(Cross-posted in Are You Insane?, my personal blog on other topics).

I just went to Starbuck and learned that the purchase of my Expresso Truffle sent $.05 to (red). I take no issue of corporations taking part of charitable courses. Having taken part in non-profit organizations, any help is appreciated. But I cannot help but notice that it is a ploy to steer people towards certain high-end products.

My expresso, like almost every Starbucks coffees, tasted like a combination of burning and sweetness. It also costs $3.65 for a Tall (small in Starbuckese).

Dell’s Product (RED) steers me towards their high end XPS desktops and their mid-range Studio 15 and Studio 17 Laptops (which has a 75 premium for some pretty cool designs). I’m pretty sure I won’t be getting a Product (RED) Mini9 anytime soon.

It’s like corporations are putting the onus on their customers to help, (RED)’s case, HIV victims in Africa. What if we don’t buy Product (RED)? Will they not send the money?

I reiterate. Whatever it takes to get money to worthy causes is okay in my book. But it would be nice for corporation to use cheaper high-volume products.

This is unexpected and welcome (Via. ROK Drop)

(CNN) — Nineteen North Koreans have been released from detention in Myanmar and sent to Thailand, Burmese officials told the U.S.-funded Voice of America news service Thursday.

The suspected defectors were detained in Myanmar in early December while trying to flee to South Korea through China and Southeast Asia.

Other news agencies said the defectors included 15 women and a 7-year-old boy.

South Korean officials told Voice of America they would be welcomed in South Korea.

According to VOA, about 14,000 defectors from North Korea have been resettled in South Korea, where the constitution automatically recognizes them as citizens. Tens of thousands more are living illegally in China, VOA reported, where they are not recognized as refugees.

Myanmar broke off diplomatic relations with North Korea in 1983 after North Korean agents set off a bomb in an attempted assassination of then-South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan. The blast killed more than 20 people, according to the Asia Times, most of them South Korean officials.

Chun survived, but the deputy prime minister, the foreign minister and the South Korean ambassador to Myanmar were killed.

Recently, however, the two countries have begun contacts aimed at restoring diplomatic ties.

I can think of a couple of reasons. Despite being human rights abuser #2, they leave the repression to exclusively their own people. Myanmar’s relation with North Korea isn’t close enough to warrant returning its people. Also, they do not want to receive further international scrutiny, not that the world will do much about North Korean refugees.

Perhaps this will occur again, but that doesn’t make Burma any better in my opinion just because it does something expected of civilized society.