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North Korea Launhes Beer! Less Threatening, Tastes Great

news.bbc.co.uk — North Korea's latest launch is not missiles, but a TV campaign for a locally-brewed beer. features a thirsty worker holding a mug of frothy beer. Young women in traditional Korean dress are shown serving trays of beer to men in Western suits. Billed as the "Pride of Pyongyang"

Who dugg this? Made popular Jul 3, 2009

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116 Comments

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  • unit001, on 07/03/2009, -3/+49ITS MADE OF PEOPLE!
  • xixphz, on 07/03/2009, -1/+36Now with 20% fewer tears,
  • RiotHeart, on 07/03/2009, -0/+33They Launhed it?
  • diggB, on 07/03/2009, -0/+28New Beer Launch Detected
  • Enhor, on 07/03/2009, -5/+32Yeah, this ***** kim Jong-Il is right. The people of North Korea don't have enough problems, let's make them alcoholics too.
    And I'm now expert in agriculture but I'm quite sure the fields used to grow the barley (or whatever this beer is made of) could be used to grow, dunno, FOOD maybe ?
  • katagana, on 07/03/2009, -3/+26Haha, LOL! I want to taste that! Stalinist Beer!
  • inactive, on 07/03/2009, -0/+18Don't make the people open up a can of Pyongyang on you!
  • nowsourcing, on 07/03/2009, -6/+23only to be used while singing I'm so ronery.
  • ZeeZee2k, on 07/03/2009, -0/+11Don't be silly, everybody needs beer.
  • dronkmunk, on 07/03/2009, -0/+11The whole thing.
  • jivatmanx, on 07/03/2009, -1/+12Use it to get a Korean girl drunk
    Win-Win
  • inactive, on 07/03/2009, -0/+11Pyongyang... of the people, by the people, with the people... BEER!
  • IgorUnchained, on 07/03/2009, -0/+11The Egyptians used slaves and beer to build the pyramids....I can only imagine the World Wonder that Lil Kim has planned.
  • inactive, on 07/03/2009, -1/+11Launches*
  • inactive, on 07/03/2009, -1/+11How dare you make a joke of 'the peoples' BEER!
  • blipblopblip, on 07/03/2009, -0/+10Better that they launch a beer than a nuke.
  • lemur, on 07/03/2009, -0/+10Dude. First of all, barley IS food. I don't drink alcohol or beer, but I have nothing against barley and it is a grain from which many things can be produced. I also like the taste of malted barley.

    According to another article I read on Digg, North Korea is actually one of the world's leading producers of agriculture, but I wouldn't be surprised if they sold most or all of it for export just to fatten the wallets of the regime. I doubt any food problem they have would come from being short a few fields for the sake of barley.

    Also, alcoholism in Korea is no laughing matter. They have a higher alcoholism rate (at least S Korea does) than any other country in East Asia. I learned this in college, and they believe the explanation is genetic because Koreans react strongly to alcohol, meaning they get drunk easily and I suppose they enjoy it more. Genes aside, I suppose anyone living under a communist regime would be a perfect candidate for alcoholism.
  • illied, on 07/03/2009, -1/+8Three minutes for a beer commercial! That's impressive.
  • inactive, on 07/03/2009, -0/+7I'm torn. I really really like beer, but I really really dislike Kim Jong Il...what to do?
  • elchispito, on 07/03/2009, -0/+7Drink to his ouster.
  • thelab101, on 07/03/2009, -2/+9I like how we have to watch an ad to....watch an ad. Gawd, the internets is broken.

    WILL SOMEONE PLEASE ***** DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS INSANITY!
  • inactive, on 07/03/2009, -0/+7Someone had a little too much beer when writing the title.
  • RandomGorilla, on 07/03/2009, -0/+6So all those nuke threats were some kind of viral advertising leading up to a beer commercial? That Kim Jong guy's got some strange ideas about marketing.
  • Skootles, on 07/03/2009, -0/+60:58 - What a terrible pour..
  • slicksoul999, on 07/03/2009, -0/+6Hopefully they don't get too toasted and beginning pressing "the buttons"
  • yocouchdigga, on 07/03/2009, -1/+6Enhor, why do you hate America?
  • inactive, on 07/03/2009, -0/+5Booooooo yucky Dictator... Hurray BEER!!!
  • AndrewDB, on 07/04/2009, -0/+5They Launhed beer just like they Launhes a nuke?.. right?
  • inactive, on 07/04/2009, -1/+5By American beer you mean Bud, Miller, etc.

    American microbrewery beer is fantastic.
  • ThSid, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4Damn!

    That REALLY reminds me of late Soviet (and early 90's) ADs i've seen on russian TV channels! The producing quality is not really great and has lots of flaws compared to contemporary european advertisments..

    still it is a step to the good direction..
  • Liability, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4When will the acts of state-sponsored brewing end?
  • Wilarseny, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4My god, does no one on this site watch It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia? Clearly this beer is enriched.

    Also, is it just me, or does the BBC volume slider go up to 11?
  • JUSTINS13, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4i don't want to sound queer or nothing but that music totally kicks ass
  • O8SERVER, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4All praise the beer leader!
  • oneofmanysteves, on 07/03/2009, -1/+5I couldn't quite make out the translation, but I assume it was along the lines of "This is a beverage called beer, which was invented by our dear leader Kim Jong il, it is the only drink of it's kind and it's tastes great!"??
  • nickmdp, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4I was thinking the same thing, there had to be a solid 3" head on that beer.
  • Hnnnnnghhh, on 07/04/2009, -0/+4What does it matter? no one in North Korea owns a television, or can afford beer.
  • bluesman3535, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4To huge U.S. market "Ok ok we no want bomb you. May we come in?"
  • kylejn, on 07/03/2009, -0/+4Ah, Soylent Beer. Truly the drink of the people, in more ways than one.
  • Acesolid, on 07/04/2009, -0/+3It's still probably better then American beer.
  • BetaBand, on 07/03/2009, -0/+3And what about that door marked "Pirate"? You think they got a pirate living back there?
  • Enhor, on 07/04/2009, -0/+3Yeah, you're right. Go outside build yourself a bunker now.
  • vizerei, on 07/04/2009, -0/+3I was waiting for that.
  • Loki101, on 07/03/2009, -0/+3The Pride of Pyongyang. 9 out of 10 people say it leaves you glowing.
  • Tiak, on 07/04/2009, -0/+2The article you read on digg would seem to be incorrect... In the 90s millions of people died of starvation in North Korea because the Soviet Union was no longer providing them with food and agricultural supplies. Wikipedia makes the claim that their geography greatly limits their agricultural output.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_North_Kore ...
    It would seem that a large portion of their population still work primarily in the cultivation of agriculture, which could be what the article you're thinking of was referring to, but when only 18% of a small country is arable, some farmers are being ordered to grow opium rather than food, people are starving, and a country's largest export is weapons, it seems unlikely that they are one of the leading producers of agriculture... They do have some specific agricultural products they produce a lot of, for example, they produce a lot of fresh fruit, and, relevantly, a lot of hops, but aren't the best at producing any of them, and their specialty products aren't exactly those that keep people from starving.
    http://www.fao.org/es/ess/top/topproduction.html?l ...

    Your alcoholism stats would seem to be somewhat correct, but misleading. They do have a high alcoholism rate for East Asia (if you ignore Siberia), but it is only slightly higher than that of Japan, and is on par with most other industrialized nations, which implies it is more a matter of culture than genetic predesposition, it would seem drinking has long been a staple of the culture, but they have more recently began supplimenting harder alcohol for alcoholic drinks that were less alcoholic. Apparently, drinking is even a large part of their corporate culture... Anyway, this cultural trait would seem to be unique to South Korea, which unlike North Korea is highly industrialized (South Korea has about 45x the GDP of North Korea).
  • lemur, on 07/04/2009, -0/+2You have a point, but I think that they weren't meaning to say the country is *****, just that, "Hey man, you're a hard worker, and after doing some good work it's nice to relax." Makes sense, right?
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  • inactive, on 07/04/2009, -0/+2They forgot to mention 3 Korean farmers are worked to death to harvest what little grain they have for one glass.
  • directedition, on 07/04/2009, -0/+2I just want to know what part of the beer R&D was ISO 9001 certified.
  • sniperpants, on 07/04/2009, -0/+2Thank you!!!
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