I wonder how much not selling this shoe in South Korea impacts Nike’s bottom line? I would think not much considering they are moving forward with the sale of this shoe world wide. It seems to me that they will have problems trying to sell this shoe in China as well:
A professor at a university in Korea has sent a letter of protest to key executives at Nike about its iconic Michael Jordan shoes, calling for the sportswear giant to stop using the Japanese Rising Sun flag as a design on its sneakers.
Professor Seo Kyoung-duk at Sungshin Women’s University, who is also a dedicated Dokdo campaigner, said Thursday that he sent the letter to Nike President and CEO Mark Parker, Vice President for Design Tinker Hatfield, six other executives of the company and also Jordan.
He said the multinational market player and its high-profile shoes should consider the overwhelming impact of its products on young people worldwide.
This is the third time for the company to use the flag’s design on their shoes, a symbol of Japan’s militarism and imperialism in the late 19th and 20th centuries, despite criticism here in Korea, with the previous incidents occurring in 2009 and 2013.
“I wanted to let the company know what it did was wrong and why,” he said. “I would like to encourage the executives to avoid making the same mistakes in the future by helping them realize their insensitivity, indifference, and ignorance of historical facts.”
Alongside the letter, he sent a picture and video footage in English explaining that Japan’s Rising Sun flag symbolizes Japan’s wartime atrocities like the Hakenkreuz, or swastika, the symbol used by the Nazi Party in Germany. [The Korea Times]
The first ever export of a submarine by South Korea must not have made the Chinese government very happy considering the maritime and territorial disputes they are having with Indonesia in the South China Sea. If these submarines ever do see combat it would likely be against Chinese ships:
South Korean-made submarine with Hall Number code H7712 has been released from Okpo Port on Thursday, March 24, which was witnessed by Defense Minister Ryamizard Ryacudu along with Indonesian Ambassador for South Korea, John A. Prasetio, and Chief of Navy Staff Admiral Ade Supandi.
According to Indonesian Minister Counselor for the Indonesian Embassy in Seoul, the submarine is the first of three submarine units ordered by Indonesia to secure Indonesian territory. The construction had begun in 2013 at the Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering (DSME) in Okpo, South Korea. All the process is under the supervision of task forces for submarine procurement project (Satgas Yekda KDSE DSME209) led by Col. Iwan Isnurwanto.
“Based on the contract, the first and second construction of the submarine will be done at DSME, while the third will be done at PT PAL Indonesia shipyard with a transfer of technology (Tot) process,” Aji said in a statement on Thursday.
During the third submarine development process, PT PAL Indonesia has also sent 112 engineers to DSME, South Korea, so they could be directly involved in the ToT process and development study, as well as independent submarine development via on the job training (OJT) stage.
The diesel electric submarine DSME209, which is South Korea’s first export production, is an improvement from Chang Bogo Class type submarine owned by the Republic of Korean Navy (ROK Navy) and Cakra Class submarine, which belongs to the Indonesian Navy. According to Indonesian Military Attaché of the Republic of Indonesia for Seoul, Col. Aditya Kumara, the submarine measured 61.3 meters long with a maximum speed of 21 knots underwater and has the ability to sail for more than 50 days. [Jakarta Post]
Via 10Mag come this article about how someone on the Internet is selling stickers to fight back with against all the illegal parkers in South Korea. I have seen apartment security guards use stickers on illegal parkers and they are an effective way in my opinion to discourage illegal parking:
Example of illegal parking in Korea via Flickr user night2300.
If you can’t stand illegal car parking in Korea (or anywhere for that matter), then read on:
“Have you had enough of asshole parking?” asks Parking Vigilante Korea, “If so, you’ve come to the right place.”
Parking Vigilante Korea is a new website that sells stickers designed to be attached to cars that have been parked with little to no consideration for others. Promising to both anger and embarrass guilty parties, the stickers read, “Congratulations. You’ve been chosen as a perfect example of a self-centered, entitled, asshole driver.” [10Mag]
This list sounds flawed to me coming from an American perspective, but maybe this is what a lot of Asian tourists want to do in Korea:
Visitors to Korea want most to experience street food, a survey showed Wednesday.
The state-run Korea Tourism Organization recently surveyed 4,369 foreign visitors. Of these, 54. 2 percent put street food at the top of their to-do list, followed by staying in traditional “hanok” housing and shopping at traditional markets. The fourth most anticipated experience was to visit a “jjimjilbang,” or public bathhouse. [The Korea Times]
This photo taken on March 22, 2016, shows a shamanic ritual, ” Chilmeoridangyeongdeunggut,” being staged on South Korea’s largest resort island of Jeju. The UNESCO-designated ritual, held every year in the second lunar month, welcomes the goddess of diving women and fishermen. (Yonhap)
I think this guy got off light with a 12 year sentence for trying to kill US Ambassador Mark Lippert so any more time in prison the Koreans can give him the better:
A local court on Wednesday sentenced the 56-year-old man, who attacked the top U.S. envoy to South Korea last year, to an additional 18 months in prison for assaulting prison staff.
The Seoul Central District Court found Kim Ki-jong guilty of hitting a prison officer and a surgeon when he was denied the right to go to a hospital for his ankle injury. The staff rejected Kim’s request as the injury was treatable in jail, prosecutors said.
Kim is currently serving a prison term for attacking U.S. Ambassador Mark Lippert with a knife at a function in Seoul in March last year.
“The defendant denies the allegations and only emphasizes the legitimacy of his (action), without showing any remorse,” the court said.
In September, the same court sentenced the 56-year-old to 12 years in prison on a string of charges, including attempted murder. [Yonhap]
South Korea due to its small size seems like an ideal location for the use of eco-friendly and driverless cars. It will be interesting to see how this technology develops over the next few years:
President Park Geun-hye pledged Friday to support the development of self-driving cars to ensure local carmakers won’t lag behind their global competitors.
Park said South Korea can compete with Google and other foreign rivals in developing driverless cars and eco-friendly vehicles, including electric cars, citing the technological prowess of local carmakers and information and technology companies.
South Korea is the world’s fifth-largest automobile producer and is home to Hyundai Motor Co. and its smaller affiliate, Kia Motors Corp., the two flagship units of Hyundai Motor Group.
“I think our carmakers won’t lag behind global competition and (will instead) stay ahead of it,” Park said at Hyundai’s assembly plant in Asan, about 100 kilometers south of Seoul. [Yonhap]
This is a tough issue to take sides on because the South Korean defamation laws do make it harder for people to lie about people especially politicians, but it does limit freedom of speech. However, in such a wired country like South Korea lies spread and are believed very fast. The perfect example was the 2008 Mad Cow Crisis which was based on lies and ushered in laws directing people to use their real name on the Internet. It is definitely a delicate balancing act the South Korean government is playing with this issue:
Park Sung-su, a political activist, protesting in front of the Supreme Court in Seoul, South Korea, last month. The sign, in Korean, reads, “Bite it off, you dogs of power.” Mr. Park was freed in December after being jailed on charges of defaming the president.
In late 2014, months after 304 people died in the sinking of a South Korean ferry, a leaflet began circulating with a scurrilous rumor about President Park Geun-hye: that she had failed to respond swiftly to the disaster that day because she was having a romantic encounter with a former aide.
Was Ms. Park, the flier asked, now cracking down on her critics in an attempt to keep that scandal from coming to light?
For Park Sung-su, an antigovernment campaigner who had distributed the leaflet — and who is not related to the president (Park is a common surname here) — the consequences soon followed. He was arrested and later sentenced to a year in prison, on charges of defaming the president and staging illegal protests against his prosecutors. He was freed in December after eight months, when a court suspended his sentence.
No evidence supporting the rumor has been produced, and prosecutors said they had investigated and found it groundless. But however dubious the leaflet might have been, opponents of the government say Mr. Park became another victim of the very thing he was denouncing: the government’s use of defamation and other laws to silence its critics, which rights advocates say is on the rise.
Last year, the United Nations Human Rights Committee warned against South Korea’s “increasing use of criminal defamation laws to prosecute persons who criticize government action.” Freedom House, a rights group based in Washington, criticized “the increased intimidation of political opponents” under Ms. Park, who took office in 2013.
“The government is especially sensitive about defending the personal reputation of the president,” said Park Kyung-sin, a professor of law at Korea University who has researched the issue.
The Constitution guarantees freedom of expression. But defamation laws here carry penalties that include prison — up to three years for comments that are true and up to seven for statements considered false — if they are deemed not in the public interest. Critics say the distinction is vague and opens the door to abuse by prosecutors.
The government’s use of the laws against critics predates Ms. Park’s presidency. During the five-year tenure of her predecessor, Lee Myung-bak, 30 such cases were filed, 24 of them criminal and six civil, according to People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy, an influential South Korean civic group. But under Ms. Park, the trend increased considerably, with 22 cases filed in her first two and a half years in office, the group said. Of those, 18 were criminal prosecutions.
“They don’t seem to care whether they win these cases,” the group said in a recent report, noting that the officials often lose in court. “The real purpose is to create a chilling effect among people criticizing and scrutinizing the government.” [New York Times]
It looks like if someone needs a good caffeine buzz, Dutch coffee products are the way to go:
Dutch coffee products on average contain four times the amount of caffeine in a cup of americano sold in cafes, according to the Korea Consumer Agency on Thursday.
The agency examined 30 Dutch coffee products in the market and found that while a cup of americano contains 0.4 milligrams of caffeine per milliliter, Dutch coffee contains 1.7 milligrams.
Currently, a beverage that contains more than 15 milligrams of caffeine per 100 milliliters is classified as “highly caffeinated” by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, and these drinks must provide a warning label to customers to prevent them from consuming more caffeine than the maximum daily intake. However, there were no warnings on the tested products.
The warning standard set by the ministry states that highly caffeinated drinks must have a phrase for those susceptible to caffeine, such as “Caution: can be dangerous to children, pregnant woman and those sensitive to caffeine,” along with a “highly caffeinated” sign. The product must also say how many milligrams of caffeine is in the drink. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
