Increasingly, our society relies on the internet for information and entertainment. Blogging and message boards are now commonplace. What is also shockingly ubiquitous is the negative, degrading, and often times filthy content of these message boards. Well-known intercultural educator Professor Min, Byoung-chul of Chung-ang University, South Korea, asked himself these same questions in an earnest attempt to make a significant change and global impact. Dr. Min has rallied educators, lawyers, and television celebrities to launch a campaign to clean up online message boards. The Sunfull Movement’s purpose is to spread the posting of positive and encouraging online comments to protect victims from cyber bullying and abuse. The Sunfull Movement was launched on May 23, 2007. What began as a simple class assignment to over 500 students in Dr. Min’s global leadership course has rapidly spread into a vast movement to counter the culture of hatred on the internet and promote the value of mutual help and respect. Min said he began the campaign after the shocking suicides last year of two female stars, Jeong Da-bin and Yuni, who both hanged themselves after being diagnosed with severe depression. Before their deaths, their homepages had been deluged with disparaging allegations and scorn over their private lives and choices, such as undergoing plastic surgery. As the founder and president of a non-profit organization called Sunfull Movement, an on-line positive comments campaign, Dr. Min led a national campaign to clean up online message boards. The Sunfull Movement aims to not only increase the awareness for alleviating anonymous derogatory message postings on web, but it also aims to actually increase the practice of posting positive and encouraging messages on board. The criteria of such ‘positive comments’ are: (1) complimenting, (2) encouraging, (3) thanking, (4) comforting, (5) apologizing, (6) forgiving and (7) compromising. According to Dr. Min, “This campaign ultimately seeks to change the face of cyberspace, which often overflows with malicious comments and slander against celebrities, politicians, and individuals, into a friendlier and more civilized public sphere.” With this vision, Dr. Min was able to gather active involvement from prominent educators, lawyers, and celebrities to draw national attention to the dire need of moral cleansing in South Korea’s cyberspace. Dr. Min’s goal is to attract ten million positive and encouraging comments (Sunfull postings) in Korea and ultimately extend this movement to attract six billion Sunfull postings worldwide. He hopes that this movement will play a meaningful role in restoring civility to the global cyber world. The Sunfull campaign is an extension of the Chuimsae Movement, a social campaign to encourage a culture of harmony. The name is derived from an expression used by drummers to cue singers, as well as excite the audience in the traditional performance art of "pansori." It is equivalent to "There you go!" or "Attaboy!" The Chuimsae Peace Movement was launched in November of 2005. Spearheaded by Dr. Min himself, along with various representatives from academia, non-governmental organizations, and civic groups, the movement attempts to demolish strongholds of envy, jealousy, and insecurity among Koreans, by giving participants an opportunity to vocalize their thoughts and feelings on what they think can hinder harmony among peoples. Chuimsae, derived from pansori, is a campaign that seeks to teach youth humility with confidence, grace, encouragement for others, and team work. Local various online mediums such as message boards, bloggs, communities, and personal web pages often carry groundless allegations and malicious comments. Sunfull organizers urged the government and internet portals to expand the existing real-name system for internet postings to prevent ill-intended messages, which are largely posted by anonymous internet users. Celebrities, including actor Ahn Sung-ki, TV star Yoo Dong-gun, lawmaker Koh Seung-duk and comedian Kim Je-dong, have being promoting the campaign. "Harmonious online culture cannot be established by force. Involve yourselves voluntarily for the good cause," Ahn said. Since its establishment on May 23, 2007, the Sunfull Movement has promoted a clean, positive cyberspace via a series of events and media reports. However, the non-profit organization became aware of a need for proactive access to the issue as it faces a reality. These days, teenagers, called the generation of the Internet or the Network, are exposed to unconfirmed information distributed without filtering through the wired and wireless internet services like SMS, replies to articles on the web, and chatting that they use in their daily lives. In addition, there is a continuous tendency for some teenagers, who are addicted to violent computer games, to impulsively commit crimes such as a shooting or stabbing because they confuse the real world and the virtual world. To directly approach the issue, the organization launched a campaign to open a Sunfull Room at elementary schools with the motto of “Let’s teach children the Sunfull Way in their first experience of the Internet.” It is the most efficient way to teach children how to use the Internet, which is emerging as the primary method for communication among people, as early as elementary education where they just begin to learn the definition of good behavior and how to use the Internet. As of June 4th, 2008, the organization has opened its first Sunfull Room in the Chungang Middle School in Jeju island and in September, the second one in the Seoul Bangbae Middle School. On October 23rd, representatives of all 181 elementary, middle school, and high schools in Jeju declared that they will participate in the Sunfull Movement and will open Sunfull Rooms in their schools. The organization hopes that the Sunfull Room Campaign which began in Jeju, the southern most island of Korea (named an island of peace), will be expanded to all elementary and secondary schools in neighboring countries and around the world. The organization has launched a campaign to attract one million participants who will post 10 million Sunfull messages with Cyworld (the largest portal community in Korea operated by SK Communications). On October 22nd, the campaign began and as of November 29th 2008, more than 45,000 internet users have signed up to post positive comments. The Sunfull Movement urges you to join the thousands of people who have already been making a difference by taking part in this online positive comments campaign. You can sign on and leave your positive and encouraging comments at www.sunfull.or.kr (phone:82-2-535-3449)