January 26, 2018
Japan closed out its best year for exports since the financial crisis with solid growth again in December, as the global economic recovery looks set to continue well into 2018.
Highlights |
|
October 8, 2017
Seoul, South Korea (AP) — Every day, South Korea's Unification Ministry sends officials to the border village of Panmunjom to call North Korea at 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. For more than 18 months, the North hasn't picked up.
As North Korea steps up its nuclear weapons tests and threats, the Unification Ministry, dedicated to improving relations with the North and eventual peaceful reunification, faces an almost existential crisis.
Not long ago the ministry was one of Seoul's most powerful departments. It had central roles in engineering two historic summits between the leaders of the two Koreas and launching joint economic projects in the 2000s. That is mostly gone after nearly a decade of hard-line conservative rule in the South, and a rapid expansion of missile and nuclear weapons development in the North.
The nuclear problem has become much larger than just a Korean Peninsula issue. North Korea has launched midrange missiles over Japan and flight-tested intercontinental ballistic missiles, confirming fears that it's close to its goal of building a military arsenal that can target the United States and its Asian allies.
The world has responded by stepping up sanctions and military pressure on Pyongyang. In South Korea, the most important decisions on North Korea now come from the president's office and the defense and foreign ministries. The Unification Ministry has been mostly left to issuing boilerplate denouncements of Pyongyang's weapons tests and propaganda outbursts.
"You need both hands to clap and North Korea isn't responding at all," said Baik Tae-hyun, the ministry's spokesman. "But it won't be like this forever. There were times in the past when it took a long time, a year or two, for relations to thaw after periods of animosity."
The election of a liberal president in May, ending nine years of conservative government, briefly raised hopes. But Pyongyang has so far ignored a Unification Ministry proposal in July to hold inter-Korean military and Red Cross talks. In changed circumstances, it is less clear what the Unification Ministry should, or can do.
DASHED HOPES
The ministry has its origins in the National Unification Board, which opened in 1969 when South Korea was ruled by the staunch anti-communist dictator Park Chung-hee. After mostly serving research functions, it became more prominent under Roh Tae-woo, who won the 1987 presidential vote that took place months after military leaders accepted free elections.
Roh sought to improve relations with Pyongyang following the fall of the Berlin Wall. He elevated the unification board to the level of a vice prime-ministerial department. The Koreas held their first-ever prime ministers' talks in 1990, and both countries joined the United Nations at the same time in 1991.
Two liberal presidents, Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun, met with North Korea's then-leader Kim Jong Il in 2000 and 2007, respectively. But his son, current leader Kim Jong Un, has conducted four of the country's six nuclear tests and seems to see no value in dealing with Seoul.
Successive conservative governments in South Korea, from 2008 until earlier this year, took a tough line on Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions, erasing past reconciliatory efforts.
The five-year presidency of President Lee Myung-bak, who took office in early 2008, was marked by animosity with the North, including North Korean attacks on a warship and a border island that together killed 50 South Koreans in 2010. He briefly considered closing the Unification Ministry and transferring its functions to the Foreign Ministry.
His successor, conservative Park Geun-hye, angered Pyongyang by openly talking about a potential regime collapse in the North. She took an even harder line last year as North Korea conducted two nuclear tests.
Her government pulled South Korean companies out of an industrial park in North Korea's Kaesong in February 2016, the last remaining major symbol of cooperation between the two. One of Park's unification ministers became so frustrated that he reportedly said his job could be given to anyone because it wouldn't make a difference. The ex-minister, Ryoo Kihl-jae, declined to comment for this story.
It's still critical that the Unification Ministry keeps knocking on the North's door, said Jeong Se-hyun, who served as unification minister under liberals Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun
"The ministry has to keep pestering Pyongyang over the military and Red Cross talks," he said. "It has to keep placing calls on the Panmunjom telephone. The situation can quickly change and North Korea could feel the need for dialogue. When they do return, they will likely want to deal with the United States first, but let them try to accomplish anything in talks with Washington without the involvement of Seoul — it won't work."
DRIVER'S SEAT TO BACKSEAT
A liberal returned to power in South Korea in May, after a corruption scandal forced Park from office.
President Moon Jae-in harshly criticized the approach of his conservative predecessors, who he said did nothing to stop Pyongyang's nuclear advances and diminished Seoul's voice in international efforts to deal with the North.
He made longtime ministry official Cho Myoung-gyun his unification minister, valuing his experience in preparations for the two summits, including accompanying Roh to the 2007 meeting with Kim Jong Il. He expressed hope that the resumption of inter-Korean talks would help put Seoul in the "driver's seat."
North Korea's only response has been more missile launches and its sixth nuclear test. Moon is now scrambling to ramp up the South's military capabilities, saying dialogue is currently "impossible" after North Korea's most powerful nuclear test ever on Sept. 3.
Some experts say the stakes have become too high for the reins to remain with Seoul. The belief that improvements in inter-Korean relations alone could lead to meaningful breakthroughs over the nuclear problem are outdated views from a time when the North's threat was weak, said Hong Min, an analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul
"Seoul needs to move with the international community to deal with the challenge posed by North Korea's nuclear missiles, instead of approaching it as a matter of who gets to lead," he said.
Chung Dong-young, a lawmaker who served as unification minister under Roh Moo-hyun, disagrees, saying Seoul should still try to lead the process and push harder to resume talks with Pyongyang.
As Seoul's special envoy, Chung went to Pyongyang in June 2005 to meet with Kim Jong Il and try to persuade him to return to multilateral negotiations on North Korea's then-nascent nuclear program. The North months earlier had declared it would no longer attend the six-party talks by the Koreas, the United States, China, and Russia that had been launched in 2003.
The June meeting helped set up North Korea's return to talks three months later in Beijing, where it agreed to end its nuclear weapons program in return for security and energy benefits.
"That was when South Korea was actually in the driver's seat," Chung said.
The six-party agreement of September 2005 foundered quickly, and the North detonated its first nuclear device in October 2006.
August 21, 2017
Foxes are my guide animal. Whenever I’m struggling the most, they always show up somehow. I have several fox tattoos and I’m probably gonna get more.
In January 2017 I traveled to Tokyo to get a TESOL certificate. I live in Mexico, so being in Japan is one of those once in a lifetime opportunity. That’s why I couldn’t let go the chance of paying a visit to the Fox Village.
It was a 2 hours ride on the Shinkansen (bullet train) to get to Shiroishi, Miyagi. Once I got there, I asked the guard was could I get a taxi and he was super nice and called one for me. This is not a strange thing in Japan, it seems to me that everywhere people are extremely friendly and they go out of their way to help you.
5 minutes later, as he said on the phone, the taxi driver was there. On the way, he showed me an adorable album of Zao Kitsune Mura (Fox Village) which only made my excitement levels go over the top.
After 30 minutes we finally arrived. He gave me a card with his phone number and told me I could ask someone to call him whenever I was done.
The entrance fee is only 1000¥ (8usd) and they explain to you in English how to behave yourself inside. If a fox gets too close you are supposed to show dominance. Don’t lean down cause they might approach behind you and try to bite. Be careful with your backpack and belongings cause they are territorial animals which mean they are probably gonna pee on your stuff. And most importantly, under any circumstances do not attempt to touch them.
Read more: http://www.boredpanda.com/fox-village-in-japan-natasha-puente/
March 7, 2018
Apple Turns Up Audio Ambition With High-End Headphones 0
by MeDaryl • Cars • Tags: ALPHABET INC-CL A, AMAZON.COM INC, apple inc, earnings, INVENTEC CORP, ipad, Japan, PRIMAX ELECTRONICS LTD, SONY CORP, technology, Wireless
Apple Inc.’s AirPods earphones have been a surprise hit. Now, the company is planning a push into the high end of the market.
The Cupertino, California-based technology giant is working on noise-canceling, over-ear headphones that rival headsets from market leaders like Bose and even the company’s own Beats by Dre brand, according to people familiar with the product’s development. The company plans to launch the headphones as early as the end of this year, but has faced development challenges that might push back the release, the people said.
Work on the Apple headset has been on-and-off over the past year. The company encountered similar problems with the HomePod during its development, including multiple redesigns, according to the people. It’s possible Apple will redesign the headphones again before launch, or scrap the project altogether, they warned, asking not to be identified discussing private development work.
An Apple spokesman declined to comment.
The latest plans call for headphones targeting the high-end of the market, replicating Apple’s approach with the $349 HomePod speaker, released earlier this year. In addition to noise-canceling capabilities, Apple plans to include similar wireless pairing functionality to the AirPods, according to the people familiar with the product’s development.
This would be the latest in a long line of music-focused products and services from Apple. The iPod and the iTunes Store revolutionized how music was consumed — as digital downloads rather than physical CDs. The company’s largest ever acquisition was the $3 billion purchase of Beats in 2014 — a deal that got Apple into high-end headphones and music streaming. The HomePod’s sound won glowing reviews this year and Apple is already preparing other audio accessories like upgrades to AirPods that add water-resistance and a new wireless chip that enables “Hey Siri” voice activation.
So far, the AirPods have been a key driver of newfound success for Apple’s Other Products segment. The category, which includes AirPods, Beats headphones, the Apple Watch, Apple TV and iPad accessories, generated more than $5 billion in revenue for the first time in the company’s fiscal first quarter, representing 36 percent year-over-year growth. Within that category, wearable product sales, which include the Watch, AirPods, and Beats headphones, surged 70 percent last year, Apple said on a recent earnings call.
Inventec Corp., the Apple manufacturing partner that builds HomePod speakers and AirPods earphones, may miss out because Apple is likely to work with a different supplier, the people said. Primax Electronics Ltd. and Shin Zu Shing Co., current Apple suppliers, are likely to partner with Apple on the new headphones, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo wrote.
Apple's Other Sales Boom
Other Products category is Apple's fastest growing division thanks to devices like AirPods
Note: Other Products include AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Beats headphones, accessories.
When the company acquired Beats Music and Beats Electronics in the 2014 deal, Apple executives said the successful Beats by Dre headphones business was one of the drivers.
Apple-branded headphones would seemingly cannibalize Beats headphones, although Beats also sells lower-priced wireless headphones that probably won’t directly compete with the new product. Athlete-oriented wireless Beats earphones still seem to be selling well despite the popularity of AirPods.
Apple previously discarded the Beats Music streaming name when it launched Apple Music in 2015. However, given the strength of the Beats headphone name, the company will likely keep that brand while developing a different new one for the new headphones.
Beats, Bose, Sennheiser, Sony and Skullcandy are the leading players in a headphone market that will generate $20 billion in annual revenue by 2023, nearly doubling this year’s projected sales, according to Research and Markets. Researcher NPD Group said last year that sales of AirPods and Beats headphones gave Apple 27 percent of the wireless headphone market and almost half the dollars spent on the category.
Pricing will be key for the new Apple headphones. The HomePod is priced more than $100 higher than its main voice-activated competition from Sonos, and $200 more than an Amazon Echo, but $50 less than a competing Google Home Max. Beats and Bose both charge $350 for their high-end wireless headphones, while Sennheiser prices range from $100 all the way to $500.
Apple’s cost for each $349 HomePod is $216, resulting in thinner profit margins than typical Apple hardware products, according to TechInsights. AirPods have been tricky to assemble and use unusual design tricks, likely making them expensive to produce. The Apple headphones will likely use similar audio technology, driving up costs.
For more on Apple, check out the podcast:
Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-05/apple-is-said-to-turn-up-audio-ambition-with-high-end-headphones