crude oil exceed USD70 per barrel

yeah... that is the fact, crude oil exceeded USD70 per barrel on 29th September 2005.

fresh from recent hike in the petrol per litre, malaysian should be starting to worry. However, this is not quite the case for some. I have talked to some people and they don't seems to bother much. To them "life has to go on" but actually some people really are terrified by it, especially those whose income are very dependent on logistic and distribution.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said the government would initiate another task force to deal with such matter, as it cannot cope the surplus demand for the petrol subsidy given to the people. Currently, Malaysian government subsidises a total amount of RM14 Billion to offset the reality-bite of the people facing with petrol expenses.

One thing to note from his recent interview where he adviced Malaysian to prescribe austerity and frugality in term of energy usage. Bingo, this is a heavy message and will accept many layers of the society.

As we all know it, nobody likes to visit petrol station, personally I lothe it. My current vehicle consumption (Proton Iswara 1.3) is already RM60 per full tank. And I spent around RM250 per month on car petroluem. Now that is around 10% of my official income, which is a lot of money.

Tourism Industry Affected
Therefore, petrol is a necessity, compared to others like telecommunications, entertaintment and even food. The Prime Minister message therefore would indirectly create a negative impact on other industries in the country. One thing for sure, travelling is going to decrease which would affect the tourism industry. Along the chain are hotels, restaurants, recreational parks and etc.

Health Status Improve
While common-joe would continue to visit petrol station to fulfill their fundamental needs, some might even considered cutting the budget for food, something which I believed would improve the overall health status of the people. For one reason, eating moderately is better than feasting lavishly.

ICT industry = Good and bad
I actually encourage everyone to cut down Telekom conversation as much as possible. Switch over to VOIP services such as SKYPE, MSN, Yahoo and even Google Talk. Make use of email (you can receive them immediately) instead normal postage and even post laju. For god sake, get a PC and broadband connection. Don't you worry about Telekom's sustainability, they have earned enough to last for few decades. The corporate world should make it mandatory for business card to comply with SKYPE's ID (or even MSN, Google Talk and etc)

While everybody is having this cost-saving mission on their mind, it will be hard for enterprise computing implementation business because even though many companies reckon the need of enterprise solutions, many actually don't have budget for it. It is just too risky to actually make a P.O for a solution costing around RM80k because many small size companies actually survive on a business model of RM2 million revenue per annum. If we take average of RM1 million turnover per year, that is close to 10% of the revenue. Thus, this would actually make a case for software piracy to be on the rise again. For me in the private sector, I find that sometimes many have no choice but to rely on piracy to survive. Unless the government is willing to transfer other budget's area to offset the petrol price hike, survival must be self-defined by our own hand.

9th Malaysian Plan:
We are expected to hear from the government about 9th Malaysian Plan which the 8th plan will hit its due on 2006. Many ICT organizations are dependent directly on such allocations; MIMOS BHD, MDC (Multi-media development super-corridor) and etc. Should market inconsistency continue to persist, the government may decide to lower the budget for ICT sector and this will affect even more companies and even ICT jobs.




Mimos Bhd currently housed 1000 researchers who directly and indirectly contributed to many other activities among the ICT community. MDC on the other hand is responsible to facilitate many events which are offered free to MSC status company. The upcoming event is GITEX at Dubai. I do believed that participants are invited to take part for a fees of subsidised RM10K per company. Imagine all these luxuries being robbed away just because of the petrol prices, we must therefore continue to rely more faiths towards computer automations and Internet usage.

MiTV Malaysia new pay television operator

yahoo.... MiTV finally decided to show its debut by having a launching with a dinner function on September 5 2005 with PM, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. After that, they will offically offer it to the public on September 6 2005.

It is such a great pleasure to wait after a long period where people can finally enjoy cheaper cable TV services since Astro many years ago. Subcriptions will be much cheaper compared to Astro one because the technologies employed will be cheaper. According to the Edge, theirs is using a partly self-developed Internet protocol over ultra high frequency (IP-O-UHF), an amalgamation of Internet Protocol (IP) standards and digital broadcast standards. Essentially, MiTV will be broadcasting digital signals over the air using ground-based transmission towers.

Okay, so it is cheaper technology than Astro because the latter shoot directly from the space, whereas MiTV has localized transmission station all over the region. In term of economical sense, they don't have to cater for any market segment when there is no demand for it, thus saving overal cost. Meaning that, if there is high demand in Bangsar area, then only they will install on base station at the vicinity. Compared to Astro's technology, the cost of the service was meant to serve the whole nation - so to speak.

Basically, subscribers will be given and IP-based set-top box and UHF antenna because the signal will be encoded in Internet protocol standards even though it is not going through the copper wire. (Quite confusing right)... anyhow, it is quite a smart move for them because they did consider the fact that evetually, everybody will be enjoying entertainment through the IP-based internet directly to their PC instead of TV. Thus, what they are having is merely to conquer the market before such phenomenon is realized. Smart strategy.

They also recommeded that subscribers must have existing broadband connection in case their base station is not functioning, you can still use the Internet for watching contents (I am just guessing).. but the main reason is that you need to use the Internet for interaction with the program, such as paying subscription fees (which would be via prepaid basis) and selections of contents or packages. Another Win-win situation for the telcos..

Biggest Revenue
Of course the biggest revenue will go to MiTV where they actually looking at securing 100K customer based by the end of one financial year. Yahoo, this gives the content developers ample time to produce better contents and also my bet is that there will be a lot of revenues for IT contractor looking to develop applications for the IP-based Set-top box. Let's assume that the IP-based set-top box will be JVM enabled, many developers will get to earn a good money for each service. What they needed is a compiler which can produce Java Bytecode.

Potential applications are:
1. We assume that installation will not be costing more than RM 2K (average cost of a PC) because there are many people in Malaysia might not be able to afford a PC yet (Malaysia RM2K per capital is around 14% currently), thus they might be looking at using the IP-based set-top box as alternative to PC. Therefore, if this is true, they will need applications like web browser, fax software and even telephony software for use on the box.
2. Contents management software and etc.
3. Firewall & security software.
4. Educational software to leverage on the contents.

While the prepaid card seller might be able to enjoy new merchandiszing, software developers will wait for such excitement to happen.

dark side of the corporate world

There are some people trying to convince the Malaysian government to censor the Internet and they based their reasons on availability of sexual material.

It is not doubtful to conclude that sexual material is bad for the society especially for the underages, besides being physically not ready for it, underages would usually have more time to explore new things and thus are exposed to greater dangers of sexual aggressions.

Frankly speaking, adult like me, even though have the access to sexual material in the Internet, the likelihood of being infatuated by it is lower simply because of the following reasons:
1. I have not enough time.
2. Making money is more important to me than anything.
3. I understand the economical consequences of falling prey to sexual misbehaviour.

But with all due respect, I still feel that the Internet cannot be censored due the following reasons:
1. Internet is the last place on earth which promises real confessions and unfiltered informations. The fact that most of Malaysia popular newspaper are government controlled, where do we find our break ?
2. Censoring the Internet is corruption because it is biased then.
3. Censoring the Internet is not democracy but dictatoring.

Surprising, the United States of America (USA) despite being known as fighter of human rights and protector of democracy allows it corporation to impose sanctions employees' blogging activities.

Even though this issue is not at the tip of the iceberg yet, but it is fast gaining momentum. Based on current scenario, we can conclude that:
1. The USA corporate world is corrupted one.
2. Corporate image is a very fragile thing. The bigger the corporation, the easier it can break.
3. Messages came from corporate web sites are not 100% honest.

I want revenge	Dark side force is so powerful that some considered unatural

--------------evaluation-------------------
1. why Internet cannot be censored?
2. how honest can corporation be ?
3. can you trust the newspaper or blogs?
-----------------------------------------------

dual-core processor

Intel and AMD has launched the dual-core concept processor. Not very far from its launching, we are starting to hear a lot about this new technology.

According to Star-Intech, the idea of dual-core processor is something which sidelined from Moore's law where the objectives is to double the size of transistor within a single slab of the processor. Dual-core processor on the other hand, takes advantage of leveraging.

The objectives:
To provide immediate advantages for people looking to buy systems that boost multitasking computing power and improve the throughput of multithreaded applications.

The applications:
Intel reckons that this technology will be widely used for the next generation gaming industry.
These efforts will fuel gaming software and features such as physics, artificial intelligence, character animation and world simulation that can take advantage of multiple CPU cores and threads. Intel® Pentium® Processor Extreme Edition that also includes Intel Hyper-Threading Technology, providing the ability to process four software "threads," and the Intel® 955X Express Chipset, formerly codenamed "Glenwood."

why four software threads ? I thought our current computing environment is already multi-threaded ? I can develop a multi-threaded application as well.

Actually, what they mean is probably something lower level. It is in fact due to the reason that each core has two memory cache and thus dual-core has four memory cache(s). Refer to the following diagram for your amusement, originated from AMD.



How they do it:
Ideally, it is achieved by achieving a greater speed of the in("1") and out("0") of electrical signal within a single moment. Their problem is that by using copper as the medium for electrcial signal transmission, the speed of trasmission has almost reached the cornerstone. And by continuously packaging more transistor into a single slab, the amount of heat generated is tremendous. Dual-core concept was then initiated where the circuit-pattern within a single processor slab is shortened by half and thus giving up to double partition concept. This is not a straight foward thing, there are many ways to achieve this reality which involved many complexities.

The dual-core concept is the initiative towards multi-core concept. Intel is also working towards using optical element to replace copper as electrical transmission medium. Nevertheless, existing optical components, which are made out of such exotic semiconductors as gallium arsenide and indium phosphine, are far too expensive for use in individual computers or even local networks. They have identified the solution to use silicon for the components and thus scientist at Intel is researching into creating silicon-laser; silicon photonics. (Creating optical signal from silicon) - Technology Revew Inc

One would never appreciate this if not for being a game developer. Perhaps you can find out from the pioneer game developer in Malaysia; Gamebrains.

Economical wise, dual-core processor should be cheaper than single core processor because it will offer better sales on top of a efficient manufacturing practice. Means that if people actually create demand for it, this should be realized. But which consumer is going to appreciate buying dual-core than single ? is all this marketing hype ?

we definitely need expert commentary from game developers.

3G services for bank

with reference to the news "celcom and maxis to provide 3G to maybank2e.net"

I thought it was a pretty stupid news because of the following:
1. Why would maybank need to partner with these people when it is expected that if you want to access Maybank2e.net via 3G, you would either engage with one of them?
2. Maybank2e.net has been around for 3 years, it is claimed that currently there are around 4k registered user. If they find that 4K is not a good number, why take so long to make noise?
3. Must maybank rely on Celcom and Maxis for creating awareness ?

I have been trying to figure out, for the fact that even though this is a win-win situation, but who is helping who ? who wins more than the other?

It could be Maybank helping these two telcos because 3G is not expected with heavy adoptions for at least another year. Let's not try to guess why Maybank want to help but if it really does, why Maybank2e?

It could be Telcos helping Maybank.. but since maybank2e have been around for the last 3 years.. if they are not happy with the ROI, why wait until now?

Then I remember one blog from Asian Mobile Tech which states the following:

I am aware of the condition of mobile application developers of today as he related his company's business model. Since more than 70% of the use of mobile phone is still concentrated on voice, the demand to use data applications on the mobile phone has yet to take off. Resulting in content developers not gaining much profit from providing mobile applications to companies and telcos. The situation is not helped with telcos eating up all GPRS traffic which is where the bulk of the revenue is from while the CP will share only a protion of the SMS or wap contents delivered.

Based on this statement, it is true that telco only care about bulk revenue from the traffic. And they will try to do anything to get more people to contribute a bigger traffic.

and if we analyse this topic again, you would find the following statement:

Muhamad Umar said the bank was concentrating on its business users because the amount of data transferred back and forth in a business environment was higher than that in personal online services like Maybank2u.net.

I got it..
Thus I feel that this should have happened.
1. Since Maybank2e.net is for corporate, and thus high amount of traffic is expected.
2. High amount of traffic means end-user spend more money online.
3. Maybank will be given certain commission based on the traffic volumn.
4. By purchasing maybank2e.net, probably end-user would get free 3G access for a certain period.

Conclusion:
Maybank is helping Telcos in hope that it will also earn some commission too from the 3G traffic generated from Maybank2e.net applications. The telcos needed this to boost its 3G initiative.

Telcos (Maxis and Celcom) are leaders of the field. At their level, they are always hoping for more traffic to be realized. They can simply add servers to cater for extra needs.

Where doesn the money come from?
From the end-user because the whole partnership programme is to bring in more revenues for those involved(maybank + telcos). And thus when someone actually can access maybank2e via streamyx, but choosed to access maybank2e.net via 3G, then basically it is feasible. They are not going to create new customer but just to rob it from streamyx.

So end-user would be paying the extra cost which would be shared among Maybank and the Telcos.

Windows XP too slow

I was invited by someone to rescue her Windows XP PC which she claimed to be very really really slow.

Okay, if it is just because of slow responsiveness, she wouldn't have called me either. The whole affair was started off last week when she claimed that after having installed AVG antivirus as recommended by me, she couldn't utilize Outlook Express to receive email via pop.streamyx.com

I am not sure what happened, but it was okay when I got to the place. So apparently, I thought that this job would be really simple, despite the fact that a trojan was detected by Norton Antivirus 2005; trojan.webus.G

I don't know what it is, by it pointed to a file called install.exe located at 'documents & settings" folder. My experience with trojan isn't something delightful, I used to spent hours just to get one trojan removed. However, for this occasion, I just hard-delete the file install.exe and it seems like everything was okay.

I told her that everything should be okay now. She insisted that the PC is really slow and I thought she was just simply being silly.

Branded HP PC
Pentium 4 2.6Mhz
256 MB (266 DDR SDRAM)

But the funny thing is that it is really slow, just like Win 98 days and I wonder why.

I launched the Windows Task Manager to find out leads about what is happening to the memory management of the PC. It seems like only the following processes monopolized the memory:

1. Explorer.exe
2. CCAPP.exe (Norton)
3. avgdw.dat (AVG)
4. SCVHost

So, there wasn't any malicious program running at the background. Then I thought that I should just disable Norton Antivirus since they are not planning to subscribe for the virus definition updates anyway. So I did, launched the application and start to disable everything features. It was at one juncture which I notice this feature "scan files on load-up".

After disabling NAV, I restarted and it seems like the system was looking for it. I had no choice but to totally uninstall it.

After rebooting the PC, it showed tremendous improvement in speed. Then I also noticed that she planted many shared folders on the desktop and that is it, I found the answer. The one responsible for slow-responsiveness is not the fact which NAV uses memory but it is because during boot-up, NAV is forced to scan through all those files in the folder. And for god sake, the total size for all shared folders on the desktop is 6.4 GB. So basically, the PC is tortured with 6.4GB of scanning everytime during boot-up. Now, with NAV dissappeared, no scanning is imposed on those desktop-sitting folders. And the boot-up process showed improments.

Then I thought, why are thse people so lame, why can't they just put them in C drive or etc. Why must they be so "leceh menyusahkan".. then as I was clicking all over the places..i found the real culprit; Windows Desktop Search.

I am not sure what imspired them so much to have utilized Windows Desktop Search, but those people who came out with the idea must be really brainless. Look at what happen now:

1. Someone placed 6.4 GB data on the desktop so that it can be searched thoroughly.
2. A HP branded PC with Pentium 4 2.4 GMhz and 256 machine running on Windows XP is more compatible to Win 98 systems.
3. Someone like me have to spend hours figure out why is new computer slower than my AMD desktop.

But the fact is that, after testing on Windows Desktop Search, I find that it is quite efficient as well. It can basically search through all documents with specific term. Take a look at the following:



It can search through all contents on the desktop which contains "celeb" and other places including emails and etc. So, files must not really reside on Desktop. It is because of the name "Windows Desktop Search" which gives rise to confusion. There is no need to keep all files on the desktop which is bad for loading especially if you are using Norton Antivirus which has a feature called "Scan files on load-up". For files to be appeared on desktop, it has to be loaded up.
-------------------------Evaluation----------------------------
1. Why do people complain that newer PC is slower than your older one?
2. why do people like to place folders on the desktop?
3. Is NAV considered smart of stupid to have implemented the feature of "Scan all files on load-up" when someone whould actually places all files on the desktop?
---------------------------------------------------------------

SYOB - Start your own business

If you are jobless for a few months.. money is running out.. what do you do ?

If you have an ICT degree or something.. don't worry about it because MDC-TDF has a solutions. They called it SYOB lar.

But funny thing is that they still want you to pay for the 5 days course. Well, this is subjective but haven't they thought about the fact which you already have not much money left, more rather one would have to travel to CyberJaya for the course.

But, I have attended one of such course and it is fruitfull. Not only the exposure to cyber activities, contacts and events, one would really get a hang of how to secure OPM (Other People's Money) such as the government's money. In the MSC world, it is very common to get financial assistant in term of grants. There are many grants around, including the RM 1 Million grant from MATRADE for your branding purposes.

Another good thing is that if they(MDC people) like you a lot, you would be given special priviledge in term of referral service. I heard that they might also able to put you within those incubator center such as on near MMU. It is a very nice building with a garden at the middle. I am sure you will like it one.

These grants, although most of them cannot be utlized for fixed salary, but it can help with cash flows and supplementary. What really needed from you is a good business plan and intuitive for entreprenuership.

So ICT graduates, don't worry lar. You will be fine one. Like me, I am still surviving good.
--------------------------evaluation----------------------
1. when company got not enough money then what you can do ?
2. how do most MSC-status companies survive?
----------------------------------------------------------

RFID in Malaysia part 1

last few months, I was indeed looking for jobs related to RFID.. but nobody give a damn a bout me.. maybe they are looking for engineering kind of people. Fine with it.. and why on earth do IT evangelist like me care about RFID ?

simply because it seems like getting hotter and bigger. I have talked to couple of people and they told me it is very old technology, well i agree but perhaps we should say it is expensive technology. We are waiting for the time when we can walk out of supermarket Giant without queing up at the payment counter.

Currently, RFID applications are:
1. Your car security controller. That is already RF.
2. Car imobilizer. -
3. MBF credit cards - Visa Wave (it is RFID)



What we can do now is to do transaction with the credit card without given the card to the cashier for security reason. They might swap it twice or copy the details.

The cards which I received from MBF has three features:
1. Visa Wave (only applies to Visa card) - RFID technology
2. EMV - Europe -Master-Visa. According to the web site, this is a joint program between Master card and Visa card where they established standard of encryption for the chip. Making it harder for duplication in case of stolen card. But I don't think this security feature applies as far as e-commerce transaction.
3. Countdown initiatives - It is actually a mechant program. The name is catchy though becoz it gives impression about hype and that something is going to happen when I thought it already happened.

But despite being so high tech, shortfalls still persist. One of it is the customer service.

I received the cards via Post Laju, which is good because it solves all the hassles (car petrol, queing) including card activations. yes, I strongly believe that since they embarked on this totally non-intervention program where there won't be any personnel from MBF cards to call you up and check with you "Sir, have you received your cards. Pls when you do, call us for activation.." Otherwise, they wasted the Post Laju cost.

So in another words, this act sort of empowers the following services:
1. That Post Laju is indeed reliable and secure. (MOU between Post Laju and MBF cards have been signed where Post Laju will bear all cost in case of security breach)
2. EMV is powerful. (Not really, EMV is only meant to prevent credit card duplication)
3. The automation process is realiable and proven. (This is quite subjective but congratulation to them)

Anyhow, I still find it risky to use the card directly, as I was looking for the appropriate customer service number to call, I wonder that "why don't they also include MSN, Yahoo, ICQ or SKYPE" service as part of the customer service ? I eventually sent them an email to customer.service@mbfcards.com

Also, they should have a VOIP driven global number so that anyone can contact them around the world. Perhaps the technology is not ready, because they need a lot of hunting line for that particular number. I am wondering... couldn't Asterisk solve the problems ?

----------------------evaluation--------------------------------
1. Banks is not using a fully VOIP PBX yet ?
2. More RFID devices should be bubbling soon, this is good for embedded computing.
3. would the customer service email channel able to respond fast?
4. Banks reckon that credit facilities will give them big revenue.
----------------------------------------------------------------

what is embedded computing

If you try to search at whatis.com, you won't find the answer, because basically there is no such term. But why not ? Are they stupid ? You can actually get the definition of "embedded system" from whatis.com.

And since Embedded system is some combination of computer hardware and software, either fixed in capability or programmable, that is specifically designed for a particular kind of application device. Industrial machines .. thus embedded computing is the process of creating embedded system.

Here is my brief and straight to the point interpretation of Embedded Computing.

Embedded Computing is more like specialized computing. Basically different companies defines it differently, Microsoft defines it using Windows CE/XPe and its development tools.

In a generic sense, Embedded Computing is about creation of a computing system for device (Embedded Device) which serves a specific purpose. Why specific purpose? Because it is a device. Therefore, we are talking about hardware manufacturing; which is actually producing the motherboard or PCB. And if you can develop the hardware, what about software? Usually there can only be firmware, but with Embedded computing, you get to have an OS built-in to the devices and thus having the ability to write application as software instead of firmware.

The following are examples of Embedded Devices:

1. Gateways.
2. Instrumental and industrial automation.
3. Windows Mobile and Windows Embedded devices.
4. Kiosks / ATM operating system platform.
5. Medical design and system.
6. Network consumer electronics.
7. Points of service terminal.
8. Projectors and large screen display.
9. Set-top boxes.
10. Specialized servers.
11. Thin client devices.
12. VOIP devices.
13. Windows Automotive.

These are taken from http://www.windowsembeddeddevices.com/

Let's take one example, VOIP devices. Let's say you have a CISCO VOIP switch which supports for Windows CE/XPe. If you need to program it so that whenever it detects your girlfriend voice, it will allocate more bandwidth to it. This is made possible by Embedded Computing.

Now the next question is what about JVM, do we need JVM for Embedded Computing?

The fact is that Windows CE/XPe, like Palm OS and Symbian are OS for Embedded Devices. Of course, I know that Cisco routers are running on its own O.S, but there are other VOIP devices which support Window CE/XPe.

Now, JVM is a byte-code specification meant for multi-platform usage. Thus, if you intended to write an application for all platforms mentioned above, the first thing you do is to write a program which generates a binary which is understood by JVM. Then, make sure that device's O.S support JVM. Take a look at the following JVM supported devices.

And how do you make sure that device's O.S support JVM?
-->You need to get a separate installation to do it, by purchasing the software from some vendors or through OSS.

Thus, JVM sits on top of Embedded System's OS which sits on top of the hardware.



Therefore, we should write more application based on JVM specification; for instance, Java byte-code is current the defacto now.
--------------evaluation-----------------------------
1. what is the difference between windows CE and JVM?
2. how does JVM work?
3. what is the connection between JVM and other platform such Palm OS and Symbian?
4. JVM doesn't always means java, it is related to Java Bytecode where Java Bytecode is based on JVM specification.
--------------------------------------------------------

how to know what would happen to computing world

recently i started a new job doing marketing for a software research house at Malaysia's very own Silikon Valley, it is called Lemboh Silikon.

One of my job is to create marketing and business strategies, although my CEO will override my proposal, I get to propose anyway.

I am not going to tell you our product this time.. but during my brainstorming session, I was evaluating what is the best way for me and others to judge my strategies for accuracies ?

As the thoughts are being pondered, I came to realized that the right way is to get second opinion. Means that instead of thinking what is right for us, I should check out what the market leaders would say about future happenings and it would be appropriate for me to try to adapt in. I mean, I got to be realistic, that I am nobody, and whatever things I said doesn't really matter. Just trying to be heard.

So, I guess I am pretty smart on this. Take a look at what the following people are working on:
1. Jamas Gosling (Creator of Java) - Currently working on a software project called Jackpot; semantic computing model. Basically, semantic modeling is trying to restructure everyhing into nodes; mother and child sort of relationship. Where there cannot be an exact clone of something in the system, it has to be a new breed with different attributes or refered back to the one already existed. In a way, the objectives is to try to create a closed-ended system.
2. Steve Jobs (CEO of Apple) - He is actually focusing on podcasting and lifestyle of iPod. But actually he is not exposing the future plans.
--> Check out my previous post about podcasting.
3. Bill Gates (Microsoft) - The last time I blogged him was about quantum computing, where you are trying to mimic quantum dynamics into computer science. Recently, he is actually focusing on Compu-taintment. Basically, they are trying to bring more contents from TV to PC.

So, I guess MiTV is moving at the right direction, but what happen to them now?

small enterprise business model

with rising petrol cost and everything, life is getting tougher indefinitely. Some people opted for side business such as MLM, insurance and etc.

I have always been wondering if it is possible for everybody to own a business, then where do we find clients?

This world has 3% rich people and the only reason they are rich is because they make money from 97% of people in this world. Now that is really cheap isn't it? but they are smart to realize that before you.

Thus I have this idea for the rest of 97%, where you basically need a sort of automation content management system. It basically leverages on the advertising industry, where there are three components:

1. Advertiser - upload contents (clip, picture, messages) and pay for it.
2. end-user - look at the contents and earn credits (credits are used for services)
3. service provider - Provide services such as VOIP, contents, games and etc for a fee.

The job of the content management is to automatically receive those contents, organize them and pay each party accordingly. For instance, advertiser pays RM100 for an ads, where RM50 is to be divided for service provider while another half for the company running the content management system.

and I have reason to believe that this will work and it is already working. Someday, the excitement of Google's adsense as well as that provided by Yahoo will slacken. Like it or not, the need for advertising will remain and audience is always hungry for something new to break the monotomy of boredom.

Try to take a look at similar business; ifilm which is showing good successes.

Try to watch the movie which is in a way very ingenius. This short film; "balancing point" shows that it is really possible to super-impose videos or images without much glitches. If you study it carefully, you will know that the movie director started off every scene with a stone structure. Then he got one actor to collapse it and captured every moment of the destruction. That actor is importatnt as the focal point to recontruct the reverse-engineering.

Thus, if you are going to run similar business, where the advertisers will pay for everything, there is no need to worry about zero-contents or boring-contents because end-user technology has reach maturity to a certain level.

what amazes you would do for others

Real traffic coming from the search engines really amazes me. Take a look statistic from site-meter.

Search Engine	Keywords
Google	what is realtek rtl8139/810 family fast ethernet
Google	hotlink active 5
Google	realtek rtl8139/810
Yahoo	reconfigure zte modem
Google	"67.19.185.246" -O15
Yahoo	hotlink 3G
Google	"What is podcast"
Google	hitb 2005 september
Yahoo	marcus evans sucks (I think this job is done by Marcus Evans’ own IT Auditors, to safeguard their Internet publicity.)
Yahoo	MCMC is under Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation
Yahoo	problem internet using handphone
Yahoo	trojan horse dropper.small 15.h
Yahoo	how to share a topup with hotlink

Conclusion:
This proves that what puzzles you will puzzle other people as well. And for the sake of creating quality blog, these are the contents which are qualified for it.

For instance, if you are having problems configuring Streamyx ZTE modem, others would face the same problem and might search for it online. And if you so happened to have documented it and got it indexed to search engines... voila.. you become a publisher.

-------------evaluation-----------------------
1. how to create quality blog?
2. how people define quality blog?
3. is quality blog same as popular blog?
4. can the concept of quality blog be manipulated?
---------------------------------------------------

How to make money as blogger

I have been thinking and exploring.. I know there are professional bloggers out there, but what if we can really collect some money from our blog, since so much effort been done on it.

Either we like it or not, tech blogger like me is helping companies with free advertisements. So far, I have been writting evaluations about the following companies:
1. Maxis, Celcom, Digi
2. Redtone
3. IBM, Microsoft, SUN.
4. Mpages.com.my
5. Blinklist
6. Google, Yahoo, MSN.
7. Many more.

It is without doubt that having contents related to such companies also helps to raise its popularity. For instance, using Yahoo, if you search for "hotlink active 5", you would be landed with a result from IT-Sideways at the fifth spot. So yeah, I actually have some real traffics coming from nowhere due to my contents. This also bring about the issue of whether writting quality content is more important than famous content.

And to make money from these companies, firstly we need to investigate the cyber law. One thing is very important, we need to investigate the legality of write-up on others behalf. If it is legal, then we need to find out to what extend we can write about them which makes us not liable for any legal proceedings. I think Cyberlaw is regulated by MCMC.

If all goes well, then we can make money from them.
1. We can deliberately write something which is not accurate. Those companies' PR might have to login to pay in order to provide for comments.
2. There must always be a free comment part, thus what we can do is that whoever wants to claim as PR of that company, they would have to login first. Non-login's comment would be condoned as unprofessional.

For instance, we can write that "Hotlink Active 5" allows for 3 favourite numbers to be registered. Then Maxis PR would come in and correct it "Hotlink Active 5" allows for 5 favourtie number.

I am sure this would stir up a lot of issues. Why don't we try, maybe we can land on front page of newspaper?

WAP application

WAP - Wireless application protocol has always been the controversial one. It is supposed to allow people to browse web sites hosted on the Internet. WAP pages are basically hosted as Web pages in the Internet. Thus, you would need to have Internet connection to your handphone first.

During the dot-com days, it was ignored because not many handphones actually supported WAP-browser. I remember the first one to support it was Nokia (the one with the roller and usually green colour).



Just as phone manufacturers set the path right for WAP, it was again sidelined by SMS. Those were during year 2002-2003, when everybody was pretty much crazy about SMS. Companies began developing SMS server for gaming and you have people trying to do everything using SMS which includes divorce.

Now, with 3G being the hot issue currently, WAP is slowly planning its revenge again and it might succeed this time.

Although many mobile phone users are still pretty much 2.5 G(GPRS) enabled, most phones are already WAP enabled. It is still quite expensive to surf a WAP page using your handphone if you are using normal prepaid services from the Telco, but there is no reason for companies not to start building up its WAP site. (Means web site with WAP interface as well)

We assume that many companies and retailers already have a basic web site. And for them to expose a WAP interface is not really that hard, because what simply needed is merely conversion of HTML codes to WML codes; which can be done in line per line basis.

Benefits of having WAP interface:
1. Mobile advertisement. You can now use your web site as advertisement instead. This is good for those who cannot afford television's commercial or billboard. Engage with some SEO people to help you with improving your site searchability. We are also expecting some WAP-page aggregators and portals to appear by then.
2. Mobile ECommerce. This will be a direct competition to Mobile Money suggested by Redtone. Because Mobile Money basically will tie up with the banks for transaction purposes; means anything will be deducted from your account with reference to a bank. For mobile ECommerce via WAP, you are basically purchasing from a retailer through its web site's payment gateway.
Why would one do that ?
--> 2a. Probably that would be cheaper than walk-in.
-->2b. Probably you don't want to queue up.
-->2c. Probably you hate the sales girl.
-->2e. You have reason for privacy.
3. Business efficiency. Customer can actually use the WAP interface for merchandize reservations which would cater for "drive-through" point-of-sales. This is bad for social science but good for computer science.
4. Many more.



Recently I found this company MPages.com.my; developer of the mobile equivalent of yellow pages. They will charge companies looking to register with them for a yearly fee and end-users will get to browse the listing free of charge. (You only need to bear the cost of Internet acccess via your handphone)

Their idea is much trickier, where by subscribing to their listing service, subscriber don't really need to have a WAP page. What you could provide is basic information like company names, address, phone and etc. Depending on the subscription fee, this is even a greater cost-saving for those interested to have mobile existence in the electronic medium.

-----------------evaluation-----------------------
1. what is left more for web page developer ?
2. How can web pages being leveraged for advertisement?
3. would eCommerce take off after 3G?
4. It is feasible for the idea of "one business one web site" ?
5. More revenues for web site development ?
-------------------------------------------------

Blogshares

Hi guys... have you check out Blogshares...

Check out IT-Sideways blogshares valuation. Opss.. this blog used to call "brandon & I.T" and the crawler of blogshares never did update its database with title changed.

I used to think what are they up to ? what is their plan ? Would they make us more famous ?

Now I got at least one answer.. I strongly believed that they are trying to earn money by having the blog's owner (people like me) to be actively involved in trading. I haven't gone through the legality and transaction processes.. but I figure there could be some revenue for them.

Nevertheless, based on its information.. I could see that the following referral really did help me with getting indexed to search engines.

1. News & Weather from Vleeptron
2. Selamber.com
3. wadd blog
4. Syiok's Blog
5. Tan's Family & associates

Check out yours too.

SEO Status Report 2

SEO is fun and time consuming :)

On the 4th August 05, Google demoted me from No.1 to No. 12 for the search-term "IT-Sideways". I am not sure why, but take a look at the screen shot.

And if you would notice, it could be due to its algorithm.

Reverse-Psychology Google’s Algorithm:
Google’s algorithm is trying to understand why you are searching for and return the best result based on what it feels is the most accurate.

As you can see, according to Google, “it-sideways” is should means “it sideways” and it should be best matched as [verb] + “it sideways”. i.e “do” + “it sideways”

That is why those with this pattern got listed first.

Thus, my next plan is to edit the Meta Tag so that it bears things like:
1. "Do it sideways"
2. "Bite it sideways"
3. "hold it sideways"
4. "kill it sideways"

But before I could do that, searching for "IT-Sideways" landed me on top-spot again.



MSN: Gone up ladder. Now No.29 for "tech blog"



Yahoo: Gone up ladder, now no. 132 for "tech blog"

We can’t have the exact answer, but I like to thank those who added link to my URL such as:

1. Syiok’s Blog
2. Tan Family & Associates. – Took me into MSN.
3. Who else ? please let me know.

One thing I noticed. By constantly adding comments to the famous TechGadgetBlog-LiewCF.com would contribute as well because LcF has this thing called the “Recent comments”. Thus, whenever crawler did to the site (LcF site), definitely my URL would be noticed because it is on the main page. But hey, this is not illegal and unethical right ? This is just a revelation. It is only unethical when I make nonsense comment where as long as I read the blog’s contents and make comments out of it, I would be fine.



One of the reason IT-Sideways is listed well in Yahoo is due to its on going real search traffic coming from nowhere, means that people actually search for something and ended up to IT-Sideways. Take a look at the report from site-meter.



If you notice, most of it coming from Yahoo and the keywords are:
1. mc orange institute Malaysia
2. dtours.exe
3. VOIP in Malaysia
4. Marcus evans sucks
5. SAP solution manager
6. TM Touch
7. SimplyFired – Thanks to Syiok’s blog
8. customer complain on GIANT supermarket shah alam
9. benefits of streamyx to telecommunication businesses in Malaysia
10. wimax in Malaysia

Ok. Today is not a bad SEO day for me. Thanks guy.

Got fired and what is next

I am not sure this would work.

There is this web site SimplyFired which allows people to post their stories of being fired from work or some unsatisfactory's treatment by employer, partly to vent anger and then to calm down, also to win some kind of competitions.

Maybe Donald Trump is part of it because of the word "You are Fired".

Of course, SimplyFired is also providing head-hunting & job placement services, which I felt that it is quite a smart way for them to attract people, without advertising. (I am also helping them to do advertising now)

Would it work for serious company like "Jobstreet", "JobsDB", "Kellly Services" and etc? would they feel a threat and wanted also to bring in the sense of transparency to its corporate image? by having similar "posting-services" for its database of users. I think not..

However, many(conventional head-hunter companies) reckons that having a web site which is similar to JobStreet would help them with a lot of problems. But they have no budget for it and many actually been thinking of doing DIY. So probably they should attend "how to make ecommerce website" for a start.

Contents faciliated by Syiok's blog

--------------------evaluation-------------------------------
1. Would it be better to perform transfer of knowledge than having service contract?
2. Many people reckons that IT is useful but are not ready to allocate budget for it.
3. Many people like to DIY (Do it yourself) for ICT matters.
4. Is getting formal education on ICT important for the future?
---------------------------------------------------------------

Search engine optimization status

I have been trying on SEO for 3 months now.. Just to give you some sharing on what I have found out.

Google just did a crawl today and it seems to have great effects. The Meta tags did help a lot.

This proves that to be searched via a unique key such as “IT-Sideways”, you need to make use of the Meta Tag.

However, to search with Google using “tech blog”, I am not even in the top 400.

Yahoo and MSN still haven’t perform its crawl since last week. Here is what they have cached on for IT-Sideways

MSN:



However, surprisingly IT-Sideways was listed as around no.32nd for the category “tech blog”



Yahoo:

IT-Sideways was listed as no. 199th for the category "tech blog"



Conclusion:
1. Must make the first contact, by having incoming links of your URL from others.
--> I have created around 200 incoming links via blog’s comment.
2. Categorization using Meta Tag. For instance, if you want to be categorized as “tech blog”, then the Meta Tag must contain that term.
--> You can download my Meta Tag from the source code. (I followed many from www.techblog.org)
3. Use pageRank to move up the ladder.
--> Google, MSN & Yahoo seems to behave differently for this aspect.

Let’s not also forget that I have submitted my entry to the following aggregators services.
1. Technorati
2. Feedburner
3. Project Petaling Street.

These three services could have inadvertently helped to propagate my URL (brandonteohno1-it.blogspot.com) amongst the crawlers. But I can’t give you a yes and no answer, just maybe.
The following blog provides alphabetical listings of directory for your incoming links submission.

http://seo-forum-watch.blogspot.com/

Go try out..

thanks for reading this tech blog :) (if you keep repeating the word tech blog over here, it probably wouldn't help)

how to build ecommerce web site - seminar

For those of you guys out there wanted to learn about building eCommerce web site, or integrating eCommerce facilities to your web site. You may be interested to attend the following seminar.

Instant I.T - Anyone can do it

I looked at the contents and thereafter, having contacted the person in charge - Mr. Melvin Wong, I was enlightened with the following facts.

By paying just RM399, participants would get the first hand knowledge on:
1. How to make connection to e-payment facilities such as credit card and maybank2u.
2. How to setup a shopping cart on top of your existing web site or new one.
3. Build newsletter.
4. Users registration.
5. Banner & advertisement services.



The Secret:
As most you technical guys out there, you would have guessed that there must be some kind of engine involved. This engine, according to Mr. Melvin wong, is quite similar to a CMS (content management system) but yet it is customized for eCommerce. What they would do is to pass you a CD on the software(engine) for just RM399 and then perform demonstration on how to use it for your web site.

P/S: This is just an 8 hours seminar which focuses on knowledge exchange, you are not expected to build the web site on the spot. Thus, this would be most suited for the following target audience.

1. Existing web site developers who have no exposure to eCommerce.
2. Budding web site developers who wanted to learn more about eCommerce.
3. Layman - Someone totally new to web site who wanted to learn about the in and out of web site building.

Organized by one of Malaysia's pioneer in Internet technology mobile services - Just Mobile.

My Recommedation:
Personally I am interested to attend as well, because for this 8 hours, you get to ask a lot of questions about web site, eCommerce and even SEO to the trainers and expect to get a lot of industrial advice from them. This would be better than trying to read numerous book on similar topic. On the average, one book would cost you around RM150.00

Besides that, by paying just RM399, you get to know the trainers and chances are high where you can continuously email them in the future to get "Free Consultation".