01.25.06
Macking in Taipei: The ‘cool’ Taipei government
Any attempt by any government to connect to youth culture is guaranteed to be an embarrassment. A couple of days ago the national college entrance exams contained bizarre questions about internet slang, but the Taipei City Government has gone one better.
Today’s front page story on Apple Daily (the biggest selling newspaper in Taiwan) was a story about Taipei City’s official ‘English Corner’ website. The Apple Daily seems to think that the website was a guide for foreigners to pick up local Taiwanese women - while this will certainly sell newspapers, it is a deliberate fabrication by the newspaper. Anyone who spends two minutes actually reading the website (ESWN has an image from Google’s cache - the original has been taken down) will deduce:
- The article is a joke. It doesn’t give any ‘advice’ about picking up women, but is an attempt at satire.
- The author is Taiwanese.
- The intended audience is also Taiwanese. The whole ‘English Corner’ website is (as the name implies) an attempt to teach non-native English speakers some English slang - the only people who might be interested in that are Taiwanese.
So, the Apple Daily finds a website which satirizes a Taiwanese guy giving other Taiwanese guys advice on picking up Taiwanese women, and turns it into an anti-foreigner front-page spread. Taiwanese newspapers have always been more interested in sensational headlines than in actual facts.
Taipei City Government tries to be cool
Of course, the real story about the English Corner website is that the City Government is so desperate to seem trendy to all the young potential voters out there in Taipei that they have produced an amazingly crass website. The dictionary of slang has words like napalm and ladyboy, and it tries to make learning English interesting with articles like “English is a disease: Catch it!“, and “English is a shirt: Iron it!“.
Just yesterday, many of us were mourning the sacking of Pasuya Yao,the most incompetent head of the national information office. I’m glad to see that Taipei City has an information office which is equally easy to ridicule …
It's Not Democracy, It's A Conspiracy! said,
January 25, 2006 at 7:38 pm
But now it’s time to get back to bullshit detection. Even though the following story has been covered quite well, it’s worth repeating. “Macking” shit up ESWN’s Roland Soong, posting on a topic which was immediately deconstructed by bothDavid at One Whole Jujuflop Situation and Michael Turton on The View from Taiwan, pulls one of his favorite rags (Apple Daily) out from under his pillow. Then, after dribbling several paragraphs’ worth of
Global Voices Online » Blog Archive » Taiwan: Macking in Taipei said,
January 27, 2006 at 12:12 am
[...] Roland Soong discussed an article from Hong Kong’s Apple Daily tabloid saying that the Taipei City Government had a page on its website teaching foreigners how to hit on local girls. The story — and Roland — drew much fire and criticism from foreigners blogging in Taiwan. Read their comments here, here and here. [...]
The View from Taiwan said,
January 27, 2006 at 6:02 am
the relationship between foreigners and locals in Taiwan. Sorry, John, I doubt you’ll see an apology from Apple Daily any time soon. No, I suspect that they will print even more outrageous nonsense. This kind of thing feeds upon itself…… UPDATE:David at jujuflop takes apart Apple and ESWN as well. [Taiwan] [media] [ESWN] [Ma Ying-jeou]
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