This popular teen boy band known as Dong Bang Shin Gi (DBSG or DBSK - in Chinese cultures, TVXO) officially became the public ambassador for the Korean e-government last week.

image from this article (in Korean)

They’re very popular in Korea, and in many Asian countries; they’re probably one of the strongest forces behind the Korean Wave at the moment, music-wise anyway. And no, I don’t know who did their hair.

Korea’s been doing alright in the area of e-governance, regardless of what’s happening in the realm of actual governance and politics. So more accurately, Korea’s been doing alright in terms of e-government readiness. It ranked 5th in the UN’s Global E-government Readiness Report 2005, following USA, Denmark, Sweden, and UK.

South Korea remains one of the world leaders in e-government. Its central services portal, egov.go.kr, continues to offer citizens the opportunity to complete a vast array of government related transactions through several payment options, including digital currency. It also provides a “service cart” similar to the shopping cart feature on e-commerce sites, allowing the user to select, apply for, and pay for several services in one transaction. The site also features the ability for users to register in order to personalize services.

The Republic of Korea is also home to one of the most impressive e-procurement implementations through its continued development of the Government e-Procurement System (GePS) as a single window for public procurement, which provides full integration (www.g2b.go.kr)
– original article here

Having a popular boy band as the public ambassador would definitely have a positive effect on attracting young (in their teens) citizens. I personally think that it would’ve been great if more focus had been placed on senior citizens or even people in ther 40+. These are the people who have to deal with citizenry issues right now, but without much needed education or training to use what’a already there. Young ones, for sure, will naturally learn to use these services when they need to, because it’s simply easier and more convenient for them to go online and ’sort things out’ than going to little and big offices scattered all around the city.

I don’t know. Perhaps this is the government’s attempt at meeting the demand in one of the most desired career sector in Korea right now: public servant. According to the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, Korea is currently the 11th largest economy in the world. However, the element of “stability” in career has been probably “the most important” element of consideration ever since the Asian Financial Crisis, when many people suddenly lost their jobs (and their lives, for some). There are people - many older people, including my parents - who are still suffering from the loss/es occurred during that time. And they are suffering without any support - or intention to support - from the government, not only financially but also welfare-wise… well in any way, really. So it really does annoy me that these people are ignored yet again when they are really in need of consideration. Foolishness.

I’ve lost my mobile phone twice recently - within three days.

The first time I lost it was when I was walking to work from home on Saturday. A friend of mine called me to discuss our plans for the evening and either because I was in a bad reception area or because her rather moody phone didn’t want us to talk anymore, we couldn’t reach each other for several minutes. I kept trying to call, but gave up, and put the phone back into my bag. Then I walked on with my Ipod’s volume down, so that I can hear my phone ringing when my friend calls. I walked on for another several minutes and decided that I should call her. I’m on a monthly capped plan, so I have enough freedom to call someone without worrying about the bill or running out of prepaid credit. Changing to this capped plan has made a huge difference in how I communicate and work, but that’s for another discussion or a blog entry.

So I put my hand into my bag and moved it around, waiting for that sensation of my skin touching the skin of my mobile phone pouch. Eventually I had to stop and actually look inside the bag. I had my wallet, notebook, and water… but no mobile. I had to look several times until I could really accept that the phone was no longer there. I panicked and walked up and down the streets between where I was and where I had stopped talking on the phone.

I was devastated. I couldn’t gather my thoughts together. I think there were some worries about forth-coming “very important” phone calls, some possible plans about how I could “triangulate” the location of the phone and whether such a method was even possible in Australia, regrets about why it wasn’t insured, and also the worry that I may have to get a new number and it’s going to be hell to try to remember it. I went on a renewed contract recently, and this phone (Sony Ericsson K800i) is not one of the cheaper models available, so the financial consequences (let’s not forget I’m a PhD student) were to be significant. Besides, I “borrowed” my sister’s rare phone pouch (without much intention to return - it’s related to this animation that’s related to my research … complicated story.. or excuse) and it was still officially hers, not mine. Losing it would bring about some serious sibling dispute.

Amongst all these thoughts and emotions though, the biggest was the helpless feeling of loss. As I was walking up and down like a crazy woman (luckily I didn’t howl or anything in my mournful state) I was completely lost in the overwheleming emotion stemming from the idea that I may never get to see some of those saved text messages and photos again. Unlike Japan, we still predominantly use sms for messaging rather than mobile email. With the phone gone, important fragments of my life vanished. Those sweet and bitter messages from past lovers (at least those I hadn’t deleted while cursing), beautiful moments of my life I visually captured, things I wanted to send but never could so were saved in my draft folder… all these were gone. I was devastated.

After a while I gained some rationality back and decided to call the phone. No answer. No answer.

Eventually a guy picked up. But as soon as I said “I think you have my mobile” he stopped talking and I could hear him talking with a woman about what he should do. He was saying that he really liked the phone etc. He hung up. I was really afraid that he wouldn’t return the phone because well… he liked it very much. I called again and again, and thought that if he really wanted to keep it, I would ask him to at least give me a chance to tranfer my history into … whatever was to replace my Sony Erikson K800i. He eventually picked up again, and we arranged to meet. He initially suggested that we meet on Monday, but I just could not wait that long… and why should I? We were within a very close proximity. So happily, I got my phone back, thanked him, and was the happiest person in the world for a while.

Today my phone is elsewhere. I think it’s in my office. I’m pretty sure it is; in fact, I know it is, so although it’s not here with me physically, I’m fine. Thanks to auto-refreshing gmail, I promptly receive important messages. Just a few minutes ago, I arranged to meet a friend tomorrow morning (we haven’t IM’ed each other yet). I knew that he would’ve messaged or called rather than sending an email to make such a suggestion (at 10pm to meet tomorrow morning), so I assumed that he had tried to call; I checked my mobile email, which stores voice messages, and yes, he was righ there :)

Through these experiences, I’ve come to think more about the embeddedness of the mobile phone in my life (physically, socially, and psychologically), personal narrative/history and the role of the mobile in constructing and storing it, multi-layered techno-social networks in which both I and the phone act as nodes, and the feeling of “loss” in general. What does it mean to “possess” something in relation to tangibility? What does it mean to be without a mobile phone?

Good think these past three days made me think. But at least for a while, I would like to be spared from the feeling/s of loss.

Jeon Do-yeon won the Best Actress award at the 60th Cannes Film Festival, which ended on Sunday, for her role in Lee Chang-song’s “Secret Sunshine.” Jeon is the first Korean and second Asian actress to win the award for best actress at the prestigious international film festival.
– original article here

I haven’t seen the film “Secret Sunshine” - or Miryang in Korean - but I’m pleased to hear that Do-eyon Jeon’s won this thing. She’s been consistently good.

(original image from the above article)

The above article says that “Jeon’s achievement suggests the global film industry is paying attention not only to Korean movies but finally to Korean actors.” I don’t agree with this completely, but it’s been pretty hard not to pay attention for the industry to what’s happening in Korean cinema/entertainment scene, particularly with the Korean Wave (otherwise known as Hallyu or Hanryu). At its peak in 2004, the Korean Wave contributed to 0.18% increase in the national GDP of Korea. Pretty impressive, especially when Korea’s been known for long as a heavily, boringly, and undeniably industrial country with the brand of OEM.

The big shake-up came with a government report in mid-90s, urging then the president Young Sam Kim to make ways for the AV industry to flourish as one of the national strategic industry. The report presented a comparison between Jurassic Park and Hyundai cars (proud national symbol of globalisation ;) ) and showed how the film had generated two years’ worth of Hyundai car exports. ALARM BELL RINGING FURIOUSLY IN KOREA AT THIS POINT… “WHAT? HOW IS SUCH A THING POSSIBLE? WHAT IS THIS THING CALLED ENTERTAINMENT (SOME CALL IT CULTURE) BUSINESS??” Subsequently, globalisation or segyehwa became the national agenda. And voila the Korean Wave, money, better diplomatic relations, and growing national pride.

Unfortunately for Korea, recent years have seen a dimishing of the Korean Wave. I, for one, have been critical of the same formulaic stories and sense of humour that have been apparent across different fields of pop cultural production. As many claim - and I agree - a lot of that great success came directly from celebrities, perhaps more so than from the quality of production, promotion etc. (Yon-sama is a living example). Celebrities fade away. Very quickly in the case of Korea (I’ve mentioned a couple of times about the paripari - hurryhurry- mentality in this blog).

And it seems that Korean films are not having a wonderful time at this year’s Cannes, just like their cousins (Korean dramas).

Business was locked in slo-mo for Korean sales companies this week in Cannes. Most confessed to having had a miserable time, despite their high-profile booths and well-backed promotion campaigns … Korean films have had a pretty rotten time at home too. Market share this year has slipped from the 60%-plus enjoyed last year.
– original article here

Ah- trouble. There was a survey done by Cetizen, a mobile community site (in Korean) - about the reasons behind changes in the frequency of cinema going last year. 51.6% of the participants attributed the decrease to the fact that they no longer were getting discounts with their mobile subscription (see this article - in Korean). It used to be the case that once you become a subscriber to a particular provider, then you get a membership card, which gives you discounts at various venues such as cinemas, theme parks, restaurants, and shops. It appears that these big telcos haven’t been diligenly keeping their promises, and as a result, many previously available benefits are disappearing… quickly. The consequences of this disappearance? Appearing quickly.

I just can’t understand why silly things like this are happening in Korea. Once in a (nation’s) life-time opportunity’s going, or perhaps already (almost completely) gone.

KOREA, please let the mobile culture (mobile technologies and all inter-related domains) grow - organically, complexly, and strongly. And please do your best to keep your much-celebrated screen quota in place; please remove those re-introduced download limits on broadband; and multiple pleases for you to take creativity seriously and encourage people to be more free in their creative expressions and interactions - eventually they will generate financial profit, if not immediately (paripari). People, technology, and culture. Please get this amazing connection and do something about it… quickly. Now.

congratulations to (soon to be) dr. jean burgess.

May is the “month of family” or on a more corporeal level, the “month of gifts” in Korea.
There’s the children’s day on May 5, mother’s day on May 8, and teachers’ day on May 15.

With the typical “gift giving culture,” May gets a little crazy for everyone trying to find suitable presents - imagine the life of a 32 year old person. You need to buy presents for your parents and grand parents, your children, your children’s teachers, and your own teachers (past and present if you’re still in contact), your nieces and nephews… perhaps May deserves a title like “the month of hemorrhage.”

KTF is offering a special “txting filial piety” service to “create a space of communication with parents” for many users who are often “too shy” to express their feelings and gratitude (see the original newswire article here - in Korean). This particular service has two sub-categories:

1. Free filial piety MMS alarm service
   The user can subscribe to this free service and receive an MMS on their phone every morning. The content of the message itself is something along the lines of “I love you” and “Thank you.” The user can then send on that message to their parent/s. KTF claims that this will also have a positive effect of allowing the parents to become more familiarised with the technology of txting - something that their demographics don’t normally use.
2. Txt music and background decoration service
   As long as the user includes one of these words - “mother,” “father,” “mum,” or “dad” - in a txt and add * at the end of the receipient’s phone number, suitable music and background image (according to those terms) will be automatically inserted, turning a simple txt message into a more emotive MMS message. I’m assuming that there are other available terms, though I’m having trouble viewing content on the KTF website at the moment (I’m on a Mac using Safari and Firefox).

I kind of like these clever ideas. They’re quite lovely. And it’s very interesting how the free filial piety alarms are sent to the user, not the user’s parents, which means the user will need to pay to forward them on to their parent/s. I guess this prevents the messages from turning into spams; this 2005 article reports that 95.8 per cent of Korean cell phone users have received advertisements on their handsets, and 41.8 per cent of the survey respondents reported that they receive spam messages once or twice a week. The numbers undoubtedly have increased since then.

My mother doesn’t bother at all with smss as she knows that all she’s getting is either spam or some sort of notification that she’s already aware of anyway. So although the first few “I love you; thank you” messages may be lovely and touching, the whole idea might lose its charm within a few days and become absolutely annoying instead. And another interesting aspect of this is that forwarding the MMS everyday will incur financial commitment from the user. So it’s a “legitimate gift” with financial involvement.

I think very soon - probably tomorrow - I should get some of those “legitimate gifts” to send my own parents too, in a manner that’s slightly slower than MMS or 100mb broadband, but with genuine love and thanks :)

From purikura (print club) to videkura (video club) to something else … sensekura, perhaps?

I’ve never quite enjoyed the whole video call idea, because to me, it felt more like a hinderance to my mobility and multifocal tendencies. However, Videkura is different in that the interaction initiative is an active one: you don’t go in and do videkura unless you want to; it’s an active form of playing.

and social.

why would you do it unless 1) you’re with friends and you want to play with them in this space and/or 2) share the outcome with other friends? Mizuko Ito and Daisuke Okabe have done a study on the social uses of purikura, which has some interesting points (view their paper here). I believe that social playing is fundamentally crucial to humanity not only because it makes people happier by means of pleasure (which I think is the key importance of playing) but also because that’s where not “coercion” but “negotiation” of the familiar and foreign can occur, leading to mergings and emergings. A lot of us miss the point; sometimes we get it, but sometimes, many times, many of us don’t.

Along the way, I’ve learnt to prefer the idea of the for- movement as compared to the against- movement. Positive verbalisastion is something that’s advocated by religions and spiritual groups, but in my case, I approach it from the “play” perspective. For example, slogans like “against terrorism” and “against poverty” fundamentally assume some form of resistance and therefore establish the definitive positions of the winner and loser. In this case, the activity of playing becomes a rigid game in which the player must try to be the winner so as not to be the loser. So playing leads to the learning of taking and breaking rather than sharing and creating. Personally I think the latter sounds much more fun and constructive.

Now, Karaoke. A few years back Karaoke recording was hugely popular in Korea and no doubt in other Asian countries too - basically you go in and sing (dance, drink, talk, scream, make out, what not) and you get an audio CD or VCD of your performance. you could then share it with others (if you dare) or keep it as a sentimental souvenir. You can still do it at some karaokes but the whole recording hype’s pretty much gone flat. Then the second stage of that, at least in the case of Korea, was a variety show on TV that featured a segment in which general pubic would volunteer and perform in a karaoke box (if selected) as a performance battle against celebrities - like these girls:

This has been one of the most popular videos of all times on YouTube and subsequently been parodied by many keen youtubeans - from various cultures including US, Mexico, Switzerland … and the Sims:

So here, you do exactly what you would in a karaoke room but in a karaoke booth (like purikura booth) but with increased consciouness about the assumed audience, and in this case the performers are “selected” by the show’s producer, and the outcome is “broadcast” via television.

With videkura, U(sers) can choose to perform and communicate their “creative outcome” in a method/s of their choice. There are two types of videkura available in Japan at the moment:

1. Ututu’s MYSQ
   MYSQ stands for “My style so qute” - I love quirky semi-make-sense english names like this. Their website has some info in English. I like their video; especially how they used a narrator with a Japanese accent :) To view the video, click on the “concept” button as shown below, and click on the video: 

   Basically you go into mysq, choose your songs etc, and go crazy while stepping on different seonsor tiles on the floor (which will generate video effects) and dance to the music (again, your sensor-enabled wrist bands will generate effects accordingly). Once you’re done, your video is compressed and sent to your mobile phone and a QR code will be displayed on the screen. Then you scan that QR code with your phone, which works as a link to your video, so you can send it to your friends - for different purposes: to make them admire you, fall in love with you, laugh at you, or even hate you ;) MYSQ is like an amalgam of purikura, DDR (dance dance revolution), and possibly in the future, karaoke, all coming together via mobile network. I like the playful combination of mobility and space. Smart.

2. Sega’s Love & Berry Digital Stage
   Who could possibly resist the temptation of playing on something with a name like “Love and Berry Digital Stage”? This one’s closer to the idea of Purikura: you get to take photos, manipulate them by adding decorative graphics and effects etc. You also get to dance to the music but without the whole fancy sensor effect generators. Once it’s all done, you get your purikura print, which is basically a set of sticker photos but with a QR code at the bottom. Then you can scan the code with your phone to view your pictures and download your video. It sounds all good and fun but unfortunately, Love & Berry Digital Stage, unlike MYSQ, doesn’t allow you to share the outcome with other friends (come on!). Apparently you can only download it to your own phone :( Sega’s selling point appears to be in incorporating anime characters like Naruto. 

   view more info about Love & Berry Digital State here

I believe that convergence is an inevitable phenomenon in any facet of life; it is particularly conspicuous in today’s techno-driven society. If we are to find any value in developing new communication technologies, it will only be through convergence - ultimately it will be the convergence between the technology and human senses (some might want to call the latter “spirituality” - I fancy the Taoist idea of “all is one,” so to me, these are talking about the same thing just in different discursive frameworks).

I guess the first technological convergence in the milieu of the mobile phone was between the phone and the user’s computer - transferring contact info and similar activities. Now it’s obviously between the phone and a big network of computers - the Internet. And I find it fascinating how things converge and emerge so quickly in such diverse domains of life in different techno-social contexts.

Join Convergekura, why don’t we? ;)