Ged Carroll

Category: media | 媒體 | 미디어 | メディア

It makes sense to start this category with warning. Marshall McLuhan was most famous for his insight – The medium is the message: it isn’t just the content of a media which matters, but the medium itself which most meaningfully changes the ways humans operate.

But McLuhan wasn’t an advocate of it, he saw dangers beneath the surface as this quote from his participation in the 1976 Canadian Forum shows.

“The violence that all electric media inflict in their users is that they are instantly invaded and deprived of their physical bodies and are merged in a network of extensions of their own nervous systems. As if this were not sufficient violence or invasion of individual rights, the elimination of the physical bodies of the electric media users also deprives them of the means of relating the program experience of their private, individual selves, even as instant involvement suppresses private identity. The loss of individual and personal meaning via the electronic media ensures a corresponding and reciprocal violence from those so deprived of their identities; for violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less identity, the more violence.”

McLuhan was concerned with the mass media, in particular the effect of television on society. Yet the content is atemporal. I am sure the warning would have fitted in with rock and roll singles during the 1950s or social media platforms today.

I am concerned not only changes in platforms and consumer behaviour but the interaction of those platforms with societal structures.

  • Hawker markets & things this week

    Hawker markets

    Eating out is an important part of life in many Asian countries. Cheap eats in Singapore are provided by hawker markets. Imagine Asian street food, if it was run by Germans. They had a similar tradition to hawkers called da pai dang (大牌檔). But the Hong Kong government has slowly squeezed them out and there are now less than 25 left. Instead I used to usually go to small hole in the wall restaurants. Da pai dang are treasured by Hong Kong citizens; hawker markets are treasured by the Singaporean people and their government. Singaporean channel Our Grandfather Story put together a video on how to support offline hawker markets. Its also a great critique of online food services.

    MiniDisc

    Sony’s MiniDisc format was a fascinating format. Friends of mine used it to record DJ mixes as it gave better quality than cassette taps. But it never beat out the humble compact cassette as a universal media. I went from cassette tapes to recordable CDs. MiniDisc operated in an interesting technological and temporal space.

    It is a very cyberpunk retro-futuristic looking media. The optical disc in the protected diskette case. If you wanted data safe, secure and offline, then this form factor looks sensible. And Sony’s Blu-Ray in a diskette is used for archiving purposes today by Sony and Panasonic under the format name Archival Disc.

    When I look at the MiniDisc, I think of dinky portable player / recorders that were almost like the watch-makers art. If it hadn’t existed, anime and manga artists would have created it as a fictional device.

    It had a second life as a pre-iPod format that offered the shareability of cassette mixtapes.

    The secret life of MiniDisc in Japan is fascinating. All of the above factors and more are featured in this documentary.

    Apple Daily

    Hong Kong’s national security police arrested senior journalists at the Apple Daily.

    Hong Kong police arrest editor-in-chief of Apple Daily newspaper in morning raids | Hong Kong | The Guardian – Steve Li Kwai-wah, head of the police’s national security division, said there was “very strong evidence that the questionable articles played a very crucial part in the conspiracy, which provided ammunition for foreign countries, institutions and organisations to impose sanctions,” adding that those arrested played “a very important role” in their publication. The articles reportedly date back to 2019. Authorities have made repeated assurances since the implementation of the controversial and wide-ranging national security law in June 2020 that it was not retroactive.

    They seized journalist computer hard drives, money and materials. The Apple Daily team didn’t let that hold them back and live-streamed the publication of their early edition of Friday’s paper.

    Hong Kongers came out to support the newspaper, queuing and buying multiple copies of the Apple Daily paper at news stand as soon as the early edition was published.

    They have an English language version of the Apple Daily paper here and I urge you to consider subscribing via the Apple app store or the Google Play store.

    You don’t have to subscribe because the Apple Daily is the lone free voice in Hong Kong media; universally disliked by those in charge (and many who wish they were in charge). You can subscribe for Chinese and Hong Kong coverage that you wouldn’t otherwise see in English language media. Such as Alibaba’s Taobao e-commerce platform having over a billion data records taken. A huge hack not mentioned elsewhere yesterday in the media.

  • Fans + more news

    China is intensifying efforts to check the “chaotic” power of online celebrity fan clubs – Asian fans are something else, so this is not surprising. Asian Fans will spend a fortune on their favourite bands records. They will take out full page newspaper advertisements or billboards wishing their favourite artist happy birthday. In China, the party is always first, not pop stars. Fans will be clamped down on, unless they’re fans of Xi Jingping. More on what Asian fandom here.

    ‘Heavy’ versus ‘Light’ business philosophies in Chinese tech – Chinese Characteristics – really interesting idea to describe culture. Heavy is a business that relies on people to make to ‘make’ the product. TikTok would be heavy. Deepmind would be a light business. Heavy businesses tend to do soft innovation

    Chinese ecommerce site Shein hit with trademark disputes | Financial Times – “As long as they have the audience that they do, they’re going to determine that it’s worth their time and energy to move products as quickly as possible — even if some of those products violate intellectual property norms.” – business as usual in Chia then (paywall)

    Farewell, Millennial Lifestyle Subsidy – The New York Times – Uber journeys subsidised by VC money. I was reminded of the ludicrously low prices of dot.com era e-tailing sites

    Hong Kong star Karen Mok comes under fire in China for wearing Dolce & Gabbana in music video | South China Morning Post – The studio of Hong Kong pop singer Karen Mok has been forced to issue an apology after she prompted controversy on Chinese social media for wearing Dolce & Gabbana in her latest music video. The brand has been seen in some quarters as anti-Chinese following a 2018 controversy over an advertisement that showed an Asian woman trying to eat pizza and spaghetti with chopsticks. The adverts were criticised by mainland audiences for “publicly insulting China” and the crisis escalated after an online leak of screenshots from a private conversation showed Stefano Gabbana, the brand’s co-founder, making insulting remarks about the country. Gabbana and the brand’s co-founder Domenico Dolce eventually issued a public apology. – how fragile is the Chinese collective ego? This makes China look weak.

    The Telegram Billionaire and His Dark Empire – DER SPIEGEL – interesting if dramatic profile of Telegram messaging platform

    Japan’s Perceptions of Otaku: Then and Now – The Tokusatsu Network – interesting change in media and consumer attitudes to otaku. More people self identify as otaku, so the media has had to change. More Japan related content here.

    Retail Could Have A Bigger Comeback Than Expected. Here’s Why. – Robb Report – interesting US estimates – the National Retail Federation revised up its annual outlook: It predicted that retail sales will now grow between 10.5 percent and 13.5 percent to the range of $4.44 trillion to $4.56 trillion. That compares with $4.02 trillion in retail sales last year

    Brown Thomas and Arnotts could be changing owners – I wouldn’t be surprised if LVMH’s DFS business didn’t bid for Brown Thomas. Ireland is too small a market (even with tourists) for single brand boutiques

    Wikipedia’s Surprising Power in Shaping Science: A New MIT Shows How Wikipedia Shapes Scientific Research | Open Culture 

  • Web response times & things this week

    Web response times

    I have been working with colleagues on a point of view that is impacted by web response times. During the research aspect of this work I came across this video by Jakob Nielsen which explained web response times really well.

    Web response time resources

    Ralph Bakshi

    I might have mentioned once or twice how I like Ralph Bakshi’s fantasy films: The Lord of The Rings, Wizards and Fire and Ice. Bakshi used rotoscoping in ways that other directors have never managed to provide a unique animation experience that modern technology can’t beat.

    Forging Through the Darkness talks about Bakshi’s career

    Bakshi was making his DIY career back before computers or social platforms. Watching this film and seeing Bakshi’s punk-like attitude makes your Tik-Tok efforts seem lame by comparison. Secondly, a lot of the early opportunities that Bakshi got in animation are no longer available as the work would have been outsourced to India, China, Taiwan or Vietnam.

    The second film places Bakshi’s role in the animation in terms of the parallel track it takes to the New Hollywood movement that came to the fore in the early 1970s and finished with Heaven’s Gate.

    I was watching Nausicaä Of The Valley Of The Wind with a friend over the weekend and saw some visual similarities to Bakshi’s Wizards. According to IMDB Nausicaä Of The Valley Of The Wind was produced in 1984, some seven years after Bakshi’s Wizards.

    Japan population decline and relationship with the city

    Open culture have an article on the ghost towns of Japan. While Tokyo feels as busy as ever. There are small towns and rural areas that have become depopulated.

    I love the video made of a man who has turned a school building that no longer has children into a hostel, café and jam space for bands.

    While we’re on Japan. The 2002 documentary Tokyo Noise looks at how different Japanese artists experience, understand, interact and are inspired by Tokyo. It also covers a diverse range of issues including robotics and Shintoism.

    More Japan related content here.

    Are you scared yet, human?

    Panorama ran a documentary that feels like Adam Curtis doing a programme for the BBC’s Horizon series that explores the area of machine learning. You can argue about the content of the film, but it has provided a base level of understanding on the area to the general public. Politicians watching this show will feel as if they are industry experts as the closing credits roll; instead of viewing it as a starting point for wider reading. I think that this might set the tone in terms of regulation for many years to come.

    It misses AI winters and the fact that the technology is only ‘smart’ in very narrow areas. For instance, understanding content and autonomous driving both have their stubborn problems. It misses the fact that what we see now is based on thinking coming out of Canadian academia in the 1980s, that hasn’t been moved on much further.

    https://youtu.be/P1VKB0u86Qs

    As cryptocurrency has shown there are physical limits to how much computing power that can be thrown at a machine learning problem.

    Technology is a threat in the hands of authoritarian regimes. A classic example of this is the relationship that the Nazis had with IBM.

    Finally, I will leave you with a nicely done public safety video coming out of Denmark about the need for wearing helmets when riding a vehicle (or a horse).

  • 6G development + more things

    6G development

    Japan teams up with Finland on 6G development – Nikkei Asia the consortium on 6G development features a number of familiar names. On the Japanese side the following organisations are involved:  includes NTT, NTT DOCOMO, KDDI, SoftBank, Rakuten Mobile and the University of Tokyo. I was a bit surprised not to see NEC here as they are Japan’s domestic telecoms equipment manufacturer. From Finland you have the following 6G development partners: University of Oulu and Nokia. (Paywall)

    Culture

    Part one of what is due to be a three part podcast: oral history of The Avalanches – Since I left you 

    Ethics

    The Secret IRS Files: Trove of Never-Before-Seen Records Reveal How the Wealthiest Avoid Income Tax — ProPublica – validation of what everyone suspected. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was a strategic leak by the Biden administration

    Finance

    China’s bid for digital-yuan sphere raises red flags at G-7 – Nikkei Asia – total information awareness of global markets, surveillance and money that can be invalidated at the push of a key….

    Indian tycoons surpass Chinese tech moguls in global rich list | Financial Times – which says more about the Chinese government clipping the laissez faire approach to its tech entrepreneurs

    Luxury

    Why Shenzhen – not Hong Kong – is luxury’s new golden ticket – only Hong Kong’s property oligarchs will be sad to see this happen

    Marketing

    ‘How the hell have we allowed this to happen?’ Rory Sutherland on creative devaluation | Campaign Live – I think that its down to a wider marketing focus on performance marketing rather than brand building

    Olympics: India drops Chinese kit sponsor ahead of Tokyo Games | Olympics News | Al Jazeera – not great for Li-Ning

    Media

    The underground zines that kept self-expression alive in Mao’s China – The Boston Globe – Despite Beijing’s tight control of the printed word and its dissemination, a new and diffuse network of underground printers — low-tech, affordable, remarkably flexible, and incredibly hard to police — springs up. Equipped with nothing more than Chinese typewriters, mimeograph machines, and stencil duplicators, underground publishers mass-produce an untold quantity of materials for a vast and diverse readership.

    Security

    How to Turn Off Amazon Sidewalk | WIRED – For the Echo family of speakers, open the Alexa mobile app and go to More, Settings, Account Settings, Amazon Sidewalk and choose Disable. In the Ring app, go to the Control Center, Amazon Sidewalk, Disable, Confirm.

    Technology

    iPhone? AirPods? MacBook? You Live in Apple’s World. Here’s What You Are Missing. – WSJ – (paywall) more Apple related content here.

    Web of no web

    Finnish Group Readies Non-cellular Technology for IoT – EE Times Europe

  • AgXeed + more news

    AgXeed

    Claas acquires share in Dutch robot manufacturer | Irish Farmers Journal – Claas has acquired a minority shareholding in Dutch start-up AgXeed B.V, with the aim of co-operating on the development and commercialisation of autonomous agricultural machines. AgXeed makes robot tracked tractors that look suspiciously like vehicles from the first Terminator movie. Automation like AgXeed is going to become more important in agriculture at labour moves to the cities and farming consolidates. You can see how unskilled factory work is also having to look at automation in the below piece from the South China Morning Post. AgXeed is the flip side of the coin to industrial robotics.

    As China’s working population falls, factories turn to machines to pick up the slack | South China Morning Post – makes a lot of sense for a brand like Midea who needs less precision than say a smartphone assembly line

    Beauty

    What’s driving the Chinese boom in cosmetics for children? | Vogue Business – In China, it’s more socially acceptable these days to show individual identity in looks. Parents born in the 1980s or 1990s are less likely to curb their daughters’ interest in beauty products and may even encourage it. The current boom is certainly one to watch: according to data from Kaola, in May 2020, sales in China of children’s cosmetics were up by more than 1,200 per cent year-on-year. Disney’s sales alone were up by 100 per cent over the same period. 

    In China, children’s cosmetics are defined as those for children aged 12 and under. On e-commerce platforms, a quick search for children’s cosmetics brings up dozens of brands and thousands of products, with prices ranging widely. Products are typically sold in sets, including colourful eye shadows, blush, lip gloss, nail polish, compact powder and makeup brushes

    Consumer behaviour

    What Gen Z Really Think And Why You Should Care – GWI – at least the author was thinking about life stages when they wrote this copy

    Energy

    Hydrogen plant planned for Cork but viable market yet to emerge 26 May 2021 | The Irish Farmers Journal – but if there isn’t hydrogen production, there won’t be hydrogen infrastructure and marketplace.

    Hong Kong

    EXCLUSIVE Hong Kong threatens Lai’s bankers with jail if they deal in his accounts | Reuters – “We can now see that any banking relationship you have centred on Hong Kong makes you vulnerable under the national security law – that is going to be a big wake-up call for the wealth management industry here, and their rich clients,“

    China’s Communist Party chips away at Hong Kong business houses | The Economist – Expropriations may violate local law. But laws can be changed, as the imposition of new security and electoral rules show. Such an outcome looks “all too believable”, says Mr Blennerhassett. The tycoons thought “they didn’t have to do anything as long as they didn’t question Beijing”, says Joseph Fan of Chinese University of Hong Kong. Now the Communist Party will not even settle for overt expressions of fealty. It appears intent on extracting value, too. – not terribly surprising. The hubris of Hong Kong business people is surprising, even to someone like me

    Legal

    British Business in China: Position Paper – British Chamber of Commerce in China | Beijing – Chinese data protection rules a key issue

    Luxury

    Can Gucci Sell High-End Watches To China? | Jing Daily – “Gucci’s high-priced watches are lacking legitimacy. Real watch collectors will not buy,” Müller concludes. In fact, the expansion into high-end watches may not help Gucci attract new clientele but will undoubtedly enhance the Italian maison’s prestige. As the luxury entry barrier lowers, the brand is required to expand in the high-end sphere to retain its exclusivity and appeal to local high net worth buyers

    Marketing

    The Test Screening That Almost Killed Fast Times at Ridgemont High | Slate – such a great interview, but would you have a cultural moment like that now; or would it be over like yesterday’s news or a TikTok meme?

    Media

    China’s Hottest Livestream Trend: Fraud – The episode was a disaster for Li. Her company had paid 200,000 yuan ($31,000) upfront just to secure a spot on the influencer’s show. It had also stocked over 4,000 boxes of shakes, anticipating a sales bonanza. But in the end, they hadn’t earned a single yuan. “Apart from the financial losses, we felt humiliated,” says Li. “All the other employees at the company were whispering that our team was totally fooled.” – ad fraud is universal but this one seems to be particularly shocking

    Technology

    iFixit tells the sad story of how Samsung “ruined” its upcycling program | Ars Technica – “Samsung, like every manufacturer, should set their old phones free. Open up their bootloaders. Let people use their cameras, sensors, antennas, and screens for all kinds of purposes, using whatever software people can dream up. The world needs fun, exciting, and money-saving ways to reuse older phones, not a second-rate tie-in to yet another branded internet-of-things ecosystem.“

    Web of no web

    Europe looks to the end of the mobile phone | EE News Europe – The aim is AR glasses that are wearable all day and weigh less than 60g with a 500mW power consumption. “We can achieve that this year with 1000nits for outdoor brightness, compared to 500nits that needs darkened lenses, and a 30 to 50 degree field of view (FoV) is enough,” he said. 

    “In the end there is a tradeoff in power consumption. The way you build the relay optics is where you lose the field of view. Increasing the field of view means the energy is relayed into the comb of the lenses so the limitation is on the capabilty of the waveguide to have a good colour uniformity across the field of view, and we are working with waveguide makers to get to 60 to 70deg. Today Hololens has 55 degree field of view for example but the military were asking for 85 degrees.” – more related content here.

    US-China tech war: China’s GPS rival BeiDou poised to support industry worth US$156 billion by 2025 | South China Morning Post