Stories about East Asia from December, 2010
North Korea's State-run TV Broadcasted its First Western-made Film
North Korea's state-run television broadcasted its first Western-made film, a heavily edited “Bend It Like Beckham”. The British soccer film contains North Korea's taboo topics, like interracial relationships, homosexuality and religion. British Embassy in Seoul tweeted it is ‘the first western live-action film ever aired in North Korea, arranged by...
Japan: Top popular Japanese phrases of 2010
Pinktentacle reported and translated into English the “Top 60 popular Japanese words/phrases of 2010″, published on the website of Jiyu Kokuminsha.
Glimpses of Citizen Media from Portuguese language countries in 2010
Throughout 2010 the lusophone blogsphere has given new perspectives on important issues that mainstream media tends to ignore. Read this post and discover a selection of the voices that Global Voices has amplified - from citizen media phenomena, to politics, governance and indigenous peoples.
Our Most Read Posts in 2010
On Global Voices we work with a large volunteer community to publish stories about what is happening in blogs and citizen media around the world. These are some of the stories that have attracted the most attention in 2010 from our readers in English .
Hungary: Relations With China
Hungarian Spectrum writes about Hungary's economic and financial relations with China.
Tunisia: The Cry of Protestors Echoes Around the World
The cries of Tunisians, protesting against corruption and joblessness for the past two weeks, is gathering momentum on the World Wide Web. Netizens from around the world are rallying behind them and echoing their calls.
Taiwan: Concerns about press freedom
Media freedom has come into the spotlight in Taiwan recently. Michael Turton has a good summary of the issues. A Taipei Times reporter writes about how the proposed changes to the child welfare law would affect her work.
China, Congo and Japan: Soccer politics
Ministry of Tofu translates Chinese netizens’ reactions over a recent soccer fans riot in Congo. The African soccer fans had mistaken the Japanese referee as Chinese and smashed Chinese-own stores to avenge the partial rule in the football field.
Malaysia-Indonesia Soccer Match Turns Into War of Words
Malaysia and Indonesia are the two finalists in the Asean Football Federation Suzuki Cup. Two twitter hashtags made it into the worldwide trending topics, ‘Hate Malaysia’ and ‘#loveindonesia’ as Indonesian netizens expressed their disappointment over the first game loss of their team
South Korea: Court Rules In Favor of Free Internet Speech
South Korea’s Constitutional Court has ruled that a law that bans the spreading of false information online is unconstitutional in a petition filed by a famous online blogger ‘Minerva’, who was indicted for causing disruptions in markets with his false reports. Twitterers, such as @jasmin4243[ko], bloggers, and civic groups have welcomed the ruling.
Japan: A year of blogs
As the character 暑 (sho) meaning ‘hot or heat' was chosen to represent the year 2010 at the annual ceremony in Kyoto, let's see a selection of “hot topics” that Global Voices covered this year.
Wikileaks, Thaileaks, Indoleaks, Pinoyleaks
There are Wikileaks clones in Southeast Asia: Thaileaks from Thailand, Indoleaks from Indonesia and Pinoyleaks from the Philippines. These websites were established/revived this month to support the work started by Wikileaks and to expose secret government documents in their respective countries.
Cambodia: Top 10 events of 2010
Natasha Robertson lists the Top 10 events of 2010 in Cambodia. At the top of the list is the tragedy during the Water Festival.
Cambodia: Phnom Penh Postal Codes
Kounila Keo from Cambodia publishes the postal codes in Phnom Penh City.
Cambodia: Jailed for printing an article from the internet
vutha doubts if there is freedom of expression in Cambodia after a UN staff member was sentenced to 6 months in prison for printing an article from a website and sharing it to his co-workers.
China: Press conference held following suspicious death of rural activist
It has not been a peaceful week in the news, with a crossbow-shooting bomber-petitioner in Beijing, a city administration official killed with a screwdriver today in Fujian province, and the grisly death of village leader Qian Yunhui in Zhejiang province on Christmas day. [UPDATE: Roland Soong at EastSouthWestNorth has been...
South Korea Defined North Korea as ‘Enemy’ in Defense White Paper
South Korea Defense ministry has decided to label North Korea as its “enemy” from its newest defense white paper, reflecting the intensified military tension between two Koreas. Some of South Korean twitterers, such as @sohjiroll[ko] considered the decision as appropriate, but worried it may not be a smart move.
China: Christmas Day death of a Zhejiang village leader
After more than 5 years of leading and serving prison time for protests against fixed elections and illegal land expropriation, the former leader of Zhaiqiao village in Zhejiang province, Qian Yunhui, was killed Saturday morning in an accident which left his head severed from his body. Graphic photos and thousands...
Philippines: Filipinos welcome new year with new banknotes
The Philippine Central Bank has issued a new set of generation bank notes which features not only improved security measures, but more so it heralds a new design highlighting historical events, figures in history and tourist spots in the country. But experts instantly detected errors in the new banknotes. Bloggers react
Cambodia: Review of 2010
Tharum Bun from Cambodia reviews the major news events in the year 2010.
Singapore: Treat toilet cleaners fairly
Cloudywind writes about the need to improve the working conditions and benefits of toilet cleaners in Singapore
About our East Asia coverage
Oiwan Lam is the North East Asia editor. Email her story ideas or volunteer to write.
Nevin Thompson is the Japan editor. Email him story ideas or volunteer to write.
