SparkLabs, the startup accelerator that wants to inject South Korea’s startup ecosystem with Silicon Valley expertise, announced its second intake today. Its latest class is an international lineup of companies that represent a variety of sectors and are at widely different stages of funding, from bootstrapped financing to those that have closed a Series A round. → Read More
After 15 years, Yahoo completed its exit from South Korea today, reports Yonhap News Agency. This move also marks the first Asian market that Yahoo is leaving. → Read More
In the U.S., 61% of all households currently have WiFi networks installed at home. According to data from Strategy Analytics, this means the U.S. is ahead of countries like Spain (57.1%), Mexico (31.5%) and India (2.5%). At the same time, though, this only puts the U.S. somewhere in the lower half of WiFi adoption among developed nations. In countries like South Korea (80.3%), the UK (73.3%) and… → Read More
Research firm research2guidance in conjunction with Android expert and developer network AndroidPIT this morning published a report that offers key findings from an analysis of mobile app trends in the Android Market. The first point is perhaps not so surprising: Although we think of Android as having significant global reach as a mobile operating system, the U.S. remains (by far) the largest… → Read More
The death of print has long been on the minds of journalists, writers, bloggers, etc. For those of us who grew up reading our books on paper, asking for magazine subscriptions, and watching our dads read the paper (on paper) at the breakfast table, it’s hard to imagine a world without a book case, and the handful of novels we never got around to picking up yet.
In South Korea, there seems to be… → Read More
It looks like the iPad 2 is selling well in South Korea, too. According to a Reuters article from today, the device is actually flying off the shelves in the country (where it went on sale on April 29). Major Korean telcos SK Telecom and Korea Telecom at least had to suspend sales today even though they started offering the iPad 2 online less than a week ago. → Read More
Oh, look, Cyber War‘s in the news, that marketing gimmick that plenty of people have used to make a few dollars writing scary sounds books. Wonderful. Cynicism aside, the South Korean government has warned its citizens to “firm up their electronic defenses” as a result of a rash of distributed denial of service attacks. The attacks could have originated in any number of countries, but… → Read More
VC funding for cleantech startups tumbled in the third quarter, last week Vestas announced plans to layoff 3,000 employees, and on Wednesday, First Wind shelved IPO plans amid weak demand— the wind energy sector is certainly facing its share of headwinds but there are still signs of life.
On Tuesday, the South Korean government announced that it will invest 9.2 trillion won, or $8.2 billion… → Read More
Having fully conquered the United States of America, forever changing the way our democracy works, Apple has now set its sights on South Korea. Apple has submitted its magical and wonderful device, the iPad, to the relevant authorities over there. It’s expected that approval will be granted (or denied) within five days. → Read More
We can’t say we are surprised: it seems that the South Koreans can’t wait to lay their hands on the iPhone 4. The sole iPhone provider in that country, Korea Telecom (KT), says that its official website got jammed today as “tens of thousands of people” tried pre-ordering the phone in a matter of hours. → Read More
The latest issue of Edge magazine has a fun little article abbot South Korea’s obsession with StarCraft. One of the issues the article brings up is: what happens to the game when Blizzard releases StarCraft II next month? Nobody knows! (My guess is that StarCraft will be around forever, no matter how many sequels Blizzard develops.) Along the same lines, kinda, Blizzard plans to give free copies… → Read More
Conclusive evidence that South Korea is the greatest country on Earth: it will begin terrestrial (that’s over-the-air) 3D TV broadcasts in a few weeks. Better still, it’ll be in full high-definition. How long do you think it’s going to be before “Dancing With The Stars” is shown in 3D here? Probably like 200 years, yes. → Read More
The South Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism doesn’t want the country’s youth becoming addicted to video games, particularly MMOs, so it’s imposing a ban of sorts. Starting in the second half of this year, underage gamers will find their Internet connections disabled for six hours every night, either from midnight to 6am, 1am to 7am, or 2am to 8am. The idea is to ween kids off these… → Read More
The iPhone officially went on sale in China at the end of October and in Japan in summer last year, but many people in one important Asian market were still waiting for it the whole time: Korea. After getting the official government approval in mid-November, the country’s number two mobile carrier, KT Corporation, started rolling out the iPhone on November 28. And it can be happy about a pretty… → Read More
Looks like the South Korean government has forced Apple to recall the first generation iPod nano over concerns that the battery can overheat, leading to fires. It’s the first time that the iPod nano has been recalled. → Read More
If you have always thought Japan is the country of robots, you might have to think again as it now turns out that South Korea will get the world’s first robot theme parks. The Korean Ministry of Knowledge Economy is ready to invest a whopping $1 billion into two so-called Robot Lands that will be built in two cities. → Read More
We all would have guessed it and now IIEE Spectrum Online has come up with some detailed and up-to-date statistics (from last month): Japan boasts the world’s highest density of robots. → Read More
Man, you’d think the government would have caught on sooner! South Korea has to be the biggest gaming nation on the planet, and yet we see so little Korean IP exported successfully to the US. Their culture and tourism minister wants to spur growth in the gaming sector and hit $3bn in exports within a couple years — a pretty ambitious goal. But if there’s as much talent waiting… → Read More
Once upon a time, I was at some press conference somewhere dealing with laptops and someone in the audience asked why battery technology hasn’t improved. The exec on stage replied something to the effect of, “Batteries aren’t our industry, they’re a chemistry problem.” So your laptop’s awful battery life can be blamed on chemistry. Until now! → Read More
Lee “Capone” Kun-Hee stepped down as Chairman of the Samsung Group, the umbrella company that controls all of Samsung’s holdings including its baby tear farms in Wonju. Kun-Hee was indicted for tax evasion and, in a bold move by the South Korean government, not really arrested because he kind of controls most of Korea’s economy. They also decided to indict Lee without… → Read More
You’d think in South Korea, with their 4G networks WiBRO, ExTCY, and other next-gen technologies that they’d have affordable HDTVs. They don’t. The problem is SK is a fairly small market when compared to the US. The TVs are essentially the same as the ones we have here, but they have to be Korean-ized, meaning new software, labels, and other things just for the Korean market. A… → Read More
How passionate does you lover feel about you? And how do you guys feel about people using the word “lover” to describe a significant other? Do you show up at a party and tell everyone that your lover’s going to be there soon? Do you show up at parties? I don’t any more (of course, I’d have to be invited to not show up). Aaaand, I’ve already gone way off track. → Read More
Dear Verizon Wireless and former Cingular customers: While we often share your frustrations and feel your pain, two wrongs do not ever make a right. Yes, you suffer from sub-par customer service with your cell phone provider. No, they don’t seem to care. Yes, there is more they could do about it. No, we don’t think they will. → Read More
This new device from Samsung is an abomination before God. Somewhere in Duder-onimy, God said with a fury that a laptop shalt not lie down with a cellphone as a cellphone lies down with a PDA. This is not as God intended, read your Bible. Also, you’ll find no mention of the platypus, likewise an abomination. It is kind of neat, though. The P9000 is an ultra-portable origami-esque Windows XP… → Read More
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