The holiday’s over…
Now that’s depressing.
I have been plagued by dilemmas, 2 to be exact.
Dilemma #1 (D1) and #2 (D2) coincides. On the lighter side of things, I’m very happy for Ryan for securing a job in Singapore with an almost non-existing portfolio since, “My comp crashed lah, and all my 3D work is lost! 4evaa!!!” after having just called me a day earlier to tell me, “Meng ah, I don’t know if I’ll get that job…I rush like mad you know. I really, really want to get the fuck out of that shit-hole.*”
*YogaZone
We’ll hopefully meet up later before he shoots off to KL, since that the next time I’ll see him will be either at Singapore or Johor. I believe he will make it big one day. Good things happen to people who take risks.
So now back to me (and my dilemmas). Yes, it’s my blog; I get to be self-obsessed here. After spending years on the sidelines, things got stirred up on D1 and finally…I’m at the end of the road. Not what I anticipated, but still. Perspective resurfaced and all of a sudden I can’t remember where I was heading to. This brings D2 into place. I’m forlorn. I don’t know why but I am. So now I’m planning the next phase. How, when, where.
On an unrelated issue, the office went thru a severe depression during CNY. The ceiling fell down, where my boss sits. Lucky him, he was pigging out, thus spared him the head-bang. The glass doors slams. Because the bloody thing that slows it down is fucked. So now, its all very chaotic.
Ian being ever so understanding, “Man, your office must suck now,” he says.
Gaping holes on the ceiling, slamming glass doors; I say, “Am I in hell?”
Feels like I’ve moved on while I was asleep.
Tuesday, 27 February 2007
Monday, 19 February 2007
Tuesday, 13 February 2007
You Will Not Tarnish My CNY!
Buat pertama kali saya akan cuba tulis satu blog entry in BM.
Kenapa? Saya pun tak sure sangat. Tapi aku rasa BM aku semakin teruk dan saya perlu membuat suatu err… (how the fuck do I say ‘take drastic measures’?)…aksi yang drastik?
Oh siyer. Tak jadi. Buruk giler BM ku ni (Acap diam! Heh). Dulu, masa sekolah, BM saya terror sial. Tiap-tiap sem sure dapat A. Kalau tak, dapat B. Mungkin kerana cikgu kita hebat sekali. Dan dia ada jari ekstra! Kita ingat dia X-men, macam ada super-power lah, macam SUPER-SMS-GUY kerana dia ada jari lebih. Sure taip SMS cepat gila.
Bila Tingkatan Empat, slack giler. Dari A runtuh ke C. Lepas tu SPM…aku ingat aku fail sial. Hampir nak nangis nih, lepas tu aku tengok member ku, dia dapat lagi teruk…dia ingat dia fail pulak. Aku lega betul. Tetapi, kita ingat…bahawa sistem markah SPM telah berubah dan kita adalah kumpulan pertama yang err…melaluinya? Oh tuhan. Tolong!
I won’t say CNY is just around the corner. I’ll say it’s just down the road. Why? Because I feel like it. I got summon by the traffic police yesterday for having a number plate that is too small. “Are you guys blind? I can see my plate from a mile away,” I said that, then I wind down my window to talk to them. “Encik, kenapa?” I asked. Curious.
He looked pretty pissed, I can understand why, it’s bloody hot and they’re causing a massive jam and basically everyone is giving them a nasty look for causing that jam, during lunch-hour, “Dik, plate ang kecik, turun tengok.”
So I did. He started off with a piece of A4 paper containing the protocol of a number plate. Alphabets distance height and so on. He carried a little key chain thing that has the measurements and placed it above my plate. Sure enough, it didn’t make the 7cm height requirements. In fact, I JUST missed it by about half a mm, “Fuck!”
“Apa?!”
“Err, nothing.”
He instructed me to go back to my car and wait. He grabbed his book and proceeded to issue me a summon. But of course, before he did, “Ini kena settle kat Patani Road tau?” When he kept saying those words in a continuous loop, kinda like a faulty-overly-scratched pirated VCD, I got the impression he wanted a backhander or something. In fact, he was.
But I damn no mood to layan. You wanna fine me, just fine me.
I will settle that next month. I have yet to do my CNY shopping y'now.
Kenapa? Saya pun tak sure sangat. Tapi aku rasa BM aku semakin teruk dan saya perlu membuat suatu err… (how the fuck do I say ‘take drastic measures’?)…aksi yang drastik?
Oh siyer. Tak jadi. Buruk giler BM ku ni (Acap diam! Heh). Dulu, masa sekolah, BM saya terror sial. Tiap-tiap sem sure dapat A. Kalau tak, dapat B. Mungkin kerana cikgu kita hebat sekali. Dan dia ada jari ekstra! Kita ingat dia X-men, macam ada super-power lah, macam SUPER-SMS-GUY kerana dia ada jari lebih. Sure taip SMS cepat gila.
Bila Tingkatan Empat, slack giler. Dari A runtuh ke C. Lepas tu SPM…aku ingat aku fail sial. Hampir nak nangis nih, lepas tu aku tengok member ku, dia dapat lagi teruk…dia ingat dia fail pulak. Aku lega betul. Tetapi, kita ingat…bahawa sistem markah SPM telah berubah dan kita adalah kumpulan pertama yang err…melaluinya? Oh tuhan. Tolong!
I won’t say CNY is just around the corner. I’ll say it’s just down the road. Why? Because I feel like it. I got summon by the traffic police yesterday for having a number plate that is too small. “Are you guys blind? I can see my plate from a mile away,” I said that, then I wind down my window to talk to them. “Encik, kenapa?” I asked. Curious.
He looked pretty pissed, I can understand why, it’s bloody hot and they’re causing a massive jam and basically everyone is giving them a nasty look for causing that jam, during lunch-hour, “Dik, plate ang kecik, turun tengok.”
So I did. He started off with a piece of A4 paper containing the protocol of a number plate. Alphabets distance height and so on. He carried a little key chain thing that has the measurements and placed it above my plate. Sure enough, it didn’t make the 7cm height requirements. In fact, I JUST missed it by about half a mm, “Fuck!”
“Apa?!”
“Err, nothing.”
He instructed me to go back to my car and wait. He grabbed his book and proceeded to issue me a summon. But of course, before he did, “Ini kena settle kat Patani Road tau?” When he kept saying those words in a continuous loop, kinda like a faulty-overly-scratched pirated VCD, I got the impression he wanted a backhander or something. In fact, he was.
But I damn no mood to layan. You wanna fine me, just fine me.
I will settle that next month. I have yet to do my CNY shopping y'now.
Friday, 9 February 2007
Thursday, 8 February 2007
Throttling Broadband Access For All
Errant motorists are causing havoc on the highway, disregarding traffic laws and eluding law enforcement.
Automobile manufacturers, particularly the sports car guys, have announced they will build into their vehicles devices to lower their maximum speeds.
You can imagine a Ferrari salesman's pitch going something like this: "Datuk, this baby's got a 400-horsepower, 12-cylinder engine that'll take you from 0 to 140kph in five seconds!
"Oh, but don't worry, we're restricting its speed to 60kph ... don't want you driving too fast now, do we?"
I know what you're thinking. A stupid idea, right? Who would want to sell a sports car with deliberately built-in speed limits? More importantly, who would even want to buy one?
Yet a similar scenario is playing itself out in Malaysian cyberspace. After years of under-achievement in our national broadband aspirations, the network service providers are taking a couple of steps back.
Cognitive dissonance territory here, or as my kids would put it, "Duh!"
Maxis did it first when it rolled out its wireless broadband service last year. Under the "Terms and Conditions" of usage, it had this little gem: "Maxis may, at its sole discretion, automatically disconnect the customer's Internet session after a period of inactivity, which may vary from 20 minutes to 30 minutes."
And if that's not all, here's the clincher: "Each customer's total usage per month shall NOT exceed 3GB of data volume transmitted ..."
Now rumours have been flying that the country's No 1 Internet service provider (ISP) TM Net is proposing to do something similar with its Streamyx broadband service.
So, you have these great big pipes and you can sign up for one of those unlimited, always-on packages.
But you're not going to get those big pipes, and you'll find that the word "unlimited" has an alternate definition in ISP-speak. Always on? Well, except for those times they choose to close some ports and cut you off, that is.
That's right, more speed bumps on the information superhighway.
The ISPs have their reasons, of course. Foremost among them is network optimisation, or making the best of what you've got. They'll tell you they don't want a few hardcore users hogging the network.
One ISP said it found out that 1% of its users were using up 30% of its bandwidth. Some will even tell you they're trying to combat illegal downloads and online piracy.
Terms such as "traffic shaping" and others are being bandied about. This is what ISPs in other countries are doing after they found out their services had been over-subscribed. But at least those foreign ISPs had to admit their infrastructure was not up to par.
Malaysian ISPs, on the other hand, are complaining about the slow adoption rate, and have conducted multi-million ringgit-marketing campaigns to boost subscription.
So despite these complaints, demand is far outstripping supply, even if the ISPs don't want to admit it. It's logical, isn't it? If your network is being under-utilised, why would you need to restrict access? Duh!
The lay of the online land has changed in the last few years. Media-rich websites are now the norm. Just check out the graphics-heavy content and advertisements popping up here and there on most of the prominent sites.
Podcasts and streaming video are no longer the exclusive domain of entertainment or lifestyle portals, but are regular features even on mainstream newspaper sites such as The Star Online.
Here is the truth of the matter: Broadband Internet access is no longer a luxury; it's fast becoming the default.
No surprises here. We have been expecting this for years now. For more than a decade, our leaders have been talking about information and communications technology (ICT), particularly computer use and the Internet, and its importance in meeting strategic national initiatives.
We were among the first countries in the world to come out with legislation that addressed the convergence of various ICTs. We foresaw the impact this was going to have on industries and societies locally and across the globe.
It's hard to reconcile all that energy and vision with the reality today, where we can boast of having a higher broadband penetration rate than, say, Greece.
As at last June, our broadband penetration rate was 2.5% of the population and 9.1% of households. Singapore's household broadband penetration was 57.4%, South Korea's was 85.1%.
Sure, it's different with those countries. We can't compete with them. That's not the point. The fact is, we can't even meet our own objectives, as laid out in the Malaysian Information, Communications and Multimedia Services 886 strategy.
The national plan, with the ungainly acronym MyICMS 886, aims for 2.8 million household subscribers or a 50% broadband penetration rate by 2008 (that's just next year) and a 75% penetration rate by 2010.
No, stop laughing. It's true. It's even achievable, assuming we don't throttle our own aspirations with, I don't know, services such as choked broadband, restricted unlimited access and, my all-time favourite, only-sometimes always-on access.
Malaysia was there at the forefront of this wave. Now, we're lagging. We've had the legislation, the pent-up consumer demand and the various national initiatives for some time now. The people are ready and the Government has done enough.
At the risk of committing the cardinal writing sin of mixing metaphors, it's now time for the ISPs to step up to the plate and tell us they're with the programme.
by,
A. Asohan
The Star
Automobile manufacturers, particularly the sports car guys, have announced they will build into their vehicles devices to lower their maximum speeds.
You can imagine a Ferrari salesman's pitch going something like this: "Datuk, this baby's got a 400-horsepower, 12-cylinder engine that'll take you from 0 to 140kph in five seconds!
"Oh, but don't worry, we're restricting its speed to 60kph ... don't want you driving too fast now, do we?"
I know what you're thinking. A stupid idea, right? Who would want to sell a sports car with deliberately built-in speed limits? More importantly, who would even want to buy one?
Yet a similar scenario is playing itself out in Malaysian cyberspace. After years of under-achievement in our national broadband aspirations, the network service providers are taking a couple of steps back.
Cognitive dissonance territory here, or as my kids would put it, "Duh!"
Maxis did it first when it rolled out its wireless broadband service last year. Under the "Terms and Conditions" of usage, it had this little gem: "Maxis may, at its sole discretion, automatically disconnect the customer's Internet session after a period of inactivity, which may vary from 20 minutes to 30 minutes."
And if that's not all, here's the clincher: "Each customer's total usage per month shall NOT exceed 3GB of data volume transmitted ..."
Now rumours have been flying that the country's No 1 Internet service provider (ISP) TM Net is proposing to do something similar with its Streamyx broadband service.
So, you have these great big pipes and you can sign up for one of those unlimited, always-on packages.
But you're not going to get those big pipes, and you'll find that the word "unlimited" has an alternate definition in ISP-speak. Always on? Well, except for those times they choose to close some ports and cut you off, that is.
That's right, more speed bumps on the information superhighway.
The ISPs have their reasons, of course. Foremost among them is network optimisation, or making the best of what you've got. They'll tell you they don't want a few hardcore users hogging the network.
One ISP said it found out that 1% of its users were using up 30% of its bandwidth. Some will even tell you they're trying to combat illegal downloads and online piracy.
Terms such as "traffic shaping" and others are being bandied about. This is what ISPs in other countries are doing after they found out their services had been over-subscribed. But at least those foreign ISPs had to admit their infrastructure was not up to par.
Malaysian ISPs, on the other hand, are complaining about the slow adoption rate, and have conducted multi-million ringgit-marketing campaigns to boost subscription.
So despite these complaints, demand is far outstripping supply, even if the ISPs don't want to admit it. It's logical, isn't it? If your network is being under-utilised, why would you need to restrict access? Duh!
The lay of the online land has changed in the last few years. Media-rich websites are now the norm. Just check out the graphics-heavy content and advertisements popping up here and there on most of the prominent sites.
Podcasts and streaming video are no longer the exclusive domain of entertainment or lifestyle portals, but are regular features even on mainstream newspaper sites such as The Star Online.
Here is the truth of the matter: Broadband Internet access is no longer a luxury; it's fast becoming the default.
No surprises here. We have been expecting this for years now. For more than a decade, our leaders have been talking about information and communications technology (ICT), particularly computer use and the Internet, and its importance in meeting strategic national initiatives.
We were among the first countries in the world to come out with legislation that addressed the convergence of various ICTs. We foresaw the impact this was going to have on industries and societies locally and across the globe.
It's hard to reconcile all that energy and vision with the reality today, where we can boast of having a higher broadband penetration rate than, say, Greece.
As at last June, our broadband penetration rate was 2.5% of the population and 9.1% of households. Singapore's household broadband penetration was 57.4%, South Korea's was 85.1%.
Sure, it's different with those countries. We can't compete with them. That's not the point. The fact is, we can't even meet our own objectives, as laid out in the Malaysian Information, Communications and Multimedia Services 886 strategy.
The national plan, with the ungainly acronym MyICMS 886, aims for 2.8 million household subscribers or a 50% broadband penetration rate by 2008 (that's just next year) and a 75% penetration rate by 2010.
No, stop laughing. It's true. It's even achievable, assuming we don't throttle our own aspirations with, I don't know, services such as choked broadband, restricted unlimited access and, my all-time favourite, only-sometimes always-on access.
Malaysia was there at the forefront of this wave. Now, we're lagging. We've had the legislation, the pent-up consumer demand and the various national initiatives for some time now. The people are ready and the Government has done enough.
At the risk of committing the cardinal writing sin of mixing metaphors, it's now time for the ISPs to step up to the plate and tell us they're with the programme.
by,
A. Asohan
The Star
Tuesday, 6 February 2007
Lies and Half Truth
It's damn funny to think that we have spent so much money promoting the Visit Malaysia 2007 campaign all over the country and the world (noticeably Old Trafford, Manchester)
Yet we have things like this still running around our cities. Unchecked, unmaintained,
Blowing thick hellish clouds of death, blocking view, shortening lives. Dirty beaches with deadly box jellyfishes floating on our shores. Not to mention the Penang Air Port runway track incident (with tones of International flights delayed) that requires a relay -- even though they had just laid a new track few weeks back -- because our beloved CM said it was too bumpy. Which is true, good call Mr. CM, but why was it so messed up the first time? Like my boss said, "A preview to Penang's road condition?"
Possibly.
Our island is getting more and more polluted and nobody is doing anything about it. In retrospect, they're building more houses, more this more that. MOREMOREMORE. Why do we even need that many housing projects? Do we even have that many people? There goes the beautiful hill blanketed by lush greens, there goes the beige beach sands and formerly turquoise sea water. It's now green and smells funny. Not to mention we severely lack an infrastructure for public transport, apart from the dark cloud of exhaust fumes we call a bus mini.
But it's not all doomed and gloomed. We still have good food. Some still cheap. A handful of places where it is still beautiful. But I guess what was once prominent is now inner-beauty.Crying shame.
We need to do something. Serious.
"Meng ah, you're good with videos and all right?" in his usual loud mouth style, Roby asked.
"OK only lah, why?" I ask. Not knowing what to expect, really.
"Want to make a video about Penang ah?" he suggests and also citing that, "It's gonna be damn political 'cos it about the Visit Malaysia '07 campaign and the reality of it," 'cos obviously, they had not prepared the country for it.
If you need to know, I turned it down. Because it's Roby. OK, not only that. I feel it's absolutely redundant. 'Cos I've tried it before in the past. With photographs.
Which was ignored. Not surprising.
Even my former college tried, with their MPPP campaign to bring back to shine.
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