iPhanatics x iPadawans: The April Apple Hong Kong Meet-Up at RED SoHo

Get your iPhones, iPads and lightsabers out!

It’s time for the iPhanatics to get together again!

Bringing Hong Kong’s “Appleratti” together since March 2009, its now time again for a rousing evening of happy hour drinks, fanatical tech enthusiasts and a chance to show off your new gadgets from the House of Jobs on Tuesday, April 27th, 2010.

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Happy Chinese New Year!

Rooarrrr! Welcome to the Year of the Tiger.

We’re taking the week off, we may be back next week sporadically for the rest of the month, as we’re working on a site re-design and a new focus in the Year of the Tiger that many of you have been asking for.

So see you in a bit and don’t eat too much of that white turnip cake! Thundercats: Hooooooooo!

Welcome to 2010: Where are the Flying Cars and Aliens?

We have made it to the future - now, when does all that sci-fi kick in?

So, we’ve finally hit a new decade: Twenty-Ten, Two-Thousand-Ten, Two-Oh-One-Oh; whatever you call it, we were expecting a lot more advances in gadgets and technology closer to Minority Report and further away from The Road Warrior - but we still think we’re heading into an exciting and revolutionary year for gadgets!

While we have yet to make contact with aliens or power up our flying cars, this year at Neonpunch we plan to bring you more great coverage of the gadget scene around the world with a focus on Hong Kong; deliver the products we talk about through our new Neonpunch Shop (opening soon); and getting more involved in helping to shape the future of gadgets coming your way (more on that later.)

For now, please take some time to sign-up on our Hitlist, join our Facebook group or follow us on Twitter as we want to hear more from you about what you want to see more of this year on Neonpunch!

Now, excuse us while we find out why babies are being sent into space, and just who we’re supposed to make contact with this year:

5 Questions: Jennifer Thyme of RockGinger.com

Q&A with the brains behind the webshow Lumina.

With web video being the way to watch TV these days, it’s not too long when shows and movies get launched online to reach the largest audience. Hong Kong’s Jennifer Thyme of RockGinger.com has started the charge with her bi-lingual web series Lumina. We were able to catch the writer/director/producer and gave her the Neonpunch Punch-Up.

You can also see Jennifer and the cast of Lumina in person tomorrow night at the monthly Web 2.0 social mixer meet-up Web Wednesday.

What is Lumina?

LUMINA is a nine part fantasy thriller web series starring JuJu Chan, Michael Chan and Vince Matthew Chung, and is free to view on www.luminaseries.com. The story centers around a lonely young Hong Kong woman who meets a mysterious prince in a mirror – it’s a modern twist on a classic fairytale, and with any good fable, nothing is as it seems. I am the writer, director and producer of LUMINA – and as with any small business, the one who handles everything that comes our way! It’s been a fantastic learning process, and I’ve met so many great people over the last year. As a result of my work on LUMINA, I’m working on another three feature films in the upcoming year (producing two, directing one.) And I’m hoping to secure funding for LUMINA season two while I’m at it!

I have a background in finance and law, but last year, I decided to revitalise a childhood dream – filmmaking. I wanted to apply my unique work experience to create a sensible small business approach to film finance, which traditionally is rather murky, to say the least. I also was an avid MMORPG player (Final Fantasy XI) and I wanted to blend some element of that into my work as well.

What are some of your personal favorite webshows?

• Wong Fu Productions: Wong Fu is an endearing trio of “nice” Asian American guys who make touching, heartfelt videos. They take cuteness to the next level. My all-time favorite from Wong Fu is “The Spare” which was shot in one day in Hong Kong.

• condition:human: I’m a big cyberpunk fan, so seeing this micro-budget Bladerunner-esque series was a real treat.

• Karma Kula: I love action, and this live action martial arts series was made by the Ninjai Gang, a group of stuntpeople, on their free time; they also made the animated series The Little Ninjai. Amazing stuff!

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