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Taiwan cultural & creative industry (Taiwan Soft Power) 
    
   world No. 1 in   2020~25,  2017~19,  2016 2015,  2014,  2013 2010~12       

 


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Taiwan

      Taiwan's poor creativity

 

   jump to:   ads.   animation   music  product design  arts  cartoon  movie   architecture   visual comm.   tour   food   medical   

 

 the Lowy Institute Asia Power Index, 2023 Edition

Cultural Influence No.1 US , No.2 China, No.3 Japan, No.4 India, No.5 Australia,  No.6~No.12 Malaysia, Korea, Thailand, Singapore, Rus, Indonesia, Vietnam,  No.13 Taiwan (ROC)
Comprehensive Power  1.US, 2.Chn, 3.Japan, 4.India, 5. Rus, 6. Aus, 7. S. Korea, 8. Singapore, 9.Indonesia, 10.Thailand,  11.Malaysia, 12. Vietnam, 13. NZ, 14. Taiwan (ROC)

power.lowyinstitute.org/countries/taiwan

 

 

   
 pic. :  This website-group was ranked No.1  "Taiwan cultural creative industry" on Yandex of Russia, 2024-5-13, 2024-2-9, 2023-11-18, 2023-9-4
 
pic. :  This website-group was ranked No.1  "Taiwan soft power" on Yandex of Russia,
2023-11-18, 2023-9-4; top 2 on Yandex, 2024-5-13

   
 pic. :  This website-group was ranked No.1  "Taiwan cultural creativity" on Yandex, 2024-5-13, 2024-2-9, 2023-9-4

 

 

  AFP, 2023-11-26: after a Taiwanese director voiced support for the island's independence in an acceptance speech in 2018's  Golden Horse Film awards, There were no mainland films in the 2019 nomination list and several Hong Kong movies dropped out that year, while big commercial productions were conspicuously absent at both the 2020 and 2021 awards.

  Variety, 2023-11-26:  After Chinese industry to boycott Golden Horse, parts of the Hong Kong industry have stayed away too. Many Hong Kong film folks find themselves torn between the developing political and financial realities back home and Taiwan's indie-spirited film industry. Tsai's government has unveiled a succession of policies seemingly designed to use culture and entertainment to give the island territory a larger profile on the world stage.  It remains to be seen if more of the TAICCA-seeded projects come to fruition. And if Taiwan's film and TV companies are willing and able to fill the gap in the market created by Hong Kong's production slowdown and by mainland Chinese entertainment's inward turn of the past five years... brief msn.com/en-us/news/other/taiwan-drifts-towards-cultural-power-as-golden-horse-film-awards-cap-month-of-industry-activity/ar-AA1kvpBA  Patrick Frater

 
abc news (Australia), 2022-9-8: Amid China's military and diplomatic isolation, Taiwan turns to films and games to reconnect with the world.  Taiwan was still "in its early days" of building soft power
.  While Taiwan's government had been aware of investing in soft power for a long time, there was a lack of coordinated strategy between different ministerial departments. "The DPP did put more of a focus on things like multiculturalism and democracy, whereas the KMT focuses a little bit more on the Chinese base to Taiwanese culture" ; In 2020, Taiwan reported $44.7 billion in revenue from its creative industry, with a 9.83 per cent increase in overseas sales on the previous year.  msn.com/en-au/news/australia/amid-chinas-military-and-diplomatic-isolation-taiwan-turns-to-films-and-games-to-reconnect-with-the-world/ar-AA11zOGi

ISSF's  Global Entertainment & Media Penetration

ranks

countries

1 US
2 S. Korea
3 Japan
4 India
5 UK
6 France
7 Spain
8 Mexico
9 Turkey
10 Italy
 

 ISSF's Global Soft Power Index 2023

Ranks countries ranks countries
1 US 14 Australia
2 France 15 Sweden
3 UK 16 Denmark
4 Japan 17 Norway
5 Germany 18 UAE
6 Swiss 19 Holland
7 S. Korea 20 Turkey
8 Spain 21 Belgium
9 Canada 22 Austria
10 China 23 Saudi Arabia
11 India 24 Finland
12 Singapore 25 Qatar
13 Italy img1.wsimg.com/blobby/go/905bb114-a609-4bd0-a33b-dabe335781b0/downloads/ISSF-WSPI-2023-FINAL.pdf?ver=1692105020621

 

 <IMDb>  "Greatest Chinese Movies of All Time" ,  only one Taiwanese movie 《Yi Yi》selected.  Most winners are movies from Hong Kong and China.

news:

cultural artifacts of Taiwan's National Palace Museum

Global Times, 2022-10-31 Those cultural treasures in NPM have become the cultural link and historical bonds that cannot be cut off between the Taiwan island and the Chinese mainland. Signs indicate that it's no accident that such incidents have happened one after another in recent years. The root cause is that the DPP authorities' promotion of "de-Sinicization" in the Taiwan island has seriously affected the protection and management of cultural relics  globaltimes.cn/page/202210/1278338.shtml
DW (Germany), 2022-8-17 Taiwan considers evacuating cultural artifacts amid China tensions; National Palace Museum denied these rumors in a statement  dw.com/en/taiwan-considers-evacuating-cultural-artifacts-amid-china-tensions/a-62836646
Global Times, 2022-8-9  CNN on July 30 revealed that "in the event of an evacuation, the museum said it would focus on saving around 90,000 relics from its 700,000-strong collection, prioritizing artifacts of higher value and those that take up less space...  to the US and Japan....it hard to dispel public concerns....The relics are  cultural heritage of the 5,000 years of Chinese history, and once sent abroad, it will be difficult to get them back,  The museum's collection will be better off if it remains where it is in the event of an "attack from the Chinese mainland," suggested Feng Ming-chu, former curator of the museum   globaltimes.cn/page/202208/1272494.shtml
China Times, 2022-8-13  "真正的護國神山在故宮" / according to world scholars' opinions, China won't attack Taiwan by nuclear bomb as long as those cultural artifacts remain in Taiwan.   chinatimes.com/opinion/20220813002769-262101?chdtv   

  Asia Nikkei (Japan), 2022-5-30: Taiwan makes soft power grab for Europe's Mandarin learners Push comes as China's Confucius Institutes face global headwinds  asia.nikkei.com/Politics/International-relations/Taiwan-makes-soft-power-grab-for-Europe-s-Mandarin-learners

  United Daily (Taiwan 經濟日報), 2022-12-21:  Taiwan's cultural& creative industry faces some key issues: How to attract business or capitalists to  invest the industryArtists are disdainful of commercial operations, 16 areas need to be promoted by different methods, how to enter international marketand - film industry has been fettered by politics , prosperity no longer exists.(影視作品受到政治羈絆,榮景已不復存焉)udn.com/news/story/7338/6853439?from=udn_ch2cate6643sub7338_pulldownmenu_v2

 Taiwan Plus, 2022-12-21: Taiwan Aims To Match South Korea's Film and TV Success  / Leading local media executives want to turn Taiwan into a film and TV powerhouse like South Korea to boost the country's soft power  msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/taiwan-aims-to-match-south-koreas-film-and-tv-success-taiwanplus-news/vi-AA15v4Y1?category=foryou
 

ISSF's World Soft Power Index 2022
Brand Recognition

1 USA
2 Japan
3 Germany
4 S. Korea
5 UK
6 France
7 Italy
8 Swiss
9 China
10 India

img1.wsimg.com/blobby/go/905bb114-a609-4bd0-a33b-dabe335781b0/downloads/ISSF_s%20World%20Soft%20Power%20Index%202022.pdf?ver=1660547924817

ISSF's World Soft Power Index 2022
Entertainment & Media Penetration

1 USA
2 Japan
3 India
4 S. Korea
5 UK
6 France
7 Turkey
8 China
9 Italy
10 Spain

img1.wsimg.com/blobby/go/905bb114-a609-4bd0-a33b-dabe335781b0/downloads/ISSF_s%20World%20Soft%20Power%20Index%202022.pdf?ver=1660547924817

 

 


 


        
 
pic. :  This website-group was ranked No.1 by keyword "Taiwan cultural creativity" on Microsoft Bing, 2024-2-9, 2023-9-4, 2022-12-12, 2022-10-9, 2022-5-31, 2021-8-9, 2021-6-24, 2021-5-9, 2021-4-18, 12-3-2020, 2019-10-23, 2018-10-1; pic.:   No.2  "Taiwan soft power" on US Bing at 2022-12-12; No.1  "Taiwan soft power" on US Bing at  12-3-2020, 10-23-2019, 11-28-2018This website-group was ranked No.1  "Taiwan soft power" on Microsoft Bing,  2023-9-4, 2021-6-24, 12-3-2020 ; This website-group was ranked No.2   "Taiwan creativity", on US Bing, 2022-12-12; No.1 at 12-3-2020, 10-23-2019,  Oct. 1, 2018



pic.:  This website-group  was ranked No.1 or top by keyword "Taiwan cultural creativity" on Yahoo search engine, 2022-10-9, 2022-5-31, 2021-8-9, 2021-5-9, 2021-4-18, 12-3-2020, 4-26-2020, Oct. 23, 2019, Oct. 1, 2018
 

    
pic. left:  This website-group was ranked No.2 "Taiwan cultural creative industry" on Bing, 2022-10-9; No.1 by keyword "Taiwan cultural creative industry" on Bing,  2021-5-9, 2021-4-18, 12-3-2020, 4-26-2020
 


pic.:  This website was ranked No. 2  by keyword "Taiwan cultural creative industry" on Yahoo ,2022-10-9; No.1, 2,3  by keyword "Taiwan cultural creative industry" on Yahoo search engine,  2021-5-9, Oct. 23, 2019

 

 

Taiwan won some important film awards 10 years ago, but not in recent years

List of Asians' big-wins in Oscar 2022 - 2023

Creatives of Chinese and Indian Descent Triumph at 2023 Oscars - Best Actress  Michelle Yeoh (Malaysia); Best Supporting Actor Ke Huy Quan (Vietnamese-born Chinese-American); Best Supporting Actress Stephanie Hsu  (grandmother is Chinese to Taiwan), Hong Chau (Vietnamese); Best Original Screenplay  Daniel Kwan (father Hong Konger); Best Adapted Screenplay Kazuo Ishiguro ( Japan born)
2022 Oscars:
Best Intl Feature    Drive My Car (Japan) ; Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom (Bhutan)
2011 Oscar awards show proved to be a monumental one, with Chloé Zhao making history as the first Asian woman to win the Academy Award for “Best Director” for her work on Nomadland.

List of Asians' big-wins in Oscar 2016 - 2021

Best Picture 2021- Japan (nominated); 2020- China (won); 2019 - S. Korea (won)
Best  Actor 2020 - S. Korea/USA (nominated)
Best Actress 2016 - Israel/USA (nominated)
Best Supporting Actor 2016 - India/UK (nominated)
Best Supporting Actress 2020 - S. Korea (won)
Best Director 2021 - Japan (nominated); 2020 - China (won), S. Korea/USA (nominated); 2019 - S. Korea (won)
Best Original ScreenPlay 2020 - S. Korea/USA (nominated); 2019 - S. Korea (won); 2017 - Pakistan/USA (nominated)
Best Adapted ScreenPlay 2021 - Japan (nominated); 2020 - China (nominated), Iran/USA (nominated); Armenia/USA (nominated)
Best Int'l Feature Film 2021 - Japan (won),  Bhutan (nominated);  2020 - Hong Kong (nominated); 2019 - S. Korea (won); 2018 - Japan, Lebanon (nominated); 2017 - Lebanon (nominated); 2016 - Lebanon (won)
PS: Hayao Miyazaki, at age 83, earned an Academy Award nomination for his semi-autobiographical fantasy film The Boy and the Heron;  Taiwanese-American director S. Leo Chiang's 19 minute-long "Island in Between" about frontline Taiwanese islands repeatedly fought over with China during the height of the Cold War  Island in Between | An Oscar-Nominated Op-Doc    is vying to win an Oscar 2024.
 

Asians' big-wins at Cannes Film Festival 2022 - 2023

Cannes 2022 - Director Park Chan-wook and actor Song Kang-ho, both from South Korea, scripted history at Cannes with their wins in the respective categories.  Among other winning Asian names and films were Iranian actress Zar Amir Ebrahimi, Chinese short film The Water Murmurs, Pakistani film Joyland, and Indian documentary All That Breathes
Cannes 2023 -
Japanese acting legend Koji Yakusho won best actor for Wim Wenders' 'Perfect Days'. Merve Dizdar took best actress for Nuri Bilge Ceylan's Turkish drama 'About Dry Grasses.'  Tràn Anh Hùng a Vietnamese-born filmmaker based in France, took the best director prize for The Pot-Au-Feu.   A third Asian film, Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Monster, took best screenplay honors, for the script from Yuji Sakamoto, a careful dissection of Japanese reticence, shame and desire
prize for best first film went to Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell from Vietnamese writer/director Thien An Pham, which premiered in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight sidebar

List of Asians' big-wins at Cannes Film Festival 2016 - 2021

 "Palme d'Or" 2019 - S. Korea (Parasite)
2018- Japan (Shoplifters)
Best Actor 2022 - S. Korea 
2016 - Iran
Best Actress 2022 - Iran
2018 - Kazakh
2016 - Philippines
Best  Director 2022 - S. Korea
 

List of Asians' Golden Lion at Venice Film Festival 2016 - 2023

Grand Jury Prize 2023 - Japan  - Evil Does Not Exist, Ryusuke Hamaguchi
 Best Picture 2016 - Philippines
een.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Lion
 

List of Asians' Best Animated Feature in Oscar 2016 - 2023

2023 Japan (nominated)日本 The Boy and the Heron   Hayao Miyazaki & Toshio Suzuki
2020 China/USA (nominated)  
2018 Japan (nominated) won Annie Awards
2016 Japan (nominated)  
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_Award_for_Best_Animated_Feature
 

List of Asians' British Academic Film Awards 2016 ~ 2023

2021 Australia, New Zealand   (BAFTA Award for Best Film)

2019

S. Korea (BAFTA Award for Best Film)

BAFTA Award for Best Film Not In English

2021 Japan  (won)
2019 S. Korea  (won)
2018 Japan, Lebanon  (nominated)
2017 S. Korea (won), Cambodia  (nominated)
 


 
 
No. 1  "Taiwan cultural creativity" on Google, 2021-11-1, 2021-8-9, 2021-6-24, 2021-5-9, 2021-4-18, 2-18-2021; top 5 at 2022-10-9

 


This website-group was ranked No.1 by keyword "Taiwan cultural creativity" on Baidu of China
, 2021-11-1, 2021-8-9, 2021-6-24, 2021-5-9, 2021-4-18, 12-3-2020

 

 Dr. Joseph Nye said hard & soft power enable Taiwan to deal with China and expand its international space. (Dec. 8, 2010)   The Diplomat 10-5-2020 (https://thediplomat.com/2020/10/us-presidential-elections-2020-the-taiwan-factor/) advises that Taiwan’s strategic calculus could double down on its use of soft power.  Washington Post, 2-17-2021:Today, 98 % of Taiwanese are ethnic Han Chinese... 
there has been a shift among younger generations who increasingly do not feel China’s emotional pull but rather embrace their home island’s history, and its Indigenous culture, as an expression of being distinctly Taiwanese.
Indigenous artists (
related to the Austronesian peoples) shine as Taiwan’s mainstream embraces its island identity.  Hollywood Reporter, 2021-11-1: While China becomes increasingly reclusive and unwelcoming of Western content, Taiwan has thrown the door open to international co-productions with new incentive schemes hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/taiwan-entertainment-sector-leverages-creative-freedoms-mainland-china-1235038510/  bangkok post, 2021-11-25: With no mainstream Chinese films showing for the third year running, Taiwan's top film festival may have lost some lustre...a Taiwanese director calling for the island's independence in an acceptance speech at the 2018 ceremony triggered an official boycott the following year.
 Taiwan stated "Taiwan is small, but our 'soft power' is big ! " , "Culture makes Taiwan great ! "
However, Taiwan's culture like a mouse in circles still stay in same place United Daily, 2022-7-5: too much controls by the gov. results in uninteresting TV show, and industry suffering udn.com/news/story/121823/6425508?from=udn_ch2cate6643sub121823_pulldownmenu_v2   A column article of United Daily 2-21-2019: Taiwan's cultural and creative industry almost become an endangered industry.  Taiwan's cultural & creative industry has nothing but slogans and many argues. The total value of Taiwan's cultural & creative production was far behind of that of Korea, Korea's value in publication is about 6 times larger than Taiwan's,  Film industry 6 times, TV 3.5 times, Advertising 3 times, Pop-music 6 times bigger than Taiwan's, according to statistics by Taiwan government and reports by headline news of the China Times at 12-24-2017.    CTN comments that Taiwan lacks of updated related laws and policy no focus, no direction, no institute, original creativity is not encouraged, the industry field is divided, without integrated marketing.   Taiwan's De-Sinicization policy gave up rich Chinese cultural background and history ......   so as to lose advantage in cultural-creativity battlefield.  Critics in UDN (10-24-2019) :  Design field thinks culture & arts are nothing but decorative, fine arts belittle commercial arts, etc ... the arts should take the lead for the fusion of tech. and culture ( for details pls. read https://udn.com/news/story/11321/4122342 ) .
  
The output value of Taiwan's cultural & creative production in '12 - '13 declined 9.28%, in contrast, Taiwan's neighbor countries increased, China 14.27%, Malaysia, Philippines 8+%, Korea 0.65% ... Taiwan's cultural & creative industry even failed to create a "bubble", the reason is lacking of original creativity. / The China Times, 8-15-2017  Apple Daily, editorial, 10-3-2020: Taiwan president Tsai said "The power of design is the nation's power".  From today on, "design" is no longer just an actor, but a "leading actor".  Hope so ! 
 https://tw.appledaily.com/headline/20201003/Y3KEHXF4CRDRLJNNY2ZOJUMZ3I/
      ( ps: "Hard Power" means military power, etc  ―  Taiwan has not invented any top weapons. )
 

 

  

 

 

    
pic. :  No. 1  "Taiwan cultural creativity" on Google, 2021-8-8, 2021-6-23, 2021-5-8, 2021-4-17, 2-11-2021, 1-1-2021  
pic. :  This website-group was ranked No.1 by keyword "Taiwan cultural creative industry" on Baidu of China,  2021-5-9

 

 

 ●   UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage  /    https://ich.unesco.org/en/lists

ranks

Asian country heritage items selected
1 China 40
2 Korea 24
3 Japan 20
4 Mongolia 15
5 India 13
6 Indonesia 10
7 Saudi Arabia 8
8 Cambodia 5
9 Philippines 4
10 Qatar 3
10 Malaysia 3
10 Pakistan 3
13  Thai 2
14 Singapore 1
14 Sri Lanka 1
14 Vietnam 1
14 UAE 1

18~2X

Myanmar, Laos, Nepal 0
  Taiwan 0
  Taiwan is doing De-sinicization (getting rid of Chinese culture) for political reason.

◆  sg.news.yahoo.com/singapore-hawker-culture-gets-nod-included-unesco-intangible-cultural-heritage-list-140941296.html  12-16-2020: Singapore’s hawker culture was officially approved on Wednesday (16 December) to be inscribed into UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage of humanity.  The biggest thanks must go to the generations of hawkers for nourishing a nation’s stomach and spirits.   Taiwan is proud of its night market culture, but was not selected.

 

       
   
  
        
pic: No.2 "Taiwan creativity" on Baidu of China, 2021-5-9
pic. left : The websites-group was ranked No.1 "Taiwan soft power" on Baidu of China, 2021-8-9, 2021-6-24, 2021-5-9
pic. middle:  Taiwan VS Korea, in Publications, Movies, TV, Ads., Pop music , CTN 12-24-2017
 (Korea -red bar, Taiwan - blue bar ); ps: China's OTT broke in TW in large scale, Taiwan cultural industries are not competitive / Liberty Times, 3-16-2019
pic. right:  The websites-group was ranked No.2 "Taiwan creativity" on Baidu of China, 2021-5-9


pic. :   This websites group was ranked No.1 on US Bing  by keyword "Taiwan soft power" at  2021-6-23, 12-3-2020, 4-24-2020, 10-23-2019, 2-5-2019, 11-28-2018



pic.:  This websites-group was ranked No.1 on Yahoo search engine
 by keyword "Taiwan soft power" at 
12-3-2020, 4-24-2020, 10-23-2019,
 2-5-2019, 11-28-2018; No.2 at 2021-4-18


 

 

 

 Taiwan's soft power  vs.  Asia's soft power

Till 2020, Taiwan has not been included in Portland or USC Soft Power survey ranking list, so Taiwan's soft power is behind Asian's "world top 20" nations , including Japan, South Korea, Australia, Singapore, New Zealand, China, India, UAE.     for details : click Soft Power  
 

world best surveys Taiwan's rankings
in top 25~30 list
comparison with
other Asia & Pacific countries
Brand Finance -  Global soft power Index 2022 failed 1. US, 2. UK, 3. Germany, 4. China, 5. Japan, 6. France, 7. Canada, 8. Swiss, 9. Russia, 10. Italy
Brand Finance -  Global soft power Index 2021 failed 1. Germany,  2. Japan, 3. UK, 4. Canada, 5. Swiss, 6. US, 7 France, 8. China, 9. Sweden, 10. Australia, 11. Korea, 12 Holland, 13.  Russia, 14. Norway, 15. Denmark, 16 NZ, 17. UAE, 18. Iceland,    19. Italia, 20. Singapore
US News: 2021 Best Countries Overall failed top 10 2. Japan,  5. Australia   7. New Zealand
Brand Finance -  Global soft power Index 2020, top 60 n/c https://brandirectory.com
 2019/2020 
Top 30 SOFT POWER by Portland
failed No. 8 Japan, No.9  Australia, No. 17 New Zealand,  No. 19  S Korea, No. 21 Singapore, No. 27 China
2020 Best Countries Overall
The Best Countries in the World
n/c No.3 Japan, No.5  Australia, No. 11 New Zealand,
No. 15 China, No. 16 Singapore , No. 20  Korea,
No.22 UAE , No.25  India,  No. 26  Thailand,
No. 30  Qatar
2018/2019 Monocle's Soft Power survey failed No. 3 Japan, No.8  Australia, No. 11 New Zealand, No.15 Korea, No. 19 China,  No. 21  Singapore,  No. 25 India
2018/2019 Soft Power 30 Study by USC Center on Public Diplomacy failed No.5 Japan, No. 10 Australia, No. 18 NZ, No. 20 S. Korea, No. 21 Singapore, No. 27 China
2017/2018 Monocle's Soft Power survey failed No. 4 Japan, No.9 Australia, No. 13 New Zealand, No.17 Korea, No. 19 China,  No. 22 Singapore, No. 24 India
2017/2018 Soft Power 30 Study by USC Center on Public Diplomacy failed No.6. Japan,  No. 8. Australia,  18. NZ,  No. 20 Singapore, No. 21 S. Korea,  No. 25.  China
2016/2017 Monocle's
Soft Power survey
failed No. 3 Japan, No.6 Australia, No. 13 New Zealand, No.17 Korea, No. 20 China,  No. 23 Singapore, No. 24 India
2015/2016 Monocle's
 Soft Power survey
failed No. 4 Japan, No.6 Australia, No. 13 New Zealand, No.15 Korea, No. 21 China,  No. 23 Singapore
 

 

 

  According to a survey of 2020, Singapore ranks No.1, Japan No.7, Korea No. 9 on "enterprise",  Japan ranks No. 5, China No.10 on "engagement", Korea ranks No. 5 on "digital", Japan ranks No.6, China No. 8 on "culture", No any Asian country ranks top 10 on "education" and "govt."
 

Best Countries overall in 2020:  1 Swiss 2 Canada 3 Japan  4 Germany  5  Australia  6  UK  7 USA  8 Sweden  9 Nederland  10  Norway  11 NZ  12 France  13 Denmark  14  Finland  15 China  16 Singapore  17  Italy  18  Austria  19 Spain  20  Korea  21  Luxembourg   22 UAE  23  Russia  24 Portugal  25  India  26  Thailand  27  Greece  28  Brazil  29  Israel  30  Qatar  31  Saudi Arabia   32 Malaysia   33 Mexico  34  Poland  35  Turkey

 

   Taiwan's cultural creativity on food


pic.: In World's Best Restaurants list, In Asia area, Australia, Singapore, Japan, India, Thailand, China, Korea are winners 

 


pic.: In Asia's 50 Best Restaurants, Singapore, China, Japan, Thailand are big winners 

 

 pic. above: Taiwan's restaurants were loser or behind in EATER's "world best restaurants awards",  CNN "world's best new restaurants" and Economists EIU "Global Food Security Index".

 

 

Taiwan's cultural creativity  :  artistsshortage of creativity & vivid imagination ! governmentlacking of forward thinking ...   Liberty Times 4-6-2016:  Government took the lead to plagiarize, and ignored copy-rights, Taiwan becomes "an island of Plagiarism".

Taiwan's soft power : click to see Taiwan Soft Power,  Human Rights  

2019/2020  THE SOFT POWER by Portland

 
1  France 16 Austria
2 UK 17 New Zealand
3 Germany 18 Belgium
4 Sweden 19 Korea
5 USA 20 Ireland
6 Swiss 21  Singapore
7 Canada 22 Portugal
8  Japan 23 Poland 
9 Australia 24 Czech
10 Nederland 25 Greece
11 Italia 26    Brazil
12 Norway 27    China
13 Spain 28    Hungary
14 Denmark 29    Turkey
15 Finland 30    Russia

 

2018/2019  Monocle's Soft Power survey

1  France 16 Nederland
2 Germany 17 Finland
3 Japan 18 Norway
4 Canada 19 China
5 Swiss 20 Belgium
6 UK 21  Singapore
7 Sweden 22 Ireland
8 Australia 23 Austria 
9 USA 24 India
10 Portugal 25 Brasil
11 New Zealand ps: Asia & Pacific countries marked
12 Italia
13 Spain
14 Denmark
15 Korea

 

2017/2018 Monocle's Soft Power survey

1 Canada 16 Nederland
2 Germany 17 Korea
3 France 18 Finland
4 Japan 19 China
5 UK 20 Belgium
6 Swiss 21 Austria
7 USA 22  Singapore
8 Sweden 23 Ireland
9 Australia 24 India
10 Italia 25 Brasil
11 Denmark ps: Asia & Pacific countries marked
12 Portugal
13 New Zealand
14 Spain
15 Norway

 

2016/2017 Monocle's Soft Power survey

1 USA 16 Norway
2 Germany 17 Korea
3 Japan 18 Finland
4 UK 19 Brasil
5 France 20 China
6 Australia 21 Austria
7 Canada 22 Belgium
8 Sweden 23 Singapore
9 Swiss 24 India
10 Danmark 25 Poland
11 Italy ps: Asia & Pacific countries marked yellow
12 Spain
13 New Zealand
14 Holland
15 Portugal

   Understand Taiwan   ―   Please click "see Taiwan in one minute" and "Understand Taiwan in full aspects" !     top rankings !

   ★  Review Taiwan   ―    "review Taiwan"   top rankings !

 

 

 

 

 

pic: This websites-group was ranked No.1 by keyword 
"
Understand Taiwan " on Google, 3-1-2018, 9-30-2017, 1-6-2017
 

 

pic: This websites-group was ranked No.1 by keyword
"comment Taiwan" on Google at  3-1-2018, 9-30-2017, 12-4-2016, 1-1-2017   
 
review Taiwan ranks top on Bing, Google at 8-15-2017, 9-30-2017, 3-1-2018

 

 

   

 

Tourism        full analysis pls. click TaiwanTour & Travel

WEF <Travel and tourism competitiveness report> of 2019 shows Taiwan had the sub-region's largest decline in competitiveness,  Taiwan ranks 10th in Asia, Taiwan's prioritization of travel & tourism ranks world No.75 ;  World Economic Forum (WEF) 2017 <Travel and tourism competitiveness report> (released at 4-6-2017), Taiwan's most important indexes for promoting tourism, like "Attractiveness of Natural Assets" (parks, beaches, mountains, wildlife, etc) ranks world No.87, "Natural Resources" ranks No.55,   "Environmental Sustainability" ranks No.75 (No.69 in 2015), "Price Competitiveness" ranks No. 46, "Hotel Price Index" ranks No. 89 (82 in 2015), Taiwan got "n/a" on China's strong indexes such as "World heritage natural sites" as well as "World heritage cultural sites" (world top 5).   Taiwan has excellent scores on "Mobile Network coverage", "ATM", etc, but those least likely are main attractiveness to international sightseers that Taiwan needs most.

 

 2015 Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report

Taiwan's weakness :
Index Taiwan's world rankings
Country Brand Strategy No.125
Prioritization of Travel & Tourism No.82
Hotel price index No.82
Tourist service infrastructure No.77
Environmental Sustainability No.69
Natural Resource No.62
Purchasing power parity No.64
World heritage cultural sites the last position, n/a (China No.5)
World heritage natural sites the last position, n/a (China No.3)
major car rental companies No.120
Travel and tourism industry development No.53

http://reports.weforum.org/travel-and-tourism-competitiveness-report-2015

 

◆  Country Brands Index 2014/2015

Taiwan's score : Taiwan's score location - "Countries" (left lower place)
Taiwan locates in "Countries" category, a lowest area  ―   having below average perceptions in both the Status and Experience dimensions.

Critera :
tourism / Value for money, Range of attractions, Resort & lodging options, Would like to visit for a vacation, Food ;
HERITAGE & CULTURE / Historical points of interest, Heritage, art & culture, Natural beauty;
etc.

 


“Country brands” – Countries that have above average perceptions across both the Status and Experience dimensions and have measurable competitive advantages over their peers as a result.
“Experience countries” – Countries whose perception strength is biased towards dimensions relating to Heritage & Culture, Tourism and Made In.
“Status countries” – Countries whose perception strength is biased towards attributes relating to Value System, Quality Of Life and Business Potential.

http://www.futurebrand.com/news/futurebrand-launches-the-country-brand-index-2014-15

top 20 countries: Japan, Switzerland, Germany, Sweden, Canada, Norway, United States, Australia, Denmark, Austria, New Zealand, United Kingdom, Finland,Singapore, Iceland, Netherlands, France, Italy, United Arab Emirates, South Korea.

top 20 most influential cities:  NY, London, Beijing, Washington, Moscow, Tokyo, Paris, Berlin, Shanghai, Dubai,  HK, Singapore, New Delhi, SaoPaulo, Rio De Janeiro, LA, Rome, Toronto, Seoul, Mumbai

 

 

   

 


Food -    poisonous/ black hearted food in Taiwan for 20-30 years, click for details  
 

best restaurants   click to see Taiwan restaurants (top rankings)

      1. Luc Besson's movie "Lucy"  shooting in Taiwan particularly includes Din Tai Fung ―  which is not only the most famous Taiwanese restaurant but also even a landmark of Taiwan, however,             

 

(1) Din Tai Fung admitted at 5-9-2012 having used  Monosodium Glutamate / sodium glutamate (M.S.G.) as addictive in some foods there -  and they won't change this policy so as to keep major cuisine (e.g., steamed bun/bao (小籠包), chicken soup) delicious (according to United Daily News 5.9.2013).  According to  National Health Research Institutes and United Daily News (8-15-2015) "Horrible foods for dining out": Taiwan's food (in restaurants, cafeteria, etc) problems include using MSG.  Taiwan's 5 star restaurants like Sherwood Hotel announced any chefs using MSG will be fired.  According to int'l medical studies, using Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) is controversial. (ref to "The Dangers of MSG" : http://health.howstuffworks.com/wellness/food-nutrition/facts/the-dangers-of-monosodium-glutamate.htm)  Some claimed it may causes asthma, headache, even brain damage. )
 

(2) Din Tai Fung was suspicious of being involved in Taiwanese food scandal, Apple Daily (蘋果日報)10-10-2014 reported that one Taiwanese Dept. of Health found out Din Tai Fung imported some oil products from King's Cook which bought  lard oil (mixing animal feed with cooking oil) from Ting Hsin Int'l. ( http://www.appledaily.com.tw/realtimenews/article/new/20141010/485241/   台中市衛生局調查發現,鼎泰豐曾向購買頂新正義油品的台中金品調理(KingsCook) 公司進貨,恐中鏢。)
 

(3) Din Tai Fung admitted having used G.M.(genetic modified) soy material(豆類) for a long time (until July 2015).   The China Times, (3.29.2013) reported professor Kuo H. J. (National Taiwan University, Department of Agronomy) comments - Taiwan using G.M.(genetic modified) is "national scandal" (國家級醜聞」), French scholar Seralini found G.M. foods may cause cancer with higher probability,    BBC (6.6.2013)<Taiwan diet danger everywhere>: Taiwan is the only country eating cured products made by animal-feed, G.M.(genetic modified) soya beans.  (主妇联盟说台湾是世界上唯一直接食用饲料级基改黄豆加工 的豆制品国家。)  But Din Tai Fung still used the "scandalous" G.M. stuff for 2+ years after the news being spread island-wide Recently, CNN (7-24-2015) dropped Din Tai Fung down to No.20 position  in Taiwanese foods list.

 

The Brand Personality ?

Din Tai Fung's Hong Kong branches were just eliminated their Michelin star
 title at Oct. 31, 2014,  (lost again in Dec. 2015)
Taiwan's Din Tai Fung never won any Michelin star title, but it is advertising itself a Michelin star restaurant by posters at front of largest Japanese mall, Mitsukoshi Dpt. Store in Taipei. (photo Aug. 22 2015)

Din Tai Fung USA website (http://DinTaiFungusa.com) has also been advertising a similar one in its front-page. (tests till present at 9-17-2015)

ps: the China Times analyzed losing Michelin most likely it's because of inconsistent quality problem.  (http://www.chinatimes.com/realtimenews/20141031001358-260405) 

 

    

pic.: In Asia's 50 Best Restaurants, Singapore, China, Japan, Thailand are big winners 

pic.: In World's Best Restaurants list, In Asia area, Australia, Singapore, Japan, India, Thailand, China, Korea are winners 

    2 Michelin Guide Taipei was released at 3-14-2018, Taiwanese cuisine was not valued high, The number of stars Taiwan obtained is much less than those of Shanghai, HK, Macao, and Singapore.   Furthermore, unlike those in Singapore, Hong Kong, Bangkok, Taiwan's night-market, street food failed to won any Michelin star.

      3  According to  "Asia's 50 Best Restaurants" (2018) , Thailand Bangkok's Gaggan consecutively got in the first place,  the number of Japanese restaurants selected is 11, Hong Kong & Macao 10,  Thailand 9Singapore 7 Korea and Taiwan both are 3, but Korea won the 11th grade, the best ever position that Taiwan got in this year is the 15th  (RAW, 18th MUME,  47th Shoun Ryugin),  China got the 8th position https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/asia-50-best-restaurants-2018/index.html

     4.   According to The World's Best Restaurants (2017) , Taiwan is not included in the list, Thailand got No.7, Singapore No.14, Japan 18th, HK 24th, Shanghai 41th.  In total, 5 Japanese , 4 Chinese, 3 Singapore, 2 Thailand, 1 Korean, 1 India restaurant(s) entered top 100.   http://www.theworlds50best.com/list/1-50-winners#t51-100.

      5.  Miele Guide (2012) :  No any Taiwanese restaurant is included in top 20 Asian restaurants list.


 Food - night markets
    
●  Yahoo News, 12-16-2020: Singapore’s hawker culture was officially approved  (Dec.16, 2020) to be inscribed into UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage of humanity.  But Taiwan's night market hawker culture was not selected  ●   China Times 7-15-2020,  till now the govt. only work on night market's toilet room, the rest is far behind the standard int'l metro's needs...    Taipei mayor Ko: Our night markets and markets are too dirty ! ●  The best-known expert in toxic study, professor Yen: Minimize the times of dining out to protect your health !

    
    The United Daily (3-1-2017): Many Taiwanese night markets closed down due to lacking of distinguishing feature or quality, and the number of Chinese tourists sudden decreasing.  Taiwan night market cuisines

 

 Food - scandals

      Taiwan's food  safety scandals   black hearted food in Taiwan 

Financial Times (UK), 8-28-2020: Taiwan eventually eases restrictions on US pork and beef imports.  Must bear in mind you may eat beef and pork with controversial Ractopamine from 2021 on,  the cost of local meat is much more expensive.   Reuters , 11-23-2020: Thousands of people took to Taipei's streets with much of the anger focused on the government's decision to ease restrictions on imports of U.S. pork. 
"Taiwanese pigs don't eat ractopamine and yet you are asking Taiwanese people to?"  
Associated Press, 11-23-2020: The drug is banned by the European Union, but is legal in the United States... “I feel these days many who do business are not ethical. If they mix the U.S. pork with Taiwan pork and then sell it to us average consumers, we as individuals have no way to know the source of the pork.”  https://apnews.com/article/global-trade-tsai-ing-wen-trade-agreements-taiwan-food-safety-cf76e2db33063462632bfd383e0b7dbf 

●  83% of Taiwan's Michelin 2~3 star restaurants, and 33% of Taiwan's Michelin star restaurants, failed to pass sanitary/health inspection (kitchen things/equipment not clean, food materials on the floor, without staffs' health examination proof ) , but they passed second inspection, such as 3 star restaurant Le Palais, 2 star restaurants RAW態芮-Tairroir、祥雲龍吟( RyuGin Taipei )、 鮨天本(Sushi Amamoto).   ref. to Liberty Times, 3-30-2020, Apple Daily 3-31-2020.    Chang Gung Mem. Hospital Toxicology expert professor   Yen Tzung-Hai M.D. (顏宗海, Doctor, Univ. of London ): Minimize the times of dining out to protect your health ! ( ref. to book <食品不安全的年代如何自保>("how to survive in this bad food-security time", April '16)) 

 Even Taiwan's Michelin 3 star winner Le Palais was found snacks containing Hydrogen peroxide (過氧化氫) and Benzoic acid (苯甲酸),  besides, many tourism hotels / 5 star hotels were found food hygiene not up to standard, e.g.,  5 star hotels used expired no-good ingredients, such as HsinChu and Taipei's Ambassador Hotel,  The Grand Hotel, Regent Formosa, and so on, reported by CTV evening news, BCC , LTN (12-19-2019) https://news.ltn.com.tw/news/life/breakingnews/3014179   United Daily 1-20-2020:  Taipei mayor Ko: Our night markets and markets are too dirty !  Liberty Times , 1-6-2019 :  Taipei City Hall's "Model Night Markets" project, aims at " Japanese tourists are willing to sit down to eat "however, quite many stalls opposed, in that elevating the hygienic level and class increases their running costs... 


    
 5 star hotel restaurants scandals - A book (Shin Kong Wu Ho-Su Memorial Hospital, Taiwan Veterans General Hospital's physician Jiang So-San M.D. 江守山 "食在安心" (10-2014)) said many 5 star hotel restaurants don't wash vegetables ...  some 5 star hotels made sashimi raw fish slices by using fresh-water fishes, this may increase the probability to get cancer  (for details 台灣餐廳  or  台灣美食Taiwan Night Markets ) ; Epoch Times (大紀元, 3-14-2017):Okura Prestige Tpe (大倉久和, a 5 star hotel) sold expired frozen shrimps, molded taro (vegetable 芋) etc;   SETN news ( 三立新聞 5-16-2016): Some 5 star hotels in northern Taiwan sold black-hearted expired seafoods ;  LTN (5-17-2016): 5 star hotels Ambassador and Howard (國賓福華) clarified this news;   Apple Daily (蘋果日報 6-7-2016): Sheraton (喜來登) 's white shrimps contained bleaching agent (漂白劑),4 times higher than the legal standard,Ranina (Spanner crabs 旭蟹) contained heavy medal Cadmium poisoning (重金屬镉) 14% higher than the standard...;  Apple Daily (蘋果日報 7-2-'13): Taiwan's tourist hotels' food ingredients expired 2 years,  only 3 out of 21 hotels passed the security check and sanitary examination etc conducting by Taiwan Administration, e.g., Shangri-La's (tnn) did not separate their cutting tools for cooked foods and raw foods;    FTV news, 5-18-2017: 13 ingredients / materials expired in a 5 star hotel in Taiwan;  CTI TV news (5-17-2017, 19:33): What can we eat in Taiwan? people are uneasy for food here...   

       ●  Taiwan administration's Dioxin ("poison of the century") control system crashed completely / FTV news, 4-22-2017.
        Major world media like The Economist
(11.29.2014) comment a series of food safety scandals is one of few main factors causing the KMT, Taiwan's ruling party, has suffered one of its worst electoral defeats since Chiang Kai-shek and his forces fled to the island at the end of Chinese civil war in 1949.

         Chang Gung Mem. Hospital professor Yin M.D. (顏宗海, Doctor, Univ. of London ): Minimize the times of dining out to protect your health ! ( ref. to book <食品不安全的年代如何自保>("how to survive in this bad food-security time", April 2016)

     ●  Dean of National Taiwan Normal University - graduate school of Chemistry,  Dr. Gaston J. C. Wu (化學所長吳家誠教授)'s book <Those black-heart products toxin-experts never buy ("毒物專家絕不買的黑心商品")> (Nov. 2013): Most of the time I eat at home, and has never dined out in street-side shops / small-eat markets (路邊攤), because those small-eat shops usually/always do not meet the minimum standards of cleanliness

      Shin Kong Wu Ho-Su Memorial Hospital, Taiwan Veterans General Hospital's physician Jiang So-San M.D. : Most 5 star hotel restaurants in Taiwan don't wash the vegetables ...  ref. to the book "食在安心"  

Taiwan's Food safety scandals
TW food
 

2015 :
Since its worst ever electoral defeats, Taiwanese government never does some soul searching and corrects the wrong,  "It's weirdo !!, Taiwanese government only focuses on 3 dried products - dried daylily, dried radish, and preserved fruits (snacks)", NTU professor Wu K.Y. stated "Completely evading the crucial point", "those 3 items are very low risky products".
Apple Daily 8-28-2015: The incidence rate of Taiwanese people suffering colon/rectal cancer was ranked world No.1 (2nd is Korea, 3rd Slovakia) , Taipei Medical University Hospital's director of surgeons expressed Taiwan's food scandals constantly happened in recent years, many black-heart tainted foods containing Carcinogen (cancer producer) is a factor causing high incidence rate.

2014 Taiwan food scandals
        ●
The New York times
(9.8.2014): The authorities in Taiwan are scrambling to control a tainted-cooking-oil scandal that has affected hundreds of manufacturers and raised fears about health risks posed in many commonly consumed food items... the new scandal shows that there is still not enough being done to eliminate lawbreaking production lines,” The Taipei Times said ...
          ● TIME (9.8.2014): Gutter Oil' Scandal Raises Food-Safety Fears Once Again in Greater China.  A Taiwanese food-safety scare has spread to Hong Kong...
          ● Bloomberg BusinessWeek  (9.8.2014): Tainted Lard: China's Latest Food-Safety Scare Comes From Taiwan       The case is the second major food-safety scandal by a Taiwan-based company in the past year,...The new gutter-oil scandal has “shocked local consumers” in Taiwan who expect more from their government, ...“I hope the law could be revised to impose tougher punishment on those who breach food safety regulations,”...   
       ●
The China Times (9.5.2014, head-page headline news): Disgusting ... Even pigs don't eat those tainted oil we Taiwanese ate !     

ps:  For full text pls. ref. to Taiwan food scandals.

 

Taiwan's Food safety scandals 2013, 2014


 

   

 

Advertisement     a long time loser

My article in <the United Daily News> (Oct. 2007) mentions Taiwan's ad. creativity has been lousy for a long time,  In the past 10 years, Taiwan is about in the last place in Cannes Ad. festival, world best ad. contest.  (Even Vietnam, Philippines, red China are bit better than Taiwan)  Till 2020, Taiwan still only has small number of winnings in int'l ads & creativity contests. 

    

Taiwan's most important ad.

 Take Taiwan's national ads : "UN for Taiwan" (Taiwan to join the UN ) , as an example :

who said ?

 said what ?

This site's comment

2007Taiwan government :

UN for Taiwan ad. is "un-limited creativity"

(1) Those are quite old ideas.

(2) click to read details

National ChenChi University, ad. professor book

using puns in UN series is " very creative and witty idea"

    

Taiwan's int'l winning ads.

As for Taiwan's business ads. or TV commercials obtaining winning records in int'l ad. festivals, are not all so original,..... or/and not very sharp-witty,  e.g., making love with an insect symbolizes insecure sex, or stick out (very out) the tongue to make a funny face, ...... are student-level ideas.

 

 

   

 

Animation (comment Taiwan's best awards in world's best contests)

Taiwan's Top Institution(ps)

animation

World's top contest, prize & honors, and university's opinions

This site's comments

National Taiwan University
of Science & Tech.
Cubic Tragedy
 

ACM SIGGRAPH  
   People' Choice Award 

                        
 Experts won't feel the idea, girl face-lifting resulting in Picasso's cubism a <weeping woman>, unexpected .  

 

National Yuan-lin University
of Science & Tech.
Cubic Tragedy

NYLU's graduate school paper concluded this animation as "Picasso-inspired idea ..... contrary to our expectation".

 experts suppose won't feel this idea "un-expected".
 
National Taiwan Univ. of arts A fish with a smile

Berlin international Film Festival, children's section, Special Prize of jury committee

 (1) it's just a story for children.
 (2) elegant drawing style, but those pictures don't look like any city in Taiwan.
National Tainan Univ. of arts After the rainy day

 winning in UK

 Just like most Taiwan's films,  boring obscure-meaning codes, hence most people are hard to understand or may make over-interpretation. 
 
National Palace Museum Adventures of NPM (1) grand prize, 2008 Tokyo International Anim. Fair.
(2) anim. goal : " bridging the gap  between ancient artworks and modern audiences.
 (1) it's a story for children, not for modern adults.
 (2) the film is showing in children's center of National Palace Museum, Taipei Taiwan.  

Tamkang Univ.'s paper concludes Taiwan animation's 1st problem is "short of creativity".    Very few Taiwan's researches 're working on this subject - creativity. (Taiwan  animation currently is only expertise at drawing tech.)

◎   comment Taiwan's international winning animation films in 2011.

 

  Picasso cartoon Cubism       Picasso cartoon Cubism
 

2 examples (pic. above) let us learn Picasso-Cubism inspired cartoons already having existed long time ago
(<The World encyclopedia Cartoons>,中國戲劇出版社)

More clever Picasso-inspired  ideas have already been developed years ago, please click to see!

 

 

   

 

Music/songs

An essay <China Tames Rebellious Side of Rock "n" Roll> in <New York Times>, likened today's Red Chinese pop music culture to the politically enforced conformity  of the Cultural Revolution, the core of songs is "have fun", culture has become an empty vessel, there are few hints of angst, alienation , or any but the mildest expression of teenage rebellion.

Washington Post,  5-29-2020
On mainland singing competition shows, contestants often perform songs by Hong Kong or Taiwanese artists.

Taiwan's pop music was tamed by political pressure in the past, the "opposition culture" in Taiwan's music field was almost eliminated.

Today's music is in a money-oriented environment.

Very few people notes an usual case :  two most popular singers, Wu-bai and S.H.E. (hottest in China too) sing 2 same-name songs, namely all the same as Chinese translation of "Brave New World" - a classic literature regarding man-handled white-terror tyranny.   S.H.E. seems so happy and exciting while singing this song.

In contrast, Apple Computer's famous commercial <1984> comes from another white-terror literature  "1984" written by Orwellian.   Ad. research papers mention one reason it succeeds ( the most remarkable US ad campaign, although aired only once ) is that people are curious about the mystery/puzzle -  a tyranny in a free country.

Certainly, the <1984> despises human-controlled tyranny.

 Apple <1984> TV commercial

 <Brave New World>

 <Brave New World> Chinese translation book

1984, Apple TV commercial

Brave New World, Chinese translation book


everybody in a blue-smog (mock IBM CIS color) "jail" are under control by big-brother in a big screen . try http://Youtube.com !
 

 (1) A literature by A. Huxley
 (2)
http://futuresteve.wordpress.com/2007/10/19/brave-new-world/  

book cover

  

 

   

 

Arts     Taiwan creativity 

United Daily 10-31-2019: Plagiarism again in Taiwanese design field !!  an art-work in Tai-Nan art festival copied UK's, another art-work on train (government's project) copied Russian's ...... All Taiwanese designers should respect themselves and take these cases as a lesson. 

Apple Daily, opinion, 7-20-2018 :  Taiwan ( Taiwanese everywhere) lacks of aesthetics accomplishments,  particularly those in power can allocate resources have "really turn me off" taste (倒盡胃口),  Taiwan's public art works are too vulgar to be endured (俗不可耐), and some are sort of cheap-copy works (仿冒竊).

Critics in UDN (10-24-2019) :  Design field thinks culture & arts are nothing but decorative, fine arts belittle commercial arts, etc ... the arts should take the lead for the fusion of tech. and culture ( for details pls. read https://udn.com/news/story/11321/4122342 ) .

Dec. 8, 2012 : To everyone's surprise, 2 out of 3 artists in Taiwan government's selection for participating Italia Venice Biennale are foreigners !  This means Taiwan does not have talented artists??

Many Asian countries have great ambition to do city-marketing by arts expo.,  there're 8 arts biennales will be taken place in Sept. 2008.

Taiwan is one of them -   <Asia Arts Biennale > was held till Feb. 2008.

Taiwan's largest news introduced (with a large-sized picture) an expo.  artwork  -  world brand's logos are spread on human bodies, this work seems to symbolize "Globalizing" phenomenon.

However, the idea "logo body" already appeared a number of times in,  i.e., <Your Logo Here, photos from S. Cal. 2004-2006>, and some logo tattoo works .......

More sharp-witty and more difficult ideas appeared in cartooning field at least 13 years ago, i.e., Japanese Yomiuri international cartoon contest.

  logos body     

pic. left: "number" logos on athletes,  pic. right: similar idea intro. by Taiwan's major newspaper

 

 

   

 

Architecture   no aesthetical & creative astonishment

◆   Taipei Performing Arts Center was selected as one among "the transformative buildings set to shape the world" in 2021, in that the eye-catching building has a planet-like sphere protruding from one side - will undoubtedly serve as a contemporary landmark for the Taiwanese capital;  however, some look-alike sphere buildings were already designed earlier  ― all "plug" into a central cube

 

 Taipei Performing Arts Center

www.world-architects.com/en/architecture-news/insight/year-in-architecture-2020

slideshare.net/manishkhageeshrestha/desing-concept

ge.com/news/reports/sphere-of-turbulence-whats-hiding-inside-a

Taiwanese architects were forced to be "construction supervisors" instead of "designers" by the government's policy,  this  finally rouse architects' angers after enduring 10 + years,  most major public architecture projects went to international architects for "unjust treaties" made by the administration. / head-line news of The United Daily, 7-17-2017

   

  pic. United Daily : Taiwanese architects protest "unequal treaty" which benefits foreigners

  United Daily  8-8-2020, editorial: Taiwanese government most welcomes international architecture works, but its double standard angers local architects who criticizing foreigners are not familiar at Taiwan's history and geo. culture.
      (
Chinese text: 國際競圖原意是希望帶動台灣建築師創作力,但後來在執行面出現不少問題,最普遍的就是國外建築師不熟悉台灣歷史、地理,就把既有想法塞進來尤其,國際競圖機制往往埋著國內建築師與國外相比的兩大不平等條約。各級政府國際競圖時,為吸引國外建築師,將設計費率提高二、三倍至百分之十三起跳,更可議的是,近年又冒出「變相國際標」,鼓勵國內建築師事務所找國外建築師設計,若獲選,設計費就可從原一般造價費的百分之四到五,略增到百分之六點二,評分總分還可加分。建築界痛批把國內建築師當「文化買辦、仲介」)

UDN (聯合報) 10-23-2019: Taiwan is far behind in urban construction, in contrast, some metro in Asia always have astonishing architectures ...  (brief)

below are Taiwan's "Face" buildings :

architecture

This site's comment

Taipei 101 building

Ugliest skyscraper in the world :  NOT very exquisite & aesthetic  appearance 

Tao-yuan international airport

  1st Hall : copied U.S. airport.
  2nd Hall :  shortage of spirit breadth and arts
atmosphere.

An article by VIP professor in Taiwan major newspaper (2002) asserted  :  " Copy is humanism spirits" 、 " How can we bear and even enjoy those original designed architecture by Taiwanese, our own people !? "

ps1:  Taiwan's Pavilion at Shanghai's World Expo. 2010 (China)  ―   an ordinary architecture, far worse than UK's Pavilion (based on same construction cost and same land-space).

ps2:  another contrast

 Can you tell which is US  Washington Dulles int'l airport, or Taiwan Taoyuan int'l airport ?

US Washington Dulles international airport

Taiwan Taoyuan international airport

US Washington Dulles international airport

Taiwan Taoyuan international airport

      ps: Taiwan eventually was ashamed of this stealing and modified its look recently ... already after many many years

 

   

 

Visual Communication

Taiwan government logo, UN for Taiwan logo, state-run enterprises logo, Taiwan's universities annual event logo ......  etc,  suspiciously are cheap-copy works.  Similar visual designs're everywhere in Taiwan.

Some examples are listed as below:

 (1)     (2)  

Central Reinsurance Co.

Taiwan's government, Central Reinsurance Co.  logo

Korea Seoul's official  logo

Logo by National ChungCheng university Taiwan
world logo appeared earlier logo of
Taiwan's government
Korea metro's logo
(appeared earlier) 
design by Taiwan's best university 

  
  

 

       


 

Pic. left is the logo of Taiwan government, since 11-9-1993, next 3 are logo of Canadian Pacific Rail, since 1968.

In addition to cheap-copy suspect, Taiwan's official document states their logo "easy to identify and associate with Taiwan's brand ... a simple shape and modernized & internationalized, aesthetic design " ; but, exactly on the contrary, it's neither modernized, nor as aesthetical simple as CPR's logo... 

 

     (3)   Taiwan's cultural landmark

  knife as tree, lawn, mountain   knife as tree, lawn, mountain

left : Silk Cut ad. in UK, appeared earlier    right:  poster for Taiwan's cultural government and Eslite book store (ps)

ps:  Both use same ideas "sharp knife tree, dangerous gear-wheel lawn"   
       Pic. at right side is an ad. for <Creative Ideas Exhibition of Taiwan Cultural Industry, Taiwan>, Eslite bookstore ( Taiwan's pride, a cultural landmark of Taiwan)

(4)  

pic. left above: logo and emblem of KMT
presidential election 2019/2020 

pic. left blow: a design for FCCLA (USA)
(ps: appeared earlier)

 

KMT denied it's a cheap-copying work,
but ROC design association
(中華民國設計師協會榮譽理事)
expressed "UP" is an obvious Plagiarism !

besides, Taiwan's head was cut out

 ref. to LTN, 11-15-2019

   

 

 

 

   

 

Film/movie    Taiwan's film almost dead

●  France 24, 11-21-2020:  Chinese cinematic talents used to dominate the Golden Horse nominations but China boycotted the event last year after a Taiwanese director called for the island's independence during an award acceptance speech. ref to:  france24.com/en/live-news/20201121-two-hong-kong-political-films-win-at-taiwan-golden-horse-awards

●  Till now 2020, Taiwan has submitted 46 films for Oscar consideration. Three Taiwanese films (The Wedding Banquet (1993), Eat Drink Man Woman(1994), and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)) have been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film  all were directed by Ang Lee.

●  New York Times, 5-29-2020 "Looking for an Introduction to Taiwan’s Greatest Filmmaker?"

      NY Times introduces Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s work :  “Millennium Mambo”(千年曼波), ,“The Assassin”(刺客) , “The Time to Live and the Time to Die” and “Dust in the Wind”(風中的塵埃), etc.  "Much of the acclaim for Hou rests on the implicit challenge that his movies pose to conventional narrative filmmaking. They are less rooted in story than in motion, space and time — the fundamentals of cinema. "
      Cinephiles scoffed: Maybe Hou was simply too challenging, too singular and too uncommercial for any distributor here to touch...  But scholar Emilie Yueh-yu Yeh noted that Hou himself likened his style to liubai 留白, the Chinese ink-painting technique of leaving space blank.    full details pls. read
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/28/movies/Hou-Hsiao-Hsien.html

●   Washington Post,  5-29-2020
      
Even today, Hong Kong artists and Taiwanese celebrities hold considerable cultural clout, working in the mainland and appearing and performing on variety shows and television dramas.

● Taiwan's film industry got 3 major troubles :

(1)   Taiwan government used to do political propaganda/comm. by using movies, till now Taiwan's government still thinks highly of things helpful to win political elections, besides, Taiwan government's movie policy already gave up to WTO, U.S., Hollywood.

(2)   Taiwan likes to 'create'  some abstract/obscure symbols attracting very very few people.  Using Eastern exotic flavor was another very useful strategy for attending world film contest.   Lacking witty & creative idea led to Taiwan film industry's death.

         ☉  Taiwan's movies fail to create better humour like "Lost in Beijing" ( red Chinese film banned by CHN gov.) .
         ☉  Taiwan's all-time grossing film, <Cape No.7>, is not a stylish witty comedy (some world best media positioned this film as comedy), but attracts lots of Taiwanese (particularly southern Taiwanese) by some simple ideas( i.e., sort of slapstick) and Taiwanese grass-roots culture elements.  
         ☉  Taiwan's <You are the Apple of My Eye> of 2011 was very popular in TW, HK and Chn, but most of it's boyish humors are not witty & stylish, this film attracts audiences by
stoking collective memory of their youngsters age.
         In 2012, Taiwan's films only won 2 awards in Taiwan's Golden Horse film festival (China and HK won most awards), which is the worst in latest 20 years.   In 2014, Taiwan was bit better, won 3 out of 23 awards in total.

(3)  Taiwanese are rich, but spent little on arts, and taste not too good - many people prefer real things, like money.    International Monetary Fund (IMF) reported 2010 Taiwanese GDP (USD 35,604) ranked world no. 21.(news 9/23/2011)

  per person per year (200X)
movie NT470 (about US 15)
drama NT91 (US 3)
dancing show  NT65 (US 2) 

TV soap opera series : Taiwan's TV opera series focus on "charming leading-actors/actress" (not giving importance to the content) to attract audiences, so, Korean, Japanese, red Chinese TV series are better & more popular.  United Daily (12-28-2014): Taiwan's TV opera are not original.  UDN (critique C2, 6-21-2015): Taiwan's drama crisis/ lacking of budge, passion, actor/actress.

Variety show/program of assorted entertainment: this sort of shows were very popular and was the reason or excuse that Taiwanese people don't like going to theater and watching movies, but till 2013, those stuffs were not fresh enough and already behind China's, some paper even questioned Taiwan's variety show/program of assorted entertainment : "Are they incurable?" (4/7/'13 UND).  United Daily (12-26-2014):  Taiwan needs creativity.  Apple Daily (8-31-2015) : Taiwan's entertainment show from bad to worse, the gap between Taiwan and China becomes bigger, Taiwan's TV field in risk !   BBC (UK), 1-13-2013: Taiwan's pop culture leaps Chinese hurdles -   Millions in China watch the Taiwanese variety talk show Kang Xi Lai Le - but not on television.  it's not just a reluctance to embrace a different kind of TV humour. Chinese regulations forbid all types of Taiwanese talk shows from being aired in their original state.

 

   

 

Cartooning

About 10 years ago, ROC on Taiwan government together with <The United News> system organized a Taiwanese team to participate in Euro's largest humour contest, <Kokke Heist Humour & Cartoon Festival >,only 3 artists (including Zola Zu) were selected.

Recently Taiwanese cartoon artists have shown little talents on Taiwan International Cartoon Contest sponsored by Taiwanese government,

Almost all juries withdrawn from <Courage World Cartoon Contest> (ranking world No. 1 for some years) , due to "seems political" reasons .   

Both animation and cartooning need creativity, but at present Taiwan doesn't have that environment.   

Taiwan youngsters like "Kuso" stuffs, however, formula/routine mind is not good enough for cartoon creativity.  

 

Japanese winning art in Knokke Heist, Belgium                1st prize work in contest held by MinSen Daily

 

 

pic. left:  Knokke Heist winner, appeared earlier.      
pic. right: Taiwan's 1st prize cartoon was sent to Knokke Heist and lost.

 

ps: Taiwan has (only a few) world class cartoonists : i.e., T.Y. Ju (Ron Chu)

 

   

 

Product Design

(1 )  Taiwan's best-selling cultural creativity :

Recently, Taiwan's best-selling & widely known product , "Chinese Fortune(or Rich) God figure toy", is based on Taiwanese superstition (Apple Daily: 88%of college students believe ghost existing ), and eagerness for money,

Taiwan's figure-toy design just simplified Chinese Gods' complicated appearance to little cute mascot, in contrast, int'l designs for gods are more witty, i.e.,

   
☉ Europe, Belgium rug Co.     installed a special compass in each product, its needle points to Islam's holy land instead of pointing South/North    this created a lot of business.
☉ Japan      made a watch converting 114 world major cities' time to Islam holy land's time, with time-alarm function for Muslims' prayer.


 

( 2 )  best-selling cultural products for int'l tourists

A major design periodical comments:  <National Palace Museum>'s rich treasures is the key to success of Taiwan's Cultural & Creative Industry.

However, <NPM> seems to look down upon the talent of Taiwanese designers.

<NPM>   product

short comments

 

Alessi "the Chin Family"

(1) <NPM> cooperates with Japan, Italy, hence, NPM's products are not purely Taiwanese or Chinese flavor.
(2)  Mr. Chin got  slant eye (or "raising eyebrows"), it's western view-point, the Oriental usually don't draw that way.

Chinese creativity vs Taiwan creativity
Taiwan's tourists guidebook/ pamphlets (pic. above)   
calls 5000 yrs treasures

  "Chinese Creativity" .

How about "Chinese Creativity" in today's Taiwan ??

"Jadeite Cabbage" tray-pillow for
 chop-sticks to rest on

(1) most products directly use antique-art shape.
(2) At least 20 years ago, various assorted dedicated vegetables and fruits  glass chopsticks tray-pillow already were made-in-Japan (best-sellers too) .

Don Dynasty ladies picture slippers

 just directly applied antique pictures on products.

<NPM> should designs Chinese treasures, and makes witty, humorous artworks  to represent Taiwan's modern arts.   Western tourists suppose like to buy souvenir with Chinese culture & flavor created by ourselves.    "Mercenaries" cannot represent Taiwan to Olympics.

<NPM>merchandises:

slippers, mugs, etc with Don Dynasty Ladies Picture


Zola Zu's design :

(1) expo. in Europe like Holland, Turkey, and was printed in best-collection albums.
(2) printed in <the China Times>.
 

 directly use antique pictures(or simplify a little bit)

I choose the theme : When the East encounters the West,  Fine arts meets Cartooning, to integrate 2 major cultures.  

NPM slippers, National Palace Museum

art cartoon, slippers

ps: "tech. oriented" product design like <idea> contest, <if> contest is not discussed in here

 

   

 

Medical

 Guardian (UK), 10-31-2020: Now, Taipei's people browse, busk and greet each other with handshakes and hugs. It feels normal.  However, Taiwan has already "exported" dozens COVID-19 infected cases to a number of foreign countries, not sure yet who should be responsible for this, according to United Daily, editorial, 10-31-2020
https://udn.com/news/story/7338/4977422?from=udn-catehotnews_ch2

New York Post  4-25-2020 : Taiwan deals with CovID-19 with "a lot more authoritarian.", "almost everyone is tracked.".  Taiwanese govt. responded at 4-28-2020 that Taiwanese would like to cooperate with our policy.  But the truth is Taiwan's "Big Brother" already sneaked into numerous families in the name of  Epidemic Prevention, by an injunction violating Tort Law and domineering over Constitution (凌駕憲法的侵權禁令) , without having noticed all nationals, in accordance with United Daily, editorial at 5-7-2020.   The ironic thing is after lifting Coronavirus Lockdown, Japan doesn't trust Taiwan's Epidemic Prevention, and has not put "democratic" Taiwan on their welcome list, many other countries did same thing to Taiwan.  The China Times, editorial (6-6-2020, 6-25-2020) analyzed one main reason is Taiwan rejects mass testing, even small-scale testing, the number of test per million people is 3000+, ranked world No. 138, about same level as that of African countries, even African Luanda tested double number of Taiwan's.  A famous National Taiwan University M.D. expert endorsed for Taiwan's policy :  there's no any CovID-19 in Taiwan, 3 weeks later, a Japanese girl staying Taiwan for 4 months was detected positive in Japan's airport.   Therefore, those free flow of information can be suspicious  and may endanger the world people According to Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, USA, "somewhere between 25% and 50%" of people infected with the new coronavirus may never show symptoms or fall ill — but can still transmit the illness to others (4-15-2020, Business Insider). Bill Gates in the New England Journal of Medicine: The prevalence of asymptomatic transmission doesn't bode well for global containment efforts.  All studies (CNBC 5-7-2020, Singapore's Blackbox Research and Toluna, Forbes 6-5-2020, 4-16-2020: The Deep Knowledge Group) concluded China is better than Taiwan on CovID-19 safety countries rankings  The China Times 6-25-2020 editorial: Taiwan has no same capacity and experience as Beijing does to face something serious, it will be horrible in case CovID-19 epidemic break out.  https://www.chinatimes.com/opinion/20200624003961-262101?chdtv

●  According to WEF<Travel and tourism competitiveness report> (released at 9-4-2019), Taiwan's  Health & Hygiene score 6.0, is worse than that of Korea, Japan, Mongolia.   

Taiwan only ranks world 45th position in Lancet's Healthcare Access and Quality Index released in 2017

Taiwan ranks world 45th in Lancet's Healthcare Access and Quality Index released in 2017
   
 

FTV (4-16-2017) comments medical Doctors' social status is lower than before.  
The book "Exposing the truth of modern medical circle in Taiwan" ("誤診誤醫", published by the China Times, 2012; by Xu Da-Fu  ) criticizes : Taiwan's hospitals focus on profit/benefit and ignore patients' rights , The whole medical circle already went the wrong route...

Surgery / Taiwan's excellent surgeons perform many operations simultaneously - happened quite often in Taiwan...
Medicines /
 the quality of prescription medicines in Taiwan is from bad to worse...
Bribery /
the institution needed to be paid bribery most is judiciary system, second is Taiwan's medical and health services ...
◎ full text pls. ref. to Taiwan Medical services  or  http://Courageworld.ch/TaiwanHospitalsMD.htm

 

   

 

Women's rights

US Country Reports on Human Rights Practices released at 3-11-2020 : In the new legislature, a record 38 percent of lawmakers were women.  ABC Radio National, Australia, 2- 27-2020: 42 per cent of Taiwan's legislators (law makers) are women;  it's the only Asian nation to have legislated same-sex marriage.

  US Country Reports on Human Rights Practices released at 3-13-2019 pointed out that Victims of rape and domestic violence did not report the crime for fear of social stigmatization, and various nongovernmental organization (NGO) and academic studies estimated the total number of sexual assaults was seven to 10 times higher than the number reported to police.   Some abused women chose not to report incidents to police due to social pressure not to disgrace their families.    <The United Daily >,  3-16-2018: Taiwan's gender equality - A long long way to go !  Taiwan passed (United Nations already passed 30+ years ago at 1979) the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) , valid from Jan. 1, 2012, but, Taiwan's women rights status is still similar according to the US report released in 2013 ~ 2018, In 2015, the number of reporting for rape or sexual assault  is only 850 less than that in previous year.     The Gov. study showed (3-2-2019) the number of  Domestic Violence in 2018 is 138637, which increases about 1% compared to previous year. 

 The US Country Reports on Human Rights Practices , released at 4-20-2018

        Rape and Domestic Violence: The law criminalizes rape, including spousal rape, and domestic violence. Many victims did not report the crime for fear of social stigmatization, and various NGO and academic studies estimated the total number of sexual assaults was seven to 10 times the number reported to police.
women work: Women were promoted less frequently, occupied fewer management positions, and worked for lower pay than men, earning on average 83 percent of their male counterparts’ income in 2015... a survey in 2016 showed 3.5 percent of women have been sexually harassed at work, yet 80 percent of these cases went unreported.

  <The United Daily 聯合報>,  3-16-2018 (prime news edition)

         Taiwan president Tsai I. W. : Taiwan still have a not short way to reach gender equality (台灣離性別平等  還有一段路要走)
         <The United Daily 聯合報>,  3-16-2018 (林志潔, professor and member of national judicial reform committee)
          The judge made mistakes again and again,
 Taiwan's gender equality
- A long long way to go !

The China Times <中國時報> 3-8-2018: according to investigation/survey, 80% female physicians met sexual harassment, ... a female physician of Cathy Hospital had different views and said the percentage of harassment to nurse probably higher because they are young and in lower status  (8成女醫曾遭性騷擾, 女醫反應兩極 ... brief)

 <Apple Daily>, 4-3-2018: According to a survey by Taiwanese government, 180 thousands of career women suffered sexual harassment, only 40-50 thousands reported to their company, others chose to keep silence... <蘋果日報> 4-7-2018: The number of sexual harassment on campus reported is up to 1400 per year.

  The US Country Reports on Human Rights Practices , released at 3-3-2017 (new report of 4-20-2018 is about same) :   Violence & discrimination against women is one of Taiwanese principal human rights problems for years.   In 2015, the number of reporting for rape or sexual assault  is only 850 less than that in previous year.      (12. 25. '14) reported that those Taiwanese male aged above 20 (2.33 million men per yr. ) The annual value of production of Taiwan's sex industry's is at least USD 200 million. Prostitution is violence against women / ref to <Prostitution : violence with no name>, "Prostitution et Societe", 2010, "Int'l Day for the Elimination of Violence against women", 11-25-2016 France.   Taiwan government is the main criminal to harm women's rights in large scale.

●   The US Country Reports on Human Rights Practices , released at 3-3-2017:   spousal rape, and domestic violence. Many victims did not report the crime for fear of social stigmatization, and various nongovernmental organization (NGO) and academic studies estimated that the total number of sexual assaults was seven to 10 times the number reported to police.  Women were promoted less frequently, occupied fewer management positions,...

 

   

 

Sports/Athletics

●  olympics.com/beijing-2022/olympic-games/en/results/all-sports/medal-standings.htm  Taiwan in Winter Olympics Beijing 2022 : zero medal.

●  Tokyo Olympic Games medal rankings : countries of Asia & Pacific - No. 2. China, No. 3 Japan, 6 Australia, 13 NZ, 16 S Korea, 27 Iran, 34 Chinese Taipei (2 gold, 4 silver, 6 bronze) .   Fox News, 2021-8-14  : China alters medal count to include Hong Kong, Taiwan to unofficially claim gold medal dominance over US.

●  According to Wikipedia (May 2020), Taiwan in Olympics (summer) has won 5 gold 7 silver, 12 bronze, was ranked world no. 66.

  In 2016 Rio Olympics medal tally statistics, Taiwan (Chinese Taipei) only got 1 gold, 2 bronze, ranks world No. 50, compare to previous years, 5 medals in 2000, 2004, 4 medals in 2008, 2 medals in 2012;Other Asian nations -  China ranks No.3, Japan No.6,  Korea No. 8,  Australia No 10,  N.Z. No.19,  Iran  25, North Korea No. 34, Thailand No. 35, Indonesia No. 46, Vietnam No.48, Taiwan No. 50.

●   Taiwanese baseball team lost all games in 1st round and was eliminated in World Baseball Classic 2017, the leader of Athletics government stepped down.    Expert comments the system weakness is obvious but we just can't improve it, patriotism is no longer working on this issue ...

●  Taiwan just held 2 world scaled athletic events that have ever seen in Taiwan's history :

World Games Kaohsiung Taiwan & Deaflympics Taipei : comments/critiques  click to see how they showed Taiwan's culture and creativity.

 

   

 

Publications

The number of new book publication keeps dropping to hit lowest in 18 years.   Some say "Taiwan's literature us dead !".

 

   

 

other Soft Power
As for other items of Taiwan's soft power, according to Reporters without Borders (RSF), Taiwan's press freedom (speech freedom) ranks No. 45 (always behind No. 45 since 2008), Taiwan's human rights, judicial system, high-ranking officials' corruption, women's rights, abuses of international/foreign workers, death penalty ( capital punishment ) etc need to be improved.    

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