AsiaPundit pretends to be a group blog. There are - supposedly - 15 other contributors as well as myself. In reality, there are usually two posts per week by authors other than me. Manuel and Rezwan have offered excellent roundups, but they are very occasional. Gordon and GI Korea drop by with excellent posts, but only around twice monthly. That said, I will not only consider ‘re-hiring’ them when we I relaunch in 2006, I will invite them.

Aside from occasional contributions, the ‘group blog’ concept has essentially been me posting in third-person and hoping that someone else will help with the ‘project,’ which (a fault on my part) is not only ill-defined but amorphous.

Right now, as AsiaPundit looks at the Weblogs Awards Tally, he realizes that after 24 hours, the voting tally for AP is below the number of people actually signed on to contribute to the site. Considering that AsiaPundit voted three times today (home, office and the wi-fi spot where I had lunch), that’s exceptionally sad.

So, to everyone on the author list: YOU ARE ALL FIRED!

This makes me feel young. I haven’t sacked a volunteer since I was running  a university radio station in 1999 1989, and 15 in one blow leaves AsiaPundit more than twice as strong as Tailor Mickey.

That was a very tactless way to sack everyone but, as I mentioned to Simon earlier when he didn’t name the one Asia blogger he wouldn’t vote for, I don’t find virtue in tact.

AsiaPundit is pleased to be on the 2005 Weblog Awards. However, he has decided to bow out. As my esteemed Singaporean colleague Mr Miyagi has done, AsiaPundit offers his endorsement to Simon World.
Simon should have taken the prize last year. However, the intelligent side of the English-language Asian blogosphere has been overwhelmed by the might of a self-centered young woman from Singapore with an unfortunately large number of underage and ‘dirty-old-man’ fans.

This year, I encourage all nominees who haven’t already done so to endorse either Simon or mr brown. ESWN, whom I nominated, already has our respect for his work and, as Simon once said, is in a completely different league.

This year, I hope the rest of us - that includes you Sassy and Robert - can unite around something intelligent. Should Asia be forever represented by XiaXue? Does this continent - Japan, Korea, China, India, Singapore, the Philippines and elsewhere - have nothing better to offer than a doe-eyed, photo-shopped enhanced, semi-illiterate adult who still behaves like a teenager as its blogosphere representative?

AsiaPundit hopes not.

VOTE SIMON WORLD

Blogging will be non-existent on Wednesday. I’ve sacked all the co-pundits and, should I escape the office on time, I plan to join Running Dog for trivia night at the pub. After that, AsiaPundit hopes to find time to read a book, have sex with his wife or both.

(Full Disclosure: Miyagi still owes Asiapundit a round of beer though we have not, at any point, discussed endorsing Simon.)

Technorati Tags: asia, blogs

The BBC, via Magnoy’s Samsara, reveals what South Korean players of massive multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGS) look like behind their avatars.:

Seang Rak Choi is Uroo Ahs

“Choi is a professor of public policy and law. His character Uroo Ahs buys and sells item in the game world, even when he isn’t there, running on scripts he writes for her.

He makes spreadsheets analysing different variables within the game and believes that using a little girl avatar helps in negotiations.

So far he’s amassed game items worth 150m Adena, the virtual currency in the game.” (Robbie Cooper)

AsiaPundit doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with having a male law professor choosing to adopt a female avatar - I’ve had professors with odder fetishes. But AP probably wouldn’t want to spend too much time around Choi. Bae Kyun-Eun, however, is another matter.:

Bae Kyun-Eun is Persia

Photojournalist Robbie Cooper captured images of gamers and their real-life selves. Here are their stories.

“Bae plays a man because she thinks that male avatars have more charisma, she wants to ‘project strength’, and all the ‘masters’ in the game have male avatars.

She says if she had to play the game alone she wouldn’t bother.

Initially, she was attracted to it because she thought it looked beautiful, but the social element has become part of her life. Her guild meets up regularly.”

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, korea, northeast asia, south korea

Every year at this time, a selection of 14 of Asia’s most intellectual and erudite bloggers are selected to as nominees in WizBang’s Weblog Awards. This year, AsiaPundit is proud to stand alongside the Sassy Lawyer, Marmot’s Hole, Hemlock’s Diary, Sinosplice, ESWN, the shaky kaiser, mrbrown, Hongkie Town, Shanghai Diaries, Our Man In Hanoi, Frog in a Well, Simon World and Mr. Miyagi as a nominee for Best Asian Blog.

And every year the nominees are humiliated by the sheer strength of the readership of Xiaxue, one of Asia’s least intellectual and erudite (aka: cheem) bloggers. With advanced congratulations to Wendy, AsiaPundit encourages you to vote AsiaPundit for Best Asian Blog (he doesn’t want the defeat to be too embarrassing).

Technorati Tags: asia, blogs, east asia, northeast asia, south asia

AsiaPundit is a believer in the huge erection index. That the construction of the world’s largest building indicates hubris and an climax apex of economic growth. Brian Mathes, with rightful skepticism, points to an item that indicates far more trouble could be caused by the desire to build the biggest, largest or tallest anything.:

    TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) - The weight of the world’s tallest skyscraper - specially built to withstand Taiwan’s frequent earthquakes - could be causing a rise in the number of tremors beneath it, a professor from the island wrote in a scientific journal.

    Lin Cheng-horng, an earthquake specialist at the National Taiwan Normal University in the capital, Taipei, says the 1,679-foot Taipei 101 building - named for the number of floors - might rest on an earthquake fault line.

Photo of Taipei 101 via the Foreigner.

While he has doubts about the earthquake theory, AsiaPundit is still expecting Shanghai’s World Financial Center to be an climax apex for the city’s property market growth.

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, northeast asia, taiwan

It has been said, by a politician, that every politician in Taiwan has friends in the mafia. So why shouldn’t every Taiwan resident have the opportunity to have a little Mafia in their own home?:

Sometimes, products here are labelled in English.  The labels may be grammatically incorrect, but it doesn’t matter.  Just seeing them takes some of the risk out of a purchase, and for that I’m grateful.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Having said that though, I sometimes see a few things written in English that are unintentionally humorous.  Here’s one that made me smile:

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, northeast asia, taiwan

Again, disturbing:

A reader sent the link for a site on Jung Myung (Myoung) Seok, who reportedly runs a sex cult near Daejon. The cult has also helped North Korean refugees reach the South, with the requirement that they join the cult. Let me see, pick the Kim Jong-il cult and starve/get executed, or pick the sex cult in the South and live… hmmm.

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, northeast asia, korea, north korea, south korea

Disturbing.

Is it a pooch, or a panda? Nah, it’s a dog dyed to look like a panda.

Besides being abandoned and then adopted by a hair dresser with a sense of humor, this dog had all of its canine teeth have been extracted to prevent it from biting. Yow.

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, japan, northeast asia