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With a billion users, Instagram takes on YouTube in video

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Instagram said on Wednesday (Jun 20) it now has more than one billion active users, as it unveiled a new long-form video feature in a bid to attract “creators” like those on YouTube.

It becomes the fourth Facebook platform to hit the billion-user mark, including the namesake social network with more than two billion users, and the messaging applications WhatsApp and Messenger.

Instagram, which had some 800 million users as of September, has been outpacing rival social networks such as Twitter and Snapchat and has been gaining younger users even as Facebook itself has seen declines in the youth segment.

Instagram chief executive Kevin Systrom announced the milestone as he unveiled the new video application known as IGTV.

“We have now a community of one billion users,” Systrom told the event in San Francisco.

“Since our launch in 2010, we’ve watched with amazement as the community has flourished and grown.”

As Facebook itself has moved deeper into video, Instagram will become a direct competitor to YouTube with IGTV.

IGTV will enable any user to upload long-form videos and will also include “channels” from video “creators,” similar to a format employed by Google-owned YouTube which has given rise to a number of YouTube “stars.”

“Anyone can be a creator – you can upload your own IGTV videos in the app or on the web to start your own channel,” Systrom said.

Built for smartphones

Systrom said IGTV is built to be used on a smartphone, and boosts the time for videos from the previous limit of one minute.

“The way we are watching video is changing,” Systrom told the event.

He added that IGTV is “built for how you actually use your phone, so videos are full screen and vertical.”

The launch comes amid a shift in video viewing habits away from traditional television to online platforms including Netflix and Hulu, and with more people watching both professional and user content on services like YouTube.

According to the research firm eMarketer, 181.7 million Americans will watch video content on their smartphones at least once a month this year, up 6.1 per cent from a year ago.

Product manager Ashley Yuki told the event that IGTV “is an open platform from day one, so everyone can become a creator.”

Rolling out for the iOS and Android apps, IGTV will allow any user to upload videos up to 10 minutes long, with the limit for larger accounts at one hour.

Systrom described the new app as “a separate space, a dedicated space to enjoy video without being distracted.”

Facebook acquired Instagram in April 2012 for a combination of cash and stock worth some US$1 billion at the time.

Since then it has become a strong engineer of growth for Facebook in terms of users and ad revenues.

While Facebook offers no detailed revenue breakdown, eMarketer estimates Instagram will generate US$5.48 billion in net US ad revenue this year, up 70.4 per cent from last year and accounting for more than one-fourth of Facebook’s net mobile ad revenue.

Facebook itself is also ramping up its video offerings with original shows and this week announced new formats including interactive game shows, quizzes and polls.

Source: AFP

Debate over pilots’ salaries heats up

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Vietnam Airlines has finally decided to raise the salaries for its pilots to VND205-246 million. However, the debate over pilots’ salaries still continues.

When 60 pilots said they wanted to resign because of low salaries, a Vietnam Airlines’ leader said: “You guys get VND250-300 million a month. And you still complain about salary.”

He went on to say that new pilot graduates receive VND70-80 million a month, high pay compared with pay for engineers and others with bachelor’s degrees.

“The sharpest increases are always offered to pilots in every salary adjustment campaign,” he said, adding that pilot’s salaries are sky-high already.

The statement has been rejected by pilots. They said the pay level declared by the airline’s leader is 20-25 percent higher than the actual pre-tax income and 40-45 percent higher than the real value they can pocket.

Some pilots said that they receive VND100-150 million a month.

Zing cited Vietnam Airlines’ 2017 annual finance report as showing that the average income of pilots in the year increased by 5 percent compared with 2016, or VND120.75 million.

Meanwhile, Vietjet’s pilots in 2017 received VND180 million a month as shown in the financial report, or 50 percent higher than Vietnam Airlines’ pilots.

Also according to Zing, the income of VND100-150 million pay declared by some pilots is not much lower than that paid to regional pilots.

Aerocadet reported that a pilot in Indonesia has a starting salary of $2,500-4,000 which is not taxed, while the average income of pilots in the country is $6,600, or VND150 million.

In Singapore, according to Phoenix East Aviation, a pilot flying Boeing 777 and Airbus A330 has the starting salary of $6,800.

Comparing the salaries paid by Vietnam Airlines and other air carriers in Vietnam, finance reports show that pay for Vietnam Airlines’ pilots is lower.

The average income of Vietnam Airlines’ pilots was VND121 million, while the figure was VND180 million for Vietjet, though the low-cost air carrier has smaller operation scale and lower revenue.

At Jetstar Pacific, a captain can receive VND110-160 million and first officer VND100-120 million.

Pham Minh Huan, former Deputy Minister of Labor, War Invalids & Social Affairs, commented that new airlines don’t have to pay to train pilots, so they are willing to pay more to lure pilots from other airlines.

Le Dinh Tho, Deputy Minister of Transport, said the demand for pilots is now higher than supply, which has led to competition in pay to attract pilots. The competition is bringing disadvantages to domestic airlines.

By Thanh Mai

Source: VietNamNet

Customer claims Lazada promotion to be fake

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Lazada promised handing out gift rice cookers worth VND890,000 ($39.2) when buying a Samsung washing machine, but conveniently forgot sending the gift to a customer with the washing machine.

Lazada customer Vo Quoc Khanh (Binh Duong province) told ICTnews that a Samsung washing machine was discounted on Lazada.vn and customers were offered a gift Elmich rice cooker worth VND890,000 ($39.2) when buying the washing machine.

On May 9, he placed an order for this washing machine and received a confirmation email. However, he did not receive the gift with the product.

“I had several arguments with various officers at Lazada, but they kept requesting time for Lazada to consider the issue. They made appointments again and again to delay for days, trying to discourage and ignore me,” Khanh was very angry.

He also claims that if Lazada refuses to deliver the gift, the whole promotion would amount to a scam. He added that Lazada launches promotion campaigns to attract customers then finds every way to delay and not perform.

Earlier, on the occassion of its sixth birthday campaign in May, Lazada released a series of attractive promotions and discounts. Another reader reported that she ordered a Bi&Ti handbag at the very low price of VND75,000 ($3.3).

Lazada confirmed the order in email. However, later on the company sent another email to inform the customer that the order was cancelled due to a mistake in pricing. The customer was very angry, she contacted the hotline but received only an apology.

In 2017, Lazada proved one of the biggest pains for customers, judged by the number of complaint letters sent to the Ministry of Industry and Trade’s Vietnam Competition Authority related to the quality of goods and services.

Source: VIR

Locked iPhone has had its day in Vietnam

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Vietnamese are no longer buying locked iPhones, while smartphone shops do not want to sell this item.

Saving money for half a year, Tran Thinh bought an iPhone 7 Plus Red locked version on March 13. On the same day, Thinh heard that Apple had neutralized the magic Gevey sim which helped unlock iPhones.

“I swear never to buy locked iPhones again. It is too risky. I had to spend more than VND10 million on the iPhone and I lived in fear that my expensive iPhone may become useless at any time,” Thinh said.

For the last half year, locked iPhones have not been sought by iPhone fans. The problem is that Apple continuously updates the patches, neutralizing Gevey sim and making it impossible to activate locked products.

Tuan Anh, the owner of a private shop in Hanoi, said locked iPhones once made up 60 percent of the shop’s sales. People bought locked products because they were cheaper than international versions. However, the figure has dropped to 30 percent.

Meanwhile, Tri, the representative of a retail chain of 10 shops, said on Zing.vn that the sales of locked iPhones now account for 10 percent of total sales only.

The prices of locked iPhones have fallen dramatically. At many shops, locked iPhone 6S is quoted at VND3 million, a VND1 million decrease compared with the previous month. iPhone 7 Plus is priced at VND7 million, or VND1.5 million lower than two months ago.

“We have cut the prices of locked iPhones to the deepest low. For some models, we sell products at cost prices to attract buyers. However, buyers now are not interested in locked products anymore,” said Xuan Tuyen from a distribution chain in Hanoi.

“We plan to stop selling locked iPhones. We will only sell iPhone international versions and Android products,” he said.

Meanwhile, Quang Trung, the representative of another shop, said he decided to stop selling locked iPhones four months ago, when Apple blocked many generations of Gevey sim.

He admitted that the decision had led to a sharp fall in revenue, but he still has to avoid troubles related to maintenance. “Perhaps, the locked iPhone has come to an end,” he said.

As Apple has blocked Gevey sim, the sim manufacturer has issued a new ICCID code to continue ‘cheating’ Apple to unlock iPhones. Apple gave new patches to block new sims six times in the last six months.

Sellers have to help clients upgrade the Gevey sim, but the profit is not attractive.

By Kim Chi

Source: Viet Nam Net

Instagram pins hopes on IGTV’s vertical video

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Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom acknowledged more and more people were watching long videos — Photo: INSTAGRAM

If you’re going to invite a bunch of Instagram’s biggest “influencers” to an event, you better make it Instagrammable to the extreme.

And artisan food, fancy coffee and quirky sets were all in place at IGTV’s San Francisco launch.

The longer-form, vertical video service – which will work as a bolt-on feature to Instagram as well as having a standalone app of its own – is enormously important to parent company Facebook.

Facebook’s main service is increasingly seen by teenagers and 20-somethings as a place better-suited for their parents, or even grandparents.

They gravitate instead to Snapchat for quick social media fixes, and YouTube for more substantial viewing.

They avoid glitzy productions from traditional broadcasters, and instead favour the “hey you guys!” intimacy of the internet’s creative stars.

And who can blame them, the appeal of video created by teens in bedrooms rather than adults in boardrooms is quite obvious.

With IGTV, Instagram, as it has done in the past, is copying features pioneered by others. It assumes that its immense scale and resources can make its version the winner, even if it is well late to the party.

The app has already successfully cloned Snapchat’s Stories feature – where users post a string of updates that disappear after a day.

Going after YouTube’s creators and Snapchat’s Discover tab is a logical and expected step.

If you want to grow your account, business or influence by reaching new audiences on Instagram, checkout the Task Ant website, which help you to manage and analyze Instagram hashtags.

Big money

IGTV will not feature ads to begin with, but Instagram chief Kevin Systrom acknowledges that will probably change soon.

It would be crazy not to.

Video adverts typically command a higher fee than other types of online display ads. Research firm eMarketer predicts $18bn will be spent on digital video advertising this year – a 22% increase on 2017.

The new service provides a way to get a bigger slice of that pie.

“What Facebook has found is that pre-roll ads don’t work all that well for short videos because people just scroll on and don’t bother watching them,” said Joseph Evans, from Enders Analysis.

“Short videos don’t have any space to have a mid-roll ad. A post-roll ad is a non-starter because people just scroll away.

“So what you need if you want to video ad inventory is you need longer videos.”

Facebook lags behind YouTube among the 18-to-24-year-old crowd that marketers love, according to a US study published in March by the Pew Research Center.

Importantly, those viewers are not just idly scrolling through YouTube, but staying there for long periods of time – watching plenty of advertisements as they go.

Instagram may be further behind, but its audience is still growing quickly.

And notably, Pew’s study indicates the 18-to-24s are more likely to use it several times a day than YouTube.

However, shifting the service further away from its photo-centric roots could be dangerous.

“There’s always a risk that in a push to make more money out of Instagram – which I think this increase in video time primarily is – that they undermine what made it so popular in the first,” said Mr Evans.

Tempting talent

IGTV’s fate will ultimately be determined by whether existing Instagram stars and others are willing to put in the effort required to make compelling vertical videos.

Tellingly, the creators brought in to promote the launch said they would still use YouTube and would wait and “see what works”.

But Instagram’s job may have been made easier by controversial policy changes made by YouTube, which raised the minimum requirements for channels to make money from their work.

IGTV won’t be offering creators payments to begin with, but it hasn’t ruled out the possibility when ads are added.

I worry, however, about the quality of what will be served up.

Facebook Watch – the on-demand service within the main Facebook network – has quickly descended into Daytime TV 2.0.

And in a trailer video for IGTV, one of the first clips we saw was someone getting a pie in the face.

Many of the most popular YouTube creators care deeply about producing “cinematic” visuals. And cinema isn’t vertical.

More broadly speaking, if today’s launch proves to be a success, increasing market share in this area might bolster the view held by some politicians, in the US and elsewhere, that Facebook has no meaningful competition and should therefore be broken up.

In a separate announcement, Facebook said it was launching an interactive quiz feature – an idea some said was brazenly lifted from HQ Trivia, one of the break-out successes of the past eight months.

Competition laws in the US are geared towards stopping major companies from merging.

But there is little on the books to prevent the granddaddy of all the social networks swallowing up ideas that show early promise.

By Dave Lee, BBC

Vietnam’s Viettel signs up 1 million subscribers in Myanmar, ten days after launch

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Mytel, the Viettel-owned mobile operator in Myanmar, has signed up more than one million subscribers in just ten days since it officially began operations.

This is the fastest customer growth rate among all markets, both Vietnam and internationally, that Viettel Group has invested in. It is also a record customer growth that few telecom service providers in the world would gain.

There are several reasons for this achievement, including the fact that the company had set up the most extensive telecom infrastructure in Myanmar even before starting operations.

It has laid 30,000km of fiber-optic cable, or 50 percent of Myanmar’s total cable infrastructure, allowing Mytel network to cover 80 percent of the population.

Mytel is the only mobile network to provide 4G services nationwide in Myanmar, covering 300 out of 330 towns, compared to 185 places of its biggest competitor.

Mytel has set up a nationwide distribution system with 50 stores and 50,000 sales agents, 70 pe cent of them in rural and remote areas.

The company is also offering very attractive promotions to mark its inauguration.

For 4,000 Myanmarese Kyat (US$3), subscribers receive 5GB and 250 minutes of calling within the Mytel network in 30 days, two times higher than other networks offer.

Subscribers also get 100 percent bonus on top-up value every day, instead of other network’s 33 – 50 percent bonus, and they can call other networks’ subscribers.

Nguyen Thanh Nam, Mytel’s general director, said while Myanmar has experienced rapid economic growth, mobile phone penetration in the country has remained low, creating huge opportunities for the telecom sector, especially Viettel.

“We are targeting two to three million customers in Myanmar in 2018,” he said.

Mytel began operations on June 9.

Myanmar is Viettel’s tenth foreign market and its largest in terms of population (53 million).

Myanmar is also Viettel’s market with the highest economic growth rate, which was seven percent last year. It also has high growth in the telecommunications and IT sector.

But it is also a very competitive market; telecom services are already used by 90 percent of the population, calling and data tariffs are cheap, and there is fierce competition from international networks like Norway’s Telenor, the 13th world’s biggest, and Qatar’s Ooredoo, the leading network in the Middle East.

As of Mytel’s opening, Viettel Group’s registered foreign investment oversea is over $2 billion.

It has already invested $1.19 billion and repatriated profits of $516 million to Vietnam.

Source: Tuoi Tre News

Vietnam’s soy beverage startup Soya Garden raises $880k from Egroup

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Organic soybean beverage startup Soya Garden has secured VND20 billion ($880,000) from Hanoi-based education-focused Egroup after impressing its chairman Nguyen Ngoc Thuy on the first season of Shark Tank Vietnam.

Soya Garden’s co-founder and CEO Hoang Anh Tuan confirmed the investment to DEALSTREETASIA, adding that the startup has also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for a strategic partnership with Singapore’s Mr Bean Group Limited, which owns 65 retail stores in Singapore, Japan and the Philippines.

The detailed information on this strategic partnership, however, has not been revealed.

Egroup chairman Thuy, meanwhile, said that he was convinced by the market opportunity for soybean beverages in Vietnam as well as Soya Garden’s business plans. If the first round of investment is successful, the group may pour additional capital in the startup.

Tuan said the investment from Egroup will be used to hire more personnel and build the firm’s IT infrastructure to support its plans to open 30 new stores in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

The soybean beverage startup, which was founded in 2016, currently has 13 stores, including 10 stores in Hanoi and three in other cities. It plans to develop a larger variety of products from soybean, offering an alternative to coffee and tea.

Established in 2008, Egroup focuses on online education in Vietnam. It owns Apax Holdings which operates about 50 English language training centres across the country.

Vietnam is seeing increased demand for soybeans and related products. According to a report by the US Department of Agriculture, the Southeast Asian country’s soybean imports are forecast to increase to 1.9 million metric tons (MMT) for marketing year (MY) 2018-19, compared with 1.65 MMT in MY2017-18.

Milk tea (bubble tea) is also fast gaining popularity in Vietnam. The Vietnamese milk tea market is valued at $282 million and has had an annual growth rate of 20 per cent, according to Euromonitor.

By Quynh Nguyen

Source: Dealstreetasia

Amazon makes first inroads to Vietnam

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Amazon is on its way to set foot in the emerging e-commerce market of Vietnam, while facing fierce competition from its Asian rivals.

In March, Amazon confirmed its cooperation with Vietnam E-Commerce Association (VECOM), an NGO and industry group composed of 172 member businesses.

Amazon’s remarks centered around their interest in helping Vietnamese small and medium businesses export their products through its global online platform.

According to Business Insider, the partnership with VECOM may be the first step towards Amazon gaining an understanding of Vietnamese consumers before launching its full marketplace, as it did in Singapore, the first Southeast Asian country Amazon stepped into in July 2017.

Gijae Seong, head of Amazon Global Selling in Singapore, appeared in March at the Vietnam Online Business Forum 2018 to discuss with local businesses how to use Amazon to sell globally.

Amazon and VECOM’s cooperation was welcomed by Vietnamese businesses and consumers alike. VECOM’s president considered the support for exporting Vietnamese products globally a positive development. Meanwhile, consumers were enthusiastic about the prospect of being able to use Amazon to buy international products in the near future.

Alibaba to Respond

Less than one week after Amazon announced the partnership, Chinese billionaire Jack Ma’s e-commerce giant Alibaba increased its investment in Lazada, one of the largest e-commerce platforms in Southeast Asia.

Alibaba spent US$1 billion to buy 51 percent of shares in Lazada in April 2016, and another US$1 billion in 2017 to increase its total shares to 83 percent.

The most recent investment, a whopping US$2 billion, was announced on March 18 along with the decision to name Lucy Peng, one of Alibaba’s founders, as Lazada’s executive in chief.

According to VnEconomy, after two years of operation Lazada has become the top e-commerce website in Vietnam by revenues in 2014, taking up 36.1 percent of the country’s e-commerce market.

Competition and Growth

Vietnam’s e-commerce market is one of the fastest growing in the world.

According to market research firm Kantar Worldpanel, Vietnam’s e-commerce revenue increased 23 percent to US$5 billion in 2016, accounting for three percent of total retail revenue. The country’s e-commerce annual revenue is forecasted to reach US$10 billion by 2020, accounting for five percent of total retail revenue.

Other than Alibaba, China’s tech and investment giant Tencent also has a lot of interests in the Vietnamese market.

Financial Times reported that Tencent holds a 39.8 percent stake in Singapore-based company Sea, an enterprise that creates e-commerce platforms and services. One of Sea’s assets is online retailer Shopee, Lazada’s biggest competitor in Southeast Asia. Foody.vn, a restaurant review, booking and food delivery services platform, is also owned by Sea. In addition, Tencent is a shareholder of Chinese e-commerce company JD.com and Vietnamese tech firm VNG, a group which invested heavily in local e-commerce site Tiki.vn in January.

As Tiki.vn’s CEO Tran Ngoc Thai Son told an audience at a conference in Ho Chi Minh City in December 2017, the appearance of international e-commerce giants is proof that the Vietnamese market has a lot of potential for growth.

It remains to be seen whether Amazon will be successful in getting a foothold in Vietnam as it did in Singapore. Although Chinese competitors may have an advantage in being more familiar with the local infrastructure and customer dynamics, Amazon’s strong global presence and high brand recognition is friendly to Vietnamese consumers who have a demonstrated, strong interest in services with a well-known brand.

By Minh Hieu

Source: Citypasssguide

New Credit Rating Speaks of Vietnam’s Complicated Makeover

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A decent rating from Fitch this month has Vietnam riding high on the small victory, despite some of the less favorable economic trends connected to this first-of-its-kind rating.

The state monopoly Vietnam Electricity, or EVN, clinched a “BB” score June 6 from Fitch Ratings, which until then had never officially assessed the credit of a non-financial company owned by the Hanoi government. That prompted a cross-section of officials in the southeast Asian country to gush about the promise in store for one of the world’s fastest-growing economies.

“This positive rating enables EVN to issue international bonds, diversify our financing sources, and reassure domestic and foreign institutional investors,” said Dinh Quang Tri, the acting CEO of EVN. “We are now on a stronger footing to deliver more reliable electricity to Vietnam.”

The ebullience, however, is tempered by two questions: Will this be enough for investors to trust EVN? And how much should government become involved in business?

Renewable energy

EVN underscores the mixed sentiments that analysts express about Vietnam, a communist country transitioning to capitalism. The fact that the government runs EVN contributed to Fitch’s confidence in its report card.

“We believe the company can secure adequate funding in light of its position as an entity closely linked to the sovereign,” it said in a media release.

Yet businesses want even more promises from the government. Vietnam has spent years courting investment in renewable power, for example, but with limited success. That is in part because businesses that generate wind, solar, and other alternative energy sources can sell it only to EVN, and they are afraid of losing money if the company does not buy their electricity.

For renewables, “there is no provision for any form of government guarantee, assurance, or support to enhance the creditworthiness of EVN as the sole off-taker/purchaser,” corporate law firm Baker McKenzie said in a September report.

State vs. free market

Some would like to see more government involvement in general, especially to bail out companies in trouble. Others would like to see less involvement, as evidenced in the push for Vietnam to privatize further by selling stakes in its many state-owned enterprises. The country has not settled on a balance between the free market and the government.

Hanoi used to give iron-clad pledges that it would pay up in case of default at one of its state firms or public works projects. The government is doing that less often now because it is moving away from a centrally-planned economy, as well as reducing its sovereign debt.

Public anxiety mounted in recent years as Vietnam approached its debt ceiling of 65 percent of gross domestic product, though the country has made progress in reining in the debt.

That means EVN must tread lightly. Now that the power company has a Fitch Rating, it is eyeing international bonds to borrow money from investors around the world.

Going through this financing process is “helping EVN benefit from the discipline that comes with access to capital markets,” said Jordan Schwartz, who is the director of the World Bank group overseeing infrastructure, guarantees, and public-private partnerships.

The World Bank gave EVN funds and technical assistance to prepare for the Fitch assessment. Its credit rating shows how tightly EVN’s fate correlates with that of the government. Electricity prices, for example, will have to increase for the utility to make profits and improve its rating. Big increases, however, require approval from Hanoi, which also wants to keep power affordable for citizens.

The correlation is even blunter in Fitch’s analysis. The overall credit rating for Vietnam’s government itself also is BB. If that improves, so could the score for EVN, Fitch said, “provided EVN’s linkages with the state do not deteriorate significantly.”

Source : Voice of America (VOA)

Vietnam intends to increase trade with Azerbaijan

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Vietnam hopes to increase trade with Azerbaijan, as well as volume of bilateral investments, Minister of Industry and Trade of the country Tran Tuan Anh told reporters June 20.

“During the meeting of the Intergovernmental Commission in Baku, we discussed the development of cooperation in a number of areas of mutual interest. This includes both energy and other areas, such as processing industry, IT technologies, education, and transport. In particular, we agreed to accelerate cooperation in the sphere of maritime transport. I am sure that the development of our relations will accelerate in the near future. In particular, it is necessary to increase the trade turnover, as well as to increase the volume of mutual investments, which today is $300 million. This indicator is not bad, but there is a potential to increase it,” he said.

Azerbaijan and Vietnam have signed the protocol of the second meeting of the joint Intergovernmental Commission on economic, trade, scientific and technical cooperation in Baku on June 20.

The document covers cooperation in a number of areas, including trade, investment, energy, agriculture, transport, communications, and high technologies.

According to the data of the State Customs Committee of Azerbaijan, the trade turnover with Vietnam in January-April 2018 amounted to $15.86 million. The export of Azerbaijani products to Vietnam amounted to about $630,000. During the year, the trade turnover between the two countries increased by 65.2 percent.

Source: Trend

‘There are trigger points’: FIFA technology head explains VAR system to Peter Schmeichel

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Russia 2018 is the first large-scale introduction of VAR (Video Assistant Referee) but how does the new system work exactly? RT’s Peter Schmeichel was given a crash course in the cutting-edge technology.

“In general we are talking about four game-changing situations,” explains Johannes Holzmuller, head of FIFA’s Football Technology Innovation to RT’s Schmeichel about when VAR will be employed – RT reports

“These are the trigger points for VAR. It means that only when one of these situations is happening on the pitch then VAR can support the referee on the pitch. If something happens, let’s say a potential red card, the ball goes out of play or even if the ball is still in the game, in the background there are checks happening.

“The entire VAR team – we will have four VARs – they will check immediately; is this a potential red card? In the moment when he is clear that this is obvious and very clear for everyone, then he will inform the referee on the pitch. The VAR then explains exactly what he has seen, what was the clear and obvious error.”

If it isn’t clear, the referee has access to a monitor on the sideline so he can make his own judgement call on the incident.

“If it is factual information – the best example is offside – it is black and white. We have a line, we will see the line and [the referee] will then of course support the VAR”

Given that VAR is still a relatively new introduction to the ruleset of the beautiful game, some grey areas still exist. Can officials, for example, bring back play by a period of two minutes?

“Yes and no,” Holzmuller explains. “In the attacking phase it is defined in the protocol the moment when it starts, the build-up to the goal.

“It’s really up to the referee to decide [when] the build-up to the goal started … and from thereon everything that is not according to the laws of the game can be analyzed.”

Tinder parent company buys anti-Tinder dating app Hinge

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Match Group, a massive online dating conglomerate, acquired Hinge today in a deal that gives the company a 51 percent stake in the app. Hinge initially marketed itself as a more welcoming version of Tinder in which users could only see potential matches who shared a mutual Facebook friend. The company then redesigned its app to get rid of all swiping features and in its place let users build out full profile pages. Hinge users can answer three questions about themselves, connect their accounts to their Instagram, and also upload multiple photos, making the Hinge experience more like a full-fledged online dating site.

In a prepared quote, Mandy Ginsberg, CEO of Match Group, said, “Hinge is highly relevant particularly among urban, educated millennial women looking for relationships.” Acquiring the company essentially turns Match into a dating app behemoth that owns 45 brands, including Tinder, OkCupid, Match, and Plenty of Fish. The only notable dating app not owned by Match is Bumble, which was created by Tinder co-founder Whitney Wolfe Herd. (Match Group recently sued Bumble over alleged patent and trademark violations.)

Bumble specifically targets women, as the app’s entire experience is designed around making women feel empowered online. If Hinge really does have a strong female base of users, it would make sense that Match would want to more directly compete with Bumble for its users. Meanwhile, Facebook announced earlier this year that it’s working on its own dating feature that could rival Match’s user base size.

Source: The Verge

HCMC Police arrest gangsters beating and robbing foreigners in District 2

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The police of District 2, Ho Chi Minh City, arrested and detained the group who robbed a foreign couple just 4 hours after the robbery.

After receiving a report of the foreign couple about a group of robber young men riding motorcycles in An Phu ward, district 2, HCMC, the anti-Criminal Police in District 2 arrested 3 suspects including Nguyen Hoang Minh (commonly known as “Minh Meo”, the gangster head, 1995), Le Hoang Minh Ba (or “Hai Banh”, 1993) and Doan Van Duc (1996), to investigate acts of “robbery” of foreign tourists.

Accordingly, around 2 am on June 14, Thomas B. (1990, Belgian nationality) and Ferrari Manon Fa. A. (1992, French nationality) went to a police station in district 2 to report about the robbery.

According to the two victims, about 10:30 pm of June 13, they visited a beer club on Nguyen Thi Dinh Street, Binh Trung Tay Ward, District 2, HCMC. While they were drinking beer, a young man named Minh came to make friend with them.

At about 1 am on June 13, B and A. got out of the bar and rode on their motorcycle. When approaching the empty ground near Giong Ong To Bridge, An Phu ward, district 2, HCMC, suddenly Minh riding a motorbike followed them. The two tourists did not understand anything and they were hit by Minh in the face then fell down on the road.

Suddenly two more other young men running on a motorbike came and hit the tourists, causing them to run away in panic.

Foreign couple are happy to receive back their property

After that, the gangsters opened the trunk of the motorbike and take away the assets including VND 3.5 million, mobile phones, foreign currency and personal papers.

After the incident, the police had investigated extensively the case and arrested all three men by 6 am of the same day. All the three did not confess until the police asked the two victims to identify them.

After that, the police returned all the lost assets to Ms. A. and Mr. B.

“Minh meo” had just married about 2 weeks. Due to their difficult life as they had no stable jobs, Minh Meo, Hai Banh and Duc decided to commit the robbery. Minh Meo had ever two criminal convictions of “theft of property”; “Hai Banh” also had two convictions of “disturbing public order” and “property robbery”.

Source: Vietnamnet

Vietnam’s Meat Boom

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Vietnamese eat diets are changing, there is little doubt about that. People eat more than before, and they eat much more meat and animal products.

This is hardly surprising, given that the country over the past three decades has transformed from one of Asia’s poorest countries to an “emerging economy” and in the process gone from food shortage to food abundance. But even if taking into account that increasing meat consumption is expected alongside economic growth, increasing affluence, and urbanization, the changes seen in Vietnam have been remarkable.

Vietnam is indeed home to a dramatic transformation toward more meat-intensive eating habits. Not that long ago, common Vietnamese diets consisted mainly of rice and vegetables. Meat was eaten only on special occasions. Now, it is quite common to include meat in every meal of the day. Indeed, the average Vietnamese person eats four times more meat now than she did 30 years ago.

Farming, Pho and Fast Food

We need to look at the whole chain from production to consumption in order to understand what is going on.

To start at the farm, Vietnam’s dramatic increases in agricultural output since the 1986 doi moi economic reforms are well-known. But while coffee and rice have attracted much attention, meat has largely gone under the radar. Vietnam has seen spectacular increases in output in the livestock sector. Indeed, production in the livestock sector has grown faster than production in crops, and now represents one-third of all agricultural output in the country.

Furthermore, much of the meat consumed in Vietnam comes from farmers in other parts of the world, and increasingly so. Alongside new trade agreements, imports of meat from different parts of the world, especially the United States and India, have soared, mostly for chicken and beef. Vietnam is now even importing live cattle from Australia for domestic slaughter.

To continue along the value chain, slaughterhouses are now larger and more efficient. The access to meat has also increased at the retail side, with a large increase in supermarkets and mini-marts, as well as street kitchens, fast food joints, and restaurants.

But none of this matters, of course, unless people actually want to eat more meat.

A Growing Meat Culture

Meat has become an increasingly important part of Vietnamese consumers’ food practices, although in many different ways. Some practices are quite conspicuous, like the boom in high-end steak houses where rich Vietnamese easily spend a worker’s monthly salary on a meal of imported steak while sipping imported red wine. Other are inconspicuous, like the gradual increase of amounts of meat in street food. Take the famous pho as an example: not that long ago it would come with tiny servings of beef (or chicken), if any at all. Now some consumers are complaining that there’s too much meat in the soup. Changing eating habits are also obvious from the fact that while pork remains the by far most popular form of meat, consumption of beef and poultry is increasing at a faster pace.

Steakhouses and pho takes us toward an important part of the meat intensification of Vietnamese diets. Studies show that across countries and cultures, people tend to eat more meat when eating out than when eating at home. In Vietnam, the typical family meal now includes meat, but often only as a small part of an overall meal consisting of rice, vegetables, and sometimes seafood. Over the last decades, however, Vietnamese have been going out to eat much more than before.

Fast food chains like McDonalds and Burger King are part of this new food scene. However, “Eastern” influences are arguably much stronger than “Western.” For example, Japanese and Korean-style BBQ joints are extremely popular, and highly meat intensive.

Meat as Progress

While all of this is going on, however, many Vietnamese are cutting back on meat consumption, usually for health reasons, but a few also for environmental or animal rights concerns. Going vegetarian is indeed trendy among the young, urban middle classes, often to the amazement and disdain of parents and grandparents who remember a time when meat was a luxury.

And this is a crucial point. In a country where even the richest parts of the population clearly remember extreme scarcity, meat is for many a defining part of progress. Thus, while wealthy Vietnamese may be cutting back on meat, many have just recently been able to afford it. Indeed, many of the processes I have outlined as driving forces behind the meat boom are at early stages in the country. Alongside increasing vegetarianism, it is thus highly likely that we will see a further increase in meat consumption in Vietnam.

By Arve Hansen

Vietnam’s ‘vermicelli village’: A delicious Hanoi side trip

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(CNN) — Known as mien in Hanoi, vermicelli takes many forms in Vietnam. You’ll find it in pho, spring rolls, noodle soups and served with grilled meats — but nowhere is it more ubiquitous than in Cu Da village.

About 13 kilometers south of Hanoi, this ancient village is known for its prolific vermicelli production and beautifully preserved architecture.

Grinding arrowroot to create flour, pasta makers produce hundreds of tons of vermicelli each year to keep up with national demand.

“Of course people want to modernize the production process, but (almost) everything is still made by hand in Cu Da village,” Quỳnh Anh Nguyen, a photographer based in Hanoi, tells CNN Travel.

“I think that’s special in the 21st century.”

Vermicelli noodle paradise

In Cu Da, white and yellow vermicelli noodles dangle everywhere, covering rooftops and walls — pretty much any surface that noodles can be hung from.

The unusual scene dates back about 60 or 70 years, when residents first started hand-making noodles for their own consumption.

But the noodles’ high quality attracted interest from all over Vietnam, and vermicelli soon became the village’s calling card.

“Producing good quality vermicelli is a must,” Cong Minh Dinh, head of the village farmers’ union, tells CNN Travel.

“Through years of experience, there have been many changes and developments. For example, vermicelli used to be coated in copper pans and molded in small tins.

“Nowadays, we use much bigger buckets and barrels for higher productivity. We also use automated machines that transmit heat instead of using direct fire (like we used to).”

There’s more to Vietnam’s diverse noodle scene than pho. You’ll be seeing red when you tuck into a bowl of bun rieu, a crab-based vermicelli soup.

Despite a few adjustments, the process is still highly labor-intensive.

First, pasta makers grind arrowroot into a flour, then mix it with water to create a paste. The paste is then smeared into a thin pancake on a bamboo tray, steamed, then dried in the sun.

Once dry, the paste is then cut into thin noodles and dried again. It’s then packaged and distributed across Vietnam.

Ancient architecture

Come for the vermicelli but stay for the architecture.

Throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the village benefited from a thriving economy, thanks to its position on a bustling trade route along the Nhue River. This relative prosperity enabled residents to build and maintain beautiful homes, gates and temples.

“I really love this place, because you can find so many well preserved buildings,” says Nguyen. “You can see a mix of Asian, Chinese, Vietnamese and even French colonial-style architecture all in one village.”

We hit the streets with a tour that’s educating visitors about Hanoi’s best street food, from bun ca (fish noodle soup) to iced coffee.

The ornate Cu Da Temple, for example, is a national heritage site that showcases precious stones and colorful motifs of dragons, unicorns and phoenixes.

Also notable are the countless French-style villas — many of which were built as community centers where residents would gather to make decisions.

Lining the peaceful river, the photogenic two-story buildings feature pastel tones, pretty balconies, eaved rooftops and intricate stone carvings.

“By visiting our village, I think people can learn a lot about preserving valuable cultural assets and traditional beauties that our ancestors left behind,” adds Dinh.

Getting there: Hire a taxi from Hanoi to make the one-hour journey to Cu Da village.

By Dan Tham and Kate Springer