The National Day Preparation Committee on Tuesday unveiled the official logo for this year’s Double Ten National Day. The logo designs are getting worse with each passing year, and “ugly” is the only word that comes to mind.
Let us begin with the colors. Deputy Minister of the Interior Wu Tang-an (吳堂安), secretary-general of the committee, said the subdued “Morandi color palette” was chosen for its calm tone to convey “steadiness and maturity.” In reality, it is more of a pale, grayish blue. Not only is it miles away from the colors of the national flag, it is also depressing. Regarding the shade of red chosen, it is darker than brick red and devoid of any sense of joy. The overlapping blue and red on the logo’s right side clash, while the blue strokes on the left meet without any contrast. It is clearly a sloppy and unprofessional design.
Wu said that the logo features two Chinese characters for 10 (十), rendered with a brush-stroke texture to display creativity and resemble a flag fluttering in the wind, full of vibrant energy like Taiwanese and highlighting Taiwan’s “diversity, freedom and confidence.”
However, the design is reminiscent of the children’s tale The Emperor’s New Clothes — self-congratulatory, when it is actually chaotic and unstructured, like a halfhearted scribble.
Throughout my work in international trade, which includes selling products such as suitcases and golf bags, I have observed and learned from the various tastes of foreign designers, and the flare they put into color and form. The committee, by contrast, seems to believe that simply deviating from traditional rigid and square-shaped characters qualifies as creative design. Misguided imitations are doomed to backfire — not only does the design fail to impress, but it also erases the symbolic imagery of the blue sky, white sun and red earth depicted on the national flag as well as the significance of “Double Ten.”
This year’s Double Ten National Day logo is akin to putting the concept of “pedestrian hell” on full display. It resembles the skid marks left at intersections when scooters weave between cars — not fresh ones, but dried-up traces of tires completely lacking any artistic beauty.
Fang Fu-chuan is an international trader.
Translated by Kyra Gustavsen
In the first year of his second term, US President Donald Trump continued to shake the foundations of the liberal international order to realize his “America first” policy. However, amid an atmosphere of uncertainty and unpredictability, the Trump administration brought some clarity to its policy toward Taiwan. As expected, bilateral trade emerged as a major priority for the new Trump administration. To secure a favorable trade deal with Taiwan, it adopted a two-pronged strategy: First, Trump accused Taiwan of “stealing” chip business from the US, indicating that if Taipei did not address Washington’s concerns in this strategic sector, it could revisit its Taiwan
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) challenges and ignores the international rules-based order by violating Taiwanese airspace using a high-flying drone: This incident is a multi-layered challenge, including a lawfare challenge against the First Island Chain, the US, and the world. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) defines lawfare as “controlling the enemy through the law or using the law to constrain the enemy.” Chen Yu-cheng (陳育正), an associate professor at the Graduate Institute of China Military Affairs Studies, at Taiwan’s Fu Hsing Kang College (National Defense University), argues the PLA uses lawfare to create a precedent and a new de facto legal
Chile has elected a new government that has the opportunity to take a fresh look at some key aspects of foreign economic policy, mainly a greater focus on Asia, including Taiwan. Still, in the great scheme of things, Chile is a small nation in Latin America, compared with giants such as Brazil and Mexico, or other major markets such as Colombia and Argentina. So why should Taiwan pay much attention to the new administration? Because the victory of Chilean president-elect Jose Antonio Kast, a right-of-center politician, can be seen as confirming that the continent is undergoing one of its periodic political shifts,
Taiwan’s long-term care system has fallen into a structural paradox. Staffing shortages have led to a situation in which almost 20 percent of the about 110,000 beds in the care system are vacant, but new patient admissions remain closed. Although the government’s “Long-term Care 3.0” program has increased subsidies and sought to integrate medical and elderly care systems, strict staff-to-patient ratios, a narrow labor pipeline and rising inflation-driven costs have left many small to medium-sized care centers struggling. With nearly 20,000 beds forced to remain empty as a consequence, the issue is not isolated management failures, but a far more
RSS