Whitney Houston

Last night as I drove home from a meeting, Whitney Houston's All at Once was playing on the radio. Since I was alone in the car, I blasted the music.

I realized what amazing voice this woman has (and hopefully still does), and it was such a tragedy to have her married to Bobby Brown and get caught in the downward spiral of drug abuse.

Well, the good news is that she's divorced Bobby and hopefully her voice is also on the mend and she'll come back with her amazing voice again to vow listeners like me.

And I do miss her, and her voice (especially ballads)

entrepreneurship in a downturn

I read an interesting article on the harvard weekly about the above
topic and its amazing that entrepreneurs will always find opportunity
in any situation, and in this case, the opportunity is during a
downturn.

It goes to say that when capital is scarce, then only the best most
efficient, most creative ideas will get funded.

However, I am puzzled by the above. If this occurs in an environment
of high entrepreneurial activity, then one can postulate that the
businesses that get funded are truly the cream of the crop.

However, what happens in a situation where there is relatively low
entrepreneurial activity, where risk taking is frowned upon. What
then? if there is a scarcity of projects, then does it mean that there
would be a mismatch between the capital that is going into less than
ideal projects?

I see singapore as being in the latter group, and fear that while the
efforts of the government in stimulating more risk taking, the
projects that are being funded is not the one that have a high
survivability factor.

What do you think? Keep capital scarce or risk pouring good money into
bad projects?

Airport users subsidizing the ERL at KLIA

This came about as some relevation that users of both KLIA and the LCCT is subsidizing YTL for the operating cost of the ERL.

While some may feel cheated, especially if you don't use the service but I feel that one must look at the matter objectively. I used to travel quite extensively to Heathrow airport and the cheapest, fastest, most reliable way of getting from London city to the airport was to use the Heathrow express.

The service is prompt and zooms me into London within 30 mins. The other alternative is cab, which could cost close the 60 gbp instead of able 30 gbp for the X.

And so does the ERL. The trains are clean and runs efficiently. I think it was a mistake not to extend the line to the LCCT because more people can then use the ERL to get to and from the airport from KL.

So for once, I think some quarters are barking up the wrong tree. Sure, the concessions should have been disclosed, but rather the cry over spilt milk, why don't the people put their heads together and lobby for the ERL to extend the line to include the LCCT?

At the end of the day, people must be willing to pay for service. Take the bus, while cheap may not be conducive since the bus is at the mercy of the jams that KL and its suburbs are so prone to.

Fair or not, you'll not hear me complain about the ERL as I think it's the right infrastructure to put in place.

Sent from my Nokia phone

Elizabeth Wong - How low has Malaysia sunked?

I read with disgust the treatment meted out to Elizabeth Wong and the recent revelation of compromising pictures sent to the tabloids and the media. Let's see what's fact and fiction (I shall try my best)
1) She is single and non-Muslim (fact). So she is free to have sexual relations with her partners. While the older folks may frown on pre-marital sex, but to be honest, this is a trend that we have seen in both the Muslim and non-Muslim community.

2) These pictures were taken without her consent. Until proven otherwise, we must assume she is innocent.

3) It was taken in a private setting, therefore, by right should remain private.

4) She has a track record for doing what's right (which is so often missing in politicians in Malaysia today)


The key question is:
1) Will her constituents still be able to trust her to do a good job after this?

2) Does it matter to her constituents what she does in private? Is she hurting anyone? Is she committing a crime (having pre-marital sex is not a crime, unless you are Muslim or a minor)?


To be honest, I think Khir Toyo is supremely hypocritical to ask Eli Wong to quite when this is the only transgression she has made. Who knows perhaps he also has skeletons in his own closet and it is just a matter of time before the skeletons come out to play.

If you subscribe to the conspiracy theory, and I fell many do, it would seem that BN would stop at nothing to dig enough dirt on the PR elected officials to force them to jump ship or quit, thus allowing them to take over the state governments. If you cannot win using a democratic method, then you use an underhand method, which is to force people to defect or shame them into quitting.

In the end, I think BN (be they be responsible for the entire fracas or just an innocent bystander - but by Khir Toyo making statements, it would mean that the BN or UMNO is linked somehow or other) will end up being the major loser, because the sympathy of the masses will sway to the direction of Eli Wong. And coming so soon after the Frog incident in Perak, it would further strengthen the people's perception that BN is desperately to take over the State Government (by whichever method that works best) and does not care what the Rakyat's wishes are. The BN has put themselves above the Rakyat they are supposed to serve.

And this puts Malaysia very close to being a failed democracy.

This is Technopreneurship!

My main beef with supposed technopreneurship coming out from multi-million dollar research funding is that the gap to close between the lab and the consumer is WAY WAY too big.

I saunter over the many websites on venture funding when I stumbled upon this company, Smule, who managed to raise US 3.9 million at a time when many tech companies are slashing workers or dying off.

Check this out. For the users, KISS (keep it short and simple), but underlying the user interface, I can only dare to imagine the coding needed, but even more, the IDEA!




This is simply AMAZING!

If you read the articles on why it is successful:
1) Any idiot with an iPhone can make music with it (good or bad is not the issue)
2) Users can hear music from other users around the world. This is the network effect, and ISP or the telcos all love this because it drives data usage (already iPhone users use more data than other traditional users of the mobile phone)
3) Well, it runs on the iPhone (need I say more?)
4) Rather than targeting other developers to use the technology, this goes to the consumer direct. Risky, but any investment made by VCs tend to be high risk high return.

What do you think?

Rain, glorious rain!

I just came back fro penang and alor seats where I spent my chinese new year holidays, and boy, was it scorching hot!

I went up north with 1 sick kid and adults, and I came back with 3 sick adults, all down from the pure heat up north.

And now as you can see it is raining in singapore. Have never been happier!

Sent from my Nokia phone