Intel - Leap Ahead

So... what about the new logo? Cool?
But what really matters at the end of the day is will Intel "leap ahead"... and by how far? (further than AMD?)

Intel to unveil new branding strategy

Luck is in the air

Imagine walking into an Apple store... and paying a small price for a "lucky bag". And opening it to find out that you have gotten...
* Airport Extreme base station
* Keynote
* .Mac account
* wireless keyboard behind it,
* wireless mouse
* D-Link Bluetooth adapter
* iLife '04
* 10%-off card

Cool? This is exactly what is happening in Japan according to ThinkSecret.

This New Year's, Apple is advertising its event with an aggressive branding campaign at its six Japanese stores. An observer noted yesterday that all the employees at Apple's Ginza store were wearing maroon t-shirts reading "Luck is in the air" bearing a picture of headphones floating away from an iPod. (that picture above)

Check out the Apple Japan website (translation)!

Bush

Bush - Forever a favourite topic of the American media.
(This video clip is very funny)

Semantic Web

I was reading Newsweek Special Edition when I came across the term "Semantic Web". Apparently, it is a new project founded by Tim Berners-Lee. Let us look at some quotes to get an idea...

"If HTML and the Web made all the online documents look like one huge book, RDF, schema, and inference languages will make all the data in the world look like one huge database."
-- Tim Berners-Lee, Weaving the Web, 1999

"The Semantic Web is an extension of the current web in which information is given well-defined meaning, better enabling computers and people to work in cooperation."
-- Tim Berners-Lee, James Hendler, Ora Lassila, The Semantic Web, Scientific American, May 2001

Read more:
W3C Semantic Web
SemanticWeb.org
Wikipedia - Semantic Web

Also, if possible, grab a copy of Newsweek Special Edition. It includes essays by King Abdullah II, British PM Tony Blair, Singapore PM Lee Hsien Loong, Eric Schmidt of Google, an interview with Tim Berners-Lee and of course, Fareed Zakaria of Newsweek.


Technorati: Semantic Web, Semantic-Web

CuteOverload.com

I have been looking at Alexa's Movers and Shakers (i.e. top 10 sites moving up and down in the traffic rankings) and I noticed that CuteOverload.com is one of them. I agree its a really cute site with cute pictures of animals [hamsters, kittens] (of all things!) They claim those are pictures that are "worth your internet browsing time" For one thing, the photos are certainly "cute". And its a blog!

It a typical case in point on how webpage popularity spreads. The webonomics of this: A blog is more easily found on Google, then lets say getting everyone to upload their "cute" photos to Flickr and tagging them via a unique name. [think Search Engine Optimisation & PageRank] (Note: someone decided to get everyone tag photos on Singapore to make a short film using the tag onesingaporeminute. The result is that some of the photos are non sequitur) Moreover, the photos go through a person (or persons) who takes on the job of "quality control." So the end-product? A cute webpage with cute quality photos.


Note: the webonomics article I hyperlinked above was written in 1996 (so its not so creadible now). I just conjured this word out of midair. Afterall, if there is Freakonomics, surely we are creative enough to join any word to economics.

Must Read and See

Its Christmas... so stay at home and do some meaningful reading.

1. Best of GigaOm (Om Malik's broadband blog - top 20 posts out of 5000 posts [get the PDF])
2. Scott Gatz's Syndicate 2005 Presentation on RSS (Scott Gatz is Yahoo!’s Senior Director of Personalization Products [get the PDF])

Well... we also decided that reading can be boring... so must see!

Google's first tv ad


Baidu vs. Google


Funny Microsoft Ad


Microsoft History (LOL - includes a live typical example of how win 98 crashes during a demo with Gate)

Bloop

Share files for free with no limits [including music, videos, pictures, anything].
www.bloop.com

www.ajchat.com is UP!

Great news... www.ajchat.com is up again!

Feed Digest Anyone?

You can insert feeds into your site with Feed Digest.

Add all kinds of RSS or Atom feeds and combine them into a "Digest" like the one you see above which you can insert into your own blog or website! Interface is user-friendly and you can create your own digest in minutes.

Firefox Stability Problems - Have you seen them?

• Firefox's use of physical and virtual memory is exceptionally high.
• CPU usage spikes to 100 percent (usually while loading a Web page).
• The browser freezes up for seconds, minutes, or permanently.
• The browser won't launch until they remove an errant "firefox.exe" process in Task Manager.
• The browser crashes suddenly (usually while loading a Web page).
• The browser has trouble loading specific pages, but there's no commonality among users as to which pages won't load.
• The initial launch of Firefox loads slower.
• Third-party application hyperlinks (such as a link in an e-mail message) take a long time to open a new Firefox tab or to launch the browser.

More here

The Power of Venture Myth

I am impressed by this article -- The Power of Venture Myth

Anyway, it confirms one thing - Google is not going to buy Riya.

Technorati's Result

Today's Technorati's results demand some explanation...

1. Wikipedia... even since some research report on wikipedia came out, and the furor over a supposed joke, and now .... we have more stories like the founder of wikipedia editing his own bio to get more credit, and co-founder Larry Sanger is now setting up a rival encyclopedia. Well, see more on digg (wikipedia)

2. "Jonathan Alter" is the ever popular (unpopular to politicians) guy on Newsweek, which I currently deem as not any better than TIME or The Economist. Of course... an issues of Newsweek cannot escape his famous Law of Media Oscillation. It goes like this...

"Under the Law of Media Oscillation, the only safe prediction is that a static, unchanging political narrative is impossible. Stuff happens in war and politics. And when it doesn't, the media will half-consciously rearrange all the atoms of emphasis and particles of story choice to make it seem so."

3. Bush is back on Technorati's top 10 (after a brief period of absence). [forever (in)famous]. We just need to read google news for the latest on him...

4. Transit Strike... no comment. read google news.

5. Ah... Christmas is fast approaching... Gentle reminder for myself to send ecards.

6. "King Kong" is the new movie by Peter Jackson, director of the highly-acclaimed LOTR. The movie is 3hrs and 7 mins (thats long) [according to IMDB]

7. Kristof [no comment]

8. NKF... People NOT in Singapore might be wondering what this is about... A little explanation must be suitable. NKF stands for National Kidney Foundation. The NKF Saga [as now called] by the local press... [etc]. ok. The public furor is over the release of the accounting report after the NKF lawsuit in which the CEO quit. Apparently, the findings are shocking. The Straits Time (a local newspaper owned by Singapore Press Holdings), has Mr. Durai's (the CEO) picture (full length from head to toe) on the newspaper front page, HOME section front page and 5 additional pages of full reporting in HOME section (promising even more details tomorrow). WOW... although we know that SPH was involved in the lawsuit... and won... but, and no but, to be politically correct, the public needs to know the truth... As I last checked, the NKF ranking on Technorati has moved up to no. 7th position.

9. No comment.

10. No comment.

Having said so much, let me tag them...
Technorati:
jonathan alter, NKF, wikipedia, bush, king kong, christmas

FutureMe

Create an email and send it to the future today!
http://www.futureme.org
Its an interesting concept.

www.ajchat.com

Allow me to bring your attention to www.ajchat.com

Ajchat is a simple online chat system, done in a web 2.0 style.


Why use ajchat?

• When your chat program/network is down.
• When you need to meet up with your friends really quick! (and you don't have a chat program installed)
• When you desperately need an answer to a question (and you are tired of googling)
• When you feel like it!
• Anywhere, anytime, any browser! (Firefox, Flock, Internet Explorer, Safari)
• You don't need Java!

In addition, I might add that ajchat also has an interesting share chat feature, which enables you to add a chat on a particular topic to your webpage.

Technorati: ajchat, web2.0, web 2.0, Ajax, chat

Gaim 2.0.0beta1

Gaim 2.0.0beta1 was just released 3 days ago!!

http://gaim.sourceforge.net/ Use GAIM, support opensource.

IE 7 is definitely useful!

It seems to be that Microsoft has been making alot of unnessary blunders on their website nowadays. While visiting the IE7 website, i scrolled to the bottom and discovered that the "No" button for the "Was This Information Useful?" field was missing. At first i thought that my firefox has accidentally forgot to load one of the buttons, so i reloaded the page. The button is still missing.

So you see? Users are not to say NO to IE7. And IE7 is definitely useful. =D

PS: This is not a joke. The screenshot above is not photoshoped. This is a geninue screenshot.

YouTube

This website is addictive!

YouTube is a short-movie sharing website. Movies can be added to your websites as well [using shockwave-flash (just add the necessary code)]. Very cool.

Their tag line is "Broadcast yourself. Watch and share your videos worldwide!"

PHP Security Guide

http://phpsec.org/projects/guide

A MUST READ for any serious PHP developer.

Is string theory in trouble?

Gosh... find out more by reading this.

combiNEWS.com

combiNEWS.com is the combination of both Google news and Yahoo! news, created to compare their top news headlines by putting them side-by-side.

Well... whats so interesting? What IS interesting is how the domain name came about.

Apparently, they received an email from Yahoo! IP Enforcement entitled "NOTIFICATION OF INFRINGEMENT / googleyahoonews.com". [their previous website was at googleyahoonews.com]

To find out more, read http://www.combinews.com/about.php

Anyway... you see that its Yahoo that is making a lot of noise, not Google. (Initially, the site also received a free Adwords voucher from Google to advertise googleyahoonews.com)

Syndicate Conference

Syndicāte is a technology and business conference where leaders and early movers in this new marketplace can share their expertise and ideas. Joining them will be senior publishing and media executives, corporate marketers, product managers, advertising and public relations professionals, intellectual property experts, venture capitalists... everybody who knows their business will be transformed by syndication -- and needs to know more.

http://www.syndicateconference.com/

Just over in San Francisco.

Mass Communication & Politics

The winds of politics have also been affected by the advert of mass communication and the creation of a global village. Politicians are now more aware of the power of electronic communication such as the Internet as seen from the huge role it has played in influencing votes by engaging young voters. The bringing of many different groups together online to influence perspective and ideas has forced politicians to be aware of more mainstream views. In this regard, the fluidity of communication has also caused transatlantic political pressures to be considered as important in national policies and agendas. For instance, electronic communications brought scenes of horror and distraught during the Vietnam War to many countries around the world through newspapers and television. This influenced global opinion and had a pressing impact on politics in the United States. In retrospect, a problem in one part of the world can be brought across to many in other areas of this global village by means of mass communication.

Yonah

A new processor from Intel, codenamed Yonah, will make its debut on Jan 6th (the launch will be in India).

Intel’s Yonah is a dual-core chip based on the 65nm fabrication process. Yonah will also mark the first launch with Intel’s new strategy in place – performance per watt.

What is interesting is that Jan 6th is 6 days after AMD's invitation for a dual-core duel ends.
So Intel is ignoring AMD (for the time being). The right strategy. Perhaps.

Office 12

On Nov 16, Microsoft released the technical beta of Office 12 to 10,000 customers.

Well... for those who did not have a chance to take part in the beta,
I managed to get a look (open in New Window first) at what the beta page looks like.
(Special thanks to Pak Chuen for this.)

Flawed MP3 player, and now flawed earphones?

I have always been a supporter of Sony products because of its high
quality and durability. However, this year, I bought the Sony MDR-EX81
at the price of SDG80, which is very expensive for a earphone. I
expected the sound quality and durability to be superb, but after a
few month's use, i felt like i've been ripped off.

Within a few months' use, the plastic/rubber insulation of the wire
starts falling apart. I firmly believe that this is not a mistake or
mishandling on my part, as many other users experienced the same
problem. You can take a look at the links provided.
Link 1, Link 2, Link 3

There are many many more such cases on the net and all this points to
the fact that this particular earphone has a serious issue and I'm
paying such a high price to be ripped off by sony.

And of course, sony is smart enough to NOT provide warranty.

meebo

Say meebo... and www.meebo.com you go!
But does not seem to work very well.

I wonder how they intend to make profits? Through ads? It seems that the popular web 2.0 approach is ads? But how long can it last before people start to use ad blocking software?

In addition, I don't see why I must use this when MSN web messenger is more reliable [and more secure (the only disadvantage being I must use IE).]


I will be in Malaysia for a week... so expect fewer posts. I addition, I am currently reading Freakonomics (although I have recommended it long ago), I have only started reading it now. Its a really insightful book. Go get it if you can.

THE Economist

Introducing... a peek into Alan Greenspan fan club...
http://www.theeconomist.com/

MailNation Solutions

1000 GB of free email space?
http://www.mailnation.net/
Its very crap... I doubt it works.

They use IceWarp Software, Merak Email Server. Even if it works... its peanuts compared to Gmail or Yahoo Mail.

FireFox 1.5

We are EXTREMELY HAPPY... because FIREFOX 1.5 is here!!!

Its really cool... with support for CSS 3 and SVG and movable tabs for tab browsing. For themes, we recommend you try out the iFox theme... (mac style). In addition, you can now access www.mozilla.com instead of www.mozilla.org.

Finally, if you are viewing this blog in Internet Explorer, we can say with full confidence that you should make the switch today!