| Attention Readers: Next Friday, Feb. 20, will be the last day that CityLab will send a daily weekday email. We will be transitioning to a weekly cadence, with the newsletter sending on Fridays, starting Feb. 27. With fewer sends, we plan to deliver an even better product. Please send any ideas for what you'd like to see to citylab@bloomberg.net. --------------- Karaoke has long been a staple in Ho Chi Minh City, but it's also one of the many things in the urban soundscape that's crowned the booming commercial hub one of the world's noisiest metropolises. Public nuisance complaints from residents yearning for an end to the near-constant cacophony of off-key singing and beer-fueled chants have bombarded officials, write John Boudreau and Cao Ban. In response, the city imposed in December a round-the-clock ban on excessive noise, hitting violators with fines as high as 160 million dong, or about $6,100. The crackdown reflects a broader social shift in Vietnam, where rising affluence is reshaping expectations of comfort, privacy and control over one's environment, Boudreau and Ban write. It also highlights a widening class divide as the national government aims to promote a vision of the country that is not only modern, but also livable. Today on CityLab: Vietnam's Karaoke Wars Are Forcing a Reckoning Over Urban Noise — Linda Poon |
