Shanghai

I'm now in Shanghai and the Great Firewall of China pretty much blocks access to Blogspot.com. It's the first time today in a month that I can reach Blogger.com, so I'm taking this opportunity to edit the titles of a couple of articles that I posted using PowerBlog.

Due to these access problems, I have set up a Forum/Blog at http://www.cabspace.com/forums/index.php?mforum=sadisfied.
My most updated thoughts/articles will be on there.

UnCreative 3

Well I'm on Page 3 of today's paper and it's already worth my 80 cents. Apparently Apple has hit back at UnCreative with a retaliatory lawsuit.

Extract from the paper:
Apple's counterstrike also appeared to have caught money-losing Creative off-guard.

Nothing really surprising there. UnCreative obviously doesn't plan ahead.
Let's bring them down, Apple!

UnCreative 2

Came across this nice article on Yahoo saying how the Apple suit is seen hurting Creative in long run. An extract:

"The lawsuit will be a long process, and even if they win, any damages awarded will be a one-off gain. This does not change Creative's business fundamentals and the fact that there is nothing much to look forward to on the operations front."

Kim Eng Securities analyst Gregory Yap said Apple was unlikely to give up its lucrative iPod business without a long, expensive fight -- time and money that loss-making Creative cannot afford to waste.

"Creative's suit against Apple may bring relief to the share price in the short term, but in the long term, it will distract and divert management attention and company resources when both are needed to turn around the ailing business," he said.

Earlier this month, Creative swung to a larger-than-expected quarterly net loss of $114.3 million in its fiscal third quarter ended March, compared with a $15.9 million profit a year ago, after a plunge in music player prices squeezed margins and forced it to write down its inventory.

Let's hope this whole thing hastens the demise of UnCreative.

UnCreative

Extract from an article in the Straits Times today:

SINGAPORE'S Creative Technology has taken its fight with its rival Apple Computer over the MP3 music player market to a new level - by seeking a legal ban on Apple's sale of its best-selling iPod in the United States.

Creative, whose line of Zen MP3 players remains a distant No. 2 in the vital US market, and elsewhere, has taken twin-pronged legal action against Apple in the US.

On Monday, it filed a complaint with the US International Trade Commission, claiming Apple's iPods breached a patent it holds over a technology used in iPods. It has also filed a lawsuit in California against the US giant on similar grounds, seeking financial damages, along with a halt to US iPod sales.

The move could give Creative a chance to reverse its fortunes, observers said yesterday, if the court bars Apple from selling iPods, which account for about three in four MP3 players sold in the US. But legal experts say the more probable pay-off Creative can hope for is damages.

Creative Technology should change its name to Uncreative Technology. Their products are no longer innovative, they started up in the MP3 player business but yet got caught by Apple, Samsung and so many others.

They can no longer compete - just have a look at the 50 colours or so that Creative's MP3 players come in these days. This means they have pretty much given up on trying to figure out what the customers might want. Instead they just dump their players in every single colour in their palette in the hopes that someone somewhere will find them to their fancy.

The only reason they still sell any MP3 players these days is that their prices are among the lowest. And even in that category, we now have brands like Le-Mon and others cutting in on their share.

And now, in order to salvage some $$, they are reduced to filing stupid little lawsuits like this one. Apple should sue UnCreative back for trying to copy the sleekness of its iPod players in their Zen range.

UnCreative should just cut its losses and get out of the MP3 player business.

Bad Parents Being Stupid

Came across this article on Yahoo News.



This type of thing really pisses me off. Bad parents trying to shift the blame to some other party for their own bloody failures. Who let the kid play 36 hours straight, huh? It sure wasn't the Warcraft distributor.

In a country where you're only allowed to have 1 kid, you'd think they'd pay a bit more attention to his/her welfare.

And why does the suit say this thing about the warning that the game is suitable only for players above age 13? 13-year-olds are above age 13!!

Highbury, 1913-2006

Come on Thierry, stay at Arsenal!

ST's Top Story

Found this "Top Story" picture on the Straits Times homepage.


Lucky they have this small caption to help us out. Otherwise I would have thought Khaw Boon Wan was shaking hands with yet another PAP candidate.

And how about that guy in the middle showing us all his teeth eh? Happy that the vendor's arm was hiding his fat belly? Feeling the pleasure of his right boob in front of everyone?

Good thing tomorrow's Polling Day and we'll soon be rid of all this election non-sense.


Anyway, for this to be considered a top story, I guess nothing is happening in the world today. Has the massacre in Darfur stopped? Nope, BBC's homepage brings us back to reality.


All about keeping the priorities straight eh ST? But I will also give them pops. After refreshing the ST homepage, I got to see this.


Happy Coronation Anniversary, Your Highness.

Wishful Thinking

Here's hoping MI3 bombs and puts a long-overdue end to that short arrogant bastard's career. Won't mention his name cos I don't want to dirty my blog with this type of filth. I won't ever understand how the American people keep supporting this gay's career and yet let the careers of so many other deserving stars peter out.


Also came across this rather funny article on Yahoo Music.

Nick Lachey may be single and looking, but he's not giving starlet Lindsay Lohan so much as a passing glance.

According to claims made by the World Entertainment News Network, Lohan has always had a crush on Lachey, and now that he is back on the market, she is hoping to act on her feelings. However, Lachey made it clear in a recent radio interview that he is not at all interested.

This past Monday, the ex-Newlywed appeared on The Ace & TJ morning radio show to promote his new post-Jessica album What's Left Of Me, which comes out next week. When he was asked if there was any chance he would hook up with Lindsay, he quickly made his feelings (or lack thereof) known by replying, "I can safely say that I don't have any interest in Lindsay Lohan...nor do I understand anyone else that does."

Guess he can't handle a repeat of his situation with Jessica Simpson, i.e. the girl earning more and being more popular than him ... :)

Singapore Car Drivers

Singapore car drivers have got to be among the very worst in the world. Sure they may not honk as much as the drivers in China but they are worse due to their selfishness and their lack of courtesy. Sure the Singapore roads are not nearly as congested as Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok but that's in no way thanks to the drivers.

It's pretty easy to see. They will never ever allow someone else into their lanes even when it's much easier to do so. They'd rather squeeze past the other car and possibly risk an accident than to do the right thing.

They might think this makes them weak and it hurts their egos. Or maybe they think that paying the COE entitles them to be the kings of the road - but guess what? all other car drivers in Singapore have paid the COE too. Watch them in action on the rare roads with two-way traffic or in the HDB carparks and you will see the king-of-the-road attitude again.

It's not like the roads in Singapore are very congested, a simple act of courtesy along their way home would cost them 5 seconds at the most but yet it's not done.

I have been to Bangkok where the jams are world famous and even in all this mayhem, you can see drivers allowing others to switch to their lanes without a fuss or a honk. Which leads me to the conclusion that it's got everything to do with the people's mentality.

Singaporeans need humility. It's too bad the only way they can understand this is when they get involved in accidents, get mugged in Malaysia or when there's a tragedy happening.

Singapore-Malaysia

Singapore's persistent refusal to allow a new Causeway bridge to be built harms relations with Malaysia than it helps. And in the meantime, all of us people who like to have a little getaway in JB or other parts of Malaysia suffer.

Nice to see that whatever Singapore does to Malaysia, Australia does to Singapore. Singapore Airlines isn't getting those rights to fly between Australia and the US anytime soon.

Singapore Opposition, read this

Today's Straits Times reports that the PM asked the three opposition groupings the below questions. All very serious issues which he felt the opposition was evading.

1. How will you keep this economy strong and competitive?
2. How will you keep this country safe from terrorists?
3. How will you manage difficult relations with our nearest neighbours and work for win-win cooperative relations?

Well the easy answer and my gift to the opposition is: keep the same experts/consultants Singapore currently has and hire more if needed. I don't think the Ministers do everything all by themselves, surely they must have expert helpers on all these issues. Although I wouldn't call the Singapore-Malaysia relations anything remotely cooperative.

Anyway, back to this little article in the Straits Times, the opposition parties are most probably not even touching these serious issues because they know they haven't got a sniff at getting elected into government. Better stick to the local/regional issues such as lift upgrading and the like.

Singaporeans 'stupid'

The below is an article titled ‘Stupid’ remarks stir up hornet’s nest by Seah Chiang Nee published in the SundayStar of Malaysia on 23 April 2006. I came by it while I was in KL on holiday for a few days.

SINGAPOREANS are affluent, educated, but are they really survival smart?

In a world of harsher living, this question that never dies has again grabbed the public focus here with a general election less than two weeks away.

At the core of the debate: Without natural resources, the Singaporean increasingly has to depend on his own guile, not only a good education, to survive; has he got it?

It’s not a new debate. In the past decade, the Education Ministry has changed the education system to teach independent thinking and entrepreneurship to correct some fundamental defects in the average worker.

The average Singaporean is good at academic studies and works hard, but falls short on individual initiative and streetwise qualities, relying too much on the government for help.

Revisiting the debate is controversial Taiwan lawmaker Li Ao, who recently ranked Singaporeans rather lower in natural intelligence to the people in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

“Taiwanese are scoundrels, but lovable, Hong Kong people are craftier, (Chinese mainlanders are unfathomable) and Singaporeans are stupider,” he said, adding that it is partially due to genetics. The original migrants who came here from China were of “poor stock”.

Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew once told Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping that the ethnic Chinese in Singapore were descendants of illiterate coolies and farmers from southern Fujian.

This had made them less able than the people of Hong Kong or Taiwan, whose ancestors were mainly businessman or technocrats.

Singaporeans could function well only as a group, not as individuals, Li told a Chinese newspaper. They would never be non-conformist or stand out above the crowd.

“If you ask me, other than Lee Kuan Yew, his son Hsien Loong, politicians aside, I can only think of a cute girl, (pop star) Stephanie Sun, there aren’t many other outstanding people. The impression that I get (of normal Singaporeans) is stupid”.

Singapore’s system, Li said, stemmed from the ancient Chinese political philosophy of legalism, which emphasised on the rule of law.

“Singaporeans do not break rules, but they also do not stand out,” he said in Mandarin.

He said Lee Kuan Yew had wanted to build a British-style democracy but because the people were not up to scratch, they only knew how to toe the line.

His report card on Singapore has shaken up the people at a time when election fever is rising, indirectly touching on a campaign issue – government control on society.

Predictably, Singaporeans have reacted angrily to the terms “stupid” and “poor genes”, dismissing them as a popularity stunt that takes no account of their successful, modern achievements. This “genetic weakness” doesn’t aptly describe today’s diverse, more mature and worldly-wise generation.

But some critics say there is some truth in what Li said, but insist that the fault lies not in genes, but in years of political and social conditioning by a top-down government.

One writer however, said: “A better word to describe the Singaporean is naïve, which comes about because of a paternalistic and rather efficient government. Everything is so structured and laid-out that the people do not need to fight for a living, blunting their ability to compete. They’re lulled into thinking the outside world also behave like Singapore.”

Businessmen from Taiwan and Hong Kong are more alert to opportunities, as well as cheats, compared to even the capable Singaporeans, whose preoccupation is getting a high salary.

They know where to take the short cuts when faced with a problem; Singaporeans will just sit and wait for better days.

Under the Lee Kuan Yew leadership, the collective good comes before the individual, so the republic’s success is a “collective creation”, Li added.

The individual is often lost on his own. It has led some critics to ask whether the Singaporean has an original viewpoint of his own beyond what the government says.

“I won’t say we are stupid. We are just not daring and street-smart,” commented a Singaporean studying abroad. In his university, other Asian students would walk up to the microphone and talk about some cause, not the Singaporeans, he said.

Li Ao is not alone in his views. Singaporean columnist Wong Lung Hsiang said it reflected what he heard in China that “Taiwanese are shameless, Hong Kongers are heartless, Singaporeans are ignorant”.

In Greater China, law-abiding Singaporeans have long been seen as gullible.

In a commentary in November last year, Wong advised Singaporeans to treasure their own system at home, “but when you are away, you should know how to adapt to others”.

What Chinese Singaporeans have inherited from their grandparents is peasant culture, explained “peasant judge” online.

“Peasants don’t care for much else except a bowl of rice on the table, a roof over their heads, and the chance to go out to the rice fields to do the daily back-breaking chores day in day out.”

Politics, too, is affected. Almost everyone goes to the polls with his rice-bowl in mind.

It occupies the citizen’s mind a lot more than his counterparts in other countries, who are more passionate about issues like justice and equality.

“Just imagine, well-informed Singaporeans advocating a one-party rule, saying it is good for the future. If this is not stupidity, what is?’ asked redbean.

This could be a recipe for future trouble should a foreign predator one day use this character weakness to take over the country.

All he needs to do to retain the people’s compliance is by keeping their stomach full and their mind empty.

Skype Me

Have finally discovered the wonders of Skype. Hit me up! :)

Stupid Thai Opposition

The Thai opposition hasn't got anything properly planned out and are selfish morons. They accuse Thaksin of letting the interests of his family business interfere with his job as PM. After he sells off the family business, they accuse him of corruption and abuse of power so his family saved on taxes during the deal. Everyone forgets they had put him in power exactly because of his CEO style.

Then they want him to resign and whine their hearts out week in week out, even after Thaksin has given them the elections they so wanted. Somehow, 1 month is not enough for the opposition to prepare for elections. They had been whinging for the PM to resign and surely they must have known that there'd be elections if he resigned, but yet didn't prepare for them at all.

And when he finally resigns, some genius in the opposition camp finally came up with the idea that hey Thaksin could still pull strings behind the scenes. So now they come out and say they want him to get out of politics.

So now even more mayhem will follow. Throughout this political crisis, the opposition have clearly shown that they are very lacking in planning and that they are opportunists much more interested in their own selfish little gains than in how their country is going (no problems at all for them if anybody gets injured or killed during the demonstrations, or if the country's image takes a beating internationally or even if the main shopping belt in Bangkok comes to a standstill). Which doesn't bode well at all for if any of them ever get into government ...
But I can't wait for when all this is over and the various parties of the opposition start biting at each other.

And I don't understand why the people in Bangkok were so eager to support the opposition in their rallies.
>> Did the opposition leaders spend every night together with the Thai people camping out in front of Thaksin's office or Siam Paragon? Probably not.
>> Do the Bangkok people really think their lives will be so much better with somebody else in office?
>>If the lives of the people in Bangkok are really so unbearable, then how come most of the Thai people everywhere else support Thaksin? Surely the Thai people in the other cities earn less money.

CRASH wins

Big, big congrats to Crash for upsetting Brokeback Mountain and winning Best Picture at the 78th Academy Awards held on 5 March 2006.

Xmas in Singapore

Some pics that I had taken with my mobile phone during Xmas time ... just bumped into them while I was doing some cleanup on my Powerbook.

Desaru

Some pics of the Pulai Desaru Beach Hotel and the beach there. Drove there and stayed for 1 night in early February, had a great time.

A New Beginning

Near the middle of The Rule Of Four by Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason. My dad sent me this book through a cousin who was visiting Malaysia and Singapore. The book was a little slow to get going but right now, it's moving along quite nicely.

And I am celebrating today, 23 Feb 2006, because I am officially done with the company I have been working with since Nov 1999. Had some great times there and met some nice people, but there's been more than a fair share of incompetent morons too - the current head of my old department is a prime example.

One thing that company showed me is that people don't need to be competent to do well ... as long as they're kissing the right ass, as long as they're laughing hard enough at the jokes of those above them, as long as they buy a daily cup of coffee for the right person. Those fakers poison the company and nobody else finds them good except the people whose asses are being smooched. Over the years I have tried to ignore the fakers but never really succeeded at it - there's just too many of them.

Anyway, enough of the idiots. Freedom, here I come!!

And speaking of freedom, I am going on a trip to Chiang Mai tomorrow and will stay at the Tamarind Village.

Bring on the fun babyyyyyyyyy ...