Interesting and funny film from Mercedes for the SLS coupe AMG. The way the businessman loses his mind trying to define luxury feels like a parody of Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Are the metaphysics of luxury and the metaphysics of quality the same? The SLS coupe AMG is a very impressive looking vehicle. But surely its performance is a bigger draw than its luxury, it’s ride is likely to be very firm. Especially given the AMG heritage.
Vice put together a great documentary about a veteran tattooist in Hong Kong. His work goes back to when Hong Kong was a port of call for the merchant navy as well as the US and Royal navies.  More Hong Kong related posts here.
I love the way Honda taps into the inner child of potential customers. With there being no truly bad cars now and green pressures, so brand and emotion becomes so much more important for car brands.  Honda has been consistently been ahead of the curve.
PBS have animated interviews that were done with Robin Williams back in 1991, and they’re really good. Really smart and thoughtful stuff that makes you realise the huge hole that the loss of Williams made in the entertainment industry.
TOMY’s Cocoro scanner which detects stress (and according to the maker, lies). I could see managers thinking that it would be a good idea to keep the Cocoro scanner ton their desk. Though I would keep it out of view if I were you,  as the display would be stress raising in its own right.
Category: germany | 德國 | 독일 |ドイツ
Willkommen – welcome to the Germany category of this blog. This is where I share anything that relates to Germany, business issues, the German people or culture. Often posts that appear in this category will appear in other categories as well. So if Berghain launched a new brand collaboration with Volkswagen. And that I thought was particularly interesting or noteworthy, that might appear in branding as well as Germany.
So far, I haven’t had too much German related content here at the moment. That’s just the way things work out sometimes.
Where I have talked about Germany much of my discussions have focused around innovation or design due to German history and reliance on its manufacturing sector. It hasn’t deindustrialised to the same extent as the UK did during the 1980s.
However it hasn’t been all good. A classic example is how German car manufacturers. They had been behind the curve on both electric and hydrogen powered vehicles compared to China, the US and Korea. While German strength is in traditional engineering areas such as software have been much more hit and miss.
I don’t tend to comment on local politics because I don’t understand it that well, but I am interested when it intersects with business. An example of this would be legal issues affecting the media sector for instance.
If there are German related subjects that you think would fit with this blog, feel free to let me know by leaving a comment in the ‘Get in touch’ section of this blog here.
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SLS coupe & other things that made last week
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Mobile data + other newsMobile dataConsumers Want More Mobile Data, But Simply Don’t Want to Pay | Parks Associates – this analysis of mobile data makes me think that mobile providers have failed to articulate the benefits of mobile data. Secondly it is probably also a symptom of the way mobile devices are used a lot in the home and tethered to the home wi-fi. The visions of mobile lifestyle used to sell mobile data have little utility and value to customers. This attitude to mobile data likely won’t likely change until horizontality changes in the mobile device and service stack. For instance differentiated high quality voice calls BeautySK-II promotes pop-up skincare studio via geo-targeted mobile ad BusinessHow to tell if a merger rumor will come true – Quartz – or how good are journalists? 4 reasons why Asian tech companies are using flash sales to sell their stuff Microsoft Ventures GM: ‘There will not be a WhatsApp-style acquisition again’ | VentureBeat – a bit harsh, I don’t think that you can categorise WhatsApp as pre-revenue or a dogs shit company – but the valuation is indicative of bubble behaviour Consumer behaviour54% of tablet users share their device with others | GlobalWebIndex Nearly half of Arab youth keen to embrace modernity | Burson-Marsteller – presumably in conjunction with PSB Infographic Snapshot: The Real Story of LGBT and Millennials | Ypulse China’s Unstoppable Gold-Buying ‘Aunties’ Move Onto Bitcoins | Jing Daily Rise of the tech-savvy mother: who says their place is in the kitchen? | Techinasia – I am middle-class, hear me roar DesignJing Daily: Zaha Hadid’s next high-profile China stop: Macau INTERNET OF CARING THINGS | trendwatching.com – emotional design Asian Champions of Design: Tiger Balm | Campaign Asia – strident classic design that it seems to shy away from on new products (paywall) Home · enyojs/mochi Wiki · GitHub – design resources on user experience by the WebOS design team EconomicsThere’s a Class War Going On and the Poor Are Getting Their Butts Kicked | TIME – interesting Time has written a piece on what would be considered social democrat leanings China PMI edges up to 50.3 | South China Morning Post – (paywall) EthicsNobody Cares What You Think Unless You’re Rich | Mother Jones FMCGRethinking Carbonates: Potential in Un-Soda – Euromonitor International GadgetsSamsung S5 Teardown: Loaded With Sensors | EE Times Qualcomm’s newest mobile chips offer a clear glimpse at 2015′s killer gadgets | VentureBeat Wearables: one-third of consumers abandoning devices | theguardian.com – this seems to be an issue of design as much as technology as the form factor doesn’t match the use case Office for iPad: There are no incumbents in mobile | VentureBeat – interesting comparison between the original MacWrite programme and Office for iPad GermanyGerman companies and China: Mittelstand and Middle Kingdom | The Economist InnovationTwitter CEO’s China Visit Is Interesting, but Not for the Reason You Think – China Real Time Report – WSJ – looking for Chinese innovation to emulate JapanJapanese manufacturers focused on high performance – Deloitte Perspectives Toyota is becoming more efficient by replacing robots with humans | Quartz JournalismThe Army v. The Press | Time.com KoreaDATA POINTS: Adspend trends in South Korea | Campaign Asia – Ad spending in the country edged up 2.2 per cent in 2013 led by a doubling of mobile spending, according to Cheil Worldwide LuxuryWatchmakers woo women to boost flagging sales | Reuters Jing Daily | China’s Sketchy ‘Daigou’ Luxury Market Is A Hotbed For Fakes Beware of Normcore | Slate – desperately wanting to be average David Beckham Wants to Launch a Clothing and Lifestyle Brand | Vanity Fair – interesting that Li & Fung are being linked with this Michael Kors Beating European Brands on Their Home Turf – Bloomberg Airbnb Becoming a Stronger Competitor to Hotel Brands | L2 Think Tank Jing Daily: Chinese Blogger Peter Xu Brings Us Baselworld’s Hottest China Trends – focus on fashion amongst younger consumers MarketingChina Email Marketing Industry Report in 2013 | ChinaInternetWatch How Real-Time Does Real-Time Marketing Need To Be? Sysomos Blog – according to marketers surveyed. It does beg the question what does real time marketing actually mean to them first of all STB defends promotional video for Filipinos | Marketing Interactive – how much do you localise a campaign when the content ends up online whether you want it there or not? ‘No Pain’ McFlame fronts social campaign for Zippo | Marketing Interactive MediaMobile adspend doubles to break £1bn barrier, says IAB report Users Engage with Major Social Networks Predominantly via Mobile | comScore Mobile adspend rockets in Korea | WARC Media Publications Database | We find the best Media/Advertising publications for you. – great research resource Weibos, WeChat & Renren: how to approach social marketing in China | Econsultancy How China is trying to get its citizens to censor themselves | Quartz – is this any different to how western governments try to interact with media to influence consumer opinion? PaymentsHere are 3 ways you can pay using smartphones in the Philippines | Techinasia RetailingHow mobile is contributing to show rooming | Marketing Interactive As competition heats up, retailers urged to innovate | Marketing Interactive Jing Daily: How Lane Crawford’s ‘unique’ business model defies China’s anti-graft drive SecurityThe NSA Archive | American Civil Liberties Union – Snowden leaks become searchable SoftwareBlackBerry Ends Licensing Agreement With T-Mobile – WSJ.com – surprised BlackBerry is cutting off its nose to spite it’s face unless T-Mobile are consumer customers and they are trying to focus on the enterprise?? Microsoft’s open sourcing of .Net: The back story | ZDNet TechnologyTelecomsCisco, Nokia: Huawei a ‘Growing Challenge,’ Say Raymond James, UBS – no real surprise VietnamVNG’s quest to build a mobile ecosystem for Vietnam | Techinasia Web of no webHere’s Google’s Smart Plan To Sell Its Computerized Glasses To Businesses (GOOG) | Business Insider – I would still be unhappy seeing Google Glass in a frontline customer services role like Virgin Atlanti Five examples of how marketers are using iBeacons | Econsultancy Bosch Plans Connectivity Push to Challenge Google’s Lead – Bloomberg Meet Microsoft’s Cortana, a More Personal Siri – NYTimes.com – no comparison with Google | Android eco-system, interesting WiFi Chip Tracks Indoor Location | EE Times WirelessIs Qualcomm losing its edge in the application processor market? | TechRadar – interesting that this question is being asked 
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Be Marlboro + more newsBe MarlboroHealth groups call to end “Be a Marlboro” campaign | Marketing-Interactive – I grew up with ‘Marlboro Country’ billboards showing the cigarette to be the poison of choice for the middle-aged cowboy taking a break. Be Marlboro was a much need revamp of the Marlboro brand. Modern-day UK Marlboro man could also be a woman; they smoked them in-or-outside the club. Occasionally they broke them down and smoked them with cannabis. Don’t be a maybe. Be Marlboro Philip Morris InternationalThe campaign went out in over 64 countries worldwide from Germany to Indonesia. Its rationale was a world away from Marlboro Country young adults feel overwhelmed by the flood of information and options that new technologies offer. In this time of uncertainty, they have very few life compasses that can provide them with guidance. With the new campaign, Marlboro encourages them to be decisive, trust themselves and follow their inspiration. The concept is very simple: there are three ways to react when faced with a decision: Yes, No, or Maybe. Marlboro does not believe in Maybes Frederic de Wilde, Philip Morris International Investor Day – Brand Portfolio and Commercial Approach – Script, 21 June 2012The universal insight that Be Marlboro tapped into is interesting, the discovering yourself moments and the later impostor syndrome of youth. BusinessPlans to boost cultural and creative industries in China | WantChinaTimes – China’s State Council, on Friday released plans aimed at promoting the integration of the creative and design service industries with the real economy – interesting description as if somehow creative and design services aren’t real Consumer behaviourPLOS ONE: Detecting Emotional Contagion in Massive Social Networks by Lorenzo Coviello,Yunkyu Sohn, Adam D. I. Kramer,Cameron Marlow, Massimo Franceschetti, Nicholas A. Christakis, James H. Fowler China’s super-rich will rise 80% in the next decade | Shanghaist – A report released by Knight Frank LLP earlier this week says that the number of China’s super-rich, those who own more than 30 million USD in assets, will grow as much as 80 percent in the next decade, according to the Global Times. EconomicsUK Economic Overview — HSBC Global Connections China – Approaching The End of Export-Led Growth Story? | Euromonitor International – not the end of it but moving to create consumer driven growth as well FinanceHow Hong Kong Lost the Alibaba IPO – WSJ.com – Alibaba wanted to nominate the bulk of the board post listing rather than one share, one vote – which is enshrined in Hong Kong’s regulations (paywall) FMCGThe hottest thing in Korea now is freezing cold ice cream made by “scientists” | RocketNews24 – liquid nitrogen cooled ice cream made whilst you wait Check Out How Coca Cola Makes the Most of WeChat Marketing – Do You still remember the “nickname bottle” that Coca Cola launched last summer? Such an impressive case was not so long ago, now Coca Cola has shifted its focus from bottle to cap, joining up with WeChat. Hong KongPatriotic’ protest leaves mainland Chinese visitors bemused | South China Morning Post – genius – Hong Kong will have just over 45 million visitors from the mainland this year. The main reason is no sales tax (paywall) How toGetting started with collections | eBay – (PDF) How To Download All Your Personal Data From Facebook – Storing information in the cloud is great, but sometimes it’s nice to have your personal data right on your hard drive. InnovationWill ‘Makers’ Change Shenzhen? | EE Times – which touches on how China will move up the value chain to be the innovator and designers of products rather than just the assemblers World’s first LNG-fueled cargo vessel starts testing in China | WantChinaTimes – the shipping industry is looking to move enmasse to LNG and reduce their environmental footprint MarketingNikon, OzMilko, BreadTalk deal with fallout from CCTV criticism – Campaign Asia – apparently fact based and fair this time How to Launch Your App in an International Market | Mashable – surprisingly useful Mashable article rather than the usual top ten link bait content MediaPeak Advertising and the Future of the Web By Tim Hwang and Adi Kamdar OnlineTencent QQ IM Adds Payment Solution for Online Courses | TechNode RetailingChina E-commerce Market GMV Hit 9.9 Tn in 2013 | China Internet Watch SoftwareWindows hits the skids, Mac OS X on the rise | The Register – Apple’s OS X share more than doubles in past six years, Windows below 90% – first time since the 90s years Peak Microsoft. According to two different web-analytics groups – NetMarketShare and StatCounter – Windows’ market share has dropped to below 90 per cent for the first time since the mid 1990s TechnologyOki Develops FPC Board Supporting large Currents | Nikkei TechOn! – such as switching power supplies and inverters. Web of no webTencent Unveils Mobile Navigation Service Lubao To Deepen Forays into Mapping Market | TechNode Magnifying glass | Atlanta Magazine – profile of That Starner who has been involved in wearables for 20 years WirelessMarket share of smartphones with 8-core processors is actually going to drop in 2014 | BGR – 64 bit processor sales will go up Motorola’s Super-Powered Google Phone – Business Insider – Motorola never really had a dance partner in Google Nokia just hit a $571-million obstacle to completing its deal with Microsoft – Quartz – the point of principle of shutting it all down for Microsoft may be worth more than the factory, how much could the Indian tax authorities try and hold over Microsoft in the future? Secondly is this a way of helping local businesses like MicroMax? 
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Nokia X & more newsNokia XModelling Nokia X Scenarios and the Level of Desperation it Reveals | Tomi Ahonen – the Nokia X is a strange device. The Nokia X is a low cost smartphone that runs Android rather than Windows. Is the Nokia X a power play by the Finnish company against Microsoft, or an engineering project that escaped the lab? BeautyIntroducing Matrix Class For Glass™ – PRNewswire – beauty brand Matrix is part of L’Oreal uses Google’s abortion bucket of wearable computing Glass BusinessChina’s Young Billionaires ‘Shoot Up’ Global Rich List | Jing Daily Why so many “activist” investors are barraging companies with money-making schemes | Quartz BrandZ 2014 China’s top brands | MillwardBrown Consumer behaviourBattle Builds Over Shampoo Prices | WSJ – Unilever’s plans to get ahead in U.S. hair care have run into a problem: a price war with Procter & Gamble. (Paywall) The Next Big Thing You Missed: How to Rebuild Computer Security From the Ground Up | Wired.com Cybernorms research department – Lund University – great set of whitepaper resources Economic Demographics of U.S. iPhone Buyers | CNN Money – One third of Apple’s U.S. sales in 2013 were to Americans making more than $100,000 a year, and of that group, Apple’s share was 65%, according to NPD (which did not provide a spreadsheet supporting that number). Survey finds Chinese see US as the “ideal country” | beyondbrics – that will have chafed Xi Jingping’s chaps (paywall) EconomicsIndia to block U.S. trade probes, ready for fight at WTO | Reuters Property prices are “castrating the whole notion of city life” – the rising cost of property in city centres is causing the “biggest crisis” facing architects and urbanists, according to critic Joseph Rykwert, the recipient of this year’s RIBA Royal Gold Medal FMCGMcDonalds to do all-day breakfasts? | BloombergBusinessWeek GadgetsNokia’s Androids not strong enough to compete in Asia | Techinasia BlackBerry Announces New Phones, Services | Time.com GermanyGermany leaning on neighbours for growth | Quartz How toFind the person behind an email address with Vibe for Mac and Chrome IdeasNilay Patel: ‘The Internet Is Fucked’ | The Verge – not terribly surprising JapanPlus size fashion in Japan | RocketNews InnovationHTC launches new project donating processor power to scientific research | The Verge ARPA-E Deputy Director Cheryl Martin Interview on EV Batteries | The Energy Collective Samsung and Apple: two flavors of innovation LegalApple sues China govt body over Siri – US technology giant Apple is suing a Chinese government agency and a domestic company over patent rights for its “Siri” personal assistant MediaDisney Is Launching Its Own Movie Streaming Service | Time.com – In a bid to convince more people to purchase digital versions of movies, Disney today launched its own movie streaming service. The new platform, called Disney Movies Anywhere, allows customers to purchase Disney films through iTunes and then stream them through their web browser or on iPhones – this is huge Sina posts big profits ahead of potential Weibo IPO, but we wouldn’t invest in it | Techinasia MarketingStudy: Digital Return on Investment Undervalued | Advertising Age OnlineChinese version of LinkedIn launched | RTHK – the two key things here are: lack of a Chinese national champion and harmonisation of content for Chinese government compliance Matt Cutts Answers If Google Uses EXIF Data From Pictures As A Ranking Factor | Search Engine Journal – probably not at the moment but could be used in the future, which would make sense SecurityIT giants to protect Chinese users after Windows XP shutdown | WantChinaTimes Element 14 Holding Orders Based On US Government Watch List | EEVblog New attack completely bypasses Microsoft zero-day protection app | Ars Technica Blackphone Launches At Mobile World Congress 2014 – PRNewswire` Why Apple’s Recent Security Flaw Is So Scary | Gizmodo SingaporeDiscriminatory approach to Singapore online gambling rules would encourage legal challenge, warns expert | out-law.com – The Singapore government would open itself up to a potential legal challenge by some of the biggest betting operators if they were discriminatory in banning those companies from offering remote gambling in the country, an expert has warned SoftwareSpritz – getting information across fast with speed-reading software TelecomsGoogle Fiber’s potential Achilles’ heel | BGR – Wi-Fi to device is the bottle neck in home broadband set-ups Telco industry needs to invest up to $1.7trn to meet data demand | TotalTele.com WirelessHutchison Telecom eyes improved mobile business after decline last year | SCMP – aims to improve its mobile business despite increased competition from the merger between HKT and CSL New World Mobility. (Paywall) Nokia’s new Windows Phone strategy is guaranteed to confuse everyone – How is Nokia going to explain the differences between its Asha feature phone application system, the Windows Phone 8 app system and the new Asha/Windows/Android app system to consumers in emerging markets? 
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DuPont plastic & more newsDuPont plastic counterfeitedChinese “counterfeit” DuPont plastic prompted Aston Martin’s giant recall – Surely physical testing would have shown that the counterfeit Dupont plastic product wasn’t to spec? It makes me wonder about the inbound quality control at Aston Martin on materials. It makes sense that counterfeiters would go after a brand like DuPont plastic. But its also interesting that counterfeiting moves beyond manufactured BusinessIBM to peddle chip unit | The Register Google bought 5.94% of Lenovo | Reuters Consumer behaviourMillennials Put Their Surprising Stamp on the American Dream – not about secure old age or a certain level of consumerism but about day-to-day control over their life JWT London study: U.K. men more multidimensional than conventional wisdom has it | JWT Intelligence EconomicsBritain is now being taxed so much that the pips are squeaking | City AM – interesting I would add to this that it is reliant on the PAYE tax payers Exclusive: How mainland millionaires overwhelmed Canada visa scheme | South China Morning Post – (reg wall) IdeasDavid Ignatius: After Snowden, a diminished Internet? – The Washington Post – sure just the worldliness that followed the ‘summer of love‘ in the late 1960s In the Asian century, Australia is becoming Asian too | Trends in the Living Networks InnovationLuxuryJing Daily: Chinese Designers Rise In Ranks At Top Global Fashion Weeks – are the creative industries in the West really a bulwark against China? Louis Vuitton attaches personas to men’s bags to broaden appeal – Luxury Daily – Internet Jing Daily: Estee Lauder pins hops on China’s tier 2 cities to lift lagging growth MarketingStudy Says a Personalized Subject Line is the Key to Email Success | Marketing Pilgrim – open with a good headline MediaYouTube clamps down on fake views with video audits – Digital Intelligence Critical blog on Blinkx was paid for by investors | CityAM The Anatomy of Facebook: A Quick Guide to the Facebook Ecosystem For Brands | Simply Measured Retailing2012-2013 China Online Shopping Transaction Situation — China Internet Watch UK retailers see rise in overseas mobile searches | IAB UK – from Germany, the US, France and the Netherlands Korea to Chinese Tourists: Shop Here, Get a Visa – South Korea plans to offer VIP cards to big-spending Chinese tourists entitling them to five-year multiple-entry visas, use of exclusive immigration counters and discounts at certain stores SecurityIndia: Huawei investigated over alleged BSNL hack | beyondbrics – one to watch to see how it develops Errata Security: That NBC story 100% fraudulent – a lot of technology media coverage is embarrassing Quoted: on British spies targeting hacker group Anonymous | SiliconBeat – Targeting Anonymous and hacktivists amounts to targeting citizens for expressing their political beliefs – Which is what security services do when the political beliefs are divergent from the establishment: anti-nuclear movement, new age travellers and anti-globalisation protestors SoftwareI, Cringely Nadella’s success at Microsoft probably depends on Gates – I, Cringely Web of no webV2V: What are vehicle-to-vehicle communications and how will they work | ExtremeTech Government OKs Car-to-Car Talk | EE Times WirelessApple RESURRECTS the iPhone 4: report • The Register – the iPhone 4/4s format is almost like the Mac Classic which lived in various incarnations through the 1980s and early 1990s in Apple’s range