new ideas to keep the NK human rights issues in the global spotlight.

You Tube. Video. Video-on-demand.

If you search You Tube for North Korea, you’ll see this guy “songunblog” who puts up NK propaganda videos (as a lark) — in less than a year, those videos have gotten 30,000 to 70,000 viewers. Pirated clips from Inside North Korea have gotten 25,000 views is a little over a month.

I would bet money that if Vollertsen and others doing similar work were to put up simple videos — for example, a brief 2 to 3 minute interview with North Korean refugees living in South Korea (or refugees he deals with hiding in third nations) —- even if they silhouette the refugees face to hide identity —

it would reach tens of thousands of people in months and up to hundreds of thousands per year.

You don’t need professional film makers to cut documentaries. The stories told are compelling enough.

Voice Of People demonstrated long ago the value of short videos up on the net 24/7.

The video edits I’ve taken from them and re-mixed get 200-400 views a day on my site, and since I haven’t added anything there in about a year, those are likely unique, first-time viewers.

You can bypass the press. Sure, continuing to come up with ways to grab major, international press coverage is a very good idea.

But next to nothing is being done to take advantage of the resources broadban internet access and cheap storage space on the net offer.

(I’m grateful the RASKB has moved in that direction.)

His conclusion was somewhat pessimistic though….saying that the human rights issue was in the hands of the political powers involved in the 6-way talks, who all have their own agendas. He seemed to be frustrated that he and his supporters were running out of new ideas to keep the NK human rights issues in the global spotlight.

I’m in a student-teaching program to get certified here in the US. The woman who does my observations asked after the last one why I didn’t go for teaching History because I clearly like it so much and bring it into the literature classes.

How could I teach kids what we are supposed to teach these teens about the world —- when I know better…..?….

His conclusion was somewhat pessimistic though….saying that the human rights issue was in the hands of the political powers involved in the 6-way talks, who all have their own agendas. He seemed to be frustrated that he and his supporters were running out of new ideas to keep the NK human rights issues in the global spotlight.

Pity the people operating the video equipment for him did not seem to know what the hell they were doing….and they did not even bother to organize a microphone for him, so people at the back couldn’t hear properly.

Any way you slice it, the human rights abuses in nK are far outweighed by the public outcry for the FTA.

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=NorthKoreaHR

I hope those videos will encourage people who normally don’t read about such topics to dig for information and even more so donate some money to the NGOs I plug.

Working on this stuff for hours and hours recently has also made me ——— amazed that people like Dr. Vollertsen can do such work firsthand with the victims of the regime year-after-year.

This stuff is utterly depressing. I have great admiration for anyone who can keep their spirits up and keep pushing to make a difference. I would be overwhelmed in a matter of weeks…

I also want to put up a notice here that I am looking for:

at least 1 Korean (Asian) male and female to do read some short sentences to record them and email me the audio file.

usinkorea@hotmail.com

I want to add voiceovers to videos and image montages for You Tube.

Here is an example of the kind of short texts I have in mind:

usinkorea.org/blog1/2007/04/21/voiceover-example-help-needed/

I hope Marmot doesn’t mind my posting this here…

Dr. Vollersten is a voice for the North Korean people when their blood relatives in the south turn a blind eye. An anti-FTA march results in hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets and one distressed taxi driver taking his life. Where is the passion for North Korea.

Hundreds of thousands? The Hankyoreh is claiming only 2000 this past week, and other Seoul rallies have been in the single thousands:

http://english.hani.co.kr/arti.....03915.html

http://english.yonhapnews.co.k.....534E0.html

http://english.donga.com/srv/s.....7040952038

http://english.yonhapnews.co.k.....241E5.html

Your brothers, sisters, grandparents and cousins are barely able to eek out an existence and are forced to “participate” in mass celebrations for a meglomaniac while south of the border you enjoy the safety and security that has enabled an economic miracle to occur (10th or 11th largest economy and all the Chanel bags you want at Lotte).

There are impassioned people all around the world. Some do good, some are evil geniuses and some are discounted as crackpots. Let Dr. Vollersten’s recognized contributions to help a broken nation and now his outspoken criticism of that nation, the human rights abuses to its people, and pleas for international recognition and support be how he is judged.

After reading material as disturbing as this, I think the more that can be done to highlight the human rights situation in North Korea, the better. Full marks to Vollertsen for his courage in standing up against all the threats and intimidation he has received.