As Thailand struggles to rebuild its economy and society after the deadly anti-government protests earlier this year, a new threat is emerging -- bored, listless, drug-addicted youth. Thailand's schools, permissive social attitudes, general disrespect for rule of law, and widespread availability of addictive drugs are all to blame, as this report points out.
Virgin Atlantic plane livery time-lapse movie from johnson banks on Vimeo.
Last year, China became Japan's top export market, replacing the United States. Rising wages and an emerging middle class means more and more Chinese can afford to buy Japanese goods, and in the next logical step, visit Japan as tourists. In response, Japan has relaxed visa restrictions for Chinese citizens, which will allow a tenfold increase in the number of Chinese tourists to Japan. No surprise -- on average, Chinese tourists outspend Taiwanese and American tourists combined on trips to Japan.
In the wake of Red Shirt riots that tore Bangkok apart earlier this summer and led to multiple deaths, the Thai government has been cracking down on the funding sources for the red shirt protests, including many business owners tied to or sympathetic with former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, seen as a key catalyst behind the protests. 
The Sands resort in Singapore is open, and it includes a deck that spans across the top of the three towers that make up the resort and hotel complex. The deck includes the world's highest infinity pool and costs $20 for visitors to visit it. That has to be a thrilling swim.
Japan is trying to convince the international community to lift the ban on commercial whaling. In order to gain some smaller countries' votes, officials have been promising aid to the countries. When that fails, they've taken to offering cash and prostitutes for the votes, as this newspaper report reveals.
There are times that I think the Chinese are on their way to developing a sophisticated domestic-driven economy based on quality, cost control, and marketing. Then, at other times, I realize that the Chinese have some way to go still. Image, and "face," are still more important sometimes than cost or profit. This article is a great example. It's about a phenomenon in China where white guys are asked to do nothing other than put on a suit and go to a meeting, so that the Chinese company looks like they have Western connections. Crazy stuff.
The United Arab Emirates is tiny -- Dubai's population is only 3.5 million. So why would the state-owned airline Emirates order 32 more giant double-decker A380's, making it the sole operator of roughly 40% of A380's worldwide? The answer is that Emirates is taking aim at traffic from other countries' traffic rights. Its latest target is Lufthansa and the huge German market -- by placing the order with Airbus (Germany is a huge shareholder in the Airbus parent company), Emirates is daring Germany to open the market and stop protecting Lufthansa. In doing so, Emirates may be re-writing the rules of open competition in the airline industry.
FoxConn is nearly doubling wages in its China factory in response to withering criticisms about worker conditions and suicides. Honda is increasing wages at a key Chinese plant by 24% to settle a crippling two-week strike. The RMB is about to appreciate. A strict labor law is coming into force. The government wants to stimulate domestic consumption and reduce dependence on exports as a source of growth. All this points to one thing -- China is eventually stop going be the "world's factory" as prices for Chinese-made goods begin a slow and irreversible climb, as this important NYT story illustrates.
Xinhua is the official news agency in China. A senior official recently gave a speech admitting that Xinhua's primary mission isn't to report the news, but to maintain peace and harmony and social stability. As an example, when China's first astronaut returned from space he had blood all over his face from a busted lip (above). Workers cleaned him up, sealed the capsule again, and then when the cameras were rolling opened up the capsule as if they were doing it for the first time.
The falling Euro is making Chinese companies less competitive in Europe, one of China's most important export markets. While the falling Euro makes European exporters like Dior happy (above, a grand opening for a Dior in Shanghai), it is complicating moves by Beijing to de-couple the yuan from the U.S. Dollar, meaning that any weakening of the yuan (which in turn would help U.S. companies hoping to sell in China and make Chinese imports in the U.S. more expensive) will likely to have to wait a little longer.
Japanese cosmetic manufacturers have a strong reputation, especially in Asia and Europe. After years of trying to make inroads into the U.S., however, several are giving up and quietly pulling out of department stores. This is happening even as American and Japanese standards of beauty are converging, highlighting the difficulties foreign companies have in entering the U.S. market without a clear marketing strategy.
A few decades ago, most believed that major swaths along the Amazon river in Brazil were inhabitable. Today, shopping malls are sprouting up in the region as new cities take root, giving rise to a consumer culture that was previously absent.
Akron-based Goodyear is one of the most globalized American companies. After all, it costs a lot to ship tires around the world, so setting up tire manufacturing where ever cars and trucks are made makes sense. Decades ago, the company was so proud of its global footprint that it set up a visitor center at its Akron headquarters complete with scale models of all its factories worldwide. There was even a full-time model expert who worked to maintain and create the sets. He's now retired, and the company is moving and no one knows what to do with the miniature models, a relic of a time past when being global was something special to crow about.
Traditionally, large automakers such as GM, Ford and Volkswagen compete on the higher end in the Chinese auto market, while local Chinese manufacturers such as BYD, Chery and Geely compete on the lower price end. That situation is about to change, with the foreign carmakers getting ready to release lower-priced subcompacts and the Chinese carmakers tooling up their capability to compete in segments that are new to them. The prize? The 65 million households in China that in the next four years will achieve an annual income above the magic $9000 mark deemed necessary to afford a basic automobile.
Although ethnic Chinese can be found throughout Southeast Asia, tolerance of their presence varies widely in the region, from complete assimilation in Thailand to legal discrimination in Malaysia. Indonesia has had an uneasy relationship with the Chinese in the past, but that is changing rapidly as China expands its economic influence in the region. The rise of Mandarin-language classes in Indonesia is only one sign of this rapidly changing dynamic.
For centuries, wine bottles have been topped by cork harvested from trees, especially from Portugal. The cork is naturally spongy to permit squeezing into a bottle, and expands to form a tight but breathable seal. Scientists discovered that cork can sometimes ruin wine, and a search for alternatives was on. In the U.S., innovators have developed plastic corks that are cheaper and just as effective as natural cork, leading natural cork producers to search for a strategy to differentiate their product.
Street demonstrations continue in Bangkok, where anti-government protesters have shut down important parts of the city. The media has generally not done a great job covering this story, but this morning's WaPo has an excellent summary of what's going on here -- who the players are from the King to the Crown Prince to former PM Thaksin, to what the issues are. Highly recommended as a primer to what's going on in Thailand these days.
