When Yeh Wan-ching (
Ignoring the grumbling from her family, she chose the former.
PHOTO: MAX WOODWORTH, TAIPEI TIMES
It's an unconventional path to take for a politics major, but not half as unlikely as the modest success her label White Wabbit Records (
By that point, school had already ranked low on her list of priorities for several years, and starting a label also conveniently ensured that her band would be able to release an album commercially, which the other labels in town were not liable to help with.
Founding a record label and record store isn't quite revolutionary, but cornering a niche market for quirky, relatively unheard-of indie bands required a measure of risk that, until White Wabbit was founded, others had only taken half-heartedly.
"There's no reliable local business model in indie-music. So, just because we went through with it, we're perceived as pioneers and get a lot of attention for it," said KK, whose label and store have been featured in everything from popular women's magazines to a DPP presidential campaign ad.
The store, located inside the music venue/shopping complex The Wall, is tiny -- no more than five pings -- but it's a significant improvement from its former address inside a converted men's restroom at the now-defunct live music house Zeitgeist. The new space allows for a proper counter, a sofa and floor-to-ceiling shelves to fit a couple thousand CDs from bands known by only a handful of truly dedicated music listeners.
Keeping the titles as obscure as possible helps the store maintain an unchallenged status locally as the city's nexus for people with their ears to the rails for upcoming bands. There's also little likelihood for would-be consumers to find the music sold at the shop on popular MP3 file-sharing systems, like Kuro.com, that major labels and record stores complain have cut into their profits.
"It's a convenient convergence of personal interests and market conditions. I like this kind of music, and it so happens that we operate in part of the music market that MP3 file-sharing doesn't affect," KK said.
Learning the ropes in the rock-music industry, where young women label-heads are noticeable in Taiwan, as elsewhere, for their absence, was a trial-and-error process, but not, KK says, an especially arduous one.
"Because the music market is so fresh, starting this kind of venture might actually be the easy part. Keeping it alive is the hard part," she said.
To do so, KK made the label and store operate symbiotically, as the label's local releases -- six in total so far by Nipples, Bad Daughter (
A significant portion of the business comes over the Internet. Through the label's Web site (www.wwr.idv.tw), newletter and community forum site, KK has built a small client base from southern Taiwan and even as far away as Hong Kong and China.
KK also designed the label's logo -- a one-eyed cartoon rabbit that looks as though it were first doodled on a napkin.
But despite her undeniable marketing acumen, KK hesitates to describe herself as a businesswoman.
"I'm more of a musician than anything else. In the beginning, keeping the accounting books straight at the store was a huge drag. I can barely count," she said.
Her laid-back attitude has given White Wabbit something of a cachet as head of Taiwan's indie-rock slacker community and masks the actual round-the-clock work that goes into keeping the label and store afloat.
And she's not so unambitious as to not forget to forge medium-term plans for the label and store.
"I hope in five years to open up a branch in Tokyo. People buy anything in Japan," she said.
Seven hundred job applications. One interview. Marco Mascaro arrived in Taiwan last year with a PhD in engineering physics and years of experience at a European research center. He thought his Gold Card would guarantee him a foothold in Taiwan’s job market. “It’s marketed as if Taiwan really needs you,” the 33-year-old Italian says. “The reality is that companies here don’t really need us.” The Employment Gold Card was designed to fix Taiwan’s labor shortage by offering foreign professionals a combined resident visa and open work permit valid for three years. But for many, like Mascaro, the welcome mat ends at the door. A
Last week gave us the droll little comedy of People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) consul general in Osaka posting a threat on X in response to Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi saying to the Diet that a Chinese attack on Taiwan may be an “existential threat” to Japan. That would allow Japanese Self Defence Forces to respond militarily. The PRC representative then said that if a “filthy neck sticks itself in uninvited, we will cut it off without a moment’s hesitation. Are you prepared for that?” This was widely, and probably deliberately, construed as a threat to behead Takaichi, though it
If China attacks, will Taiwanese be willing to fight? Analysts of certain types obsess over questions like this, especially military analysts and those with an ax to grind as to whether Taiwan is worth defending, or should be cut loose to appease Beijing. Fellow columnist Michael Turton in “Notes from Central Taiwan: Willing to fight for the homeland” (Nov. 6, page 12) provides a superb analysis of this topic, how it is used and manipulated to political ends and what the underlying data shows. The problem is that most analysis is centered around polling data, which as Turton observes, “many of these
Since Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) was elected Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chair on Oct. 18, she has become a polarizing figure. Her supporters see her as a firebrand critic of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), while others, including some in her own party, have charged that she is Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) preferred candidate and that her election was possibly supported by the Chinese Communist Party’s (CPP) unit for political warfare and international influence, the “united front.” Indeed, Xi quickly congratulated Cheng upon her election. The 55-year-old former lawmaker and ex-talk show host, who was sworn in on Nov.
RSS