My Life With IT

Online, it’s pretty easy to turn off people since the words on the screen are emotionless. Nobody really knows what you are saying unless they see and hear. With the rise of Facebook and Twitter, it seems that these two popular media have been taken to be a medium for abuse. Maybe abuse is a strong word to use but it’s really easy how to turn off people from sites or from you such that you have a strong repelling personality.

Steps to annoy people

• Blast out “Come to my site!” on every single site you visit.
• Constantly send the same email every other day to a lot of recipients you have absolutely no relationship with in the first place.
• Place lots of advertisements every other 2 lines.
• Lots of popups every page of your site.
• Keep urging people to visit your site at Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, etc.

The above steps may just be something that will make people puke at the sight of your name. I haven’t tried it since I have no time to do all of those steps. I rather spend my time amusing myself with the actual productivity of learning something useful even if I have no chance at this point in time to use a 3rd language. No, it isn’t related to IT even.

Facebook is such a hot site that even hackers want a piece of the pie. Having been using Facebook for a while, I find that there are people who are very good at maximising the use to promote their sites while I have been just using it for other things. Youtube has a long list of how to make use of Facebook. Check out the videos here.

Personally, I have encountered being added by total strangers just because some of my friends are friends with them. It’s even a higher activity level if there are guys adding females and I have seen a few requests with guys having more than 1000 female profiles added. I wonder if those guys do know of them or they are just collectors. I even had one who is out to snag a girlfriend by constantly sending requests for contacting me on a more personal level than just using Facebook’s messages. My avatar? It’s a cartoonised version that doesn’t look remotely like me either.

ProBlogger has a problem with adding strangers and is now limiting the friends list to just real people he knows or has interest in continuing the contacting. While adding friends seems to be showing off the power of your network, I know that there are some I’ve added without knowing them at a personal level and there are some I added just because I was playing certain games and the larger network in the games applications, I have, I have a faster way to progress up the games faster.

Ultimately, I got tired of playing the games since being games, they tend to be repetitive after a while. The games developers have been hard at work trying to add new features to the games every few months just to keep up with the interest. That said, I know why I didn’t choose my career in the games industry. That will kill my brain cells in just a few months.

There are so many applications in Facebook to help promote websites and one of the application I’m using is called Network Blogs. It’s rather simple and much like Technorati in a way. Just a few conditions for it to showcase your blog posts; there must be more than 5 followers and for more tracking, more than 20 followers for the most frequented followers.

To me, Facebook is a tool. A tool that can be used up to the individual’s imagination. It’s a neutral tool just like the Internet. It’s the humans who choose to do what to use the tools for, like what a knife is being used for.

While I admit that I had visions of reading several books using an electronic device such as Kindle, I had no idea that such devices would be big. Perhaps, I had envisioned more of a hologram device that can be activated with the press of a button on a wrist watch or a small PDA like device to read books.

Although there is a price fight currently for Kindle and iPad, I see myself not using them as I realise that I would be carrying around too many devices that may be portable but add them up together, I am torturing my shoulders. What I see for the future is more in software and handheld gadgets.

A seamless integration with the end users understanding how to use the applications easily. There are so many models with different mobile OS these days and each with different browsers of viewing the web. Mobile applications are more popular with those who have the need to be able to surf the Internet on the go.

Applications for connecting to social media sites will be more seamless and there will be ease of installing in any OS without any hassle. As such, mobile phones designs will be consisting of screens as more people use the web for various reasons; travelling routes, book air tickets, buying daily necessities, checking bus arrival times, booking taxis and much more.

In addition, netbooks are also gaining popularity with the tech-savvy. Its lightweight feature adds to its appeal and more cafes will allow such electronic devices to use the power sockets as it drives more customers to them as a win-win situation.

In future, watching movies on the go may just involve a pair of ear piece and holograms being projected from a small device, thus, saving the shoulders and the movies with more 3D feel. Designs may probably have the same feel as the movie, Iron Man did with his armour.

Apparently, mobile phones these days can’t really last till your contract ends or even longer. My Omnia is screaming overwork ever since I started making full use of the data plan. Opera Mobile 9 gave me problems with logins after a few weeks, so I decided to install Opera Mobile 10 Beta to test it out. It worked beautifully until just a day later that the processor is unable to take the heat, literally.

Omnia keeps hanging or lag terribly. I am at my wits just to use basic functions like Plurk, Twitter, Facebook, Gothere and FourSquare! Just surfing using Opera Mobile 10 Beta only! How can do this to me? In addition, IE for mobile is acceptable. Not that I’m complaining but I like to use the keyboard to hit “Enter” and it does nothing. Neither did Opera Mobile 10 Beta react except appear a cursor.

Since it’s nearly 2 years that Omnia has been with me, I have to find a replacement. Unfortunately, Nexus One and HTC HD2 have 1GHz processor with 512RAM. Looks like it’s still quite some time before processors and RAMs can shrink small enough for mobile phones. To think I thought Nano technology was the hot stuff in 1997.

Therefore, I’m uploading photos via mobile and checking road maps for now. There must be a way to have an easier time using Omnia to surf!

A pleasant invitation from a representative from InFocus was a welcoming change. I accepted the invitation since I had some time. It was a launch session to introduce a number of new and updated projectors that would be more user friendly and better asthetics.

After watching the product videos, I was really impressed with the changes and love the new projection images. I chatted with a few of the representatives and gathered some background information about InFocus. It is a company whose core business is projectors, hence, they have about 460 patents related to projectors. The company is currently more than 20 years old with projector knowledge. It is looking at 3D trends and various technologies that will enhance user experiences.

Now, my arrival at Raffles Hotel took me to pass through some tourists. I was going in the right direction when I saw the sign stating the room that I was supposed to be going to. Upon reaching the room, I was greeted by the banners that InFocus had placed strategically so that I wouldn’t miss the room.

There, I was greeted by the people in charge of the registration. It was a breeze since I didn’t have to sign anything, I like that smooth flow. Being greeted by the buffet spread was too tempting since 11am is near to lunch time. After obtaining my goodie bag, I was ushered into the room. The projectors were on display and even had power running through so that I could play around to find out the ease of using. I should have made a small Power Point slide (apologies as my understanding was wrong) could have used some .jpg or .jpeg files to test them out since they come with the technology to plug and play USB devices.

We were given an overview of the milestones and upcoming road path where InFocus would be moving towards. The goodie bag was rather informative too. All the necessary brochures of the projectors being displayed and the specifications and key features.

People who are often on the go and need a mobile or portable projector, they have a few models to be considered. A feature that I found rather useful for those designers is the Split Screen. In addition, as a trainer, I like the idea of the glow ring around the lens to let me know that the projector is in standby mode. Schools are using them and installing them on ceilings can be a challenging task just to check that the projector is ready to be used.

The projectors also have this technology called BrilliantColor. A very useful function for classrooms too. With this function, the room lights can still be on while the images from the projector can still be viewed clearly. A delightful range will be the home entertainment range for people who simply love to entertain guests with wonderful movies giving the home theatre effect. Information below is an explanation by InFocus for the BrilliantColor function.

DLP® Projectors with BrilliantColor™ technology feature multi-colour processing to produce stunning, vibrant colours on the screen. Unlike other technologies such as LCD which use just 3 primary colours to produce the image, DLP® Technology with BrilliantColor™ uses up to six separate colours. BrilliantColor™ not only improves colour accuracy, it brightens secondary colours as well. This combination produces a new level of colour performance that increases colour brightness by up to 50% over other technologies and provides accurate true to life image.

Besides being impressed by the technology, I was rather contented with the service from the start. Even if I wasn’t buying anything, I was treated politely and I believe that one day, I may just buy a good projector from InFocus just because they have good smiles and treating everyone with respect.

On a last note, I love the USB Thumb drive. It contains the images and detailed information about the projectors that allowed me to be able to upload for your viewing pleasure. All images have been resized to allow faster loading.

It’s a funny thing that gets really interesting over the years just about copyrights. I remember the huge uproar over being fined just for keeping or was is sharing MP3 songs over the Internet. Quite a number of people were fined with the court supporting certain cases.

I think the person who first came out with MP3 for songs is purely for personal use and the ease of the digital song format got spread fast and furious. Even better than the singers trying their darnest to hold autograph sessions and concerts with their marketing strategies like freebies, etc.

It’s so strange since spreading the songs and movies via the Internet is a lot faster than spreading via the television, billboards, newspapers, special shows interviewing the actors and actresses, and other money spending marketing techniques.

The Internet consists of Twitter, Facebook, Plurk and I don’t know what social media they will come up with in just a year’s time. Things that do need publicity tend to spread faster online than offline. By the time the video or something gets into print, more than a million views may have just hit the video in Youtube.

Recently,there’s this huge case about weddings playing copyrighted songs. Seriously, I am amazed at the ways money can be squeezed out from using the word “Copyright”. I wonder if it’s meant for everything since I don’t remember that word can cover everything. It’s a sad thing that just to play one song, the couple may just get into deeper debt by playing a few songs at their wedding.

From this point forth, will anyone dare to do anything or will there be ways about it? Humans are creative creatures who can come up with wonderful ways just to avoid being prosecuted. That’s where bribery came about since the I don’t know when. We have come a long way from reducing bribery, I hope we don’t have to resort to this stage just to play a few songs at a wedding dinner that’s supposed to be a happy occasion.

Sometimes I wonder what’s the use of “Apply Online” and “Quick Apply” if 80% of the companies often request that you send the resume via email. Is the format of the buttons that send out the information that difficult to read?

Another question is that there are some positions that don’t require (IMO) for a need to have a look that is required for that position but a request for a photograph is often required before they even want to go through your resume.

Instead of using photographs as a visual aid to remember candidates by, develop an assessment template to record the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate and assess them objectively according to your job requirements. (Fair Employment)

So, I guess I could be too hasty in thinking that they want the photographs for other reasons. Unfortunately, legislation can’t be enforced in order to keep up the competition. Seriously, who wants to have another person snatch their rice bowl away?

I used to be casual about blogging. It was supposed to be a place for me to rant and vent out my frustrations. Over a span of two years, it has changed into something more complex than just typing out what I want to say online.

Advertisements came into place. Followed by being paid for posting some positive only reviews on products and services. Now, we are supposed to disclose that we are being paid to post stuff. Others expect us to post positive only reviews when we attend their functions. These posts are a mandate if we were to attend those functions.

First off, the mandate posts for attending the functions aren’t paid. Even the goodies given aren’t even enough to cover the transport and time spent. Second, posting only positive reviews is too one-sided. It’s like a one way connection to a destination. A read only CD.

Second, all paid per posts aren’t that easy to write; even a 50-word advertisement can take hours just to draft out something decent.

Third, other prominent bloggers have taken blogging to another level, coming out with e-books and even printed books on how to blog. All I thought was blogging was simply just typing out the words and put them into paragraphs and that’s it. However, online text can be difficult to read since it’s more taxing on the eyes.

The internet is unregulated. However, there is a fine line between over-scrutinition and ensuring that it is safe for children/innocent people who believe in the fantastic results of earning tons of money with just some automated online sites.