Thailand Bombing

Small bombs exploded today in at least four places in Thailand’s capital, Bangkok, injuring at least 12 people, according to police. There were at least a dozen people injured, but could only confirm one death. To me it doesn't matter if there is a conflict in the south because of the instabilites in the political undercurrent. One thing certain, the people who commited these monstrosities are not the patriot of this country and should be dealt with like an enemy of the state.

Tech Moron of the Year

Well it's not everyday that I would get a privileged of handing out this great award at the end of every year. First I'm a fairly conservative minded guy when judging other people stupidity. Since all of us got that "oh I was an idiot" movement, and yes I've experienced quite a few of them. Nevertheless there are times sheer stupidity fueled with ignorance tenacity, would overcome all reason of a man- hence a moron is created. And it is my duty to remind us all with power come great responsibility. So if you're planning to be a moron, please refrain yourself entering the world of politics.

Without further delayed, let me introduce you all to our Tech Moron of the Year and he is not Senator Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), The Series of Tubes Guy. Though his remark resembled a drunk homeless guy talking about the yellow brick road. In Mr. Stevens defense, at least he knew the benefits of the internet as a potential monetization platform for the US government so he definitely got the runner up prize. As for out top moronic winner this year goes to the new Thailand ICT Minister, Professor Sitthichai Pokai-udom. As for the audience who are wondering about his background, not to worry he didn't really have anything valuable too much for your IT trend research. For a starter he is a newly Thai junta appointed leader of Information and Communications Technology of Thailand, which ironically the organization was form by the deposed Thaksinian government. Why does he deserved the Tech Moron of the Year 2006 you asked? Well recently in November, Sitthichai came with a strong criticism toward open source software. In an interview, he noted,

"With open source, there is no intellectual property. Anyone can use it and all your ideas become public domain. If nobody can make money from it, there will be no development and open source software quickly becomes outdated... As a programmer, if I can write good code, why should I give it away? Thailand can do good source code without open source. Apart from Linux, open source software is often abandoned and not developed further, and that it leads to a lot of low-quality software with lots of bugs.

And here's the gem - he said the current government plan (regarding open source) was a case of the blind leading the blind, as neither the people who are in charge nor the people in the industry seem to know the dangers of open source software."

What a head trip, did I hear this correctly? So I went to consult the source on IT intelligence at Slashdot just to make sure that I'm not only one who nominating him and sure enough, it was confirm on their category Tags. Wow I did not know that, the dangers of open source software, obviously the Professor has been watching too many Battlestar Galactica episodes. The hi-tech renegade open source Cylon is coming out for vengeance toward their creator and the rest of humanity rest in the hand of Microsoft. Probably that was the motive for Microsoft Thailand representatives meeting prime minister, deputy prime minister, and finance minister for implementation of the future of the Thai e-government.

One thing is certain on the current state open source initiative in Thailand, a senile blind leading the blinds to an abyss of anti-competitive monopolistic software business . If you hoping the carnage would cease there, letting all the sacrificial blood of the open source hippies on the alter then you're so wrong. To add more salt to the wound, Mr Sitthichai Pokai-udom made another great insight in a recent MIT invention for the world poors, The OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) which he nonchalantly disregard them as "toys". So let me summarized Mr. Siitthichai's deluded Phenomenological world, he thinks open source is only good for A.D.D hippies and OLPC is such a bad toy it need not be introduced to Thai poor youths who barely have money to even buy a toy this Christmas. Perhaps the real reason for his anti-sentiment toward open source is the lack of support in the technical services and financial support from Mr. Gate? So it' s better to accept a software that famous for the blue screen of death and bloated with security vulnerabilities than an open standard of open source initiative which is on constant scrutinies from it user 24/7 for bugs?

Perhaps Mr Sitichai himself never use the world wide web, which came from W3C open source initiative. May be the minister himself worries that if a web page is broken on his computer, then he might actually have to call Tim Berner Lee himself. Better yet in Mr Sittichai's wonderland, let's call Microsoft because they invented WWW with the Internet Explorer right ? So let me explain a brief point the leader of the blinds. Open source is all about the initiative to implement an open standard where all could benefit on an agreeable software framework platform. In the current digital world one thing reign supreme, which is standard the ultimate trump card. Obviously he is missing the real point, this idea of common share knowledge will prevent some moron who are trying to patent hyperlink just because they feel like it. Plus you don't publicized your magical source code that enhance your competitive edge open on the internet, even though the framework of your application is base on open source software.

As for the situation of the destruction of Intellectual Property, perhaps the professor fail to read the latest theory of The Law of Conservation of Attractive Profit, which state once software is commoditized just like the PC from IBM in the 70-80's. The monetary value will migrate up the value chain in the form of services on the platform, or stacked down in the form of supportive ecosystem of the framework. As you can see the perfect examples are Google with Adsense and Skype with their VOIP Services. On the other hand in the eternal sunshine of his spotless mind, the nutty professor probably still think they are some nifty websites worth bookmarking for his weekend chat with Tin man. Here is a food for though my fellow Thai techies, "In the Land of the blind one eye man is the king". So let's vote for our Tech Moron of 2006 !

Kirk Sato's IT Proverb 2006

Well as the year 2006 is approaching to a definite end, I feel that many people out there would share the feeling of nostalgia among the mist. For the most part, many of you folks out there probably trying to recall the past mistakes that you have done foolishly in the past year. Which in hope 2007 will bring you a certain resolution achievement, even though you may never be able to get rid of that bad habit. As for me, the biggest blunder of 2006 probably would be in the field of my job, which happen to in Information Technology. Though the consequence might not have threaten my livelihood entirely, but it sure did leave me a nasty memory which I love to abandon with all the days in this year. So in the hope of finding my own resolution for the next year in my career, I have compile little words of wisdom in the world of computing to share with you all. This might not be a definitive guide, however you might find them to be more than useful when you get stuck in one of those computer errors anger movement.


IT Proverb 2006

It is better to have a gold digging girlfriend than a computer. Because owning a computer is like a marriage, it never works unless you spend money on it.


I had a life once... now I have a computer and a modem.

To err is human. To really foul things up requires a computer.

On the Internet, nobody knows you're a moron. (into believing)

Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tubes hurtling down the highway.

Profanity is the one language all programmers know best.

Open source is buggy , crashing Windows and Gates in a world without borders

Press any key to continue or any other key to quit...



The Best Movement of Internet 2006 -A Series of Tubes....

Digital Tsunami

Damm the freakin earthquake in Taiwan two days ago not only happened on the same date as the Tsunami 2004. Also it managed to cut clean all 6 transcontinental undersea fiber optics, which leave my sorry asian ass without broadband for 2 days. Talking about digital tsunami in Asia, god damm when all this crap would end.

Akira

Alright if you're a fan of the Matrix trilogy and Ghost in the Shell then you can't miss this chance online. Courtesy from Google video, an entire length of Akira has been posted online. For those of you who wanted to get in touch with the stable of the Japanese anime, look no further this is a must see movie. Here I'll post you a quick synopsis to prepared you for a this mind blowing dystopia. Neo-Tokyo, Fast Yakuza future bikes, genetic engineering out of control oh my.

Akira (アキラ, Akira) is a 1988 animated movie by Katsuhiro Otomo based on his manga of the same name. The movie led the way for the growing popularity of anime in the West, with Akira considered a forerunner of the second wave of anime fandom that began in the early 1990s. One of the reasons for the movie's success was the highly advanced quality of its animation. At the time, most anime was notorious for cutting production corners with limited motion, such as having only the characters' mouths move while their faces remained static. Akira broke from this trend with meticulously detailed scenes, exactingly lip-synched dialogue (voices were recorded before the animation was completed, rather than the opposite — a first for an anime production) and superfluous motion as realized in the film's more than 160,000 animation cels.^[1

The story takes place in the politically volatile city of Neo-Tokyo, built over Tokyo Bay after an unexplained explosion inciting World War III destroyed the original city in 1988. The cataclysm is revealed to have been caused by the frightening psionic powers of a child, Akira, who had earlier been the subject of a secret government research project for the development of psychokinetic abilities.

So sit back and enjoy this great film on your post mayhem Christmas hangover....



     

Nokia N95 multimedia computer

Even though I never been a big fan of Nokia, since all of my phones are a long line of descendent of Hello Moto. Currently I owned the KRZR of course, however I ran into a commercial of this new N95. I'm pretty positive this sucker can defnitely give Nokia a good punch back on the smart phone category once more.

New commercial "multimedia computer" upcoming soon. It will be Nokia N95, just released by Nokia. The Nokia N95 is scheduled to hit stores by Feb 2007 and will be have such features: 5 Megapixel camera, 802.11g Wi-Fi, HSDPA, 150 MB internal memory, 2.6 inch QVGA, ATI 3D graphics chip, GPS, microSD card slot, 3.5mm audio jack and dedicated music keys.

Nokia N95 on video:

     

All the fun stuff you can do with water in Zero G

Man what a billions of tax payers dollars well spent, poking fun at water.....

Inferno in Bangkok

Well this particular blog might seems to be some what off beat, however for the sake of my infinite appeties for artistic appreciation. I felt compel to experiment a little mixture art with technology in photo jounalism. Not to wory all, I still dedicate my spare time bringing you all my critical thought on technological impact on our dystopian world. You just have to wait in other blog for the future to come. Fortunately couple of nights ago, I was at the right time and place. There was a massive fire that burn down a slum community that left hundreds homeless, usally this kind of disater would get a lot media coverage plus a timely response to their immediate danger. However that never happened, first becuase the blaze was left untreated due the traffic congestion and the sheer incompetence of the Thai traffic police. Second for all those drama unfolding in front of my eyes, it took the news crew two hours to get their fat ass reporting it on the televison set. Last but not least, all those suffering homeless folks got only these pathetic little column about their lost on this Bangkokpost news , here is a sample of rather dry excerpt.

The Klong Toey fire destroyed 54 houses, left hundreds of people homeless, and caused five million baht in damage.

A make-shift relief centre has been set up near the community for the fire victims.

Police are investigating the cause of the three fires in the city.

So in the spirit of how Web 2.0 can amplify any content to be more dramatic and open ended, I have use a few Web 2.0 tools plus my artistic sense to deliver the same news content in a more dramatic overtone. After all in this technological dystopia, the news agency in Thailand can learn a thing or two from CNN, adding more drama in a timely fashion equals better rating. It is rather frighten that people choose to be persuade by a dramatic misinformation over a boring substance.So here is my photo jounalism without any help from photoshop and tripod.(those are for kids in photo journalism.)



Now here is the story with some great pictures
The Prelude to a Disater



The Beginning of the Slum Fire than rendered hundreds homeless. Here is the news link

The Firestorm Against Bangkok Skyline



The Wind Started to Pick Up the Pace



Some 30 fire engines could only prevent the blaze from further spreading and waited three hours for the fire to consume itself.

The Smoke Thickens


The blaze quickly spread beyond the slum threaten near by convention center and a power plant. Here is the news link

The Spreading of a Disater


The blaze also spread to a building of Metropolitan Electricity Office near the community and destroyed some 20 official vehicles there.

Eerie Lights Electrify the Scene



Over 100 houses on two-rai area were destroyed but the Klong Toey district officials had yet to survey the number of affected people.

A Close Up Look



The fire fighters faced shortage of water, so they had to ask for helps from nearby districts. Strong wind had obstructed the attempts to put the fire.

Lights Out



Police have to close traffic at Asoke Intersection and Ratchada-Rama IV road. Community radios suggested commuters to stay away from the roads near the blaze site.

There Were Some Explosion


Initially, police said the fire started from a furniture shop inside the community but Wallop said he leant that the blaze began at a temporary shelter of construction workers at mouth of the soi.

FYI about Bangkok

Last night I ended up at Spasso Bar first time in like 10 years, cool place indeed I even got a job offer from Cisco System In Singapore. However man that place filled with hooks, the ratio of girls vs guys were unbelievable. If you're into rent an expensive girlfriend that is a place to be.....

Back from My Spiritual Trip Part II

Alright let's get going on my 2nd part of this three part photo blog series shall we ? Thanks my friends on Myspace for all the nice comments, however I guess on the blogger ecosystem most of the time I just got the admiring lurkers. So if you feel compel to send me a shout out please do on the comment section ! Anyway were we ? Oh from the first few days of my trip to Lampang, My next venture took me the neigbor province of Phayao. So I took the advice from the monks in Lampang to pay a visit to the Anayootipyharam Temple. From what I gathered from the visit at the monastery in Lampang, the head monk who ran the Abbey, was from this huge monastery residing in the Thailand national park reserve, stretching several hundred acres throughout the forest. It took me a good couple of days to finish the tour literally, however for a photography afficcidio like I am it was worth every single tiring steps. So without further delay let's get this photo blog going.

Trip to Anayootipyharam Temple in Phayao





This the front entrance to front part the temple, you have to take quite a few step up the abbey. However the entire monastery expand all over the national park, I really recommend a car for the entire tour or else you will need a few days of walking and you don't want that.






This happen to be a Hindu Statues, I don't know why would they have them around here.



This is a 30+feet Buddha statue I mean this thing is huge



Very beautiful craftmenship on the carpentry work



The inside view of the biulding, I believe this is for prayer and meditation.







Yes the whole thing is made of gold, all solid gold.....



This is a exact replica from the famous buddha statue in India portraying the death of Lord Budhha



An Abbey by the lake



Inside the Abbey



This is sculpture is depicting the first teaching of Buddha to his five disciples





This statue is a 5 stories tall standing Buddha statues !

So I hope you would enjoy this second and stay tune for the conclusion of my next blog ! Here is a link for the gallery in Prayao