This is a Chinese ad I found on Cloned in China blog. At first, I thought this was an ad that a Blackberry retailer in China created, but then I realized that the logo says, “BlockBerry”. Apparently the ad copy says, “Obama has Blackberry, I have Blockberry”.

The shamelessness of this ad and the product is so far-out that it feels like cultural satire in a form of actual product. After all, they could have simply called it “Blackberry”; why bother altering the name? What would swapping the ‘a’ with ‘o’ do in terms of protecting them legally or otherwise? It seems like they swapped them just to poke fun at intellectual property laws, in a similar way Saturday Night Live often obscures curse words just to ridicule FCC regulations.

It would be cool to own one of these. Many people would get a kick out of it.

Umm… I’m not sure what to make of this. These two Japanese men were caught carrying US government bonds worth $135 billion. It’s weird in so many ways. Firstly, my understanding of government bonds is that they do not print anything physical. It’s all in the computers. Nowhere else. Is that wrong?

Secondly, even if it’s true that they print physical certificates, it’s not possible for someone to have $135 billion. Even Bill Gates is worth only $40 billion. If they are real, these Japanese men must be government agents or something. Even then, it’s not possible to move that kind of money without the government officials knowing about it. So, they can’t be real, but they are apparently indistinguishable from the real thing.

This is really a strange story. I will be following this news closely.

Update (6/12/09)

According to this financial blog, the US government used to print certificates but no longer. There is also a theory circulating that these are North Korean agents carrying fake Japanese passports. If the certificates are real, they could belong to the North Korean government. Given that the US is printing money like crazy, it’s possible that North Korea decided to dump their US government bond holdings. If this is true, this might be good news for the US. 40% of it would have to go to the Italian government because of their smuggling law. Anything to make North Korea poorer is a good thing for the US.

It’s also possible that these were Chinese agents too (given the amount of control the Chinese government has on the flow of information). If so, this is bad news for both China and US. If the Chinese government is secretly trying to dump the US government bonds, this could trigger a panic in the bond market. It’s also strange that the US media is not picking up this news. Is it because this was a secret operation sanctioned by the US government? This is a complete speculation, but I wouldn’t be surprised, given that China has been complaining about the massive printing of money by the US government. Maybe Geithner is letting them dump some bonds in the black market? Who knows?

Another Update

According to this Bloomberg article, it is more likely that they are fake. Certificates of that high denomination could not have existed at the time it was presumably issued, it says. If this is true, could that legally be considered counterfeit or forgery? It’s like designing your own 7 dollar bill; since no such dollar bill exists, it wouldn’t be a “forgery”, would it?

Update: (6/14/09)

According to Daily Kos, the bonds are real:

According to the official press release by the Italian police these bonds were issued by the US Federal Reserve Bank.

I can’t read Italian, so I can’t confirm anything. The discussion on Daily Kos is pretty interesting too.

Update (6/15/09)

Here is a blogger with an interesting theory on this “Italian incident“. Some new facts that I was not aware of:

These denominations are strictly for government-to-government transactions and are not found in the private sector. The 16 primary dealers who make a market for US government debt are the only private sector organizations even remotely likely to have access to bonds of that size in paper or bearer form. However, the auction process is entirely electronic and has been so for decades ever since the Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation was established. This would suggest that these bonds, if real, belonged to a Central Bank.

…it would be extremely difficult for a forger to make a successful market in denominations typically exclusive to central bank transactions because of the eyebrows it would raise.

I’m beginning to think that they were really Japanese. If so, they would have to be government agents. If true, this is scary stuff. Just imagine the panic it could cause.

Update (6/16/09)

I found this article by J. S. Kim. He believes it’s counterfeit for the following reason:

One of the quickest ways to sabotage and usher in the death of a currency is to raise legitimate questions about its ability to withstand counterfeiting efforts. Prove that counterfeiting is not only possible but highly likely, and the world’s confidence in the sabotaged currency will undoubtedly plummet.

In fact, this very tactic was applied during World War II when the Nazis launched Operation Bernhard in an attempt to crash the British economy by producing, by 1945, 132 million expertly counterfeited British pounds, a figure that represented roughly 15% of all real British pounds in circulation at the time.

An interesting theory and history, but as one of the comments says, Japan or China would not want to sabotage US dollar because they have so much of it. If this is a Japanese or Chinese operation, the bonds would have to be real. It would be their way of reducing exposure to the US dollar in the black market. If counterfeit, North Korea would be the only Pacific Asian nation that would make sense.

Update (6/18/09)

So the verdict from the US Treasury is that the bonds are fake. Apparently they look nothing like the real thing. If so, what the hell were those “Japanese” men doing? If they look nothing like the real thing, can they even be considered “counterfeit”?

A friend of mine sent me the link to this article about the problem of creativity in China.

I think many people do not consider the fact that “creativity” is historically and culturally dependent. If someone who does not know the existence of calculus invents it all on his own today, nobody would recognize it as “creative”, but if you think about it, it’s actually an amazing feat. What is considered as “creative” is a cultural matter, not some sort of objective and universal standard. As of today, the Western world defines the rules of this game called “creativity”. Naturally, the Chinese would be behind the curves in things like technological innovations. Given that they started playing this game only a few decades ago, what they achieved in this competition is not bad at all.

In the West, there is too much emphasis on “creativity” even at very young age. Earlier this week, I wrote about this on another blog. Because American kids do not adequately master the basics, they risk wasting time on things that have already been done before. Their primary objective is to be “creative”, so they try to skip the first step of mastering the basics, and go straight to being “creative”. In the East, the primary objective is learning. Creativity is left up to the individuals to develop on their own. The assumption here is that true creativity is something unique to each individual, and that it cannot be taught or replicated. So, they don’t even pretend to teach it. True creativity must come from within you, and nobody can help you with it. Any pretence of teaching creativity only confuses the matter, and delays the progress. This is why in Zen art forms, you have to go through years of just mastering the basics without bothering to create anything original of your own.

The West is all about originality for the sake of originality, because of this, many presumably “creative” things grab the attentions of the media, not because there is any substance, but because they know how to paint the facade of originality or “creativity” in order to get attention. The West is certainly winning in the realm of marketing, promotion, and PR.

As I was growing up in Japan, my parents often told me that, if you want to build a mountain high, you need to start it wide. The implication is that, if you start it narrow, you can build it very quickly but at some point you will get stuck. I think this is a common belief in the East. American students are so highly specialized so early on that they are able to build things quite quickly, but their narrow foundation will sooner or later come back and haunt them. Later in life, they realize that they do not have a wide enough foundation to grow further.

China is just getting started. They are not in a rush. They are doing fine. They should just ignore the Western cliche of what “creativity” is. I would predict that in 30 years from now, when these kids reach their most creative and productive ages, China will rule the market of creativity, and the West will be wondering what went wrong with their approach in what they call “creativity”.

photo credit: Ed-meister

Today, the Chinese government blocked Twitter, Flickr, and Hotmail, two days ahead of the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. Apparently YouTube was also banned earlier this year. At this rate, where do they stop? There are plenty of other services that offer similar functions. I would imagine that the users will simply move from one service to another.

By banning these services, wouldn’t they bring more attention to the subject that they are trying so hard to suppress? Even the people who didn’t know about the Tiananmen Square massacre would now start searching for the reason why the government suddenly shut down all these services on the same day, and I would imagine that they’ll find the reason sooner or later, and realize how significant the issue is for the government. Or, perhaps, the Chinese citizens are used to this type of treatment, and they don’t make anything of it. Either way, investing in Internet related busiensses in China is clearly risky. After investing millions of dollars, they might just shut you down one day and give the business to the competitors.

This just in:

Kearny Street Workshop , the oldest Asian Pacific American multidisciplinary organization in the United States, is now accepting submissions for the 11th annual APAture festival of emerging Asian American artists. Each September, APAture showcases about 100 artists at venues throughout San Francisco, making it the Bay Area’s biggest platform for Asian American art.

We are accepting submissions in five disciplines: visual arts, film & video, music, literary arts and performing arts. The deadline to submit is July 11, 2009.

Go to kearnystreet.org/apature for more info and to apply online!

Questions? Contact apature@kearnystreet.org

This girl figured out a way to wear a mask without looking like wearing a mask. She printed her own face and glued it on to the mask.

My friend in Japan told me that everyone is wearing a mask over there. What they are afraid of isn’t so much the Swine flu itself, but what happens to you socially if you catch it. You wouldn’t be able to lead a normal life because you would be ostracized. They are in a full crisis mode with just under 300 people with the flu. Here in the US, we have 6,700 cases but I don’t see anyone on the street with a mask.

What I don’t understand is this: If you don’t have the flu, is there any point in wearing a mask?

When speaking of strange food from Japan, natto usually tops the chart. You can see a video of how to eat this stuff on YouTube.

What is strange about natto to a Westerner is not so much the flavor but the slimy texture, simply because slimy texture is not part of the Western food culture. The closest thing is okra. It is surprisingly easy to get kids to eat this stuff because most kids haven’t developed any prejudice towards slimy texture. They might reject a particular kind of food based on looks, but not so much on texture.

Another reason why many people are disturbed by it is because it’s fermented. It’s basically rotten soybeans. It also has a very distinct smell. I’m used to it, and I don’t find it objectionable. (In fact, I think it smells good.) My wife thinks it stinks.

The easiest way to enjoy natto might be to get a sushi roll with natto. It’s pretty common, so you should be able to ask for it at any sushi restaurant. Because it is wrapped in a lot of rice, you barely feel the texture or the smell of it, but you do taste the flavor. So, try it out next time you are at a Japanese restaurant.