WordPress.com has served me well over the past year. I’ve received much more readers than I did with my old blogger blog. Now with the Chinese New Year, and with my 10000th visitor/hit, its time for a new start again. I’ve moved on to my own domain: fusedthought.com

I’ll be leaving the blog posts here untouched as I don’t want to spoil the permanent links. However, I did move the essays over to the new blog. I’ve linked each essay here to its respective new URLs. I would have loved to do a redirect, making it easier for readers, but that’s not possible here.

Please update your bookmarks as well as the RSS / Feed subscriptions in Google Reader or other RSS readers with the new RSS listed below.

New Blog: http://fusedthought.com/en/blog

New RSS / Feed: http://feedproxy.google.com/FusedthoughtStudio

Buying a domain entails more work than it seems.

I bought “fusedthought.com” in the morning, and, after half a days work, I finally manage to get my domain up and running..

Here’s a rundown:

• The buying part was easy. It’s just a matter of giving your payment details and choosing your domain.
• Waiting for domain propagation was agonizing… A little waste of time. Thankfully, I still had my site to do..
• The DNS setting was painful. My registrar limits the number of records. So I had to find another free DNS service to use with less restrictions. After 3 switches, it was up.
• It was quite a breeze to set up Google Apps for Domains.  Now my email is contact[at]fusedthought.com

I’ll be moving all the essays and portfolio over once its done. My blog will be moving there also…

*shudders at the thought of all the permanent link redirection and updates…*

For now, back to work on my site…

Yay!

Fast food chain Burger King seems to think people will. In their recently launched Facebook application aptly named “WHOPPER Sacrifice“, you get a free WHOPPER if you delete 10 friends.

As of 11.30am (GMT+8), the counter on the “whopper sacrifice” shows that a whopping (pun intended) 96421 friends have been sacrifice, bringing a total of 9642 whoppers issued. Quite a huge number considering that the people you sacrifice will be published on your news feed. Judging from the number of people sacrificed, it seems that this is not a major concern. Neither are people concerned with what the person being deleted might think.. It is definitely a weird thought that you’re sacrificed for a burger…

Seeing that most Facebook users have quite  a number of people who they don’t know on real life, only their online profiles, I guess sacrificing some may not seem like a very big deal. Well, I guess you can always add those people you deleted again.

So, would you do it?

It is 5 days after the New Year and 2009 have descended upon us…. Most school going students would have gone back behind the gates, while college students will be doing so soon.

For me, the past year has been a slightly monotonous one, with certain blips in both directions to the otherwise straight line on the monitor. With conscription being my full time job now, I don’t really have much exciting things to share about or am allowed to share about  as compared when I was in school or work… This is probably why I missed school so much.

But I do have to give thanks for all the eventful times I have with my bro and the clique… Thank you all for having me.

I wanted to put a collage here but I don’t seem to have enough photos… Still scouting around my archives…

On the side note, as I hit the “big” 2s in this coming birthday, I think I’ll get myself a domain name as a present to myself….

Anyway, here’s wishing everyone out there a Good Year ahead!!! Cheers.

As of now, I am officially miffed. My Internet Security software is going to expire soon and I can’t seem to activate the new subscription.

As these companies protect their interest more, they seem to complicate the registration issues. Currently trying to find a free solution, but these free solutions seem to fall short in certain ways… Probably I can’t expect much, but for someone going to spend online for a while, a review that says the firewall lets in browser based attacks isn’t very assuring…

I will probably post my final choice sometime, but need to do serious consideration now…

According to BBC News, UK was considering giving websites ratings as what countries would do to movies. It is to ensure that Children would be protected from content that is deemed undesirable for them. In the report, UK Culture Secretary Andy Burnham said that “clearer signposting” is required for the “confusing (online) world”.

The move is definitely a pertinent one. Many could see it happening in the near future. In fact, I think no one expects the internet content to go relatively unregulated for long. In fact, I am sure that many other countries are considering the same kind of measures. The only limiting factor is the implementation and its reception.

I really wonder how effective such a implementation would be. The most a site can do would be to display the rating prominently on their sites. After that, whether or not the person acknowledges the rating is a whole different matter. In fact, there may be reverse psychology invovled (as in movie ratings), where the young, seeing a rating which advices them not to enter would be more likely to enter the website.

Furthermore, it is hard for a single country to get jurisdiction on any website that is hosted in servers out of its own soil… A solution to that would be to implement a ISP level proxy filtering for sites that are not conforming to their rating systems or modify the websites by adding the ratings before serving up the pages. I am sure many would provide a leeway for this without protesting or using the old “deprivation of human choice/rights” argument against this…

I think ultimately, the best move would be develop something like a plug-in for web browsers, leaving the choice of whether to be filtered to the end users.

To everyone out there, today is the day for festivities and celebrations!

A Very Merry and Joyous Christmas to all

God bless you’all. =)

Cheers!

It was with much anticipation that I went to watch “Twilight” in the cinemas and I left it with very mixed feelings.

Twilight Movie Poster

A little background: Based on the wildly popular book series written by Stephanie Meyer,  Twilight is a tale about the forbidden romance between a mortal (Bella Swan) and a Vampire (Edward Cullen).  When Bella’s mother remarries, she moves to Forks to live with her father. Attending the school there, she meets Edward and his family who have a foreboding presence and are all too gorgeous to be true. Bella finds herself wondering why he has a seemingly immediate disdain for her, and this curiosity eventually leads to her falling “unreservedly” and “irrevocably” in love with him.

In the movie: Starring Kristen Stewart (as Bella Swan) and Robert Pattinson (as Edward Cullen) doesn’t really deviate much from the book which would statisfy fans of the book series. Both Stewart and Pattinson are not new faces to the movie scene, with Stewart having starred in the “Panic Room” (2002) as Sarah Altman and Pattinson having starred in “Harry Potter” movies as Cedric Diggory.

While the overall result of the movie may satisfy extremely devoted fans, I feel disappointed in how the show played out especially when compared to the book. Though I understand the need for cuts from the book to fit into the budget and time constraints of a movie, the way this movie was set, the mood and the choice of cuts to the plot really made the it lose the appeal that the book have.  Thus, the movie may do little in getting more people interested in the book.

Much of my displeasure seems to stem from the fact that the movie has been too hyped about, especially after the success of the book. Moreover, the way the book was written made the characters  (like the Cullens) too perfect, which made it hard to actually get perfect real life characters. Moreover, character portrayal was somewhat inconsistent with the book, with Bella seemingly more confident than Edward (and sometimes paler than him).

Though I am displeased with this movie (and really hoping that the follow-up: “New Moon” would be better…), the local newspapers here have reported that there are some fans who actually watched the show more than once, with one girl watching it 10 times in two different countries. So, I can’t really say it was totally bad…

Overall Notes:

The good…

• Carlisle was shown as expected
• Charlie acted his part and actually gave a refreshing touch to the movie.
• James acted his part
• Alice was gorgeous
• Screenplay was good for such a small budget.
• The ending of the movie was a saving feature for the movie as it closed the first part of this Twilight series quite well, though it would be better if Bella threw as big as a fit as in the book. She seemed quite agreeable to Prom compared to the book.

and the Bad…

• Plot progression was OK at best.
• Didn’t like the lighting in certain scenes.
• hmm.. I thought Jessica Stanley has lots of question for Bella after seeing her and Edward together after Prom shopping?
• At Bella’s house, Edward seems more furious than restrained, especially at Bella’s reaction to the kiss.
• There were moments where Edward asks questions out loud which should have been answered by his mind reading.
• Edward in the sun (and in fact, any of the Cullens) was suppose to be spectacular.. But the movie was not even close. It only showed him glittering (like he had dipped himself in glitters).
• On screen chemistry between Edward and Bella wasn’t as profound as in the book. Though this point has to be overlooked somewhat as we can’t really expect a total replication of feelings from the book.
• Supporting characters like Angela and Jessica didn’t really get enough screen time, though that can be overlooked also due to movie constrains.

The above only represents my view. In fact, the only few things my friend and I could agree on was that the casting of Ashley Greene (as Alice Cullen) and Peter Facinelli (as Carlisle Cullen) was 2 things that the movie got right.

(This post was updated on 23/12/08)

Was just having my daily dose of Google Reader… Took longer than usual to clear my feed items today… The picture shows why…

Overload

Anyway, that’s not the main point. I came across this article about “Guiltyware” on Digital Inspiration Blog. It seems to be a rather interesting concept. Instead of locking up the software, the software will accept the pirated key and tries to appeal to the user’s guilty conscience as shown in the screen shot taken off DI:

You should be ashamed

This approach is definitely more subtle in nature and may even be more effective… it can be likened to talking to a child/person as to why they have done wrong rather than scolding them. However, the true effectiveness of such an approach is too dependent on the person sitting in front of the computer screen… In my opinion, if the software developer, by doing that, is able to convert a “hand-countable” number of people from pirates to full-payers, then this approach of appealing to the pirate’s “guilt” can be considered as successful, especially if you consider that these were already “lost sales”. Kudos to the developer.

I read this CNET article stating that web site-based crimeware is hitting all-time high.. I must add that I am definitely not surprise by this development.

An excerpt from the article:

“The number of URLs with hidden code for stealing passwords nearly tripled between July 2007 and July 2008, to a record high of 9,529, while the number of malicious-application variants hit a high of 442 this May, the APWG reports in its quarterly report (PDF) issued this week.”

With the current generation all internet connected and the older generation starting to move online, with more seeing it as an avenue to connect, it is not surprising that the percentage of crimeware would increase.

As population increases, I a proportional increase in the number of online crime would be expected. However, I think that this does not mean that more people are turning to crime, rather, the increase in online population is an incentive for current perpetrators of online crime to become more active. With more people online, the chances of having someone fall prey to them would increase. Furthermore, according to the CNET article, the current recession is also making things worse…

So what should we do? I guess the usual “do not be click happy with our mouse” applies as well as always. With online applications become more sophisticated, direct attacks (some of which are quite simple in methods) like SQL injections would become increasingly common.

In the end, I guess our best option is to hope that developers test out their applications thoroughly enough, and trust our own intuition when it comes to submitting information online…

In this age where online space and computer space are relatively easy to come by, many fail to see the need to clean up the access files. Sometimes, our habits from our virtual life “overflow” to our real, physical life, resulting in a very messy physical desk space.

I too, fall prey to such untidiness sometimes. Weirdly enough, I think my Windows desktop (screenshot) is more organized than my physical desktop (no pictures here). It’s much simpler to clear your virtual clutter compared to real life. You could just drag your unwanted files in your virtual desk space to the “Recycle Bin” (with a click of the mouse), as compared to the real world, where physical work is needed to compile, bag and dispose your stuff at a common bin somewhere outside your house. Sigh… I guess these are nothing but mere excuses. Just for the record, I do clear up my physical desk space once every two months while my virtual desktop about once to twice a month.

On that note, I wanted to highlight the following montage, which consist of photos taken from a BBC News “picture showcase” on chaotic work spaces…

Cluttered Desktop Collage (Original Images from BBC News Website)

Looking at those pictures, I really wonder how they manage to work with that kind of environment. I can honestly say that though I am not an extremely tidy freak, I definitely would not reach that degree of cluttered-ness. I would lose my sanity working through that….

Reading the write-up on each of the pictures, one common factor among all of them is the lack of  “Time”. Needing more time is definitely an issue every one of us have to grapple with. In certain occasions, I do wish that I would have more time… But, its my opinion that, the act of wishing for more time is actually a sign that my time management needs more work…

What do you think?

[via BBC News]

Adding a task management list is definitely one of the most requested feature of Google Mail.

Up till now, users have had to resort to workarounds like emailing themselves with  “+notes” attached to the end of their user name, setting filters and labels, or using third party applications like Remember the Milk for task management integration. Thus,  the introduction of a “Tasks” in Gmail Labs is a much awaited news for many.

However, its worth a note that the new lab feature is far from a full featured task management service, YET. As quoted from the Official Gmail Blog its a

“lightweight way to keep track of what you need to do, right from within Gmail.”

Therefore, it would probably be more suitable for people with simpler task management needs. I am sure that, by the time its fully released from labs, it would be featuring more functions like sync options or integration with Google Calendar. With that said, I must add that Tasks in Gmail is still in development and has no guaranteed release. However, I am quite sure that this feature has a high chance of reaching release status due to its popularity. For now, if there is any feature you think may improve the service, users can suggest it at Gmail’s Task listing in Google Groups.

One of the features of this new lab feature is the conversion of email to tasks: select one or more messages and go to “More Actions” and then “Add to Tasks” (Or turn on keyboard shortcuts and use + t). The interface feels a lot like Gmail’s Chat feature, allowing you to “pop-in” or “pop-out” when needed.

Check out the Official Gmail Blog for screen-shots, or try it out by enabling “Tasks” in the  “Labs” tab of the “Settings” page in Gmail.

[via Official Gmail Blog]

Google Reader Minimalist Interface

The change in interface at Google Reader came as a shock unlike the WordPress upgrade. Unlike the hype that has been built around the new wordpress interface among developers, the Google Reader interface change was somewhat a quite affair.

The new look, like WordPress 2.7, focuses on a much more cleaner and minimalistic look, and in doing so, ” make Reader act and feel more speedy and responsive”. The navigation is now customizable, taking on igoogle’s widget like behavior, allowing the user to minimize it to take up less space. Moreover, navigation is also now separated into three “widget like sections: “All items”, Friends’ shared items” and “Subscriptions”.

For those of us who subscribe to news feeds and thus have unread counts which can rocket to 1000+ just after a day, it is now possible to turn off the unread count. This is really great as I am sure it would cause less stress not to know the number of unread entries… As for me, I think that disabling unread count would prevent me from going into a fit every time I come back to my computer and  Google Reader after a few days’ (and sometimes up to 10 days) hiatus from civilization and internet..

Another change which is none-interface related is the creation of  RSS “bundles” which users can subscribe to. According to the Google Reader blog:

“…. Feed bundles are small sets of feeds related to a topic that you can subscribe to all at once. Historically, these were done “by hand” by the Reader team, but this just wasn’t working out. So we’ve written a program to make “bundles” for us – no more manual editing of bundles, and a much richer and interesting set of subscriptions for you to choose from….”

However, I really wonder how the program does the selection. Maybe it selects based on the number of subscriptions are maybe the PR of the feed? It’s really hard to guess.

Anyway, though the interface change definitely made the Reader easier to read, one point  I felt that they should have done is to put the “Refresh” button from the subscription list back to its original prominent place rather than the current location which is in the Subscriptions options menu.

However, as with the WordPress upgrade,I am sure this layout may not go down to well with some people. I wonder if Google Reader will suffer a backlash similar to what iGoogle experience when Google implemented the canvas interface for iGoogle…

Overall, in my personl view, I think that both Google Reader and WordPress Teams have taken a step in the right direction in this update.

Screenshot of different WordPress Versions

Since there was an announcement 2 days ago regarding upgrade of WordPress.com blogs, there was a feeling of anticipation when I logged in to try a live roll-out of the new interface.

As with the previous major 2.5 release of WordPress, WordPress.com has rolled out the new interface before the WordPress.org release after the software. Prior to this, developers were able to run the beta release from WordPress.org.

The new layout is definitely cleaner and more pleasing to the eye. Color contrast between the background and the navigation text, something which I didn’t like in the previous layout, has thankfully been improved.

The dashboard is now customizable, with the ability to re-arrange the dashboard modules as well as hide them. The navigation is also collapsible, allowing the blogger to increase screen space when blogging.

What struck me at the dashboard was the QuickPress feature and the Recent Drafts module. Probably due to the manner which I blog, just this 2 features have already saved me quite a few clicks. That’s a god-send especially when I on most days, I am in a location (I can’t say where!) which has mutiple proxies and slower internet connections.

Another long-awaited addition worth mentioning is a file-uploader which can now be found under the “media” section. Previously, I had to go to “create a new post” in order to upload files to places like the sidebar. Having the uploader in the “media” section would save the hassle.

Its also worth mentioning that in this current iteration of wordpress, the development team has added quite a few “quick editing” features. Besides the aforementioned QuickPress feature on the dashboard, the post pages also inherited the ability to quickly edit post tags, time-stamp etc. Quite a nifty feature especially if you want to add a new tag and don’t want to load the full editor just to do it…

Other than the interface, the speed at which the admin interface loads caught my attention. The time taken for the dashboard to load definitely feels alot faster. Although I can’t back it up with real statistics here, I am quite certain on that.

Anyway, I am sure there are still many under-the-hood improvements which I haven’t seen, but I can safely say that the day-to-day blogging experience has been improved in my personal opinion. However, the changes may not have gone down well with everyone. Looking through the announcement thread, you can see a couple of people voicing their displeasure. I can only echo Matt in saying that we should give the new interface a few days and see how it goes.

As for me, I am satisfied with the improvements with the current WordPress. Thanks to the WordPress Team and Matt!

Now its just a wait for the WordPress.org version to be released so that I can continue with my web developments.

In a blink of an eye on Thursday Night, two major services which I used, underwent interface changes. The two services are: WordPress.com and Google Reader.

I took about a day (Friday) to re-orientate (for wordpress) and try out the newly designed services.

In the following 2 posts on this blog, I will be giving my personal opinion on the two updates.

Everyone who has been surfing the web for a while would most definitely have amassed a sizable amount of accounts across many websites. Many websites nowadays require you to “sign up to enjoy the full benefits” of the website.

After a while, it may actually be difficult to sort through all those newsletters that this sites tend to send. However, a relatively new service called OtherInbox may be able to solve this problem.

From their website:

“OtherInbox is the cure for email overload – it provides consumers with a free email account that automatically organizes newsletters, social networking updates, coupons and receipts from online purchases so that its easy to find the most interesting things and ignore the rest.”

It is quite an interesting concept as signing up for an account seems like creating your own sub-domain which you can have virtually unlimited email addresses. For example, if your user name is user, then you can have:

• facebook@user.otherinbox.com for your facebook account,
• youtube@user.otherinbox.com for your youtube account
• etc.

It can be argued that current email services like Google Mail have filters which can used to the same effect, it will be interesting to see how a service dedicated to such sorting would go down in the long run.

In my personal opinion, after creating my account there and using it for a while, I feel that this service really has lots of potential, especially as a first line of defense against rogue websites. One benefit of giving out different addresses to different websites that I can think of is: If you start receiving spam at a particular addresses, you can now narrow it down to which website may have leaked your information.

It has definitely earned a place in my personal list of online services to look forward to…

A week ago, there was a news article published in the New York Times on the effects of television (TV) on a person’s happiness. The article mentioned that:

“… the people who did the activities more — visiting others, going to church, all those things — were more happy… TV was the one activity that showed a negative relationship. Unhappy people did it more, and happy people did it less”

The study acknowledges that it does not conclusively show that the watching TV is the main cause unhappiness. It only shows the negative correalation. So even if you turn off your TV, it may not neccessarily make you any happier.

After doing some thinking about TV in my life, I realize that I seem to watch more TV shows when I am unhappy or bored. Rather than TV being the source of unhappiness for me, it is actually a avenue to “cool” myself off. I wonder if there are others who would use TV to the same effect though….

At this juncture, I guess most people would tell themselves the over-used line: “balance is the key”. I doubt we can go without TV. Especially since TV has gotten more “alive” with reality shows, movies and other kinds of entertainment. Moreover, TV may be the only source of news for some people who doesn’t read the newspaper much.

It would have been more helpful if the study had shown, how much TV is too much. But I think that’s another area that is hard to come up with a conclusive judgment.

Saw this comic in one of my Google Reader feeds. It was posted on All Things Digital and first published by Geek Culture’s Joy of Tech. Its a Thanksgiving parody by Nitrozac and Snaggy. I actually found it quite interesting even though it was drawn up 2 years ago… Hope its not too distasteful to some….

Thanksgiving Parody published by Geek Culture

Source: http://www.geekculture.com/joyoftech/joyarchives/1180b.html Cheers!

I guess I should deviate from my usual tech-focused posts once in a while…

It’s been a while since I have stopped keeping my blog as a personal diary of my life, opting instead to blog about things that are of interest to me or issues that I can’t seem to get off my mind… Frankly, after stopping personal posts for a while, I am now a little puzzled as to how to go about writing a post that is personal and documenting my personal life.

This change in attitude to blogging was probably due to reading too many privacy related articles and spending too much time online that it became hard to resist the instinctual urge to have my posts redacted.

Looking back to the time when I started my first blog at blogger on October 14th 2004, writing about personal feelings and thoughts, I can see the transition my posts had in terms of content. I can vaguely remember which post I had written more, but had it cut before posting. All seems well then, but after a substantial amount of posts, I began to wonder if its worth my time to write something only to have it cut. The essence of the posts seems to be lost. Furthermore, as time goes on, I began to question the rationale and the need to post it online. Shouldn’t your thoughts be kept in the good ‘ol locked diary

However, I must admit that having posts that are closer to the heart (and less in the head…) does have some perks. Reading them again (like now) really brings back memories. Its something like engraving your history on a piece of the web…

Unlike dairy pages which would oxidize over time and thus become unreadable, putting thoughts on the web is like immortalizing your thoughts as it will be kept there and not expire as long as the web exists.

Anyway, from my previous blog… 10 memorable entries for me (these aren’t necessarily the top 10 as there are a few more…)

1. Emotions: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2007/12/troubled.html
2. Losses (Family): http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2007/11/douse-of-flame.html
3. Economics: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2007/09/economical-savings.html
4. Crowding a crowded train: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2006/11/scene-from-nel.html
5. Abolish Homework!: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2006/11/news-article-abolish-homework.html
6. Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2006/09/back-to-normal-and-imcb-photos.html
7. So-called holidays: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2006/05/start-of-so-called-june-holidays.html
8. Graduation: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2005/10/153rd-anniversary-speech-graduation.html
9. Christmas ecstasy: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2005/12/haha-yea.html
10. Exam Withdrawal Syndrome: http://gyeojz.blogspot.com/2005/11/exam-withdrawal-syndrome-ews.html

Reading the aforementioned entries had me re-living the emotions and thoughts I had at the point of time — events which I seemed to have forgotten… It actually felt quite refreshing…

Although moving to this current blog on December 22nd/23rd 2008, I had limited myself with regards to the posting of personal information because of future concerns, maybe its time again to let myself a little loose and reintroduce some of the personal aspects I had in my old blog…

However, these type of personal post would most probably not appear as frequently as they do on my old blog, but I guess once in a while, its good to take the monotony out of the usual stuff.

Main Story: Most technology websites and news sites would already have announced that Facebook has recently rolled out a “verified apps program”. According to Techcrunch, the “program was first announced over the summer at their F8 Developer Conference”. From now on, Third party facebook applications will be categorized into into “Great Apps”, “Verified Apps” (trusted apps), and everything else.

So how to get in? You pay. After going through facebook’s initial vetting process, you have to pay $375 to get the verified badge… However, that’s not the end. The badge is only good for a year. In order to retain it, you pay again.. annually.

Reading the details of the program, one would no doubt have to agree that the scale is tipped very much in Facebook’s favour. There is a huge money making potential in this program, especially since many developers put many hours into developing the application.

It is still early to say whether this program will be successful as some applications are already used by so many that the developer doesn’t really need to get it verified unless FB steps in and decides to take them out till they get verification. However, if FB were to do that, it may backfire.

Over to Microsoft, the Windows Live SkyDrive Team announced that Window Live Skydrive storage limit will jump “soon” to 25GB. Furthermore, new features like, downloading of photos directly to your Windows Live Photo Gallery, downloading an entire folder in one compressed file will be made available.

For those who store lots of files online and are running out of space, I guess we’ve got one new service to store them. Coupled with Office live workspace and Live Mesh, we can comfortably store a substantial amount of our lives online (not that we aren’t already doing so… with facebook, flickr and our blogs…).

On the issue of having our lives online, the recent move by youtube may put our lives in a clearer, and sharper view. YouTube was reported to be testing a even higher resolution videos. Up till now, YouTube already provides an option to view higher quality versions for some videos and you can also append “&fmt=18″ to the URLs. However it seems that if you add “&fmt=22″, some YouTube videos are now available at an even higher quality.

Looking up the web, it is reported that the difference in quality are as follows:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEOID (standard format – mono, resolution: 320×180)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEOID&fmt=18 (stereo, resolution: 480×270)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEOID&fmt=22 (stereo, resolution: 1280×720)

The higher resolution videos aren’t available for all videos yet. But is something to look forward to for those frequent YouTube video viewers..

Cheers!

Google Mail a.k.a. Gmail has been improved under the hood far too many times to count. However, one feature often neglected is the color scheme of gmail which cannot be changed. Long time users of Gmail has created plugins in browsers like firefox to enable the theme-ing of gmail.

Up till now, I’ve been using Stylish plugin for Firefox and Cascading Style Sheets to theme my gmail. One problem with this is that it is only available on my personal computer, and the styles aren’t resistant to Gmail Code changes.

Following in the direction taken by Google;s Personalized Homepage, Google has implemented themes on Gmail also.

According to the Gmail Blog, the developers

“wanted to go beyond simple color customization, so out of the 30 odd themes we’re launching today, there’s a shiny theme with chrome styling, another one that turns your inbox into a retro notepad, nature themes that change scenery over time…”

“…We’ve also done a minor facelift to Gmail’s default look to make it crisper and cleaner — you might notice a few colors and pixels shifted around here and there.”

It is definitely a step in the right direction for the gmail theme to provide customization options for users. At least now, the theme changes aren’t limited to your own personal computer.

Maybe Gmail can now go a step further and allow users to upload a theme? However, I guess that will be a security issue.

Gmail Theme Settings

To apply the new themes, go to the Themes tab in the Settings page..

To read more about the themes, head over to Gmail’s Help Center.

Anyway, my current favourites for now are “Graffiti” and “Desk”. What are yours?

According to BBC News, the new U.S. President Elect, Barack Obama may be giving up his email during the course of his presidency as “transparency laws would open his correspondence to public view.” In fact, I was surprised that that neither Bill Clinton nor George W Bush used their email duing their presidency.

Reading that report, I wondered how things would be like to actually give up your email. This question got me thinking for quite a while…

Would I be able to do it?

My Conclusion: It is possible… Only for a short while.

I thought of a few possible scenarios after giving up email. Yes, we can stop using our emails and depend solely on new web trends like Facebook Private messages, Twitter or FriendFeed messages. Going one even further, we can create a private blog on services like WordPress.com or Blogger and get your friends to direct any messages there. WordPress.com also has a theme like the prologue theme which would be perfect for such usage.

However, if we look further into all the “solutions” I came up with, the essence of all these “solutions” is still the act of sending and recieving of messages a la email..

So, physically, you might seem to have given up on using the email, but psychologically, you did not…

At this juncture. one may start to ask about other services such as Instant Messaging (IM). However, unlike email, IM does not have the benefit of allowing the recipient to be absent at the point where the chat is being initiated. Sure, you can use offline messaging, but email is still more suited for large amount of text per message compared to IM.

Reading through this post, it seems that I am just finding reasons to hold on to my email… This may be true to a certain extent, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that it is an addiction. Rather. it is because email is just crisp and simple.

So…. What do you think?

Articles mentioned in this post:

• BBC News: Obama “could stop using e-mail”

.

Google and Microsoft has been pushing constantly into the domains of one another. Microsoft has been playing the catch up game with Google’s online services while Google is trying to use its online services to encroach into Microsoft’s desktop territory. It is an unspoken competition for users.

I.N. this week

• Microsoft Live Mesh / New Live Homepage
• Google Video Chat / Translation
• Hitwise Top 20 Websites (Oct)

In the past week, other than the much talked PDC showcase of Windows 7, which is the next version of Windows, Microsoft released Live Mesh Beta to a wider public. It aims to “Sync, share, and access the information you care about—wherever you happen to be.” It features a live desktop, a online desktop with 5Gb of space as well as a sync function across your PCs and Macs. Frankly, I haven’t tried it, but will do soon. I’m quite interested in the live desktop function especially if its faster than Ulteo.

Other than this, Microsoft has also sought to tie the Live services better, with an announced revamp of the Live Home Page. The new homepages remains one of Facebook profiles. “All Things Digital” has a more detailed writeup and screenshots on it.

On the other hand, this week, Google launched two new features. The first, is Google Video Chat within Gmail itself. I haven’t tried the new features as I am not using my own computer now, but it does have a huge potential as people are familiar with the Google Mail interface. Moreover, there isn’t a need to open up another application for video chat. Though is shouldn’t put a huge dent in Skype or similar services, but it may increase the usage of it Instant Messenging services via the Google Mail website. Here’s a video from Google’s Blog:

Other than that, Google Reader now has translation features built in. This would definitely be useful for those who prefer to read in another language. For me, it would be useful practice if I ever take up another language. What better way to practice than to read all your feeds in the language you are learning? Haha.

I believe a screenshot here would be best…

Google Reader Translation Menu

On a side note, Hitwise has released the October stats for the U.S. Top 20 Websites. Doing a comparison among the email services, it is clear that Yahoo Mail is leading (4.7%), followed by  Windows Live Mail(1.94%) and Google Mail (0.8%). This is also consistent with stats from previous month.

Email Market Share

As with all statistics, we cannot take it at face value. The stats most probably would be based only on traffic to the individual mail pages and not traffic that come from other sources like desktop email clients. The traffic via IMAP and POP3 is unaccounted for.

Only some local Yahoo Mail accounts provide POP3 access, whereas Windows Live Mail can be access via Windows Live Mail Desktop, and Google provides both IMAP and POP3 access. Furthermore, companies using Google Apps Mail accounts don’t access via normal Google Mail URL.

The statistics is definitely a good reference nonetheless.

For students, disregarding the time we spend on Social Networks, the bulk of our time online is spent on researching and doing projects, scouring the web for information. When I was a student, Google, Yahoo and Windows Live Search have  been and still are hot-keys on my keyboard. However, when searching for academic material, we are always swarmed with links to sites totally nonacademic related.

Enter RefSeek (rĕf-sēk), a new service which promotes itself as a web search engine for students and researchers. The front page of the website is reminiscent of Google’s minimalistic approach.

Refseek Frontpage

Doing a sample search, it would seem that RefSeek’s search results focuses more on Government Organizations, Education and Wikipedia sites. I did a sample search on the “World War 2″ and did find quite a few interesting articles. For example, a time-line from SparkNotes, which isn’t found on the 1st page results from Google’s, Yahoo or Windows Live Search.

However, do note that this doesn’t apply to all search queries. For example, if you are searching for latest movies, you’re better off searching on Google. RefSeek gave results to torrent sites which doesn’t do any good if you’re trying to find out more about the movies… So those taking theater studies looking for maybe 70’s movie write-ups or related articles may be disappointed with RefSeek.

As always, I think its still best to run your search through all the usual search engines when doing any kind of research due to different search algorithms the search engines employ. Its still probably worth to keep RefSeek on your arsenal of search engines.

There is a interesting service from Hewlett-Packard which emails you printable PDF Newsletter of the feeds you select. Aptly named Tabbloid, it turns your favorite feeds into a personal magazine.

The service, lets you add the feeds you want and specify the delivery frequency. Your feeds will be sent to your inbox formatted like a magazine.

The service is really useful if there are some subscriptions which you would prefer to read in hard-copy rather than on screen, or just feels more comfortable reading articles in a  newspaper layout.

On a side note, it is a good way to receive feed updates in a familiar avenue if you have limited subscriptions which doesn’t justify the use of a full fledged feed reader.

I am sure pictures are worth a thousand words, so here’s a screenshot of a PDF containing the more popular tabbloid subscriptions:

Screenshot of a PDF containing the more popular subscriptions

Link:

• Tabbloid

Online social websites are far from immune to attacks. The fact that the application is widely used gives crackers the incentive to cook up a Trojan or virus which uses the social networks to propagate.

The latest social network site to be hit is Facebook. According to Mashable,

a so-called “Facebook trojan” is making its way around the site

The trojan masquerades as a Facebook message with a title like “Nice dancing! Shouldn’t you be ashamed?” or “Some0ne thinks your special and has a *Hot_Crush* on you. Find out who it could be”.

The trojan works by disguising itself as an email from facebookmail.com executing a worm W32.Koobface.A (according to Symantec) which will search for cookies on the user’s machine. It will then modify the settings of the user account with links that point to its own malicious website.

Symantec stats on its security page that the Trojan was discovered on August 3, 2008.

Well, the general rule when dealing with online messages or emails is not to be “click-happy”. Clicking all attachments or links without first giving any thought will cause people at lot of trouble sooner or later… This is especially true for .exe files. However, sometimes the best of us will still fall prey to such tricks, either by accident or when we have a bottle of alcohol too much.

For more information about the virus check out Symantec’s security response site

Main Story: Earlier this year, Yahoo entered into talks with Google about search advertising deal amid U.S. Department of Justice starting investigations into this alleged bold move. It can be said that Yahoo entered into these talks to fight off an aquistion attempt from Microsoft.

According to the Official Google Blog, Concerns from advertisers and government regulators as well the risk of

“a protracted legal battle but also damage to relationships with valued partners.”

has ended this deal.

While this deal would no doubt created controversy if it have gone through, it was a better alternative than Microsoft acquiring Yahoo which would have effectively removed one more search and advertising competitor. In fact, at the web 2.0 summit, Yahoo’s CEO said that

“To this day, I have to say that the best thing for Microsoft to do is to buy Yahoo. I don’t think that is a bad idea at all…at the right price, whatever the price is, we are willing to sell the company”

In those sentence, it is clear that Yahoo wants to be bought by Microsoft, a stand which is a reversal from previously where Yahoo seemed to be trying to prevent a Microsoft buyout. This reversal may have come as a direct response to this Google-Yahoo failed deal.

If Microsoft were to really hit the negotiation tables with Yahoo right now, it is safe to say that the offer may be lower as Microsoft would be buying a slightly weaker Yahoo as compared to the Yahoo during the previous offer. However, it seems that Microsoft would not be sitting at a new negotiation table as Steve Ballmer said on Friday, at a Committee for Economic Development of Australia lunch in Sydney, that:

“We are not interested in going back and re-looking at an acquisition”
Source: Mashable!

The future of Yahoo remains on a delicately balanced weighing scale, which is, at the moment, tipping away from the side favouring Yahoo. In its aftermath, you would wonder if such a opposition would have been more muted if Google and Microsoft weren’t involved.

End of Windows 3.x: For a software made in 1990, it sure has a long and arduous life. Windows 3.1 was the first of Windows Graphical User Interface (GUI). According to BBC News:

Microsoft maintained support for Windows 3.x until the end of 2001, and it has lived on as an embedded operating system until 1 November 2008.

Its hard to find anyone still using Windows 3.x nowadays except in embedded systems where tech specs are a more limited and cannot cater for current Windows O.S. systems which can demand high capability processors and up to a minimum of 1GB Ram.

In this era where software support cycles are valid only up till at most their next major software release, a 18 year software support is commendable.

USB 3.0: Just a heads-up (From: CNET News), the USB 3.0 Specification will be introduced on Novemeber 17 at a Developer’s conference hosted by USB Implementers Forum in San Jose, Calif. The spec is expected to offer 10 times the speed of USB 2.0.

For people like me with the lack of cash and thus have small music libraries, online streaming sites like last.fm have always been an avenue for me to listen to music.

I’ve been on last.fm for a while now and it has served me well.. However, the one issue I have with last.fm is its speed. Though streaming is generally fine, the speed of the search feature and the website as a whole still have room for improvements. Although this problem is solved by using their desktop client, I’m not always on a computer with the last.fm desktop client installed. It’s because of this reason that I’ve been turning increasingly to another music network recently.

I don’t usually talk about online services BUT music-based social network Grooveshark really caught my attention.

Screenshot of the music-based social network Grooveshark

As with all social sites, you can search the music database and listen to streaming audio from thousands of artists. Furthermore, it is possible to embed songs into web sites and social networking profiles, or share them via email or Instant Messages.

The important factor that made me turn to the site was the speed at which searches are made as well as the familiar interface it has. Even if you have been on a computer hiatus and have not been on the internet for a year or so, using the service wouldn’t be problem.

So if you are away from your personal computer and craving for some music, head over to Grooveshark to satiate your hunger.

Anyway, here are the links to the 2 services mentioned:

• Grooveshark
• Last.fm

In September, I posted an entry about the excellent Compact Calendar from David Seah. Well it seems that the compact calendar also caught the attention of another blogger.

In an email sent to David Seah about a month ago, Yoshiomi Kurisu said that he had created an Online Compact Calendar Creator based on David Seah’s design.

The online creator is quite a neat little application, allowing you to find your country’s holiday from Google Calendar and then generating PDF files for printing… If needed, you can add in additional dates which may be set aside for holidays or maybe events. For students, you can add in the dates for your school holidays etc.

Compact Calendar Creator [via David Seah's Blog]

Main Topic: Again, it seems that there are battery problems. According to an Oct 31 press release on the Sony Electronics News and Information website:

Sony Corporation will support voluntary recalls announced today by various PC manufacturers and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, encompassing about 35,000 notebook battery packs in the U.S., with an additional 65,000 sold worldwide.

I seem to hear quite a number of recalls these few years, not necessarily only Sony.
I guess laptops aren’t meant to be used on our lap anymore especially with cases of overheating and in some cases, smoke and flames.

US Elections: Its finally here! Tomorrow will be the D-Day for the elections. I really wonder who will actually win. Its quite intriguing. It is the first time in U.S. history that two sitting senators will run against each other for president. Furthermore, it is the first time an African American is a presidential nominee for a major party. I really hope that the guy’s background won’t stifle his chances.

Well, at least it looks like Obama is on track to win this election, with a Wall Street Journal/NBC News public opinion poll released on Sunday showing that he has an 8-point advantage over McCain.

After much resistance on my part, I’ve succumbed to the social networking world and joined Twitter…

It seems that I may get to squeeze some productivity aspects out of twitter. Currently I have a service set up  to push my blog post to twitter.. I’m so glad that at least the service supports OpenID… I really wish most sites would go on and support it now. Its really much more convenient.

Anyway, now I have to go look through all those Lifehacker and Mashable Twitter tips that I’ve skipped in defiance…

Oh and my Twitter URL: http://twitter.com/fusedthought

For users of Google Reader, there are times where your Reader subscription would grow to unmanageable amounts. When Google launched the trends page last year, it helped readers see users see how data is consumed and which subscribed feed is read most often, and thus help in users in reducing feed amount.

However, even with the pruning, I am sure there are times when you notice that you are visiting Google Reader more often because you don’t know when feeds will be coming in. In order to solve this problem, Google Reader has added statistics on when the posts are coming in.

Furthermore, it is now possible to view a particular subscription’s trends on the subscription page itself. The “show details”  link,  can be found near the top right hand corner of the page. It will be a good way to view your own reading habits for the individual feed as well as the posting pattern and cycle of the website.

Hopefully, this will help me further trim my feeds subscription and better manage my reading patterns…

Google Reader Individual Stats Screenshot

[via Google Reader Blog]

hmm.. My blogging schedule a bit screwed this week… Got a few events to take care of this week…. Should be back to normal by next week though.. Anyway, recently, a DVD of “free, hand-checked, non-commercial selection from Wikipedia” was launched. The DVD, a release by SOS Children UK, in coordination with the Wikimedia Foundation. According to the website, the DVD has

about 5500 articles (as much as can be fitted on a DVD with good size images) and is about the size of a twenty volume encyclopaedia (34,000 images and 20 million words).

The DVD is available for download via bittorrent only.

I must say it is a good idea to keep a local copy of some of the Wikipedia contents especially if you are not always online. Though it doesn’t contain the entire wikipedia, I am sure most articles will have been included in it. Not just wikipedia, I find it really useful to actually store my online files locally for easy access or when I am in places where there are no wi-fi access.

Wikipedia Selection for Schools [Download]

For users like me who depend a lot on this three Google services, finding all in one page saves a lot of “Ctrl-Tabs” or mouse work.

One solution is to create an igoogle page at http://www.google.com/ig and link the three services in your main tab. Since Reader just got integrated as an igoogle widget, this may be a good solution.

The second solution requires the use of Firefox with the greasemonkey extension. With the extension, it is also possible to integrate all three services in one page without the use of igoogle.

Depending on which services you use, either two or 3 scripts are needed.. The links are as follows:

1. GCal/GReader- Header Removal in IFrames [Userscripts.org]
2. Gmail – Google Reader Seamless Integration [Userscripts.org] Refer to edits below
3. Gmail – Google Calendar Seamless Integration [Userscripts.org] Refer to edits below

The first script is recommended if you want to install the two other scripts. A screenshot of the result  (from Lifehacker) is shown below:

Integrated GReader, GCal, Gmail screenshot (via Lifehacker)

Alternatively, if you just want your Google Calendar agendas instead of the full calendar in beside your inbox, the Greasemonkey script, GmailAgenda [Userscripts.org] is also worth a try… A screenshot of the config is shown below…

Google Calendar Agenda and Gmail Integrated

However, I would suggest not to use the GmailAgenda script in a shared Firefox browser as some data is saved in Firefox’s about:config page.

As for me, I prefer using the Gmail and GmailAgenda combination while keeping my Google Reader separate. Although I need to switch a few tabs this way, I find it much neater…

EDIT:

The developer has updated his script. Now it is able to collapse your inbox for easy calendar and feed browsing, and work with Google Apps accounts. Furthermore, he has combined the reader and calendar script as well as add support for Picasa, Google Notebook, Groups, Sites, News, Maps and Finance.

• Gmail w/ Collapsible & Minimalist Inbox plus Google Calendar, Reader, Notebook, etc… Seamless Integration [Userscripts.org]

Last week there was news on Firefox 3.1 beta as well as the release of version 2 of Flock (a Firefox based browser)…

Flock has been dubbed a Social Networking Browser, and Version 2 of it doesn’t disappoint. However, much of the features can be replicated in Firefox via countless addons, but having Flock support so many services “out of the box” and having tighter integration is definitely a much needed bonus.

That said, isn’t the browser market getting crowded? Current commonly used browsers are Opera, Firefox (Versions 2.0 and 3.0), Internet Explorer (Versions 5.5, 6.0, 7.0), Safari and Konqueror.
With the recent entry of Chrome (coupled with Google’s brand name) into the foray, the browser usage distribution may change yet again.

It is said that:

Competition may be good for the progress of oneself, but too much competition may be detrimental instead.

However, taking the quote into the context of this browser war, browsers have, (without any doubt) came a long way since the first Netscape browser. But is adding so many browsers desirable to the overall online demography? I am really doubtful…

Anyway, on a sidenote, Hitwise also released the Top 20 websites in the U.S. for September…

Listed by Rank.
Market Share is in brackets.

1. www.google.com ( 6% )
2. mail.yahoo.com ( 4.7% )
3. www.myspace.com ( 4.01% )
4. www.yahoo.com 3.88% )
5. mail.live.com ( 2.14% )
6. www.ebay.com ( 1.61% )
7. search.yahoo.com ( 1.48% )
8. www.facebook.com ( 1.2% )
9. www.msn.com ( 1.08% )
10. www.youtube.com ( 0.93% )
11. www.gmail.com ( 0.79% )
12. www.wikipedia.org ( 0.53% )
13. images.google.com ( 0.52% )
14. mail.aol.com ( 0.42% )
15. search.msn.com ( 0.41% )
16. news.yahoo.com( 0.41% )
17. my.yahoo.com ( 0.4% )
18. address.yahoo.com ( 0.4% )
19. www.pogo.com ( 0.37% )
20. www.craigslist.org ( 0.33% )

Not surprisingly, Google is leading the race.

I saw this on a NYTimes blog:

Surfing the Internet Boosts Aging Brains

According to that entry, dated 16 October 2008,

Scientists at the University of California, Los Angeles, have shown that searching the Internet triggers key centers in the brain that control decision-making and complex reasoning. The findings, to be published in the upcoming issue of The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, suggest that searching the Web helps to stimulate and may even improve brain function.

So now people will have an extra excuse to go online….
However, although its nice to hear an alternative argument for a change, it is good to take such studies with a pinch of salt.

Oh. And that reminds me… A commentary in a newspaper (forgot which), threw up a very interesting question:

If a Tobacco company puts out a study showing that we need to do more on educating the young about side-effects of Tobacco use, we question their underlying motives.

However, if a contraceptive company puts out a study showing that more has to be done to educate the young on the use of contraceptives, we fail to question the motives..

(Note: the above is not verbatim, but translated from the best of my memories)

So are we being bias here? Or just a common response that years in society has given rise to?

Received this via email.. Thought it was quite funny…

Quoted verbatim from the email:

It’s not the fault of student if he/she fails. Because, the year ONLY has 365 days…

Typical academic year for a student:

• Sundays – 52 Sundays in a year, you know Sundays are for rest.
  Days left 313.
• Summer holidays – 50 where weather is very hot and difficult to study.
  Days left 263.
• 8 hours daily sleep – 130 days GONE.
  Days left 141.
• 1 hour for daily playing- (good for health) means 15 days.
  Days left 126.
• 2 hours daily for food & other delicacies (chewing properly & swallowing) – means 30 days.
  Days left 96.
• 1 hour for talking (man is a social animal) – means 15 days.
  Days left 81.
• Exam days – per year at least 35 days.
  Days left 46.
• Quarterly, half yearly and festival (holidays) – 40 days.
  Days left 6.
• For sickness – at least 3 days.
  Days left 3.
• Movies and functions- at least 2 days.
  1 day left.
• That 1 day is your birthday.
  How can you study on that day ?!?!?!?!?!

Balance = 0
So? How can a student pass ?????

Haha.. Hope that loosens some tense shoulders.. now time to get back to studying!!…

Was looking through my Google reader archives for something when these two entries caught my eye and I thought I’ll share…

Email Security:

In an October 8, 2008 article, CNET’s Michael Horowitz talks about being smart about Web mail, and securing your access to mail services like Google mail, Yahoo Mail, or Windows Live Mail. Especially with the recent example of Sarah Palin’s Yahoo Mail being hijacked, securing your mail isn’t a paranoid thought..

Anyone involved in backing up computer files knows the importance of testing the recovery process and the same applies with Web mail. The best way to insure that you can recover or reset your password is try it.

very Web mail system asks for personal information as a means of identification should you lose your password. The problem is that this personal information can also be used by a bad guy to learn your password.

So no harm to take a look.. probably users can pick up a few pointers….

Backup

For those looking to syncronise files or backup, can try the free open-source software, Synkron, which is available for all the Windows/Mac/Linux platforms. The interface seems simple enough and according to online reviews, does its job properly. Being cross-platform is definitely an asset. Features include being restore files, which were overwritten during the synchronization and add files and folders to black list to make sure they won’t be synchronized in the future.

Definitely worth a look..

Ciao.

After watching this video, I would think that studying in the future won’t be the same. Proabably the video would get technology savvy students who are into biology (or those in related fields) drooling over their keyboard.

Studying the Gray’s Anatomy has never been so interactive…

The real capabilities of tablet computing, harnessed and put together, especially in an academic setting, is very well illustrated in this video.

I look forward to such a future… Lifestyle and habits would definitely change.

Now to wipe my keyboard clean of drool before it short-circuits…

Main Story: In this new media world, privacy is quite a luxury rather than a basic given commodity/right. In an October 9, 2008 BBC News article:

Perfect secrecy has come a step closer with the launch of the world’s first computer network protected by unbreakable quantum encryption at a scientific conference in Vienna.

All quantum security schemes are based on the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, on the fact that you cannot measure quantum information without disturbing it

The new cryptography method is based on laws of quantum theory, which have been shown to be inherently unbreakable. But as with all cryptography methods, it is not that unbreakeable if you can find enough processing power to do so.

This news is definitely welcomed in an era where information sniffing is more common than surveys on streets…

On Melamine Scandal: It seems that more products are found with melamine….3 more products that are imported in Singapore have been found to be tainted with it.

According to CNA, Singapore (as of October 10) has found 13 food products tainted with melamine in the local market. They are:

Cadbury Choclairs – Blueberry flavour
Cadbury Choclairs – Chocolate flavour
Panda Dairy Whole Milk Powder (industrial pack)
Silang House of Steamed Potato – Potato & Tomato Cracker
Silang House of Steamed Potato – Potato Cracker
New Sshmallows Mallow-Dippers – Strawberry flavour
Dutch Lady Banana Flavoured Milk
Dutch Lady Honeydew Flavoured Milk
Dutch Lady Strawberry Flavoured Milk
Puff Rice Rolls – Butter Corn flavour
Puff Rice Rolls – Cheese flavour
YiLi Choice Dairy Fruit Bar Yoghurt Flavour Ice Confection
White Rabbit Creamy Candy

So beware…

On the same topic, Singapore’s Agri-food and Veterinary Authority (AVA) had said melamine kitchenware is generally safe, as long as it’s properly used.

Improper use includes heating melamine ware directly on stoves, and in convection or microwave ovens.

While the authority noted that residual melamine can migrate from containers into food, it said the level of migration is insignificant or very low under normal use. (Source: CNA)

Online: A court has ordered RealNetworks to temporarily suspend distribution of RealDVD. The software allows users to copy DVDs to their hard drive, but Hollywood fears that it will be used to copy DVDs from rental shops. The outcome of this legal tussle could determine the future of the development of such software…

Also Online (in the Google world), Google has updated spreadsheets web app, giving it a full file menu similar to the Google Docs. The update makes the menus slightly neater and organized than the previous version and also gives the interface a slightly more familiar feeling…
On a side-note, Google rolled out a Theater View and Lights Out mode for long videos in Youtube.

These are definitely welcomed additions to the service…

In fact, YouTube is now offering (according to CNET News):

15 50-minute TV episodes from Star Trek, Beverly Hills 90210, and MacGyver and with prominent new ads.

Although the key target is advertisement revenue, but they are still full length shows. Its really a departure from the norm…

Wow.

Went to watch The House Bunny yesterday. I must say, the movie is quite hilarious with some eye-brow raising moments… However, the show seems to have some conflicting take-aways.

For the first half of the show, it seems that the movie is putting across that looks are everything and every male in the universe has just lustful thought when it comes to women… The second half, however, makes a point to note that there are men which are exceptions and looks aren’t everything. It subtly suggests that we should have our own individuality.

This 180 degree turn on views (regarding outward appearance or inward appearance) actually made me feel that the movie lacked a strong storyline. However, it is admirable that the script was trying to lead people onto the ethnically right thinking. The ending is definitely safe and nothing controversial.

With that said, I guess its best to enter the cinema and enjoy the funny antics and not think too much into the plot or underlying meaning.

My Google Reader Feeds just seem to keep on increasing… Must keep it in check…

Anyway, I saw this interesting link. Its on Powerpoint presentations and how to achieve “PPT nirvana”…

From the site:
(The 9 points below are quoted verbatim from “http://sethgodin.typepad.com/”
So copyright belongs to original author.)

1. Don’t use Powerpoint at all. Most of the time, it’s not necessary. It’s underkill. Powerpoint distracts you from what you really need to do… look people in the eye, tell a story, tell the truth. Do it in your own words, without artifice and with clarity. There are times Powerpoint is helpful, but choose them carefully.
2. Use your own font. Go visit Smashing Magazine and buy a font from one of their sponsors or get one of the free ones they offer. Have your tech guy teach you how to install it and then use it instead of the basic fonts built in to your computer. This is like dressing better or having a nicer business card. It’s subtle, but it works.
3. Tell the truth. By this I don’t mean, “don’t lie,” (that’s a given), I mean “don’t hide.” Be extremely direct in why you are here, what you’re going to sell me (you’re here to sell me something, right? If not, please don’t waste your time or mine). It might be an idea, or a budget, but it’s still selling. If, at the end, I don’t know what you’re selling, you’ve failed.
4. Pay by the word. Here’s the deal: You should have to put $5 into the coffee fund for every single word on the wordiest slide in your deck. 400 words costs $2000. If that were true, would you use fewer words? A lot fewer? I’ve said this before, but I need to try again: words belong in memos. Powerpoint is for ideas. If you have bullets, please, please, please only use one word in each bullet. Two if you have to. Three never.
5. Get a remote. I always use one. Mine went missing a couple of weeks ago, so I had to present without it. I saw myself on video and hated the fact that I lost all that eye contact. It’s money well spent.
6. Use a microphone. If you are presenting to more than twenty people, a clip on microphone changes your posture and your impact. And if you’re presenting to more than 300 people, use iMag. This is a setup with a camera and projector that puts your face on the screen. You should have a second screen for your slides–the switching back and forth is an incompetent producer’s hack that saves a few bucks but is completely and totally not worth it. If 400 people are willing to spend an hour listening to you, someone ought to be willing to spend a few dollars to make the presentation work properly.
7. Check to make sure you brought your big idea with you. It’s not worth doing a presentation for a small idea, or for a budget, or to give a quarterly update. That’s what memos are for. Presentations involve putting on a show, standing up and performing. So, what’s your big idea? Is it big enough? Really?
8. Too breathtaking to take notes. If people are liveblogging, twittering or writing down what you’re saying, I wonder if your presentation is everything it could be. After all, you could have saved everyone the trouble and just blogged it/note-taken it for them, right? We’ve been trained since youth to replace paying attention with taking notes. That’s a shame. Your actions should demand attention (hint: bullets demand note-taking. The minute you put bullets on the screen, you are announcing, “write this down, but don’t really pay attention now.”) People don’t take notes when they go to the opera.
9. Short! Do you really need an hour for the presentation? Twenty minutes? Most of the time, the right answer is, “ten.” Ten minutes of breathtaking big ideas with big pictures and big type and few words and scary thoughts and startling insights. And then, and then, spend the rest of your time just talking to me. Interacting. Answering questions. Leading a discussion.

The points above are tips rather than rules… but its worth to a note….

And on a side-note, I do agree on point 1. Sometimes the best presentations are given by speakers without Powerpoint presentations.

And (this is just my 2 cents worth)… PPT is seriously an ineffective teaching tool in my personal opinion and experience. While it started out as an optional aid, PPT quickly became the common teaching tool.

Moreover, in reference to Sydney Morning Herald article on April 4, 2007, titled: “Research points the finger at PowerPoint”, Australian researchers had made findings that

It is more difficult to process information if it is coming at you in the written and spoken form at the same time…

So why are we still flashing PPT slides while the teachers are teaching? More often than not, you’ll find yourself looking at the PPT and not listening to what the teacher is saying.

Although I must agree that PPT has its advantages, PPT is sometimes just too “depended upon” and over-used or used ineffectively…

Night Sky photography.. the words resonate sub-conciously, causing a sigh.
Taking photos at night isn’t easy.. at least for novices.

For that reason, Wired’s How-To Wiki’s guide to “Photographing the Stars” may be of some help.
So check it out before pointing your lens to the heavens for your star-gazing album…

Wired’s How to Wiki [ via Lifehacker ]

According to BBC News,

China has been monitoring and censoring messages sent through the internet service Skype, researchers say.

Citizen Lab, a Canadian research group, says it found a database containing thousands of politically sensitive words which had been blocked by China.

The more worrying part is that:

…a report revealed that its (Skype’s) Chinese service not only monitors text chats with sensitive keywords, which it had earlier admitted, but also stores them along with millions of personal user records on computers that could easily be accessed by anybody. (Source: Reuters)

That’s one more point to the list on the “Great Firewall of China”.

Am I surprised by the news?

No.

Privacy concerns are pertinent, and have been around for almost as long as the internet revolution. However, it really does puts the spotlights on companies providing such social services on how far are they willing to go to secure one of the biggest market: China.

On a side note, while reading the newspapers this week, I found a comment by Warren Buffet interesting.
As published in the Straits Times on 0 31/0/2008:

The US economy is “flat on the floor” after a cardiac arrest as companies struggle to secure funding and unemployment  increases….

A very subtle way to describe the current economy… He compared the economy to a heart attack patient:

“Paramedics have arrived”… “and they shouldn’t argue about whether to put the resuscitation equipment a quarter of an inch this way, or they shouldn’t start criticizing the patient..”

So I was thinking… does that mean that the US$85 billion loan for AIG was early “CPR” and the recently senate approved US bailout plan can be described as an Electrical Cardioversion?

Back home in Singapore: Three people contracted the dengue virus after receiving infected blood from a donor in Singapore… The infected blood came from a 52-year-old repeat donor who gave blood on July 15 last year. (Source: CNA).
That’s definitely something new. I’ve never really heard of dengue through blood till now. According to CNA again:

Health Sciences Authority (HSA) said this is the first local case of dengue fever transmission via blood. The other reported case of transfusion transmitted dengue was from Hong Kong.

Well.. now we know..

Also in Singapore:

For the first time, heritage structures such as bridges and towers will be included under a national programme to conserve Singapore’s architectural heritage…

The bridges gazetted for conservation are:

Anderson Bridge…., Elgin Bridge at Boat Quay, the Cavenagh Bridge just outside Fullerton Hotel, the Ord, Read and Crawford Bridges.

Its really good that they decided to gazette all these bridges for conservation. But I do wonder… Even if they aren’t gazetted, what are the odds of them being demolished and rebuilt? Anyway, its still a nice thought that we will see such familiar structures some 50 years down the road…

Ciao.

Was just looking through my RSS feeds and this one caught my eye..

“9 Fail-proof Tips for Eating Healthy at Social Gatherings”
by Zen Habits

I must admit, sometimes at gatherings, I eat rather unhealthily too. Though I cringe away from food with heaps of oil most of the time at home, the same cannot be said during gatherings..

This is especially true at gatherings where there are lots to talk about, and eating becomes a motor action where you “feed” yourself while talking, without paying attention to the fact that you are already full or pause to think about the type of food I am feeding myself with…
In fact, I am already doing points 1, 7, 9 and half of point 4 (below, all in bold) sometimes…

However, placing limits (pt. 2) or taking logs (pt. 6) are just not for me… haha.. Maybe it will apply to others though…

Originally posted at Zen Habits:

1. Eat before you go. This was by far the most popular tip, and probably the most useful. Fill up on healthy foods at home.
2. Place limits. Try a 2 plate limit, and a 2 drink limit.
3. Plan ahead. Find out the menu ahead of time and make healthy choices, before you go.
4. Drink lots of water and eat veggies and fruits. You can eat as many veggies as you want without consuming many calories. Just avoid dipping sauces and dressings.
5. Have a big salad before the main course. Again, avoid too much dressing, and go for the lighter dressings.
6. Log what you eat, so you’ll be more aware of it.
7. Avoid alcohol. It’s just empty calories. You can have fun without alcohol — I do it all the time.
8. Bring your own. If it’s a potluck-style gathering, cook something healthy and bring it with you.

And my favorite (too):

9. Just try to eat healthy most of the week, and relax when you are at social gatherings.

With that, I’ll end here…

and Its time for lunch! Haha…

Ciao!

F1 (as in the Formula One race and not the key between the “Esc” and “F2″.. haha ) is finally here! Although it is a huge event, it seem like there isn’t much hype on the streets. However, it is still something to look at.

Online, saw a few free Microsoft software for photographers that seem quite useful. Downloaded those but have not installed it yet though.
They are:

• “Image Composite Editor“, an app for stitching several pictures together into one panoramic photograph.
• “Pro Photo Tools“, a full-featured metadata editor.

Also, for those who need a quick way of editing photos, and don’t want a full image editor like GIMP, there is the free https://www.photoshop.com/, which recently included a mobile version for Windows Mobile users also. Adobe gives a decent amount of storage space too..

On Wall Street, it seems like Washington Mutual Inc was closed by the U.S. government in by far the largest failure of a U.S. bank, and its banking assets were sold to JPMorgan Chase & Co for $1.9 billion (Source: Reuters).

There are many other news, but its just too tedious to follow. I have a list of events (non-exhaustive) that happened on the first 7 days, but I really cannot keep up (on the updating) after that.

Back in Asia, there seems to be no sign of an end to the milk scandal. The the products tainted by Melamine have increased over this week, as the recalling of all products (with milk contents) that are manufactured in China continues.
The World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) yesterday said that China’s contaminated milk powder scandal was ‘deplorable’ as more countries in Asia and Europe banned imports of Chinese milk products. (Source: BT)

Personally, I have dumped quite a few items at home that are China-made with milk contents. What a waste of money! .
But there isn’t a choice.. Better be safe than sorry….

After scouring through my external hard drive for screen shots, I did a massive update to my portfolio. I’ve now included some themes that I’ve done as far back as 2005. They are mostly Blogger and WordPress themes, but nonetheless, still designs I’ve done.

Sadly, I can’t find those before that. Maybe it got lost when my hard drive got reformated around that time..Sigh..

Anyway, have a great night! Cheers!

View My Portfolio…

Compact Calendar Screenshot

Was looking around for calendars on the internet when I found this little gem. Seems to be quite popular.. Wonder why I didn’t find this in the past… I guessed its only recently that I started looking at things to minimize the time I spend on the computer for work….

Anyway, For Those Interested (FTI): check out David Seah’s Compact Calendar which have already been updated for 2009. The download comes in the form of an excel spreadsheet.

Compact Calendar [David Seah's site]

.. Cheers!

With the collapse of Lehman brothers as well as the takeover of Merrill Lynch, the economy is going into a troublesome time.

The list below is a time line on this week’s events that happened (from Monday to Saturday), or those I read about… (it’s actually more for my own reference.. :p ).. Its a little lengthy…

150908 (Monday) :

• Bank of America Corporation today announced it has agreed to acquire Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc. in a $50 billion all-stock transaction that creates a company unrivalled in its breadth of financial services and global reach.
• Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.
  1. Announces It Intends to File Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Petition; No Other Lehman Brothers’ U.S. Subsidiaries or Affiliates, Including Its Broker-Dealer and Investment Management Subsidiaries, Are Included in the Filing
  2. UPDATE: they have filed a petition
  3. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc’s bankruptcy filing was as much as 15 times larger than any other Chapter 11 case in history and may leave creditors with tens of billions in losses, lawyers said. (Source: BT)
• The US central bank also had injected 70 billion dollars into financial markets amid turmoil following the bankruptcy of Wall Street giant Lehman Brothers.
• SINGAPORE: The Straits Times Index (STI) finished 84.12 points or 3.3 per cent lower at 2,486.55 after falling as much as 3.5 per cent earlier in the day

160908 (Tuesday) :

• Goldman Sachs Group Inc, the larger of the two remaining major independent US investment banks, reported its worst slump in profits since going public in 1999. (Source: BT)
• Markets had been under pressure amid fears of a collapse of American International Group, a global insurance giant with US$1 trillion in assets.
• SINGAPORE:Queues formed outside AIA’s offices, with some clients seeking to end their policies as AIA is a subsidiary of New York-based American International Group (AIG), which sparked fears on whether it will collapse.
• SINGAPORE: SGX has suspended Lehman Brothers Pte Ltd (“LBPL”) from taking on new securities and derivatives positions
• SINGAPORE: AIA said that its insurance funds are segregated from that of AIG, its parent
• The Nikkei 225 stock average shed 605.04 points, or 4.95 percent, to 11,609.72 – its lowest close since July 2005. The broader Topix fell 5.07 percent to 1,117.57. (Source: J POST)
• SINGAPORE: The MAS assured the public that “AIA currently has sufficient assets in its insurance funds to meet its liabilities to policyholders”
• Stocks in Asia fell sharply as anxious investors, already reeling from the carnage that consumed two of Wall Street’s biggest investment banks, steeled themselves for more bad news from the US financial sector. In Japan, Hong Kong, China and South Korea, where markets were closed on Monday, share indices plummeted following the worst declines in US stocks since the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks on Sept 11, 2001 (Source: BT)

170908 (Wednesday) :

• 0945 SG hrs According to CNN, Federal Reserve agreed to an $85 billion bailout that would give the government an ownership stake in the troubled insurance giant American International Group on Tuesday
• SINGAPORE: The company that provides fire insurance plans for Housing Board homeowners also falls under the American International Group, the AIG umbrella. However, AHA assures HDB fire insurance plans not affected. (Source: CNA)
• SINGAPORE: The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has urged AIA policyholders not to act hastily to terminate their insurance policies
• SINGAPORE: Scores of Singaporeans continued to throng the American International Assurance (AIA) office again, although this time, some were looking to reinstate their policies. (Source: BT)
• Shares of Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs plummeted to multi-year lows
• NEW YORK: Stocks plummeted, with the Dow industrials falling 449 points in its second worst session of the year, as the government’s emergency rescue of AIG amplified fears about the stability of financial markets. (Source: CNN Money)
• News emerged of takeovers involving No. 2 U.S. investment bank Morgan Stanley
• Goldman Sachs stock suffered its biggest one-day drop ever. Morgan Stanley stock had its worst day in at least 15 years (Source: Reuters)

180908 (Thursday) :

• The Bank of Japan pumps another $14bn into money markets as Asian shares continue the worldwide fall in prices.
• Lehman shares plummet 53%.
• SINGAPORE: AIA may waive penalty charges for customers who reinstate policies (Source: CNA)
• American International Group Inc (AIG) former chief executive officer Maurice ‘Hank’ Greenberg saw the value of the AIG stake he controls shrink by about US$2.4 billion this week as the insurer collapsed. (Source: BT)
• UK bank Barclays buys some of the core assets of collapsed investment bank Lehman Brothers for $1.75bn ($250m for North American investment banking and trading unit, and $1.5bn for its New York headquarters and two data centres.). (Source: BBC)
• NEW YORK: Banks are scrambling for merger partners
• Lloyds TSB is to take over HBOS in a £12bn deal which will create a banking giant holding close to one-third of the UK’s savings and mortgage market.
• Banks’ exposure to Lehman emerges.
  1. Three Chinese banks have some $297.4m (£166.1m) in Lehman Brothers bonds, state media and local reports said.
  2. Swiss Life said it had exposure of $20m Swiss francs (£9.9m) and Swiss Re had exposure of 50m Swiss francs.
  3. UBS said on Tuesday that its exposure to Lehman Brothers was less than $300m.
  4. Japanese firms’ total Lehman exposure was far greater at 440bn yen (£2.3bn), according to an earlier Kyodo news report.

  (Source: BBC News)

• Current Cost so far: US$905billion
  1. US$85 billion loan for AIG
  2. US$87 billion financing to Lehman brothers via JPMorgan Chase
  3. US$200 billion for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
  4. US $29 billion to finance JPMorgan Chase’s buyout of Bear Stearns
  5. At least US$200 billion of outstanding loans to banks

  (Source: The Straits Times)

• The European Central Bank and the Bank of England said they would each offer up to $40 billion in overnight funds. The Fed said it would authorize $180 billion expansion of temporary foreign currency swap arrangements and Bank of Japan announced it would launch dollar supply operations as part of the worldwide effort to tackle the dollar shortage. (Source: Reuters)
• Washington Mutual reportedly has put itself up for sale (Source: CNN Money)
• JAPAN: Japan’s central bank said it reached a dollar-yen swap agreement with the Federal Reserve until Jan. 30, 2009, for a maximum amount of $60 billion. (Source: CNN Money)
• SINGAPORE: AIA Singapore’s executive vice-president and general manager, Mark O’Dell has resigned from the company and has taken leave of absence with immediate effect. AIA said that his decision to leave the company is not related to the recent developments at AIG. It was a personal decision that he had been planning for some time. (Source: CNA)
• LONDON, England: Lloyds TSB, Britain’s largest provider of checking accounts, on Thursday announced a £12.2 billion ($21.85-billion) deal to take over struggling HBOS, Britain’s biggest mortgage lender… The government said it would facilitate the deal by overriding anti-monopoly regulations…. (Source: AP)
• MOSCOW: Russia’s finance minister said trading on Russian exchanges won’t resume until Friday, as the government tried to stem the dizzying plummet in share prices and restore confidence in the economy. (Source: AP)
• CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa: Republican presidential candidate John McCain said on Thursday he would, if elected, fire U.S. Securities and Exchange (Source: Reuters)
• WASHINGTON: The possibility of a massive, U.S. taxpayer-funded bailout to attack the mortgage crisis and calm financial markets gripped Washington and Wall Street, on signs a Bush administration plan was in the works… (Source: Reuters)
• NEW YORK: Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced that he is looking into whether traders spread false information in an effort to drive down certain stock prices amid the recent turmoil on Wall Street… The probe will focus on whether traders spread rumors about firms such as Lehman Brothers, AIG, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, which have been pummeled by the current financial crisis… (Source: CNN)

190908 (Friday) :

• SINGAPORE: Human resource analysts said banks are expected to scale back on their hiring in response to the ongoing Wall Street turmoil. They said it might take at least a year before the job market returns to normal. (Source: CNA)
• SINGAPORE: Job losses can be expected at all levels and banks will also be more conservative in hiring and salaries are likely to be revised downwards.
• NEW YORK: When General Motors unveiled its much-anticipated Chevy Volt this week, it also repeated pleas for the government to fund loans (a proposed $25 billion loan to GM, Ford and Chrysler) to the automakers. (Source: Fortune)
• LONDON: Britain’s Financial Services Authority says it is temporarily banning short-selling of shares in publicly traded financial companies… The rule will remain in place until Jan. 16, 2009, but the FSA said it would review the situation again after 30 days and may extend the ban to other sectors… (Source: AP)
• Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke plan to work through the weekend with Congress… to discuss a “comprehensive approach to address the illiquid assets on bank balance sheets that are at the underlying source of the current stresses…” (Source: Reuters)
• US stocks had earlier surged on news of the rescue plan, with the Dow Jones up 3.86%, to 11,019.69.Japan’s Nikkei echoed the rally, with a 1.24% rise at Friday’s opening. (Source: BBC News)
• SHANGHAI: China’s benchmark stock index surged 9.3% in early Friday trading following a government decision to cut a tax on share purchases…Shanghai Composite Index was at 2,072.12 by midmorning, gaining 176.28 points in the first hour of trading…(Source: AP)
• Japan and Australia pumped a further $20 billion into their money markets… New Zealand relaxed rules on collateral to ease funding conditions and South Korea’s central bank chief promised to act aggressively and supply enough cash to the financial system to calm markets… The Chinese government was also trying to stabilize markets, buying shares in three of the biggest state-owned banks and ditching a tax on purchases of stocks… (Source: Reuters)
• MUMBAI/SHANGHAI: Within hours of Bank of America agreeing to buy Merrill Lynch this week, Indian financial services firm Ambit hired five Merrill executives, a sign that Asia hopes to gain from massive Wall Street layoffs. (Source: Reuters)
• WASHINGTON/NEW YORK: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission issued an emergency order on Friday temporarily halting the short selling of 799 financial stocks in an effort to protect investors and markets. (Source: Reuters)
• RUSSIA: Trading on Russia’s two leading stock exchanges is suspended for a second time in a day after share prices rise too sharply…. Trading was halted on the RTS and Micex indexes within an hour of opening. They then reopened only to close again after rising to 25.4% and 20.2% respectively. (Source: BBC News)
• NEW YORK: Ameribank Inc. was shut down on Friday by the Office of the Thrift Supervision, making it the 12th bank this year to go under… The bank had total assets of $115 million and total deposits of $102 million, according to a statement on the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Web site. (Source: CNN Money)
• NEW YORK: The terms of British bank Barclays Plc’s, planned acquisition of Lehman Brothers main North American businesses have been revised, pending court approval… In the revised deal, which must be approved by the bankruptcy court, Barclays would absorb about $47.4 billion in securities and assume $45.5 billion in trading liabilities, attorneys said. The original deal called for $72 billion in securities and $68 billion in trading liabilities… (Source: Reuters)
• WASHINGTON: The United States surged into action on Friday to launch an all-out attack against the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, readying a plan to tap hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer funds to buy up toxic mortgage-related debt. (Source: Reuters)
• SINGAPORE: CITI Singapore did not sell Lehman Minibond notes in Singapore, the head of Citi Singapore told a news conference today. There was also “no launch of Lehman structured notes or Lehman guaranteed notes by Citibank Singapore”….. (Source: BT)

200908 (Saturday) :

• MORGAN Stanley, its shares and debt battered by anxious investors, is in talks to sell a larger equity stake to China Investment Corp at the same time it is in merger talks with Wachovia Corp and other banks, two people familiar with its plans said on Thursday.
• Seoul HSBC dropped a US$6.3 billion offer for 51 per cent of Korea Exchange Bank, blaming turmoil in financial markets and ending what would have been the biggest cross-border move in South Korea’s bank sector. (Source: BT)
• WASHINGTON: The Treasury Department said that its financial rescue plan could permit it to buy assets beyond those backed by mortgages and potentially buy them from foreign holders. (Source: Reuters)
• NEW YORK: President Bush asked Congress for the authority to spend as much as $700 billion to purchase troubled mortgage assets and contain the financial crisis (Source: CNN Money).The Administration is seeking extraordinary authority as it tackles the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. (Source: Reuters)
• NEW YORK: A New York bankruptcy judge has backed a $1.3bn (£700m) plan for Barclays to buy the core business of collapsed US investment bank Lehman Brothers. (Source: BBC News)

EDITS:

210908 (Sunday) :

• The European administrators of failed US investment bank Lehman Brothers have filed a court order in New York demanding $8bn (£4.4bn) be returned from the US to London.A PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) spokesman said the money was needed to pay creditors, salaries, property bills and other day-to-day expenses.
• Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have changed their status to become bank holding companies, allowing them to take deposits from investors and raise more funds by opening commercial banks. (Source: BBC News)The Federal Reserve approved the two bank’s transformation into bank holding companies regulated by the central bank, effectively ending Wall Street’s investment banking model and subjecting the two to much tighter regulation. (Source: Reuters)
• Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson called on Congress to move swiftly on the Bush administration’s $700 billion proposal to bail out the financial system (Source: CNN Money)

220908 (Monday)

• TOKYO/HONG KONG: Japan’s Nomura Holdings has reached a deal to buy the Asian operations of Lehman Brothers, outbidding other banks seeking to scoop up Lehman’s Asia group on the cheap.(Source: Reuters)
• LONDON: European stocks halted a rally in world equities on Monday and the dollar fell as jittery investors awaited detail of Washington’s $700 billion bailout to tackle the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. (Source: Reuters)
• HONG KONG: Asian markets rose Monday after the U.S. government proposed a $700 billion plan to solve the world financial crisis by rescuing banks from billions of dollars in risky mortgage debt.
  1. Japan: the Nikkei 225 index climbed 1.4% to close at 12,090.59 points
  2. Hong Kong: Hang Seng index rose 1.2%.
  3. China: the Shanghai Composite Index soared 7.8%

  (Source: AP)

• NEW YORK: Stocks tumbled as investors worried a $700 billion bailout for the financial sector may not resuscitate a slumping economy, while a record spike in oil prices renewed concern about consumer spending. (Source: Reuters)
• WASHINGTON/PARIS: Group of Seven nations welcomed the $700 billion U.S. markets bailout plan on Monday and said they were prepared to step up international cooperation to protect the world’s financial and banking system. (Source: Reuters)
• NEW YORK: Uncertainty about the government’s $700 billion financial rescue plan drove investors to gold..The December contract for gold settled up $44.30 to $909 an ounce from $864.70 on Friday… Investors flee to commodities as $700 billion financial sector rescue plan threatens to boost inflation. (Soruce: CNN Money)
• SINGAPORE: Just under 5,000 policyholders have terminated their insurance contracts with the American International Assurance (AIA) so far, a small percentage of the over two million policies that AIA has in force in Singapore….This update was given by the Deputy Chairman of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), Lim Hng Kiang, on the sidelines of a business event…
• Shares in Bradford & Bingley (B&B) climbed strongly in early trading, amid reports that it could be the next bank in line for a takeover… B&B shares were up as much as 10%, but ended the day 1.7% higher at 28.25 pence…. (Source: BBC News)
• Morgan Stanley shares surged after Japanese banking giant Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group said it would buy a stake in the bruised Wall Street bank… the stake will account for 10% to 20% of Morgan Stanley’s common shares… (Source: BBC News)

230908 (Tuesday):

• The Bradford & Bingley bank has managed to draw a line under a potentially damaging obligation to buy £1.75bn worth of mortgages. (BBC News)
• Japanese bank Nomura has confirmed that it will buy some of Lehman Brothers’ European and Middle Eastern operations for an undisclosed sum…Nomura said it expects to save the jobs of a “significant proportion” of the 2,500 Lehman staff in those businesses… (Source: BBC News)
• NEW YORK: Billionaire Warren Buffett gave the transformed fiscal landscape a vote of confidence with a $5 billion investment in embattled banking titan Goldman Sachs. (Source: Reuters)

240908 (Wednesday):

• The US Federal Reserve is making $30bn (£16.1bn) available to central banks in Australia, Denmark, Sweden and Norway, to ease money markets.The Fed said the aim was to “improve liquidity” globally, at a time when the availability of credit is limited. (Source: BBC News)
• LONDON: Stocks rose in Asia and Europe after Warren Buffet’s investment. (Source: Reuters)

(p.s. I guess I will only update till 240908… the post is becoming far too lengthy and I don’t see the crisis ending anytime soon…)

Technology really has moved to fast. Just how power-hungry (in this case, processor-hungry) people are? I just wonder what will our electricity consumption be like the near future.. I don’t think its something to look forward to…

(P.s. This I.N. comes earlier this week due to a special I.N. I’m posting on Sunday.)

Some interesting updates this week:

1. More Cores..
   Ouch! The monthly power supply bill is going to go up to the roof (and maybe out of it)!

   (15 September 2008) SAN FRANCISO – Intel Corp. announced seven new 45-nm multicore Xeon 7400 processors aimed at high-end servers.
   The Xeon 7400 devices feature up to six processor cores per chip and 16 MB of shared cache memory.

   Source: EE Times

2. Google data centers cruising out to sea?
   

   Google Power

   Google… is considering deploying the supercomputers necessary to operate its internet search engines on barges anchored up to seven miles (11km) offshore…

   …The “water-based data centers” would use wave energy to power and cool their computers, reducing Google’s costs…

   Source: TIMES ONLINE

   According to Guardian, Google has applied patents for the idea (the original patent application)..

3. Tim Berners-Lee Announces World Wide Web Foundation
   

   “The World Wide Web Foundation seeks to advance One Web that is free and open, to expand the Web’s capability and robustness, and to extend the Web’s benefits to all people on the planet. “

   Source: Web Foundation Site

   The foundation is still at its infancy, with its full launch scheduled in 2009. It will be interesting to note what they can really accomplish. Moreover, I do find this thought by Sir Tim intriguing:

   “If the Foundation achieves all the things I can imagine now, we will have failed.”

   Source: Speech before Knight Foundation

Ok.. That’s all folks!