A fairly young club formed by a group of models, Cyber Models Club is a fast growing club consisting of more than 40 members currently.
With the mission of promoting professional modeling and modeling activities in Singapore, the club envisions to level up the image of modeling and its professionalism amongst the general public.
There’s a new kid on the micro-blogging block and that’s Plurk. As a fairly long-time Twitter fan I was intrigued to see so much commotion about it going on in the Twittersphere so I had to check it out for myself.
A Brief Video Tour of Plurk
I put together a short video showing how Plurk and Twitter compare and in the video I also mention a tool called FeedTweeter that allows you to take your Plurks and automatically Tweet them so if you want to test out Plurk while you continue to use Twitter this is a way to do that without too much extra effort.
Plurk has hit the market in a fully-featured way. It has quite a sexy ajax interface and comes with some significant features that make it stand out from the crowd.
How will Twitter, the hugely popular micro-blogging service (among the tech-savvy crowd anyway), make money? That’s the polite version of the question posed today by Allen Stern over at his CenterNetworks blog. Stern writes: “As Twitter usage has grown, have they f’ed themselves out of a real, sustainable business model?”
Twitter doesn’t charge for use of the service, though there can be some costs associated with sending SMS messages (with both Twitter and users footing the bill depending on whose sending and which country they’re based). Additionally, Twitter doesn’t (yet) serve ads — and to make matters worse, many of its regular users access Twitter through third-party clients, such as Twitterific, which utilize Twitter’s own free APIs.
Stern continues:
Most of the heavy Twitter users use the service via the API and “offsite”. I actually use the Web site and refresh the page every few minutes while I am at home. How can they monetize the API usage? If a Twitter user already paid $15 for a piece of [third-party] software, would they then be willing to pay Twitter for their account? It’s like paying for mIRC and then having to pay for the use of IRC itself.
In a fun post on his own blog, Dave Winer responds by saying that there are far harder problems than this particular web 2.0 conundrum (my words not his).
When I was in college, professors used to ask questions that are much harder than the question Allen Stern asks in this piece.
The NY Times crossword puzzle is harder.
Geez, installing a new hard disk in a MacBook is harder, and as I’ve found out that’s pretty easy.
According to Winer, Twitter has a number of potential business models, all of which rely on the service acquiring a large enough user base in the first place.
Become a distributor of third-party apps and services that use Twitter and take a cut in return.
Design and sell hardware such as a cellphone with “Twitter baked in”.
Or, better still, partner with mobile device makers and carriers to offer superior Twitter integration.
And finally, sell the service to a carrier.
The first and third suggestion seem the most viable. Setting up a Twitter products and services store would be similar to Skype’s shop that sells USB phones and other products that utilize Skype’s API. And partnering with mobile carriers seems a “no brainer” and might provide a way to reduce SMS costs. Although, as Winer also points out, making Twitter more stable should be a first priority.
Steve O'Hear is a London-based consultant, educator, and journalist, focussing on the Internet and all aspects of digital technology. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
A UFO dropped in on Barack Obama’s inauguration ceremony, it was claimed last night.
News footage captured a shadowy object flashing across the sky before the new President’s speech.
The high-speed object appears to streak behind the Washington Monument and then disappear into the clouds.
The CNN clip, featuring veteran US broadcaster Wolf Blitzer, has attracted thousands of hits on video-sharing website YouTube.
UFO experts are convinced it shows an alien craft speeding behind the 555ft-high monument – but sceptics say it was a bird or a bat.
Enthusiast Nick Pope said: “We know it is not an aircraft because a strict no-fly zone was imposed over the area.
“It seems to have been going a little bit too fast for any type of bird.”
During the election run-up, UFO bloggers claimed mysterious “orbs” were spotted over an Obama rally in Chicago.
Calls for him to release all information held on UFOs attracted over 170,000 votes on his new online “Citizen Briefing Book” last week – more than any other subject.
Mr Pope said: “Despite the economic downturn and the conflict in Afghanistan, the number one topic people were pressuring the President over was UFOs. It proves this is more than a fringe issue.”
THE quartet who played at the inauguration have admitted they were miming – after recording the music two days before.
They said sub-zero temperatures would have put their instruments out of tune.
Aren't they tired? Is Microsoft really that bad and not learnt antyhing?
A new year, new charges from the EU against Microsoft
Just weeks after the New Year's celebrations ended, the European Union's European Commission has issued a fresh round of accusations against Microsoft. Likely inspired by past successes which saw the EU reaping $1.4B USD (899M €) in its latest fine against Microsoft, the pair is getting ready to wage battle in the European Union's courts yet again.
The EU released a statement Friday stating, "Microsoft's tying of Internet Explorer to the Windows operating system harms competition between web browsers, undermines product innovation and ultimately reduces consumer choice."
Microsoft is currently reviewing the statement and deciding whether to fight the charges by requesting a formal hearing. It has been given an eight week deadline to reply to the charges. In the past Microsoft has had little success fighting the EU, with its appeals against fines consistently failing.
While Microsoft has diversified substantially, with revenue from internet business, the Xbox 360 gaming console, the Zune MP3 player, and more, the company's biggest business remains its operating systems. While Microsoft has tried to move away from bundling its software with the OS's to avoid being charged with anticompetitive practices, it has failed to do so with its Internet Explorer software.
It’s hard to argue the effectiveness of Microsoft's strategy. Internet Explorer maintains a relatively large lead over second place competitor Firefox, with a 59.5 percent market share in Europe compared to Firefox's 31.1 percent. While part of this is due to Microsoft's advantages over Firefox in a large business environment, much of it is simply due to the fact that the software comes with every Windows install. This practice, says the EU, while effective, is anticompetitive.
The last fine against Microsoft came in February 2008. The fine and future fines to come from the European Commission saying Microsoft willfully ignored a 2004 ruling, which ordered it to cease certain anticompetitive practices. As the result of these violations, Microsoft is under extended oversight, and now looks to be headed for even more fines.
The most recent charges were spurred by a complaint from Norway's Opera browser company. Some analysts are noting that the timing of the latest charges is rather odd, as Internet Explorer is at its lowest market share in several years. Further, while the U.S. focused on IE in antitrust charges in the late 90s, the EU has for several years declined to focus on it, instead targeting Microsoft's bundling practices in general.
While Microsoft may be a bit morose over the fact that more antitrust charges have been dropped on it, it can take comfort in that at least it is not alone. The European Commission, which practices a stricter brand of antitrust law than the U.S., has targeted Intel and even Apple with separate charges or accusations. However, those charges fall short of those leveled at Microsoft, which has proved the EU's favorite source of antitrust fine revenue over the years, being forced to pay over $2.4B USD in fines.
"Today marks a new milestone for BLOG2u and SGBloggers. BLOG2u Pte Ltd announced today that it has acquired SGBloggers, a local blog hosting site catering to the needs of Singaporean.
As a new media advertising network, BLOG2u believes that SGBloggers’ services complements our existing business model. With SGBloggers, BLOG2u will be able to reach out to a wider audience and roll out new services to help bridge new media between companies and bloggers."
About Blog2u
BLOG2u.SG is an online advertising agency that match-make between Advertisers and Bloggers together (New Media); to deliver online ‘word of mouth’ for products and services, to ignite the spread of the ‘wild fire’ to the targeted group of potential customers (readers of the blogs)
Microsoft has delayed the public release of its Windows 7 beta download due to an overwhelming demand that its servers couldn't handle.
Windows 7 Beta Delay
The announcement was made late Friday afternoon in a posting at the official Windows 7 Blog. (click on image for full-sized view of Microsoft's message to downloaders.)
"Due to very heavy traffic we're seeing as a result of interest in the Windows 7 Beta, we are adding some additional infrastructure support to the Microsoft.com properties before we post the public beta," the message explains.
The post does not give a definitive time for when the Windows 7 beta will be made available again.
"We want to ensure customers have the best possible experience when downloading the beta, and I'll be posting here again soon once the beta goes live," it says.
Overwhelming Demand
Reports as early as Friday morning indicated that Microsoft's servers were being crushed by the demand for Windows 7, even before the files were initially posted. Microsoft had planned to allow only the first 2.5 million users to download the operating system. The company has indicated it would like to have the software fully tested and ready for its final release by the end of the year.
We intend to restore the fundamental necessities and environmental awareness of the species through the avocation of the most current understandings of who and what we truly are, coupled with how science, nature and technology (rather than religion, politics and money) hold the keys to our personal growth, not only as individual human beings, but as a civilization, both structurally and spiritually. The central insights of this awareness is the recognition of the Emergent and Symbiotic elements of natural law and how aligning with these understandings as the bedrock of our personal and social institutions, life on earth can and will flourish into a system which will continuously grow in a positive way, where negative social consequences, such as social stratification, war, biases, elitism and criminal activity will be constantly reduced and, idealistically, eventually become nonexistent within the spectrum of human behavior itself. This possibility is, of course, very difficult for most humans to consider, for we have been conditioned by society to think that crime, corruption and dishonesty is "the way it is" and that there will always be people who want to abuse, hurt and take advantage of others. Religion is the largest promoter of this propaganda, for the "us and them" or "good and evil" mentality promotes this false assumption.
The reality is that we live in a society that produces Scarcity. The consequence of this scarcity is that human beings must behave in self preserving ways, even if it means they have to cheat and steal in order to get what they want. Our research has concluded that Scarcity is one of the most fundamental causes of aberrant human behavior, while also leading to complex forms of neurosis in other ways. A statistical look at drug addiction, crime and incarceration statistics, finds that poverty and unhealthy social conditions comprise the life experience of those who engage in such behavior.
Human beings are not good or bad... they are running, forever changing compositions of the life experience(s) that influences them. The "quality" of a human being ( if there was such a thing ) is directly related to the upbringing and thus belief systems they have been conditioned into. This simple reality has been grossly overlooked and today people primitively think that competition, greed and corruption are "hardwired" elements of human behavior and, in turn, we must have prisons, police and hence a hierarchy of differential control in order for society to deal with these "tendencies". This is totally illogical and false.
Intel came up with a novel way to show how important the Internet and computing have become in the lives of Americans. In conjunction with Harris Interactive, the company conducted a survey of adults in the United States under the prosaic-enough banner “Internet Reliance in Today’s Economy.” But the first “key finding” from the study is a little more attention-grabbing. According to the study, 46 percent of women and 30 percent of men would opt to forgo sex for two weeks instead of giving up access to their precious Internet for the same period. More broadly, those surveyed said access to the Internet ranked highest among the discretionary spending items they could not live without. Cable television, dining out, shopping for clothes and gym memberships followed in declining importance.
Along similar lines, 61 percent of the women surveyed said they would rather go without TV for two weeks than lose access to the Internet for one week. Using the data as a means of pitching products fueled by Intel chips, the company said: “The survey revealed that 65 percent of adults feel they cannot live without Internet access, and even more — 71 percent — responded that it is important or very important to have Internet-enabled devices, such as laptops, netbooks and mobile Internet devices that can provide them with real-time updates on important issues including the state of the economy.” Harris Interactive polled 2,119 adults on Intel’s behalf.
A fairly young club formed by a group of models, Cyber Models Club is a fast growing club consisting of more than 40 members currently.
