Philip Khor » internet

The Need To Shout It Out

Philip Khor — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 00:06:43 +0000

Update: The state of 4G [Ars Technica]

As a marketer, as an advertiser of a product or service, often times we have to shout out half-truths to sell our product. It is a fact. We do it seemingly quite often these days, ignoring the little prick from our conscience. Eventually it shapes our personality and individual actions towards one another. It is quite a scary thought.

What really grinds my gears is the public misinformation being spread by corporations nowadays which feeds on lack of knowledge on technical issues. Take 4G internet for example.

While Wikipedia acknowledges there are “loose usages” of this term, just like when 3G was first introduced, 4G cellular system “must have target peak data rates of up to approximately 100 Mbit/s for high mobility such as mobile access and up to approximately 1 Gbit/s for low mobility such as nomadic/local wireless access”.

Let’s explore some Malaysian companies claiming to have 4G.

YTL Wimax (July 2010)

P1 WiMax (Around for some time)

(We’ve seen izzi’s banners, all claiming 4G)

Now for some real world tests.

Some providers are able to provide milliseconds worth of “BURST” speeds. So you’re loading a 100Kbyte typical website, it will be done in no time at all. Great demonstration of technology and if you’re a client, of course you will be convinced. Other’s cheat by using special logins which uncap their lines and gives special priority privileges on traffic.

When you go home and start using it, you find out your coverage is not that good. Because many people are connected to the same network node in your area, there is congestion. Worst of all, there are bandwidth quotas which are quite miserable. (Although I must admit some other countries like Australia are far worst in terms of quota)

How about 100 megabit speed? Pipe dream.

Do you know that in America, there is a difference in standards between AT & T (iPhone) 3G and Verizon’s 3G? If we go with our 3G sets there, we have to hook on to AT & T as Verizon’s standard uses a different frequency NOT compatible with our phones.

Likewise with Wimax. Intel who ships Wimax chips on their laptops are going with 802.16m (802.11 a/b/g/n is Wifi) The other 3GPP standard, telcos like it. There is no love between these two. Kinda like twins separated at birth, same idea, different ideals.

LTE Advanced standardized by the 3GPP
802.16m standardized by the IEEE

Telekom Malaysia has long been guilty of false advertising.

When Streamyx started, it was 384kb/s “BROADBAND” speed for a long time. The acceptable industry standard back then was 1.5mbit. And we know the legendary problems TM faced during the initial phases.

Today we get 1 - 4 mb/s depending on how much we are willing to pay. Truthfully, we are at a pretty good state. Now we got to bring down “latency” from 400 ms to <200 ms to the USA. Personally, I prefer an ISP with extremely good latencies instead of “apparent 50 Mbit download speeds”.

In the words of Steve Jobs, “Click *boom*. Click *boom*.” That’s how responsive I want my sites to load.

Thank you very much!

First time you met her

Philip Khor — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 23:21:15 +0000

Remember the first time, that you met, her.

It started up with a dial-tone, a series of telephone keypad beeps, a pulsating fax-esque (hah, betcha can’t pronounce that!) tones, then it all begin.

The negotiation. Its kinda like two lawyer arguing, roaring at each other back and forth in a course tone. When the Grandfather’s clock chime twice, you know you’re half way through.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen. I’m talking about the internet!

My first experience was on a RM 10k Apple Macintosh G3, the pre-iMac one. It was blazing fast! We pumped up the RAM from 32MB, to a whopping 96MB. We felt god-like.

Back in those days, IDD phone calls were damn expensive. My sister, who was studying in HELP KL created an account for me, it was philipkhor38@hotmail.com . Only problem was, she forgot to drop me an e-mail!

I was at my friend Nicholas Thien @NTMJ house, login to my account. (while waiting for my mac to arrive from cupertino)

It was about RM 4 per minute IDD rate: “Eh, che (sister).. “send” liao boey?” During that time, I also changed my default password to a 6-letter “m” word that a lot of you might know! Ha ha ha…

Ah.. the days of IRC, and ICQ “uh-uh”!

One of my e-mails back in 2001, educating my friends about the severity of junk / chain mails. Even back then I was this geeky technocrat.

Nov 2001 10:52:21 +0000
Subject: Re: ?
Heylo…..

Hmm… VERY SPENDID idea to SEND THIS JUNK CHAIN MAIL TO ME!

It may sound.. *ahem* sexy to send it out… but it’s CAUSING INTERNET TRAFFIC CONGESTION.

What I’m trying to say, is that, whenever you send ONE SINGLE MAIL to 13 different friends .. you ARE ACTUALLY slowing the Net down.

Here’s how. This e-mail is 33 K heavy! Your modem does 6K/s max. Basically, that’s 5 seconds of… web surfing, let’s say.. So, if you do the Maths, 5 seconds X 13 friends = 65 seconds of internet time surfing WASTED on your “CHAIN MAIL” forwarding!

Well, AT LEAST 13 friends x 33 K = 429 KiloBYTES (or 0.4 MB) of data traffic is wasted!

The main and bad intention of these CHAIN MAIL creators are simple. To PERSUADE “less informed” people to send this around the Net – at the same time, create what we call “Net congestion”. The INTERNET SLOWS DOWN.

PEOPLE’S MAILBOXES will be FLOODED with all these stuff. Hard Disk space is FILLED within hours (for E-mail providers such as Hotmail).

If chain mail is TOTALLY STOPPED, E-Speed (ADSL) could have been cheaper (Bandwidth is CHEAPER) and less servers are needed for people who FORWARD CHAIN MAIL… which in turn means LESS COST FOR EXPENSIVE SERVERS sending and receiving… CHAIN MAIL.

Of course, this is lovely and all but think twice before SPAMMING.

Love,
Pip

http://go.to/f3g

Date: Fri, 23 Nov 2001 10:52:21 +0000
Subject: Re: (2ND REPLY)
……..

Oh, and “the rest” shouldn’t be happy that you “revealed” their addies to someone.

Sorry if these replies are… not nice.. but then..
Just telling ya da facts! =)

One more reason not to FWD chain mail is because E-mail addresses are REVEALED. If you look at what you’ve just sent, hundreds of e-mail addresses are seen. What if your chain mail falls into the hands of porn operators (yes, there are such people).. or even.. EVIL people who deliberately subscribe LOTSA porn to your e-mail address.

THIS IS HOW DIRTY STUFF GETS TO YOUR E-MAIL ADDRESS..

STOP CHAIN MAIL NOW!

Sorry if u feel offended.
=)

Love,
Pip

Oh, and I had the best e-mail addresses back then!

>
>>From: Pip Khoon >>Reply-To: pip@spl.at
>>To: pkhor@mac.com
>>Subject: Heheh!!
>>Date: Fri, 28 Sep 2001 22:06:45 -0700 (PDT)
>>
>>29th September 2001 @ 1:05 pm
>>
>>Promise: I, Philip H.K. Khor will not go online until the 22nd October
>>2001. However, if I feel I would like to do so, I can – but with a 5 minute
>>limit per day.
>>
>>E-Signed: Philip
>>
>>P.S. Wanna join?

AU revoir, we are off to learn Font-say!

TM Net is pretty good

Philip Khor — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 23:01:23 +0000

Its been a common problem since the birth of DSL in Malaysia.

Everyone’s talking about it. Even kids in school says “TM Net sucks” before even knowing who they are!

Imagine the internet as the Federal Highway during rush hour. You got your Ferrari FXX, fuelled with V-Power to the brim ready to pedal to the metal! Well, you can’t.

Despite having the fuel (Data waiting to be downloaded), the vehicle (fast computer & servers on the other end), the limiting factor is the highway (internet pipe).

You see, internet bandwidth is VERY expensive. Even if you have one billion ringgit right now (that’s RM 1,000,000,000) you probably could buy yourself 2-3 pipes, each to Hong Kong and Singapore and one locally. Then what? You got lets say 3 x 100mbit of bandwidth at your disposal. And enough money to pay for the recurring data fees for 24 months. There goes a billion!

But you got to remember, the pipes only ship your data to these Point of Presence (POPs) or Internet Data Hotels. Beyond that, your data is at the mercy of the gods of the internet data handling and routing. Thankfully, the TCP/IP protocol has the intelligence to get your data all the way to its destination, with up to 30 hops. It travels through that much switches and servers before actually reaching the intended destination.

So why does Japan, Sweden, and dare I suggest, Singapore have uber fast internet connections?

1. Population density. Dense areas are ISPs wet dreams. The more people you can reach per square kilometer, the more people you can hook up to with minimal infrastructure costs.

2. Investment in technology. The telephone lines we are using are at least 50 years old technology. They may have been laid not long ago, but still, it is like the “Steam Engine” of computers from back then.

3. Management & Piracy. We are greedy people. When they say Unlimited internet access, it means we can waste. Because we paid for it! This model of all-you-can-eat internet access does not work anymore. Last time, it was okay because there wasn’t enough content. The only time we needed 1 megabit was downloading 10 MB patches. Instead of waiting 30 minutes, we get it done in 3 minutes. Nowadays everyone knows P2P, and ISPs are shitting bricks.

Once we solve problems 1-3, then we face the pricing issue. At RM 88 for 1mb/s, that’s DIRT CHEAP! Our ringgit is weak, so our bandwidth bidding power is also weak. Say Singapore is willing to pay higher for higher priority routing. They play WoW with Americans, getting 150ms… Malaysia only get 2nd choice bandwidth thus pushing our ping times to America to 250ms. Mind you, that’s not Transfer rate, rather the time for a frame of data to do a round-trip. That’s 67% faster than us!

If a Singaporean with 1mbit connection were set to do a set of common everyday task, like MSN, e-mail, Facebook and check the news, a 1 hour task would take a Malaysian 1 hour 45 minutes to complete just because of “latency”.

DSLreports.com is one of my favourite sites. It tells you the Broadband scene around the world. It has this cool feature that figures out where you are, and guesses your ISP and see what people are saying about this.

Our ISP is so slow they think its Wireless. Comment 1 is awesome. A “Wi-fi coffee shop” uses TM backbone. Comment 2, Dialup is hell, and he still wants that shit?

The most common problem is modem / computer settings.

Here’s a Pip Po Top Tip. If your friends complain of “slow internet access”, then them that they must be watching porn. When their computer is infested with malware, naturally it will bring down their internet access speeds!

P1 Wimax

Pippo — Fri, 15 May 2009 00:31:28 +0000

I got a brochure from this company selling WiMax in Klang Valley.

P1 Wimax, is it REALLY 42 times faster than dialup?

Ok, as we know, dialup is 56kbit/s, that is theoretically 8KB/s maximum. But lets put it at a real world 6KB/s performance. How does P1 WiMax stack up against good ol’ dialup!

Test A: Loading Google

Google is about 15KBytes of data. Simple maths would stipulate dial up can download it in under 3 seconds. Can P1 do it in 0.07seconds? Even to ping to google (malaysia) it would take about 0.07 seconds already, thats excluding downloading anything at all. I think we’re looking closer to 1.5 seconds. In which case, P1 is only 2 times faster than Dialup.

Test B: Loading CNN.com

CNN do not have local servers, but MIGHT have mirrors in Hong Kong. But lets say we’re connect to their server in the United States. And the site is 100 KB worth of images and media.

Dialup would take 17 seconds. Can P1 load it in 0.4 seconds as claimed by their brochure? Again, ping to USA would take 0.2 seconds, just to “find” the server.

Test C: MSN test

To send a message to a friend via MSN, it takes dialup exactly 1 second from pressing enter to appearing on a friend’s PC. Can P1 wimax make it 0.023 seconds? Faster than the speed of thought?

Test D: The 100 MB test

Downloading a 100MB file from a fast server. Ok, here, P1 might excel. My calculations show dialup will take about 5 hours. If P1 Wimax is able to deliver 2.4mbit full speed then it will only take 7 minutes. And yes, that makes it 42 times faster than dialup.

Ok, the speed tests are estimates but it does give a good idea on how fast the actual performance gains you will see.

In summary, P1 is not lying. They’re bloody fast.

But what does the number mean to you? Well, the above will really explain the TRUE picture.

On another note, I am designing and maintaining www.petroleo-services.com .. too bad my energi.my domain is not used. Any takers?

UTAR Admin Spammers are STUPID!

Pippo — Tue, 12 May 2009 23:43:04 +0000

I enquired about Masters programme in UTAR a year ago, and am in their mailing list.

Ok, firstly, its bad enough I’m receiving SPAM from you, but that I can filter and tolerate.

What I CANNOT tolerate is that you release my e-mail address to hundreds of people on the interweb. SCREW you UTAR. So in revenge, I hereby post out UTAR’s mailing list for the whole world to see.

I’m selling this list to TARGETTED SPAMMERS for RM 2 per active e-mail, I’m rich!!!!

KHONG@s.carsems.com.my, abbycyw@yahoo.com, abs_1226@yahoo.co.uk, adeline_kee@yahoo.com, aerinna_cly@yahoo.com.sg, albert.chong@yahoo.com.my, anniewk2308@hotmail.com, anomabdullahsani@gmail.com, bhavanee84@gmail.com, bubbly1112@yahoo.com, c_kar_ching@hotmail.com, chaisk@tm.net.my, chengweemeng@yahoo.com, chongly@mail.utar.edu.my, ckck37tan@yahoo.com, csz_scorpio@hotmail.com, don_tew@yahoo.com, ecfj@hotmail.com, ee_yin86@hotmail.com, esther_wyw@yahoo.com.sg, eswar_4@hotmail.com, eunice_csy83@hotmail.co.jp, feny15_wong@hotmail.com, gohsiaoyen@yahoo.com, haneko_515@hotmail.com, hyzhi_feld@yahoo.com, jane_swc@hotmail.com, jeffchan@tm.net.my, joey.son@axa.com.my, joey.soon@axa.com.my, jonathanchiam@hotmail.com, lai_clm@hotmail.com, lai_mary@hotmail.com, lcchung@paclease.com.my, lijingyi87@yahoo.com, lingcs@hotmail.com, lingyeen@yahoo.com, lolo_ola@yahoo.com, lui_py86@yahoo.co.uk, marilyn.liew@gmail.com, marilyn_95@hotmail.com, meimeiy2k@hotmail.com, minah021402@yahoo.com, nicolette_b9@yahoo.com, nikukis@gmail.com, nithi_anne@yahoo.com, nurson2003@yahoo.com, oimean@gmail.com, oneil_lim@yahoo.com, oph888oph@yahoo.com, orangeyt3ng@yahoo.com, osw2k@hotmail.com, p.komalah@yahoo.com.my, patricia@sirim.my, penny1610@gmail.com, poly_ng1127@yahoo.com, pooh_jasmin86@yahoo.com, qtchang1@yahoo.com, rillet2302@hotmail.com, romeo5739@yahoo.com, saamacho@yahoo.com, sanctuary.aura@gmail.com, sf_84only@yahoo.com, sflee@mmu.edu.my, sharon@aceipin.com.my, shenny_tan@yahoo.com, shuang6001@yahoo.com, siangyang.teo@gmail.com, simy-y@hotmail.com, sisi_ng@yahoo.com.hk, songpe@hotmail.com, soosing8@hotmail.com, stepfenny_nie@hotmail.com, tae_li@hotmail.com, tanaraj@unitar.edu.my, tendy80@yahoo.com, thinaw_ivy@yahoo.com, waiyee_1115@yahoo.com, whlee_85@yahoo.com, wwcarier@yahoo.com, yeeshing190786@yahoo.com.sg, yeh_shiuan@yahoo.com, yen2868@hotmail.com, yflew_12@yahoo.com, yifeng.wan@gmail.com, yogeswaran07@yahoo.com, zendelxex@gmail.com, zhumau@gmail.com, Beatree_01@hotmail.com, James_doremi2@yahoo.com, Tonychuakx@gmail.com, abdulghani@mmu.edu.my, abiramivelu@yahoo.com, ahlim76@yahoo.com, ahpao@hotmail.com, ailingfook1912@yahoo.com, akchan02@yahoo.com, ally_babyclown1707@hotmail.com, alvinblim@gmail.com, andystanza@hotmail.com, angela_cheok08@yahoo.com, angetan6176@gmail.com, april_fool38@yahoo.com, arsenalwai14@yahoo.com, awlsim@yahoo.com, benson9091@yahoo.com, bernard.hg.chuah@my.pwc.com, blackmike88@yahoo.com, catherine_cl1314@yahoo.com, cheelw@hotmail.com, chris.chng@hotmail.com, ckloh7076@gmail.com, cobbyhow88@yahoo.com, cofee_85my@hotmail.com, ctcctcctc@hotmail.com, davidlhw2@yahoo.com.my, dynastyyuan@hotmail.com, einsson@hotmail.com, elaine.ng248@gmail.com, ellieteoh@yahoo.com, enialelyn@yahoo.com, fnick25@hotmail.com, gouri@hla.hongleong.com.my, hartmiller7@hotmail.com, hoguekhoon@yahoo.com, hy_chiang1215@hotmail.com, hycarL_dino@yahoo.com, jasonqwh@hotmail.com, jimmy_none@hotmail.com, juliusyeoh@hotmail.com, kai_shi85@hotmail.com, karen_sonne@yahoo.com, kehwui@gmail.com, khoohp@gmail.com, kiranjeet.s@klk.com.my, lew_yee@yahoo.com, limileng@yahoo.com, lisa.wcho@gmail.com, llaisin@yahoo.com, lmwraymond@gmail.com, lys0703@gmail.com, mala_2226@yahoo.com, metzj_85@yahoo.com, ming23teng@yahoo.com, musnaliza@yahoo.com, mynisy@yahoo.com, narcissus760129@yahoo.com, ng_ch83@hotmail.com, nicholasooi1985@gmail.com, nisha_ab2003@yahoo.com, pei-ci@hotmail.com, peiyee0211@yahoo.com, pphy206@hotmail.com, reeve_yvk@yahoo.com, rsmlive@gmail.com, sanjit15@hotmail.com, santhus84@yahoo.co.uk, sao5corn@yahoo.com, scodrash_2@hotmail.com, shanice@thenextview.com, siawyi@hotmail.com, siewl23@hotmail.com, sisi_ng@yahoo.co.hk, sleepingbeauty_2705@hotmail.com, slsshiying@hotmail.com, smiley_shasi@yahoo.com, sp40084@yahoo.com, srikrsna_5@hotmail.com, sura_mis@yahoo.com, syoonvoon@hotmail.com, tam_yie@yahoo.com, transauwal@yahoo.com, undertaker-mvp@hotmail.com, vtym3@yahoo.co.uk, wangloochien@gmail.com, wee.khai.eu@my.abnamro.com, wehrit_lee@hotmail.com, wjs513@hotmail.com, xiong-89-frederick@hotmail.com, xjian1985@yahoo.com, xyph-keele_rynn@hotmail.com, yap_cs@hotmail.com, yengyew@hotmail.com, yingching_91@hotmail.com, yngjye88@hotmail.com, yong_ccy@yahoo.com, yuehhua17@yahoo.com, aiweisiow2000@yahoo.co.nz, bembi_007@yahoo.com, biboh83@yahoo.com, birdsvictim@yahoo.com, blintzbase@gmail.com, bonnie_castle21@hotmail.com, chellsy_loh@hotmail.com, chiaalvin@gmail.com, chong_meei_huey@yahoo.com, chun202@hotmail.com, clairy_lee@yahoo.com, crazy_suann@yahoo.com.sg, david982662000@hotmail.com, dirwinny.chong@gmail.com, edward@popularworld.com, est301020@yahoo.com, fatma_nzrn@yahoo.com, freyesosorio@hotmail.com, funnyaw@hotmail.com, gabchaik@gmail.com, genescsy@yahoo.com, gerald_ebenezer@yahoo.com, govin1955@yahoo.com, hansiang_1@hotmail.com, hk_clarinet@yahoo.com, hr_wong@servicefinder.com.my, ian_tps@hotmail.com, jac3968@yahoo.com.sg, jaclynn_har@yahoo.com, janechua77@gmail.com, jeansuekl@yahoo.com, jeeva28_physics@yahoo.com, jguntor@is-dept.com, jlquah@yahoo.com, joe.chong@atosorigin.com, josephinecyl_88@hotmail.com, karhui_tai@hotmail.com, kkwsls@yahoo.com, leeching_helen@yahoo.com, leolina_2085@yahoo.com, leong6826@yahoo.com, lfy@oxfordfajar.com.my, lilac_girlz@hotmail.com, lingkesh_12@yahoo.com, loke.yoon.hein@gmail.com, low_yihyoke@yahoo.com, lsh@ppb.com.my, mahalakshmi_thiagarajan@yahoo.com, metalducker@hotmail.com, mike_goh88@yahoo.com, neoth86@gmail.com, nicole_chong84@yahoo.com, nimalan@sakra-associates.com, obaidhaqpk@hotmail.com, paritoshsood@gmail.com, pbalanh@hotmail.com, raasi_sparkling@yahoo.com, renelow811@hotmail.com, sec_sho@yahoo.com, sensen2@hotmail.com, sstan97@yahoo.com, stella6773@yahoo.com, supin309@yahoo.com.tw, tanhunchong2191@yahoo.com, tansweekiow@yahoo.com, tantinju@gmail.com, tenny.wyn@gmail.com, thinu85@hotmail.com, tilak3.9maddy@gmail.com, twdragon4877@yahoo.com, victoria.ooi@hotmail.com, wesley.heng@hp.com, yen2yeh@yahoo.com, yingjui@yahoo.com, yokesanhoo@gmail.com, zann_yeejia@yahoo.com, zeeyie@hotmail.com, zin@teacher.com, Stanleyooi0704@gmail.com, abirbd017@gmail.com, abjk99@yahoo.com, adwin.kianhui@gmail.com, akubi_carpo@hotmail.com, alanmukangwai@yahoo.com, aldrichlee2006@hotmail.com, amandawwp@gmail.com, angelin_liew@yahoo.com, beelingloo@gmail.com, bhages23@hotmail.com, brynn_tcj@yahoo.com, careemahchoong@gmail.com, cathrynkate@hellokitty.com, celestine_santhanasamy@yahoo.com, cgng76@gmail.com, charleswyk@yahoo.com, charmaine_lew@hotmail.com, cheekeong.c@aseam.com.my, cheong@allict.com.my, chiawleng@yahoo.com, chiayin119@hotmail.com, chinpang17@hotmail.com, chongshinwa@gmail.com, choong.carmen@gmail.com, christinechai0886@gmail.com, christpk85@hotmail.com, chuke80@hotmail.com, chungpk87@hotmail.com, cwwong_stats@yahoo.com.au, david_ngu8@yahoo.com, edwincsonn@yahoo.com, elune_t@hotmail.com, ennkiat@yahoo.com, eza_hazrina@yahoo.com, fmyap1381@yahoo.com.tw, free_girl86212@hotmail.com, gddth@hotmail.com, geniesun@yahoo.com, georgetownsecsch@hotmail.com, gohnelson@hotmail.com, grace-ML.toh@aig.com, gungeng101@yahoo.com, hemalatha.gunasekaran@yahoo.com, hengwee_xinghui@yahoo.com, hooidean@yahoo.com, hotmac725@yahoo.com, iris@3s.com.my, j_yanthi83@yahoo.com, jared_chew9@yahoo.com, jason.chew@ericsson.com, jay18khan@hotmail.com, jayne_chengling@hotmail.com, jeffreyngoh@hotmail.com, jenny200555@hotmail.com, jijoelectro@yahoo.com, joeyfua@yahoo.com, kaiting_neo@yahoo.com, karwei_wong@hotmail.com, katemin_on@hotmail.com, kelvin_njg@hotmail.com, kong@mafrica.com.my, konglq@yahoo.co.uk, kubend_24@yahoo.com, kzhztee@gmail.com, lane_cwe@yahoo.com, laukharkeat@hotmail.com, lee655@streamyx.com, leojilim@yahoo.com, lim_senghui@yahoo.com, lk_chuah@yahoo.com, longyewfoo@hotmail.com, lovdaphne@yahoo.co.uk, lowjungchian@yahoo.com, luayingshiuh@gmail.com, lwaanlee@yahoo.com, madeline6962@hotmail.com, miko_011085@hotmail.com, ng_seok_peng@hotmail.com, ngliangshen@yahoo.com, nini1988522@sina.com, niniyusof@gmail.com, nursagittarius@yahoo.com, okyew83@yahoo.com, ongoivoon@hotmail.com, oyq.tommy@gmail.com, pak_wu_lau@hotmail.com, peggywg84@hotmail.com, peipei98@hotmail.com, polo_dic@hotmail.com, pooyoke@yahoo.com, pp847@yahoo.com, ratha@rex.com.my, renee6868@gmail.com, rtoong@gma
il.com, rysk_82@hotmail.com, saintchai@gmail.com, samantha.chan@my.tesco.com, santhy@kpkt.gov.my, selvarajah.manivelu@alrahibank.com.my, sh_ooi17@hotmail.com, shaniaten@hotmail.com, sharonchiawl@yahoo.com, sharontks@hotmail.com, shirli78@yahoo.com, shu_bao03@yahoo.com, shuehmei@hotmail.com, siewsy_85@msn.com, sohkeyi@gmail.com, stanley_gan216@yahoo.com, suhan_0710@yahoo.com.my, sunthary@ti.com, szeyinng_85@yahoo.com, tan.jit.han@wdc.com, tankeehaow2002@yahoo.com, tayth@time.net.my, tehalia@yahoo.com, teohhc@time.net.my, teoricfoo@gmail.com, tienming86@hotmail.com, tkyforward@gmail.com, tonyliew@streamyx.com, trachelwk@hotmail.com, umah2483@gmail.com, vanan10@yahoo.com, vera@mib.edu.my, vieripoon83@hotmail.com, vince.weileong86@windowsilver.com, vivi_yap@hotmail.coml, wansky89@gmail.com, wooikeat_teoh@yahoo.com, y.y_ong@hotmail.com, yauhuimin@yahoo.com, yokemoi77@hotmail.com, yvonnechye@gmail.com, zillian_wackzta@yahoo.com, abuphon@hotmail.com, agathayeoh@yahoo.com, alistiarlee@mph.com.my, azu_4225@yahoo.com.my, beebee1@gmail.com, blackie_bebe_2005@yahoo.com, bp_boy03@hotmail.com, cactus_yap@hotmail.com, carolyn.chitra@gmail.com, catherineloh77@yahoo.com.sg, ccyydoll@yahoo.com, charmaineang@gmail.com, cheewai_28@yahoo.com, cherylwong@cuscapi.com, chessdunk@hotmail.com, chinglamgoh@gmail.com, christopher_biz@yahoo.com, clannchee@gmail.com, deenawati@yahoo.com, desmond_shyuan@yahoo.com, dorcaskongsm@yahoo.com, earth_911@hotmail.com, ed_alvin@hotmail.com, eugene_9926@yahoo.com, fee.mak@gmail.com, fieniz_143@yahoo.com, futurechin@gmail.com, garyotm@yahoo.com, h_minzhi@hotmail.com, haulee2004@hotmail.com, helios@heliography.com.my, heyma1973@yahoo.com, hockh@pc.jaring.my, hoeyyee@yahoo.com, hoongying2004@yahoo.com, hshschin@hotmail.com, hui_tze@hotmail.com, huntingkat@hotmail.com, ilovesoojin@hotmail.com, inji_indy@hotmail.com, jaganvasunath21@hotmail.com, jc85_weiwei@hotmail.com, jjy0409@hotmail.com, jlen2000@hotmail.com, joeyin_tan@yahoo.com, just_j2401@hotmail.com, k3nt83@yahoo.com, kevin_foong18@hotmail.com, keyra_85@yahoo.com, khawhuihui@yahoo.com, kiransharma501@yahoo.com, kong_siokah@intimal.edu.my, koonloong.ong@dialogasia.com, ksnjvk@gmail.com, leechin@thepinstudio.com, leekoonmeng@yahoo.com, limwpei@gmail.com, losweeloong@tpb.com.my, mages_rama@yahoo.com, mark_kwseah@yahoo.com, metalgear852002@yahoo.com, mofairustakaful@yahoo.com, murugadas@pass.edu.my, myphang@gmail.com, nelson_hooi@hotmail.com, nftang8@live.com.my, nicolechaisy@yahoo.com, njcjh12@gmail.com, nyimshi_yapp@hotmail.com, ooi_hong4784@yahoo.com, oritalk@gmail.com, pauline1028@gmail.com, philip.khor@gmail.com, pookcheeyin101@yahoo.com, rachelgoh38@yahoo.com, regleon@tm.net.my, resha_cute@hotmail.com, saminib@gmail.com, sc_joanne@yahoo.com, shiling86@yahoo.com, siewching82@yahoo.com, silverbamboo@hotmail.com, slt79@yahoo.com, soonglim.lee@my.panasonic.com, ss_tan@colpal.com, stevelow84@hotmail.com, subra6876@yahoo.com, sung.mei.tan@citi.com, sunnykhoo@gmail.com, syloh629@yahoo.com, thamnik@yahoo.com, thereturner_211@yahoo.com, ttthing@gmail.com, uranus_chern83@yahoo.com, wongxiwen@yahoo.com, y_tenyap@hotmail.com, yean_ny_nie@yahoo.com, yeap_mon@yahoo.com, yeongpeow@yahoo.com, yflee@s.carsems.com.my, yfrosemary@gmail.com, yimwah_87@yahoo.com, yingmei20@hotmail.com, yoongseng.lee@infineon.com, yue_min86@yahoo.com, yuetyi@gmail.com, yuwen_girly@yahoo.com, ziyanpng@yahoo.com, bryantanwx@gmail.com, cclim@alliancebg.com.my, hazel1908@hotmail.com, jennie_2612@hotmail.com, kfxchim@tm.net.my, kongyew.tan@mimos.my, lucky86destiny@yahoo.com, me@nicklim.com, munyeetan83@yahoo.com, pylim84@yahoo.co.uk, sagaya_das@yahoo.com, sirajudin@accamail.com, smhusainy@yahoo.com, teeyng_831@yahoo.com, wooikeat_teoh2003@yahoo.com, yihui1118@gmail.com

Party 25 May 2009 @ 6pm

Pippo — Tue, 12 May 2009 23:30:35 +0000

There will be party at the end of the month

Event: Internet Commerce dinner with RC Ho

Date: 25 May 2009

Time: 6 – 11pm

Location: Yuen Steamboat, Sunway

Other plans: Bowling at Sunway Pyramid (bring socks)

RSVP: Visit Party 2009 website

Contact: pip [at] thepippo.com

Yes, you can bring your friends along.

Yes, there is a limit of 30 people (3 tables) first come first served. Please RSVP. Thanks

Events of early May 2009

Pippo — Mon, 11 May 2009 00:32:58 +0000

Here are some pictures of the events that happened in early May 2009.

Some Penang cafe next to Salmon Steak SS15, Subang Jaya

Can anyone guess which mamak in SS15 Subang Jaya this is?

Inside Patrick’s Kembara

Phailed Moon Photography. Taken with SE K850i, thus this quality lah!

6 Shuet Char, 3 people!

Shawn Khik & Karen Mayer

Karen, the birthday girl

Ban Huat Restaurant, Sg. Buloh. Good, cheap food.

Some place in KL

Oh yeah, its Chan Thoong Kee in Bukit Bintang near Time Square

Darrel and Jonathan leeching Starbucks WiFi in TIME SQUARE, KUALA LUMPUR! Waiting for Krispe Kreme (still haven’t tried it yet)!

Wilson (the Scouser) and Boon Gin (boogy wonderland)

Sexy Darrel with his poker face. And cleanliness conscious Lukas Foo

My Schedule from 4-6 May 2009

Electronic Engineering bo gia A1! But still successful lah

No-grip el-cheapo slippers from Carrefour. Never trust the French!

Melvyn Wee on the way to Sunway Pyramid

Kathryn Ho, going for Japanese Food

Sharing a light moment

Black Gurl

Mc Flurry is now cheaper *under RM 4* but smaller.

Under 3rd column Beverages, the last one damn funny: Classique Ice Lemon Tea, RM 5.70. Next to it, Lipton!!!

Bottled water: Product of Malaysia (RM 1.00) Producte In Malaisie (Rm 4.80)

Some new car along NKVE near PJ / Damansara Exit. Anyone can guess what make / model it is?

The University Hospital medicZAtion interface. Still running on baseline install of Windows XP

That’s it guys. Hope you guys can avoid the Monday BLUES

Glory glory Man United!

iPhone 3G Magnetometer

Pippo — Fri, 08 May 2009 09:20:31 +0000

This is the crazy shit I was talking about. Its a new hardware called a magnetometer. It combines with GPS and Accelerometer to give you a 3D Compass. Imagine the possibilities [from Macrumors.com]

BoyGeniusReport posts a screenshot from debugging menus in the 3.0 beta firmware which seems to confirm that Apple has built-in magnetometer (digital compass) support into the operating system.

Evidence of a magnetometer was first reported in April and MacRumors has heard that the magnetometer will indeed be present in the next generation iPhone expected this summer. We previously explored what additional functionality would come with a digital compass. The possibilities were particularly intriguing:

Examples of how this could be used include pointing your iPhone’s camera at a building and the phone telling you what building it is by combining GPS, accelerometer and compass information. The iPhone could even overlay graphics and text on top of the image to provide additional information. Another application described is the ability to show information about stars and constellations simply by pointing your iPhone towards the sky.

All I can say is, WOW!

Registering domain energi.my

Pippo — Fri, 08 May 2009 03:40:00 +0000

I successfully registered this domain name

So i went and look it up at our Malaysia’s authority (the MYNIC) registration site. Super funny weh, the captcha.

I guess the programmers at Cyberjaya are too bored, and have a funny sense of humor. Good job, guys =)

Star Trek 2009 DVDrip YWownzor kuchai torrent

Pippo — Fri, 08 May 2009 01:24:20 +0000

Ok, I’m just bs-ing about the title hoping to get YW into trouble!

Watched Star Trek with Aidan, Pat and Lke.

It is amazing. Its safe to say it is the best movie I’ve watched for the past 12 months (I haven’t watched many, actually).

I used to be a fan of Enterprise back in those days. I’m always amazed with quantum physics, astronomy and space/time travel. Why I didn’t pursue? Because in this field, you have to be the best. Its either hero or zero, there’s no 50% P, 65%C, 75%D.

I really liked the show and recommend anyone to go to the cinema to watch it.

A busy week is finally coming to an end. This leads us to a busy weekend, filled with meetings, appointments, yum char and pool sessions. No bowling today for whatever-god-kn0ws-what reason, but thats ok.

I’ll probably spend some time to complete my semester-long-ongoing Internet commerce assignment which requires us to collect articles (since 2005) regarding the subject matter. Must be a journal. Some people found the cheat to how to Google for it. I haven’t. So I’ll spend the weekend completing that task. I will have to do my Advertising Assignment #2 also which involves creating a promotional plan for a Broadband company.

After those two assignments are settled, then its time to hit the books in preparation for the final exams in 3 weeks time.

Oh, and to my sister who is reading this, remember our lunch date on Saturday. Preferbly in 1U / Ikea / PJ / Subang area lah, so its convenient for me. Thanks a lot Saturday is wesak day too.

Class start in a few moments. Anyway, since moving to the new house, I do not have internet access. I dongle my HP to Maxis’ 3G network, and subscribed to the Unlimited plan for about RM 3 a day. So about 1 week downtime (Thanks to Terrorkom and TM nut) I have to fork out RM 21 just to keep connected. Oh well, it is and has been a fun experience playing with 3G.

This is REALLY a true friend [link]

Good day everyone. Live long and prosper.

Quickie regarding Maxis GPRS

Pippo — Tue, 05 May 2009 16:28:11 +0000

I’m on GPRS now dongled to my Computer. Here’s some info:

Tracing route to www-real.wa1.b.yahoo.com [209.131.36.158]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 * * * Request timed out.
2 604 ms 493 ms 1006 ms 10.208.129.10
3 997 ms 396 ms 562 ms 10.208.128.24
4 784 ms 519 ms 478 ms 10.208.130.70
5 1895 ms 783 ms 562 ms 10.208.130.70
6 757 ms 720 ms 497 ms 10.208.128.193
7 372 ms 601 ms 382 ms 202.179.111.69
8 * 1239 ms 765 ms 218.188.104.45
9 588 ms 618 ms 691 ms 218.189.5.22
10 510 ms 618 ms 642 ms 62.216.147.17
11 * * * Request timed out.
12 * * * Request timed out.
13 * * * Request timed out.
14 848 ms 849 ms 785 ms so-3-0-0.0.ejr02.pao001.flagtel.com [62.216.128.
1]
15 1208 ms 984 ms 986 ms peer.flagtel.com [62.216.145.226]
16 768 ms 777 ms 1945 ms ae0-p141.msr1.sp1.yahoo.com [216.115.107.51]
17 516 ms 1023 ms 737 ms te-8-1.bas-a1.sp1.yahoo.com [209.131.32.17]
18 756 ms 2079 ms 2845 ms f1.www.vip.sp1.yahoo.com [209.131.36.158]

Trace complete.

This means the latency sucks. And the max speed is about 10Kbyte/sec.. so its a bit slow.
But the good thing is I’m ONLINE! Until terror-kom come and fix my Stimix / Shitmix.
United to go through to Champion’s League Finals. :”)
Catan later lah (lukas) when my connection goes ünlimited.
I’m listening to physical CDs on a physical CD player now. I feel so old-school..

[1am update]
WOW!
My 3G / HSPDA is very weak right now, only 1 bar.
But surprisingly, that means I can connect up to 30-40KB/s. That’s crazy.
Yeah, but still latency is an issue, I’m getting about 600ms pings to common sites.

But with nice speeds, I’m enjoying every moment of my Maxis 3G experience.

Will report back tomorrow for further evaluation.

Oh, today I finished my Marketing assignment (excel). Happy everything worked out well.

[7am update]
Great Man Utd win. Fletcher got unlucky with the red card, but its all part of a bigger plan. The winner of Chelsea / Barca will have one player excluded from the finals too. Fletch can help us with our Premier League aspirations 100%.

I am super impressed with Maxis 3G. I got connected to the HSPDA (3.6mbit) but the signal only 1 bar. I expected the worst, but I manage to peak at 130Kbytes/sec (1.2 mbit) and danced around in sessions of about 100Kbytes/sec averaging about 65Kbytes/sec over 15 minutes. That can even sometimes challenge Shitmix on a good day.

Of course you can’t torrent 100% on Maxis 3G unlike Shitmix, but hey, as a temp connection, this shit is WHACK!

Keep in mind my room is super duper deep indoors, and it has to pass through many layers of wall! If got antannae at roof, sure get higher consistent speeds. I went to DiGi yesterday and played with their 3G broadband in selected areas. Wow, the speeds rox… pure 1mbit weh, and decent latency. They use 3.75G, which is even more hebat, promising a theoretical max of 14.4Mbit/sec.

I got an old P3/500mhz rig. I plan to set it up as a private server of some sort. Will post details about this project soon.

A week + ago, I was talking about “finishing strong in life”. It doesn’t matter how you messed up your life. It is all about how you finish in life. I think Pastor Daniel Ho of DUMC preached about this issue. Its funny that I cannot remember the past weeks sermon, but when put into a situation, all the things I’ve heard suddenly come back to me now.

I found this in Lowyat Forums, “How to write complain letter to Telekom Streamyx”.

Got all sort of templates for different things. They also publish email address of key people, so you get faster response. If you’re facing problems, give this a shot! [link]

Have a nice day, everyone

Google Yahoo Ask Live.com

Advertising on Internet

Pippo — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 00:16:21 +0000

Introduction

Integrated Marketing Communication is a management concept that is designed to make all aspects of marketing communication such as advertising, sales promotion, public relations, and direct marketing work together as a unified force, rather than permitting each to work in isolation.

David A. Aaker of UC Berkeley argues that “the internet is the glue that holds IMC programs together”. It is a tool to use alongside traditional elements of IMC.

A typical fast-food restaurant would employ several media channels to convey their marketing message. The backbone and glue that holds all of this is a corporate website with an easy-to-remember domain name. This is the point where customers obtain further information about the company.

Big corporations such as Mc Donalds would fire in all fronts, so to speak. For smaller companies like Burger King where resources are more limited, they have to seek alternate ways to raising the same amount of industry buzz while spending a fraction of the cost of the big giants.

Advertising in social networking websites.

Facebook is a free-access social networking website that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. Users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school, and region to connect and interact with other people. People can also add friends and send them messages, and update their personal profiles to notify friends about themselves.

Marketers and advertisers have trying for months on how to tap into Facebook’s Applications feature to use as an effective IMC tool. Even big companies like VISA tried their Visa Business Network program to provide a platform for businesses to exchange contacts. It failed miserable and was abused because it offers free US$50 advertising credits upon signup.

About The Internet

The internet is the largest network of computers in the world. As of December 2008, there are about 1,574 million active users worldwide. That is roughly one in four of every human being alive.

Most households in Malaysia have a personal computer capable of connecting to the internet. For those who do not, there are countless Internet Cafés in many major cities and towns that offers access for as low as RM 2 per hour.

The future is exciting for internet advertising. As more mobile phones are internet capable, the reach and coverage is growing wider. At the same time, the target audience is specific. This is possible through various technologies to track user location and demographic.

Imagine a scenario, walking down a busy shopping mall. You see an indoor poster saying “Are you hungry? Mc Donald’s ahead”. 10 seconds later, your handphone beeps. It plays a video advertisement by Mc Donalds, followed by a coupon to redeem free items with every purchase. The technology is already there, it is just a matter of time.

Internet advertisements get published quickly withstanding location and time. Advertisements can be customized to reach the specific target audience.

To Disseminate Information
To Create Awareness
To Gather Research Information
To Create an Image
To Stimulate Trial
To Improve Customer Service
To Increase Distribution

Other examples of internet advertising include banner advertisements, in-game advertisements and ad links.

Not only does Facebook store your personal information, it links you to other friends that you might have. Advertisements on Facebook are targeted based on location, age, gender and likings. Consider the real-world situation of 3 friends I know.

A – Receive car modification advertisements always around the end of the month

B – Receive dating ads and cosmetic advertisements

C – Receive get-rich-quick schemes and “business opportunity” advertisements

Google employs another technology which is controversial for rights protection agencies. Their e-mail service, GMail scans each and every message for keywords. When reading the e-mail on their website, the ads on the right sidebar relates to the e-mail that you are viewing. Google claims that no real humans are reading through your e-mail, just computer programs. They then use this data for the Google Trends and sell this information for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The Advertisements

Burger King’s objectives are to get as many people talking about the Whopper as possible. The technology within Facebook allow for such comments to be made and viewed by friends-of-friends. This form of viral marketing catches on very fast and the effectiveness rivals television, billboard and print ads combined. The cost to create both advertisements varies according to existing infrastructure.

Below is a table comparing several aspects of creating and publishing the advertisements.

	Burger King Whopper	KFC Downloadable coupons
Hosting & Domain Name cost	RM 800 (2 dedicated servers)	Minimal. Because site has been in existence for a long time
IT Personnel	RM 7000 (cost based on a project to create a computer code)	No additional special skills or personnel required
Time taken	~4 weeks from conceptualization to going live	3 days working with designers and making coupons available online
Coverage	Mainly in USA but reache to a worldwide audience	Limited to USA

Advertisements are basically used to inform, persuade and remind. Most businesses use web-sites to provide a platform for the business’ online presence. This allows formal communication with other businesses and to their clients and customers.

In Burger King’s campaign, they managed to generate a buzz and got many news agencies talking about it. Their clever idea of making Facebook users “sacrifice” or delete their friends from their list not only promotes their brand name, but it makes consumers rethink who their friends really are.

There is lack of creativity on KFC’s part, but coupons have several advantages. In tough economic times such as today, consumers are more price sensitive. By giving coupons, it encourages trial and increase consumption of established brands, such as KFC.

Target Audience, Reach and Coverage

Within 7 days of launch, there were 82,000 users who installed the application sacrificing 230,000 friends. The best part is that, on average each friend has 100 other friends, and they all get notified of the sacrifice via the user’s news feed.

Both KFC and Burger King target college students & young working adults under 30 years old both male and female. This demographic typically consumes fast food at least once a week. Fast food is popular in urban areas especially shopping malls and business districts. The target audience is likely to be interested in trying new things and willing to spend on food.

KFC downloadable coupons have been and still are an ongoing promotion. The only difference from conventional coupons is the method of delivery or, the media selected. Coupons are traditionally delivered to your doorstep by mailmen or flyer distributors. Some are inserted alongside daily newspapers while some are given in-store.

Media Scheduling

As long as the company pays for the hosting services, the advertisements can be accessible for as long as you like. In this assignment, the placement of the advertisement is on relatively cheap media such as the company’s own website, YouTube or Facebook, the social networking site. There is no need to worry about airspace and airtime. The internet is available 99.9% of the time 24/7/365!

Comparing both advertisements

Burger King	KFC
Original concept. Many other similar programs on Facebook has failed but this has achieved resounding success	Simple and traditional approach to advertising
Arouse curiousity. When someone notices that a friend has been deleted, they want to know more. Burger King taps into the curious nature of the human kind to generate awareness and to reinforce its brand image	Main objective is to target price conscious consumers
The product advertised is the famous Whopper. Through this campaign, they are able to make consumers walk in to their shop and also buy other products with higher mark ups.	In order to get the coupons, consumers have to fill in personal data like e-mail and phone numbers. This is then used for future promotions and to build up their customer database.
Sophisticated. Well linked to social network	Plain and simple. Print and use it.

Message delivery success

The Facebook ad is more successful in creating awareness. To put it simply, both companies give out coupons in exchange for awareness and personal information. This is used to tailor their products to different markets and preferences, as well as to disseminate future promotions via e-mail or SMS messaging.

In Malaysia, coupons are a big hit amongst budget conscious consumers. They are often delivered along with the daily newspaper. The discounts offers by outlets such as Mc Donalds are up to 30% off list price.

Conclusion

The internet has huge potential. Since the dot-com bust, companies have been coming up with innovative and creative ways to advertise. Clearly, the future of internet advertising lies with the social network. How better to deliver a message than to deliver it to a known customer base and hope that it spreads virally through personal web sites and blogs.

The internet has no geographical boundaries. An advertisement can reach a wide audience immediately once it has been published. The start up cost is considerably less compared to newspaper and magazine advertisements which can cost an upward of RM 10,000 per day.

As described earlier, the internet works in tandem with newspaper, billboard, radio and television. Nike aired a 30-second teaser commercial on television with a hanging ending. To see what happens next, consumers have to visit their website.

Services like YouTube makes it easier for content publishers and advertisers to publish their videos online. If the ad is creative and eye catching, people would want to view it again and share it with their friends. Modern Web 2.0 technologies like Twitter, and the “e-mail to friend” function has simplified this process. In this case, the internet is used as a media for delivering TV and interactive ads.

This assignment raises the awareness that the internet is the next big thing in advertising for years to come. The sky is the limit for the possibilities of online advertising. Traditional graphic designers and video production houses have to learn new programming techniques to keep up with the face paced advances in technology.

In the earlier years of existence, Facebook was primarily made up of college and university students aged 18-22. Since then, the demographics have greatly shifted to higher age groups as these students graduate and enter the workforce. According to Facebook themselves, the fastest growing age-group of their customer base were having a median age of 25 2-years ago but today, and 28 1-year ago. Today, this number is 35.

References

Eldon, Eric. (2008-12-18). “2008 Growth Puts Facebook In Better Position to Make Money”. VentureBeat. http://venturebeat.com/2008/12/18/2008-growth-puts-facebook-in-better-position-to-make-money Accessed on 08 April 2009
Belch, George and Michael Belch (2007), Advertising and Promotion: An Integrated Marketing Communications Perspective, 7^th edition, McGraw-Hill/Irwin
Shimp, Terence A (2007), Integrated Marketing Comminications in Advertising And Promotion, 7^th edition, Thomson South-Western
The Facebook Blog, http://blog.facebook.com Accessed on 08 April 2009