KoreaCrunch

At last, iPhone officially launched in Korea on Nov. 28th, 2009. iPhone consumers lined up at midnight to be among the first in the country to get their hands on it in front of launching event place.

Hundreds of people began to stand in line from midnight in front of Jamsil Stadium in Seoul, waiting until 2 p.m. to get their iPhones — made available only to 1,000 people who raffled online for early purchases.

Some 60,000 people who made online preorders over the past week will have their iPhones delivered starting Saturday, said KT, South Korea’s second largest mobile carrier.

KT is so far the only mobile carrier in the country to clinch a deal with Apple to sell iPhones and related mobile services.

iPhones will be available to other buyers at KT shops starting Dec. 1th, the mobile carrier said. The 32-gigabyte iPhone 3GS costs US$341 for customers who subscribe with a monthly service fee of US$38 with 500MB data and 200 min free calling plan. Of course various optional plan were offered too.

As followings are pictures of scenes in launching day.

It was globally released Windows 7, the new operation system of Microsoft On Oct. 22th. There were several funny episode to do.

Linux’s Celebration for Windows 7 in Japan
Microsoft tried to torpedo the success of the Japan Linux Symposium by launching their Windows 7 product that same day. They even had setup a big promotion booth across the street from the conference center.

During a break, Linus Tobalds and Chris Schlaeger decided to make some fun of Microsoft and dragged him over there. When they arrived there, Linus was sold immediately on the product as you can see in the picture. At least that’s what the sales guy thought. He obviously had no idea who he was dealing with. But in the end Linus surprisingly did not buy a copy. Wise man!

Korean 777 Bloggers got promotional Window 7
In Korea, there was Windows 7 release party with 777 bloggers hosted by Microsoft Korea. Many bloggers requested to join there because it promised to give free Windows7 Ultimate. Most of bloggers thought “Windows 7″ box for sale.

But, it is just promotional Disc. written in not for resale and also 32bit only English version.

It was honest good, but got feeling of deceived.

Windows 7 Whopper with 7 patties
The Windows 7 Whopper consist of seven stacked beef patties that measure over 5 inches in height, and the whole thing costs an appropriate ¥777 (or $8.55). It’s available for seven days only, completing the run of sevens.

There was popular news on top of Techmeme, but it’s hard to eat it despite of employee Microsoft Japan.

Still demo ghost in Japan?
On demonstration of Windows 7 touch function, Windows 7 was frozen. There’s no need for a translation here. A fail this epic speaks for itself and brings back fond memories of the classic Windows 98 fail. Enjoy. The laughs from the TV hosts are the best part IMHO.

Some people replied the monitor is made in China, but it’s still on demo ghost of the classic Windows 98 fail in Japan.

Windows 7 launched on Macbook Pro?
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was on NBC Today Show that is a morning news and entertainment program that airs on NBC, a big TV network here) to unveil “>Windows 7 on MacBook Pro in the background.

Adobe Photoshop is common marketing language in global as well as China.

Anyway, congratulation Windows 7 release!

I have engaged Northeast Asia Open Source Software promotion Forum was formed by China, Korea and Japan governments and regional organizations for Open source software promotion. Because there were many issues of web interoperability in north east Asia, it have been hard to promote open source web browsers based on as like Gecko or Webkit engine.

I and my colleagues in web standards have been activities of NEAOSS working group 3 for 3 years and we closed our activities and summarized the status of China, Japan and Korea.

As following presentation was presented in 8th NEAOSS Forum in Tokyo.

The Status Of Web Interoperability And Activities In China, Japan And Korea

Of course, many issues still were solved yet as like Active-control based internet banking and e-commerce sites. But, for 3 years, many good signals were produced on three countries.

As following is the photo of Korean members: Hyeonseok Shin (Opera Software Korea), Channy Yun (Daum) and Hoon Cho (Dibidib)

Daum Communications Corp. decided to give iPhone 3GS to all employees as a gift. Daum.net is 2nd internet portal site and owner of Lycos.com in US.

Of course, iPhone hasn’t yet launched in South Korea. If it is released, this plan will be processed. Its plan includes 2 years guaranteed data plan. It was very big news in IT media and it about to make a big splash with its employees. As soon as iPhone launches, Daum plans to give away the highest spec iPhone 3GS to all of its employees (appx 1,000).

Daum already launched two applications for video-sharing and map services on Apple’s App Store and aggressively approached mobile web business, so all employees must be good at smartphone life as like iPhone.