Ged Carroll

Category: energy | 能源 | 에너지 | エネルギー

Energy has come to define our history over the past few hundred years. The industrial revolution was defined as much by the use of coal and steam power as it was by breakthroughs in technologies.

The industrial age was defined by the spread of electricity, electro-magnetic waves and the use of oil and gas in the energy mix.

Alkaline, dry acid batteries and rechargeable batteries liberated technology. Making it firstly luggable and then truly portable.

Without innovative approach in battery technology you wouldn’t have the ubiquitous smartphone. Nor would you have much demand for three wi-fi in coffee shops, or multi-screening.

Digital photography would still be more of a niche interest and there would be no Instagram or Tinder.

On the other hand you would be less likely to responding to emotional content on Twitter straight away, unless you were glued to your desktop computer or connected TV.

The aspiration for a low carbon economy is another aspect that affects energy and not just oil and gas. 99 percent of materials that we use, even for batteries and capturing renewable energy are not sustainable. Turbine blades are made from composite that eventually end up in a landfill site. Battery technologies rely on rare earth metals, lithium and nickel. They feature a polymer liner in lithium ion battery.

Energy is at the centre of the progress of innovation, design, climate change, consumer behaviour and even culture. Far more so, than people actually realise.

We tend to not pay attention to energy unless there is a problem. A power cut, a price jump at the petrol pump are the times when we notice.

  • Supply chain disruption + more news

    Supply chain disruption

    Is there an end in sight to supply chain disruption? | Financial Times -There are major barriers to ending supply chain disruption by decoupling from China. Japan is trying to reduce supply chain disruption by replicating Chinese factories in other countries like Thailand and Indonesia. Here are some of things stopping multinational corporations from making that happen. In order to end supply chain disruption, I would imagine that a higher degree of automation is key, which will require corresponding improvements in automation technology. This doesn’t just mean software but also in mechanical engineering. The main issue for fine motor control in robots is the design and price of harmonic drives. This doesn’t operate on a Moore’s Law speed and scale of innovation. Increased automation also likely means major changes in approach to product design. Back in the golden era of consumer electronics just prior to the consumer adoption of the internet, circuit boards were less dense because they were designed for automated ‘pick-and-place’ machines. Nokia had a similar approach to its phones prior to the pivot to Windows and Qualcomm chips. The reason why Apple needs iPhones made in China is because a lot of the final assembly is closer to the work of a watchmaker servicing a mechanical watch than you would credit. So lots of cheap, (younger, smaller, delicate, usually female) hands are required. Our financial system’s obsessive, narrow focus on shareholder value will curtail these movements. Look at how Apple crows about how green they are and yet makes the virtually unrecyclable Air Pods by the million. Until that changes and the computers are assembled from modular boards, closer to their home market the supply chain won’t change despite the political, economic, national security and moral imperatives otherwise. Which is why Apple amongst others point out that they have an inability to move production out of China. This will get even harder as China moves up the semiconductor value chain. Once they are building memory modules and modern silicon fab processes, its game over for manufacturing elsewhere in the electronics sector. China is also the sole provider for many of the ingredients in multi-vitamins and pharmaceutical products. They process and mine just under 90 percent of the world’s rare earth metals – key for a large swathe of technologies from magnets to chips and batteries. They have a similar position in solar cell polysilicon and lithium ion battery ingredients. 

    JAXPORT achieves strong cargo volumes through first three quarters of Fiscal Year 2021
    JAXPORT promises less supply disruption

    So ending supply chain disruption would mean replicating whole ingredient manufacturing chains and industry knowhow that multinationals had migrated to China decades ago. All of these actions to reduce supply chain disruption may not be received very well by China itself. China has bought key infrastructure around the world: power generation, ports, water supply, rail networks and more. All of which means that they get a greater say in how the world’s supply chain works. Xi Jingping has been straight forward in saying that he wants the world to rely on China more, and China to rely on the rest of the world less. Decoupling from Chinese supply chain disruption has taken on even more importance with the rise of Chinese secondary sanctions. More on nearshoring to avoid Chinese supply chain disruptions here: China’s economic woes: An opportunity for U.S. manufacturing? 

    China

    Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab – but feared debate could hurt ‘international harmony’ – An email from Dr Ron Fouchier to Sir Jeremy said: “Further debate about such accusations would unnecessarily distract top researchers from their active duties and do unnecessary harm to science in general and science in China in particular.” Dr Collins, former director of the NIH, replied to Sir Jeremy stating: “I share your view that a swift convening of experts in a confidence-inspiring framework is needed or the voices of conspiracy will quickly dominate, doing great potential harm to science and international harmony.” Institutions which held the emails have repeatedly resisted efforts to publish their content. The University of Edinburgh recently turned down an Freedom of Information request from The Telegraph asking to see Prof Rambaut’s replies, claiming “disclosure would be likely to endanger the physical or mental health and safety of individuals”. – this is going to turn into a dumpster fire

    Beijing’s South China Sea claims ‘gravely undermine’ rule of law | Al Jazeera 

    Half of international students did not feel completely ready for courses – poll | Evening Standard – Nearly three in four (72%) international applicants wanted more information about what their year would look like.- and this is probably deliberate by the institutions

    Dutch university gives up Chinese funding due to impartiality concerns | Netherlands | The Guardian – Amsterdam’s Vrije Universiteit (VU), the fourth largest university in the Netherlands, has said it will accept no further money from the Southwest University of Political Science and Law in Chongqing and repay sums it recently received. The announcement came after an investigation by the Dutch public broadcaster NOS last week revealed VU’s Cross Cultural Human Rights Center (CCHRC) had received between €250,000 (£210,000) and €300,000 annually from Southwest over the past few years. According to NOS, the CCHRC used Southwest’s money to fund a regular newsletter, organise seminars and maintain its website – which has published several posts rejecting western criticism of China’s human rights policy

    Economics

    Buy Things, Not Experiences — harold lee – long term benefit

    Did macroeconomics fail us on inflation? – by Noah Smith 

    Ethics

    The soft bigotry of America’s cultural left | Financial Times 

    Why is it still considered OK to be ageist? | Financial Times – A study by academics at Yale found that people with a negative approach to ageing deal with it worse mentally and physically and die seven and a half years younger. To put this in context, mild obesity shortens life by three years, extreme obesity by 10. Hardly surprisingly, this has prompted a great deal of fuss at government level. Policymakers and health professionals obsess over obesity. But what about the damage done by poor attitudes to ageing? Until I read about the survey I had no idea it was even a thing: the fact that ageism can actually kill you is a well-kept secret. It is also a costly one. According to the WHO report, the resulting ill health places an additional annual burden on the US healthcare of $63bn. I realise that health policymakers have been busy since the report came out last March, but still there hasn’t been a peep out of them

    FMCG

    Short sellers tuck into Beyond Meat | Financial Times 

    Spilling the Beans on Political Consumerism: Do Social Media Boycotts and Buycotts Translate to Real Sales Impact? by Jura Liaukonyte, Anna Tuchman, Xinrong Zhu :: SSRN – on the contrary, they create a short term sales bump and your customers stick with your brand, so long as you keep your advertising spend up

    Hong Kong

    Xinjiang anti-terror general to lead China’s Hong Kong garrison | Hong Kong | The Guardian – things are going only one way like a ratchet. This especially interesting as the Hong Kong government’s national security apparatus has been making steady progress despite high profile government failures in other areas such as COVID social distancing that further undermined trust with citizenry, more here Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam vows to bring in new security laws | The Guardian 

    The Big Pigture: Life Lessons from the World of Mcdull | Sotheby’s – interesting that Sotheby’s is auctioning off McDull artwork.

    Hong Kong democracy activist Edward Leung released from prison | Reuters – Edward Leung was involved in the ‘fishball revolution’ where police took action against food stalls, he was the person that made ‘Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our time’ popular as a slogan

    Britain’s newest immigrants are showing a flair for protest | The Economist 

    Innovation

    Why is the Nuclear Power Industry Stagnant? – Austin Vernon’s Blog – interesting discussion on the economics and need for innovation

    America needs more basic research – by Noah Smith 

    I love this 60 Minutes Australia film about an Australian inventor

    Equations built giants like Google. Who’ll find the next billion-dollar bit of maths? | David Sumpter | The Guardian – The PageRank story is neither the first nor the most recent example of a little-known piece of mathematics transforming tech. In 2015, three engineers used the idea of gradient descent, dating back to the French mathematician Augustin-Louis Cauchy in the mid-19th century, to increase the time viewers spent watching YouTube by 2,000%. Their equation transformed the service from a place we went to for a few funny clips to a major consumer of our viewing time.

    Japan

    ‘Society was volatile. That spirit was in our music’: how Japan created its own jazz | Jazz | The Guardian

    Murata’s Thailand move heralds Japan tech shift from China | Financial Times – “The most populous country today may be China, but in 2030 that will be India, and further down the road it will be Africa,” Nakajima said. “Will those economies be aligned with China or the US? We don’t know. We should be able to respond to both scenarios.”

    Hong Kong: how colonial-era laws are being used to shut down independent journalism – police recently told reporters that opinion articles aren’t the only ones that can be regarded as seditious. Media interviews with exiled activists and features on clashes between protesters and riot police can also be considered seditious if the content is deemed by the government to be “fake news” or inciting hatred towards the government and endangering national security

    Hong Kong independence activist Edward Leung released from jail, told to stay silent — Radio Free Asia – Hong Kong barrister and former lawmaker Siu Tsz-man said supervision orders are sometimes issued to released prisoners involved in violent crimes, including murder and manslaughter, and require the former prisoner to maintain contact with supervision officers and remain at a stable residence. But Siu said the order to stay away from the spotlight was unprecedented. “I have never heard of this happening before,” Siu said. “My staff have never heard of a supervision order under which the person isn’t allowed to give interviews to the media.” Siu declined to comment on whether the order was appropriate without knowing the details of the case. “The point of a supervision order isn’t to confine someone at a certain location and not let them leave,” he said. Some drew parallels between Leung’s release and the continuing controls on released political prisoners in mainland China – similar in nature to an ASBO but inherently political in nature

    Korea

    Young Koreans Lose Interest in Chinese Studies | Chosun – this Korean example shows a wider decline in Chinese soft power

    Media

    ‘Industry Challenges’ Blamed For DriveTribe’s Demise 

    Brand collaborations with TikTok content creators drive big results | TikTok For Business Blog – social media platform claims that marketing on their social media platform delivers business results, honest….

    Facebook’s Vast Wasteland 

    Retailing

    Gen Z and Millennial Shoppers Are Less Likely to Return Unwanted Online Purchases

    Shein adds US listing plans to its cart – that the founder is looking to change citizenship is very interesting and I am sure won’t go down well with the Chinese government

    Security

    Chinese Police Hunt Overseas Critics With Advanced Tech – The New York Times

    Virginia burglaries work of ‘crime tourists,’ authorities say – The Washington Post  – Authorities call them “crime tourists.” Law enforcement experts say cells of professional South American burglars, particularly from Colombia and Chile, are entering the country illegally or exploiting a visa waiver program meant to expedite tourism from dozens of trusted foreign countries. Once here, they travel from state to state carrying out scores of burglaries, jewelry heists and other crimes, pilfering tens or hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of goods each year, the FBI estimates. Experts said the groups often operate with impunity because they have found a kind of criminal sweet spot. Bail for nonviolent property offenses is often low, so an arrested burglar often quickly gets bond and skips town for the next job, experts said. The crimes often don’t meet the threshold for the involvement of federal authorities. And they attract less attention at a time when U.S. authorities are contending with a rise in homicides. Dan Heath, a supervisory special agent with the FBI’s criminal investigations division, said “South American theft groups,” as the agency calls them, are a growing problem across the United States — and in countries including India, Britain and Australia, where they often employ similar tactics. “They represent an enormous threat right now in our country,” Heath said. “They are tending to thread the needle in avoiding both state and federal prosecution.”

    Hacker Claims to Have Seized Control of Teslas Around the World

    Dutch athletes warned to keep phones and laptops out of China -media | Reuters

    Team GB athletes offered temporary phones over China spying fears | The Guardian

    Video Appears to Show Drug Cartel Using Drone to Bomb Enemies | Futurism

    FedEx Asks Permission to Install Anti-Missile Lasers on Its Cargo Jet | Futurism

    Revealed: UK Gov’t Plans Publicity Blitz to Undermine Chat Privacy – Rolling Stone and more here: The United Kingdom authorities launch a new campaign against the social media apps encryption / Digital Information World 

    WhatsApp ordered to help out U.S agencies to spy on Chinese phones / Digital Information World – tracking metadata, US agencies looking to carry out supply chain disruption of fentanyl

    VW fired senior employee after they raised cyber security concerns | Financial Times – A senior Volkswagen employee was dismissed weeks after raising the alarm about alleged cyber security vulnerabilities at the carmakers’ payments arm, which is soon to be majority-owned by JPMorgan. The manager alerted bosses in September 2021 to concerns that VW’s system in the region was “open to fraud” following an attempted cyber attack, and maintained that $2.6m sitting in the company’s accounts could be stolen, according to documents seen by the Financial Times. The staff member, who also told superiors that VW could face regulatory action if the vulnerabilities were not addressed, was then fired in October. – not terribly surprising

    Software

    After ruining Android messaging, Google says iMessage is too powerful | Ars Technica – “Google clearly views iMessage’s popularity as a problem, and the company is hoping this public-shaming campaign will get Apple to change its mind on RCS,” writes Amadeo in closing. “But Google giving other companies advice on a messaging strategy is a laughable idea since Google probably has the least credibility of any tech company when it comes to messaging services. If the company really wants to do something about iMessage, it should try competing with it.” – if this wasn’t an admission of failure by Google I don’t know what is. Google has a history of failed or closed communication services Google Talk (GTalk) (which was retired when Google decided to move away from an open messaging standard , Google Hangouts (which was spun out of Google+ messaging functionality), Google Allo and Google Wave

    Once billed as a revolution, IBM’s Watson Health is sold off in parts 

    Taiwan

    Christine Lee and Foreign Interference: what the UK can learn from Taiwan | China Dialogues – As part of the transition from authoritarianism to democracy, Taiwan retooled its political commissar system (zheng wei 政委) – formerly responsible for policing political loyalty toward the regime – into an institution that safeguards democracy by working to identify Chinese influence at all levels of Taiwanese politics and society. Political commissars (PCs) not only receive extensive military training but also develop a deep understanding of the Chinese Communist Party’s political warfare tactics. Most major government departments and private sector organisations in Taiwan will have PCs operating within their ranks, monitoring and reporting evidence of foreign interference. As many democracies facing Chinese influence and interference do not have such well-established systems in place, Taiwan’s zheng wei system may provide a starting point for how anti-foreign influence institutions can work effectively within democratic societies

    Technology

    EETimes – Arm Predicts Stagnation if Nvidia Deal Fails – without investment from Nvidia, Arm would be seriously disadvantaged in its bid to grow in data center markets and compete against Intel Corp. and x86 incumbents. The filing also explains why an Arm stock offering is a non-starter while noting that Arm faces stiff competition from emerging RISC-V competitors – interesting that they don’t mention ARM China crisis at all. Nvidia have now walked away from it and Softbank is supposed to be preparing a public offering for ARM

    Web of no web

    How Shopify is moving closer to bricks-and-mortar retail – Latest Retail Technology News From Across The Globe – Charged – retail shop automation software a la China’s automated convenience stores

    Connected Health Station | Body Scan – Withings

  • Hydrogen & more stuff

    Max Fujita, head of European hydrogen fuel cells at Panasonic, discusses the importance of hydrogen technology. Hydrogen is the most widespread chemical element in the universe and could play a significant role in achieving zero net emission and other goals such as wind and geothermal power. Hydrogen is important for more environmentally friendly steel mills and foundries. It even offers a solution for the range anxiety caused by lithium ion battery cars.

    The Asia Society have a video on the story behind the Japan traditional craft revitalisation competition. If you read Monocle you will be well aware of Japan’s strength in traditional crafts, often within centuries old businesses. More Japan related content here.

    Interesting observations on culture and remote working. Interesting where they are talking about a culture crisis. For the past five years before the pandemic I saw company cultures changed as noise cancelling headphones went on and desks turned into long benches. This ironically damaged company culture. The pandemic shook up office space again, with the home office. I was quite fortunate as I had pretty much everything I needed after freelancing. But I did a lot of Zoom calls with people punched on the end of their bed. The range of views in this series of interviews shows that there will be wide mix of responses.

    Finally as a curry cup noodle fan, this next story appealed to me. Nissin (who make the iconic Cup Noodle) has a new strategy in the sustainability game by eliminating the “lid closing seal,” a thin strip of sellotape type material that holds your noodle cup closed while the ramen is cooking in boiling water. This very small change will save an estimated 33 tons of plastic waste per year produced by Nissin. Instead the lid will be held shut by two ‘ears’ on the lid film.

  • Standard Chartered + more news

    Standard Chartered

    Standard Chartered to cut branch network in half – Standard Chartered is to reduce its global branch network by half to around 400 to cut long-term costs after the UK bank reported a stronger than expected first quarter profit. The Asia, Africa and Middle East-focused lender, which had as many as 1,200 branches worldwide in 2014, said today it will shrink the network to a third of that total as it also gives up office space worldwide – this move by Standard Chartered seems to be a short term move to try and please investors

    Temple of Mamon

    Consumer behaviour

    Sex sells: China farm region becomes ‘lingerie capital’ | Hong Kong Free Press HKFP – around 2013, volumes soared as younger Chinese consumers began discovering their sensuality, Lei said. Most buyers are now between 22 and 25. Initially, loose-fitting, not-too-revealing designs were favoured in China. Today, semi-transparent, “body-hugging” numbers dominate

    Why are South Korea’s young men turning against Moon Jae-in and his ruling party? | South China Morning Post – Unpopular housing policies and a backlash against Moon’s perceived ‘feminist’ agenda has seen support for his Democratic Party administration collapse among Korean men in their 20s and 30s. Not so among young women, however – meaning victory for the opposition is far from guaranteed at the next presidential elections set for March 2022

    As boundaries between work and home vanish, employees need a ‘right to disconnect’

    Glancing at your phone quickly prompts other people to do the same | New Scientist – Such a rapid, automatic response is probably due to people mimicking each other without realising it – what scientists call the “chameleon effect”. While such mimicry is thought to have evolved in human societies to help people bond with each other, mimicking mobile phone use might have the opposite effect, says Elisabetta Palagi at the University of Pisa, Italy. “We have a need to follow the norms imposed on us by people around us, to [match] our actions with theirs in this automatic way,” she says. “But smartphones can increase social isolation through interference and disruption with real-life, ongoing activities.” – digital yawning

    Economics

    The panopticon of Germany’s foreign trade: New facts on the first globalisation, 1880–1913 | VOX, CEPR Policy Portal – The history of globalisation is usually told in two parts, separated not only by two world wars but also by changes in technology, institutions, and economic logic. This column reconsiders that narrative. Using detailed new evidence on Germany’s foreign trading practices from 1800 to 1913 (the ‘first’ globalisation), it finds that most growth took place along the extensive margin, while 25–30% of trade was intra-industry. If the first globalisation saw substantial heterogeneity within countries and industries, it may be time to re-think the ‘classical’ versus ‘new’ trade paradigm

    Ethics

    Mediatel: Mediatel News: An ill-advised alliance & cross-media measurement pinch-points – Bob Wootton on the moral bankruptcy of P&G circumventing audience privacy measures on Apple devices in China

    Finance

    E-Residency joins campaign against IBAN discrimination | Estonia E-Residency Blog

    Media

    WordPress Saves Creative Commons Search Engine From Shutting Down 

    Pandemic propels Thai mom with ‘nothing to lose’ into internet pornstar | Coconuts Bangkok – And when the internet sees a woman posting sexy nudes, it usually assumes she does porn. At first Fernie hated those insinuations. She felt insulted and would block anyone called her a “porn star.” But it eventually wore her down and, in the way of internet grooming, became a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy as the messages kept pouring in. “When I got them that frequently, I started to think of them as compliments,” she said with a giggle. “Then the thought of, ‘If I sell nude pics, I might as well sell porn,’ came to my mind, because they’re similar anyway.” More content related to adult entertainment here.

    Security

    Havana syndrome: NSA officer’s case hints at microwave attacks since 90s | Espionage | The Guardian

    China’s regulator names 33 apps including Baidu, Sogou, iFlytek, Tencent for unauthorised data collection | South China Morning Post – Thirty three apps from Tencent, Baidu, Sougou and more are among the latest to receive scrutiny over user data. App makers will have to comply with new privacy regulations banning collection of data and forcing user consent

    April 30, 2021 – Letters from an American – really interesting post on information warfare and the way the US body politic is looking at it

    Taiwan bans recruitment for jobs in China to combat brain drain – Nikkei Asia 

    Technology

    Toyota will showcase its hydrogen-powered Corolla at Super Taikyu event – Toyota is definitely thinking about a hydrogen future due to the limitations of lithium ion battery cars. Motorsport is where a lot of research and development happens for car and commercial vehicle manufacturers

    Why has TSMC’s Nanjing expansion plan stirred up a hornets’ nest in Beijing and Taipei? | South China Morning Post – TSMC says expansion will help it address chip shortage, particularly for automotive sector. One analyst says move could stifle domestic chip development on the mainland

    Baidu will offer first paid robotaxi service in China next month, letting people hail rides without drivers

  • Hydrogen fuel cells + more news

    Hydrogen fuel cells

    Hyundai and Ineos team up to develop hydrogen future | CAR Magazine  BMW details fuel cell plans | EE News – I think that this move to hydrogen fuel cells makes more sense than lithium ion batteries. Hydrogen fuel cells are well understood, having been used by NASA during the Apollo space mission, the main challenge as been the cost of the cell. Hydrogen fuel cells don’t induce range anxiety and don’t have the environmental problems that you get recycling lithium ion batteries.

    Panasonic finally looks at European battery gigafactory – but this is happening with hydrogen fuel cells being in a more effective decision. Elon Musk is down on hydrogen fuel cells, but ignores the issues with lithium ion batteries compared to hydrogen fuel cells. Lithium ion batteries have their own dangers. Hydrogen fuel cells don’t have the same recycling issues that spent lithium ion batteries have. Given the strategic hold over lithium mining by China; hydrogen fuel cells offer a better option to reduce dependence. The hydrogen lobby does a better job to combat the Tesla showmanship.

    China

    EU braces for battle despite new faces in White House | Financial Times – “ There will be a number of easy wins and enhanced co-operation on climate, the pandemic and remedying some of the offences of the past four years,” said Kristine Berzina, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. “But there are real dangers that disagreements on issues like data privacy and digital taxation will make it more difficult to get agreements on other issues that are very important for both the US and Europe — particularly China

    Germany frets over its corporate dependency on China | Financial Times – Robust Chinese demand has helped Germany’s auto manufacturers and their suppliers to offset weaker European and US markets still afflicted by the pandemic. But it has also revived concerns that German industry is too dependent on China. And it has raised questions about whether Berlin will be willing to respond to growing pressure in the EU for a stronger line towards Beijing and to embrace a new transatlantic partnership on China under a Biden administration. – you can see this in the split between Merkel and her party over China engagement – Daimler, which has two large Chinese shareholders, sells nearly 30 per cent of its Mercedes cars in China. It accounts for about 11 per cent of group revenues. For several companies in the Dax 30 index, China represents at least a fifth of sales including BMW, chipmaker Infineon and plastics manufacturer Covestro. Likewise, Volkswagen is estimated to generate a similar proportion of its sales in the country last year, selling nearly 40 per cent of its vehicles there. All of this leaves you vulnerable to the Australian situation: China sends a message with Australian crackdown | Financial Times – The message is clear. If your media is overly critical, if your think-tanks produce negative reports, if your MPs persist in criticism, if you probe Communist party influence in your community and politics and if you don’t allow Chinese state and private companies into your market, and so on, you will be vulnerable to Beijing’s retribution as well

    Red Convergence | China Media Project – media policy in China – with implications domestically and internationally. It outlines how the Chinese Communist Party intends to leverage transformations in global communication, both at home and abroad (though the latter is more implied), to sustain the regime and increase its influence internationally.

    Lessons from China’s decision to halt Ant Group’s giant IPO | Financial Times – interesting points from WeBank about a sweet spot from Rmb 8,000 – 200,000 were debtors do not have an incentive to run away or speculate. SMEs are focused on having a good credit record

    Q&A: Gareth Richardson – Western Brands No Longer Have an Easy Ride in Asia | Branding in Asia Magazine – In China, there’s no access to Google and Facebook but consumers are immersed in WeChat. This is a playground where western brands have no inherent advantage. In fact, many Chinese consumers don’t know or much care about where the brand originated (save for a few specific categories such as Infant Milk Powder). In western culture individuals are heroes and this is reflected in the approach to brand storytelling. However, in Asia, the culture is more collectivist and storytelling celebrates multiple heroes. Asian brands should celebrate their cultural values. Examples include brands built on traditional values of Asian hospitality, such as Mandarin Oriental. There’s a paradox though. Asian culture is collectivist and yet Asian businesses are very hierarchical. There’s often a significant power gap between the C-suite and the frontline staff. This makes branding more challenging to implement even when its value is properly understood by the leadership – this also happens within agencies. True story: I was asked to go and present to the Chinese subsidiary of a US multinational. The global digital lead had gone in there previously with the global client ambassador and made a mess that couldn’t be cleared up. Firstly, they hadn’t recognised the great firewall. Twitter doesn’t matter in China. Secondly, they thought that democratic political campaigning experience was an example of great marketing. At the time, the person who was the global data lead had also worked on the first Obama presidential campaign. All of them had come from a political background and were clueless about brand marketing. Finally, they’d unintentionally priced a measurement solution ludicrously low. It was a shit show. We had lost the client already, but the client lead had held out hope that hanging on in there churning out a monthly report with no actionable insight would somehow provide a way back in. But at least I got to Guangzhou for the first time.

    Consumer behaviour

    Right-wing populism with Chinese characteristics? Identity, otherness and global imaginaries in debating world politics online – Chenchen Zhang, 2020 – The past few years have seen an emerging discourse on Chinese social media that combines the claims, vocabulary and style of right-wing populisms in Europe and North America with previous forms of nationalism and racism in Chinese cyberspace. In other words, it provokes a similar hostility towards immigrants, Muslims, feminism, the so-called ‘liberal elites’ and progressive values in general. This article examines how, in debating global political events such as the European refugee crisis and the American presidential election, well-educated and well-informed Chinese Internet users appropriate the rhetoric of ‘Western-style’ right-wing populism to paradoxically criticise Western hegemony and discursively construct China’s ethno-racial and political identities. Through qualitative analysis of 1038 postings retrieved from a popular social media website, this research shows that by criticising Western ‘liberal elites’, the discourse constructs China’s ethno-racial identity against the ‘inferior’ non-Western other, exemplified by non-white immigrants and Muslims, with racial nationalism on the one hand; and formulates China’s political identity against the ‘declining’ Western other with realist authoritarianism on the other. The popular narratives of global order protest against Western hegemony while reinforcing a state-centric and hierarchical imaginary of global racial and civilisational order. We conclude by suggesting that the discourse embodies the logics of anti-Western Eurocentrism and anti-hegemonic hegemonies. – This is interesting especially when the Communist Party of China is adopting a more Han nationalist stance (and in some respects reaching back into historic integration of Mongol and Manchu rulers). Secondly, Communist Party academics and legal academics from Beijing University have been drawing heavily on the work of Carl Schmitt. As have far right organisations and Russian nationalists. Schmitt was Nazi Germany’s leading legal theorist. He was known to be hostile to parliamentary democracy and supported the power of an authoritarian leader to decide the law. Schmitt’s rejection of attempts to take politics out of the operation of the law or economic policy implementation – have appeals to diverse audiences.

    Design

    Top 3 reasons why Nokia N97 failed: The “iPhone killer” that actually killed Nokia – Gizchina.com – Nokia N97 has a slide-out design with a three-line QWERTY keyboard displayed below the display. That was an advantage at the time, but it was just another manifestation of Nokia’s outdated ideas. With the improvement of input methods, touch screen keyboards have become more accurate and soon eclipsed physical keyboards. – the keyboard was very poor compared to the Nokia E90 Communicator that I used to use. I also remember that the address book feature used to crash the phone if you loaded more than 999 contacts into it. Even their ‘E’ series business handsets like my E90 Communicator and the later E71 devices. I moved to the iPhone because I wanted an address book that worked. If the iPhone ever came in a Nokia Communicator type format, I would be ecstatic. More gadget related content here.

    Ideas

    I have been watching more David Hoffman films recently, looking back to the past to try and understand the present. What becomes apparent was that there was a schism of values in the late 1960s America. What’s less apparent was how, or even if; that schism was eventually healed.

    Online

    China tightens grip on booming livestreaming sector | Financial Times – this needs to be viewed in the wider aspect of reining in internet companies

    Style

    Good Collaborations Are Art, Great Ones Are Kitsch | Highsnobiety – “You know it’s art when the check clears,” said Andy Warhol. With Roy Lichtenstein and Robert Indiana, Warhol made his way into museums by turning the mundane world into works of art by enriching it with pop references, connotations and associations. Warhol’s art is commercial and his commercials are art (a Warhol ad launched Absolut vodka in 1986)

    Technology

    A little automation goes a long way in distracting drivers | INPUT – technology creating more problems than it solves in the car driving experience.

  • Mariah Carey & other things that caught my eye this week

    Mariah Carey, media changes in 2020, coming shortages on rare earth metals, China and Russia’s threat to the west and the power of China.

    Mariah Carey @ SingaporeGP 2010
    Mariah Carey @ SingaporeGP 2010 by KWSW

    I found it relatively easy this year to avoid a lot of the Christmas ads. Maybe because there are much bigger things to think about like the new UK government, protests from Chile to Hong Kong and the soap opera that is the Trump presidency.

    Mariah Carey on aging is just tremendous: A Brief History of Mariah Carey Refusing to Acknowledge Time over at The Cut. It is hard to remember that Mariah Carey has a three decade career behind her that started when she was in her teens.

    My old colleague Andy at New York creative agency Praytell have pulled together a US centric set of ideas on media changes to expect in 2020. The anticipated changes to the NCAA and Instagram are very interesting. The NCAA is a very lucrative franchise and yet the players get so poorly rewarded for their efforts.

    I’ve been negative about the focus of lithium ion battery power for everything and this talk gives compelling economic and environmental arguments to look at alternatives like hydrogen fuel cells. This presentation on the coming shortages in rare earth metals should be a call to action.

    Great panel at The New Enlightenment Conference held in Edinburgh looking at Russia and China and what it means for the west and the threat they present.

    The Center for Strategic and International Studies produced this video on the power of China