Pretty in pink: tech gadgets go girly

Japanese electronic entertainment device makers are targeting fashion-savvy Korean women with pink gadgets. Sony is launching a pink VAIO laptop for the first time in Korea, which has a glittery “nail-polished top” in ballerina pink. Nintendo is seeing sales figures rise with its pink Nintendo DS Lite, launched just a few months ago.
Sony Korea yesterday unveiled its VAIO CR series, a 14.1-inch laptop computer that comes in four different colors, including pastel pink. Although previous models of the VAIO have been available, only black and silver ones were sold in Korea, mainly catering to a tech-hungry male clientele.
Not anymore. Although men are still on Sony’s customer list, the company is going after the women this time, and it is not ashamed to say so. Not only is it marketing female-friendly catchphrases and holding woman-only promotional parties, but it also hopes new designs will communicate with the fairer sex.
It all begins on the outside, with a chrome frame around the laptop that Sony Korea spokesperson Simon Lee says was meant to feel like a clutch. For style-conscious women wanting to make a striking first impression, Lee says that emphasis was placed on making sure the computer literally shines. Other than the shiny chrome frame, there is also a shiny coating on the cover and a backlight that changes color according to what function one is using on the PC.
But being pretty isn’t just about being shiny on the outside. The keyboard of the new VAIO CR has a beautiful font unique among laptops, and the keys are placed close together so that women don’t get their fingernails caught in between. It also has a 1.3 megapixel camera and Intel’s Core 2 Duo Processor.
In a sense, the launching of the pink VAIO follows the success of Nintendo’s pink DS Lite. In Korea, the console game market takes up less than 5 percent of the entire game market because online games dominate. The success of the DS Lite was mainly attributed to women gamers. As of last month, only four months after its initial release in Korea, more than 270,000 consoles had been sold here.
“Women customers are showing more interest now that gadgets are becoming more colorful,” said a vendor at Technomart, an electronics mall in eastern Seoul. “But pink products sell at least two times more than other colors.”

By Wohn Dong-hee
Staff Writer for JoongAng Daily

Fake phones force company to increase policing effort

The LG Group is increasing its global effort to block counterfeit cell phones. It has registered its trademark in several customs offices worldwide and is operating investigation units in China, Dubai and Hong Kong.

The company said yesterday that it is beefing up its efforts to terminate counterfeits of its popular models, such as the “Chocolate” and “Shine” phones. It is expanding its trademark registration at the customs offices of major countries such as the United States and China so that fake goods can be confiscated at customs gates. It is in the process of registering its trademarks with the European Union and United Arab Emirates. LG trademarks are already registered in patent offices, but the company said that separately registering the trademark with customs authorities enables immediate regulation.

Last month, LG Corp.’s legal team and LG Electronics’ patent center officials conducted a training session that included participation by customs officials from Saudi Araba, Qatar, Oman and other countries in the Persian Gulf region.

LG Electronics discovered last month that a phone called “Diamond,” an imitation of its “Shine” phone, was being sold in China and Europe via the Internet, and it moved to put a stop to sales of the product. It is currently preparing a suit against the maker of the phone.

According to the LG Group, the number of cases in which the LG brand and design was misused increased in China from five cases in 2005 to 39 cases last year; in Dubai, there was only one case in 2005, but six cases last year.

By Wohn Dong-hee for JoongAng Daily

Dual-display phone opens messages for others’ eyes

A new cell phone that displays text messages on its cover, as well as inside, aims to change the behavior of its users.

Motorola premiered the new phone, the Razr2 (Razr Squared), a clamshell type that has two displays, yesterday at an art gallery in Seoul.
Motorola Korea said the phone will be available next month and will be released in the U.S. in August.

The biggest new feature is the tandem display, which shows the same information on the cover of the phone and inside, meaning that it could make it harder for the user to keep text messages secret.

Motorola said that it hopes the new design will change cell phone etiquette, but it remains to be seen if users will want to share their display with the world.
“People have the tendency to break off the conversation to answer the phone, which is not good manners,” said Gill Hyun-chang, president of Motorola Korea. “The front display allows users to peek at text messages without having to actually open up their phone.”

Lee Ji-hyok, a product planning senior executive, joked, “My wife is so busy checking her text messages when I get home that she hardly looks up. Now it’s easier to see what kind of messages she’s getting.”
The new model is aimed at business people.

By Wohn Dong-hee for JoongAng Daily

With great power comes great cameras

Computer graphics in films have never been so seamless, thanks to digital technology. But the trend towards digital doesn’t just apply to the technology used in making the film. As movie series progress, the digital devices used in them reflect what kind of gadgets are hot.

In the first of the Spider-Man series, Peter Parker (Spider-Man), a physics graduate student and photographer for the Daily Bugle, used a Canon F-1N with an AE finder, which uses conventional film.

In the latest Spider-Man 3, however, the main characters are no longer using film cameras. Eddie Brock Jr. (Venom), Parker’s rival photographer, carries a Nikon digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) camera.

	The Nikon D200, a digital single-lens reflex camera.

Online camera forum users have been debating which model Peter Parker used in the latest film, but many believe it was a Contax N digital, which is paradoxical because the digital Contax N, not being great at taking a rapid series of shots, is not considered to be the optimal camera for newspaper reporters.
DSLR cameras operate on the same optical and mechanical principle as modern auto-focus SLR cameras.
The main difference, however, is that photographic film has been replaced by image sensors and electronics, which create digital images within the camera. The need to develop the image from film is removed.

One scene in Spider-Man 3 involves using the zoom-in feature to identify a certain person. Such an extreme zoom-in would probably be impossible with the lens that was actually used in the film, but one of the merits of DSLR cameras is that the lenses are interchangeable. This allows the photographer to have a wider ranger of shooting options. Also, most lenses that are used on film cameras can be used on DSLR cameras, provided that the brands are the same.

	In Spider-Man 3 Eddie Brock Jr. (Venom), used a Nikon DSLR.

The growth of the market for DSLR cameras is clearly seen in the figures. According to the market research firm GfK, DSLR camera sales in offline stores in February accounted for 10 percent of total digital camera sales, a 6 percentage- point increase from last year.
The new cameras used in Spider-man 3 reveals the changes that have taken place in the consumer market and the rise of digital over film cameras. These advances, or rather evolution, in camera trends, was seen in another superhero movie ― Superman Returns, in which a Samsung Anycall phone camera is used to take a picture of Superman rescuing a woman. The photo is used on the front page of newspapers ― something that would have been difficult with phone cameras in the past. It has become easier today because phone cameras support high resolution. Phone cameras also store images in digital format.

By Wohn Dong-hee for JoongAng Daily