Straits Times Nov 5, 2008 - StarHub delays iPhone sale - It will not bring it in this year

STARHUB, which had earlier said that it will have the Apple iPhone 3G in stores by end of the year, will not be bringing it in after all. In a results briefing on Wednesday, StarHub chief executive Terry Clontz said that Singapore’s second largest mobile operator will not be able to bring the gadget in this year.

But the telco is continuing ‘dialogue with Apple’, he said adding, ‘At this particular point in time we cannot be specific when we will have it in our stores… they (Apple) have their priorities signing on distributors.’ This leaves SingTel as the sole iPhone distributor here for now. MobileOne had previously said it was in discussions with Apple, but did not commit to a date.

The iPhone, said Mr Clontz, has created ’some consternation’ for StarHub. SingTel sold over 20,000 iPhones since its Aug launch, although some estimates put the number at over 60,000. The ‘pent up demand’ for it is not unexpected, said Mr Clontz, although ‘things seemed to return to normal after three to four weeks.’ But StarHub ‘resisted coming to the market with big offers because we believed it (iPhone) would run its course - and it did.’

The company intends to adopt the same defensive strategy this quarter, in light of the economic uncertainties. Mobiles operators usually sweeten their offers during the festive period. While Mr Clontz expects that ‘there will be some promotional activities in Q4, I believe that all operators, not being able to predict how deep the recession will be, will put the brakes on a bit.’

So Mr Clontz, are you experiencing substantial cross-over from StarHub to SingTel because of the iPhone? Is that why there is some consternation? By having not securing the deal with Apple, you WILL definitely feel more when StarHub users who are on the fence will finally not wait and go over to SingTel, especially during this festive period.

Geez, you had a good opportunity to 1) get more NEW customers because of your much better mobile broadband infrastructure 2) get more existing customers to sign new contracts, and yet, decided not to get the iPhone for the exclusive launch and now not delivering what you had said about bringing the phone here by end of this year, to say that I am feeling disappointment is an absolute understatement.

Sparky - go pee and bite your owner’s leg now.

Barrack Obama will be the 44^th President of the United States of America. I hope that he will really make the changes that will bring improvements to the USA and the rest of the world.

The portion of the speech that was inspring:

This election had many firsts and many stories that will be told for generations. But one that’s on my mind tonight is about a woman who cast her ballot in Atlanta. She’s a lot like the millions of others who stood in line to make their voice heard in this election except for one thing - Ann Nixon Cooper is 106 years old.

She was born just a generation past slavery; a time when there were no cars on the road or planes in the sky; when someone like her couldn’t vote for two reasons - because she was a woman and because of the color of her skin.

And tonight, I think about all that she’s seen throughout her century in America - the heartache and the hope; the struggle and the progress; the times we were told that we can’t, and the people who pressed on with that American creed: Yes we can.

At a time when women’s voices were silenced and their hopes dismissed, she lived to see them stand up and speak out and reach for the ballot. Yes we can.

When there was despair in the dust bowl and depression across the land, she saw a nation conquer fear itself with a New Deal, new jobs and a new sense of common purpose. Yes we can.

When the bombs fell on our harbor and tyranny threatened the world, she was there to witness a generation rise to greatness and a democracy was saved. Yes we can.

She was there for the buses in Montgomery, the hoses in Birmingham, a bridge in Selma, and a preacher from Atlanta who told a people that “We Shall Overcome.” Yes we can.

A man touched down on the moon, a wall came down in Berlin, a world was connected by our own science and imagination. And this year, in this election, she touched her finger to a screen, and cast her vote, because after 106 years in America, through the best of times and the darkest of hours, she knows how America can change. Yes we can.

America, we have come so far. We have seen so much. But there is so much more to do. So tonight, let us ask ourselves - if our children should live to see the next century; if my daughters should be so lucky to live as long as Ann Nixon Cooper, what change will they see? What progress will we have made?

This is our chance to answer that call. This is our moment. This is our time - to put our people back to work and open doors of opportunity for our kids; to restore prosperity and promote the cause of peace; to reclaim the American Dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth - that out of many, we are one; that while we breathe, we hope, and where we are met with cynicism, and doubt, and those who tell us that we can’t, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of a people:

Yes We Can. Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.

Read transcript of Obama’s acceptance speech

Boy did I assume wrongly.

Here’s an example of an app listed on the SG AppStore

Note the pricing. At no part of the store page were there any mention of pricing or currency, not even on the Store Terms and Conditions Page.

Likewise the receipt that one received from Apple

So when I checked my credit card bill today, I found that I was charged US$2.99 instead of SG$, incurring the final cost of S$4.50.

Though the price is not high, Apple should be more forthright in how the pricing is displayed on the AppStore and also on the receipts that they sent out. They need to know that their customers are NOT just from the USA!

A quick look around various stores in different countries around the region are all like SG, just have the $ in front of the price, whereas in UK and France, they are using UK Pounds and Euros respectively.

I am actually quite surprised no one actually made any noise about it. Imagine the shock when someone’s parent look at their CC bill to find tons of US$ billings for apps bought by their kids!

Called Apple earlier and all they can say is that they are in US$ and will be switched to the SG$ in the future. And that was after a few minutes of discussion with his colleagues. For surprising was that in HWZ, a user there posted an email he received from a Apple rep that stated that:

Each country as its own currency. Only the US Store is in US currency. Your Singapore Store with be in Singapore currency.

So is Apple pulling a fast one on their customers around the world with this pricing display?

Happy Halloween!

As the title of this entry says, XDRTB is a mutated form of Tuberculosis that is extremely drug-resistant and difficult to detect.

Similar in creation to multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) but more extreme in its manifestation, it arises when common tuberculosis goes untreated or standard TB drugs are
misused…

Many people think of TB as a disease of the past, but in 2007 alone, TB killed 1.7 million people. That’s 4,660 deaths a day, or one death from TB every 20 seconds. TB is the leading killer of people with HIV: Individuals are able to live with HIV but are dying from TB. Without proper treatment, 90% of those living with HIV die within months of contracting TB.

TED and James Nachtwey worked together through James’ photographs to raise awareness of XDRTB.

Take a look at his photos that represent these varying strains. Learn more about TB, MDR-TB and XDR-TB, and learn how you can take action to stop this deadly disease.

The photos are finally done. After sieving through couple of hundreds of shots taken at the SingTel Singapore Grand Prix, I finally managed to bring it down to a manageable 98 photos that covered three days of the race.

See it all here at Flickr

Here’s a few to whet your appetite.

SingTel Singapore GP - Kimi Räikkönen, Ferarri by macbiff, on Flickr

SingTel Singapore GP - Samba Girl by macbiff, on Flickr

SingTel Singapore GP - Heikki Kovalainen, McLaren by macbiff, on Flickr

SingTel Singapore GP - Track side by macbiff, on Flickr

SingTel Singapore GP - Happy Ushers by macbiff, on Flickr

SingTel Singapore GP - Up close & personal by macbiff, on Flickr

Funny how life is. One month ago, we had our almost perfectly planned wedding washed out by passing rain which, decided to play havoc with us and stayed for exactly one and a half hour before moving on.

Till this day, as we strolled along East Coast Park under a very brightly lit full moon, we could almost taste the irony of it.

We joked about whether we should have held the wedding in October 14 instead. We wondered out loud how our perfect wedding would have been if the rain didn’t fall on that evening. We asked whether when we’ll stop joking about how exciting that night was.

Honestly, I think we won’t. One month has past and many many full moons in the future, we will still look back on September 14 2008 with great memories, of how much fun we had waiting for each of us in our own house in the morning, how we kissed un-glam-ly as I raised her veil, how we waved to another couple as they look at us in the cute topless Copen (thanks Steve!) while they sat in their cough*boring*cough wedding car sedan, how we went about getting ang paos as we serve tea, how we go about preparing for the lawn, how I try to keep the secret of the band from Yannie, how we worried as we heard the news about the rain, how worried we became as we waited for the missing tables to be done up, how we lovingly took our vows, how we happily walked down the aisle, how happy Yannie looks when she saw the surprise performance I kept from her, how happy we were when we watched the video made by our dear friends, how happy our parents were when we fumbled as we thanked them, and lastly, how happy we were as we looked at each other on our wedding day.

I think all the good and bad made our wedding something more special in our mind. A wedding we will never forget, as we count our blessings and look forward to more happy memories as husband and wife.

More photos will be uploaded as I find time…reservist training is tiring…especially the travelling.

• Some photos here and some here and they are all taken by Eadwine from Plush Photography

So to my surprised last week when I try to access LTA’s e-services via One Motoring on my Mac. I got a blank page. I tried it on Safari and Firefox and still got a blank page.

Needless to say, while starting up VMWare to try the site on Windows, I went to the One Motoring feedback and informed them of the problem.

This was the reply I received:

Dear Mr Jimmy Liew

LTA e-Services via SingPass
FEEDBACK NUMBER: 7xxxxx

We refer to your feedback on 05/10/2008.

e-Services@ONE.MOTORING is currently only compatible with Internet Explorer (IE) and Netscape on Windows Operating System (OS) Windows 2000 and above.

This is a deliberate design decision as compatibility between IE and Netscape on Windows OS, which is the most commonly used combination, would enable a majority of users to access e-Services@ONE.MOTORING.

Based on the current adoption rate of other non-IE and Netscape web browsers and non-Windows OS, we feel that it is still not cost-effective to make e-Services@ONE.MOTORING compatible with such browsers and OS.

Nevertheless, we are monitoring the adoption rate of alternative web browsers such as Safari, Mozilla, FireFox etc, and alternative OS such as Macintosh etc, and would consider making our e-Services@ONE.MOTORING accessible via these browsers and OS when there is sufficient demand.

We thank you for writing in.

Yours sincerely

(SIGNED IN LOTUS NOTES)

XXX XXX XXX

ASSISTANT MANAGER, VRL SERVICE DEVELOPMENT
VRL SERVICE DEVELOPMENT
VEHICLE SERVICES

(emphasis was mine)

I am quite disappointed to read such replies from companies who still hold the belief that Mac users are far and few between and shouldn’t be provided the services that Windows users received. That is just bullshit.

This is a deliberate design decision as compatibility between IE and Netscape on Windows OS, which is the most commonly used combination, would enable a majority of users to access e-Services@ONE.MOTORING.

Anyone and everyone who uses the internet will know that Netscape is DEAD! Yes IE is still dominant with Firefox second. Next is Safari at about 7% (according to wiki).

Based on the current adoption rate of other non-IE and Netscape web browsers and non-Windows OS, we feel that it is still not cost-effective to make e-Services@ONE.MOTORING compatible with such browsers and OS.

I wonder how archaic their planning and programming for them not to even consider cross-platform compatibility as one of their priorities. Yes the numbers of Mac users definitely are not comparable to Windows users but that doesn’t mean we should be deprived from accessing a government service.

If we were in the early 2000s when OS X was still in its infant stage, I can acknowledge their reasonings since Mac developers and cross-platform web programming were not as advanced as now. But after 8 years, almost all banks in Singapore have made it a point to provide cross-platform compatibility on their e-banking services. And so did many of the government services.

So I absolutely don’t agree on their lame-ass excuse to say that it is not cost-effective. Yes One Motoring is no longer managed by LTA and handled by Green Dot Internet Services (which is a subsidiary of Singapore Computer Systems), being a portal for government services, they should make it a priority to provide access to ALL users, regardless of the users’ operating system.

Nevertheless, we are monitoring the adoption rate of alternative web browsers such as Safari, Mozilla, FireFox etc, and alternative OS such as Macintosh etc, and would consider making our e-Services@ONE.MOTORING accessible via these browsers and OS when there is sufficient demand.

Look. Mac ownership in Singapore will never reach the volume that will be deemed sufficient by most commercial entities decision makers. But this is a government service. What happened to IDA’s iGov2010 policy “that delights customers and connects citizens through the use of infocomm technology”? Do I really need to wait till 2010 before I can access LTA’s e-services on my Mac?

Someone should knock some senses on these old-foggies that still think Windows is the only platform everyone wants to be using.

Who’s James Nachtwey?

James Nachtwey (born 1948) is an influential American photojournalist and war photographer who has been awarded the Overseas Press Club’s coveted Robert Capa Gold Medal an unprecedented 5 times. In 2003, he was injured by a grenade in an attack on his convoy while serving as a TIME contributing correspondent in Baghdad.

He was awarded one of three 2007 TEDPrize, where he received “one wish to change the world”.

“I’m working on a story that the world needs to know about. I wish for you to help me break it, in a way that provides spectacular proof of the power of news photography in the digital age.”

First, watch his TEDPrize Wish video:

Come 3 October, check his TEDPrize page to see the “Story the world needs to know.

• James Nachtwey’s site - http://www.jamesnachtwey.com/
• See other TED Prize Winners - http://www.tedprize.org
• See other TED Talks - http://www.ted.org

3 days, 20 cars, 10 teams and 1028 photos. I am tired. So is my Canon 30D. Here’s just a teaser of what I managed to shoot over the last few days. Check back soon.

What can I say. The SingTel Singapore GP is one hell of a show. The first two days of practice runs were just a teaser of what was to become an amazing race of attrition and smart pit tactics. Coming through all the various crashes and safety car delays, Fernando Alonso emerged triumphant despite coming in from a lowly 15^th position.

Me and GQ were sitting at the Marina Bay Grandstand and though it was at a relative slow area of the track, that short straight between Turn 17 and Turn 18 turned up to be the crucial section that changed the fortunes of Felipe Messa and the eventual winner Alonso. You can read the race report at Planet F1 or an abridged version by the wifey.

Besides the successful holding of the race, I am also impressed by the infrastructure work done for the race. The lights for the race were really bright but more impressive was how evenly lit through out the whole track. We were able to walk down the whole track after the race and experienced how it was for the drivers.

One other crucial aspect which I felt was quite well done was the control of the human traffic. Thankfully, the 100,000+ crowd was spread across various grandstands and free standing areas across the whole track, making it more manageable for the police and ushers to control those who enter and leave the track area. There were some obvious bottlenecks which were much better managed on the final night. But they do need to put up more directional signs to direct traffic, especially when people are leaving the track. Many, especially the tourists were not sure how to reach the CityHall MRT station.

At trackside, the ushers had quite a torrid time trying to get people to their right seats as apparently there were some tickets that were printed with the same seat numbers. They also had to managed enthusiastic crowd (like me) who tried to get to vantage positions to snap the race cars. But kudos to the ushers, from the students to working adults who helped made the race enjoyable to watch.

Prior to the race, we also had quite some fun walking around the F1 villages. We managed to catch some performances by Brazilian samba dancers (sexy, real sexy), Zouk DJs (party time), some Austin-Power look-alikes plus lots and lots of eye-candy. We also managed to catch some close views of Mika Heikkinen at the Johnny Walker Lounge while we waited for the qualifying on the second night.

One thing which was not surprising was the heavily marked up prices of the food and drinks. Our dinner (mixed vegetable rice) today cost us between S$12-$15, while a cup of drink cost S$3. But thankfully, it was quite edible and wasn’t a waste of money.

All in all, we really had a blast at the SingTel Singapore GP and we are definitely returning for the 2009 race. And this time, the wifey is definitely coming along!

Do come back here again when the photos are uploaded. I have 1028 photos to go through, but at least half or more will be ignored or deleted. This was my first time shooting racing, and made more challenging when its done at night. Thankfully, the lights are bright and allow faster shuttle speed. The 70-200mm 2.8 L lens I rented definitely came in handy. After 3 days of shooting, I think my 2-eyes-open-and-pan technique definitely improved as I shoot from the top of the Bay Grandstand. Next step is to filter, then tag, then touch-up before uploading. Watch out for them in the next few days.