Make fun of the slogan all you like, but the KTO’s “Korea, Sparkling” ad — which, slogan aside, I really like — has won gold at the New York Festivals, one of the world’s Big Three advertising award ceremonies (along with the Clio Awards and Cannes Lions).
The TV spot, which features Korean pop star Rain, hit all the right notes apparently, capturing the beauty of Korea’s natural environment and the dramatic contrast between ancient and modern.
Which beats this CNN version:
Well, there will always be the “Seoul: Soul of Asia” ad to kick around, I guess:
Sorry I couldn’t find the one with the talking dog.
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Regardless of what I think of pretty-boy Rain, the first ad IS much better and may actually help to acheive its goals because it doesn’t feature him so prominently. Like Michael Hurt said in his podcast on the Korean Wave last year, very few CNN watchers not already in Korea would ever have heard of Rain, so he’d be unlikely to ever attract many tourists here. Korean audiences however, would have loved it, and they do still seem the be the main audience for the vast majority of “Dynamic Korea” and “Korea Sparkling” ad campaigans.
For the record, I believe that Soul of Asia is the best goddamn slogan a city could ever come up with. Like, as in the history of the world, man.
excuse me, “sub-slogan”. didn’t mean to slight, “hi! Seoul”.
I had never seen that 2nd CNN ad. “Korea, the place to be.” Not as good as the Suh In-young line “Korean where you wanna be in.”
As far as the Seoul of Asia one, using “soul/Seoul” four times in five seconds is grating.
Korea should be realistic and spend more resources attracting Japanese, Chinese and Indian tourists. Aside from back packers, most North Americans with their two or three week vacation are not going to pack their bags to come to Seoul. US military brought lots of North Americans, with the hardship tours, many family members came to Korea to see their family members, but with the the US military in Korea filled with Gypos and its reduction of forces, there is even less incentive for Americans to visit Korea. If you had two weeks and three thousand dollars and could go anywhere in the world for vacation, would you come to the soul of Asia just to say hi?
Here is THE Seoul music vid:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_lEROaqCpg
None of them are half as good as Malaysia, Truly Asia, though.
I believe there are great things to see and do in Korea, but the KNTO doesn’t seem to understand how to get that across. They need to work a deal with the Singapore, Thai, and Malaysia tourist boards where they can intern some people with them and learn how to present Korea’s wonders in a better light.
The TV spot, which features Korean pop star Rain, hit all the right notes apparently, capturing his semi-retarded look and the dramatic contrast between what Korean women think of him and what Western men think of him.
Let’s face it. You can’t shine shit.
“Sparkling” is right up there with “dynamic Korea” (who really thinks of Korea as “dynamic”?. To be honest, it captures the real essence of Korea equally as well – irrelevant and self-centered.
Well, I for one think of Korea as “dynamic.” The still-occuring changes undergone by compressing 200 years of development into 40 or 50 are obvious, and in the next decade or so Korea has still more wrenching changes to go through as it deals with its the lowest birthrate in the world AND a disproportionately large but no longer competetive manufacturing sector. If anything, sociologically-speaking then Korea is one of the most dynamic countries in the world.
If anyone’s interested in that, you can read more about it in my blog in the link below. In case you think I’m overanalysing your comment, well probably, but it’s still good to have ads about Korea tha highlights its technological sophistication, night life, music industry, and hell, hot girls too. There IS more to Korea then the mask dances and kimchi-making that are the normal content of tourist campaigns, but which strangely never seem to have attracted all that many in the past.
http://thegrandnarrative.wordp.....-to-study/
The use of the ‘Red Devil’s and the ‘Daheanminkuk’ soccer cheer seems dated to me. The World Cup was held in Korea in 2002, which is now nearly a decade ago.
James: “The still-occuring changes undergone by compressing 200 years of development into 40 or 50 are obvious”
An obvious ripoff, yes. Remember, it was not actually developed here but all just handed over – capital, technology, science, political stability, national security, education system. It is true that in the 60s and 70s, Korea was moving at a dynamic pace. Today the self-congratulatory complascency and infamous has come to the fore and the nation is essentially stagnant, effete and – here’s the key – mistakes frantic for dynamic.
“…in the next decade or so Korea has still more wrenching changes to go through as it deals with its the lowest birthrate in the world AND a disproportionately large but no longer competetive manufacturing sector.”
What’s wrong with a low birthrate in an undesirably overpopulated place? It’s not as though the workforce has even scratched the surface yet in tapping their human resources – women and older people.
“If anything, sociologically-speaking then Korea is one of the most dynamic countries in the world.”
Actually, one of the most reactionary. Frantic pace does not equal dynamicism. Koreans tend to flit frantically from fad to fad with little substantive change in thinking – surface changes belie the stubborn nature of the Korean character, as profoundly uncomfortable as ever in international situations.
Adopting the trappings of international trends for the sake of outward appearance is not dynamicism. By that logic, primative tribes that adopt a few modern tools like the axe would have to be considered the most dynamic societies in the world.
Dynamicism involves a real change in thought, in action, not just frantic benchmarking of other societies. And dynamicism is driven by creativity, not copycatting.
Koreans are quick to pride themselves on silly, faddish innovations and yet far behind the times in changes that really count like improving the environment.
I think you may have missed the great conservative undercurrent in a society that has always felt under seige – isolationism, stubborn, solipsistic resistance to new views.
By the way, you have a nice blog. I like it.
Thanks for your nice comments about my blog, but naturally I disagree with… well, just about everything you say. Robert, sorry in advance for the very long reply in your comments section, but just saying “go to my blog” wouldn’t quite have the same effect!
1. “Remember, it was not actually developed here but all just handed over – capital, technology, science, political stability, national security, education system.”
I’m not sure what your point is sorry. Does the fact that capital and technology and so forth came from OVERSEAS somehow mean that the ensuing sociological changes didn’t take place?
2. “It is true that in the 60s and 70s, Korea was moving at a dynamic pace. Today the self-congratulatory complascency and infamous has come to the fore and the nation is essentially stagnant, effete and – here’s the key – mistakes frantic for dynamic”
On the contrary, I think you’re the one that has mistaken frantic for dynamic, at least sociologically speaking. Just because the industry and technology arrived in the 60s and 70s doesn’t mean people started thinking differently overnight: Convergence theorists have demonstrated that it usually takes decades. And while the Korean domestic economy is completely stagnant at the moment, Korea has gone from having the highest number of salarymen in the world (much more than Japan ever did) in 1997 to the highest rates of irregular, short-term work in the OECD in 2007 – one extreme to another. Or in other words, from a male-breadwinner welfare system where the man worked at the same company for life and made enough through his salary and other perks to support his family…to largely a Western hire and fire system, and all without a welfare state to speak of. This is a wrenching socioeconomic change, and has had huge impacts on all aspects of Korean life. Needless to say, as a result Koreans are VERY different people to what they were like in 1997, much more so than in places like the US, UK, NZ or Japan.
3. “What’s wrong with a low birthrate in an undesirably overpopulated place? It’s not as though the workforce has even scratched the surface yet in tapping their human resources – women and older people.”
Again, whether it’s desirable or not is beside the point. The whole reason Korea has such a low birth-rate in the first place is because it educates women on a par with men, but then it’s minimal and poorly enforced maternity-leave and childcare laws make it almost impossible for a Korean woman to have children AND a career; it’s like the US before Germaine Greer’s “The Female Eunuch.” For the sake of the economy, Korea must start finding workers and soon, and whether they be woman, old people, or (God forbid) immigrants, getting enough of them to work as required will involve HUGE changes in way Koreans view those groups’ roles in society. This is one reason why Korea is so interesting, because these changes will be much greater and have to occur much earlier than in most over developed countries.
4. I said “If anything, sociologically-speaking then Korea is one of the most dynamic countries in the world,” you said “Actually, one of the most reactionary. Frantic pace does not equal dynamicism. Koreans tend to flit frantically from fad to fad with little substantive change in thinking – surface changes belie the stubborn nature of the Korean character, as profoundly uncomfortable as ever in international situations.”
Complete BS. Plenty of Koreans are like that sure, but just as many aren’t, and after 8 years here I’m surprised everyday at things I see and hear that would have been unthinkable and quite taboo even a few years ago. You really need to start hanging out with different Koreans.
5. “Dynamicism involves a real change in thought, in action, not just frantic benchmarking of other societies. And dynamicism is driven by creativity, not copycatting”
Sure, creativity isn’t highly regarded here, although there’s still plenty of it about, it just gets little media attention (listen to the Metropolitician sometime). And virtually every Korean knows that their economy can no longer survive with an education system that produced graduates able to, say, figure out how Italian toasters are put together and then how to do so much more quickly and cheaply than the Italians, but its difficult reorientating the education system around this new reality. If it were easy, Koreans would have done so already.
6. “Adopting the trappings of international trends for the sake of outward appearance is not dynamicism. By that logic, primative tribes that adopt a few modern tools like the axe would have to be considered the most dynamic societies in the world.”
Well, you said yourself that technology=social change. The tribe wouldn’t be different overnight for sure, but in less than a generation you’d have different work patterns, living spaces, methods of warfare, geographical spread of the tribe…the oldsters would be complaining about it bitterly.
“I’m not sure what your point is sorry.”
If you take dynamic to simply mean “ever-changing,” then this hardly differentiates Korea from any other society, does it? But if “dynamiuc Korea” is to imply innovation, and being at the forefront -which it does from the context in which it is being used – Korea is hardly in the running. It remains a nation of followers, imitators playing catch-up as opposed to innovators and trend-setters.
“Does the fact that capital and technology and so forth came from OVERSEAS somehow mean that the ensuing sociological changes didn’t take place?”
This strawman argument is strictly rhetorical. Generally speaking, sociological changes are always taking place in virtually all societies. Your argument appears to rest on conflating sociological change with dynamicism.
“Complete BS.”
Not much of an argument.
“Just because the industry and technology arrived in the 60s and 70s doesn’t mean people started thinking differently overnight: Convergence theorists have demonstrated that it usually takes decades.”
All of which is irrelevent in supporting your argument re “dynamic Korea.”
“Needless to say, as a result Koreans are VERY different people to what they were like in 1997, much more so than in places like the US, UK, NZ or Japan.”
Needless to say, perhaps but not needless to prove. What you should properly say is that Koreans APPEAR TO YOU VERY different people from what they were in 1997. The argument conveniently ignores stubbornly enduring characteristics that just haven’t budged and begs the question of whether you have noticed them, especially if the extent of your exposure to Korean society only spans a single decade since 1997.
“The whole reason Korea has such a low birth-rate in the first place is because it educates women on a par with men”
Another unsupported assumption. One could pose any number of hypothetical explanations for demographic changes. Why should we accept yours without evidential support?
You have failed to prove your apparant hypothesis that sociological changes in Korea reflect a deeper progression from stubborn resistance to fundamental attitudinal change to dynamicism in thinking. Has the mindset changed significantly enough or are Korean s still deeply xenophoebic and resistant to altering their worldview?
Let me enlighten you – “Dynamic Korea” is another substanceless marketing phrase. As someone who has participated in marketing at Korean corporations, as well as a long time observer, I have seen that a nice sounding English term, no matter how meaningless if deconstructed, is often accepted as a valid argument. “Hi Seoul!” has greater relevence and depth of meaning, and at least it’s honest.
If I reply point by point this time this reply will be rather long again, so I’ll try to be more succinct.
I never said that Korea was at the forefront of innovation, although I accept that the ad wants to convey that impression. If that is what the phrase “Dynamic Korea” means to you, then sure, I agree: Korea is not “dynamic.”
But like you say, I do indeed conflate social change and dynamism. Yes, I accept like you say, that all societies are changing, so Korea is hardly unique in this regard. But my basic argument was that Korea society is changing much more quickly than many others, and I gave reasons why. That’s it.
I consistently said that I was talking about sociological change. You, in contrast, seem to be fixated on innovation, and because Koreans are not at the forefront as the ad claims, have this stubborn refusal to acknowledge that Koreans and Korean society is changing at all. “Complete BS,” for instance, was an appropriate response to your writing-off of all Koreans as people who “tend to flit frantically from fad to fad with little substantive change in thinking.” Like I said, if you can be bothered looking – and I strongly suspect that you can’t – there’s plenty of creative and independent-thinking Koreans out there.
“What you should properly say is that Koreans APPEAR TO YOU VERY different people from what they were in 1997. The argument conveniently ignores stubbornly enduring characteristics that just haven’t budged and begs the question of whether you have noticed them, especially if the extent of your exposure to Korean society only spans a single decade since 1997.”
Yes, I’m so sorry, Koreans do “appear” different to me. Can you please tell me how they aren’t also merely “appearing” to be stubborn and unchanging to you?
“The whole reason Korea has such a low birth-rate in the first place is because it educates women on a par with men”…”Another unsupported assumption. One could pose any number of hypothetical explanations for demographic changes. Why should we accept yours without evidential support?”
You’re misquoting me, missing the second half of my sentence. But if you’re not misquoting me, instead referring to my whole argument that women receive the same education as men, but then inadequate and poorly-enforced maternity laws prevent them having a career and children, and so they plump for the former…well, if someone doesn’t have a link then their arguments can instantly be dismissed? And what link will satisfy you, considering the millions of webpages a google search will give? Will the THIRD of my blog devoted to this issue do? http://thegrandnarrative.wordp.....d-raising/
“You have failed to prove your apparant hypothesis that sociological changes in Korea reflect a deeper progression from stubborn resistance to fundamental attitudinal change to dynamicism in thinking. Has the mindset changed significantly enough or are Korean s still deeply xenophoebic and resistant to altering their worldview?”
Yep, again because that never was my hypothesis. And for someone who felt that they had to point out, twice, the length of time that you’ve been here, I’d be lying if I said that rather than the Koreans whom you dismiss so readily, it is your own views about them that seem jaded, cynical, and much more resistant to change.
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