using my australian mobile phone’s proving to be exorbitant, and i’m going to be here for a while, so i’ve decided to get a korean mobile phone… yes! very excited. currently it’s very cheap to get a phone if one’s prepared to subscribe to KTF or LGT. SKT, once the most popular, has been losing popularity for a while, especially since the launch of KTF’s new 3G+ service, Show (but largely because of the concurrent ‘free phone offers’ for those who’s bringing their numbers over to KTF; LGT offer the same kind of deals, but people don’t seem to have much respect for this company that started with PCS phone services). i’ve previously talked - briefly - about how video call was painted to be the next big thing in Korea, and yes, Show’s mainly about that. however, as i’ve found out by talking to my friends here, it’s still considered to be ‘too expensive’ and thus ‘not worth it’ - as a video phone user (of a few years), i’m not surprised. i never really liked and rarely used the feature. let us be private multitaskers as we are and desire to be, perhaps ;)

anyway, STK’s keen to claim the emperor(ess)’s seat again in the over-saturated Korean mobile world, and they’re ambitiously going to release 7 new samsung phones in a few weeks. not sure if it’s worth waiting. i know that i would like SKT - my roaming phone’s with KTF and the connection’s been very unsatisfactory. besides, i would really like to try the RFID ordering system at the Shinchon McDonald’s. i don’t go to mcdonald’s pretty much ever (except when my niece wants an oreo mcflurry), but i would really like to try this service. if unable, i think i’ll just grab anyone there and ask if i could use their phone :)

SKT has also done some very interesting tv ads about video calls - ‘mastering video calling’ (but interestingly, it’s really about how to look beautiful for it); there have been four lessons so far:

more interestingness when considered in relation to:

1. some of Larissa Hjorth’s work on gendered use of the mobile phone in Korea
   • Hjorth, Larissa. “Snapshots of Almost Contact: Gendered Camera Phone Practices and a Case Study in Seoul, Korea.” Cultural Space and Public Sphere in Asia. Ed. Shin Dong Kim. Seoul, Korea, 2006: 211-32.
   • Hjorth, Larissa, and Heewon Kim. “Being There and Being Here: Gendered Customising of Mobile 3g Practices through a Case Study in Seoul.” Convergence 11.2 (2005): 49-55.
2. Lee, Dong-Hoo. “Women’s Creation of Camera Phone Culture”. Fibreculture Journal 6 (3 Oct. 2006). <http://journal.fibreculture.org/issue6/issue6_donghoo.html>
3. Korea: Is being good-looking a privilege? (GlobalVoices)
4. SOUTH KOREA: the dark horse of medical travel (International Medical Travel Journal)
5. Bae Yong-Joon, Hybrid Masculinity & the Counter-coeval Desire of Japanese Female Fans (Particip@tions)
6. korean film, ‘200 pounds of beauty (미녀는 괴로워)’ (2006)

Just in case I was too subtle last time about the race and gender politics of the personification of technology in the ‘Get a Mac’ ads, here are two new ones (one, two). I’m speechless.

girl in pink:
“even I know stuff like this”