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Korea, The Test Bed
from the future-testing dept
It's no secret that folks in South Korea are quite a bit more connected than most other places in the world -- with much wider spread adoption of high speed wireline and wireless broadband technologies. Many companies have gone to South Korea to see how people there are using these technologies to get a head start on how others around the world are likely to use technologies after they catch up in the connectivity department -- and companies with experience there are looking to spread that knowledge elsewhere as well. Because of this, it's not at all surprising that you can find lots of cool new gadgets in Korea first -- but what might surprise some people is that they're not all from Korean companies. Instead, plenty of foreign gadget makers are releasing products in Korea first, as a test bed, before pushing the products out around the globe. Of course, that foreign competition leads to some patriotic complaints from local companies -- but, as the article notes, that doesn't seem to stop many from buying iPods or other foreign gadgets.
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Atypical demographics
South Korea has the world's lowest birth rate (1.15 children per woman), and presumably one of the lowest marriage rates.
Although, one could argue that they are typical of recently industrialized countries. Other recently industrialized countries like Japan, Italy, or Spain also have very low birth rates, because there is a gap between women who expect to have careers, and parents who tell their sons to marry submissive women who will cook, clean, and have babies. (Their sons do explain that such women no longer exist, but stubborn parents refuse to accept reality.)
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Stay tuned for...
Will Korea lead the world in using new communication technologies to coordinate mass uprisings at schools? In the country next door today, three middle school students were told to go home after they were caught smoking in the bathroom. Instead, the students kicked the door down and beat the crap out of three teachers, kicking them in the stomach and back, causing them to get hospitalized for a week.
The System responded by sending two cruisers and 8 pigs to suppress the uprising.
http://www.zakzak.co.jp/top/2005_06/t2005060235.html
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Re: Stay tuned for...
err...uhm... What?
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Re: Atypical demographics
Actually, I think recent sharp increases in the number of young Korean women holding off getting married or having babies are due to economic uncertainties.
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