u/SuddenFlatworm7971

Winning the Gold medal at the Asian Games qualifies male athletes for the military service exemption. Following their win against Japan to win the Gold Medal at the 2026 Asian Games, several members of the Korean Men's National Soccer team stated that "Medals and wins do not matter, we were only playing for the military exemption".

The statements by the players sparked outrage and contempt across South Korea's general public. The expectation is that the athletes will take pride in representing their country, not playing for their personal gains. While some may say that the players were merely saying the quiet part out loud, the controversy has put the already controversial Arts and Sports Service Exemptions into spotlight.

An earlier post referred to SK and Hynix refusing to pay up front KEPCO’s 5 year electricity bill and interpreted it as a refusal to expand production and skepticism towards future demand.

That is a completely wrong interpretation of what is going on - I am sorry but if you want to discuss another country’s economic plan, you should at least learn to read past the headline. I know this is a half shitposting sub but still.

The fact is, current Korean administration (liberal / left leaning party) wants to place the new fab buildout in the southwest corner of South Korea, which has historically been a liberal stronghold. It is also one of the most underdeveloped region of S. Korea.
The current admin wants to score political points in their home turf as well as to also push for ‘equal development’ across the peninsula, relieving pressure on the capital, where half the nation’s population is crammed into.

SK and Samsung were (likely) strongarmed into agreeing to this development plan when they announced it a couple months ago.

SK and Samsung does not want to do that - planning a massive buildout from ground up in a region where there is practically nothing - is a capital and time intensive venture. Also, nobody would want to move there - most Korean tech talents want to live in a greater Seoul area. It is not uncommon to see employees pack up and jump ship when they are dispatched to branch offices out of Seoul. It’s like taking employees from NY or SF and telling them to move to a new office in Oklahoma or Missouri - companies will lose out on talent.

SK and Samsung has been expanding their production capacities but mostly just outside the Greater Seoul Metropolitan area within commuting distance with possible spillovers into Chungcheong province, a couple hours south of Seoul.

So yes, the consensus amongst S Korea is that SK and Samsung wants to expand capacity, but not in the southwest region of Korea. They have been looking more into GSA or the United States. They don’t want to commit 18 billion dollars into a power grid buildout in a region they do not want to be locked into.

So yes, the refusal to pay the bills up front say little about how SK and Samsung is anticipating future product demand - it is more about logistics and talent acquisition issue as well as domestic political pressure.

Eventually, NAND flash memory began to be used in digital cameras, portable music players, and mobile phones, and Toshiba began to make huge profits from it. However, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix were the first to recognize its potential, and by the time the huge NAND market emerged, Toshiba, which had created it, was lagging behind the other two companies.

Kioxia: A major semiconductor company whose stock price is soaring, originated from the semiconductor business that Toshiba sold off when it was in financial trouble. From Kioxia's perspective, having been "sold off," their current situation, freed from Toshiba's shackles, is not as dire as outsiders might portray. This is due to the long and painful history of Toshiba's semiconductor division.

Toshiba's fatal mistake: In the late 1980s, "fabless" semiconductor companies specializing in design were beginning to emerge in the United States, and in Taiwan, Morris Chang, formerly of Texas Instruments (TI), was making headlines by establishing TSMC, a "foundry" that undertook production for these fabless companies. At that time, (Mr. Kubo) vividly remembers how TAEC's management was making fun of TSMC, calling them "rice crackers."

Thoughts on this hiring? He has some experience under Luis Enrique - wondering if he carries the same energy

As the South Korean Football Association is undergoing major reforms following the messy scandal during the 2026 World Cup, it seems like FIFA might step in under the guise of protecting the 'autonomy of the football association'. FIFA has decided to conduct an on-site investigation of the Korea Football Association to inspect the situation of Korean football, including 'infringement of autonomy'.

South Korea's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism recently launched the Football Innovation Committee headed by Ji-Sung Park to reform the Korean FA under close scrutiny.

After being down 50% for nearly 3 years, I exited all my positions today with a modest 40% gain.

Not sure if the stock will continue to go up but a 150% gain in one day will surely see a correction in coming days.

Would like to know what everyone’s plan is for their investment.

Like when did y’all buy this stock?

Even if you bought the KOSPI 000660 Hynix share, you would be up 18% in the last 5 days, barely down 10% in the last month or 3 months and up 85% in the last 6 months.

Did everyone here buy at the ATH price in June?

I know we're just guessing here but I would like to know what everyone's ballpark ideas are.

I am still using iPad mini 6 as a secondary device since it allows me to carry it around at work.

iPad imo is a bit strange since it's been a while since it came out, but somehow Apple is still putting certified refurbished iPad mini 6 on sale. This gives me hope that it still might be supported for 2+ years with updates. The hardware is a bit dated, with 4GB Memory and 64GB storage, so it may get cut off from update soon, but it wouldn't be like Apple to sell a device from their official website and cut off the update so soon.

The whole rhetoric is so overused at this point. Reddit is especially filled with these posts.

"Japan is so racist" "Koreans are obsessed with skin color" "Chinese / Korea / Japan looks down on dark skinned people"

News clips of whatever immigration policy coming out of Japan or Korea gets immediately labeled as "xenophobic" and "closed minded"

They are having a demographic crisis - how DARE they not accept immigrants?

While whenever EU / Canada starts clamping down on their failed immigration policy, it is "about time" and "a step in the right direction".

It is also so sad to see so many South Asian / SEA redditors jump on the bandwagon.

Major subreddits are Western-hemisphere centric and mostly white liberal, but I think many of them still suffer from cognitive dissonance where they want to call out racism for brownie points but also not have to face any internal conflicts about themselves being white.

So East Asia is an easy scapegoat for those who want to deflect colorist racism trope onto someone else.

"Yes, our societies have problems with racism - but have you seen racism in ASIA where the population is 99% homogenous?"

I guess East Asia fits the bill for them - highly developed, relatively high income, closed off, separated from most western hemisphere social media so they really can't speak on the issue, Asians are mostly isolated from the history of race relations in Europe / North America.

They can comfortably accuse Asians of racism without any sense of guilt or backlash whatsoever.

Meanwhile a grandma gets pushed onto subway tracks in Chinatown and nobody cares. Ha!

South Korea’s ascent was therefore never an autonomous national achievement in the narrow sense. It relied extensively on foreign aid, borrowing, imported machinery, technology licences and access to external markets.

What distinguished it was the political organisation of that dependence.

Foreign resources were channelled through a state determined to build nationally controlled firms. South Korea often preferred foreign borrowing and technology licensing to direct foreign ownership because these instruments allowed domestic companies to retain managerial and strategic control.

The state wanted large corporations because industrialisation required organisations capable of mobilising capital, absorbing foreign technology and coordinating complex projects. Concentration was not merely an unintended consequence of development. It was partly a deliberate institutional choice.

But support was not supposed to be unconditional.

Companies were expected to enter targeted industries, invest, expand capacity and meet export goals. Exporting earned foreign currency, but it also provided a measurable test of performance. A protected firm could not indefinitely survive by selling inferior products to captive domestic consumers. It had to confront international competition.

This created a combination of protection and discipline.

Many Southeast Asian governments also provided protection, credit, monopolies and contracts to politically connected firms. But benefits were often tied more closely to political loyalty than to technological or export performance. The issue was not whether rents existed. Every major industrial transformation creates them. The issue was what firms were required to do in exchange.

By the time South Korea’s success became impossible to ignore, the political economy that had produced it was already being reinterpreted.

The country presented an uncomfortable problem for the market-oriented development ideas that became dominant during the 1980s and 1990s. South Korea had certainly exported and participated in international markets. But it had also controlled banks, protected industries, restricted imports and foreign investment, directed credit and encouraged firms to enter sectors in which they possessed no established comparative advantage.

Instead, the Korean story was translated into a more comfortable formula: macroeconomic stability, education, high savings, export orientation, openness and a generally supportive business environment.

Southeast Asia entered a different world economy. Production became increasingly fragmented across borders.

Large corporations retained control over design, technology, brands and strategic coordination while locating assembly and selected component production elsewhere. Southeast Asian governments built industrial estates, ports and transport systems to attract these activities.

This was real industrialisation. But it differed from the Korean experience in one decisive respect.

South Korea had supported domestic corporations seeking to coordinate increasingly complete industrial systems. Southeast Asian governments more often competed to attract particular segments of systems already coordinated by foreign corporations.

Entry became faster. Control remained elsewhere.

The firms commanding the principal technologies, intellectual property and final markets remained predominantly foreign. Malaysia became highly successful in electronic production without generating an equivalent number of corporations capable of defining product architectures and controlling global brands.

Thailand followed a comparable path in automobiles. Thailand created a major automobile industry without creating its own Hyundai. The contrast is revealing. South Korea accepted decades of risk and initially inefficient production in order to build domestic automobile companies. Thailand obtained high-quality manufacturing more rapidly by integrating into the international networks of already successful producers.

Vietnam is the most important contemporary test. Its manufacturing rise has been remarkable. Political stability, investment in infrastructure, trade agreements and a capable workforce have made it a major platform. Yet the strategic hierarchy remains clear. Product design, key technologies, global branding and many high-value inputs remain controlled outside Vietnam. Domestic firms are still concentrated disproportionately in lower tiers and less technologically demanding functions.

South Korea protected domestic firms before exposing them fully to international competition. Vietnam must often build domestic capabilities while already immersed in competition organised by foreign lead firms.

This is not simply a difference in government competence. It is a difference in historical timing.

미국? 캐나다?
호주?
아니면 한국?