Empathy vital for 1Malaysia

He said the success of the 1Malaysia concept lay in its promotion of empathy.

“Empathy means we are not just seeing things from our point of view but trying to understand them from others' perspectives as well.

“Put ourselves in their shoes, where they come from and appreciate them,” he said, adding that many problems in the country could be resolved if everyone appreciated the meaning of empathy.

Najib said he always tried to practise it.

The Government, he said, had also introduced a new approach by going to the ground to understand the problems facing the people and resolve them instead of waiting and making them travel to Putrajaya to get their problems attended to.

“The Government has taken steps to try to understand the problems, aspirations and dreams of each community,” he said.

I'm reading the tome that is Dr. Mahathir's latest book. Different views. Focused dilemma.

Kudos to Najib for trying to practice empathy. Wonder what the success rate is?

Facebook used to scale out your news portal - kudos Malaysiakini!

So it seems that http://www.malaysiakini.com/ is down and being DDoS'ed (a state in Malaysia is having some pretty important elections). Its also quite common that many Malaysian companies I see, don't like to invest too much in scaling out. The cloud might be here, but it takes effort in ensuring that the application itself is built with scale in mind. Plus the local cloud services in Malaysia at the moment are pretty laughable, so if you're looking for a good point-of-presence, Singapore is the closest link.

Its no surprise that Malaysiakini decided to scale out using their Facebook page - https://www.facebook.com/MalaysiaKini using their notes platform https://www.facebook.com/MalaysiaKini?sk=notes
They currently have 24,691 fans and I expect this number to grow once this exercise is complete

Cybertroopers might think it makes a lot of sense to "knock" a website off the Net. Governments can think of banning stuff. But how do you deal with the mass that is Facebook? They scale for you. Yes, some governments ban Facebook access via DNS blocks and so on, but people will still work around it

We're in a time where its going to be pretty hard to *not* get news. And in a country where mainstream media tends to be controlled, people are looking elsewhere. And its going to be pretty hard to stop the river of news, short of pulling the plug on the nation's network

Follow my friend Prem, CEO of Malaysiakini, on Twitter as well: https://twitter.com/#!/premesh - he's got updates on operational stuff. Their Twitter account is at https://twitter.com/#!/mkini_en with currently 5,335 followers, and their latest hashtag - #mkinionfb

Malaysiakini

--
Colin Charles, http://bytebot.net/blog/
twitter: @bytebot | skype: colincharles
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mohandas Gandhi

New Facebook ad: You vote on the Anwar video (and win a MacBook)

Facebook_ad

With such a provocative picture, I bet they're getting lots of clicks, no? It doesn't go to a Facebook fan page, but to a URL - http://www.planet49.com.my/cgi-bin/wingame.pl

Free-test

You then get asked a rather simple question. They tell you of your chance to win a free Apple MacBook.

So at this point I'm thinking up all the weird things that politicians in the ruling government might be cooking up. I check out the terms & conditions:
"Planet49 Asia Pacific Pte Ltd ("Planet49"), a company incorporated in the Republic of Singapore whose main business activity is to collect data for purposes of promoting and marketing of products or services offered by sponsors and clients of Planet49."

I whois the domain, to find out its registered to these folk: http://www.ipmirror.com/en/ - they claim to be Asia's online brand expert. They also obviously have an outfit in Germany.

And it seems like they're running promos for the following companies:

(download)

I'm not entirely happy with the above companies sponsoring a prize based on some leaked video on YouTube.
Does this kind of ad improve the brands for the folk above? I for one know I'm unlikely to visit those daily deal sites, I'll probably never spend a single cent on Reader's Digest again (not that I have in a long time), and I'm sure I'll find a better way to fly than Lufthansa.

Will this increase brand awareness for the prize sponsors?

Content disabled in the US :)

Releases_isohunt_the_bittorren

I find this amusing. I found this at ISOHunt.com.
In fact their searches are also quite limited. Tunnel outside of the US, and magically you get to see releases, better search, etc. of torrents

Why is it amusing to me? Well, outside of the US, so much content is not available (buying music, streaming music, buying TV shows, renting movies, etc.) online. So people outside of the US find it rather difficult to grab content legally, that many people within the US take for granted that they just buy online with a click.

YourSingapore targets ads on Facebook exclusively for Malaysians

Yoursingapore_ad_for_malaysian

A targeted ad for Malaysians on Facebook, that does not link to a Facebook fan page, rather a website: http://www.yoursingapore.com/content/traveller/en/browse/international/countr...

Its interesting to see that they have country exclusives. Its just a landing page though, and you have to "search" (i.e. scroll down) to find the exclusive deals only for Malaysians. http://www.yoursingapore.com/content/traveller/en/browse/international/countr...

Its worth noting that there are other countries they target with their exclusive deals: Australia, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, United Kingdom, United States, Vietnam

They've even engaged bloggers: http://www.yoursingapore.com/content/traveller/en/browse/international/countr... (currently Joyce of kinkybluefairy and Huah Bin of sixthseal)

Yoursingapore

Scammers for earthquake/tsunami based in Malaysia?

Looks legit right?

Even the website goes to a legit part of the web. Little do you know you can add details at will on the site

I tried calling Zubaidah. Zilch.

I wish Maybank/Hong Leong will take a closer look at the account owner

Remember to donate via legit sites (like the Red Cross, your local bank, etc.). Too many scammers trying to prey on people in situations like this...

Profiting from a tragedy is just despicable

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Masako Honda
> Date: 28 March 2011 11:29:08 GMT+08:00
> To: byte@aeon.com.my
> Subject: JAPAN TSUNAMI SURVIVOR NOW IN MALAYSIA(PLEASE READ)
>> Hello Sir/Madam
>> TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN
>> Please kindly read and acknowledged my message by assisting my present situation that i am going through with my family at the moment.
>> i am sorry if my english not too perfect and understandable,because i was use is translator.
>> I am Masako Honda,60 yrs old, mother of 4 from FUKUOKA,Japan.
> I believe the world is aware of the present Tsunami disaster and Earthquake happening in Japan that have wiped most everyone in the city.
>> I have lost everything,my husband,my two kids are still missing, i am now left with 2 kids, we are lucky that we are helped by Malaysia rescued forces in Japan who have helped so many victims and send us to Malaysia.
>> On arriving Malaysia we are assisted by a malaysia woman ( Mrs Zubaidah)for accommodation ,and provide us some little help.
>> please any form of assistance you can render will be more appreciated. incase of any donation or assistance you want to render please you can send through (mrs zubaidah) details below
>> NAME: ZUBAIDAH BT
> CONTACT NUMBER:0172927793
> MAYBANK ACCOUNT:114785089223
> HONG LEONG ACCOUNT:19250107606
>> for any further information regarding your donation you can email me : masakohonda@yahoo.com
>> THANKS AND GOD BLESS YOU.... PLEASE NO DONATION IS TOO SMALL..........
>> Also here below is the Japan web-link if you have someone in Japan to contact of survival or missing people.
>> http://www.familylinks.icrc.org/wfl/wfl_jap.nsf/QuickSearch/A5C2C06C0D3933B0C...;=eng
>>