Culture was the central point of my reason to start this blog. I thought that there was so much to explore in Asian culture to try and understand the future.
Initially my interest was focused very much on Japan and Hong Kong. It’s ironic that before the Japanese government’s ‘Cool Japan’ initiative there was much more content out there about what was happening in Japan. Great and really missed publications like the Japan Trends blog and Ping magazine.
Hong Kong’s film industry had past its peak in the mid 1990s, but was still doing interesting stuff and the city was a great place to synthesise both eastern and western ideas to make them its own. Hong Kong because its so densely populated has served as a laboratory of sorts for the mobile industry.
Way before there was Uber Eats or Food Panda, Hong Kongers would send their order over WhatsApp before going over to pay for and pick up their food. Even my local McDonalds used to have a WhatsApp number that they gave out to regular customers. All of this worked because Hong Kong was a higher trust society than the UK or China. In many respects in terms of trust, its more like Japan.
Korea quickly became a country of interest as I caught the ‘Korean wave’ or hallyu on its way up. I also have discussed Chinese culture and how it has synthesised other cultures.
More recently, aspect of Chinese culture that I have covered has taken a darker turn due to a number of factors.
Reddit have interviewed geek heroes. In each interview they discuss their formative moments for a series of videos on YouTube. The complete playlist is below. Steve Wozniak aka Woz is one of the geek heroes highlighted . It’s a a quality interview with the Woz on form on various topics. You can read more about Woz here.
Holly Herndon and Jace Clayton in conversation. Holly and Jace are interesting characters. They are academics, at least one published book author and artists. They have explored areas such as sampling themselves and the use of machine learning in composition and sound creation.
Holly Herndon on process is fascinating. I think this has wider implications for creative industries. It does raise question about the nature of creation itself in terms of intellectual property.
James Lavelle on the history of Mo’Wax. These films by FACT magazine are nice. Although they miss a few things.
Lavelle’s impact goes beyond music:
Lavelle has managed to self destruct and reinvent himself, which is only obliquely touched upon in this footage.
More on the history of Mo’Wax. There is more serendipity in this than this video lets on. Also Japan’s Major Force Records needs more kudos than seems to happen in this video. If you liked this it is well worthwhile checking out the
How J&J Research Led From Bath-Time to a Mobile Sleep App | Digital – AdAge – fascinating story how consumer insights can dramatically shake up product development and or service design
The idea for 6 things learned in a corporate environment came from having spent four months working day-in, day-out onsite at a large corporate.
What other things learned in a corporate environment have you come across?
Come to Singapore! The Sights (And Branding) Are Lovely | WIRED – it feels very Monocle-esque in terms of editorial style. Come to Singpore! is very different to the Conde Naste Traveller type editorial. Singapore is aiming at developing a start-up culture so targetingWired (US) readers make a good deal of sense. More Singapore related posts here.
William Gibson on the decline of cyberspace. It is fascinating in terms of how Gibson’s inspiration has evolved over time. He was reacting against genres that he didn’t want to write as much as ideas he wanted to convey. The ability to say no, is a very interesting creative process and it reminds me of an interview I saw with an Apple executive talking about why the iPod didn’t have an FM radio.
Interesting to see Renault going back to Alpine’s sports roots with the Vision sports coupe. It is made to a similar formula to the original 1960s cars that made Alpine famous. A light, small car, a rear-mid engine placement with a highly tuned small capacity engine. Performance is viewed by the Alpine team in much more holistically with an equal focus on handling and breaking.
I am a sucker for well done manufacturing and process films. The first one up is from Tesla, highlighting robots working in a manufacturing cell on their X model vehicle. Tesla has had problems around areas like panel fit. I am not sure if they have resolved those quality issues, but robots should provide them with a very consistent process and higher throughput.
China’s highest-grossing film of all time Monster Hunt flops in US, takes in $21,000 during opening weekend: Shanghaiist – interesting that they didn’t bother to put some marketing wallop behind Monster Hunt, they had enough time to do a good English dub (great way to get Asian Americans on board) and push it out to a more general audience in the US. It would have been a great China soft power vehicle. Instead a China soft power opportunity was lost.
Then there is the other view, that Monster Hunt performed to expectations. There is a possibility that its Chinese ticket sales were inflated. I and others that I know have gone to see a western film on more than one occasion in a Chinese cinema. The ticket is rang out as a local film and then the screen number is crossed out and the western movie screen number written on by the assistant.
Secondly, Monster Hunt didn’t spawn a Toy Story-esque merchandise avalanche in China and other Asian markets. Which indicates it wasn’t that much of a cultural moment and ergo, not as successful as one would believe. More China related posts here.
Blu-ray Isn’t Going Anywhere – Park Associates – interesting demographic pattern of ownership – “Owners have higher incomes than the overall broadband household population as well as a strong preference for the highest-quality video.“
Hillary Clinton is losing young voters to Bernie Sanders. | Slate – not scientific but interesting. It also gives an interesting viewpoint on Corbyn’s political chances.
Arriving at San Francisco – interesting delve into Apple’s new system font. Unfortunately I can’t download it in a format to use it in documents
StarTech Unveils Dual-Display Thunderbolt 2 Docking Station with 12 Ports – AnandTech – this looks like all my peripheral prayers were answered. I ended up with two of these. They work well for handling by two Apple Cinema displays
Who Killed Nokia? Nokia Did | INSEAD Alumni Magazine – Despite being an exemplar of strategic agility, the fearful emotional climate prevailing at Nokia during the rise of the iPhone froze coordination between top and middle managers
Why Yahoo Couldn’t Adapt to the Smartphone Era – The New Yorker – the irony is that they got on mobile services early. Yahoo! Go had been launched when I was there at the beginning of 2006. It was a one stop shop to search, access email, share photos on Flickr, get news and access Yahoo! Finance. Christian Lindholm was at Yahoo! back then. He was the director in charge of the S60 operating system interface at Nokia prior to
LLVM Patches Confirm Google Has Its Own In-House Processor – Phoronix – interesting that they have a custom processor, it is related to their internal network infrastructure
Why Jeep’s $10M Super Bowl Ad Only Used a Third of the Screen | WIRED – interesting example of online considerations driving TV creative decisions – mobile devices
Telemundo to Build New $250 Million Miami Headquarters – The Wrap – which indicates how big the Latin media market is
On the hypothetical eventuality of no more free internet – FT – interesting discussion of Internet economics and how it relates to the commons (paywall)
CBS Says Super Bowl 50 Broke Streaming Records With 3.96 Million Unique Viewers | TechCrunch – which is still relatively small compared to broadcast TV audiences for major events such as this
Akamai earnings call hints at Apple CDN – Business Insider – not terribly surprising, Akamai has strategic partnerships with Apple rivals as well. Akamai earnings hint at the service’s ubiquity
US intelligence chief: we might use the internet of things to spy on you | Technology | The Guardian – not terribly surprising, each technological frontier represents opportunities and IoT won’t be any different in that respect. The very pervasiveness of IoT is what makes it such a security risk
Come to Singapore! The Sights (And Branding) Are Lovely | WIRED – it feels very Monocle-esque content on Singapore
This Google app could forever change the way you travel – Google’s translation app has a new feature that will come in handy for travelers. You point your smartphone’s camera at a sign printed in a foreign language, and Google’s translation technology