I am going to have to go watch this film:

Dozens of American and South Korean veterans attended a special screening Wednesday of a South Korean box-office hit that chronicles the Korean War and other hardships South Korea has gone through to rebuild itself from the war’s ashes.

“Ode to My Father” has become a sensation in South Korea since its opening on Dec. 17, surpassing the 10 million viewer mark in less than a month, as it struck a chord with older generations who have witnessed how South Korea overcame poverty and other hardships to become what it is today.

Organizers of the special screening — the Korean Churches for North Koreans (KCNK) and the human rights group LiNK — said they held the event and invited American war veterans to shed light on the meaning of the Korean War to Korea-U.S. relations.

The movie, which tells the story of an ordinary father who sacrificed himself to support his family, begins with spectacular scenes of a massive evacuation operation that pulled some 105,000 U.S. and South Korean troops and about 98,000 refugees to safety during the Korean War.

The December 1950 operation, known as the “Heungnam evacuation” after the name of the North Korean port, came as the U.S.-backed South Korean forces began retreating from North Korea after China sent massive numbers of troops to fight alongside the communist neighbor.

U.S. veterans attending the screening at the Regal Fairfax Towne Center theater included retired Col. Thomas Fergusson, a grandson of Edward Almond (1892-1979), then commanding general of the U.S. X Corps, who is known for his decision to dump all weapons overboard to get more refugees aboard evacuation ships at the port of Heungnam.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

Yes they are and they even admit to it:

Part of the Samsung Smarttv EULA: “Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party through your use of Voice Recognition.”

This is part of their speech-recognition tech, which uses third parties (whose privacy policies Samsung doesn’t make any representations about) to turn your words into text.  [Boing Boing]

I recommend everyone read more about this over at the Marmot’s Hole.

Why the Asia-Pacific region matters to the United States: http://t.co/oQnWdtesv3

— Stars and Stripes (@starsandstripes) February 13, 2015

This Rodong Sinmun photo released on Feb. 11, 2015 shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-un visiting the construction site of an orphanage in Wonsan on the east coast. (Yonhap)

Please leave anything you want to discuss in the comments section.

Why Kim doesn’t love Hitler, and why this matters http://t.co/o7OUQUQFF5

— NK NEWS (@nknewsorg) February 11, 2015

South Korean actress Jeon Ji-hyun speaks during an event in Seoul on Feb. 11, 2015, to promote furniture brand Hanssem. (Yonhap)

To people that haven’t spent a whole lot of time in Korea these slogans may seem humorous, but domestic food security provided by rice farming and fishing are very important to the Korean people on both sides of the DMZ:

North Korea could one day become a land of fairies, where a pungent, fishy aroma permeates the air as stylishly dressed children walk to school.

This is what the reclusive communist nation actually wants its people to aspire to, according to a list of 310 national slogans released by its state media Thursday.

There are five different references to building a socialist, scientific or military-influenced fairyland, according to a translation of the Rodong Sinmun story by the KCNA Watch blog.

Several of the slogans concern food production. One calls for “fragrant smell of fish and other seafoods,” while another declares, “Let the strong wind of fish farming blow across the country!”

Other slogans are less aspirational and more educational, for example: “Fertilizer means rice and socialism.”

The slogans were printed in Korean and haven’t yet been posted in the English versions of the Rodong Sinmun or the Korean Central News Agency, North Korea’s primary media organs.   [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link.

The Korean Air heiress at the center of the Nut Rage case is not going down without a fight:

The eldest daughter of Korean Air Lines Co.’s chairman on Friday appealed a court decision that found her guilty of violating air safety and other laws, court officials said.

Cho Hyun-ah, former vice president of the nation’s top carrier, was convicted a day earlier of changing the planned route of a flight, intimidating and assaulting a flight attendant, and obstructing the business of the airline.

She was sentenced to one year in jail despite her repeated apologies to the judges, which she hoped would earn her a suspended jail term.

On Dec. 5, Cho ordered a senior crew member off the Korean Air flight headed to Incheon from New York because of the way she was served nuts. The plane had already been taxiing with 250 passengers on board. She said she was upset that her macadamia nuts were provided in an unopened packet rather than on a plate, which, according to the then vice president of cabin service, violated the proper nut-serving protocol.

The Seoul Western District Court in charge of the case said Cho’s attorney submitted an appeal Friday afternoon.

“The decision misconstrued facts and the principle of aviation law,” attorney Seo Chang-hui said. “We also believe the sentence is unjustified.”  [Yonhap]

It will be interesting to see how this turns out.  Maybe this is what was planned all along, convict her for one year then appeal, and then wait for the media attention to die down.  Once the media attention dies down quietly let her win the appeal and release her for time served.

Reuters Seoul correspondent and author James Pearson to talk about capitalism in North Korea http://t.co/VdCgRNCE6D #NorthKorea @pearswick

— NorthKoreaRealTime (@BuckTurgidson79) February 11, 2015