This is bitchin, and a fine example of the empirical study of history. However, in order for a truly empirical study it must be peer reviewed. AsiaPundit requests that Dr Chae send him the blueprints for this device so he can shoot at the guys doing dredging work across the street at unacceptable hours verify the results.:

Dr. Chae Yeon-seok of the Korea Aerospace Research Institute said Friday he has built a replica of the 14th-century weapon which can fire arrows 150 meters, and that he sucessfully tested it.

The artillery piece, 30.2 cm long and 4.6 cm in diameter, was a state-of-the-art weapon in Northeast Asia at that time in terms of its power and range. It is believed to have been invented by a scientist during the Goryeo Kingdom (918-1392).

The replica was constructed according to an original that had been passed from one owner to another, including antique dealers, over the years. Chae built the replica after being asked recently to determine its authenticity.

The original has an inscription reading “18th year of Hongmu,” which was the 11th year of the reign of King U of the Goryeo Kingdom or 1385 A.D.

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

Curzon at Coming Anarchy notes that North Korea is seeking the arrest of people who helped others escape the gulag state.:

North Korea issued a warrant yesterday for the arrest of four members of Japan-based NGOs helping North Koreans flee or defect to South Korea and Japan. The warrants were issued on the following charges, carrying the following penalties:

Joining or leading groups that engage in anti-State activities: 5-10 years of “labor reeducation”

Fleeing to a foreign state for the purpose of engaging in anti-State activities: 5-10 years of “labor reeducation”

Masterminding insurrection against the State: death penalty, confiscation of all property

No charges are leveled against the individuals for protecting dissidents who have fled North Korea—which is what all four activists do for a living.

Japan’s national Police Agency has opined that because North Korea is not party to the International Crime and Police Organization (ICPO), the warrant is meaningless unless if the suspects go to North Korea, calling it a “nonsense warrant with no enforceability.” (Information taken from Japanese language Sankei Shinbun article.)

AsiaPundit thinks this is a great opportunity and that talks should be opened with the North with an eye to bringing it in line with international legal processes. If the North wants to put some Japanese residents on trial, that seems fair - but only if the trials meet international standards and it reciprocates by handing over some of its citizens who are wanted in the West.

(Image stolen from here.)

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

Joshua at Korea Liberator - which is not incidentally a CIA front - reports that attempts to shut down the North Korean prison camp musical have backfired.:

In one of the great ironies of this young year, “Yodok Story” has had a splendid opening because of the very people who tried keep it from seeing its first opening act. The Chosun Ilbo reports that many shows are sold out, and that the play’s Web site has crashed from the overflowing traffic (though OFK/TKL readers have known for weeks that the site has labored under what we will call technical “challenges”).

A month after the fact, the government finally got around to denying reports that it tried to intimidate “Yodok Story” producers into watering down the atrocity stories in the script, or that it had a hand in pressuring some investors to pull out of the production. Director Chung Seong-San also claims that someone threatened his life. Soon afterward, a flood of media attention attracted new investors, donors, and the interest of theataah-goers.

Whoever attempted to stop “Yodok Story” failed miserably. Not only did the play get most of its publicity from its enemies free of charge, so did the cause those enemies tried to conceal from the world’s attention.

UPDATE: Reports of a smash hit have likely been exaggerated.

(Photo stolen from NPR.)

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

Via the blogger formerly known as Marmot, China ordered the removal of a recently erected statue of a Korean who assassinated a Japanese leader on Chinese soil.:

The Dong-A Ilbo reports that Chinese authorities ordered the removal of a statue of Korean independence activist (or terrorist, depending on your point of view) Ahn Jung-geun 10 days after it was erected near Harbin Station. Harbin Station, of course, is where Ahn, also known by his Catholic name of Thomas, popped a cap into former Japanese Prime Minister Ito Hirobumi in 1909.

The 4.5-meter-tall statue of Ahn was unveiled on Jan. 16 in a square along Harbin’s central Zhongyang Avenue, some 200~300 meters away from the spot of the assassination. At the foot of the statue is Ahn’s hand-print (minus, of course, a digit), so that the statue could be recognized from long off. The monument was erected by an Ahn Jung-geun remembrance association and a Korean businessman identified by his family name of Lee.

As it would turn out, Lee had gotten permission from the Harbin city authorities to put up the statue in the square, which is in front of a department store in which Lee was investing heavily.

Beijing saw matters differently, however, and not long after the statue was unveiled, the central government ordered that it be covered up and then moved inside the department store. “Statues of foreigners are not permitted,” explained Beijing.

And in Taiwan, Chen Shui-bian has ordered the removal of statutes of Chiang Kai-shek from military bases.:

The graven image of the venerable Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek will no longer greet you as you report for mandatory military service. President Chen has decided that the statues of Chiang which grace all of Taiwan’s military 100+ bases will be brought down and stored at an undisclosed location. According to one KMT Party mouthpiece (i.e., The China Post), this is like the destructive dismantling of traditional cultural icons that took place in China during the Great Proletarian Revolution (1966-76). Just as monuments to Confucius were scrapped, so too will images of Chiang, our "Eternal Leader," be tossed on the fire.

Technorati Tags: asia, china, korea, northeast asia, taiwan, japan

Andy at the Flying Yangban alerts AsiaPundit to a post condemning South Korean imperialism.:

“Today’s anti-war, anti-occupation demo in Seoul, one of hundreds that were held around the world this weekend, in the biggest show of force from the world’s second superpower(tm) in a long time. The march in Seoul was similar to those around all over the world in calling for an end to occupation and calling for no attack on Iran. More specifically it called for the withdrawal of the so-called Zaytun Division of Korean soldiers stationed near Irbil in northern Iraq. In true Orwellian style the troop division is named with the Arabic word meaning olive - a reference to the olive branch of peace. Surely the Arabic word for imperialism would be more appropriate.”

Kotaji is exactly right, the neofascist Korean warmongers have conquered northern Iraq for their own insidious imperialistic purposes. I have the proof in pictures:

Look closely and you might detect the subtle mark of Korea’s insidious imperialism. This poor girl has become a cog in the Korean war machine.

Technorati Tags: asia, northeast asia, korea, puppy

Jeff in Korea is hosting a hilarious US-produced video explaining why Asian women dig white guys:

And Chinese viewers should appreciate how Indian guys have it worse.

Technorati Tags: asia, china, east asia, india, yellow fever, japan, korea, northeast asia, south asia, southeast asia

Via Korea Liberator, North Korea has allegedly jailed members of its National Cheerleading Team, possibly for talking about a trip to the South.:

Lee Myeong-ho, a former inmate of the Daeheung concentration camp in South Hamgyeong Province who recently escaped to China, said “21 beautiful women” were detained at the camp since the end of last year. “Later I found out that they were the cheerleading team that had gone to South Korea,” he said.

Lee said since inmates are forbidden to talk to one another, he could not find out for sure what mistake they had made, but the rumor was that they had broken their promise to North Korean security services not to disclose what they had seen in South Korea.

Another defector explained the cheerleaders are picked among university students, propaganda squad members and music school students from good families. Before they were sent to South Korea, they had to sign a pledge bearing their 10 fingerprints that says if they are going to an enemy country — Pyongyang’s epithet for the South — they must fight as soldiers of leader Kim Jong-il and never talk about what they have seen or heard in South Korea once they return. They agree to accept punishment if they break the promise.

(Photo Yonhap via the Foreigner)

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

While AsiaPundit does not yet trust the ’science’ behind this, it is brilliant marketing by LG. AsiaPundit wonders, however, ‘is the kimchi air conditioner odorless?‘:

LG Electronics, the world’s leading air conditioner maker, said on Thursday that it will start selling air conditioners that prevent avian influenza with a special filter coated with a substance extracted from a fermented kimchi. The new air conditioners target Southeast Asian countries affected by bird flu and will be marketed this year.

The new products, nicknamed “Anti-A.I. Aircon,'’ have a filter covered with an anti-bacterial substance extracted from kimchi, South Korea’s spicy fermented cabbage dish, the company said in a press conference. …

There have been a few reports that indicate kimchi and other fermented dishes could be effective in treating avian influenza on birds, as a Seoul National University team reported last year. However, there hasn’t been no evidence of its effect on humans so far and there is no commercially available vaccine to protect humans against the bird flu yet.

(via Boing Boing)

Technorati Tags: asia, northeast asia, korea, puppy

A promising new group blog has been founded:

From the authors of The Asianist, Guns and Butter, DPRK Studies, and OneFreeKorea.

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

Via Mutant Frog, Kuomintang Chairman Ma Ying Jiu has denied that the party is contributing to anti-Japanese nationalism, saying that he loves sashimi.:

Reports that the KMT walks lockstep with the mainland (China) in their anti-Japan campaign do not reflect my real feelings. I even love sashimi!” On the 10th Ma Ying Jiu (mayor of Taipei), chairman of the KMT[Chinese Nationalist Party], Taiwan’s largest opposition party, assembled Japanese reporters resident in Taipei and issued a denial of the viewpoint that he was himself a believer in anti-Japan ideology.

There are indications that the KMT has been intensifying their anti-Japan tendencies, such as stressing their own role in the Sino/Japanese war. “We criticize even the white terror (of KMT despotic rule) and (China’s) Tainanmen incident from the same basis of human rights and constutituional government. There’s no reason to make an issue out of only Japan,” Chairman Ma Ying Jiu said.

However, “I do not approve of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s Yasukuni Shrine visits,” he said, not forgetting that stab in the neck. Ma Ying Jiu is currently considered the favorite to win in Taiwan’s next presidential election.

As someone who lives in China and has has lived in Korea, AsiaPundit will note that it is entirely possible to like sashimi and harbor ill will toward the Japanese. It’s also possible to wear Levi’s jeans and Nike sneakers and be anti-American.

Technorati Tags: asia, china, east asia, japan, korea, northeast asia, taiwan

The usual disclaimer applies. This is not porn, this is numismatics.:

Many coins showing sexual positions similar to the Koryo copper mirror can be found in the Chosun era, which was ostensibly very conservative about sex. They look like real coins but were not circulated (06). Later in the era, the representations are mostly in the nature of pornography. Documents of the time tell us that pornographic pictures from 18th and 19th century Japan or late Ming-Dynasty China made their way to Korea, and homemade pornography appears in the 19th century. Some of the pictures bear the seals of prominent painters Kim Hong-do or Shin Yoon-bok, though we cannot be sure whether they are authentic (07).

It seems that this passionate side to the Korean psyche, though often suppressed, has always found expression in one way or another, in all its forms and among people of all ages.

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

AsiaPundit has an itch that he, once again, needs to scratch: Please, please, please stop calling China the world’s second largest internet market!

The above link is to a CBS report, but AsiaPundit could have picked from thousands of blog entries and news items.

Below are the domestic revenue numbers and estimates for the top search engines in each of four markets - the US, Japan, South Korea and China. These numbers are just pulled from quick searches and are not deep analysis. Though they should demonstrate something about the so-called second largest internet market.

USA: Google

, Google reported total revenues of $6.139 billion, an increase of 92.5% over revenues of $3.189 billion in 2004. Revenue growth was attributable to both Google sites and Google network sites…

International Revenues - Revenues from outside of the United States contributed 39% to total revenues for the year compared to 34% in 2004.

Revenues from US were $3.75 billion

JAPAN: Yahoo Japan Corp

For the full-year to March, the company expects to post net profit of 46.40-47.95 bln yen on revenue of 175.24-178.44 bln yen.

(fiscal year ends 31 March)

About $1.48 billion at low end of guidance.

SOUTH KOREA: Naver

Sure, NHN is still a midget compared with Google. Its revenues leapt 53% last year, to $351 million, while earnings should come in at $86 million, Daewoo Securities estimates (for 2005).

Estimated revenues $351 million

CHINA: Baidu.com

Total Q1 revenue $5.2 million.

Q2 at Rmb65.2 million (Rmb8.3/$1) $7.8 million

Q3 2005 was Rmb83.2 million (Rmb8.1/$1) $10.3 million

Baidu.com, Inc. announced that it expects to generate total revenues in an amount ranging from RMB102 million ($12.6 million) to RMB106 million ($13.1 million) for the fourth quarter of 2005.

That would be a ballpark total of $35.9 million (not adjusting Q1 for revaluation and going with low end of guidance)

There are many differences that could be noted about the above companies - Google is very big in advertising while Yahoo Japan is big at auctions - but these are not the biggest reason for the discrepancies. These are the top brands in their respective markets and the revenues they generate should be a more important indicator about the size of the market than the raw number of users.  Baidu is expecting revenues of about one-tenth of Naver, and a just fraction of those of Yahoo Japan or Google.

AsiaPundit is not downplaying the fact that there is significant growth opportunities for Chinese internet businesses, the quarter-on-quarter rise in Baidu revenues clearly indicate that there are.

However, the amount of cash that can be gained through direct investment here is still small. Picking a few local Chinese stocks - or playing the venture capital angle - is a far more reasonable way to make money through internet investment in China.

Technorati Tags: asia, china, east asia, economy, , japan, korea, northeast asia, yahoo

China has shown a sharp downward trend in press freedoms last year, while the Philippines remains dangerous and North Korea abysmal.:

While some countries in Asia have remained stable with regard to media freedom, there have been sharp downward trends in several Asian countries, particularly China, Nepal, the Philippines and Thailand.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF), the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and Freedom House, a non-governmental organization that monitors press freedoms around the world, assessed the levels of press freedom in countries based on the prevailing legal environment, political and economic situation and the overall attitudes of authorities towards the media.

The surveys were generally concordant in their results, with China, Nepal, North Korea and the Philippines remaining the biggest causes of concern for journalists in Asia.

"Compared to last year, there really aren’t many positives in Asia," said Karin Karlekar, Managing Editor of the Freedom House survey. "While some countries have remained steady [Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong], we can see downward trends in many countries in the region."

North Korea was found to be the worst country in all surveys, showing no signs of improvement over the past couple of years. All media in North Korea continue to remain tools of Kim Jong-il’s state, while all foreign media are repeatedly portrayed by the regime as "liars" seeking to destabilize the government, according to the Freedom House report. However, the report also suggests that an increase in international trade has resulted in greater contact with foreigners, which might allow for greater access to international news reports in the near future.

China has also shown a sharp downward trend in 2005, said Karlekar, which can be attributed to increased censorship of newspapers and radio stations, and greater Internet surveillance.

According to RSF, the so-called "broadcasting Great Wall" in China has been growing over the past year: The Voice of Tibet, the BBC and Radio Free Asia are among the radio stations jammed by the government in 2005. 

• Reporters Withouth Borders - Wordlwide Press Freedom Index 2005 
• International Federation of Journalists - Targeting and Tragedy 
• Freedom House - Freedom of the Press 2005

Technorati Tags: asia, censorship, china, east asia, north korea, northeast asia, south asia, thailand, burma

Via GI Korea, AsiaPundit learns of the new ‘lite’ soju.’:

Doosan Corp. unveiled yesterday its new brand of soju, with a slightly lower alcohol content and a slightly lower price.

Soju is a colorless, nearly tasteless liquor that has become the stuff of lore and legend among foreign residents here. T-shirts available in Itaewon describe "the nine stages of soju," and even many American GIs are leery of the stuff.

But the announcement could lead to questions about whether company officials had been taste-testing their new product a bit too much. The alcohol content in the new brand was reduced from 21 to 20 percent and the price is 70 won (about 7 cents) cheaper than the mainline version.

Han Key-sun of Doosan’s beverage division said the alcoholic content was reduced to cut costs and the savings passed along to consumers who imbibe to forget their economic hardships.

Interesting, in most countries ‘lite’ means low calorie or low in alcohol, as in Australian ‘mid-strength’ beers. In Korea ‘lite’ seems to mean "cheap enough so that the unemployed can drink away their sorrows."

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

After the sudden of burst of activity last week, when every second post here was about internet companies in China, AsiaPundit was not going to touch the topic today. However, Tom Zeller Jr today said something in the New York Times that struck a nerve.:

What if Chinese law required Internet companies to reveal the identities of all users who forwarded really bad e-mail jokes, lame chain letters or any messages containing the terms “free speech,” “Tiananmen Square” or “Super Freak,” because such activities carried a 10-year prison term?

“With all due respect to the memory of Rick James, the king of funk,” an executive might say, “we must abide by the laws of the countries in which we operate.”

And what if — as a mark of good faith for being permitted to do business in what any rational observer has to admit is now the most tantalizing Internet and technology market on the planet — an executive from each company were required to assist, mano a mano, in the beating of an imprisoned blogger?

While Tom makes a few interesting points, AsiaPundit is going to be “irrational” and suggest that China’s internet market is far from the most tantalizing on the planet. Off the top of the head, AsiaPundit would suggest that the most-tantalizing internet markets are — in descending order — the wealthy and tech-savvy United States, followed by the EU, e-commerce friendly Japan and possibly then the well-wired South Korea. China would certainly be in the top-10, and maybe even the top five, but it’s not the most tantalizing by a longshot.

Here’s a note from a MarketWatch item on Google’s prospects in China, issued after the China censorship issue was announced but ahead of the company’s earnings announcement. ():

One Wall Street analyst wrote in a report that Google’s China decision could cost more than it’s worth in the short term.

“We do not see meaningful revenue” in China for Google in the near term, UBS analyst Benjamin Schachter told clients Wednesday.

“We are concerned that the inevitable negative PR will damage Google’s brand,” wrote Schachter, who has a buy rating on Google shares.

Schachter downgraded Google to neutral after the earnings announcement, via Dow Jones:

UBS cut Google Inc. (GOOG) to neutral from buy, due to concerns over international revenue growth and the rising investment needed to potentially improve performance in key international markets.

The analysts said that while it agrees with Google that these markets provide important potential opportunities, it may take “longer than expected to effectively monetize them.”

UBS’ China analyst was bearish on the company’s prospects here ahead of the formal launch of the China portal:

Eric Wen, the UBS Internet analyst based in Asia, sums up what he believes are some of the prevailing issues in China for Google in a research report published this month.

Mr. Wen believes that Google is still testing the waters, and does not yet have a clear China strategy. Google has partnered with NetEase and Sina uses Google for some of its technology, but Google.com is facing a dilemma in China. The company recently began conforming to Chinese censorship standards, but Mr. Wen believes that Chinese users chose Google precisely because it was not censored. By conforming to the government standards, Google is trying to enable itself to enter the market in terms of attracting local businesses to advertise. However, by conforming, Google loses its differentiator. This is a dilemma for Google and the reason Mr. Wen believes that Google will not dominate the Chinese search market.

As Bill Bishop noted, China is not an essential market for Google to be in financially:

I am guessing that Google will be happy if they can generate $30M in revenue in China in 2006. Baidu, the market leader, is projected to generate somewhere between $65-70M in revenue in 2006. I believe Google is expected to generate over $8B in revenue worldwide in 2006. If my math is anywhere in the ballpark, China will account for LESS THAN 2 DAYS of Google’s 2006 revenue. And given the economics of the keyword value chain in China, that revenue should be significantly lower margin revenue than is US revenue. So if the China business went away, would investors care?

Perry Wu, in an exceptionally bearish item, says bluntly that Google will have about as much success as its Western rivals who are also getting lambasted on blogs, in the press and Congress. Basically, very little.:

Yahoo (YHOO) tried many times to adapt. As far back as 1998 (or Web 0.98 Beta) when its then-VP, Heather Killen, made high-profile visits to China, the Western Internet company tried to sit at the Chinese banquet table. But Yahoo finally gave up last year when it bought a billion dollar stake in China’s Alibaba.com and then gave Alibaba the rights to run Yahoo! China. There was not even a whimper from the company as its Chinese portal was torn down and replaced with a simple search engine. Sohu (SOHU), Sina (SINA), and Netease (NTES) had finally beaten the foreign interloper.

Lycos tried too. It bought firms like Myrice.com. Netscape tried, via AOL. MSN has also been bobbling along with a few victories here and a few setbacks there–nothing much to be proud of.

All of these companies have one thing in common: they entered China to win, but left only remnants of their power after a few years’ struggle. Chinese history is filled with tales of foreigners coming to the Middle Kingdom with money, but leaving the country poor, confused and embarrassed. Ask Chris Patten.

While the UBS boys, Wu, Bishop and others may be a touch , none are irrational. China’s internet penetration rate is still growing at an impressive pace, but the rate is slowing and the average user is still not deep-pocketed.

There’s a great deal of cash to be made in providing infrastructure for the build out of third-generation networks and broadband capacity, but there’s not a lot yet there for search- or advertising-based business models; certainly not when compared to Western markets.

Zeller is not the first pundit to hype the China market, most commentary seems to assume that the companies that are active here are putting principle at risk over in order to get massive returns. That’s far from true.

Technorati Tags: asia, blogs, censorship, china, cisco, east asia, economy, , japan, korea, media, microsoft, northeast asia, yahoo

South Korea’s current leadership is allegedly pressuring sponsors to pull funding from a musical about a North Korean prison camp, which is apparently "too negative" about conditions in the camp. While AsiaPundit generally would not support a musical, especially one that is as of yet unseen, AP wonders: ‘Is there any way donors outside of South Korea can contribute funds to get this made?‘:

A planned musical about human rights abuses in North Korea’s Yoduk concentration camp has run into massive obstacles, not least from officials fearful of upsetting the Stalinist country.

South Korean government agencies are demanding changes to the story, which they say dwells too heavily on the negative aspects of the camp, according to producers. Officials also allegedly invoked the National Security Law to warn producers against showing a portrait of former leader Kim Il-sung and the singing of North Korean songs in the show….

“Yoduk Story” focuses on a camp where 20,000 inmates work more than 14 hours a day living on just one bowl of cereal and a spoonful of salt. Those who try to escape are executed by hanging or stoning because the authorities do not want to waste bullets killing them.

But its scheduled debut in March is now in jeopardy. Reportedly under official pressure, more than half its budget of W700 million has disappeared, making it difficult to feed producers and cast.

"After reading our script, government officials demanded that we change part of the story, saying it’s too much,” Chung said. “I got a phone call, I don’t know if it was a government official, saying ‘It’s so easy to get you. You will be punished.’”

But Chung is determined to plough on. When Seoul KyoYuk Munhwa Hoekwan promised to show the musical in its theater last December, Chung borrowed W20 million against a contract to sell his left kidney. His father was publicly stoned to death in a Hoeryeong concentration camp in 2002. “I feel that my father is watching over our rehearsals,” Jeong says.

Private citizens are also chipping in. One elderly woman sent a gold ring, a jade ring and a pair of earrings after reading about the show, and an elderly man sent a box containing W500 coins, W1,000 bills and W10,000 bills totaling W10 million.

(Via Mingi)

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

Surreal.:

While traveling in South Korea, Boing Boing reader Newley Purnell
happened upon a box of black-colored condoms in a Seoul shop. The copy
on the box reads, "Keep it real. Keep on faith. Keep on going. Piece!
Stay real! We are all brack people." to one photo, and . "There’s so much to analyze that I don’t even know where to start," says Newley.

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

Keen!

In last January 11th, Dcinside opened “Kim Jong Il Gallery’ in a category of ‘figures and others’. It is getting great interests from netizen so that only in three days, around 200 replies were posted on the bulletin board of the gallery.

In the bulletin board, varied opinions on ‘Kim Jong Il Gallery’ appeared, such as “why made this kind of gallery?” and “Jong Il might visit it, though”.

A manager of Dcinside guaranteed at maximum the opportunity that netizen can show their outspoken opinions, by posting the introduction “please insert only pictures and matters related to Kim Jong Il, otherwise deleted or moved to elsewhere” on the bulletin board.

The Dcinside party stated “we opened it according to the suggestion that as there is a Korean politicians gallery, so how about opening Kim Jong Il gallery?” adding “it reflects that Kim Jong Il is raising as a socially concerned figure”.

(Via OneFreeKorea)

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

As is typical of most news related to North Korea, this is disturbing. Still, Asiapundit wonders, who would win if a panda and a Bengal tiger got into a fight.:

The grainy, sometimes out-of-focus film opens with a warning: "This program is something you’ve never seen before. It is about brutal animal fights and it is all real and intensely interesting."  The 52-minute video, which the opening describes as "made in North Korea as a documentary", goes on to show a variety of animals, many endangered species, either tearing one another apart or posturing for an attack.

This is not your National Geographic documentary about animals in the wild kingdom battling over territorial rights, dominance or a sex partner. It’s not about predators and their prey. Hanjoon Productions’ animals are mostly caged, their battles initiated. Rumors about North Korean films of savage, staged fights involving endangered animals have been around for years. Now, the films are available. The video can be found at some video rental shops in South Korea, but hunting around is required. A handful of Korean online video retailers carry copies, which can be purchased for about 5,000 won (US$5).

(via Nomad)

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

Via Nomad, South Korea’s courts have decided that nude yogurt fights have no artistic merit.:

Naked Dairy Fight Had No Artistic Merit, Court Finds

A Seoul appellate court on Friday sentenced an executive of a domestic milk company to a fine of about US$5,000 for staging a nude yoghurt fight to advertise a new product.

The bench ruled the performance was purely commercially motivated and had no artistic merit whatsoever. It said the show, in which three nude models sprayed each other with yoghurt, was obscene and sensational, adding it could find no justification for using nudity to achieve the goal of the campaign. One model identified as Park, who also serves as head of the Korea Nude Models’ Association, was fined US$2,000, while two other models were fined US$600 each.

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

Oranckay says the South Korean president has three blogs:

It’ll probably be in the English press by morning but president Roh Moo Hyun has got his own blog.

Or two.

Or three.

One at Naver, one at Daum, and one at Paran.

Some have said one of Roh’s biggest problems is that he’s got his head buried in the internet. You know, instead of just governing without constantly trying to be best buddies with The Netizens all the time. I wonder if he is going to be able to sleep at night without wondering what kind of comments he’s been getting. (He’s been known to leave a few himself here and there.)

Hopefully these will be more active than the three blogs of his northern counterpart. Kim Jong-il has let two of them slide. Speaking of that, we should have all checked the infrequently updated Beloved Leader site for details of his China trip. It would have spared us a lot of speculation:

Screw those Beijing Clowns

I am going Shopping!
Damn! Is today a holiday? I had some of my Overseas Bureau lads put me ashore this morning so I could shop for some hard-to-get items. Are those little LG things the same as iPods?

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

As AsiaPundit noted in a recent item, South Korea had a booming equities market in 2005 - with equity returns up 53.96 percent in local currency terms during the year. So why is AP expecting a bust? While many analysts have said the index has overshot in the past year and have used various accounting measures to suggest that it is already overvalued, AP just has a hunch.:

Here’s a great photo found at the blog of Nyquist Capital.  It’s of a rally to encourage people to invest in the stock market.  The up arrows, gigantic bull, and Rally Korea! sign pretty much gets the message across.  In a way it’s not that much different from those Nasdaq-100 ads with the CEOs of Starbucks, Staples and Microsoft, but in Korea it’s been deemed that there’s a pressing need to broaden participation in the market–in 2005 only 8% of the population owned stock.  Too bad, they’ve really missed out.  I guess that’s why they have a need for this kind of public rally.

One of the strange things about South Korea is that public rallies often work. Moreover, they often work so well that they create brand new problems.  In one of the notable recent examples, the government and banks promoted credit card use to encourage domestic consumerism and reduce tax evasion (cards leave a paper trail). That one worked really, really well.

As the above mentioned Nyquist Capital blog notes:

The shocking thing about this photo is the naked embedded marketing message. Buy now or you will be left behind. This is just one picture, but if this is the tone the exchange wants to set, it looks like the birth of an irrational exuberance investor culture. The folks that run the exchange should realize they are running a market, not a casino.

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

A scientific organization would have to be nuts to offer a position to disgraced South Korean scientist and cloning fraudster Hwang Woo-suk. The doctor is fortunate then that there happen to be a bunch of crazies that run what they claim to be a commercial cloning operation.  Clonaid has decided to offer him a position.:

It is interesting to do the mental exercise, for just a few seconds, and ask oneself - why would Dr Hwang play with the hope of millions of people who are desperately waiting for stem-cell cure to be available for either themselves or one of their relatives? Why would he declare that he has made these lines, if he wasn’t able to do it, knowing that millions are watching him and that he would have to deliver them soon?

In the same way, how can people believe that Clonaid’s announcement of a cloned child being born was a hoax while thousands of parents-to-be were and are counting on us? Thankfully these parents didn’t trust the media and today many of them had their baby…

We at Clonaid, believe that Dr Hwang has cloned human embryos and has the knowledge to develop stem cell lines.

We also believe that, like Dr.Boisselier, he has been discredited as he wasn’t in line with what the political and religious powers of this world wanted regarding the cloning technology. It is easier to discredit someone than to believe in his words when he disturbs the establishment….

Dr. Boisselier has offered Dr. Hwang to collaborate in one of Clonaid’s laboratories.

(Via The Marmot)

Technorati Tags: asia, korea, hwang woo-suk, northeast asia, south korea

Richardson at DPRK studies provides a 15-point outline for evaluating whether the Dear Leader is crazy:

The answer to the question of whether or not Kim is crazy depends on how one defines ‘crazy.’ If by crazy you mean a foaming-at-the-mouth lunatic that needs medication to function somewhere near normal, the answer is a categorical no, Kim is not crazy. As Madame Secretary will testify, Kim Jong-il can be ‘charming,’ and as odd as it may seem, he has been skillfully maneuvering to remain in power for decades, consolidating power internally while keeping external forces at bay.

Yet this answer does not satisfy – no sane person would run gulags, have people shot for leaving the country without permission, or wear their hair like that; Kim is more than just an eccentric. And not all mental disorders are of the stereotypical schizophrenic type. For example, consider the definition of a sociopath (a.k.a. psychopath): A person with an antisocial personality disorder, manifested in aggressive, perverted, criminal, or amoral behavior without empathy or remorse. Why not - Johh McCain agrees. More of the profile:

Characteristics of the profile:

1. Glibness/Superficial Charm

2. Manipulative and Conning

3. Grandiose Sense of Self

4. Lack of Remorse, Shame or Guilt

5. Promiscuous Sexual Behavior/Infidelity

6. Need for Stimulation

7. Lack of Realistic Life Plan/Parasitic Lifestyle

8. Callousness/Lack of Empathy

9. Criminal or Entrepreneurial Versatility

10. Irresponsibility/Unreliability

11. Shallow Emotions

12. Pathological Lying

13. Incapacity for Love

14. Poor Behavioral Controls/Impulsive Nature

15. Early Behavior Problems/Juvenile Delinquency

The Dear Leader is currently missing, likely somewhere in Northeast Asia. The Guardian has a good summary.

Technorati Tags: asia, east asia, kim jong-il, korea, north korea