IT Training of The Disabled
“Follow, follow, follow me!” This is the line of G-Dragon in LG U+’s latest TV commercial. G-Dragon is the leader of the famous K-Pop group “Big Bang,” and he is currently the advertising model for LG U+’s all-in-one smartphone plan called LTE8, also known as the “follow” plan. The number “eight” in Korean conveniently rhymes with “follow.” The radical plan provides unlimited (mobile-tomobile only) voice calls, text messages, and data transfer for 80,000 or 85,000 won (US$78.28 or $83.17) per month, depending on the range of additional services. There have been unlimited plans before, for never for LTE. No other wireless communication service company in Korea can present this kind of deal.
The combination of eye-catching slogan and radical smartphone plan, plus using a really popular K-Pop idol in its LTE advertising campaign must have worked. For the first time since its establishment in 1996, LG U+’s market share in wireless communication services surpassed 20 percent in April. However, it’s still the third out of three among major wireless communication service companies in Korea. Because of this, LG U+ is always in need of flash radical marketing campaigns to hit niche markets and keep the public aware of them.
Under its slogan for social contribution, “Love +: Happiness Adding Company,” LG U+ has found a solution to use its resources effectively to help out the disabled: direct use of its high-tech devices and technologies. In April, it distributed 070 Players to the families of disabled people through Korea Blind Union. The 070 Player is an Internetbased home phone on which all Android smartphone apps can be installed and used. In the device, it added a special app called “Vonation,” a compound word made from “voice” and “donation.” The Vonation app is a library of poems and prose that were voice-recorded by the executives and staff of LG U+, so that the families of the blind can hear them.
Also, LG U+ has used this unique way of social contribution to make barrier-free movies. In March, it held an electronic audition to select ten people to participate in a movie as voice actors. The way to audition was to submit a recording of voiced lines from the pool through smartphones. The Korean Barrier Free Film Committee then got to select the winners by evaluating the submissions.
Globally, LG U+ has been holding a “Global IT Challenge” since 2011. This event was established to help disabled students utilize IT and increase the level of information to which they are exposed to. This is more apparent in emerging countries. To encourage these students to use IT and to provide the opportunity to communicate globally, it held this event in different parts of the world.
In the first year, 150 participants from Vietnam and Korea gathered in Hanoi, Vietnam. In the second year, 360 IT specialists from around the world and disabled students from the Asia-Pacific region gathered in Songdo, Incheon. Last year, the event was held in Bangkok, Thailand.
This year’s event was the biggest IT event in the Asia-Pacific region. Fully 130 disabled students and 40 IT specialists and public officials from around the world, a total of 240 people, participated in this festival.
The disabled students competed in the following categories: e-Tools, a document making and program utilization contest; e-Life, an Internet surfing contest; and the self-explanatory e-Sports. IT specialists and public officials shared related information and sought solutions in policy seminars.
For its innovative social contribution activities, LG U+ received a minister’s award from the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning (MSIP) at the 25th Information Culture Award Ceremony. Baik Yong-dae, CSR Team Leader of LG U+, said, “We will consider this award as an encouragement to be more active in sharing information culture, and do our best in CSR activities.”