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In the about 1,000 days between her drunken-driving crash in May 2022 and her death, South Korean mainstream news organizations published at least around 2,000 stories on film actor Kim Sae-ron.They illustrate how the local media often cover a celebrity’s fall from grace. Previously one of the brightest young stars in South Korean cinema, Kim was condemned and ridiculed for driving drunk; for talking about her financial struggles after losing roles; for taking a job at a coffee shop; for attempting a comeback in theater; for going out with friends instead of “showing remorse”; and for being seen smiling on set while shooting an indie movie.After the 24-year-old actor was found dead at her home Sunday, the headlines predictably swung to calling for changes to the way celebrities are treated in the public arena.Kim’s death, which police consider a suicide, adds to a growing list of high-profile celebrity deaths in the country, which some experts attribute to the enormous pressure celebrities face under the gaze of a relentlessly unforgiving media that seizes on every misstep. EDITOR’S NOTE: In South Korea, callers can receive 24-hour counseling through the suicide prevention hotline 1577-0199, the “Life Line” service at 1588-9191, the “Hope Phone” at 129 and the “Youth Phone” at 1388. Here’s a look at the intense pressure faced by South Korean celebrities who fall from grace. A sudden fall from grace South Korea is notoriously harsh on its celebrities, particularly women.Kim rose to stardom as a child actor with the 2010 hit crime thriller The Man from Nowhere and garnered acclaim and popularity for her acting in movies and TV dramas for years.But that changed after May 18, 2022, when Kim crashed a vehicle into a tree and an electrical transformer while driving drunk in southern Seoul. She posted a handwritten apology on Instagram and reportedly compensated around 60 shops that lost power temporarily because of the crash, but that did little to defuse negative coverage and she struggled to find acting work.When a Seoul court issued a 200 million won ($139,000) fine over the crash in April 2023, Kim expressed her fears about the media to reporters, saying many articles about her private life were untrue.“I’m too scared to say anything about them,” she said. Relentless negative coverage In the wake of Kim’s drunken-driving crash, celebrity gossip channels on YouTube began posting negative videos about her private life, suggesting without providing evidence that she was exaggerating her financial straits by working at coffee shops, and arguing that social media posts showing her socializing with friends meant she wasn’t showing enough remorse.Other entertainers, especially female, have struggled to find work after run-ins with the law, including drunken driving or substance abuse, and experts say many of them are reluctant to seek treatment for mental health problems like depression, fearing further negative coverage.Kwon Young-chan, a comedian-turned-scholar who leads a group helping celebrities with mental health issues, said celebrities often feel helpless when the coverage turns negative after spending years carefully cultivating their public image. Kwon, who stayed with Kim’s relatives during a traditional three-day funeral process, said her family is considering legal action against a YouTube creator with hundreds of thousands of subscribers for what they describe as groundless attacks on Kim’s private life.Peter Jongho Na, a professor of psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine, lamented on Facebook that South Korean society had become a giant version of “Squid Game,” the brutal Netflix survival drama, “abandoning people who make mistakes or fall behind, acting as though nothing happened.” Media blamed for celebrity deaths The National Police Agency said officers found no signs of foul play at Kim’s home and that she left no note.But a spate of high-profile deaths has sparked discussions about how news organizations cover the private lives of celebrities and whether floods of critical online comments are harming their mental health. Similar conversations happened after the 2008 death of mega movie star Choi Jin-sil; the death of her former baseball star husband, Cho Sung-min, in 2013; the deaths of K-Pop singers Sulli and Goo Hara in 2019; and the death of “Parasite” actor Lee Sun-kyun in 2023.Sensational but unsubstantiated claims like from social media are widely recycled and amplified by traditional media outlets as they compete for audience attention, said Hyun-jae Yu, a communications professor at Seoul’s Sogang University.Struggling with a sharp decline in traditional media readership, he said, media turn to covering YouTube drama as the easiest way to drive up traffic, often skipping the work of reporting and verifying facts.Following the 2019 deaths of Sulli and Goo Hara, which were widely attributed to cyberbullying and sexual harassment both in the public and media, lawmakers proposed various measures to discourage harsh online comments. These included expanding real-name requirements and strengthening websites’ requirements to weed out hate speech and false information, but none of these proposed laws passed. Reforms remain elusive South Korean management agencies are getting increasingly active in taking legal action to protect their entertainers from online bullying. Hybe, which manages several K-Pop groups including BTS, publishes regular updates about lawsuits it’s filing against social media commentators it deems malicious.But Yu said it’s crucial for mainstream media companies to strengthen self-regulation and limit their use of YouTube content as news sources. Government authorities could also compel YouTube and other social media platforms to take greater responsibility for content created by their users, he said, including actively removing problematic videos and preventing creators from monetizing them.The South Korean office of Google, YouTube’s parent company, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.Heo Chanhaeng, an executive director at the Center for Media Responsibility and Human Rights, said news organizations and websites should consider shutting down the comments sections on entertainment stories entirely.“Her private life was indiscriminately reported beyond what was necessary,” Heo said. “That’s not a legitimate matter of public interest.” Kim Tong-Hyung, Associated Press
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A TikTok trend claims giving your baby a tablespoon or two of butter before bed will help them sleep better at night. What if I told you my toddler was still waking up every 2 hours at almost 2 years old until I started giving her real grass fed butter before bed, reads one TikTok post by creator @bridgette_.gray. Since then, her child has experienced a week straight of sleeping almost 8 hours every night. @bridgette_.gray We will be trying double the amount next week and aiming for 12 hours a night! #fyp #buttermagic #toddlerlife #toddlermom #hack #lifesecret #momcheatcode Save My Soul – noahrinker Another TikTok user @abbyexplainsitall calls butter (importantly, not margarine) the best sleep hack for kids and she lets hers eat as much as they want. The video currently has 279.8K views. In the caption she adds, The fats help keep them satiated and that helps with sleeping! My kids sleep from 6:30pm – 6:30am and still take amazing naps throughout the day. @abbyexplainsitall The best sleep hack for kids – butter – (not margarine) my kids love butter and I let them eat as much as they want. The fats help keep them satiated and that helps with sleeping! My kids sleep from 6:30p – 6:30a and still take amazing naps throughout the day. We also use avocados – Healthy fats are great for brain development and cognitive function. #sleeptraining #motherhood #babyhacks #toddlersoftiktok original sound – Abby But experts are pumping the brakes on the trend. According to pediatric consultant Niamh Lynch, there is actually no scientific evidence that giving babies butter before bed makes them sleep longer. Unfortunately butter is not going to make babies sleep better, she said in a video posted to Instagram. It might upset their tummy. It might cause diarrhoea. Its a choking hazard obviously to give them a big chunk of butter. So, park the butter idea. Instead she suggests a list of foods that do actually help with sleep, including kiwi, cherries, milk, fatty fish, nuts, and rice (although beware of allergies). View this post on Instagram A post shared by Dr Niamh Lynch (@dr_niamh_lynch) Giving babies any solid food before they are around 6 months old is also not recommended. From about 6 months old, babies can begin to be offered nutritious solid foods. Even then, butter is not the best option as it is high in salt and saturated fat, which are not recommended in large amounts. Butter is not the only sleep-hack tried and tested by desperate parents. It was once thought that adding cereal in a bottle of milk before bedtime would also help babies sleep through the night (research found this did not increase sleep in the slightest). More recently, the viral lime hack, where parents cut a lime in half, place it in a dish, and position it next to their childs bed for better sleep, has been doing the rounds online. The truth is, it is perfectly normal for babies to wake during the night. Not even a stick of Kerrygold or half a lime can come to parents’ rescue.
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Alphabet Inc’s Google is close to deciding on locations in its key market of India where it will open its first physical retail stores outside the United States, three sources familiar with the matter said. Google counts India as a key growth market, where it has committed to investing $10 billion. It currently has only five physical stores, all in the United States, which sell its products such as Pixel phones, watches, and earbuds. It is aiming to mirror a retail approach that helped Apple Inc. rake in billions of dollars in the past two decades by showcasing its own products. Apple has 500 plus stores worldwide. Google is in advanced stages of finalising locations in or around the capital of New Delhi, and the financial capital Mumbai, said three sources, who declined to be named as the process is confidential. Google declined to comment on the matter. The first source said the stores are likely to be around 15,000 square feet, and will take at least another six months to open, though the timeline could change. The IT hub of Bengaluru in south India was also considered, but New Delhi and Mumbai are the frontrunners, the person added. “The idea is to compete with Apple . . . especially to target the luxury segment,” said the person, adding more stores will be considered if the initial ones do well. Google currently sells it products in India through authorised retailers, as does Apple. But in 2023, Apple CEO Tim Cook visited India to open its first company-run stores in Mumbai, and then in New Delhi. Pixel phones in India cost from about $370 to $2,000 for top-end models. Apple’s iPhones cost from about $520$2,130. Google has also started making Pixel smartphones in India. In 2024, Apple dominated the local market for premium phones, priced above $520, with a roughly 55% share, compared with Pixel’s 2% share, research group Counterpoint said. The fast-growing Indian market has about 712 million smartphone users currently. Google’s plan to open the stores is firm and will be executed soon, there are some standard regulatory and compliance processes to clear before the stores can be set up, said the second source, without elaborating on the issues. A third source said one of the possible locations Google is considering near New Delhi is in the satellite city of Gurugram, where many global corporations such as Uber and Meta have offices and the likes of Uniqlo have retail outlets. In India, Google is battling many regulatory and legal challenges. Among them are ongoing antitrust cases related to its in-app billing system and abuse of market position in the market for smart TVs. In a top-level departure, Google lost its India head of public policy this month, marking the second departure in around two years from the critical role which is key to government engagement. Aditya Kalra, Reuters
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