Herbivore man + more news

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Herbivore man

FT.com: Korea’s white van man is a herbivore“Herbivore man is a dandy metrosexual with an abhorrence of martial arts. He has no qualms about ordering wine or soft drinks instead of Korea’s fiery spirits, de rigueur among the old guard. Dried-fish woman is an impeccably dressed model employee, but after work she just wants to lounge on the sofa in a track suit, watch television and munch on dried squid. Both are rebels from Korea’s crippling and prohibitively expensive treadmill of education, marriage and family, hailed as the be-all and end-all by the taciturn older generation. As consumers, they lavish money on their free time, buying DVDs, furniture and comfort food. In a society that prides itself on being collectivist, they are suspicious loners. Herbivore man is particularly distasteful to the macho fathers and grandfathers whose values were forged in Korea’s agricultural and highly militarised past.” – Herbivore man likely didn’t benefit from the explosion of the chaebols, instead herbivore man has seen the likes of Samsung strangle opportunity

Design

Not Your Daddy’s Longboard | Fast Company

Economics

Economics: What went wrong with economics | The Economist 16th July 2009

Lending binge | The Economist – interesting Chinese economic statistics and analysis

How to

Airport travelators actually slow passengers down – New Scientist (July 18, 2009) – Something to bear in mind when navigating around an airport.

Ideas

The Meteoric Rise of the App Store

Japan

JeanSnow.net — The Otaku Encyclopedia – everything you wanted to know about manga, anime and more

Trends in Japan » Tokyo Girls Collection Fall 2009 – great article on the brand diversification strategy of Tokyo Girls Collection. Their last event attracted over 23,000 in-person attendees. Interesting the way that they have expanded into health & wellness.

Luxury

Burberry and the Next Big Brands to Come From the East | The Green Room | Fast Company

Media

Twitter is not for teens, Morgan Stanley told by 15-year-old expert | Business | guardian.co.uk – it amazes me how the media industry was blown away by this, given that there are lots of sources which already have the same content as this ‘revolutionary’ research note

Stephen Fry Admits He’s a BitTorrent Pirate | TorrentFreak

Online

FT.com / Technology – Yahoo renews vow to fight Microsoft – yeah right. Bartz has already put the white flag up the pole in Sunnyvale with the search deal and her comments about the Yahoo! China deal.

Software

Why Google’s Chrome OS Is Not in Your Future | TechWatch | Fast Company

Does Social Networking Breed Social Division? – NYTimes.com

Digital Evangelist: All that is wrong with the US view of mobile

Daring Fireball: Microsoft’s Long, Slow Decline – not sure that it is a long slow decline. Microsoft has moved to being a value company like GE or Caterpillar rather than being a growth company like Google. Apple has always positioned itself as a popular but premium product company. Discussions around the Daring Fireball post over at Hack News flagged lots of interesting points both for and against.

Web of no web

Mobile augmented reality: Reality, improved | The Economist

Wireless

Six in 10 companies plan to skip Windows 7: survey | Technology | Reuters

HK green light for fixed-mobile portability – but the telecoms companies will fight this tooth and nail

Digital Evangelist: Confusion over the Handset market