Ni hao – welcome to the Taiwan category of this blog. This is where I share anything that relates to the island of Taiwan, business issues relating to Taiwan, people from the island of Taiwan, or Taiwanese-specific culture. I don’t post that often about Taiwan but given its strategic location, vibrant culture and importance in global manufacturing I’d like to remedy that.
Taiwan has a range of cultural exports including music, but most of that is focused addressing a Chinese speaking audience. Many of China’s stars actually come from across the strait. Many Chinese factories are actually owned and run by Taiwanese companies with many managers and engineers crossing the straits to work. They were as responsible for the success and opening up as their Hong Kong brethren who moved their factories upstream along the Pearl river delta.
The Republic of China to give it its formal name has had a complex history, acting as a cradle of traditional Chinese culture that was destroyed and remade on the mainland under Mao Zetong. He was looking to build a new country, while Chiang Kai-shek was looking to preserve as much of an old country as he could. The island across the strait was like a seed bank ready to regenerate the mainland at some point in the future.
Often posts that appear in this category will appear in other categories as well. So if the Palace museum launched a collaboration with a brand that had great design chops and that I thought was particularly notable that might appear in design as well as Taiwan. Or if there was a new white paper from the government of Taiwan, that might appear in ideas and Taiwan. If there are Taiwanese 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.
I have noticed a lot of b-roll from Japan on YouTube. This seems to have expanded to a wider category of Asian archive footage.
Here’s some footage of the 1970s and 1980s in Japan. This is interesting because it doesn’t seem to be broadcast quality footage and at least some of it was shot by an amateur cameraman.
My latest Asian archive footage discovery was footage from Taiwan. Taiwan was a wider economic powerhouse before the opening up of China. This footage was shot during the 1980s and 1990s. The first thing that struck me the influence on Taiwanese modern culture of Japan (like baseball). But the traditional Chinese culture is still better preserved than anywhere on the mainland and probably even more so than Hong Kong and Singapore.
Russian economics
Perun was a gaming channel that pivoted into making thoughtful analysis videos on different aspects of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This video covers the economic impact. TL;DR – war creates a huge amount of economic value destruction. It is well worth a watch as Perun does some great analysis.
Shortcut to scratching
I wish I had this video 30 years ago. DJ Shortcut of The Invisibl Skratch Piklz and World Famous Beat Junkies breaks down scratching techniques.
Chinese invasion of Taiwan
Chris Cappy provides an interesting perspective on the PLA and a likely Taiwan invasion. But that doesn’t mean that they couldn’t do a blockade or Pearl Harbour style strikes to isolate Taiwan. Secondly, like Saddam Hussein before them the non-military Chinese leadership may not fully realise their own limitations. China has been known to throw its military into conflicts that they weren’t ready for, or capable of. The example that immediately comes to mind is the shambolic border conflict with Vietnam.
NASA’s administrator says cost-plus is a “plague,” just as DoD is giving up on fixed-price development | Acquisition Talk – this reminds me so much of the UK’s ministry of defence. My Dad moved over to the UK to work on the Resolution class of submarines that were designed to carry the Polaris nuclear missile. At the time the Royal Navy paid for these submarines on a cost plus basis which meant that the shipyard advertised for tradesmen in newspapers in Ireland and across the Commonwealth. A lot of people spent a lot of time drinking tea and claiming overtime. One can understand why cost plus could be seen as a plague.
However bad cost plus is, fixed cost doesn’t seem to work either with failed projects and strong disincentives to try innovative solutions. Where NASA is at the moment I can understand why fixed price makes more sense than cost plus. But high innovation programmes like Ares or the Apollo programme would do better under cost plus. One of the current best arguments for cost plus is the likelihood that the Ajax armoured vehicle will never be issued. It is a ‘firm priced’ meaning fixed price contract. Crossrail looks more like a cost plus project, it was a mess, it cost way too much, but it runs. I wonder if the UK ministry of defence will ever consider cost plus again?
Opinion | Boris Johnson Is in Trouble, and So Is Britain’s Conservative Party – The New York Times – First through austerity, then through Brexit and Mr. Johnson, the Conservatives have left Britain in the ruins of their ambition. Each one of their proposed solutions, offered in the name of national renewal, has made the situation worse. No one in the party can escape blame for this baleful legacy. One of the pretenders to Mr. Johnson’s throne — Rishi Sunak, Liz Truss or Jeremy Hunt — may offer a change in style. But a substantial change of course is unlikely to come. An economy predicated on low productivity and low investment, buttressed by a self-defeating lack of seriousness about Britain’s condition, is all the Conservatives seem to be able to offer.– Worthwhile reading in association with this: Grim times lie ahead for UK as inflation combines with low growth | Financial Times
Russian emails appear to show ‘network’ holding $4.5bn assets linked to Putin | Russia | The Guardian – An anti-corruption expert in Russia, who requested anonymity given the political situation in Moscow, said the findings raised questions as to whether there was a level of “common management”. “LLCInvest looks most of all like a cooperative, or an association, in which its members can exchange benefits and property,” they suggested. For nearly two decades, Putin has been accused of secretly accumulating vast wealth through proxies, fuelled by a series of disclosures in leaks such as the Pandora papers about the fortunes of those closest to him. Sergey Kolesnikov, a businessman, claimed 10 years ago that he had been behind a scheme that allowed a group of Russia’s top oligarchs to pool billions of rubles into a type of “investment fund” for the benefit of Putin, who was then serving as prime minister. The claims were denied and Kolesnikov fled from Russia. – Interesting how this has been set up
It’s time for data-first diversity, equity, and inclusion | Fortune – In 2010, using nationally representative data on thousands of individuals in their 40s, I estimated that Black men earn 39.4% less than white men and Black women earn 13.1% less than white women. Yet, accounting for one variable–educational achievement in their teenage years––reduced that difference to 10.9% (a 72% reduction) for men and revealed that Black women earn 12.7 percent more than white women, on average. Derek Neal, an economist at the University of Chicago, and William Johnson were among the first to make this point in 1996: “While our results do provide some evidence for current labor market discrimination, skills gaps play such a large role that we believe future research should focus on the obstacles Black children face in acquiring productive skill.”
Incoming Hong Kong leader John Lee unveils team, while Beijing lays out key expectations | South China Morning Post – John Lee pledges to win people’s trust and make policies that meet demands as State Council approves his governing team. Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office lays out five expectations for incoming administration, including tackling housing and addressing wealth gap – this explains the big gaps in Lee’s previous policy document. What’s less apparent is how Lee will deliver on these intractable challenges when every previous chief executive haven’t managed to address them
Edelman Launches Global Gen Z Lab | Edelman – Today, Edelman announces the formation of The Gen Z Lab, a global offering comprising 100 Gen Z employees, a roster of internal and external on-call advisors, and data hub dedicated to generational insights. Under the watch of Edelman’s Global Chief Brand Officer, Jackie Cooper, the Gen Z Lab will lend expertise, perspective and counsel clients looking to effectively engage the Gen Z consumer. In a breakthrough move, Edelman is also appointing the world’s first ZEO as a cultural and creative advisor for the Gen Z Lab. Stepping into this inaugural consultative role from July 1st, will be gender fluid fashion designer, Harris Reed. He will be supported by Amanda Edelman as Gen Z COO. The Gen Z Lab will harness their generation’s perspective and ambitions to solve issues such as race and diversity, sustainability, and climate change, and align with brand interests to become catalysts for change. – I’d totally trust them managing my brand reputation…………….. NOT!
Meta’s new digital fashion marketplace will sell Prada, Balenciaga and Thom Browne | Vogue Business – Balenciaga CEO Cédric Charbit in a release. “Web3 and Meta are bringing unprecedented opportunities for Balenciaga, our audience and our products, opening up new territories for luxury.” Balenciaga, along with Prada and Thom Browne, is among the first to sign on to sell digital fashion in a new Meta-created avatar store where people can buy clothing for their avatars to wear on Instagram, Facebook and Messenger. Eventually, other designers will be able to independently offer digital clothing for sale in the marketplace. The items for sale in the avatar store will range from $2.99 to $8.99 to start. A Meta spokesperson said that it did “not have details to share” on if or how it would share revenue with designers. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram VP of fashion partnerships Eva Chen, who announced the updates via Instagram Live on Friday, said these capabilities will be available next week, starting with the US, Canada, Thailand and Mexico. – Worthwhile reading this piece also: Inside The Metaverse Strategies Of L’Oréal And LVMH | The Drum
What Chinese media reveals about Shein’s secretive operations – Rest of World – There are two main kinds of suppliers: “free on board,” those that make simple designs they haven’t devised themselves, and “original design manufacturers,” those that do both. They all feed into Shein’s sprawling manufacturing execution system (MES). The designer-suppliers will find pictures online and send a selection to Shein’s internal buyers for consideration; the buyer and their manager settle on a final pool. Once samples have been received, there might be two, or even three, rounds of changes before manufacturing can commence. (The entire time, everything needs to be recorded in the MES — materials, pricing, even chat logs — something suppliers balk at, because, if the deal falls through, all the information sits in Shein’s records, and there’s nothing to stop them from producing it elsewhere.) – I could see Amazon acting in a similar way
China’s Expanding Surveillance State: Takeaways From a NYT Investigation – The New York Times – DNA, iris scan samples and voice prints are being collected indiscriminately from people with no connection to crime. The police in China are starting to collect voice prints using sound recorders attached to their facial recognition cameras. In the southeast city of Zhongshan, the police wrote in a bidding document that they wanted devices that could record audio from at least a 300-foot radius around cameras. Software would then analyze the voice prints and add them to a database. Police boasted that when combined with facial analysis, they could help pinpoint suspects faster. In the name of tracking criminals — which are often loosely defined by Chinese authorities and can include political dissidents — the Chinese police are purchasing equipment to build large-scale iris-scan and DNA databases. The first regionwide iris database — which has the capacity to hold iris samples of up to 30 million people — was built around 2017 in Xinjiang, home to the Uyghur ethnic minority. Online news reports show that the same contractor later won other government contracts to build large databases across the country. The company did not respond to The Times’s request for comment. The Chinese police are also widely collecting DNA samples from men. Because the Y chromosome is passed down with few mutations, when the police have the y-DNA profile of one man, they also have that of a few generations along the paternal lines in his family. Experts said that while many other countries use this trait to aid criminal investigations, China’s approach stands out with its singular focus on collecting as many samples as possible. – and more here: Police in China Stalk Citizens With Surveillance That Predicts Future Crime
Davis Polk Asia chair withdraws from Hong Kong security law forum | Financial Times – Guessing that Davis Polk Asia didn’t do a thorough opportunity cost analysis before agreeing to participate in the Hong Kong National Security Law Forum. An alternative hypothesis that I have heard about Davis Polk Asia could be due to being really screwed globally and will ANYTHING for some billings. Even if David Polk Asia really desperate, I can’t imagine that there will be that much upside in the greater China market and maybe some backlash in the law firm’s other international and US domestic offices. The backlash happened as soon as the FT published news of their forthcoming participation. I can also imagine that the subsequent Davis Polk Asia withdrawal will cause blowback with mainland clients and government contacts. The smart play for Davis Polk Asia would have been to decline the place in the first instance. It is even more surprising when David Polk Asia could have looked at Mayer Brown pulling away from representing Hong Kong University last year was a case study in likely outcomes. Given that one would want solid wise heads in the senior staff of a law office rather than status seeking sycophants, the Davis Polk Asia chairman Mr Rogers doesn’t look like a credit to his firm. Discretion might have been the better part of valour in this case.
Shanghai lockdown exposes global supply chain strains | Financial Times – the Port of Los Angeles, for example, is monitoring data from China on energy consumption, traffic patterns and pollution, to understand how busy the country’s factories are so it can prepare for the volumes of cargo to come. “I’m on the phone most evenings with friends . . . in Shanghai telling me what’s happening on the ground,” – interesting how they’re having to rely on abstract data
As Q1 results disappoint, should brands look beyond China? | Advertising | Campaign Asia – brands were able to offset these losses thanks to the strength in North America and Europe. Aeffe, the parent company of Mochino, nearly tripled its net income in the three month period, as Europe (which represents almost one-third of its total revenue) jumped 37.5% thanks to Germany and the UK. Tapestry shares even climbed on May 12 after it posted that sales in North America rose 22% year-on-year, fully offsetting mid-teens decline in China. These two regions will be crucial as China slowly recovers from its worst Covid wave since 2020. Although the mainland is on track to become the world’s largest luxury market by 2025, the US is still in top spot, accounting for 31% of the global market (China accounts for 21%). As such, it is important for brands to continue building traction in North America and Europe to cushion against near-term losses in Asia
China Brief: Expanding State Power Still Tops Xi Jinping’s Agenda – The published speech shows how much of Xi’s economic thinking is about control, tied to what he sees as a necessary expansion of government power. The speech frames China’s problems as coming down to the “reckless expansion of capital,” or private industry, which can only be curbed by expanding the CCP’s power. That idea relates to one of Xi’s favorite terms from last year: “common prosperity,” achieved via the redistribution of wealth. Publishing the 2021 speech now may be an attempt to revitalize that language. Other Chinese officials, such as Premier Li Keqiang, are focused primarily on addressing economic issues, but party power still tops Xi’s agenda. One part of the speech may seem incompatible with its profession of socialist values: how conservative it sounds about welfare. Xi explicitly states that “common prosperity” isn’t welfare. His words also suggest a fear of overpromising what the government can deliver, but they also echo an idea I’ve heard from rich and powerful people in China—that people living in democracies never vote to cut welfare benefits because the public is lazy and entitled
Consumer behaviour
“Macho pink” menswear takes over in China | Vogue Business – “Macho pink” can be seen as a kind of “rebellion”, however, this rebellion currently remains limited to product categories considered mainstream for men, such as e-sports, sneakers and electronics. As male consumers in China put more emphasis on self-expression, this is validated to some extent by pink goods. – this reminds me of the bold neon colours of 1980s skiwear brands like Nevica. More on the social impact here: Millennial Pink Begone, Enter the Age of Hot Pink Fury | High Sobriety
Liberals Should Be Worried About the Conservative Comedy Scene – POLITICO – Conservative humorists aren’t merely catching up to their liberal counterparts in terms of reach and popularity. They’ve already caught them — and, in some cases, surpassed them, even as the liberal mainstream has continued to write conservative comedy off as a contradiction in terms. “[Liberals] are ceding ideological territory in the culture wars to the right via comedy,” Marx told me, noting that once-beloved liberal comedians like Stewart are struggling to find their footing in the treacherous landscape of post-Trump humor. “This thing that we thought we have owned for the last 20 years has been leaking, and the borders are slowly getting shifted.”
Company Reviews on Glassdoor: Petty Complaints or Signs of Potential Misconduct? – HBS Working Knowledge – Whether it’s Theranos and its fraudulent blood testing technology, Wells Fargo and its fake financial accounts, or Volkswagen and its bogus emissions data, a whistleblower eventually comes forward to expose the behavior, and executives are held accountable. “But what you start to realize is that the problems that have been uncovered have been going on for a very long time,” says Dennis Campbell, a professor of business administration at Harvard Business School. Far from being just a few bad apples, most business improprieties occur within a widespread culture of bad behavior—or at least, a lot of people looking the other way as misconduct is taking place, he says.
Koreans Think AI Is the Future – The Chosun Ilbo – 1/ artificial intelligence 2/ robotics 3/ future mobility 4/ hydrogen fuel 5/ energy 6/ biotechnology 7/ aerospace 8/ new materials 9/ batteries 10/ semiconductors – skews to Korea’s current strengths in semiconductors, hydrogen fuel cells and robotics
Luxury
LVMH-owned watchmaker Tag Heuer to accept crypto payments | Vogue Business – terrible timing given the bear market in crypto at the moment. Its also part of the odder financial aspects happening in the watch sector. From companies going vertical into the pre-owned marketplace to Breitling adopting a car lease type model for watches
Marketers, investing in market research is not superfluous – there is the big initial deep dive that happens when a new CMO arrives or a new product or market is contemplated. Second, there is the lesser but more common annual research that updates the organisation on the market, its segments and associated behaviour that feeds annual market planning. Finally, there is the more occasional inquiry into a specific micro issue that springs up. A pricing problem, a sudden reduction in market share or some other occasional issue that demands customer insight to guide management action
Hong Kong Considers Blocking Telegram Messaging App, Local Paper Says – Bloomberg – Hong Kong authorities are deliberating whether to curtail public access to the messaging service Telegram, the Sing Tao Daily reported, potentially reviving fears the former British colony is moving closer toward Beijing-style internet controls. The Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data is considering invoking regulations for the first time to restrict access to a platform it found to be rampant with doxxing, the local newspaper reported Tuesday. The widespread doxxing — or online exposure of sensitive and personal data — was aimed at government officials as well as citizens, the newspaper said, citing unidentified people.
Chinese Hackers Tried to Steal Russian Defense Data, Report Says – The New York Times – The emails landed on March 23 in the inboxes of scientists and engineers at several of Russia’s military research and development institutes, purportedly sent by Russia’s Ministry of Health. They carried a subject line that offered seemingly tantalizing information about a “list of persons under U.S. sanctions for invading Ukraine.” But the emails were actually sent by state-sponsored hackers in China seeking to entice their Russian targets to download and open a document with malware, according to a new report to be released Thursday by the Israeli-American cybersecurity firm Check Point… The Chinese campaign targeted Russian institutes that research airborne satellite communications, radar and electronic warfare
I think my interest in this vintage TV series Special Branch comes from a couple of places:
Sharing Mike Herron’s subversive books, Apple TV adaption and audio books with friends and my Dad
Sharing my love of John LeCarre with friends during lockdown
Special Branch was before my life time. The episodes start very much in the vein of a Le Carre or Len Deighton-type story. Later episodes were more human interest focused including an investigation of a religious cult. However one episode touches on the often overlooked post-war history of the British security services and military combatting Cypriot desire for independence.
You can see more episodes of Special Branch on YouTube here.
Genesis on luxury
This is an interesting event that Genesis took part in for marketing purposes. The tone of voice on the session was more about the ‘business of luxury’ rather than encouraging luxury consumption. It’s trying in a way that Lexus didn’t need to. Lexus let their engineering do the talking, by comparison luxury and fashion is something that Mercedes and BMW have increasingly lent into.
There is also no focus on sport in the way that BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Infiniti and Lexus have had.
Lights and shadows
A lovely collection of video footage showing light and shadow views in Japan. A good deal of it is the the same locations shot at different times of the day. There is some b-roll, TV and film footage mixed in for good measure.
Mysterious circles in the Sahara
My guess when I first saw this was oil exploration. I had worked in the oil industry before I went to university and heard the upstream and exploration adventures of older colleagues. This documentary is a fascinating journey to find out the truth and the limits of the internet and assumptions about modern industry practices not being a good guide of past practices. Without any further introduction I will leave you to this mystery of the Algerian desert.
Calculus on Pornhub
Taiwanese mathematics tutor puts calculus lessons on Pornhub. Attracts audience with attractive female assistants who clean the board. His rationale of taking his content to a less crowded platform can’t be faulted though.
An interesting essay on the nature of scientific slow down that applies as much to applied innovation as well – Scientific slowdown is not inevitable – Works in Progress – The most popular version of the low-hanging fruit model is that we are picking fruit at a slower rate because the higher-up fruit are harder to get to. You can only invent fire, the wheel, or a flint axe once. This story says that declining research productivity is inevitable. The fact that we once saw increasing scientific progress is because we were continually increasing inputs: adding more researchers, more research tools and technology. But now research is getting so much harder that even this is not enough. But another explanation for falling innovation ‘yields’ is that we are getting worse at picking it, despite the progress in picking methods that has happened. We’ve handed in our stepladders for footstools, without realising it. Our recent decline in innovation vibrancy might be explained by ideas becoming inherently harder to find, but it may just as easily be explained by us becoming worse at finding them. – The scientific slow down is real and is occurring across disciplines:
Pharmaceutical research is taking longer and there is a patent cliff on blockbuster drugs
Each process change in semiconductors costs more money and takes more time
Software takes more lines of code
But the scientific slow down might also be down to problems with incentives. Technology executive and engineer Judy Estrin talked about the way ‘hard innovation’ is no longer invested in compared to ‘soft innovation’. Innovation itself has become financialised with blockchain being like a snake eating its tale. The scientific slow down could be as much related to the incentives and choices that drive research. The scientific slow down could also be down to the divorce between developing and making things. Silicon Valley is no longer making silicon. So it is harder to foster an eco-system to deal with scientific slow down.
China Will Be Deglobalization’s Big Loser by Minxin Pei – Project Syndicate – China was headed toward at least a partial decoupling with the United States well before Russia invaded Ukraine. And it has been seeking to ensure that this process happens on its terms, by reducing its dependence on US markets and technology. To that end, in 2020 China unveiled its so-called dual-circulation strategy, which aims to foster domestic demand and technological self-sufficiency. And yet, last year, China was still the world’s largest exporter, shipping $3.3 trillion in goods to the rest of the world, with the US its leading export market. In fact, overall trade with the US grew by more than 20% in 2021, as total Chinese trade reached a new high. Trade with the European Union also grew, reaching $828 billion, even as disagreements over human rights torpedoed a controversial EU-China investment agreement.
Cleaning Up Streetwear’s Act | High Snobriety – the European Commission are proposing new standards which would dictate how durable apparel would need to be in addition to bans on the destruction of unsold materials. This comes at a time when a cavernous dichotomy exists between the cohort of people who require their products to be sustainably minded and the growing number of consumers who succumb to the whims of fast fashion led by retailers like Shein mushrooming to a $100 billion valuation
