Friday, June 19, 2009
11:40 by FoxTwo
Why amused? Because for all their dirty underhanded tactics, they are still losing ground. Back in 1995 when they first introduced Internet Explorer on Windows 95, the king of browsers back then was Netscape Navigator. Microsoft tried to de-throne it through forced-bundling of IE with the OS, through strong-arm tactics of resellers and hardware manufacturers. Many class action suits have been filed against them. I don't need to go into details since the history can be found on the Internet.
Microsoft also fought a war on the web itself - making ActiveX pages, hoping to attract users since ActiveX was more "interactive" and "engaging" at the time. In today's world, Flash and Java have already unseated ActiveX. There's hardly any non-Microsoft websites using ActiveX nowadays.
Microsoft tried again with "Silverlight", to go head to head with Java and Flash on the Interactive Content arena. Apparently they still lost, since I have hardly heard of anyone, tech guys included, who are won over by it.
So now, we finally have them making a series of web pages that DENY all other browsers except Internet Explorer 8 to view it, in the form of this contest.
Now, I don't want to go into the morality of this move, but personally, I think that Microsoft has made a bad call - you can't simply deny a group of people access to your content just because they do not use what you want them to use. If you want to practice this kind of restrictions, an INTRANET would be the appropriate place, but not out here on the INTERnet. Then again, that's just my opinion.
Somehow this smacks of the Browser Wars of the 90's, brewing again. Except this time I think perhaps Microsoft might actually lose. Back in the 90's, there weren't many choices for browsers. Users had no idea how and where to go to get one. Microsoft conveniently provided them with one. The only reason IE rose to prominence was the convenience of its availability.
Users then started to use the freely provided IE to download a different browser of their choice (be it FireFox, Opera, Safari etc) and stopped using IE. Microsoft recognised that their strong-arm tactics of forcing IE onto desktops was had in fact, backfired.
Back in the 90s we had a slew of web pages "best viewed in Internet Explorer". Those pages would use many IE-specific code and only IE could view those pages correctly. The intention was to "support" IE, and "encourage" people to use IE. Remember what happened next? There was an outcry, and the pages were made compatible with industry-standard code.
This "contest" is just a different way of doing the same thing as was done back in the 90s. Will it work this time around? It may. I personally don't think so. A person might switch to IE for now, to attempt to get the US$10,000. If he failed, he would probably switch back to whatever he was using.
Personally, I have never used IE on a regular basis. It's sitting there on my desktop but I don't click on it. My browser of choice has always been a competitor - Netscape Navigator in the 90s, and FireFox in 2000s. If so inclined, I might just click on IE, just for the sole purpose of trying my luck for the contest. Whether I win or not, I can guarantee you I'd be back on Firefox once this is all over.
If I were so inclined.
But I'm not :)
The best summary I can think of, is the video below. It shows what users perceive the Internet as, today. It's no longer "Firefox", or "Internet Explorer" or "Safari". The software used by the user today is, I guess, no longer important.
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11:40 by FoxTwo
Is Microsoft Finally Losing The Browser Wars?
Image via Wikipedia
Why amused? Because for all their dirty underhanded tactics, they are still losing ground. Back in 1995 when they first introduced Internet Explorer on Windows 95, the king of browsers back then was Netscape Navigator. Microsoft tried to de-throne it through forced-bundling of IE with the OS, through strong-arm tactics of resellers and hardware manufacturers. Many class action suits have been filed against them. I don't need to go into details since the history can be found on the Internet.
Microsoft also fought a war on the web itself - making ActiveX pages, hoping to attract users since ActiveX was more "interactive" and "engaging" at the time. In today's world, Flash and Java have already unseated ActiveX. There's hardly any non-Microsoft websites using ActiveX nowadays.
Microsoft tried again with "Silverlight", to go head to head with Java and Flash on the Interactive Content arena. Apparently they still lost, since I have hardly heard of anyone, tech guys included, who are won over by it.
So now, we finally have them making a series of web pages that DENY all other browsers except Internet Explorer 8 to view it, in the form of this contest.
Now, I don't want to go into the morality of this move, but personally, I think that Microsoft has made a bad call - you can't simply deny a group of people access to your content just because they do not use what you want them to use. If you want to practice this kind of restrictions, an INTRANET would be the appropriate place, but not out here on the INTERnet. Then again, that's just my opinion.
Somehow this smacks of the Browser Wars of the 90's, brewing again. Except this time I think perhaps Microsoft might actually lose. Back in the 90's, there weren't many choices for browsers. Users had no idea how and where to go to get one. Microsoft conveniently provided them with one. The only reason IE rose to prominence was the convenience of its availability.
Users then started to use the freely provided IE to download a different browser of their choice (be it FireFox, Opera, Safari etc) and stopped using IE. Microsoft recognised that their strong-arm tactics of forcing IE onto desktops was had in fact, backfired.
Back in the 90s we had a slew of web pages "best viewed in Internet Explorer". Those pages would use many IE-specific code and only IE could view those pages correctly. The intention was to "support" IE, and "encourage" people to use IE. Remember what happened next? There was an outcry, and the pages were made compatible with industry-standard code.
This "contest" is just a different way of doing the same thing as was done back in the 90s. Will it work this time around? It may. I personally don't think so. A person might switch to IE for now, to attempt to get the US$10,000. If he failed, he would probably switch back to whatever he was using.
Personally, I have never used IE on a regular basis. It's sitting there on my desktop but I don't click on it. My browser of choice has always been a competitor - Netscape Navigator in the 90s, and FireFox in 2000s. If so inclined, I might just click on IE, just for the sole purpose of trying my luck for the contest. Whether I win or not, I can guarantee you I'd be back on Firefox once this is all over.
If I were so inclined.
But I'm not :)
The best summary I can think of, is the video below. It shows what users perceive the Internet as, today. It's no longer "Firefox", or "Internet Explorer" or "Safari". The software used by the user today is, I guess, no longer important.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
13:24 by FoxTwo
Due to habit, I click refresh to see the latest updates from my friends, on the Home Page. Lo and Behold, what do I see?
Yes indeed, it seems that the former Facebook layout is coming back! However, right now it's kind of a hit-and-miss thing. Sometimes when I click refresh, I get the old layout. Other times, the new.
What I can speculate is that perhaps, the Facebook Team is rolling back the changes they made, and they are now synchronising all the servers to update them all. That would explain the randomly alternating between the old and new layouts.
Or perhaps Facebook is experiencing a server or database problem and their engineers are fixing it..
Well I sure hope the old layout is coming back!!
13:24 by FoxTwo
Is The Old Facebook Layout Coming Back?
Due to habit, I click refresh to see the latest updates from my friends, on the Home Page. Lo and Behold, what do I see?
Yes indeed, it seems that the former Facebook layout is coming back! However, right now it's kind of a hit-and-miss thing. Sometimes when I click refresh, I get the old layout. Other times, the new.
What I can speculate is that perhaps, the Facebook Team is rolling back the changes they made, and they are now synchronising all the servers to update them all. That would explain the randomly alternating between the old and new layouts.
Or perhaps Facebook is experiencing a server or database problem and their engineers are fixing it..
Well I sure hope the old layout is coming back!!
Labels: facebook, internet, self
Monday, March 16, 2009
15:23 by FoxTwo
Even so, I don't mind it so much when Facebook changed their homepages or layouts to "improve" things. In fact, when other people have been screaming blue murder about the latest changes, all I did was to just "get used to it", and learn how the new layout works.
The one just before the current one is, in my opinion, the best offering they've had so far. I get a running newsfeed of what my friends did, who got tagged in which photos, and so on. In fact I have found a few friends this way - a friend got tagged by another friend, whom I also know. Then I'd send a friend request and we link up.
I also liked how all your invites were in the right sidebar - you can see how many of which types of invites you had.
However, the latest one blows. In fact, I'd say that the latest incarnation of the layout just broke everything. People were just getting used to the "new" layout and then they decided to change it again. Yes, it looks amazingly sparse. Kinda like Twitter in fact. Basically, the majority of what's there on the homepage after you log in is basically just status updates from your friends. That's it. You can't see if they've joined a group, or uploaded a new pic, or commented on a picture. In short, all the stuff that used to be there on this page.
The thing I find most frustrating with the latest layout is that my "Invites Box" went missing (or so I thought). Try as I might, I could not locate my latest slew of useless invites to games I will never play or install. However, that doesn't mean I don't want to see them - there might be an invite to an event or a game I might actually be interested in!
After asking around a bit on Plurk, some friends finally told me where to look for it. I present it in the picture below:
Click image to enlarge
Ok if I didn't show you this picture, would you have noticed that single line I circled in red? You'd be hunting left and right to see where your invite notifications are, wouldn't you? After all, it USED to be on the right sidebar.
There's really too many things dropped in this new layouts. I even tried to fiddle with the newsfeed options, but guess what? I couldn't find it. I remember that it existed before, because I remember the slider bars which I can pic to choose which type of event(s) I wanted to see from which specific friend. I remember sliding them around to "See More Of" and "See Less Of" the various types of events of my friends, to tweak them to my personal preference.
Now, all I see are status updates 90% of the time., which is essentially like Plurk (more than Twitter) because you can comment on the status just like how we chat in Plurk. In fact, if this is what Facebook is trying to emulate, then Plurk is already "there". We're all using it, and Plurk has the advantage of having a scrollable timeline. We just drag the timeline around to see older "status updates". With Facebook we have to click on "older posts" and wait for the page to change.
So, Facebook, stop trying to emulate others. Just be yourself - Facebook. That's why we're here. Otherwise, we might as well be at the website(s) you were trying to emulate.
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15:23 by FoxTwo
Facebook, Stop Messing With Layouts!
Image via CrunchBase
Even so, I don't mind it so much when Facebook changed their homepages or layouts to "improve" things. In fact, when other people have been screaming blue murder about the latest changes, all I did was to just "get used to it", and learn how the new layout works.
The one just before the current one is, in my opinion, the best offering they've had so far. I get a running newsfeed of what my friends did, who got tagged in which photos, and so on. In fact I have found a few friends this way - a friend got tagged by another friend, whom I also know. Then I'd send a friend request and we link up.
I also liked how all your invites were in the right sidebar - you can see how many of which types of invites you had.
However, the latest one blows. In fact, I'd say that the latest incarnation of the layout just broke everything. People were just getting used to the "new" layout and then they decided to change it again. Yes, it looks amazingly sparse. Kinda like Twitter in fact. Basically, the majority of what's there on the homepage after you log in is basically just status updates from your friends. That's it. You can't see if they've joined a group, or uploaded a new pic, or commented on a picture. In short, all the stuff that used to be there on this page.
The thing I find most frustrating with the latest layout is that my "Invites Box" went missing (or so I thought). Try as I might, I could not locate my latest slew of useless invites to games I will never play or install. However, that doesn't mean I don't want to see them - there might be an invite to an event or a game I might actually be interested in!
After asking around a bit on Plurk, some friends finally told me where to look for it. I present it in the picture below:
Ok if I didn't show you this picture, would you have noticed that single line I circled in red? You'd be hunting left and right to see where your invite notifications are, wouldn't you? After all, it USED to be on the right sidebar.
There's really too many things dropped in this new layouts. I even tried to fiddle with the newsfeed options, but guess what? I couldn't find it. I remember that it existed before, because I remember the slider bars which I can pic to choose which type of event(s) I wanted to see from which specific friend. I remember sliding them around to "See More Of" and "See Less Of" the various types of events of my friends, to tweak them to my personal preference.
Now, all I see are status updates 90% of the time., which is essentially like Plurk (more than Twitter) because you can comment on the status just like how we chat in Plurk. In fact, if this is what Facebook is trying to emulate, then Plurk is already "there". We're all using it, and Plurk has the advantage of having a scrollable timeline. We just drag the timeline around to see older "status updates". With Facebook we have to click on "older posts" and wait for the page to change.
So, Facebook, stop trying to emulate others. Just be yourself - Facebook. That's why we're here. Otherwise, we might as well be at the website(s) you were trying to emulate.
Labels: facebook, internet, Rant
Friday, January 30, 2009
12:17 by FoxTwo
In the old days, we wanted to do our mails offline because the cost of Internet connection was high - many places charge by either the amount of data downloaded or the amount of time you spent online. The more you use, the more you pay. Hence, it made sense to download all your mails quickly, reply them offline at leisure, connect again and send your replies quickly.
Compare that to today's age of broadband - everyone's "always on", and it makes very little difference how long they spend online get their email. Many people no longer are on the pay-by-amount-of-data plans. Most ISPs offer "unlimited connections" or close to it.
So, when I came across this article - "Official Gmail Blog: New in Labs: Offline Gmail", I was wondering, has everything come full circle? Do people now want a way to read their mail offline, again?
Now Gmail is offering an "offline" function to assist people with "spotty network connections". To do that, you need to install a small bit of software from Google to allow it to detect the state of network connection on your computer.
I find this redundant because we already have software that can do the same thing for years upon years. Heck, you may even know it, because one of them is called "Outlook". Yes, Outlook (like most other email software) can download your mail to your PC and let you read and reply at your leisure! Amazing isn't it?
Not only can Outlook do it, so can Thunderbird, or Pegasus, or whatever. Just go to any software library site like CNet's Download.com, Softpedia, or Tucows and do a search on them. You will find a whole slew of them!
If you use IMAP on these email software, you are simulating the web-based experience only via a new GUI - your email software's. Everything you do when on an IMAP connection is real-time, just as if you're on the actual web page.
All these email software will download your mail by using a protocol called POP3. That is the traditional method. This is also the method that Google is mimicking to download a copy to your local PC.
Personally I've always used an email software, even if I may be using a web-based mail service. The advantage is, all my email accounts from the various services are contained within ONE software. For example, in Thunderbird, I can configure a mix of POP3 and IMAP services as I please, depending on how I wanted to get my mails. I am sure it will be the same in Outlook or whatever other modern email software that you do decide to use.
The caveat is - if your primary email service is HOTMAIL, you may have no choice but to use the latest versions of Outlook. Only MS Outlook can download emails from your Hotmail account.
Since this entry is talking about Gmail, you can relax. Google has wisely allowed both POP3 and IMAP protocols to be activated on your account, so you can easily configure an email software to access your Gmail emails via either protocols.
So I'm still puzzled - why's everyone going gaga over this "feature"? I've had it for YEARS :)
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12:17 by FoxTwo
Offline Gmail - What Is The Point?
Image via CrunchBase
In the old days, we wanted to do our mails offline because the cost of Internet connection was high - many places charge by either the amount of data downloaded or the amount of time you spent online. The more you use, the more you pay. Hence, it made sense to download all your mails quickly, reply them offline at leisure, connect again and send your replies quickly.
Compare that to today's age of broadband - everyone's "always on", and it makes very little difference how long they spend online get their email. Many people no longer are on the pay-by-amount-of-data plans. Most ISPs offer "unlimited connections" or close to it.
So, when I came across this article - "Official Gmail Blog: New in Labs: Offline Gmail", I was wondering, has everything come full circle? Do people now want a way to read their mail offline, again?
Now Gmail is offering an "offline" function to assist people with "spotty network connections". To do that, you need to install a small bit of software from Google to allow it to detect the state of network connection on your computer.
I find this redundant because we already have software that can do the same thing for years upon years. Heck, you may even know it, because one of them is called "Outlook". Yes, Outlook (like most other email software) can download your mail to your PC and let you read and reply at your leisure! Amazing isn't it?
Not only can Outlook do it, so can Thunderbird, or Pegasus, or whatever. Just go to any software library site like CNet's Download.com, Softpedia, or Tucows and do a search on them. You will find a whole slew of them!
If you use IMAP on these email software, you are simulating the web-based experience only via a new GUI - your email software's. Everything you do when on an IMAP connection is real-time, just as if you're on the actual web page.
All these email software will download your mail by using a protocol called POP3. That is the traditional method. This is also the method that Google is mimicking to download a copy to your local PC.
Personally I've always used an email software, even if I may be using a web-based mail service. The advantage is, all my email accounts from the various services are contained within ONE software. For example, in Thunderbird, I can configure a mix of POP3 and IMAP services as I please, depending on how I wanted to get my mails. I am sure it will be the same in Outlook or whatever other modern email software that you do decide to use.
The caveat is - if your primary email service is HOTMAIL, you may have no choice but to use the latest versions of Outlook. Only MS Outlook can download emails from your Hotmail account.
Since this entry is talking about Gmail, you can relax. Google has wisely allowed both POP3 and IMAP protocols to be activated on your account, so you can easily configure an email software to access your Gmail emails via either protocols.
So I'm still puzzled - why's everyone going gaga over this "feature"? I've had it for YEARS :)
Labels: email, Google, internet
Saturday, November 22, 2008
13:14 by FoxTwo
What that taught me was that I should never stick to just 1 site to host my videos. I had to slowly, and painfully, re-upload all my videos to a new site. Upload speed, as you know, is pathetic on Singapore's broadband plans. 256K, 512K, 1MB at best.
Anyway right now I have hosted my non-gameplay videos at Viddler. However, more importantly, I found a game-oriented site to host my gameplay videos - Wegame. My gaming videos can be seen here.
It's a new site, started only in 2007. The thing I like about it, is that the video quality rivals that of Vimeo, perhaps even better! The only drawback is that it doesn't have a High-Definition format. Also, encoding videos on wegame is really quick. My videos were all converted and ready almost as fast as I could upload them!
In fact I watched my own videos in amazement as I uploaded them - they looked almost as good as the original file I uploaded! Even on Vimeo, I could see some "degrading" when they convert my videos into FLV format for use on the web. However on Wegame, I almost couldn't tell the difference if I didn't have the original video with me. As an aside though, Viddler really sucks at converting my videos. They immediately become all chunky and blocky.
On Wegame, we can upload up to 1GB per file. That beats Vimeo's 500MB per week quota. The downside is, they also have a rule that the video shouldn't be more than 20 minutes long. I have no idea why though - if you encode a video file correctly, even 1 hour can be squeezed into about 400MB without much loss of quality.
The reason why I didn't upload non-gameplay videos there was because I didn't want to take the risk of running afoul of thier TOS. Now, the thing is, Vimeo also never had a rule against gameplay videos, but they changed the rules halfway through and never informed their userbase. I hope Wegame takes note of this and inform their userbase should their rules change mid-way.
Anyway guess I found a new home for hosting my gameplay videos!
13:14 by FoxTwo
A New Video Hosting Site - Wegame
What that taught me was that I should never stick to just 1 site to host my videos. I had to slowly, and painfully, re-upload all my videos to a new site. Upload speed, as you know, is pathetic on Singapore's broadband plans. 256K, 512K, 1MB at best.
Anyway right now I have hosted my non-gameplay videos at Viddler. However, more importantly, I found a game-oriented site to host my gameplay videos - Wegame. My gaming videos can be seen here.
It's a new site, started only in 2007. The thing I like about it, is that the video quality rivals that of Vimeo, perhaps even better! The only drawback is that it doesn't have a High-Definition format. Also, encoding videos on wegame is really quick. My videos were all converted and ready almost as fast as I could upload them!
In fact I watched my own videos in amazement as I uploaded them - they looked almost as good as the original file I uploaded! Even on Vimeo, I could see some "degrading" when they convert my videos into FLV format for use on the web. However on Wegame, I almost couldn't tell the difference if I didn't have the original video with me. As an aside though, Viddler really sucks at converting my videos. They immediately become all chunky and blocky.
On Wegame, we can upload up to 1GB per file. That beats Vimeo's 500MB per week quota. The downside is, they also have a rule that the video shouldn't be more than 20 minutes long. I have no idea why though - if you encode a video file correctly, even 1 hour can be squeezed into about 400MB without much loss of quality.
The reason why I didn't upload non-gameplay videos there was because I didn't want to take the risk of running afoul of thier TOS. Now, the thing is, Vimeo also never had a rule against gameplay videos, but they changed the rules halfway through and never informed their userbase. I hope Wegame takes note of this and inform their userbase should their rules change mid-way.
Anyway guess I found a new home for hosting my gameplay videos!
Monday, November 17, 2008
11:28 by FoxTwo Some months ago, I moved my videos from Youtube to Vimeo. At the time, Vimeo was an up-and-coming startup, and it offered some features which I liked. For example, no 10 minute limit, weekly 500MB uploads, and your videos can be in High Definition!
All these made me choose Vimeo over other sites like Viddler or metacafe or veoh.
However, just today, I got a short and terse email from Vimeo:
"Your account has been removed. Reason: Gameplay videos not allowed"
Um wha~~!? I've been uploading gameplay videos since Jan or Feb 2008 and nobody said anything about it. In fact I don't even remember reading anything about their usage policy saying that we can't upload videogame captures! Besides, I distinctly remember seeing other gameplay videos from other people on Vimeo too!
Now, if the rules changed mid-way, shouldn't a site like Vimeo send an email out to all members to tell them to click on ACCEPT on the new Terms Of Service? Well no such email came. No blinking "we updated our terms of service, please read" words appeared on my dashboard or whatever whenever I logged in to upload videos.
In other words, I didn't know.
Also, I don't only have gameplay videos on Vimeo. I have machinimas too (stated on their new terms of use as being allowed) as well as non-gameplay videos like videos of my friends in funny situations.
They removed my account without warning. NONE. Just a short, terse, "your account has been removed" email.
So how does a user take steps to remedy a situation before account removal happens? No chance to even delete/remove them on my own accord to keep my account.
So if you are looking for a video sharing site, do NOT use Vimeo! No, not even if your videos are non-gameplay videos. The way they do things is not .... reasonable.
I guess I'm switching AGAIN... maybe Veoh, maybe Dailymotion. Who knows?
11:28 by FoxTwo Some months ago, I moved my videos from Youtube to Vimeo. At the time, Vimeo was an up-and-coming startup, and it offered some features which I liked. For example, no 10 minute limit, weekly 500MB uploads, and your videos can be in High Definition!
All these made me choose Vimeo over other sites like Viddler or metacafe or veoh.
However, just today, I got a short and terse email from Vimeo:
"Your account has been removed. Reason: Gameplay videos not allowed"
Um wha~~!? I've been uploading gameplay videos since Jan or Feb 2008 and nobody said anything about it. In fact I don't even remember reading anything about their usage policy saying that we can't upload videogame captures! Besides, I distinctly remember seeing other gameplay videos from other people on Vimeo too!
Now, if the rules changed mid-way, shouldn't a site like Vimeo send an email out to all members to tell them to click on ACCEPT on the new Terms Of Service? Well no such email came. No blinking "we updated our terms of service, please read" words appeared on my dashboard or whatever whenever I logged in to upload videos.
In other words, I didn't know.
Also, I don't only have gameplay videos on Vimeo. I have machinimas too (stated on their new terms of use as being allowed) as well as non-gameplay videos like videos of my friends in funny situations.
They removed my account without warning. NONE. Just a short, terse, "your account has been removed" email.
So how does a user take steps to remedy a situation before account removal happens? No chance to even delete/remove them on my own accord to keep my account.
So if you are looking for a video sharing site, do NOT use Vimeo! No, not even if your videos are non-gameplay videos. The way they do things is not .... reasonable.
I guess I'm switching AGAIN... maybe Veoh, maybe Dailymotion. Who knows?
Labels: internet, Rant, self, video
Tuesday, November 04, 2008
13:27 by FoxTwo
Well as far as I'm concerned, they almost were. Lately my talk times have increased almost 100%. My usual mobile phone plan comes with 300 mins and costs $48.15 a month. However, recently I have been clocking as high as 700 mins a month. For every 60 mins over the "free" bundled minutes, I pay almost $10 (16 cents a min x 60 mins). So, you can roughly guess how much my phone bills were.
Now you might be thinking, 300 mins (which is 5 hours) of talk time should be enough. Not really. If you actually calculate, it means you can only talk for 10 mins a day, for 30 days, before all your minutes are used up. A few months ago, 300 mins was enough for me. Recently though, 300 mins barely lasts me 2 weeks.
Luckily, since I recently got a new mobile phone, the Nokia E51, it is touted as a VOIP-enabled phone. As such I started exploring possibilities that I can leverage VOIP on the phone to cut my costs down.
My current problem is simple - I do not have enough "minutes" in my mobile plan, and I don't want to go up to the next higher plan as that would mean I spend $82 a month instead of $48.15. That's almost $30 more a month, every month.
After hunting around a while, I came upon 2 very potential solutions. One is by Skype, and the other by pfingo (incidentally, pfingo is not a "new startup". It's actually Starhub).
Skype has a subscription mode that seems very suitable to me. I pay US$5.95 (approx S$9) a month, and I get to call a selected country for "free". The word "free" is quoted because the small print says "up to 10,000 mins". They did not give any specifics, so I'm naturally wary. The "selected country" for me of course, is Singapore. Luckily too, that Singapore is in their list of being able to call both MOBILE and LANDLINES for free. This subscription has no "fixed" period. You can subscribe for as little as 1 month, or let Skype continue to charge your credit card every month if you choose to stay with them.
pfingo's offering is slightly different. First off, if you subscribe to pfingo, not only can you call Singapore numbers free (both mobile and landlines), you also get your very own number, free too! In other words, should you use pfingo to call your friend, he/she will see your new pfingo number on his phone instead of "withheld" or "private number". This is of some influence in my decision, as I know some of my friends will refuse outright to pickup any incoming calls that are "withheld" or "private numbers". Why? Because most of the time, these numbers are telemarketers calling to sell you something.
The downside to pfingo's offerings is the higher price per-month ($13 compared to approx $9 for Skype), as well as the minimum period to subscribe is 3 months. Thus, if you are not too sure, like I was, you can't just "try them out" for 1 month. However, if you try them via the usual way - buying $10 of credits and calling out first and deciding if they are good enough, then once you subscribe to pfingo for 3, 6 or 12 months, you can literally have the peace of mind that:
Needless to say, both have solutions for mobile phones too, so that you can use either GPRS or Wifi to make VOIP calls.
Currently I am trying out Skype for a month. I did activate a Caller ID with Skype too, but it doesn't seem to work. Opening a support ticket elicited no response. With pfingo's offering so tempting, it is very tempting to switch over to pfingo.
In a sense it's a lot more convenient for me using VOIP phones since I do not have a desk phone, and if I want to make calls out to vendors I would need to use my mobile phone. Now that I have Skype on my laptop, it's like having a phone with me too! Oh yes, my laptop easily connects with my bluetooh earpiece for my mobile phone, so there's no need to have any extra "headsets".
Conclusion:
$48.15 a month for mobile plan
$9 for Skype's subscription
Total = $57 a month for almost unlimited talktime.
Of course if you have a cheaper mobile plan than mine (ie those with 100 mins), then your costs are lowered significantly too.
You should consider VOIP to supplement your mobile plans, if you have a modern enough phone. You should seriously consider VOIP especially when your phone has WLAN capabilities ("wifi").
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13:27 by FoxTwo
Are Your Mobile Phone Bills Killing You?
Well as far as I'm concerned, they almost were. Lately my talk times have increased almost 100%. My usual mobile phone plan comes with 300 mins and costs $48.15 a month. However, recently I have been clocking as high as 700 mins a month. For every 60 mins over the "free" bundled minutes, I pay almost $10 (16 cents a min x 60 mins). So, you can roughly guess how much my phone bills were.
Now you might be thinking, 300 mins (which is 5 hours) of talk time should be enough. Not really. If you actually calculate, it means you can only talk for 10 mins a day, for 30 days, before all your minutes are used up. A few months ago, 300 mins was enough for me. Recently though, 300 mins barely lasts me 2 weeks.
Luckily, since I recently got a new mobile phone, the Nokia E51, it is touted as a VOIP-enabled phone. As such I started exploring possibilities that I can leverage VOIP on the phone to cut my costs down.
My current problem is simple - I do not have enough "minutes" in my mobile plan, and I don't want to go up to the next higher plan as that would mean I spend $82 a month instead of $48.15. That's almost $30 more a month, every month.
After hunting around a while, I came upon 2 very potential solutions. One is by Skype, and the other by pfingo (incidentally, pfingo is not a "new startup". It's actually Starhub).
Skype has a subscription mode that seems very suitable to me. I pay US$5.95 (approx S$9) a month, and I get to call a selected country for "free". The word "free" is quoted because the small print says "up to 10,000 mins". They did not give any specifics, so I'm naturally wary. The "selected country" for me of course, is Singapore. Luckily too, that Singapore is in their list of being able to call both MOBILE and LANDLINES for free. This subscription has no "fixed" period. You can subscribe for as little as 1 month, or let Skype continue to charge your credit card every month if you choose to stay with them.
pfingo's offering is slightly different. First off, if you subscribe to pfingo, not only can you call Singapore numbers free (both mobile and landlines), you also get your very own number, free too! In other words, should you use pfingo to call your friend, he/she will see your new pfingo number on his phone instead of "withheld" or "private number". This is of some influence in my decision, as I know some of my friends will refuse outright to pickup any incoming calls that are "withheld" or "private numbers". Why? Because most of the time, these numbers are telemarketers calling to sell you something.
The downside to pfingo's offerings is the higher price per-month ($13 compared to approx $9 for Skype), as well as the minimum period to subscribe is 3 months. Thus, if you are not too sure, like I was, you can't just "try them out" for 1 month. However, if you try them via the usual way - buying $10 of credits and calling out first and deciding if they are good enough, then once you subscribe to pfingo for 3, 6 or 12 months, you can literally have the peace of mind that:
- You can call out to Singapore numbers for free for the next 3, 6 or 12 months
- You have a number appearing on the other side so that people can actually see who's calling.
- If your friend didn't answer your call, ie a missed call, he can actually call you back on that number!
Needless to say, both have solutions for mobile phones too, so that you can use either GPRS or Wifi to make VOIP calls.
Currently I am trying out Skype for a month. I did activate a Caller ID with Skype too, but it doesn't seem to work. Opening a support ticket elicited no response. With pfingo's offering so tempting, it is very tempting to switch over to pfingo.
In a sense it's a lot more convenient for me using VOIP phones since I do not have a desk phone, and if I want to make calls out to vendors I would need to use my mobile phone. Now that I have Skype on my laptop, it's like having a phone with me too! Oh yes, my laptop easily connects with my bluetooh earpiece for my mobile phone, so there's no need to have any extra "headsets".
Conclusion:
$48.15 a month for mobile plan
$9 for Skype's subscription
Total = $57 a month for almost unlimited talktime.
Of course if you have a cheaper mobile plan than mine (ie those with 100 mins), then your costs are lowered significantly too.
You should consider VOIP to supplement your mobile plans, if you have a modern enough phone. You should seriously consider VOIP especially when your phone has WLAN capabilities ("wifi").
Thursday, October 30, 2008
13:59 by FoxTwo Back in 2007, a new blog traffic tool appeared on the Internet - Blogrush.
1 year later, I received an email saying that Blogrush is shutting down. That would of course, include the shutdown of Traffic Jam too.
Now, I've written about how mis-named the 2 sites are. Blogrush didn't, it crawled. Traffic Jam wasn't, too. An avalanche of traffic poured in instead. Now, both are shut down.
I wouldn't really say that I miss them though. Blogrush was a nice idea but it didn't work that well. There are a ton of other traffic-exchange sites out there to help you with your blog (and mine). Right now, though, all I am doing is just to remove the Blogrush code from my blog. I'll eventually get around to looking for another traffic-exchange site but not right now.
In any case, I haven't really been updating my blog here anywhere near a "consistent" basis. Lately it's been pretty ad-hoc. In the past I'd update once every couple of days at least. Now, a week can go by before I find time to write something down.
Goodbye Blogrush! It was good having you around!
13:59 by FoxTwo Back in 2007, a new blog traffic tool appeared on the Internet - Blogrush.
1 year later, I received an email saying that Blogrush is shutting down. That would of course, include the shutdown of Traffic Jam too.
Now, I've written about how mis-named the 2 sites are. Blogrush didn't, it crawled. Traffic Jam wasn't, too. An avalanche of traffic poured in instead. Now, both are shut down.
I wouldn't really say that I miss them though. Blogrush was a nice idea but it didn't work that well. There are a ton of other traffic-exchange sites out there to help you with your blog (and mine). Right now, though, all I am doing is just to remove the Blogrush code from my blog. I'll eventually get around to looking for another traffic-exchange site but not right now.
In any case, I haven't really been updating my blog here anywhere near a "consistent" basis. Lately it's been pretty ad-hoc. In the past I'd update once every couple of days at least. Now, a week can go by before I find time to write something down.
Goodbye Blogrush! It was good having you around!
Wednesday, October 08, 2008
13:47 by FoxTwo
Image via WikipediaThe recent price increase by Singtel on landlines sparked off a wave of protest around my friends, and many bloggers. On the surface, if you look at it, the increase isn't really that much. Only 0.01 cent more per minute, and a total of $10 more per YEAR.
And yet, people protest and grumble.
I think, the problem isn't the amount of the increase. It's that everything has been increasing and yet we see no improvements. As a matter of fact, bus fare, MRT fares, and taxi fare increases have not done a thing to help us - MRTs are still packed like sardines, and we pay to be packed like sardines. Bus fare increases only help to put stupid TVMobile boxes into the buses, which do nothing to "entertain us" while we are in a "standing-room-only" packed bus.
The Singtel price increase is probably the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back.
Nowadays, almost everyone has some sort of broadband connection at home. It's high time we take note of VOIP technology (Voice Over Internet Protocol) and use it as a telephone. VOIP is not exactly a new technology. It has been around for at least 10 years if not more. Back then, the major application for VOIP technology was games. No seriously, it was used for games! Picture this - you're frantically fighting off a horde of monsters. Is it faster to shout "HELP!" or to click the screen, bring up the chat box, and then type HELP (in the meantime the monsters would still be pummeling you)? Even then, would your friends be looking at the chatbox on the screen, or would they also be busy fending off the monsters?
Over the years, VOIP grew from a game-only application into what it is today - ready for mainstream. As an illustration, Starhub already offers it as a commercial product - their Digital Voice products. Yes, Starhub leverages on the cables which they have already laid into your HDB homes meant for their internet and cable TV services to carry voice as well.
Why VOIP?
Because, it's dirt-cheap. You already have an internet connection. You're already paying for it. If you use VOIP to call someone also using VOIP from the same service provider, it is almost guaranteed that the call will be free. Another illustration - on MSN, call your buddy and TALK to him with a mic. That conversation is free. Yes, you hear voice. Yes you can see video (if you both have webcams). Yet, that session is free.
VOIP comes into its own when it comes to calling your friends and loved ones who are in a different country. If you actually sat down and compared IDD rates with VOIP global calling rates, the VOIP rates would typically be at least 40% to 70% cheaper! Seriously. About a year or so ago, I called a friend up in Hong Kong and had a 1 hour 30 minute conversation with her. The price? S$2.00.
No you didn't read that wrong. It cost me US$1.80 for a 90 minute call (2 cents a minute). US$1.80 is about S$2.00 or so. If you think about it, it was cheaper to call overseas at 2 cents a minute, for 90 minutes, than to call your buddy in Singapore up on the mobile phone (16 cents a minute) and talk to him for 15 minutes!
If you are worried about the "call quality", and whether there will be "drop outs" etc, you can rest easy. My overseas friends whom I have called, keep telling me I sounded so clear, it was just like standing next to them. Well it's actually not that surprising since the microphones you own/have is probably better than those on the phones.
Skype is a popular and well-known VOIP provider. Many people I know also have skype accounts. Even the company I work in now encourages Skype usage if you are not physically in the company network. In the company itself, the entire PABX system is all VOIP. To dial anybody up in the world, all you need is just a 5 digit number - first digit represents country, the other 4 digits for the extension. The "overseas call" is thus, free too. Why? Because we are using the company internal network, which is already laid for the LAN and WAN networks for the computers.
With costs so low and dirt cheap, it is little wonder VOIP isn't very well known outside of the IT industry. Telephone companies such as Singtel will definitely not want to lose their "golden goose". Without the masses paying for their high rates (16 cents a minute for mobile calls, 0.16 cents a min for landline calls), they'd lose a huge chunk of their revenue.
Some VOIP services like Gizmo and pfingo even have mobile clients ("software for your phone") that allows you to use your phone to call overseas using their cheap rates, as long as you have an Internet connection. Modern phones probably come with wifi as one of the connectivity options and thus you can just use your phone and "log in" to your own home wireless network, and call using VOIP.
Alternatively, you can subscribe to mobile broadband plans which are definitely cheaper than mobile phone plans. For about $22 a month you can get mobile broadband services on your phone with 50GB of bundled free transfers. 50GB is definitely more than enough for you to make VOIP calls. As an illustration, a typical user only consumes 20GB to 30GBs a month even if he watches youtube videos regularly
So, effectively, you can downgrade your mobile phone plan to the cheapest one available and get mobile broadband to use cheaper call rates (2 cents a min to call any number in Singapore).
If you use the pfingo service, they even have a callback function! Simply go to the internet on any computer, phone or PDA, key in a callback number for you (home or mobile phone), then the destination number. Your phone will ring, a message will tell you to hold, and soon your friend (overseas or local) will be on the other end. So you don't even have to be "on the internet" to use their VOIP service!
In a similar vein, Skype offers an "unlimited country call". Meaning for about S$8 a month you can call any number in Singapore (or your choice of country) free. Downside of course, is that you have to use the Skype client on the desktop or mobile phone, or own a skype-fone. If you go for the Global option, you pay about S$18.00 a month and call Singapore plus 35 other countries FOR FREE.
Now if this blog post hasn't spurred you on to at least do some research into the VOIP technology and how it may be able to help you save some money, nothing else will :)
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13:47 by FoxTwo
Image via WikipediaThe recent price increase by Singtel on landlines sparked off a wave of protest around my friends, and many bloggers. On the surface, if you look at it, the increase isn't really that much. Only 0.01 cent more per minute, and a total of $10 more per YEAR.And yet, people protest and grumble.
I think, the problem isn't the amount of the increase. It's that everything has been increasing and yet we see no improvements. As a matter of fact, bus fare, MRT fares, and taxi fare increases have not done a thing to help us - MRTs are still packed like sardines, and we pay to be packed like sardines. Bus fare increases only help to put stupid TVMobile boxes into the buses, which do nothing to "entertain us" while we are in a "standing-room-only" packed bus.
The Singtel price increase is probably the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back.
Nowadays, almost everyone has some sort of broadband connection at home. It's high time we take note of VOIP technology (Voice Over Internet Protocol) and use it as a telephone. VOIP is not exactly a new technology. It has been around for at least 10 years if not more. Back then, the major application for VOIP technology was games. No seriously, it was used for games! Picture this - you're frantically fighting off a horde of monsters. Is it faster to shout "HELP!" or to click the screen, bring up the chat box, and then type HELP (in the meantime the monsters would still be pummeling you)? Even then, would your friends be looking at the chatbox on the screen, or would they also be busy fending off the monsters?
Over the years, VOIP grew from a game-only application into what it is today - ready for mainstream. As an illustration, Starhub already offers it as a commercial product - their Digital Voice products. Yes, Starhub leverages on the cables which they have already laid into your HDB homes meant for their internet and cable TV services to carry voice as well.
Why VOIP?
Because, it's dirt-cheap. You already have an internet connection. You're already paying for it. If you use VOIP to call someone also using VOIP from the same service provider, it is almost guaranteed that the call will be free. Another illustration - on MSN, call your buddy and TALK to him with a mic. That conversation is free. Yes, you hear voice. Yes you can see video (if you both have webcams). Yet, that session is free.
VOIP comes into its own when it comes to calling your friends and loved ones who are in a different country. If you actually sat down and compared IDD rates with VOIP global calling rates, the VOIP rates would typically be at least 40% to 70% cheaper! Seriously. About a year or so ago, I called a friend up in Hong Kong and had a 1 hour 30 minute conversation with her. The price? S$2.00.
No you didn't read that wrong. It cost me US$1.80 for a 90 minute call (2 cents a minute). US$1.80 is about S$2.00 or so. If you think about it, it was cheaper to call overseas at 2 cents a minute, for 90 minutes, than to call your buddy in Singapore up on the mobile phone (16 cents a minute) and talk to him for 15 minutes!
If you are worried about the "call quality", and whether there will be "drop outs" etc, you can rest easy. My overseas friends whom I have called, keep telling me I sounded so clear, it was just like standing next to them. Well it's actually not that surprising since the microphones you own/have is probably better than those on the phones.
Skype is a popular and well-known VOIP provider. Many people I know also have skype accounts. Even the company I work in now encourages Skype usage if you are not physically in the company network. In the company itself, the entire PABX system is all VOIP. To dial anybody up in the world, all you need is just a 5 digit number - first digit represents country, the other 4 digits for the extension. The "overseas call" is thus, free too. Why? Because we are using the company internal network, which is already laid for the LAN and WAN networks for the computers.
With costs so low and dirt cheap, it is little wonder VOIP isn't very well known outside of the IT industry. Telephone companies such as Singtel will definitely not want to lose their "golden goose". Without the masses paying for their high rates (16 cents a minute for mobile calls, 0.16 cents a min for landline calls), they'd lose a huge chunk of their revenue.
Some VOIP services like Gizmo and pfingo even have mobile clients ("software for your phone") that allows you to use your phone to call overseas using their cheap rates, as long as you have an Internet connection. Modern phones probably come with wifi as one of the connectivity options and thus you can just use your phone and "log in" to your own home wireless network, and call using VOIP.
Alternatively, you can subscribe to mobile broadband plans which are definitely cheaper than mobile phone plans. For about $22 a month you can get mobile broadband services on your phone with 50GB of bundled free transfers. 50GB is definitely more than enough for you to make VOIP calls. As an illustration, a typical user only consumes 20GB to 30GBs a month even if he watches youtube videos regularly
So, effectively, you can downgrade your mobile phone plan to the cheapest one available and get mobile broadband to use cheaper call rates (2 cents a min to call any number in Singapore).
If you use the pfingo service, they even have a callback function! Simply go to the internet on any computer, phone or PDA, key in a callback number for you (home or mobile phone), then the destination number. Your phone will ring, a message will tell you to hold, and soon your friend (overseas or local) will be on the other end. So you don't even have to be "on the internet" to use their VOIP service!
In a similar vein, Skype offers an "unlimited country call". Meaning for about S$8 a month you can call any number in Singapore (or your choice of country) free. Downside of course, is that you have to use the Skype client on the desktop or mobile phone, or own a skype-fone. If you go for the Global option, you pay about S$18.00 a month and call Singapore plus 35 other countries FOR FREE.
Now if this blog post hasn't spurred you on to at least do some research into the VOIP technology and how it may be able to help you save some money, nothing else will :)
Sunday, August 24, 2008
20:23 by FoxTwo A couple of posts ago, I wrote about gothere.sg. In a nutshell, it's replacement to Streetdirectory.com, especially now that the latter has splattered adverts everywhere, including right smack in the middle of the map you're looking at. Irritating as hell.
As a quick update, since Monday, 18 Aug, gothere.sg has introduced a new feature - embeddable maps! Now I think some of you can still remember - in the past, you used Streetdirectory.com to indicate your location and pasted a small portion of the map onto your website so people can find you.
Gothere.sg went a bit further. Full interactivity in its embeddable versions! Think of "youtube" but now, it's with maps. As an example, I'll embed one below:
In the map above, I selected my start point as Compass Point (Sengkang's Interchange) and my destination as Singapore Expo.
You can drag it, view it, put pins on it, and so on. One great use I can think of, is for us bloggers to recommend new-found makan places! Easy, no need to describe until face green green (local hokkien version - bin chi chi). Just find a location, stick a pin on it, and start describing in the embedded map.
For the more mobile among us - gothere.sg has a mobile version. Just point your phone's browser to http://gothere.sg/m and you're all set! Of course, take note that the mobile version is a cut-down version, saving you in transfer bytes and thus, air-time costs.
20:23 by FoxTwo A couple of posts ago, I wrote about gothere.sg. In a nutshell, it's replacement to Streetdirectory.com, especially now that the latter has splattered adverts everywhere, including right smack in the middle of the map you're looking at. Irritating as hell.
As a quick update, since Monday, 18 Aug, gothere.sg has introduced a new feature - embeddable maps! Now I think some of you can still remember - in the past, you used Streetdirectory.com to indicate your location and pasted a small portion of the map onto your website so people can find you.
Gothere.sg went a bit further. Full interactivity in its embeddable versions! Think of "youtube" but now, it's with maps. As an example, I'll embed one below:
In the map above, I selected my start point as Compass Point (Sengkang's Interchange) and my destination as Singapore Expo.
You can drag it, view it, put pins on it, and so on. One great use I can think of, is for us bloggers to recommend new-found makan places! Easy, no need to describe until face green green (local hokkien version - bin chi chi). Just find a location, stick a pin on it, and start describing in the embedded map.
For the more mobile among us - gothere.sg has a mobile version. Just point your phone's browser to http://gothere.sg/m and you're all set! Of course, take note that the mobile version is a cut-down version, saving you in transfer bytes and thus, air-time costs.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
14:03 by FoxTwo
Until recently, I have been manually using Google Maps and cross referencing with SBS and SMRT manually to find out how to get to a location.
After reading dk's post on his thoughts on Streetdirectory.com, I feel I should introduce a website which, thanks to Krisandro, has been brought to my attention.
The website is called GoThere. It sports the same features that used to be available on Streetdirectory.com - the bus guides, the driving instructions etc. In fact, I find it easier to use than Streetdirectory.com. You can easily enter a local name for a place, like "Raffles Hotel", or "Bugis Junction" into the search box, and it'll show you exactly where it is. You don't need to know the road name or even the postal code.
The "Get To Here" and "Get From Here To" box works the same. Just enter a name, part of a name, postal code, or just a local name, and it'll calculate the distance for all 3 modes of travel - driving, bus only, or bus+MRT. In fact it's so spot on, that the colleagues I have introduced this website to, have bookmarked it.
As you can see from the screenshot of the page, I only typed in "Bugis Junction" as a location. No address, nothing. What was returned was the full address of the place. If you look at the map carefully, bus stops are clearly indicated on the map.
Yes, you can click on the numbers to go directly to SBS IRIS and get more detailed bus information. Yes, you can even query when the next bus is coming too (although IRIS has been known to be inaccurate especially during peak hours).
In the bottom left corner you can also see a searchbox to look for nearby locations. Unlike in Streetdirectory.com, you are not limited to searching only for nearby ATMs or 7-11 stores. You can search for ANYTHING. Even "Boon Tong Kee" chicken rice if you want to.
Which brings me to another point. With Gothere.sg you don't need to search for a specific location. You can search for eating places, shopping, whatever. The site is kind of like "open source", where everyone contributes. If you liked a shop, a stall or whatever, and it's not listed, you can add it in. Other people can come and add comments and rate your selection.
14:03 by FoxTwo
A True Alternative To Streetdirectory.com
Until recently, I have been manually using Google Maps and cross referencing with SBS and SMRT manually to find out how to get to a location.
After reading dk's post on his thoughts on Streetdirectory.com, I feel I should introduce a website which, thanks to Krisandro, has been brought to my attention.
The website is called GoThere. It sports the same features that used to be available on Streetdirectory.com - the bus guides, the driving instructions etc. In fact, I find it easier to use than Streetdirectory.com. You can easily enter a local name for a place, like "Raffles Hotel", or "Bugis Junction" into the search box, and it'll show you exactly where it is. You don't need to know the road name or even the postal code.
The "Get To Here" and "Get From Here To" box works the same. Just enter a name, part of a name, postal code, or just a local name, and it'll calculate the distance for all 3 modes of travel - driving, bus only, or bus+MRT. In fact it's so spot on, that the colleagues I have introduced this website to, have bookmarked it.
Yes, you can click on the numbers to go directly to SBS IRIS and get more detailed bus information. Yes, you can even query when the next bus is coming too (although IRIS has been known to be inaccurate especially during peak hours).
In the bottom left corner you can also see a searchbox to look for nearby locations. Unlike in Streetdirectory.com, you are not limited to searching only for nearby ATMs or 7-11 stores. You can search for ANYTHING. Even "Boon Tong Kee" chicken rice if you want to.
Which brings me to another point. With Gothere.sg you don't need to search for a specific location. You can search for eating places, shopping, whatever. The site is kind of like "open source", where everyone contributes. If you liked a shop, a stall or whatever, and it's not listed, you can add it in. Other people can come and add comments and rate your selection.
An example is shown in the screenshot above. I looked for a Boon Tong Kee Chicken Rice store near Toa Payoh, and it offered the Balestier branch as the result. Here you can see that people have left comments for that particular branch of Boon Tong Kee.
The best thing about gothere.sg is - it's FREE! No need to sign up for membership even. You can contribute pretty much anonymously like Wikipedia. No ads, no clutter.
The conclusion is, for me anyway - I don't need Streetdirectory.com anymore. Gothere.sg does everything I need and much faster too.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
23:41 by FoxTwo
Image via WikipediaI received an email today, pretty late in the day actually. It was from the PR firm of Streetdirectory.com, and it says, in essence, that Streetdirectory.com is up and running with new maps and satellite pictures.
So I went over and had a look.
I came away pretty indifferent. Well you can't really blame me. In its current state, Streetdirectory.com is nowhere near its former glory. Bus and MRT guides return error results. Driving directions return a blank page.
Google Maps, at the very least, gave you driving directions (oh you didn't know it could? Yes it does, pretty accurately too). Just look at the pic above.
In fact I believe the site is still pretty buggy. Here's how you test.
To test the Bus and MRT directions feature, you have to get creative to work around the bug. I clicked on "to here" link, and went up 1 level. It will bring me to this page. From there, I clicked the "Singapore Bus and MRT Guide" link, to get to the right page.
By doing this, however, you have to fill in both your start and end point information. It's not a problem, since I just wanted to test it. The result that is returned is this:
Ah well.
At least the maps are back. Still, I'd be using Google Maps over Streetdirectory.com for now, just because at least the driving directions work, and Google Maps have less ads and clutter, hence load faster. Besides, Streetdirectory.com is currently using the satellite pictures from Google Maps anyway (but the maps aren't from Google, just to clarify). I may as well go direct to the source instead of coming here for my usage. Yes I'm weird. I always load the maps with satellite pictures because I want to get my bearings by looking at nearby buildings for landmarks.
As it stands now, Streetdirectory.com is a pale shadow of its former self during its hey-day. As soon as the driving directions and bus/MRT guides are fixed, people will start to come back. Right now though, I don't forsee anybody jumping for joy.
Update: In a plurk response by Krisandro, he mentioned a site called "GoThere". It does indeed provide directions on which bus to take from your start point to reach your end point.
23:41 by FoxTwo
Streetdirectory.com Is Back.... Kinda..
Image via WikipediaI received an email today, pretty late in the day actually. It was from the PR firm of Streetdirectory.com, and it says, in essence, that Streetdirectory.com is up and running with new maps and satellite pictures.So I went over and had a look.
I came away pretty indifferent. Well you can't really blame me. In its current state, Streetdirectory.com is nowhere near its former glory. Bus and MRT guides return error results. Driving directions return a blank page.
Google Maps, at the very least, gave you driving directions (oh you didn't know it could? Yes it does, pretty accurately too). Just look at the pic above.
In fact I believe the site is still pretty buggy. Here's how you test.
- At the main page, search for any road in Singapore. I tried to look for "Orchard Road".
- At the map page for the result, scroll down to the bottom and locate the tiny little combo box under the heading of "directions to:".
- No matter which you choose - Bus & MRT, or Driving Directions, it will always take you to the Driving Directions page.
- Even so, after filling in your start and end destinations, no results are returned. Just a blank page listing your start point and end point.
To test the Bus and MRT directions feature, you have to get creative to work around the bug. I clicked on "to here" link, and went up 1 level. It will bring me to this page. From there, I clicked the "Singapore Bus and MRT Guide" link, to get to the right page.
By doing this, however, you have to fill in both your start and end point information. It's not a problem, since I just wanted to test it. The result that is returned is this:
Sorry, we are terribly sorry, there are technical difficulties when processing this routing page. Our administrators has been notified. Please try again later.
Ah well.
At least the maps are back. Still, I'd be using Google Maps over Streetdirectory.com for now, just because at least the driving directions work, and Google Maps have less ads and clutter, hence load faster. Besides, Streetdirectory.com is currently using the satellite pictures from Google Maps anyway (but the maps aren't from Google, just to clarify). I may as well go direct to the source instead of coming here for my usage. Yes I'm weird. I always load the maps with satellite pictures because I want to get my bearings by looking at nearby buildings for landmarks.
As it stands now, Streetdirectory.com is a pale shadow of its former self during its hey-day. As soon as the driving directions and bus/MRT guides are fixed, people will start to come back. Right now though, I don't forsee anybody jumping for joy.
Update: In a plurk response by Krisandro, he mentioned a site called "GoThere". It does indeed provide directions on which bus to take from your start point to reach your end point.
Labels: internet, street directory
Friday, July 18, 2008
13:48 by FoxTwo Ok I'm really late to do this. Seems like everybody has hopped on the bandwagon and joined a relatively new "blogging network" place called SocialSpark except me. Well I finally got around to doing it and signed an account up on SocialSpark.
At first glance, Social Spark seems like a revamped "Pay Per Post", but that's only the first impression. If you actually browse the "marketplace", which is the new name for the "open opportunities" section, you can see several types of "opportunities".
The first available is "Sponsored Posts". This is the usual type that is normally available. That means, you write about a service or a product, submit it for the sponsor to review, and then the sponsor pays you. Something like an advert.
The second type, which is new, is a "Blog sponsorship". Personally I find this category the most irritating of all, and I never will take part in this. What happens is that a blog/website/company will "sponsor" your blog for a time period. To have the sponsorship, you have to install a small piece of code into your blog, which (to me) is irritating and pops up whenever someone visits your blog. If the code contains animation and sound and video, you can imagine how much it'll slow the loading time down! Plus if it's annoying music or video, the visitor has to hurriedly close/cancel/stop the music or video.
Fortunately, you are free not to utilise this portion of the functions if you don't want to.
The third (and final) type of sponsoships available to you is just called a "Spark". Essentially these don't pay you in monetary terms, but in traffic exchange. It really depends on what is offered. Some might review your blog in return, some might link your blog for a month. You have to read the terms before you accept the offer. Some don't even offer anything in return, but to rally support for a specific cause, or for promotional awareness efforts.
Well since I'm still relatively new to Socialspark, I need to explore it much more before I can give a more complete run-down of it.
13:48 by FoxTwo Ok I'm really late to do this. Seems like everybody has hopped on the bandwagon and joined a relatively new "blogging network" place called SocialSpark except me. Well I finally got around to doing it and signed an account up on SocialSpark.
At first glance, Social Spark seems like a revamped "Pay Per Post", but that's only the first impression. If you actually browse the "marketplace", which is the new name for the "open opportunities" section, you can see several types of "opportunities".
The first available is "Sponsored Posts". This is the usual type that is normally available. That means, you write about a service or a product, submit it for the sponsor to review, and then the sponsor pays you. Something like an advert.
The second type, which is new, is a "Blog sponsorship". Personally I find this category the most irritating of all, and I never will take part in this. What happens is that a blog/website/company will "sponsor" your blog for a time period. To have the sponsorship, you have to install a small piece of code into your blog, which (to me) is irritating and pops up whenever someone visits your blog. If the code contains animation and sound and video, you can imagine how much it'll slow the loading time down! Plus if it's annoying music or video, the visitor has to hurriedly close/cancel/stop the music or video.
Fortunately, you are free not to utilise this portion of the functions if you don't want to.
The third (and final) type of sponsoships available to you is just called a "Spark". Essentially these don't pay you in monetary terms, but in traffic exchange. It really depends on what is offered. Some might review your blog in return, some might link your blog for a month. You have to read the terms before you accept the offer. Some don't even offer anything in return, but to rally support for a specific cause, or for promotional awareness efforts.
Well since I'm still relatively new to Socialspark, I need to explore it much more before I can give a more complete run-down of it.
Labels: blog, internet, socialspark
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
17:39 by FoxTwo Sometimes, being indifferent does indeed have its advantages.
For example, I'm in mybloglog and blogcatalog. You do see people there making friends, talking to each other at the shoutboxes of each other, talking to each other at the forums, but I never did any of these. They are both supposed to be "communities", yes, but I never really "got into" them.
In Facebook, for a while, I was actively engaged in buying and selling, having fun and so on, with my friends, pingsters and non-pingsters alike. Slowly but surely, Facebook burnout got to me and I started to log in to Facebook less and less. In fact I hardly log in to Facebook nowadays and my friends have to SMS me to chase me to log in so I can hep them do some stuff or give them money to buy their pets etc.
When I joined Entrecard, I see similar levels of activity there. People there frequent the forums. They drop cards, they make friends. I did almost none of these, except for dropping cards and SELECTIVELY making friends by leaving comments on their blogs (I made some great friends this way, such as Aronil, Jasmine and Jade).
In all cases, the "community" was there, but I didn't really actively take part in it, since they are based so far away - in the USA. The selective people I befriended slowly via the means mentioned above usually are Singaporeans or based in Singapore, or at the furthest, Malaysia (Aronil).
I only decided to become more active in ping.sg, a local organisation, based in Singapore, with Singaporeans, or people living in Singapore, forming the core members. I thought it was be preferable to interact in this kind of environment compared to the others mentioned above.
Alas, recent events have shown that it was the wrong thing to do. Indifference which I have shown above in the other "communities" would have insulated me from the impact of recent events. Seriously, if I had been as indifferent in ping.sg as I was in the others, I'd probably be totally unfazed at what's happening within the "community".
Perhaps it's time I backed away and not invest anymore efforts.
Indifference is key, I guess.
17:39 by FoxTwo Sometimes, being indifferent does indeed have its advantages.
For example, I'm in mybloglog and blogcatalog. You do see people there making friends, talking to each other at the shoutboxes of each other, talking to each other at the forums, but I never did any of these. They are both supposed to be "communities", yes, but I never really "got into" them.
In Facebook, for a while, I was actively engaged in buying and selling, having fun and so on, with my friends, pingsters and non-pingsters alike. Slowly but surely, Facebook burnout got to me and I started to log in to Facebook less and less. In fact I hardly log in to Facebook nowadays and my friends have to SMS me to chase me to log in so I can hep them do some stuff or give them money to buy their pets etc.
When I joined Entrecard, I see similar levels of activity there. People there frequent the forums. They drop cards, they make friends. I did almost none of these, except for dropping cards and SELECTIVELY making friends by leaving comments on their blogs (I made some great friends this way, such as Aronil, Jasmine and Jade).
In all cases, the "community" was there, but I didn't really actively take part in it, since they are based so far away - in the USA. The selective people I befriended slowly via the means mentioned above usually are Singaporeans or based in Singapore, or at the furthest, Malaysia (Aronil).
I only decided to become more active in ping.sg, a local organisation, based in Singapore, with Singaporeans, or people living in Singapore, forming the core members. I thought it was be preferable to interact in this kind of environment compared to the others mentioned above.
Alas, recent events have shown that it was the wrong thing to do. Indifference which I have shown above in the other "communities" would have insulated me from the impact of recent events. Seriously, if I had been as indifferent in ping.sg as I was in the others, I'd probably be totally unfazed at what's happening within the "community".
Perhaps it's time I backed away and not invest anymore efforts.
Indifference is key, I guess.
Labels: blog, internet, ping.sg
Monday, July 07, 2008
22:01 by FoxTwo ... everything's quiet on the western front.
Not a mouse peeped.
Not a cat leaped.
And the atmosphere feels strained.
It's kinda like a wake. You know, where everyone knows what everyone else is thinking, but nobody's saying anything. To be polite, to attempt to move on.
I logged into Plurk today, after so many weeks of not logging into it. Why? Well many of the regular people disappeared from the usual place. Exactly what I feared. Exactly what I wrote - the harsh action taken will have an effect, and it may not be the one intended. But, I found them all there on Plurk.
Interestingly though, suddenly one of the Plurks became a mini-shoutbox. Everyone congregated there, and everyone talked.
Talked.
Something which should have happened before The Incident.
I still think it's not too late to Talk.
While I doubt things will return to like what it was "in the good old days", Talking will go a long way to help that process.
For now, the place feels like an empty house. Kids have all left home, and I'm just wandering around the empty halls.
It's a lonely feeling.
22:01 by FoxTwo ... everything's quiet on the western front.
Not a mouse peeped.
Not a cat leaped.
And the atmosphere feels strained.
It's kinda like a wake. You know, where everyone knows what everyone else is thinking, but nobody's saying anything. To be polite, to attempt to move on.
I logged into Plurk today, after so many weeks of not logging into it. Why? Well many of the regular people disappeared from the usual place. Exactly what I feared. Exactly what I wrote - the harsh action taken will have an effect, and it may not be the one intended. But, I found them all there on Plurk.
Interestingly though, suddenly one of the Plurks became a mini-shoutbox. Everyone congregated there, and everyone talked.
Talked.
Something which should have happened before The Incident.
I still think it's not too late to Talk.
While I doubt things will return to like what it was "in the good old days", Talking will go a long way to help that process.
For now, the place feels like an empty house. Kids have all left home, and I'm just wandering around the empty halls.
It's a lonely feeling.
Labels: blog, internet, ping.sg
Saturday, July 05, 2008
21:48 by FoxTwo
Yes I do know cliques will ALWAYS form in any social environment. Humans are gregarious - we always seek out like-minded people and connect with them. That's how societies develop. That's how villages and towns and cities are built.
Giving a label to a group of people will always happen. The "popular", the "bad", the whatever. In your own email client, or even in hotmail and gmail, you can create your own distribution list. In this list, you normally put the people you connect with regularly on it, so you can share jokes, funny pictures, or anything with your friends, ALL your friends, by just typing a label. It's not a bad thing to get a label. Even among friends, you have "best friend" and just "friend" labels, to denote how close they are to you. Not everybody is your friend, and certainly you should have very little, or just one, "best friend".
I know Daphne meant no harm in her original post about "in-groups". She was just putting a label on something, to better describe a group of people. I mean, it's going to get tedious naming the said individuals time and time again. Was it a mistake? I don't know. I have no opinion on this. I just understand that Daphne was just attempting to describe a group of members.
Then, there is the original ideal of ping.sg - to be a platform for everybody, regardless of your popularity or how "in" you are.
It just appears that some members feel that the original ideal should be upheld - one platform for all, and not to segregate members into various groups. Personally, I think this ideal should be upheld too. Equality for all!
However, the recent debate about the use of the label "in-group" got way out of hand too quickly. I personally have made many friends when I joined ping.sg. For want of better words, I belong to the "lim jiu" group of pingsters (*grin*). Although I seldom join them for their outings and activities, that by no means imply I elevate myself above them or I am an "elite" (or otherwise). I just do not forsee the said activity to be interesting to me, or I could be otherwise engaged during the timing of the said activity. Usually I appear for activities that involve liquor (*grin again*), and one should not be surprised that the same people will turn up for such an activity - not everybody drinks, just as not everybody likes the colour purple.
The sudden ban of dk from ping.sg really will adversely affect the image of ping.sg. To any outsider, a ban of a long-time member of ping.sg without some sort of formal announcements as to the reason why, shakes the confidence of the masses. Right now speculations are rife that the ban was due to the disagreement of ping.sg and dk's opinions. Without some sort of formal clarifications, such rumours and speculations will take on a life of its own, and will, very likely, be counter-productive to ping.sg. As we all know, word-of-mouth rumours spread like wildfire and soemtimes, have a greater impact than any official "advertising" or PR campaign.
For all we know, dk could have been banned for a totally different, and possibly unrelated, reasons. For now, we don't know. From the way it looks now, he got banned for caring. Then in this case, should I start to be more aloof? Should I start not to care, because if I care too much, the same might happen to me.
I love ping.sg. I love the virbancy of the whole thing, the people, the good times (and the bad). I identify with the ideal too - to be a platform for everyone. I really hope to see some form of clarifications, because I truly want to know where I (and everyone else) stand.
21:48 by FoxTwo
I Am Saddened By Recent Events In Ping.sg
Yes I do know cliques will ALWAYS form in any social environment. Humans are gregarious - we always seek out like-minded people and connect with them. That's how societies develop. That's how villages and towns and cities are built.
Giving a label to a group of people will always happen. The "popular", the "bad", the whatever. In your own email client, or even in hotmail and gmail, you can create your own distribution list. In this list, you normally put the people you connect with regularly on it, so you can share jokes, funny pictures, or anything with your friends, ALL your friends, by just typing a label. It's not a bad thing to get a label. Even among friends, you have "best friend" and just "friend" labels, to denote how close they are to you. Not everybody is your friend, and certainly you should have very little, or just one, "best friend".
I know Daphne meant no harm in her original post about "in-groups". She was just putting a label on something, to better describe a group of people. I mean, it's going to get tedious naming the said individuals time and time again. Was it a mistake? I don't know. I have no opinion on this. I just understand that Daphne was just attempting to describe a group of members.
Then, there is the original ideal of ping.sg - to be a platform for everybody, regardless of your popularity or how "in" you are.
It just appears that some members feel that the original ideal should be upheld - one platform for all, and not to segregate members into various groups. Personally, I think this ideal should be upheld too. Equality for all!
However, the recent debate about the use of the label "in-group" got way out of hand too quickly. I personally have made many friends when I joined ping.sg. For want of better words, I belong to the "lim jiu" group of pingsters (*grin*). Although I seldom join them for their outings and activities, that by no means imply I elevate myself above them or I am an "elite" (or otherwise). I just do not forsee the said activity to be interesting to me, or I could be otherwise engaged during the timing of the said activity. Usually I appear for activities that involve liquor (*grin again*), and one should not be surprised that the same people will turn up for such an activity - not everybody drinks, just as not everybody likes the colour purple.
The sudden ban of dk from ping.sg really will adversely affect the image of ping.sg. To any outsider, a ban of a long-time member of ping.sg without some sort of formal announcements as to the reason why, shakes the confidence of the masses. Right now speculations are rife that the ban was due to the disagreement of ping.sg and dk's opinions. Without some sort of formal clarifications, such rumours and speculations will take on a life of its own, and will, very likely, be counter-productive to ping.sg. As we all know, word-of-mouth rumours spread like wildfire and soemtimes, have a greater impact than any official "advertising" or PR campaign.
For all we know, dk could have been banned for a totally different, and possibly unrelated, reasons. For now, we don't know. From the way it looks now, he got banned for caring. Then in this case, should I start to be more aloof? Should I start not to care, because if I care too much, the same might happen to me.
I love ping.sg. I love the virbancy of the whole thing, the people, the good times (and the bad). I identify with the ideal too - to be a platform for everyone. I really hope to see some form of clarifications, because I truly want to know where I (and everyone else) stand.
Labels: blog, internet, ping.sg
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
17:28 by FoxTwo
As an aside - yeah I'm plunging headlog into work. The new place wasn't really what I expected when I went to be interviewed. It was MORE. In other words, better.
Anyway, during my random surfing and stumbling around, I came across yet another Increase-Your-Blog-Traffic website called Scoutle. To describe it, it's similar to Blogrush in that you install a widget and then the traffic is supposed to start coming in.
However, that's where the similarity ends. In Scoutle, you create a robot, a web-crawler called a "scout". You program your scout to start scouring the web and "connect" to sites which you programmed it to. The scout then will trawl the web and hit websites with the widget installed, and "make contact". They call the widget "a stage". The different versions offered at the Scoutle website offers differing levels of traffic when installed, and it's up to you to select the levels of traffic you would want.
I think of this as a sort of "robot social networking" where the bots talk to one another, and then shows the URL and links up in your dashboard on the Scoutle site. What you do is to visit the Scoutle dashboard every couple of days and check up on the new "connections" made, to discover new blogs and interesting websites.
I'm still new in Scoutle, so my connections aren't alot right now. It's been just a couple of days and I can't really tell if Scoutle's worth the hype right now. I will post again a couple of weeks later to see how it goes with Scoutle.
17:28 by FoxTwo
Increase Your Traffic with Scoutle
As an aside - yeah I'm plunging headlog into work. The new place wasn't really what I expected when I went to be interviewed. It was MORE. In other words, better.
Anyway, during my random surfing and stumbling around, I came across yet another Increase-Your-Blog-Traffic website called Scoutle. To describe it, it's similar to Blogrush in that you install a widget and then the traffic is supposed to start coming in.
However, that's where the similarity ends. In Scoutle, you create a robot, a web-crawler called a "scout". You program your scout to start scouring the web and "connect" to sites which you programmed it to. The scout then will trawl the web and hit websites with the widget installed, and "make contact". They call the widget "a stage". The different versions offered at the Scoutle website offers differing levels of traffic when installed, and it's up to you to select the levels of traffic you would want.
I think of this as a sort of "robot social networking" where the bots talk to one another, and then shows the URL and links up in your dashboard on the Scoutle site. What you do is to visit the Scoutle dashboard every couple of days and check up on the new "connections" made, to discover new blogs and interesting websites.
I'm still new in Scoutle, so my connections aren't alot right now. It's been just a couple of days and I can't really tell if Scoutle's worth the hype right now. I will post again a couple of weeks later to see how it goes with Scoutle.
Labels: blog, internet, scoutle
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
13:23 by FoxTwo
Usually, it is with trepidation that I download a new browser on the actual release day itself. The main reason is the add-ons. I have come to rely on certain extensions and add-ons in Firefox in my daily surfing and other internet activities, and without those, the browser seems.... naked.
So yes, I actually bit the bullet and downloaded Firefox 3 today. It is with some relief that my extensions are 99% intact - only 1 was incompatible, and I can certainly live without it, since I hardly use it. However, the majority of my themes have been disabled. When Firefox 3 started, it was the "default" theme, and I must say, it doesn't look bad either. I could actually like the default theme enough not to go looking for other themes!
As for "faster".. well honestly, I don't really feel it. Feels about same to me, but of course, I do not have any benchmarking tools running to see actual figures. In normal usage it just feels... "normal".
The main feature, if you could call it that, is the new URL bar, dubbed "Awesome bar". You can type the letters as usual and it'll show you the previous URLs you have been to. In addition, now the URL bar offers you suggestions from web page TITLES too!
Now, you can even tag your bookmarks (like how you tag blog posts) and the Awesome Bar can pick up those tags too. So in other words, you now also are able to search via tags too! For people like me who has a massive collection of bookmarks over the years (mine stretches back to 1996), it's going to be quite daunting to go back and re-tag all the bookmarks...
There are other features too, but right now I'm just exploring them. Firefox 3 isn't that much different from Firefox 2 aside from the Awesome Bar, cosmetics wise and functionality wise. I will, of course, need to read the changelog to see what's new, but as it is right now, Firefox 3 just seems a more streamlined version of Firefox 2.
13:23 by FoxTwo
Have You Gotten Your Firefox 3 Today?
Usually, it is with trepidation that I download a new browser on the actual release day itself. The main reason is the add-ons. I have come to rely on certain extensions and add-ons in Firefox in my daily surfing and other internet activities, and without those, the browser seems.... naked.
So yes, I actually bit the bullet and downloaded Firefox 3 today. It is with some relief that my extensions are 99% intact - only 1 was incompatible, and I can certainly live without it, since I hardly use it. However, the majority of my themes have been disabled. When Firefox 3 started, it was the "default" theme, and I must say, it doesn't look bad either. I could actually like the default theme enough not to go looking for other themes!
As for "faster".. well honestly, I don't really feel it. Feels about same to me, but of course, I do not have any benchmarking tools running to see actual figures. In normal usage it just feels... "normal".
The main feature, if you could call it that, is the new URL bar, dubbed "Awesome bar". You can type the letters as usual and it'll show you the previous URLs you have been to. In addition, now the URL bar offers you suggestions from web page TITLES too!
Now, you can even tag your bookmarks (like how you tag blog posts) and the Awesome Bar can pick up those tags too. So in other words, you now also are able to search via tags too! For people like me who has a massive collection of bookmarks over the years (mine stretches back to 1996), it's going to be quite daunting to go back and re-tag all the bookmarks...
There are other features too, but right now I'm just exploring them. Firefox 3 isn't that much different from Firefox 2 aside from the Awesome Bar, cosmetics wise and functionality wise. I will, of course, need to read the changelog to see what's new, but as it is right now, Firefox 3 just seems a more streamlined version of Firefox 2.
Labels: FireFox, Firefox 3, internet
Saturday, June 07, 2008
15:29 by FoxTwo
15:29 by FoxTwo
Plurk And Twitter, Which Is Better?
Wow it's been a WEEK since I last wrote an entry here. This is my longest "haitus", so far, on my blog since 2005. Sorry guys, Real Life (tm) happened.
To get right to it - recently Twitter had some problems. People who used Twitter heavily were badly affected (withdrawal symptoms, hiak hiak!). For me it was little more than an annoyance that twitter was down.
Then, when Twitter came up in spurts a little later, uniquefrequency from ping.sg had a tweet - he'd found a good replacement to Twitter called Plurk. Since Twitter was, at the time, not stable, I thought I may as well check it out.
First thing that hits you after you sign up on Plurk - the timeline. It's sideways scrolling so it will definitely take some getting used to. Within a few hours of signing up, I had 18 to 20 friends on Plurk and ALL of them are pingsters.
Secondly, replies in Plurk are threaded, like in forums. A little to structured for my liking. When someone replies to a friend's plurk, you get notified, and you have to go hunting for a plurk that might be a few hours old just to see the reply. That means alot of backtracking (and sideways scrolling if you don't click on the "view responses" link at the bottom of your screen).
In any case, this post isn't a "review" on Plurk. It's more like my opinion on which service is "better", in my own context. The initial push to check out Plurk was that Twitter was down. I was impressed that Plurk supports more than just GoogleTalk as the IM of choice. You can choose between the popular ones on Plurk - MSN, Yahoo, GoogleTalk, Jabber, and AIM. All major protocols are covered. Personally, since I use Digsby, it didn't really matter which I chose. The fact that MSN was unavailable in Plurk at the time didn't really bother me much too, even though I would have really preferred to have an MSN IM bot.
However, a couple of days later, the IM bots disappeared. They were offline all the time. This seems eerily the same problem that Twitter had - IM went down. The bots aren't up yet, even today.
When the IM bots went down, Plurk suddenly had none of the perks (to me) to use it over Twitter. No 3rd party clients, no IM, and Plurk definitely doesn't have SMS support. To be "updated", I had to keep the webpage open again, which I hate. Intensely.
Twitter also has the advantage of being "mainstream", so more people use it over Plurk. This is only natural since it's more established. That also means that integration with some other services like Facebook, Mybloglog et al, is already available. Plurk is just a new kid on the block and it will definitely take time for people to come use it, let alone be integrated. Even so it may never overtake Twitter, just like Jaiku and Pownce hasn't, even though they may have been around for almost as long as Twitter has.
If I were to move to a new platform, let alone just to Plurk, I'd have to persuade my friends to do so too. I don't like doing that, since my friends will have their own personal opinions on what they like and do not like. I can gush and enthuse about how great something is (like Digsby), but it's really up to them to take the plunge.
So what's my take?
I have Twitter up all the time on Digsby anyway, so I guess my answer would be - Twitter for me. Plurk is a nice distraction, and I'll still pop in occasionally, but it won't be my "main", so to speak. Also, Twitter isn't "down" now anyway. It works fine, it's up, so no complaints from me.
Labels: internet, plurk, twitter
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
16:02 by FoxTwo
16:02 by FoxTwo
If You Want To Make Money Online....
.... you really, REALLY have to look at this link. Without reading that link, you will be wondering why you failed in your attempts, or why your efforts are not bearing fruit. That link will be an eye-opener if you never knew those before. Trust me.
Don't worry it's safe to click on the link. You can examine the link yourself - it's not an affiliate link, no hidden gotchas to make you click so I earn money off your click. :)
I know you've heard it all before. Making money online is fast. If you have a blog you can make money easily. You can live off the income you generate online. The link above will tell you THE TRUTH.
I mean, who wouldn't be persuaded, especially if you keep seeing these being said time and time again? Every Make-Money-Online blog or website you come across will always definitely tell you the same thing - it's easy, you don't need much skills at designing web pages, it's automatic and so on.
Like everyone else, I *have* been tempted before. I even broke out my credit card on a couple of times. However, it's always at the last minute that reason reared its head and I kept my card, and navigated away from those pages.
Nowadays there are some of those sites that vary those motto slightly. They will tell you it's not that easy, and that you need to put some work in. Well they're only toning it down and telling you something a little less untrue.
The bottom line - most of these sites are commonly referred to as "scam sites". As the old adage goes - "If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is".
Incidentally, this goes for those "warning" emails you get from friends too.. you know, about a new fantastic virus that can infect everything. It sounds so fantastic, that it's impossible to be true. But, that's another topic.
Don't say I didn't warn you! :)
Labels: internet, make money online
Sunday, May 25, 2008
16:57 by FoxTwo
In the early part of the week, I was cut off by Google from accessing 2 of my blogs. I kept getting the damned "Google Sorry Page". At first, like everyone else, we thought it was a temporary problem. Common ways to resolve the "Sorry Page" problem was to use a different browser, clearing cookies, clearing cache, etc. However, it seems that this time Google has it in for us. All these measures did not work. I even made sure to disconnect from Starhub and reconnect with a new IP address. Same thing, no go. Google still showed the "Sorry Page".
Ok before we go further, this is the "Sorry Page" I'm talking about:
Yeah it was driving me nuts since I couldn't access my blog to do maintenance or reply comments. I kept hoping it would be a temporary problem and it would go away. It never did. Even up to today, I still see people twittering about this. A very good example is shown below:
All my blogs were hit except this one. The only difference? This one's self-hosted, ie not stored on Google's free blogspot.com servers.
It was VERY fortunate though, that the 2 blogs that were hit, had already had the default Blogger commenting system replaced with the more powerful Intense Debate and Disqus ones. Thus, I could still reply to their comments via email. In the case of Disqus-powered commenting system, I could even head to the Disqus website and reply to the comments from there if I wanted to.
So I set about converting my blogs from the nifty Layouts format to Blogger Classic templates, so that I can publish them to my own server, away from Google's reach. I succeeded early on in the week with my fitness blog. I was lucky - I found the same exact template which I used, all ready and waiting to be used as a classic template. That one was fast.
However, there wasn't any classic version of my gaming blog template, so I attempted to manually convert the template by hand into a Blogger Classic template. After 3 failed attempts, I gave up. I have no clue why they failed - the CSS was left mostly intact, yet it looked haywire upon previewing. After having wasted 3 days trying to hand-code the XML template into a HTML one, I gave up and thought seriously about finally moving away from Blogger platform. I was deciding between Drupal and Expression Engine but the theme I used was not available on those platforms. Thus my decision was primarily forced by the need to use the same theme, and to get it working FAST. So Wordpress became de facto platform of choice.
Long story short, it was only today that I completed the migration of my gaming blog to Wordpress. I only used Wordpress due to convenience, not because it's a "all powerful" system. The migration had numerous hiccups, and even their much-vaunted import functions FAILED. Utterly. Wordpress forums were no help. Everyone just said "it SHOULD work!". Yeah it should, but it didn't.
Wordpress was, and still is, very finicky with some themes and javascript not playing nice together, so even though you might like a theme, you can't use it because of some javascripts that you're running. Even worse, some themes look fine on one browser but sucky on another. I know Wordpress die hard supporters will not like me saying this but it's true - Wordpress is almost as good (or "bad") as Blogger.com. The only difference is that Wordpress runs on a server out of Google's reach, which solves my current problem.
I do not have a problem with Blogger platform, just Google blocking me from accessing my blogs. I also do not have have a problem with Wordpress as a blogging platform, just the Wordpress fanbois. I can use either, and I am happy to say that I like (or hate) both equally. None is "superior" to the other in my opinion and usage. No wait, I take it back. Blogger has an edge - I can write 3 blogs from one Dashboard even if the blogs are all self-hosted and externally published. With self-hosted Wordpress, 1 blog per installation please, thank you (without using WPMU and having to muck around with Apache settings and such).
So, now that I've finished addressing my more immediate concerns, ie getting the blogs OUT from blogspot.com servers and onto my own, I can slowly concentrate on perhaps, migrating them completely out from Blogger and onto other platforms. Perhaps I will revisit Drupal, or try out Chyrp. One thing's for sure - the CMS system that I pick to migrate THIS blog to, will need to have this theme readily available and useable.
Now, with Intense Debate or Disqus as my choice of a commenting system, I wouldn't even mind trying out other CMS systems and see if they would be a better, or at least, more interesting choice, than Wordpress. After all, ID or Disqus can be used with any sort of web site, even if commenting systems were not originally available on them!
16:57 by FoxTwo
Death To The Google Sorry Page!
In the early part of the week, I was cut off by Google from accessing 2 of my blogs. I kept getting the damned "Google Sorry Page". At first, like everyone else, we thought it was a temporary problem. Common ways to resolve the "Sorry Page" problem was to use a different browser, clearing cookies, clearing cache, etc. However, it seems that this time Google has it in for us. All these measures did not work. I even made sure to disconnect from Starhub and reconnect with a new IP address. Same thing, no go. Google still showed the "Sorry Page".
Ok before we go further, this is the "Sorry Page" I'm talking about:
Yeah it was driving me nuts since I couldn't access my blog to do maintenance or reply comments. I kept hoping it would be a temporary problem and it would go away. It never did. Even up to today, I still see people twittering about this. A very good example is shown below:
All my blogs were hit except this one. The only difference? This one's self-hosted, ie not stored on Google's free blogspot.com servers.
It was VERY fortunate though, that the 2 blogs that were hit, had already had the default Blogger commenting system replaced with the more powerful Intense Debate and Disqus ones. Thus, I could still reply to their comments via email. In the case of Disqus-powered commenting system, I could even head to the Disqus website and reply to the comments from there if I wanted to.
So I set about converting my blogs from the nifty Layouts format to Blogger Classic templates, so that I can publish them to my own server, away from Google's reach. I succeeded early on in the week with my fitness blog. I was lucky - I found the same exact template which I used, all ready and waiting to be used as a classic template. That one was fast.
However, there wasn't any classic version of my gaming blog template, so I attempted to manually convert the template by hand into a Blogger Classic template. After 3 failed attempts, I gave up. I have no clue why they failed - the CSS was left mostly intact, yet it looked haywire upon previewing. After having wasted 3 days trying to hand-code the XML template into a HTML one, I gave up and thought seriously about finally moving away from Blogger platform. I was deciding between Drupal and Expression Engine but the theme I used was not available on those platforms. Thus my decision was primarily forced by the need to use the same theme, and to get it working FAST. So Wordpress became de facto platform of choice.
Long story short, it was only today that I completed the migration of my gaming blog to Wordpress. I only used Wordpress due to convenience, not because it's a "all powerful" system. The migration had numerous hiccups, and even their much-vaunted import functions FAILED. Utterly. Wordpress forums were no help. Everyone just said "it SHOULD work!". Yeah it should, but it didn't.
Wordpress was, and still is, very finicky with some themes and javascript not playing nice together, so even though you might like a theme, you can't use it because of some javascripts that you're running. Even worse, some themes look fine on one browser but sucky on another. I know Wordpress die hard supporters will not like me saying this but it's true - Wordpress is almost as good (or "bad") as Blogger.com. The only difference is that Wordpress runs on a server out of Google's reach, which solves my current problem.
I do not have a problem with Blogger platform, just Google blocking me from accessing my blogs. I also do not have have a problem with Wordpress as a blogging platform, just the Wordpress fanbois. I can use either, and I am happy to say that I like (or hate) both equally. None is "superior" to the other in my opinion and usage. No wait, I take it back. Blogger has an edge - I can write 3 blogs from one Dashboard even if the blogs are all self-hosted and externally published. With self-hosted Wordpress, 1 blog per installation please, thank you (without using WPMU and having to muck around with Apache settings and such).
So, now that I've finished addressing my more immediate concerns, ie getting the blogs OUT from blogspot.com servers and onto my own, I can slowly concentrate on perhaps, migrating them completely out from Blogger and onto other platforms. Perhaps I will revisit Drupal, or try out Chyrp. One thing's for sure - the CMS system that I pick to migrate THIS blog to, will need to have this theme readily available and useable.
Now, with Intense Debate or Disqus as my choice of a commenting system, I wouldn't even mind trying out other CMS systems and see if they would be a better, or at least, more interesting choice, than Wordpress. After all, ID or Disqus can be used with any sort of web site, even if commenting systems were not originally available on them!
Labels: Google, internet, Rant
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
05:02 by FoxTwo
So anyway, I was a little surprised to see an email coming in via my Entrecard inbox. Well, I've been getting alot of emails from Entrecard because I just put my fitness blog up on Entrecard, so I have been getting advert approval requests. However this is different - this is an email from a real human :)
Well, before I get to the email, let me just say that Entrecard finally added the ability to add multiple blogs to one account! YES FINALLY! Therefore you don't need a separate email for each blog you want to register there now. Seeing this new function, naturally I added my fitness blog. After all I don't need an extra email address now, so it's very convenient. Plus, Entrecard just naturally draws traffic in.
But, to really increase traffic from Entrecard, you need to give it a little "boost". You don't just sit back on your laurels and "watch it happen". To this end, Bogdan Ionescu from Learniacs.com has written a nice little PDF e-book. Click on the picture on the left, or here, to grab the book.
I tried to get it, but apparently the site is now hit by a high load of traffic or something (perhaps trying to grab this free e-book), so it's unavailable to me right now.
However, I'll still be trying to get it. After all, who doesn't need/want more traffic for their blogs? Even if the blog isn't really a money-maker type (like mine).
Update: Ok finally got the book. What I can tell you is, Bogdan writes in a no-nonsense way. Eg - You want this? Do this. No running around in circles telling you stories of when he was a kid and what he did . And did I mention I just added my 3rd blog to Entrecard? Using the tips Bogdan has in his e-book should prove useful and probably will draw traffic in much faster than my original blog did when I first joined Entrecard last year.
We now return you to your regular programming of useless stuff, nonsense and ramblings.
05:02 by FoxTwo
Leveraging Entrecard To Get More Traffic
So anyway, I was a little surprised to see an email coming in via my Entrecard inbox. Well, I've been getting alot of emails from Entrecard because I just put my fitness blog up on Entrecard, so I have been getting advert approval requests. However this is different - this is an email from a real human :)
Well, before I get to the email, let me just say that Entrecard finally added the ability to add multiple blogs to one account! YES FINALLY! Therefore you don't need a separate email for each blog you want to register there now. Seeing this new function, naturally I added my fitness blog. After all I don't need an extra email address now, so it's very convenient. Plus, Entrecard just naturally draws traffic in.
But, to really increase traffic from Entrecard, you need to give it a little "boost". You don't just sit back on your laurels and "watch it happen". To this end, Bogdan Ionescu from Learniacs.com has written a nice little PDF e-book. Click on the picture on the left, or here, to grab the book.
I tried to get it, but apparently the site is now hit by a high load of traffic or something (perhaps trying to grab this free e-book), so it's unavailable to me right now.
However, I'll still be trying to get it. After all, who doesn't need/want more traffic for their blogs? Even if the blog isn't really a money-maker type (like mine).
Update: Ok finally got the book. What I can tell you is, Bogdan writes in a no-nonsense way. Eg - You want this? Do this. No running around in circles telling you stories of when he was a kid and what he did . And did I mention I just added my 3rd blog to Entrecard? Using the tips Bogdan has in his e-book should prove useful and probably will draw traffic in much faster than my original blog did when I first joined Entrecard last year.
We now return you to your regular programming of useless stuff, nonsense and ramblings.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
08:06 by FoxTwo
You click on the small "k" in your status bar in Firefox. That will pop out the small options box you see in the screenshot.
Then you select the portion you wish to "cut", like as if you're on the actual Kwout website. Once done, you click on "CUT", as usual.
You'll see the final box appear once you've clicked on "CUT". The extra feature here is that you can SAVE the picture to your own computer, or if you click UPLOAD, it'll bring you to the Kwout website for it to be processed and the code generated for you to be put into your blog entry.
Again, in case someone forgets, Kwout is cool because not only does it screenshot a website, the screenshot image contain working links (if you allow)! In other words, if the screenshot has a button labelled "home", and you allowed image mapping, you can click on the "home" button in the screenshot image, and you will be brought to wherever the link points to. Think of it as a "miniwebsite".
Seriously, try it on my previous post. Click on the links in the picture, and you WILL be brought to the bloggers' actual blog entries!
08:06 by FoxTwo
Cool Way To Screenshot A Website Part 2
Back in January, I wrote this entry here, about a web service called Kwout. For those not familiar with it, it's basically a service to screenshot a page and provide ready-made code for you to insert into your blog to show a screenshot.
Now they've come up with a FireFox extension to do the same thing!
You don't have to to go their website to screenshot a website anymore with this extension. Here's how the extension works in Firefox:
You click on the small "k" in your status bar in Firefox. That will pop out the small options box you see in the screenshot.
Then you select the portion you wish to "cut", like as if you're on the actual Kwout website. Once done, you click on "CUT", as usual.
You'll see the final box appear once you've clicked on "CUT". The extra feature here is that you can SAVE the picture to your own computer, or if you click UPLOAD, it'll bring you to the Kwout website for it to be processed and the code generated for you to be put into your blog entry.
Again, in case someone forgets, Kwout is cool because not only does it screenshot a website, the screenshot image contain working links (if you allow)! In other words, if the screenshot has a button labelled "home", and you allowed image mapping, you can click on the "home" button in the screenshot image, and you will be brought to wherever the link points to. Think of it as a "miniwebsite".
Seriously, try it on my previous post. Click on the links in the picture, and you WILL be brought to the bloggers' actual blog entries!
Labels: Extension, FireFox, internet, website
Friday, May 16, 2008
17:58 by FoxTwo
If you don't know what RSS is, in a nutshell it's a consolidation of blog entries in a simplified format, so that you can use a reader to read it instead of visiting every blog you like to read the latest entries. All you need to do is subscribe to the RSS feed and add the RSS URL into your reader, and you can read all your favourite blogs in one place - your reader.
Yeah most blogs have a "subscribe me" button that asks you to enter your email address, and Feedblitz emails the RSS feed to you. Well, at least that was what it USED to do. In the intervening months where I've left Feedblitz alone, I just realised what it can do when I had to reinstall its code on my new blog templates.
Yeah look at the options now - MSN, Yahoo, Twitter. Now you can get the whole RSS thing beeped to you wherever you are!
I just can't imagine how your Twitter will look like if a full blog post comes in via RSS through your Twitter... your followers would probably see a whole bunch of tweets coming from you (assuming you used the public option as shown in the picture).
And if you have subscribed to the feed via your MSN or Yahoo or AIM, Lord help you when you're in the middle of a presentation for your bosses and a new blog post comes in :)
17:58 by FoxTwo
Feedblitz Does More Than Just Email Now
If you don't know what RSS is, in a nutshell it's a consolidation of blog entries in a simplified format, so that you can use a reader to read it instead of visiting every blog you like to read the latest entries. All you need to do is subscribe to the RSS feed and add the RSS URL into your reader, and you can read all your favourite blogs in one place - your reader.
Yeah most blogs have a "subscribe me" button that asks you to enter your email address, and Feedblitz emails the RSS feed to you. Well, at least that was what it USED to do. In the intervening months where I've left Feedblitz alone, I just realised what it can do when I had to reinstall its code on my new blog templates.
Yeah look at the options now - MSN, Yahoo, Twitter. Now you can get the whole RSS thing beeped to you wherever you are!
I just can't imagine how your Twitter will look like if a full blog post comes in via RSS through your Twitter... your followers would probably see a whole bunch of tweets coming from you (assuming you used the public option as shown in the picture).
And if you have subscribed to the feed via your MSN or Yahoo or AIM, Lord help you when you're in the middle of a presentation for your bosses and a new blog post comes in :)
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
12:17 by FoxTwo
For example, I discovered the Intense Debate commenting system and implemented it here. Then a day or so later, I came across a competing commenting system, which also garnered rave reviews, and implemented it on my gaming blog. Well yeah I am still "in the process" of implementing the commenting and forum features to my third blog, and even thinking about using it on my website in general too.
Before we go further, I'd just like to jog your memory a little. When you read blogs, do you notice that a vast majority of them have some sort of "share this" button or link at the end of the entry? Yeah, those that you click or mouseover, and a list of services will be shown, like StumbleUpon, Digg, Twitter etc?
Well today I'll just touch on something similar, and it's available on the browser. It's a FireFox extension, called Shareaholic. and it's your own personal "share this" button on your own browser.
Remember when you first joined StumbleUpon? Yeah they told you that "it is highly recommended" that you install their toolbar. Then, you joined de.licio.us. They told you the same thing - "install our toolbar". You joined Technorati. Although they don't have a toolbar, you can use the many bookmarklets they have there to "bookmark" your faves.
The list goes on. For every of these "social sites" you have yet another toolbar to install, or more bookmarklet codes to put on your browser bar to "share" your favourites.
This is where Shareaholic comes in. This one single add-on will render all those toolbars and bookmarklets useless! Ok I exaggerate, but this can replace all of them in one fell swoop. Well check out the picture below for a better idea:
As usual, click to enlarge if you can't see it clearly.
As you can see, this one single add-on allows you to share the current page you're on with a multitude of services. I personally only picked those I really use. After all I doubt anybody would have an account on each of those services!
Well, is that it? Not quite.
Shareaholic also works very much like StumbleUpon. Well I think of it as "StumbleUpon without stumbling". What do I mean? Well when you click on the icon in your browser, you will see a selection called "Community links". This is where people using Shareaholic have bookmarked stuff and are sharing it across the various services that Shareaholic supports. The stuff they are sharing all appear here (although not really in real-time). The more impressive thing about this is that, you need not necessarily have an account in whatever services those links are bookmarked to - as long as you have the Shareaholic extension you can see every link passing through the system.
Yes indeed, by using this link, I "stumble" upon new stuff, almost exactly like "stumbling" :)
12:17 by FoxTwo
Shareaholic - The One Button To Rule Them All
For example, I discovered the Intense Debate commenting system and implemented it here. Then a day or so later, I came across a competing commenting system, which also garnered rave reviews, and implemented it on my gaming blog. Well yeah I am still "in the process" of implementing the commenting and forum features to my third blog, and even thinking about using it on my website in general too.
Before we go further, I'd just like to jog your memory a little. When you read blogs, do you notice that a vast majority of them have some sort of "share this" button or link at the end of the entry? Yeah, those that you click or mouseover, and a list of services will be shown, like StumbleUpon, Digg, Twitter etc?
Well today I'll just touch on something similar, and it's available on the browser. It's a FireFox extension, called Shareaholic. and it's your own personal "share this" button on your own browser.
Remember when you first joined StumbleUpon? Yeah they told you that "it is highly recommended" that you install their toolbar. Then, you joined de.licio.us. They told you the same thing - "install our toolbar". You joined Technorati. Although they don't have a toolbar, you can use the many bookmarklets they have there to "bookmark" your faves.
The list goes on. For every of these "social sites" you have yet another toolbar to install, or more bookmarklet codes to put on your browser bar to "share" your favourites.
This is where Shareaholic comes in. This one single add-on will render all those toolbars and bookmarklets useless! Ok I exaggerate, but this can replace all of them in one fell swoop. Well check out the picture below for a better idea:
As usual, click to enlarge if you can't see it clearly.
As you can see, this one single add-on allows you to share the current page you're on with a multitude of services. I personally only picked those I really use. After all I doubt anybody would have an account on each of those services!
Well, is that it? Not quite.
Shareaholic also works very much like StumbleUpon. Well I think of it as "StumbleUpon without stumbling". What do I mean? Well when you click on the icon in your browser, you will see a selection called "Community links". This is where people using Shareaholic have bookmarked stuff and are sharing it across the various services that Shareaholic supports. The stuff they are sharing all appear here (although not really in real-time). The more impressive thing about this is that, you need not necessarily have an account in whatever services those links are bookmarked to - as long as you have the Shareaholic extension you can see every link passing through the system.
Yes indeed, by using this link, I "stumble" upon new stuff, almost exactly like "stumbling" :)
Labels: Extension, FireFox, internet
Sunday, May 11, 2008
21:32 by FoxTwo I saw the first mention of it here, at Lisa C Writes. Then a few weeks later, I saw another mention of it here, at Bloggerfocus.com. What am I talking about?
It's about a new commenting system for the Blogger.com platform. (edit - oops, it is not just for Blogger platform. It is also available for Wordpress, Typepad etc too). Yes I know, stuff like Haloscan has been around for quite a while. However, this new comment system, called Intense Debate, appears to be much better than plain old Haloscan.
So is this going to work on this blog?
I hope so. I have, like a typical kiasu Singaporean, made backups of my original templates before slotting in the new codes for the new commenting system. I have also decided NOT to retro-fit this "upgrade" to all older entries. That means I won't lose all the old, precious comments that are currently stuck in the (old) Blogger.com system.
It would have been better if I could have made a complete switch - that means, importing everything from Blogger.com into IntenseDebate and then do a one-time complete template overhaul. Since it couldn't be done, I have to be VERY mindful about not "republishing entire blog" from now on inside Blogger.com.
Henceforth, until such time that this system shows itself to be unstable, this blog will be on the new, Intense Debate commenting system!
21:32 by FoxTwo I saw the first mention of it here, at Lisa C Writes. Then a few weeks later, I saw another mention of it here, at Bloggerfocus.com. What am I talking about?
It's about a new commenting system for the Blogger.com platform. (edit - oops, it is not just for Blogger platform. It is also available for Wordpress, Typepad etc too). Yes I know, stuff like Haloscan has been around for quite a while. However, this new comment system, called Intense Debate, appears to be much better than plain old Haloscan.
So is this going to work on this blog?
I hope so. I have, like a typical kiasu Singaporean, made backups of my original templates before slotting in the new codes for the new commenting system. I have also decided NOT to retro-fit this "upgrade" to all older entries. That means I won't lose all the old, precious comments that are currently stuck in the (old) Blogger.com system.
It would have been better if I could have made a complete switch - that means, importing everything from Blogger.com into IntenseDebate and then do a one-time complete template overhaul. Since it couldn't be done, I have to be VERY mindful about not "republishing entire blog" from now on inside Blogger.com.
Henceforth, until such time that this system shows itself to be unstable, this blog will be on the new, Intense Debate commenting system!
Saturday, May 10, 2008
14:02 by FoxTwo
Facebook has this "feature" which all other networks do not have. Or, even if they did, not to this level of detail. The feature I'm talking about is the newsfeed. You know, when you log in, you are given a summary of what your other friends did, like "commenting on a photo" or "joined xyz group", or even "kissed, hugged, punched" someone etc in the various apps.
Again, let me relate a story. Again, I am not directly involved, and names have been changed to protect the guilty and innocent. App names have also been generalised - ie I will not make references to any specific app by name.
Stella is a very friendly and outgoing person. She also has a soft heart, she can't say "NO" because "it will hurt his feelings" type of person. Like everyone else, she installed many apps due to her friends inviting her to do so. One of these apps is a flirting/dating type app. How this app works is to show her picture rather anonymously, and show only her first name without her last name. Also, in this app, there's no direct link to her profile. Thus the only way for potential suitors to communicate is via this app itself.
So Stella got to know a guy through this app. Let's call him David. David was browsing profiles in this app and saw Stella. Thinking she looks hot, he initiated contact. Stella, being the friendly sort, always replies. At first things were cordial. They sort of "clicked", and more info about each other were exchanged. She gave him a link to her Facebook profile, and accepted his friend request.
Then he started to hint at something more.
Stella recognised the hints and started to back off, but yet still always replying, and never making any ambiguous remarks. She even came right out and reminded David that she's married (as shown in her profile) and that she's only looking for FRIENDS, nothing more.
David, being a resourceful kind of guy, some how managed to obtain her email address (never shown on Stella's profile). Let's not speculate how he got the info. The fact is he did. So he started to send her lovey-dovey messages to her personal email as well as doing all the "sexy" and "naughty" poke actions to her on Facebook.
Every time Stella sees those, she gets upset. At first she tried to ignore them, but when she did, David very angrily demanded to know why she was specifically "singling him out" yet she responds to her other male friends. He insisted she respond to his "pokes" and email, and says that he could see, via the newsfeeds, that she got his "pokes", why wasn't she responding? David kept harping on one point - if she wasn't interested in him, why did she tell him her profile address and accept his friend?
Stella was in a quandry - she confided in her friends, not knowing what to do as it was stressing her out. She didn't want her husband finding out, or else he would think she had been flirting with guys on Facebook (which she didn't). Her friends advised her to totally block David on Facebook, and to set up a filter in her email to automatically delete anything from David's email address.
Stella, the soft hearted girl, didn't want to do any of those. She didn't want to "hurt his feelings". Yet, she's the one being traumatised. Also, in a way, she was afraid of what David will do.
As of right now, this situation with Stella isn't resolved. She now avoids Facebook like a plague. She is afraid to open her email. In a sense, Stella the friendly and outgoing girl, became withdrawn and afraid. All because of one guy.
Stella isn't alone in this. I know of at least a couple more female friends who are in a similar situation - unwanted attention from guys, who won't take NO for an answer. They also are soft-hearted and "don't want to hurt his feelings".
Guys - when a girl says NO, it's not a "maybe" ok? Being "determined" makes women afraid of you, not admire you. There's a fine line between "determined" and "harrassing".
Girls - don't be soft-hearted. Block the irritating ones immediately. Once you block, no matter what kind of threats he issued, you won't even see it. Also when you block, the "newsfeed" no longer updates on the guys' end. Set up filters in your email to automatically DELETE email from these stalkers. In other words, cut him off totally.
If you don't, the only one suffering is YOU, not the guy. He's not soft-hearted towards you, why should you be nice to him?
14:02 by FoxTwo
Facebook Is A Stalker's Paradise
Facebook has this "feature" which all other networks do not have. Or, even if they did, not to this level of detail. The feature I'm talking about is the newsfeed. You know, when you log in, you are given a summary of what your other friends did, like "commenting on a photo" or "joined xyz group", or even "kissed, hugged, punched" someone etc in the various apps.
Again, let me relate a story. Again, I am not directly involved, and names have been changed to protect the guilty and innocent. App names have also been generalised - ie I will not make references to any specific app by name.
Stella is a very friendly and outgoing person. She also has a soft heart, she can't say "NO" because "it will hurt his feelings" type of person. Like everyone else, she installed many apps due to her friends inviting her to do so. One of these apps is a flirting/dating type app. How this app works is to show her picture rather anonymously, and show only her first name without her last name. Also, in this app, there's no direct link to her profile. Thus the only way for potential suitors to communicate is via this app itself.
So Stella got to know a guy through this app. Let's call him David. David was browsing profiles in this app and saw Stella. Thinking she looks hot, he initiated contact. Stella, being the friendly sort, always replies. At first things were cordial. They sort of "clicked", and more info about each other were exchanged. She gave him a link to her Facebook profile, and accepted his friend request.
Then he started to hint at something more.
Stella recognised the hints and started to back off, but yet still always replying, and never making any ambiguous remarks. She even came right out and reminded David that she's married (as shown in her profile) and that she's only looking for FRIENDS, nothing more.
David, being a resourceful kind of guy, some how managed to obtain her email address (never shown on Stella's profile). Let's not speculate how he got the info. The fact is he did. So he started to send her lovey-dovey messages to her personal email as well as doing all the "sexy" and "naughty" poke actions to her on Facebook.
Every time Stella sees those, she gets upset. At first she tried to ignore them, but when she did, David very angrily demanded to know why she was specifically "singling him out" yet she responds to her other male friends. He insisted she respond to his "pokes" and email, and says that he could see, via the newsfeeds, that she got his "pokes", why wasn't she responding? David kept harping on one point - if she wasn't interested in him, why did she tell him her profile address and accept his friend?
Stella was in a quandry - she confided in her friends, not knowing what to do as it was stressing her out. She didn't want her husband finding out, or else he would think she had been flirting with guys on Facebook (which she didn't). Her friends advised her to totally block David on Facebook, and to set up a filter in her email to automatically delete anything from David's email address.
Stella, the soft hearted girl, didn't want to do any of those. She didn't want to "hurt his feelings". Yet, she's the one being traumatised. Also, in a way, she was afraid of what David will do.
As of right now, this situation with Stella isn't resolved. She now avoids Facebook like a plague. She is afraid to open her email. In a sense, Stella the friendly and outgoing girl, became withdrawn and afraid. All because of one guy.
Stella isn't alone in this. I know of at least a couple more female friends who are in a similar situation - unwanted attention from guys, who won't take NO for an answer. They also are soft-hearted and "don't want to hurt his feelings".
Guys - when a girl says NO, it's not a "maybe" ok? Being "determined" makes women afraid of you, not admire you. There's a fine line between "determined" and "harrassing".
Girls - don't be soft-hearted. Block the irritating ones immediately. Once you block, no matter what kind of threats he issued, you won't even see it. Also when you block, the "newsfeed" no longer updates on the guys' end. Set up filters in your email to automatically DELETE email from these stalkers. In other words, cut him off totally.
If you don't, the only one suffering is YOU, not the guy. He's not soft-hearted towards you, why should you be nice to him?
Labels: facebook, internet, social networking
