Flintstones selling cigarettes (old TVC)

Back in the old days of black-and-white television, the world was a less politically correct place where the Flintstones can star in a TV commercial plugging Winston cigarettes.

I am not sure if the stone age family was properly informed of the ill-effects of smoking then:

WARNING:

• Smoking causes mouth diseases
• Smoking can cause a slow and painful death
• Smoking causes lung cancer
• Smoking kills - Flintstones included

Technorati Tags: winston cigarettes, the flintstones, old tvc, old commercial, flintstones selling cigarette, smoking, harmful effects of smoking, tabacco ad, tabacco ad targetted at children

Modern Toilet Restaurant in Taiwan (便所主题餐厅)

Eng Shan introduced me to this restaurant, prior to my Taipei trip and I went there with Rachel, Mark and Meiyen.

In this toilet-themed restaurant, the seats are all made from toilet bowls, not chairs. Sink faucets, wash basins and various toilet-related decors adorn the place. Currently they have a chain of 12 restaurants in Taiwan and one in Hong Kong. You can find out more about Modern Toilet via their official website.

Here are some pictures we took during our visit to their Ximending (西门町) branch:

Waiting to order

Toilet bowl salesgirl

Hand basin to wash hand; not to shit into

Mushroom soup - pretty ordinary looking

Pork chop rice - looks nice hor?

The serving is very big - as big as Rachel’s head

Seafood baked rice in basin

Appertisers

Chocolate shake in urnial bottle

Mark and Meiyen act cute

Shitheads

Ultimate ice challenge

Mark and Meiyen embark on their gastronomy challenge

Rachel looking happy being served with two lumps of shit

Rachel looking unhappy with two small lumps and one giant lump of shit

Rachel and I embark on our gastronomy challenge

Tada! Look at the mess we left behind!

Group photo

My drawing 1 - guy shitting

My drawing 2 - Girl see guy’s shit and puke

Parting shot outside the restaurant: Rachel and me, looking satisfied

Parting shot outside the restaurant: Mark looks constipated while Meiyen smiles on

Technorati Tags: ximending, taipei, modern toilet, marton restaurant, modern toilet restaurant, alvinology, chua eng shan, hua meiyen, mark tan chet siang, alvinology, rachel chan, gastronomy challenge, shit, urinal, toilet bowl, wash basin, seafood baked rice, pork chop rice, ice cream, 西门町, 便所主题餐厅

Cyclone Nargis, Burma

Cyclone Nargis struck Burma on 2 May 2008, causing catastrophic destruction and at least 80,000 estimated fatalities with a further 56,000 people estimated still missing. Accurate figures of the destruction are not available due to the uncooperative military junta who rules Burma, resisting foreign aids and relief efforts.

Labutta Township alone was reported to have 80,000 dead and some have estimated the death toll may be well over 100,000.

Damage is estimated at over $10 billion (USD), which made it the most second most damaging cyclone of all time. It was also Burma’s worst natural disaster overall, as well as being the deadliest.

Even though knowing most of our donation will be sucked away by the corrupted junta, Rachel and I still went ahead to make our donation to the relief effort in Myanmar at a collection point in Peninsular Plaza, the Burmese enclave in Singapore. If just one percent of our donation reaches the victims, we are still glad to have help in some way to the impossibly shitty situation the victims are in with a corrupted government and lack of foreign aids, intervention and media attention.

Donations flow in fast and furious for the Si Chuan earthquake relief efforts, demonstrating that Singaporeans are indeed a compassionate lot. I am blogging about Cyclone Nargis now, even though it happened much earlier because appeals for donations are still ongoing, despite the lack of media coverage.

Here are some locations you can go to make your donations (alternatively, you can also pop by Peninsular Plaza and donate directly at various collection stations).

Technorati Tags: burma, burmese, Myanmar, Myanmese, singapore, cyclone nargis, labutta township, military junta, si chuan earthquake, relief efforts, donations, fund raising, peninsular plaza, cyclone victims

Vuestar: Imaging linking on the Internet is PATENTED

(I can’t hyperlink the image above to their website as it will infringe their patent)

Zhun bo?????? Can patent this kind of thing one meh???

If Vuestar Technologies Pte Ltd, a Singapore-incorporated company, has its way, a crisis is brewing ahead for the World Wide Web which will affect practically every single websites on the Internet.

You can read this news article lifted from Straits Times to better understand the scenerio:

Patent breach by ‘virtually all websites’? Pay up, firm demands
526 words
27 May 2008
Straits Times
English
(c) 2008 Singapore Press Holdings Limited

A SINGAPORE firm has threatened to sue websites that use pictures or graphics to link to another page, claiming it owns the patent for a technology used by millions around the world.

In a move that has come under fire from the online community, VueStar Technologies has sent ‘invoices’ to local website operators asking for thousands of dollars in licensing fees.

The company, which said ‘virtually all websites’ are infringing on its patent, is also planning to take on giants like Mircosoft and Google.

It is a battle that could, at least in theory, upend the Internet, though intellectual property experts have some doubts that VueStar can actually enforce its claims.

The company said it has been awarded a patent here and in several other countries, including Australia, New Zealand and the United States, for the method of ‘locating Web pages by utilising visual images’.

In other words, clicking, scrolling or streaming over a visual image to connect with a website or Web page is an infringement, the company claims on its website.

The technique is the de facto method used to connect websites across the globe, from personal blogs to the biggest search engines.

VueStar managing director Paul Smith said if sites want to keep using images as links, they will have to pay his company - located in a single-unit office at The Adelphi off Coleman Street - between ‘$200′ and ‘millions’ annually.

It is a claim, however, that has its doubters.

Technology and intellectual property lawyer Bryan Tan of Keystone Law Corporation said that while VueStar has been granted a patent, it is an extremely wide one.

In fact, ‘if the patent is allowed to stand, it will probably bring the (Internet) industry to its knees’. And VueStar’s patent may be contested and overturned in court, he said.

The firm has been sending out invoices to Singapore companies since last week asking them to pay up, said Mr Smith. He declined to say how many have gone out, but there have been ‘enough to keep my phone busy’.

Those who do not pay up, warned Mr Smith, face legal action, and his company is ‘highly confident that (a court decision) will be in our favour’.

Mr Alvin Koh, who runs the non-profit Arrowana fish website arofanatics.com, received one of VueStar’s invoices last week for $5,350. He does not intend to pay up and said: ‘I would rather close down the site’.

Mr Smith recognises that Mr Koh’s stand will likely be a popular one, and his firm is already girding up for a public backlash.

‘Website owners are just upset because they never had to pay for it before,’ said Mr Smith.

VueStar will begin enforcing its patent claims in Australia and the US ’soon’, he said, and the firm is also working on invoices for Internet heavyweights like Google and Microsoft.

While governments and charities will need a licence, VueStar will not be asking for payment from these parties, he said.

Mr Tan urged companies to contact their lawyers before ‘paying VueStar anything’.

So how? I am very sure 99% of web publishers (bloggers included) must have done image linking at one point or another. For those bloggers who serve ads from blogs ads networks like Nuffnang and Advertlets, it can’t be more obvious. Jialat liow… now Vuestar will be coming after everyone.

In case you are curious, here are some profile information about Vuestar Technologies Pte Ltd (via EDMW):

Domain: www.vuestar.biz

Registrant:
Goldspirit Investments Pty Ltd

8/25
Edmonstone Street
South Brisbane, Queensland 4101
Australia

Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. (http://www.godaddy.com)
Domain Name: VUESTAR.BIZ
Created on: 16-Dec-07
Expires on: 16-Dec-09
Last Updated on: 21-Feb-08

Administrative Contact:
Langford, Ron langfordron@yahoo.com.au
Goldspirit Investments Pty Ltd
8/25
Edmonstone Street
South Brisbane, Queensland 4101
Australia
738466996 Fax — 738466996

Technical Contact:
Langford, Ron langfordron@yahoo.com.au
Goldspirit Investments Pty Ltd
8/25
Edmonstone Street
South Brisbane, Queensland 4101
Australia
738466996 Fax — 738466996

Domain servers in listed order:
NS3.EGNAROSOFT.COM
NS4.EGNAROSOFT.COM

To read more about this strange case which somehow reminds me of the Odex Saga, you can also visit the following URLs:

Hardwarezone’s EDMW forum (heated discussion going on)

Simply Jean - Imaging linking is patented, websites and blogs affected, Advertlets, Nuffnang and Blog2U may have to call it a day

HongKiat - You breached our patent by using images as links - says Vuestar

CNET Asia - New image hyperlinking patent comes under fire in online forums

Slashdot - Singapore Firm Claims Patent Breach By Virtually All Websites

The Electric New Paper - Local company tells websites to PAY UP

Chris Linfoot - Only in Singapore

Internet Marketing Singapore - Vuestar Technologies Are Patent Trolls? You may get sued for using ANY image on your site…

Technorati Tags: vuestar, singapore, image linking patent, vuestar technologies pte ltd, straits times, locating web pages by utilising visual images, paul smith, the adelphi, bryan tan, keystone law corporation, alvin koh, arrowana fish website, arofanatics.com, nuffnang, advertlets, goldsprit investment, edmonstone street, godaddy.com, vuestar.biz, Ron Langford, Ronald Langford, Internet Marketing Singapore, CNET asia, hongkiat, simply jean, hardwarezone, edmw

An Evening with Vinton Cerf

Vinton Cerf in Singapore

The Digital Movement, together with Google and IDA, organised an exclusive evening with the Vice President of Engineering and Chief Internet Evangelist of Google, Vinton G. Cerf.

Widely known as a “Father of the Internet,” Vint is the co-designer with Robert Kahn of TCP/IP protocols and basic architecture of the Internet. You can read more about his extraordinary achievements here.

Packed conference room

The topic of his presentation was “Tracking the Internet into the 21st Century” - the up and coming trends of the Internet; how will the Internet shift in the future; and how will our lifestyles change with the shift?

Heavy stuff? Not really, Vint managed to put across his visions in very digestible bits for lay audience like yours truly.

Regional Internet Statistics (200

Some points Vint mentioned which strike me particularly about the future in 2035 (via Yuhui and Joanna Teo’s Blog):

Vint predicts that the total internet population to grow up to 1,320 million internet users (1.3 billion) in 2035. That is 20% penetration of the world’s population. Asia will be the top contributor region to the internet population of the world as the infrastructures in those places gets more developed. Some countries will have beyond 100% of penetration because he saw them using more than 1 device to access to the internet at the same time. It is just like how mobile penetration can get through 100% in Singapore because some of us owns 2 mobile lines.

Death of print does not mean newspaper companies like SPH will just collapse and disappear - people still need to read the news, except that the physical form of the ‘newspaper’ as we know it may change, delivered to our door step in an alternative digital format, cutting down logistics and material costs tremendously.

The virtual environment will have a greater presence in the internet sphere. Vint projects the use of holographic technologies in instances like a business conference meetings, not on a screen but a virtual 3 dimensional figure right in front of our eyes. This moves far beyond the current state of use of the virtual environment that we see today in SecondLife and other virtual games. The boundary will be challenged.

The death of URLs. Permanent names will be used to identify processes and services that run for years.

Bandwidth will continue to increase. File transfers will be the norm, not streaming, and at high speeds.

Information will be real-time, geographically indexed, and always available.

We wil be able to predict trends based on historical Google searches. Example: knowing when an epidemic starts.

10 billion mobile devices by 2035, working as remote control and information delivery. More and more different types of devices will be part of the internet ecosystem. He estimated that one person will be using 10 devices that can be connected to the internet. Currently the number stands around 3.

You can read more about these Vint’s presentation via these other bloggers’ entries. They did a better job than lazy me in summarising the presentation:

Yuhui’s Blog: Recap of Vinton Cerf’s presentation at Suntec City

Joanna Teo: An evening with Vinton Cerf

Simply Jean: Live blogging at “Tracking the Internet into the 21st Century”

James Seng: An evening with Vint

Ian: A very special evening with Vinton Cerf from Google

After the session with Vint ended, I headed towards Citylink to meet Rachel, Mark and Meiyen for late dinner. On the way, I bumped into my good friend, Chitra and her friend, Canny. Chitra asked what I was doing at Suntec and I told her about Vinton Cerf, the Father of the Internet. Canny’s reply aptly summed up what most people in the world will feel towards Vint: “I don’t know who he, but help me thank him. I am very grateful for his invention.”

Technorati Tags: suntec city, vinton cerf, vint, father of the internet, google, the digital movement, tdm, ida, vice president of engineering google, chief internet evangelist of google, robert kahn, tcp/ip protocols, tracking the internet into the 21st century, yuhui, joanna teo, simply jean, james seng, ian

Publicity Ads for Singapore Blog Awards

The Singapore Blog Awards was launched on 2 May 2008. The panel of professional judges have been announced too and all that’s left is publicity to drive nomination/registration. The toughest thing actually… which is why omy can use all the help we can garner.

Just for fun, my good friend, Marc, also omy’s graphic designer, produced the following three print ads concept for the Singapore Blog Awards:

Do you like them?

If so, do help to pass the message on by pasting any of these posters onto your blog to help us spread the message on the call for nomination/registration.

Alternatively, if you have other interesting ideas - be it on print, video, e-newsletter, events, any format at all - let your creative juices flow. You can create your own Singapore Blog Awards ads and send them to marketing@omy.sg. Better still, publish it on your blog as well and help us spread the message. You are welcome to use any of the logos, photos and other materials on omy to create your work.

omy will publicise the good ones on the offical Singapore Blog Awards Blog to share with everyone and maybe even adopt them for omy’s next series of publicity if they are really good.

Technorati Tags: singapore blog award, singapore blog awards, omy, omy.sg, blog award, famous bloggers, tan swie hian, singapore, blogging award, creative ads, ad campaign

A Mui Live! 獨唱戲《蔓珠莎華》performed by Alice Lau (劉雅麗)

Picture taken from alivenotdead

The previous Friday (16 May), Rachel and I went to watch a solo stage performance by singer, Alice Lau (劉雅麗), which chronicles the life story of the legendary Cantopop star, Anita Mui (梅艳芳) with more than 30 of her hit songs. Our tickets were complimentary from Crocodile International, the anchor sponsor for the performance.

Alice in red leather outfit

Purple hair Ah Lian with gold jacket

It was held at D’Marquee, Downtown East. Alice’s singing and stage performance were really great. The only sore point was I don’t understand Cantonese (the entire performance was in Cantonese). As no subtitles were provided, poor Rachel had to act as a human Cantonese-to-English translator, much to the annoyance of the aunties sitting near us.

Techno backdrop

Super long wig

Some TVB actor talking about Anita Mui during the video intermission

The two of us were quite out of place among the audience composed mostly of kindly looking aunties and uncles. Nevertheless, it was an interesting experience listening to a different kind of concert from the usual pop/rock fares. I walked out developing a keener interest in past songs, sung by Anita Mui.

I like Anita Mui’s deep, raspy voice. Somehow, I am drawn to female singers with such vocal quality. I also like songs by Cyndi Lauper and Cai Qing (蔡琴). However, there don’t seem to be any such singer among the younger artistes nowadays lei. Sigh.

Technorati Tags: anita mui, alice lau, a mui live!, cyndi lauper, cai qing, crocodile international, d’marquee, downtown east, pasir ris, cantonese, cantopop, 蔡琴, 梅艳芳, 獨唱戲, , 蔓珠莎華, 劉雅麗

Pedra Branca belongs to Singapore!~

Picture taken from Wikipedia

As ruled by the International Court of Justice. You can read the full judgment report HERE. The most important sentence is on page 75, paragraph 277:

“For the foregoing reasons, the Court concludes that sovereignty over Pedra Branca/Pulau Batu Puteh belongs to Singapore.”

A small victory for Singapore. I have created a blog button below for bloggers to post and spread on the Internet. As a sign of patriotism, you can stick it to your blog and hyperlink it to the WIkipedia entry on Pedra Branca as I have done below:

A bit of background from Wikipedia for the uninitiated of the dispute between Singapore and Malaysia over Pedra Branca:

Pedra Branca has an area of 2,000 m², and during the low water spring tide it measures, at its longest, a mere 137 m. It does not include Middle Rocks, which are two clusters of rocks situated 0.6 nautical miles (1.1 km) south of the island that is owned by Malaysia, and South Ledge, a rock formation visible only at low-tide, 2.1 nmi (3.9 km) to the south.

Singapore refers to the island as Pedra Branca (”white rock” in Portuguese), and Malaysia as Pulau Batu Puteh (”island of the white rock” in Malay); the island is so named for whitish bird droppings that were seen on the rock in the past. Ownership of Pedra Branca/Pulau Batu Puteh is disputed by Singapore and Malaysia and is the only formal dispute over the maritime Malaysia-Singapore Border.

The dispute dates back to early 1980, when Singapore lodged a formal protest with Malaysia in response to a map published by Malaysia in 1979 claiming the island. In 1989 Singapore proposed submitting the dispute to the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Malaysia agreed to this in 1994. In 1998 the two countries agreed on a Special Agreement that was needed to submit the dispute to the ICJ. The Special Agreement was signed in February 2003, and the ICJ formally notified in July that year.

On May 23, 2008, the ICJ decided that Pedra Branca is under the sovereignty of Singapore while the Middle Rocks belong to Malaysia.

Technorati Tags: pedra branca, singapore, malaysia, territorial dispute, wikipedia, ICJ, international court of justice, pulau batu puteh, south ledge, white rock, island of the white rock, soverignty, middle rocks

居然还有这种人啊～(找骂的辽宁女孩)

China girl from Liao Ning (辽宁) rant against Sze Chuan (四川) earthquake victims. This girl is way worst than Fragrance Prince!

Here’s a short summary in English of her ranting provided by BadGirlMay2008:

“She expresses her indifference to shichuan [sic] earthquake. She also finds it too boring to keep seeing reports of the incident on TV. She feels unsympathetic towards the victims of the earthquake. She thinks that the people of shichuan have spoiled the day. She despised the fact that shichuan people are asking for donation and help. She asked whether the earthquake was the result of the fart from shichuan people.”

I read from various online forums that she has already been arrested and dealt with. Anyone have more accurate information to share on this?

Also, not sure if this real either - these are alleged to be her personal details angry Chinese neitzens “CSI-ed”:

辽宁沈阳市苏家屯区苏家屯区林盛堡镇文城堡村
辽宁沈阳市苏家屯区海棠街22号
名字应该是叫：张雅
沈阳人
她的电话 024-89125250
QQ：100011553
此女在新成子区虎石台网吧 传的视频 新成子区虎石台网吧电话：024-81820592
上网的IP为:124.92.21.254— 沈阳网通
1987出生 技校毕业

Technorati Tags: 找骂的辽宁女孩, 辽宁, 居然还有这种人啊, liao ning, fragrance prince, sze chuan earthquake, 四川, wen chuan, natural disaster

放天灯 (Sky Lantern)

During our trip to Taipei, Rachel and I travelled to Ping Hsi (平溪) to release a sky lantern. According to the tourist pamphlets, the Shih Fen (十分) area used to be coal mines and are tucked in remote mountainous area not easily accessible by transportation. In order to let their family members know they have safely arrived at the coal mines, the miners will release these sky lanterns.

Over time, the releasing of these sky lanterns became a custom to seek for blessings and well-wishes from above.

Here are the photos documenting our journey to experience this tradition.

When we got off the train at Ping Hsi, the area was pitch dark although it was only slightly past 8pm. Most of the shops were closed and the lights in the residential dwellings were mostly switched off too.

Here’s what the place looks like in general:

There’s also a large creepy mural painting depicting various scenes of how to be a good citizen sprawling a full five metres wall.

Rachel and I were very hungry at this point as we have not eat anything since around 12 noon and the cold wind, coupled with light drizzling rain does not make it better for us. Hence when we saw a sole desert shop still open, we dashed in.

A kindly granny greeted us and serve us with sweet potatoes and yam balls. They were damn delicious! It’s probably because we were starving. I am not sure, but for that moment, those simple balls tasted like the best cuisine in the world for us.

Granny’s store also sell fruits. They look good too, but we have to rush off as we have to catch the last train back at 9pm and we have yet to achieve our objective of releasing a sky lantern.

Along the way, we encountered a few provision stores like the one below, offering sky lanterns for sale.

For some inexplicable reason, we settled for this hardware store below:

We were presented with a large red sky lantern by a stout looking shopkeeper. He passed us a brush and a bottle of ink for us to write and draw blessing messages onto the lantern.

To make things simple, we chose the chinese characters - 平安, 幸福, 快乐 and 大吉 (safety, bliss, happiness and prosperity) and Rachel wrote them onto the four sides of our sky lantern.

The shopkeeper then fixed the solid fuel into the sky lantern. The lantern is now almost good to go.

A final inspection was done. A small hole was discovered on the surface of the lantern and the shopkeeper promptly fixed it by just sticking a few layers of scotch tapes on the hole.

We are finally ready. With lantern in toil, we marched with the shopkeeper to a nearby bridge to release our lantern. Countdown…

3…

2…

1…

and up in the air it soared!

We watched as the lantern flew higher and higher into the air…

Higher and higher till it was just a tiny flicker of light in the dark sky…

And it was gone.

Technorati Tags: sky lantern, ping hsi, shih feng, taipei, tian deng, coal mines, coal miners, alvinology, rachel chan, yam balls, sweet potato balls, 放天灯, 平溪, 十分