Garfield is my second cat. Similar to my first cat, Garfield was a stray cat, roaming around in the neighbourhood, living off scraps and the occasional careless mouse or bird. In 2012, around three years after my first cat had passed, two ginger cats appeared in the neighbourhood. The nature in which they arrived, the bond between the two, their friendliness with strangers and preference for dry cat food suggested they were previously domesticated cats from the same place. They stuck on and made the neighbourhood their home. Three months in, one of the two cats was removed by AVA for being a nuisance with its constant meowing. AVA probably caught the wrong cat as I recalled Garfield to be a lot more vocal than the other. Garfield stayed on and began to frequent my bedroom’s window sill (my parents’ home is on the first floor). He often spent hours in the evening watching me work on school projects or meddle with my PC, but he never ventured into the house. A few months later, a group of volunteers brought Garfield for sterilisation and he had the tip of his ear snipped as a result. He continued to perch on my window sill for a few more weeks before my parents and I decided to bring him in and give him a home.

Garfield settled into my parents’ place seamlessly like how my previous cat did. He enjoyed the freedom of entering and leaving the house whenever he wanted. To him, the home was a safe place to eat and sleep while the outdoors was his playground (and also his litter box). Things went well until 2017 when Garfield decided not to return home. He was still in the neighbourhood but he decided to make the void deck of an adjacent block of flats his home. We were not quite sure why he did so but there were a few theories. First, there were indications that other neighbourhood cats were trying to drive him out of my parents’ block. They were probably eyeing his food supply in my parents’ place. Unlike my previous cat, Garfield was not a good fighter and he probably lost his territory psychologically. Second, it was clear that he was afraid of my mom. Third, a cat lover in the adjacent block had taken to feeding strays. These factors put together probably caused Garfield to decide to “move out”. We decided to let him go and just kept an occasional eye on him to ensure he was healthy. I moved out of my parents home in end 2018 and thought about bringing Garfield along. But I decided against it because I did not think Garfield would enjoy moving from endless roaming grounds to a 90 square metre enclosed space. I thought it would be better to wait until Garfield got older when he would likely be more amenable to trading off freedom for security.

This year, my wife’s desire to have a pet could no longer be contained. And if we were to get a pet, my preference was to give Garfield first dibs given that I am officially his owner. (Garfield is microchipped.) Having pets is a life long commitment and I wanted to be there to see his life through, especially in his silver years. So, my wife and I planned out his introduction to our home. For several weekends, we started bringing Garfield home. This involved carrying him home and having him wander around our home for a few hours. Garfield adapted rather quickly. On his second visit, he started eating. On his third, he was comfortable enough to take a nap. We decided that it was time to see if he could make it through the night in an enclosed space. This was never done before even during the years when he lived at my parents’ place. He would always go out at night in search of adventure (mostly mice and birds). To ensure he could make it through the night, we needed to have everything he needed, most importantly – meshed up windows, a litter box and a scratch post. One of my key considerations was to ensure Garfield did not add to the maintenance work of our home which included not destroying the furniture. I also did not want any additions to affect the aesthetics of our home.

We decided on a mesh window roller for the service yard as this was the only set of windows we would constantly leave open. After toying with the idea of a robotic litter box with automated cleaning, we decided to start with a simple box because we were unsure if he could adapt. If he failed to adapt, we would have to return him to my parents’ neighbourhood, and we did not want to be stuck with an expensive unused litter box. We could not find a suitable scratch post that was sturdy enough for a 6.5kg meatball to pounce on and remain upright. To work around this, we ensured he had little access to scratch-able furniture. Thankfully most of our furniture was not fabric or leather based and the only potential problem was our sofa. We dotted the edges with axe oil (the minty smell drives cats away), covered it and sprinkled the seats with items so that he would not even remotely consider approaching the sofa. The measures worked out better than we thought. Garfield took to the litter box almost immediately probably because he could not find any where else with soil. We had decided to fill his littler box with garden soil (procured from a flower shop) because this was close to what he was familiar with. My wife and I cheered when Garfield did his first business at 2am on his first night at our home.

A few issues did crop up. While Garfield was having really good naps in the day, he was finding it hard to be confined at night. There was constant meowing which lasted for three weeks. My wife and I toggled between allowing him into the room, going out to the living room to accompany him and outright ignoring him. He has since largely adapted. His meowing spurts are now limited to when he wants to enter or leave the bedroom. We plan to install a cat flap on our bedroom door to allow him to enter/exit on his own. Garfield also needed somewhere above ground to perch just like all cats do. We decided after three weeks (when we were sure he was adapting well) to install a platform in the service yard above his litter box. It also came with a scratching platform which he took to immediately. This is now one of his favourite spots especially when he hides from his sole enemy in our home – our robot vacuum cleaners. His other favourite spot is the study desk. We later also repurposed a scratch mat into a scratch post by wrapping it around the dinning table leg. Thankfully, Garfield has limited his scratching to just these areas and our furniture remains unharmed. We were also concerned about possible smell from his litter box. While the smell was barely noticeable (cat litter is indeed magical), we decided to ensure constant active ventilation by installing a small fan which pushes stale air out of the service yard every hour for 15 minutes .

Garfield’s smooth transition into becoming a fully domesticated cat was aided by the ongoing COVID-19 situation. My wife now works from home which means Garfield has company 24/7. Unlike my first cat, Garfield likes to have people around him. My wife is obviously delighted to finally realise her childhood dream of having a pet cat. I am just glad that I can see him through the remaining years of his life. We do not know how old he exactly is. His vets estimated that he was around 2 years of age when he was first brought into my parents’ home in 2012. This means he has to be at least 10 years old by now. Being fully domesticated will likely extend his lifespan and his health has been tip top so far. Going forward, we hope to have him adapt to a harness and leash so that we can bring him outdoors. He appears to have already forgotten about the joys of being outdoors but we are sure he will want to relive them.

I have undergone five surgeries since 2002. All five were ear, nose and throat (ENT) related. I removed my over-sized tonsils, which were causing very frequent sore throat. I was unable to breathe normally through my nose because of a deviated septum (the cartilage between nostrils) and excess cartilage in my nose. In addition, I was born without 1.5 out of 3 middle ear bones in my right ear which meant I was almost completely deaf on my right. I thought it would be interesting to share what the experience was like.

General anesthesia

All five were classified as day surgeries. This meant I was admitted and operated on the same day. As all five surgeries were done under general anesthesia (GA), I had to stay a night for observation each time. GA is an interesting experience. What it does is to paralyse you. Most folks call it being put into sleep but it is not. Your body knows that it is being sent into a coma and fights the GA though you would be unconscious by then. GA is administered via intravenous therapy. The oxygen mask that is placed over your mouth simply helps to ease breathing. It is rarely used to administer GA. As GA is being pumped into your body via IV, your limbs are first to go numb. You are still awake. (I fought to the very last to remember the experience. I had five tries anyways.) Then the feeling of being paralysed rises to your chest before it hits your head and you finally “fall asleep”. Your body then goes into shock but it is short-lived and patients are usually not aware. The general anesthetist’s job is to stabilise your body quickly so that it exits the shock phase and enters induced rest. Then, a breathing tube is inserted into the throat to aid breathing, and the surgery begins. One tip for those going into GA is to try to position your body in the most comfortable position as far as possible. Make sure your palms and feet are resting normally, and that no muscle is being exerted. Tell the nurses if you are not resting comfortably and they will help adjust. If not, you are going to suffer from muscle ache when you wake up. I learnt that from my third surgery. Waking up from GA feels roughly the same as waking from a bad hangover. Your head is heavy, you feel drowsy and you just want more sleep. I was fortunate to react well to GA four out of five times. The one time I did not, I spent six hours vomiting occasionally. That is par for the course.

Tonsillectomy (Throat)

My favourite surgery. There is not much to say about this. It is straightforward and simple. The surgeon removes the tonsils via laser and it is easy to get a clean cut. Healing is quick and recovery is easy. The best part is being on soft and cold diet for two weeks. I had so much ice cream. Post surgery improvement was very observable. The number of times I had sore throat fell drastically from every two weeks to at worst thrice a year.

Septoplasty (Nose)

But I was still getting flu quite often (once every two months) because I had difficulty breathing through my nose. This meant that I only breathed through my mouth, leaving my throat dry and exposed – a perfect breeding ground for viruses and bacteria. My septum was deviated quite badly though it was fortunately not observable from the outside. The first surgery helped to straighten it and also remove excess cartilage. But the surgeon was too conservative and I was still not fully comfortable with breathing through my nose. I went for another round roughly ten years later and the surgeon took more aggressive measures. Recovery was quick and easy. For the first time in my life, I felt that I could take in all the air my lungs needed via my nose. It was life changing. But I was still subconsciously breathing through my mouth when I slept because my brain was hardwired to do so for thirty years. I actually had to tape my mouth shut when sleeping to redefine my habits. After two weeks of doing so, I defaulted to breathing through my nose when asleep automatically. It was no surprise that I was getting flu a lot less. In fact, I am now falling sick significantly less often than my family and friends.

Ossiculoplasty (Ear)

I was unaware that I was almost deaf in my right ear until I was six. My aunt had then gifted me a PC and I told my parents that the right speaker was not working. It was working. But they did not take note because I was able to judge sound direction perfectly well. What had happened was that my brain had compensated by leveraging my left ear. I was put through a regular hearing test when I was eight, and test results indicated that I was almost deaf on my right. Conversely, my left ear was incredibly sensitive, picking up sounds beyond the average human range. I decided to deal with the issue in my thirties because it was affecting my work. Scans showed that I was missing 1.5 middle ear bones which resulted in a disconnect. The solution was to insert a titanium implant (see image below) to bridge the gap.

The first surgery was not a success largely because the implant that was inserted was too short (4mm, as shown in the image above). In the second surgery, the surgeon replaced it with a 6.5mm implant. When I woke up from surgery, I could immediately hear the difference. Even though my right ear channel was clogged with blood, I was picking up sounds. This was my one time waking up from GA with a huge smile across my face. Over time, the sounds got clearer and louder mostly because excess blood had cleared. When my surgeon removed some dressing after a week, I was unable to believe what I was hearing. In fact, I got confused. My brain needed time to adjust to being able to hear from the right. Walking along the roads was disconcerting. I was jumping at sounds buffeting my right ear, and I actually had to hold onto a lamp post to steady myself before walking slowly.  But you can probably guess how magical the experience felt. It was pure joy. The graph below shows how drastic the improvement was. The dark red portion indicates the improvement in my right ear. Improvement varies case by case and this was the best result I could hope for.

I am now able to hold conversations with folks sitting on my right. I am enjoying music like never before. The world has become a much livelier (and also noisier) place. That said, recovery was tricky. I had to completely minimise movement for three full weeks. I was also feeling very listless in my first week because my ear was clogged up which made me feel like half my head was underwater. Nonetheless, the difficult recovery made the surgery’s success all the sweeter.

Now that my ear, nose and throat are all fixed, I hope never to enter the operating theatre again. This has been a life changing journey and I am very grateful to those involved.

1. Ride hailing apps are no longer sufficient for me. It does not cover my last mile to office which requires a 200m hike uphill (which gets real shitty when it rains). I sucked it up for six years and I think that is enough.
2. The cost difference between ride hailing apps and owning a car is dropping. I am spending more and more on rides (currently S$500-700 per month). I take rides twice every work day and sometimes more on non-work days. It gets more expensive when I have to ferry my parents because I will have to hire a seven-seater to have sufficient space for two wheelchairs. While this is definitely still cheaper than owning a car, the delta is no longer as significant (estimated addition of S$300-400 per month).
3. With my wedding and new home settled, I have no other large sum expenses planned for the next decade so owning a car has become a defend-able luxury.

All these added on to non-time dependent factors, such as developing a life skill, personal independence – not wanting to rely on others to drive me around, etc.

I went via the driving school route because I could not find good private instructors in my area that were available. But I was still determined to get my license done quickly. It took a total of 14 practical lessons and single tries for the theory and practical tests. I am told that this is rather quick for the school route. But it was admittedly aided by my decision to take an auto transmission license instead of its manual counterpart. Driving auto is easy and I did not see significant upsides to expending more effort to learn manual knowing that I will not use it eventually.

The 14 practical lessons and test were completed in two months because I decided to cram. This meant a month of back to back night lessons and then waiting for three weeks or so for my practical test. I like doing things as efficiently and effectively as possible, and I absolutely loathe dragging the process out. There was no such thing as forgetting what I learnt from previous lessons because lessons came thick and fast. The back to back night lessons were draining as they came after long hours at work. Reaching home at 11:30pm every work day for a month was not fun. But it got the job done quickly and I moved through the course rapidly.

I did not get a fixed instructor and actually benefited from getting a wide range of tips from various instructors. Driving is highly situational so getting additional perspectives is very useful for developing road sense. What also did help was having prior road experience from four years of road cycling. I was nervous before my practical test but was fortunate to have an easy going tester. The test took around 30 minutes and I was not put through every item on the checklist (e.g. u-turns were skipped).

Looking back, I think the school lessons provided sufficient confidence for driving on open roads including on expressways. I had little trouble adapting. But the same cannot be said for parking. I still need several tries before I park right. Parking perfectly in a single try was possible on the circuit because of guides that are not available in reality. Given the many complaints about how Singapore drivers are parking horribly (and now I am one of them), schools might want to rethink how they teach parking. For now, I will just keep practicing as I begin my hunt for a second hand car.

Concept

• Guest orientated. While the wedding is about the newly weds, we wanted it to be a memorable experience for our guests. We wanted a unique venue, one that was high up with a fantastic view. Most unique venues have the issue of being inaccessible and we did not want our guests to have trouble locating the place. Hence, it was important for the venue to be centrally located and easy to access.
• Short and intimate. We felt that best experiences were kept short but filled with high quality interactions. We wanted a good level of interaction with each guest. Since they were here for us, it was only right that we could devote quality time with each of them. Hence, we kept the guest list really small. In total, including us and our families, we had just slightly over a hundred guests. We also knew how much of a time sink hole weddings were and did not want our guests to use up most of their weekend for us. Keeping the programme short meant that we had to ensure that every bit of the experience was great. This meant that the food and entertainment had to be top notch. High quality meant higher cost but a shorter duration kept the budget balanced.

Venue

We shortlisted Salt Grill & Sky Bar, Equinox, One Altitude and Clifford Pier. Clifford Pier was too large for a small intimate wedding and its ground level sea view of Marina Bay did not quite capture the views offered by Salt, Equinox and One Altitude. One Altitude was dropped because it was not very accessible for wheelchair users (my parents). Equinox was dropped because its sky views were limited and parts of its windows were algae ridden. You would realise that we did not consider hotel ballrooms and that was largely down to the lack of views.

Salt was the best match for us. It had a very high ceiling laid with glass from roof to floor which was well maintained. To top it off the food was excellent and the service commendable. Service was another key consideration as we wanted our guests to feel that they were well tended to.

Salt came with its limitations. First, it is small. It can only accommodate a maximum of up to 110 guests but this worked fine for us. Second, it was pillar ridden. There were a total of seven pillars which could obstruct the views of some guests. We had to plan the seating and the march in to ensure most guests could see us. Third, the chairs were too “restaurant-like” which did not flow well with the theme of the wedding. We had to rent our own chairs. Fourth, it was pricey. The cost per guest for lunch was higher than most hotels. Nonetheless, because we wanted the experience to be rich and fulfilling for each guest, we asked for a six course (three appetizers, two mains and one desert) lunch menu which was more than their usual four or five courses. Fifth, high food quality meant each dish was curated on the fly. This meant that keeping the experience short and keeping timing in check was tricky. Salt’s usual serving speed was not quick enough but we managed to work out with the manager to ensure that the six course lunch was served on time while maintaining quality curation.

Gown and Suit

We had to settle our gown and suit before we could move on to the pre-wedding shoot. We decided on Cang-Ai wedding due to recommendations from friends. The gowns were of good quality and the design options matched our concept. We decided to rent gowns only from Cang Ai as I felt that my suit could be tailored instead of rented. With that, we visited Bangkok to have my wedding suit made. It was very good value for money.

Pre-Wedding Photoshoots

• New Zealand. Since we managed to get a venue which fitted our “in the sky” concept, we wanted our pre-wedding photoshoot to match. We wanted a photoshoot in the mountains and that quickly led us to New Zealand’s Wanaka. We put in plenty of effort trying to shortlist a good photographer and decided on Williams Photography. It turned out to be great pick. Williams Photography is a husband and wife company and Warren is an excellent photographer and host. In fact, he would have made a very good tour guide. He drove us from Queenstown where we resided to Wanaka and back and we enjoyed long conversations throughout. The helicopter ride to Roy’s Peak was fun and it was my first time riding in a tiny helicopter in strong winds. Roy’s Peak is an often used venue for photoshoots and it is easy to see why – the views are absolutely stunning especially with the lake and other mountains in the background. Visiting New Zealand is like walking through a scenic picture book and Wanaka offered one of the best views in the south island of New Zealand. The photoshoot took slightly over an hour and Warren took additional shots before and after the helicopter ride to give us a good variety of photos. Warren was extremely good at breaking the ice and warming us up so that we could look natural and carefree in the photos. He delivered 204 photos and we receive them three weeks after the shoot.

• Taiwan. We did not plan to have another overseas photoshoot but Cang Ai gave us a pretty good deal and we thought “why not?” Both of us had not visited Taiwan before and we took the photoshoot as an excuse for another holiday. The photoshoot in Taiwan was completely different from New Zealand. While New Zealand had a natural setting, Taiwan offered a massive outdoor studio where everything (well besides the trees) were man made solely for wedding photoshoots. There were at least five other couples present rotating different shooting spots. I was telling Alyssa that this felt like a wedding shoot photo booth. To top of it off, the photographer would actually give you a form asking you how you wanted the photos touched up. You could asked for your jaws to be photoshopped such that it was more angular or squarish, for your tummy to be slimmed down, the list goes on. This was the exact opposite of Warren where he wanted to keep the photos natural and adopted a light touch in editing. Our photographer in Taiwan (hired by the studio) was very experienced and went to detail on how we should stand, place our hands, twist our bodies, where we should look and the exact type of smile we should portray. You can probably understand how stark the differences were between the two places now. One was all natural and the other entirely staged to the nth degree. The photos in Taiwan turned out well and in some ways very polished given how it was staged. Unlike New Zealand, photography studios in Taiwan limit the number of photos given unless you are willing to pay over the top for all the photos. As we already had many shots from New Zealand, we went with just 30 photos from Taiwan – which was more than sufficient to provide a good range and balance to our New Zealand photos.

Solemniser

With the pre-wedding photography done, the next step was begin preparations for the actual day. Getting a solemniser was somewhat like dating, there were long lists of names to choose from but it was tough to find a solemniser who was free on the date and time of our wedding day. We wanted our solmenisation to be serious, solemn event and hence our solemniser had to be someone senior that looked and spoke respectfully. S/he also had to be able to keep to a short timeline so that our programme could flow punctually.

We found that in Mr Tan Peng Yam who was an absolute pleasure to have with us.  He was deeply experienced and we practiced the solemnisation process both in our first meeting with him (at McDonalds!) and also on the wedding day as a refresher. Mr Tan was punctual and very clear. He kept things short and sweet exactly the way we wanted it to be.

Cards and Cakes

We gave our families and relatives a heads up on the wedding date a good six months so that they would keep the lunch slot free for us. (Close friends were informed later and closer to the date.) Formal invitations to families and relatives came around two months before the actual wedding day. We took this time not only the deliver the cakes and cards personally but also to ask them for their food restrictions and choice of main dishes, given that Salt would customise the menu personally for each guest. The cards were self-designed and utilised the photos from New Zealand to keep to the sky concept. It was printed via gogoprint which meant printing costs were really low. We also ordered wedding card sleeves which added to the presentation of the card.

Programme and Decoration

• Programme. As mentioned above, we wanted the wedding to be short and intimate affair. The programme was planned around this. We agreed to reduce the complexity of the gatecrash and also for our actual day photoshoot to be a very short one. The solemnisation, tea ceremony and lunch all took place at Salt to save time and to reduce travelling requirements for our guests. The solemnisation was kept to immediate families only unless relatives wanted to come early to witness it. The tea ceremony was scheduled before lunch and was used as the buffer period for guests to stream in. The march in was timed for 12pm sharp and the six course lunch was scheduled to be completed with three hours. As per the norm, buffer time was added throughout.

• Decor. This was where we did sort of wish we had a wedding planner to take care of the many disparate details of the decoration. We rented chairs, ordered flowers, signages, frames, bought ribbons, cable ties, pens, tea sets, the list goes on and on. As for the wedding favours, we ordered cookies from MINDS Bakers as we felt that it was a meaningful thing to do. We also ensured that each guest had a personalised menu (there were a total of seven menu variations due to guest preferences) and name tent. Throughout this period, we ran the programme over and over and over to ensure we had everything we needed and for every Plan A there was a Plan B.

• Entertainment. We wanted lunch entertainment to be top drawer, meaningful and classy. We decided on ShiLi & Adi who were very experienced singers, performers and emcees. They have performed in many high key events and we felt comfortable to having them run the entire show including the emcee bits. We did not have to write a script for them and simply provided them with the programme and a short write up of our relationship and they ran the show. They did so perfectly and engaged the guests by taking up song requests.

Photography

• Photographer. We went to Chris Ling for actual day photography and engaged Jackyz. Jackyz and us clicked well. He had an impressive portfolio that matched the style we were looking for. He was also very importantly good at crowd control and at conveying his instructions. He delivered 560 high quality photos over the span of eight hours.
• Henderson Waves. In line with the sky concept, we had a 30 minute photoshoot before leaving for Salt. Besides fitting our concept, Henderson Waves is also the location that Alyssa and I return to every year for Valentines’. It is a bridge that holds deep meaning for both of us. We kept the photoshoot at Henderson Waves short so that Alyssa and I plus the bridesmaids and groomsmen could have adequate time to rest and prepare at Salt.

Execution

• Final recce. To ensure that our guests had zero issues locating Salt, we re-recced the area thrice to ensure we could provide detailed instructions to our guests whether they were coming by car, private transport or public transport. These detailed instructions were packaged as an infographic folded into a reminder for the event. This was distributed electronically three days prior to the wedding.

• Setup. The execution of the event took place at 11pm on the night before the wedding. Alyssa and I had collected our ROM documents in the morning. We had delivered the items for the wedding to Salt in the afternoon. We also met our chauffeur and observed our wedding car (both procured via recommendations) getting decorated in the early evening at Cang Ai. Alyssa was made to return home to rest and not take part in the 11pm setup because she needed to be fresh and ready for her make up at 5am. We also did not want to overly tax the bridesmaids and groomsmen with a midnight setup as they had to be fresh to manage the guests. They were very important to the overall guest experience. Hence, it was left to one bridesmaid Min and one groomsmen Arnold and myself to manage the setup with Salt’s entire staff. The setup ended at 2am and everything looked perfect. In fact, it turned out better than I had envisioned. All that was left was for Min, Arnold and myself to catch three hours of sleep before the day’s events began at 6am.
• Coordination. We were very lucky to have Arnold who stepped up as a coordinator. His detail orientedness and foresight meant that our detailed programme and logistics could be executed as planned. While Arnold worked with fellow bridesmaids and groomsmen plus Salt’s staff, I was the coordinator for families and relatives. Both of us helped to keep the programme on the clock and were very well supported by Min, Wanxi, Jean, Xinni, Ben, Zhong Xian, Keng Meng and Chao-Hsiang. Salt’s person-in-charge for the event Maribeth was the third coordinator and she ensured that her staff was on point, keeping up with the serving schedule and making sure that guests were well tended to.

Wedding Day

Everything went like clockwork. I was very surprised as this defied my experience with past events. We were blessed to have every piece in the jigsaw falling into place exactly the way we wanted it to. Keeping the programme short and the event simple helped to minimise possible issues while over preparing ensured that gaps were plugged before the actual day.

Besides having an excellent team supporting us, we also had very cooperative guests. There was close to zero attrition and everyone showed up on time. This was one of the benefits of keeping the guest list small. Hence, every item on the programme was executed on the dot. The only thing that we did not prepare for or expect was that guests wanted to stay even after the event was over. One of the good things about having a very scenic venue was that guests were automatically kept entertained taking photos of the city skyline, etc. The minor downside was that some did not want to leave and we had to hand over the venue to Salt by 4pm. Salt was understanding and we managed to clear out the place on the dot.

We also had a lot of time interacting with the guest. To be honest, I felt very drained at the 2:30pm mark having only had 2 hours of sleep for the past 30 hours but the event was flowing very positively and watching the guests enjoy themselves kept me going.

Post Event

We left for my parents’ place for the last bit of photography and also to repack all the items removed from Salt. It was a very cathartic to handle the post event administrative work especially when everything went well. But the day was not done yet. We had, probably ill-advisedly, decided to run the Sundown half marathon on the same night. The clock was ticking for me and I badly needed my sleep. We checked into Marina Mandarin at 7pm, had dinner at Marina Square at 7:30pm before falling asleep at 8pm. I had three hours of sleep before finding myself at Sundown’s starting line with my wife at 11pm. I was dead tired and a walking zombie and we spent most of the half marathon chatting about our plans as husband and wife, reflecting on a memorable wedding day, and chatting about our trip to Japan and China which would begin the very next night.

Overall, we would like to highlight our thanks to:

• Parents: Alyssa and my parents were supportive throughout. They did not make any demands and allowed us to freely plan and execute the wedding. It was a breeze and as a bonus both sides got along well too.
• Min, Wanxi, Jean, Xinni, Arnold, Ben, Zhong Xian, Keng Meng, Chao-Hsiang: They did a heck lot of work and delivered on every count. Small issues were dealt with very quickly and much of the positive guest experience was down to their hard work.

• Maribeth: She made working with Salt an absolute pleasure. We were concerned that Salt was less experienced with weddings as compared to the usual hotels but Maribeth’s experience and eagerness to make our wedding a success was key.
• Jackyz, Warren and Cang Ai staff: The photos were well taken. Good wedding photographers are critical and they have ensured that warm memories from the event would never be forgotten. Cang Ai was very professional and warm when handling Alyssa’s gowns and our arrangements for the Taiwan leg.

Photos

Albums can be accessed below. (Note: Google has an album limit of 500 photos, hence not all 560 photos from the actual day could be uploaded.)

• New Zealand
• Taiwan
• Wedding Day

My music preferences lean towards a more classical genre, shaped by my dad’s daily indulgence in mostly classical and Christian music. Since I was an infant, I grew up listening to Tchaikovsky and Beethoven, and more mainstream Christian artistes from the Maranatha group in addition to Don Moen and Lenny LeBlanc. As I got older I took up slow, easy-listening music such as that from Enya and serene instrumentals including those from Hennie Bekker, Chris Spheeris and Yanni. I guess my choice of music always reflected a desire for peace and tranquillity.

I had always been doing my utmost to suppress the emotional side of me. As the only child of two physically handicapped parents, it falls on me to be the rock of the family. To do what is right for others rather than self remains an important tenet of my life. I had actively driven myself towards a life based on logical deductions and utilitarian considerations. I saw people including myself as entities in a giant framework that required optimisation for society’s benefit. This was probably why I decided to do economics even though my mathematical skills were/are terrible. My fiancee had told me that I was somewhat robotic when we first dated many years ago. She is probably right. But this balance shifted when I was introduced to Linkin Park.

I first listened to Linkin Park, in particular the song “Faint”, when I was in Millennia Institute due to a school project on music. My first response was disgust. I didn’t understand the need for Chester to be belting out the lyrics screaming. (How is this even music? Did this guy not get a sore throat?) A visual look at Chester made it even clearer that this was no way an artiste I could look up to. A strict Christian upbringing teaches you to eschew tattoos and piercings. Chester was a walking museum of such adornments. But there was a project to deliver and my close friends had picked Linkin Park. Being the tech guy in the group, I had to arrange parts of “Faint” to fit our presentation. This meant that I had to listen to Chester yelling “I won’t be ignored” over and over until the presentation was perfected. I had to this on headphones because God forbid my parents found out I was listening to a rock/rap band.

Unexpectedly through this reluctant initial contact, Linkin Park grew on me. It made me question why I was keeping in all that teenage angst bottled by principles and the fear of exploring a messy whirlpool of emotions. It made me take that step towards embracing myself in totality. In my darker times, I found that Chester’s screaming was a welcome release for me. I acquired Hybrid Theory and never looked back. But this was done quietly. I had never publicly identified Linkin Park as a band that I followed because it was so different from my ideals and the way I am.

Linkin Park turned out to be the only band that I followed consistently and it grew up with me. Their more recent albums had mellowed significantly and became somewhat more reflective in nature. While many fans did not like this modulation in direction, it gelled well with me. “Not Alone” was played over and over during difficult times in 2016. In completing my third decade this year, I found “One More Light” and “Sorry for Now” a timely reminder of my time and the importance of treasuring both positive and negative moments.

The passing of Chester made me recognise that this marked an end to a conduit that had made me “less robotic and more human” (says the fiancee) in my past ten years. On learning of Chester’s death, I turned to Linkin Park like clockwork not because of Chester’s association but because Linkin Park is always my go-to outlet in unhappy moments. However, doing so this time simply reinforced what a loss Chester was to me. A Linkin Park without Chester is unlikely to trigger the same perfectly toned notes in an unlikely fan like me. But I am grateful for the brilliance when my world was asleep.

Thank you Chester. Thank you for the music.

In 2015, I tried to take the sport seriously enough to do “acceptably well” for an enthusiast cyclist. There was no real bar to measure myself but I was keeping pace with my cycling groups and completing century rides (~160km) without much difficulty. I pushed myself without a real training plan or a goal in mind and slowly saw my progression diminish. It was at this point that I assessed that my weight was hindering me from progressing.

Weight is an important factor in road cycling. The heavier you weigh, the more power you have to generate to move yourself forward. This effect is heightened if you are climbing up hills. I enjoy climbing hills during my rides and so the issue of weight was something I could not dismiss.

Decision

It was with cycling primarily in mind and with a long held desire to get my body weight down from the overweight range that I decided to lose weight again. This time, the goal would include reducing my body fat percentage, which was around 18-19%.

When I turned 29 in January 2016, I was reminded that an average human being’s physical fitness levels would begin dropping steadily after the age of 30. I had a short window to get myself fit and enjoy the benefits of being fit. This injected urgency into making the decision to get fit and maintain it once and for all.

And so I decided on my birthday that I would craft a training plan aimed at sustainably reducing weight and body fat while working towards becoming a stronger cyclist.

Method

The operating principle did not change. I was going to modify my diet while being consistent in my exercise regime. However, this time, I was going to be a little bit more “scientific” about it. I needed to make sure that my body and mind could adapt to the changes in lifestyle and that the progress was gradual enough such that I could sustain it.

The target period was to get to 70kg with a body fat percentage of around 12% in six months. I should also be registering around a 20W increase in functional threshold power (cycling terminology) while losing weight. This is tricky as it was difficult to maintain power, let alone increase it, while losing a significant projected amount of weight.

Tools

What I did this time was to record what I ate using myfitnesspal. It is an app that estimates your calorie intake (among other components) and projects how many calories you should be taking in in order to reach your target. Of course, this is oversimplifying the process as there are many nutritional components to consider, and even the calorie component itself can be divided into many sub groups. But I was not going to let the details hinder me. I reckoned that I didn’t have to dive into the details given the scope of the task. A general guide would suffice. This would be sufficient for keeping my food intake in check.

The other side of the equation would be exercise. In 2015, I had often over exerted myself because I did not understand my limits or have any way of measuring what I had exerted as compared to my capacity. I decided to get a power meter to track my power output. This would be in addition to my heart rate monitor. With these tools, I could calculate my training stress so that I could dial back my training where necessary. I also put in place a mandatory rest week after every three weeks of training. My training efforts and form were planned and tracked in TrainingPeaks, it incorporated calorie data from myfitnesspal and gave me a good idea of where I stood.

I also got myself a fitness tracker in the form of the Garmin Forerunner 235. I used it to track all-day heart rate and my step count. What was most important was my resting heart rate. Any time I went 10bpm above the average, I would take precautions and lower my activity intensity the next day as an increased resting heart rate was my body’s way of telling me that it had done too much the day before.

I weighed myself using an electronic weighing scale (Fitbit Aria) which could estimate body fat via electric pulses. The weighing scale was connected to myfitnesspal which in turn transmitted my weight data to other platforms such as TrainingPeaks and Garmin Connect. Weighing was done every morning after washing up.

Progress

My weekly routine consisted of long distance low intensity rides (~50-200km) and runs (~10-16km). Calorie count was capped at 1600 kcals per day (not including exercise), which was rather aggressive. I was never a breakfast person, and I kept my breakfast to grains and nuts. My main meal was lunch. This was because I lunched with my colleagues and it was difficult for me to customise my lunch. My dinner intake was dependent on the level of exercise for the day and was balanced around breakfast and lunch intakes. (E.g. I would eat more during dinner if I was exercising hard that day/I only had a light lunch.)

First Three Months (6kg loss)

The first three months of my weight loss went better than planned. I lost around 6kg with my body fat percentage falling to around 14%. I experienced a slight increase in weight during my trip to Australia but it was more of a blip than a trend as I got back on track on my return to Singapore. I did not go hungry or feel lethargic. In fact, the weight loss was somewhat energising. I felt that I could do more without putting out as much effort. At this stage, most of my family members and friends could not tell that I was losing weight. The more observant ones could spot a slight decrease.

Next Three Months (another 6kg loss)

In the next three months, I started by increasing my long distance rides and reduced my long distance runs. This was largely due to a local cycling challenge to cover 2,000km within two months. I completed it within 1.5 months. My weight continued its steady decrease and I met my target of 70kg with a body fat percentage of around 12%. It was at this point that I completed my first full marathon (~42km) without much training. I could feel the difference from losing all that weight and my improved endurance as I felt fresh the very next day after the marathon. This is also the point where most of my family members and friends noticed the weight loss. They thought it was sudden. It probably looked sudden from the outside but it had been a steady decrease for six months. As I had met my initial goals and was feeling quite burnt out from the 2,000km challenge, I decided to switch strategy. This was also timed to coincide with my career posting.

Seventh and Eighth Month (a further 7kg loss)

I decided to push for 65kg and a 10% body fat percentage. This would better position me for cycling and would be a good-to-have but not necessarily important-to-reach target.

This time I focused on strength. Long distance rides and runs went out of the window. In place were short intense spinning sessions (~50-70mins) and short but high-paced runs (~5km). The aim was to push my threshold power and heart rate. I also began incorporating the use of weights in my weekly routines.

Over the two months of doing so, my weight loss went further than planned at 63kg. My body fat percentage hovered between 10.1-10.6%. More importantly I reached my FTP target with a noticeable 20% increase, moving me up 1.5 categories on the power-to-weight scale. I was also finishing runs at paces that were previously unattainable for me.

I decided to increase my weight to 65kg and adjusted my calorie goal accordingly. The calorie target to hold constant at 65kg would be about 2,000 kcals a day (assuming no exercise). Given the lesser amount of food intake, I now had to be more cautious about the quality of food I was eating. I started, to the surprise of my family members, to increase my vegetable intake.

Ninth Month (holding steady at 65kg)

On the ninth month, I was able to consistently maintain a weight of 64-65kg with a body fat percentage of 10-10.5%. My FTP showed a slight increase and I was feeling significantly stronger when cycling and running.

Conclusion

I am obviously happy about the results. I was once at a stage where I did not believe I could return to being lean. Note that this was about me returning to what I was before. 65kg at 179cm is not something foreign to me. These were my stats before I started my National Service (ironic), university and career. Much of these few months was about returning to what I naturally was and becoming stronger at my hobbies.

It was a useful exercise for me to prepare for my thirties, a stage many would consider as the middle segment of an average life span. I can now focus on maintaining my weight while building my strength.

Weight and training management has been an exercise in discipline. There were many days where I did not feel like working out. There were nights where I returned from work at 9pm knowing that I had to put in a gruelling 60 min spin session. But the constant progress and clear results pushed me on.

I wrote this post primarily because I have been asked by many about what I had done and what my journey was like. I hope this post answers your questions. To those who are embarking on similar journeys, I wish you the very best and may you find joy in the process as I did.

Thinker: As a young analyst, what really struck me was Lee’s ability to see both the forest and the trees at the same time. It is often difficult to balance both breadth and depth without being drawn too deeply to either ends of the spectrum. There are many strategic thinkers who are unable to keep track of the micro details that will slowly change the long term trends that they are watching. Knowing when to zoom into the details is important. It comes with experience and knowledge of the subject matter at hand. Lee’s ability to keep the big picture in mind while quickly focusing on the key micro information gaps was something to be admired. He did on his own what some would require a team to do. These thinking skills when well-honed can translate to better situational awareness and the ability to act two or three steps ahead of others. This was what made Lee a forward thinker. This to me was Lee’s most important attribute that led to his success.

Executor: Lee was able to find the right balance between planning and execution most of the time. There are leaders who rush to make decisions. Some may feel the pressure to appear decisive and this often comes at the cost of poor planning. Some get so fixated with the perfect plan that the plan in reality can hardly be executed. Toeing the fine line between sufficient planning and proper execution made Lee a leader that could effectively translate his thoughts into action. A brilliant thinker who is unable to take action is waste of talent and Lee dodged that common bullet with his uncanny ability to execute well-thought plans at the right time.

Leader: Some leaders are stuck in the middle of executing an action plan because they are not clear about the vision they have in mind. Some do not believe fully in what they are doing. This often translates into half hearted efforts that do not inspire followers to support and take actions necessary to see the plan come into fruition. Gaining clarity is not easy but this was second nature for Lee. Benefiting greatly from his ability to think through each issue comprehensively, Lee gained self confidence, boldness and the belief that he had the right vision in mind. With this, it became easy for Lee to be committed to his ideas because that would be the only logical thing to do. This was why it was important that Lee did only what he believed in. Failing which, he would not have been able to push through tough policies and be convincing in persuading others to believe in his plans. With a strong personal conviction, commitment and follow-through become a lot easier and natural.

The traits above are not just important for leading others. They are important for self reflection and personal improvement. A leader begins from within. A man with a brilliant mind must first be able to master his thoughts and channel them the way he wants to. To be able to bring your own mind under subjection allows you to be clear about what you are thinking. Such self awareness is rare but Lee was able to do so with the skills above. He was able to project his confidence into others and people trusted him because they knew he had a plan that was clear, well-thought out, relevant and more importantly one that he would execute and follow-through to the end.

Lee’s passing is a loss for Singapore but his skills must be emulated. As the country takes time to mourn his absence, we must find in ourselves the same elements that can enable us to realise our potentials just like how Lee unlocked his. Failing to do so would be an even greater tragedy for Singapore.

My parents gave me a bicycle when I was five years old. It was a black BMX bicycle with two extra support wheels to help me balance. The bike did not last for too long but long enough for me to develop an interest in cycling. I never rode past the vicinity of my block. Fast forward to end 2008, my dad had a heart attack largely caused by his physical disability. I decided I should restart cycling again to get my heart sufficient exercise. I bought a cheap blue dual suspension mountain bike and started riding again. I rode further distances this time, using it to commute to my local exchange at NTU and also up to Tiong Bahru and Sentosa. This was also the bike that I ignorantly took to the AYE before realising mid-way that cycling on an express way was illegal. While this bike certainly revived my interest in cycling, I stopped cycling soon after due to my final two busy years in NUS. It was not until a couple of months into my current job that a chit chat with colleagues made me dust off the bike and hop on again. It felt good peddling again but the bike was pretty worn from its earlier use. The gear shifters and the brakes were not working properly. I decided to get what one would call a proper bicycle. In August 2014, I bought a Polygon Recon 3.0 (2014) mountain bike with a proper gear shifting system and disc brakes. And the journey to my first century ride began.

Going Further

A better bike allows you to go further and I did. I started making 60-80 km night rides towards the eastern parts of Singapore. These rides would have multiple breaks in between for food and chit chat. Long journeys filled me with a sense of accomplishment. I soon decided to try for long distance rides with no extended breaks. It started with a 70 km non stop half island ride in November 2014 and progressed to a 130 km journey in December 2014. It was at this point that I decided to do a century ride.

Preparations for a Century

A century ride is a 100 mile (160.9 km) ride done under 12 hours. Most riders do it in groups and with road bikes. Road bikes are faster, lighter and require less effort to travel as compared to mountain bikes. But they have their downsides being less versatile and somewhat less comfortable. I was advised multiple times by various online communities that I should just get a road bike to complete this milestone. But having ridden 130 km with my mountain bike, I felt I could push to 160 km without too many problems. I was also going to do it solo because no one I knew wanted to do a 160 km ride on a mountain bike. Friends with road bikes would be too fast for me.

I picked up a few lessons from the 130 km ride. I wanted to avoid long lonely stretches because it completely destroyed my morale. There were parts in Punggol, Sengkang, and especially Tuas where the roads seemed never ending and every thing was dead quiet. And so I decided that my 160 km attempt will be around neighbourhoods – Jurong West, Choa Chu Kang, Woodlands, Sembawang, Yishun, Ang Mo Kio, Bishan, Toa Payoh, Serangoon, Bukt Timah, Bukit Batok, Jurong East and Taman Jurong. I made Yishun my mid point because I would take an hour’s break there. The break was to rest, eat, recharge my GPS watch and offload some GoPro files. I decided to film the entire century ride in the event that I did not want to do something like this again. I took a three hour afternoon nap before leaving late in the evening to begin the attempt.

The Journey

I started at somewhere familiar – Jurong West. I had commuted here very often during my Secondary school days and cycling around familiar areas was nice. I focused on keeping myself fresh. One of the lessons learnt from the 130 km ride was that my arms felt tired near the end because I put too much pressure on them and locked them in a fixed position. So I made sure I changed positions every couple of minutes. I went at leisurely pace. It was going to be a long night. The YouTube playlist below has videos of the entire ride. You can choose other segments from the top left hand corner.

Moving on to Choa Chu Kang required a familiar quiet route via Lim Chu Kang. I picked up speed at Lim Chu Kang because it was just long stretches of quiet roads. At this point, I enjoyed a good mix of bustling neighbourhoods interwoven with quiet long roads. Choa Chu Kang was vaguely familiar because I had spent some time there both for school and work. Things were very upbeat at this point. The first quarter of the ride had seemed effortless.

I needed to utilise a long stretch of Woodlands road to get to Woodlands. I usually take this road before exiting to Mandai Road. This was when the ride turned rather sour. Woodlands is a really hilly place even within the neighbourhood. This must be viewed from the context that I have lived in the western parts of Singapore all my life where the land is flat. So going up and down over and over when touring Woodlands neighbourhood was a chore and I was thrown out of my comfort zone.

My main motivation from here was to get to the mid point. Sembawang was less hilly and had interesting car parks. I planned my route via Ride With GPS and I was surprised to be directed into car parks to get to the next road. One of the car parks even opened up into a self contained food and groceries centre. It was like a self contained residential zone within a neighbourhood. I did not spend too much time in Sembawang and moved on to Yishun where my break awaited. Alyssa hosted me with food and equipment and I spent about an hour and a half resting and recharging devices. She decided to accompany me to Ang Mo Kio and utilised her shiny new road bike. At this point (80 km mark) I was getting tired and had some trouble keeping pace with her.

Ang Mo Kio restarted the irritating uphill and downhill routine. It was a mixture of having really fast and fun descents followed by steep climbs. At this point I lost track of time and just focused on getting myself out of Ang Mo Kio. There was nothing really of note here. A grand old neighbourhood that was well developed.

The Bishan and Toa Payoh segment brought me close to some familiar schools and also Toa Payoh Central which is close to where my church is situated. The area was thankfully flat and riding became a lot easier. It was nearly 4 am at this point and my worry was that I had taken too long a break and had paced myself too slowly to get back on time. I was also beginning to feel the weight of the bike and equipment on me at this point.

Getting to Serangoon and then Balestier was where it became psychologically challenging . I felt so far from home and yet no where close to the end. I was at the 120 km mark at this point which meant that I was three quarters done with the century attempt. But the distance from home really bothered me. Riding past NEX mall really hit me on how far away I was from home after putting so many kilometres in. I had to take a break because I suddenly felt hollow in my stomach and I was concerned that I might end up crashing out. A quick chocolate and nut bar soon fixed that. I also took a small detour to Potong Pasir after hearing so much about it. It was an old neighbourhood which appeared to have a wide ranging demographic.

Hitting Bukit Timah was a welcome psychological boost. This was the point where I started heading towards home. I went through a couple of small roads through private estates. Its amazing how some can afford very large patches of prime land. Bukit Timah Road is very familiar for me. I take it at least twice every week to get to church. Best of all it was quiet and without much stoppages. I rushed through this segment only to be hit by the next challenge.

Bukit Batok was the second psychological hurdle. It was, you guessed it, really hilly again and I felt I could not give much more at this point. Going clipless really paid off here. I was at times too tired to generate sufficient force in pedaling down-stroke and had to rely on the up-stroke pulls when climbing. I had also started to count down at this point which was not a good idea because I kept checking my distance count every few minutes. This made the entire segment a lot more draggy. It was also at this point that I had to reach out for my go-to comfort drink. I pulled into a petrol kiosk for a bottle of coke. I never downed an entire small bottle so fast before. It was not a very smart move. The sugar rush perked me up but began to feel really cold. At this point, morning traffic was beginning to pick up and I was dragging myself towards Jurong East.

Ah, Jurong East. Somewhat of a home to me when I was in Primary school. The entire place was getting busy at this point. The roads were flooded with both public and school buses. I could not understand why kids were reaching school as early as 6:30 am but here they were with glum faces filled with morning blues walking into the many schools in Jurong East really early in the morning. It was a welcome thought to know that I had an off day that day.

I abandoned some of my planned routes at this point. I felt that I needed to get close to home quicker in case I needed a recharge. Riding solo for so long (close to 8 hours at this point) was getting to me. I also decided that it would only be fitting if I ended my century ride with a segment at a nearby park. A park which I spent most of my weekday cycling time at. So I dashed through Boon Lay to head for Taman Jurong. My legs pushed forward harder even though I was mentally exhausted. It never felt so good to be near home.

I got to Jurong Lake Park and started off on my final 10 km in what felt like the most beautiful sunrise I had experienced. I had never gone to Jurong Lake Park this early and it was filled with elderly folks who stared at me curiously. I must have looked like an idiot riding fully lit up with a water reservoir back pack and a GoPro. Who comes to a park like that? I rushed through the final round. Spirits were very high. I was so eager to finish that I nearly screwed up clipping in on the final road home.

And then there I was. Home. Sweet. Home. I dragged my body and bike across the living room, muttering to my parents that I would never do this again. I ordered Macs and laid flat on the floor unable to move. It was done. The century ride was complete.

Takeaways

Would I do this on a mountain bike and solo again? No. Having at least a partner on a ride is important. I was very cherry when Alyssa accompanied me for the segment between Yishun and Ang Mo Kio. Spending 95% of the ride solo was mentally difficult.

If the conditions are right to do this again I would change the route. Spending the bulk of the journey in the north was a huge mistake. The gradient coupled with the many stops and starts due to the multiple traffic lights was a bad combo. I got myself completely tired out at Woodlands, Ang Mo Kio and Bukit Batok. Climbing for long hours on a mountain bike was tough. I would also lower the amount of time spend in neighbourhoodx. While the 130 km journey was rather lonely because it required many stretches of long deserted roads, I over compensated in my 165 km journey with too many neighbourhoods. I would better balance the two.

I felt a massive sense of achievement from completing this. This might be cycling’s version of a marathon, something I hope to complete for running at the end of this year. Looking at the GPS, cadence and heart rate data together with GoPro footage, I am not quite sure how I pulled through. But it was well worth it. It was a huge milestone for a newbie like me and I am both happy and relieved to clear it.

But this is not the end of the road. It is just great to get the milestone out of the way. I will be doing more 60-80 km journeys, something like the one I did five days after the 165 km ride. It is amazing how a century ride makes other rides seem rather easy. Cycling will be my go-to fitness sport after running and I hope that remains the case for the many years to come.

More Information

I upload all my rides (and runs) on various platforms. My 165 km ride was uploaded on all of them. Feel free to view them at the following links and add me if you run and/or ride too!

• Strava: Ride | Profile
• Ride With GPS: Ride | Profile
• RunKeeper: Ride | Profile
• Garmin: Ride | Profile
• Endomondo: Ride | Profile

You can also view my cycling video log here (and below) and my outdoor gear here.

Most developed and crowded cities are trying to encourage cycling as a mode of transport so as to save scarce space and to more efficiently manage people-flows. Cycling is the second most space efficient form of transport, edging just ahead of motorcycles and falling behind mass public transport options such as busses and MRTs. But cycling in Singapore is difficult due to the inherent problems of being a very accessible and versatile option.

Cyclists in Singapore have to use bike paths and the road instead of the pavement. Cycling on the pavement is usually illegal but the law allows for many exceptions because of the insufficient number of bike paths (you can almost never commute to your destination entirely by bike paths). Cycling on the pavement is dangerous for both the cyclist and pedestrians because of the large difference in speeds. While cycling on the road is less dangerous, a high percentage of accidents (if they happen) result in fatalities. Cyclists are stuck between a rock and hard place. Here are just some of the problems:

Pavement:

• Illegal. Large difference in speeds.
• Pedestrians are not looking at where they are going especially with the popularity of smart phones. Many have earphones plugged in and they cannot hear a bike’s bell.
• Large varying group of users including vulnerable groups such as the elderly and young who do not expect a 15-20km/h bike in their direction.
• Many obstacles which slows down the ride tremendously. Ride is also bumpy if you use a hard tail bike.
• Accidents occur most frequently here.

Bike Path:

• Few in number. Most paths are for recreational purposes.
• Difficult to expand network because original transportation plans did not provide space for bike paths. Most bike paths end up being pretty weird because they were clearly afterthought implementations.
• Pedestrians prefer walking on bike paths rather than on walking paths especially when the paths are next to each other. This could be because bike paths are wider but this negates the purpose of a bike path. A large number of pedestrians do not care about the bike/pedestrian path differentiation.

Road:

• Most efficient and reliable way to commute but narrow lanes make sharing space with motorists difficult.
• Some cyclists are clearly not road ready because there is no license required to use the road unlike motorists. Most do not signal, some do not obey traffic rules as there are no penalties.
• Varying cyclist skills makes it difficult for motorists to estimate when they can overtake, etc. Some cyclists confuse motorists with inconsistent speeds, sudden turns and even a wobbly ride posture.
• Some motorists are unhappy about sharing the road with a user that would slow them down even though they do not need a license, pay road related taxes, etc.
• Fewer accidents but injuries are more serious and have a higher percentage of fatalities.

The list above are just a few of the issues I have observed and experienced over the years. Policy makers are thinking about building an extensive bike path network but the lack of space simply means that this would not materialise. We should go for the second best option which is to share the roads between cyclists and motorists with the following changes:

• Cyclists should be licensed. A cyclist should at least be able to maintain a constant speed throughout the commute, understand and use hand signals, know the rules of the road and how to ride defensively. A cyclist should also be physically fit enough to be cycling alongside motor vehicles. This includes having good vision, etc.
• Cyclists should fall under the same penalties if they fail to obey traffic rules. Penalties for not following cycling rules (such have not having the right lights, etc) must be enforced for the safety of both cyclists and motorists.
• Bicycles must be certified road ready. This includes ensuring that the bike undergoes annual checks at local bike shops. Most responsible cyclists already do this but many cyclists do not fall under the responsible category.
• The left most lane should be expanded by about a metre (doable on most roads) to give cyclists more space. This additional space should be marked out as a bike lane. This is not to be confused with bike paths which are mostly recreational in nature and does not require licensing. This is just a simple expansion of the “double yellow line” space that is often used by cyclists on the road currently.
• Motorists should be educated on how to deal with cyclists and the rules regarding the expanded left lane / bike lane. Penalties against drivers for failing to share the road fairly and safely should be implemented.

The suggestions above may seem onerous but they are required to keep the roads safe. There is no use having strict guidelines for motorists and then allowing others to use the roads without the same stringent requirements. Cyclists are in many ways similar to motorist minus the motorised vehicle and a carbon footprint.

Cycling can be turned into a viable form of transport and it is only a question of good planning and execution to make this happen in Singapore.

Click here more information about my bike and rides. You can also follow me on Runkeeper, Strava, Ride With GPS, Garmin and Endomondo.

Nine long years. Nine years of close shaves. Nine years of shooting ourselves in the foot. Nine years of questioning the team’s belief. It ended early this morning and it ended with silverware. Arsenal hoisted the 2014 FA Cup at the Wembley after 120 minutes of heart stopping, hair tearing and nerve wrecking action. Football, bloody hell. But we have the cup and that’s all that matters!

It took a very Arsenal like performance to win the FA Cup. Paired with less illustrious opponents, the Gunners were hot favourites after their route to the final included beating teams like Liverpool, Tottenham and last year’s winners Wigan. But any Arsenal fan would be a fool to believe that the hot favourite tag would lead to an easy win in the final. Of course not. This is Arsenal.

We went 0-2 down in the first nine minutes. For a team of Arsenal’s calibre, it was shocking to see how the team was more overawed by Wembley than Hull City. Two of Hull’s defenders scored via set pieces against a static Arsenal defence still coming into terms with the game. It was similar to games against Liverpool and Chelsea. We were slow out of the starting blocks and we instantly fell not once but twice. The fans were shell shocked and I was thinking – “not again”. But screwing up early has its benefits, we had time to respond. Cazorla replied in the 17th minute with a beautiful rasping free kick that squeezed between the bar and a fully stretched ‘keeper.

But we still looked rattled. The team never expected themselves to be down by two goals so quickly. Replying early was crucial and all we needed now was another goal to draw parity. The team tried to mount a siege but it did not materialise. Our offensive play was terrible. Players were drifting to the wings and hugging the defensive line leaving the offensive centre empty. Defenders had no one to aim quick passes to. The only option was to fire long balls at the wings and over the defence. That did not work because long balls require a longer build up time to deliver and Hull was quick to press. There were fleeting chances but nothing serious came out of them because our offensive tactics were off. Defensively, we pressed poorly. The team seemed to be in two minds. Three players will fall back with only one pressing forward. A quick Hull one-two will dispose that player and expose a newly formed gap in our defensive line. Why can’t we press like other teams? You either send two to three players to press or you don’t press aggressively at all. It was terrible for the first sixty minutes. Cazorla was the only player making movements all over. He was the only outlet that remembered to fill the middle gap at times. It was clearly not good enough.

Approaching the final 30 minutes of the match, Wenger decided to change to a more direct 4-4-2 formation. Sanogo was introduced for Podolski and the game changed immediately. We were no longer had all our players stretched to the perimeter of the field. The two strikers took turns to drop into the hole and Ramsey returned to the middle. The aforementioned gap in the middle of offence was finally filled and it changed the game. We looked more certain in both attack and defence. The chances kept coming. Hull was fouling and wasting time and the referee did not seem to mind. We threw everything at goal and it finally came from Koscielny via a corner. How critical our French defender has been for us over the years. His goals sealed Champions League football for the past three season in all three decisive games, and this time he handed us the equalizer after the ball pinged in Hull’s box. He twisted himself inside out and managed to flick it past the keeper at close range. 2-2. Relief.

Arsenal could not find the winner and the game approached extra time. Strangely, Wenger decided against using his remaining two substitutions at the start of half time. The game had fallen in pace drastically by then. We did not have pacey players left besides Gibbs, and Hull was reeling from a very hard pressing display which they pushed through up till the 80th minute. From the 80th minute, we did not look to be in any danger conceding. It was chance after chance and I was personally more worried about having to face a penalty shoot out because the game was there for the taking. Wenger finally decided to make two changes with Wilshere and Rosicky coming on for Cazorla and Ozil. With fresh legs in the team, the second half of extra time saw a renewed push for the winner. The winning goal came in typical Arsenal fashion from Ramsey who had before that skewed almost all his short and long range efforts. Another foray into the box saw Giroud released diagonally away from the goal, he drew his marker with him and back heeled the ball to an on-rushing Ramsey. Ramsey made no mistake this time, firing low into the right bottom corner. The fans went wild. After a long 109 minutes in this match, we finally had the lead.

But it is not like Arsenal to kill off the game and give their fans an easier time. Nope. We immediately suffered three scares as Hull decided to push for an equaliser. Fabianski reminded the fans why we have been so divided about him after a hot blooded decision to charge out of his box in a failed attempt to slide the ball out of play. Per had earlier tripped himself when attempting to clear a wayward pass awkwardly. With an open goal and two on-rushing Hull players, a goal bound cross was delivered but Gibbs managed to race back and clear it off the line. That was his second goal line clearance and yet again it was a reminder of how his clearances had been instrumental in key decisive games like the final CL clinching match two seasons ago at West Brom. Minutes later, Arteta decided to step out of a long shot which nearly fooled a blind-sided Fabianski. But Fabianski reacted very quickly and made a full stretched save at the bottom left corner. The final whistle blew. The fans erupted. The manager and players celebrated wildly. I was stuck to my chair, overcome with emotion. It was strange to see the Gunners lift the cup. It was a feeling that I have been so far removed from. Winning. We won a bloody trophy.  We won a bloody trophy!

It was amazing to watch Vermaelen lead the team up the stands to receive the trophy. An embattled captain who spent most of his time on the bench or in the treatment room, he now has an honour that Henry, Fabregas and Van Persie do not – captaining Arsenal to a trophy. Our last captain who did that was Vieira in the 2005 FA Cup victory over Manchester United, and now Vermaelen joins him and host of former captains to have lifted the trophy. The trophy was raised by delighted players and it was telling that Mertesacker and Koscielny decided to raise the trophy together. Their partnership had brought stability to the defence and both of them scored the equalisers in the semi final and final. The cup was passed around, paraded, hoisted to the fans as more senior players such as Rosicky and Sagna could not believe they finally had a taste of silverware in an Arsenal jersey. Sagna did not want to let the trophy go and Rosicky celebrated like there was no tomorrow. The fans were overcome with joy and there were tears after nine barren years.

We did it, and in a very Arsenal way too. It’s celebrations for now but the team will have to work to improve for the next season. The hope is that this win erases some mental barriers and disbelief – especially freezing up in big games. Onwards and upwards! Victoria concordia crescit.

I live in a corner house on the ground floor in the west and M1’s coverage in my home is rather poor. Coverage ranges between one to zero bars on a mobile phone. It’s unfortunate because I almost immediately receive full bars the moment I step out of my house. I’ve tried this with different phones and it has always been the same result. M1’s coverage seemed to completely evaporate the moment I step within my four walls. I made three complaints over the course of late 2013 and was offered in late December 2013 to be placed on the Femtocell programme.

What is a Femtocell?

A Femtocell is a small, low-power mobile base station that improves indoor voice coverage and data performance for users. By placing a dedicated Femtocell indoors, it connects to M1’s mobile network via fixed broadband access and addresses any indoor coverage gap. M1 announced on 21 May 2013 that it was rolling out this service island wide to cope with indoor coverage complains. I was not aware of this service until it was offered to me. I was told that M1 would set up a base station in a building that was under construction next to my block of flats to improve coverage in that area. However, from then till the building was completed, I would be out of luck with coverage at home. As such, I decided to take up the offer. It was free and the Femtocell would be on loan until I stopped my subscription with M1 or decided to move to a different location.

A Femtocell is a small, low-power mobile base station that expands M1’s coverage via your fixed broadband access.

Signing and Setting Up

I was placed on a waiting list in late December 2013 and it was not until late February 2014 that I received a call that I could finally pick up the Femtocell. Even with a heavy work schedule, I decided to pick it up the self same day. I was sick of getting complaints at home that coverage was poor. Picking up the device took some time as the staff had to register the device to my location on top of the usual paper work.

Setting up the device was simple. The device is plugged into one of the spare ports on your home network router. The device takes about 30 minutes to an hour for auto self configuration to be completed. When it is done, M1 sends you an email that the Femtocell has been registered. You restart your phone and you’re good to go. The Femtocell basically acts as an indoor base station running off your home internet service.

Pros and Cons

The obvious benefit here was that my coverage went from zero to full bars. Calls were clear and dropped calls were a thing of the past. The device did what it was supposed to do perfectly. The range of the device was also good. Coverage in a HDB flat was not an issue even though my placement of the device was not optimal. The Femtocell also offers a LAN pass-through meaning that you can connect any LAN enabled device to the Femtocell in case you are short on LAN ports.

The downside is that the model offered for home users (Alcatel-Lucent 9361 Home Cell) is 3G only. This means you will not get LTE coverage via the Femtocell. This is not an issue for most users since the Femtocell falls within the home internet network and you are likely to be connected via WiFi. The other downside is that the device can only accommodate up to four active users. This is not an issue for me but larger families would have trouble placing more than four concurrent phone calls at the same time.

If you have trouble accessing M1’s mobile network and you have a home internet service with speeds greater than 4mbps, this is the solution for you.

Verdict

Credit to M1 for rolling this out for free. There are no fees and you simply have to return the device in a good condition without missing accessories to avoid any compensation fees. The device does what it sets out to do and is a welcome relief for those who have trouble connecting M1’s mobile service at home. The device is pretty much targeted at providing good call and SMS connectivity as you are unlikely to use data over this since you would be within a home internet network.

If you have trouble accessing M1’s mobile network and you have a home internet service with speeds greater than 4mbps, this is the best (and possibly only) solution M1 has for you.

I was not looking forward to Commencement. Commencement is NUS’s rebadge of Convocation which basically refers to the graduating ceremony. On paper, it felt like a simple ceremony packed with recipients where you will spend 99% of your time waiting first for your turn to come and then for the ceremony to end. Thankfully, things turned out very differently from what I expected. Commencement 2013 was a memorable moment and one that will hold a special place in my memory.

Pre Event

It began with a huge rush. I left my workplace late the night before to use the gym facilities (which are rather good). I am almost at the end of recovering from a stress injury in my foot and am transiting back to my normal exercise regime. After being physically dormant for almost 4 months, I am starting to grow sideways again. So, the day started off slightly tired without sufficient sleep, but thankfully, it soared quickly after that.

We had an early group photo taking session at 8:30am for the Economics honours students. It was early but going down early was a blessing in disguise because most of the photo taking was done before the event. We had time and space to get dressed. After the group photo taking, the crowd had not swelled yet and so all the individual and small group photos could be taken without having hordes of people in the background.

Because of the early group photo taking, all individual and small group photos could be taken without having hordes of people in the background.

This is also where I began to feel that I was at a milestone in my life. The same friends that I had toiled hard together in projects and exams were now fellow working adults. It’s kind of crazy to use the word adults but I didn’t really feel like I was an adult even after army and during university. It is really the moment you stop becoming a student that you feel like you’re no longer a kid and this event captured that transformation. Things like chit chat turned from school work to how our first jobs were like. It was a wonderful atmosphere of change and anticipation. This pre event set the stage for the ceremony that would start at 10am.

The Ceremony

The crowd swelled quickly at 9:30am. What was absolutely great about it was the sheer amount of joy and energy that flowed throughout. You could feel the buzz emanating from happy graduates and proud parents. It was an amazing and refreshing atmosphere to be in. My parents soon arrived with the help of a family friend and joined up with my grandmother and my uncle. The joy and pride written on their faces was priceless. It was something they worked so hard for, I am just glad they received their due reward.

You could feel the buzz emanating from happy graduates and proud parents. It was an amazing and refreshing atmosphere to be in.

On paper, the ceremony was a drag but it turned out very differently for me. We started with a couple of videos of past graduates and even one on former Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew receiving his honorary doctorate from NUS in the Istana. As much as LKY is a massive figure in Singapore’s history, I did not see the reason why a video of him receiving his doctorate should be screened during this event. Nevertheless, we stood for the arrival of our professors who frankly did look a little like clowns in their academic gowns.

The event formally started with the singing of the National Anthem. I did not expect that and I was surprised (and somewhat embarrassed) to feel slightly emotional during the Anthem. I think the Anthem brought back memories. The last I sang it was probably 5-6 years ago when I was in full time service in the army. Before that, it reminded me of the many days in school and how things have changed so much. The days of running around before morning assembly in Primary School, leading the school pledge as the head prefect in Secondary School and the morning groans and grumbles (and sometimes the dash to be in time) during pre-university. The National Anthem somehow became a running motif for my education journey.

The National Anthem somehow became a running motif for my education journey.

Thanks to my surname (Lum), I was quite fortunate to have my name in the middle of over 500 students receiving their degrees. Being near the front or end would have made the perceived waiting time to be twice as long. Nevertheless, this rather long segment was interspaced by friends that I knew making their 30 second appearance on stage. It felt really great to see everyone reach the finishing line together. This was the moment we were waiting for the past four years. The ceremony ended with a few speeches before a balloon waterfall and streamers. The sheer happiness and joy was infectious. We were finally graduates!

Post Ceremony

My family exited the auditorium to a sea of graduates and their family members. The Universal Cultural Centre (UCC) is a small place and it became quite difficult to navigate the place. As mentioned above, I was glad I took photos with my friends before the event. My parents and relatives found a spot at the other exit of UCC to take family shots before we left the place a buffet lunch at Penang Place Restaurant.

It was a special occasion especially for my parents and I feel blessed to be able to deliver what they had dreamed of and once thought impossible.

I cannot describe the pride and joy that was etched on the faces of my family and friends. It was a special occasion especially for my parents and I feel blessed to be able to deliver what they had dreamed of and once thought impossible.

It was indeed a wonderful day and a milestone for the family.

The Logitech G series represents the Logitech’s take on gaming products and also forms their top of the line premium category. In many ways, ‘gaming grade’ equipment is to electronic equipment what ‘military grade’ is to industrial machinery. The G700s comes from a long line of gaming mice that dates back to the G5, G7 and G9 mice that later spawned the G500, G700 and G9x. Logitech decided that it did not need to make drastic changes in the latest update. This could be seen right from the way they branded their lineup for 2013. The G700s is Logitech’s rechargeable gaming mice that allows both wireless and wired functionality. It retails at S$135.

Hardware

The Logitech G700s barely differs from the G700 but that is a good thing. With the G700s, Logitech has crafted a mouse that fits comfortably with hands of varying sizes. This is due to the curvature and button placement that makes the mouse accessible. Left handers would however be disappointed to note that this mouse is definitely not ambidextrous.

Button placement is spot on, you will not have difficulty finding any key.

The G700’s main strength is in allowing the user to make full use of all 13 programmable buttons naturally without requiring much time to settle in like the G600 or Razer’s Naga. Button placement is spot on with 4 thumb buttons and three placed on the edge of the left mouse button. You will not have difficulty finding any key or even accidentally hit the wrong button.  This is especially important when gaming because much of the mouse becomes is left to muscle memory and you do not want to spend time locating keys mid game. The G700s does not feature as many programmable keys as the G600 but the keys provided are sufficient and better placed than the G600.

The biggest difference between the G700s and its predecessor is the surface of the mouse. I am not a fan of the new design as I prefer my equipment to look simple. However, the new surface feels better on the palm and you will not feel as if the surface of the mouse will peel anytime soon. A one week tryout is insufficient time to properly judge the new surface but it is definitely felt better than my G700.

The biggest difference between the G700s and its predecessor is the surface of the mouse.

As mentioned above, the G700s also shines in being able to act as a wired or wireless mouse. Logitech guarantees that the report rate of either option is the same. Leaving your G700s plugged in also allows charging while the mouse is in use. There is no downtime nor is it necessary to prepare standby batteries. Better still, you can go wireless when you need the mobility or wired when you need ity. In all test conditions, the G700s functions flawlessly when paired wirelessly.

The G700s is a solidly built piece of hardware that feels like an improvement over the G700 physically. However, I wish Logitech would have gone for a more classy design on the surface of the mouse.

Software

Just like all Logitech G Series products, the G700s utilizes the Logitech Gaming Software. This review is done based on LGS 8.46.27. You are able to programme almost anything and everything onto the mouse:

• Keystroke: Assign a single keystroke. You can set delay and repeat options.
• Multi Key: Record and assign multiple keystrokes, basically macros. Again, you can set delay and repeat options.
• Text Block: Enter a block of text that will be instantly typed out when you hit the assigned button. While you can do this in a macro, this method is more refined and not prone to hiccups. Repeat options also available.
• Mouse Functions: Assign the following functions to any key. Left click, Right click, Middle Click, Back, Forward, Double click, DPI up, DPI down, DPI Shift, Default DPI, DPI cycling, Mode switch, G shift.
• Media: Assign the following media commands. Play/pause, Stop, Previous, Next, Volume up, Volume down, Mute
• Hotkeys: Assign the following commands. Close window, Show desktop, Next tab in browser, Previous tab in browser, Restore default zoom, Copy, Cut, Paste, Undo, Redo, Open charms (Win 8), Search charm (Win 8), App bar (Win 8).
• Shortcut: Create a shortcut to any local or network applications, files, folders, computers or URLs.
• Function: Assign predefined shortcuts. Email, Web browser, Media player, Calculator, My computer.
• Ventrilo: Assign the following native ventrilo commands. Command 1, 2, 3, Mute/unmute sound, Mute/unmute microphone, Push to talk.

You are also able to set multiple DPI levels so that you can switch between them in game. Also, the report rate can be set. Higher report rates will see more sensitive performance at the cost of power consumption. You can also pick the power saving mode or simply set it at ‘Max Gaming’ to never have the mouse got to sleep.

The LGS has every corner covered and you will be hard pressed to find something that the G700s is not able to do.

Conclusion

The G700s is a solid mouse that provides a balance between function and form. If you are looking for a mouse that gives you a good range of programmable options together with the ability to switch between wired and wireless connectivity, the G700s will fit you perfectly. Those who already have a G700 should try out the new surface to see if it is worth the upgrade.

Logitech has played it safe with the G700s and the move seems to be a sound one. The G700s will not have G700 users scrambling to upgrade but it will appeal greatly to those who want a lot of features and flexibility with their current mouse.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

Fires from the Sumatran islands have affected both Singapore and Malaysia as dry winds are carrying smoke towards the east. Singaporeans have reacted in a wide range of ways from fury and disgust to humor. As much as I thought that dengue was going to be the health concern of 2013 for our island city, it is the haze, at its record levels, that will take the centre stage.  This unfortunate event is our SARS of 2013. It is one that may not be immediately deadly on the more vulnerable parts of the population but its impact is greater because it affects everyone as compared to SARS.

The Situation

Based on news reports worldwide, it is in everyone’s interest to put out the fires. It is easy to simply blame Indonesia (and I do believe that Indonesia should bear a significant portion of the blame) but let us put this blame game behind and focus on the issue for now.

Save your anger for those who started the fires and for those who failed to enforce the law and remember the many innocent Indonesians that are suffering greater than we are.

Whether you live in Singapore or Malaysia or Indonesia, you have an immediate need to put out the raging fires to stop the haze. At ground zero, plantations are being burnt and there is a very real danger that residential homes are next in line. Think of the fires in Australia, this is the tropical version. Indonesians in those areas face a greater danger to their health in terms of smoke inhalation and their lives are in immediate risk because of the uncontrollable fires.

Save your anger for those who started the fires and for those who failed to enforce the law and remember the many innocent Indonesians that are suffering greater than we are and have a very dire need to see the flames put out. To be frank, Singaporeans are suffering the least as compared to the Indonesians and the Malaysians. But of course this does not mean we sit around and just take it as it is.

Solutions

It is difficult to solve this issue. Remember that Indonesia an extremely large country with over 18,000 islands. Law enforcement becomes problematic at this scale. We tend to think that everyone is like Singapore but we need to remember that not everyone is lucky enough to be as small as Singapore. We have our disadvantages of being tiny but we also reap significant benefits in that our island is easy to govern and police. I reckon, that if we put the Singapore Police Force in Sumatra, they too will have significant problems ensuring that no one breaks the law.

To put this in perspective for an urbanized population like ours, the fires in Sumatra are akin to those occurring on the basement two levels in shopping malls.

The dry weeks that we have faced only serves to make things more difficult as it is easier for fires to spread and more difficult for anyone to put it out. The fires are not ones that are above ground. They are 3 to 4 m below ground level. To put this in perspective for an urbanized population like ours, the fires in Sumatra are akin to those occurring on the basement two levels in shopping malls.

Firefighters on the ground cannot get too close because of the intensity and the fact that the fire may have already spread under the very ground they are now standing on. How efficient is water bombing then? The underground fire is also is why rain seeding and water bombing will have limited effect. The amount of water that is generated from these solutions is not sufficient to completely flush out the fires. We need an extended storm and you are looking at 8-12 hours of heavy rain at this point. Even if you summon the entire squadrons of aircraft from all 3 countries, the amount of water they can carry and dump cannot compare to the amount of rain we need. I am sure the rain we need will come in the coming week. This is basically a guess but we are due a downpour after these dry weeks.

Indonesians themselves have criticized their own government in their local media.

We should also look at long term solutions. I usually offer a few but not in this case. Due to the aforementioned scale and the costs and benefits of private owners in carrying out the slash and burn option, we have a problem that no one can solve. Indonesians themselves have criticized their own government in local media but put yourself in the shoes of the Indonesian government – what can you actually do? It is difficult to justify the cost of ramping up law enforcement by a huge magnitude just to deal with a seasonal problem. The second question will be if there is sufficient funds to do so.

Economists have suggested using a price mechanism to deal with this. Fines can be used or inversely monetary incentives. Either ways the money flow will be long and tedious while being subject to corruption at many levels. We are stuck between a rock and a hard place. At this point, we can only ride it out.

Stay Safe

The haze should last another week and we will probably need two rounds of rain to make headway against this problem. At this point, it is important to keep hydrated and this means drinking more water and getting more baths at the same time. Don’t forget that the particles are not just inhaled, they also sit on your skin. It will also be a good time to ramp up house cleaning to get rid of the dust. Think of the haze as a situation where you live in an industrial area. Trust me I know this, I live in Jurong. Keep your body and surroundings clean.

Keep your body and surroundings clean.

Depending on the individual’s health status, mask up if you have to go out. A normal mask does nothing to filter the particles. Yes it reduces the smell a little but what we need to stop are the PM 2.5 particles which will easily pass through normal face masks. Get the N95 types, and if you can find get those with air valves. The valves make it significantly easier to breathe and so wearing these N95 variants for an extended period of time becomes more comfortable.

Don’t panic over PSI numbers. Stick to these measures on anything below 500. When it hits 500, you probably have to lock yourself in and switch on the aircon and air purifiers. But at this point, the British stiff upper lip and the overused phrase will be necessary.

Keep Calm and Carry On.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

This is long overdue. I have been keeping pets since the age of 4. It began with fishes – guppies, tiger barbs, tetras, angelfishes, ‘sucker’ fishes, just to name a few. My dad believed that keeping pets was going to be an important part of my growth. I was told he wanted to have more kids even though we were in a poor state financially. My mom didn’t want to and so these pets were there to teach me responsibility over living things. To learn what it is like to care for something smaller and to embrace the little things in life. The story of my pets thus begins with fishes.

The Blue Tiger Barb

We had one main tank and it was rather large for a beginner. A few incidents are well remembered even though it has been 15-20 years ago at this point. I remember a tiger barb that was so resilient he outlived most of the other fishes. It fell sick for about 6-7 times and we had to isolate him in a smaller tank filled with medicated water. The water would turn blue or green depending on the medication we used.

It was with us for so long I felt very sad when it finally passed.

But it survived all the time. It was quite an amazing feat considering that most fishes would go after 6 months to a year. It was with us for so long I felt very sad when it finally passed. I thought of giving it a burial but my mom disposed of it when I was at school.

Silver Pair

The tiger barb was significant for the long life he lived even though it was tiny but the longest living fishes I had was this pair of silver coloured fishes. Measuring 8 to 10 centimeters, they were one of the larger fishes I kept and rather aggressive. Till this day, I do not know what their exact breed is. I kept them in the final years of my fish keeping hobby and they survived anything thrown at them.

I was told that my mom found one of them on the floor after she returned home from the market. It had apparently jumped out of the tank through a protective netting. It survived for a good 2-3 minutes without water as my mom finally managed to scoop the slippery body back into the tank. This happened once or twice. Nothing it seemed could kill those fishes.

They were one of the larger fishes I kept and rather aggressive.

It even ate smaller fishes. I was filled with guilt when I placed tiny neon coloured tetras in the tank and their numbers kept dwindling. I felt like a murderer but there was nothing I could do (we didn’t have a spare tank at this point), all of them were gone within a night. Memories like that will never be lost.

Anyways, this silver pair were my final fishes. They were still strong when I decided to stop keeping fishes in lieu of a larger pet – a cat. I decided to release these two tetras into Jurong Lake. It took time to get them adjusted to the water but the time came and the two of them found themselves much larger waters.

The Little Things

There are more memories than just these two significant ones. I remember how washing the tank was quite a chore. Transferring the fishes, making our own suction hose, rinsing the pebbles, cleaning the decorations and wiping down the sides of the tank. It was a lot of work and my mom did most of it.

I remember we fed the fishes two kinds of food. There were the small pellet-sized dry ones and also the live blood worms that were placed in an inverted cone (with minute holes). The worms were pretty gross and watching my fishes tear them out of the cone was a mind opening experience for the preschool-me at that point.

The worms were pretty gross and watching my fishes tear them out of the cone was a mind opening experience.

Angelfishes were really fragile. I thought they were the prettiest looking, so agile and majestic but they never survived past a month even when separated from the other fishes. It was probably my fault for not knowing how to take care of them. Oh well.

I always had one or two of those “sucker” fishes in the tank. They were greyish to black and never seemed to require food. My parents were convinced that having one or two around would help keep the tank clean. They seemed distant in my memory because there was never a need to feed them. They just went around their business in the tank, almost like an automated vacuum cleaner.

Growing Up

The fishes I had taught me how to care. It gave me a sense of responsibility and a desire to give the best I could for these little lives. My dad was probably right, this first pets of mine were instrumental to my growing up. It prepared me for learning to take care of my next pet – a cat.

And that, is a much longer story for another day.

I eagerly anticipated WWDC 2013 because Apple really needed something new to lift an image that is fast becoming stale.  I think Apple largely delivered on the premise of visual change in iOS 7. WWDC 2013 probably showcased less features than the preceding year but Apple addressed the question that it was posed. It delivered a design uplift to iOS. The rest of its announcements did not really raise eyebrows.

Traditional Devices

If you had read my piece last month on why it is not a good time to buy tech products, I warned potential PC and Mac buyers to wait till Haswell is released. Haswell has been launched early this month and OEM manufacturers like Lenovo, Asus, HP, Dell, Acer, Sony and many others have jumped right on. Haswell will provide a considerable increase in battery life and it is not surprising that Apple has followed in suit with the MacBook Air. There were no announcements about the MacBook Pro. Now is the right time to buy Haswell laptops and the MacBook Air is one of them.

Now is the right time to buy Haswell laptops and the MacBook Air is one of them.

On desktops, Apple has uncharacteristically announced a product that will not be available for purchase within three months. The Mac Pro was showed off as a reduced tower that was compact. The tower will use dual AMD GPUs which is something I cannot recommend at this point in time considering how far nVidia is ahead with Titan. However, even those interested will not know when they can purchase one besides ‘later in 2013’. With Tim Cook the supply chain guru as CEO, it is rather strange that he would choose to unveil a product that cannot be bought.

iOS

The star of the show was iOS. iOS powers iPhones, iPads and iPods, devices that account for the bulk of Apple’s revenue. Apple did not rise to its current position because of OS X or Macs but rather on these iDevices. iOS looked tired. Dead tired. I have mentioned many times how iOS 6 looks just like iOS 1 and Apple responded today.

Flattening iOS was a good move but Apple chose to go for a colour scheme that didn’t suit the new design language.

The main update to iOS was a rework of its visual appearance. I would call this facelift both a hit and miss. I like how Apple flattened the entire design. The 3D styled effects of earlier iOS versions looked like what amateurs with Photoshop did in the early 2000s. Flattening iOS was a good move but Apple chose to go for a colour scheme that didn’t suit the new design language. Apple is known to prefer bright metallic shades of neon colours. These colours went very well with its former curved beveled designs but the same cannot be said on a flat base.

It is hard to fathom that Johnny Ives made these designs decisions but I think there’s more than meets the eye here. I think Ives’ end goal is to have a simplified colour palette that will fit with a minimalist approach, like how Microsoft reduced the number of core colours to no more than 8 in its Metro UI design language. But unlike Microsoft, Apple decided not to rock the boat. This can possibly explain the half hearted approach in design change. Some pro Apple sites have surprisingly denounced the design changes and I can see why but I think iOS 7 is a design change in mid flight executed in this manner to allow its current user base to transit to a new design language.

Unlike Microsoft, Apple decided not to rock the boat. Expect design changes to be completed in iOS 8.

In terms of features, iOS 7 brought less to the table than iOS 6 did. The only new features is that of its iTunes Radio service and Airdrop. I don’t think either of the features are game breaking. In fact, both features are late and will probably not be used much. iTunes Radio is very late behind Spotify and options from Amazon and Google. As I wrote in the Google IO post, Apple lost its huge lead in music in this area. However, it is good to see that they have finally come on board. The Airdrop service is strictly for use between iOS users. The fact that iOS has lost its lead in US and fares even lesser in other countries means there is limited use for this. People will prefer to use universal platform services like Dropbox rather than Apple’s or Samsung’s file sharing features that is locked into a relatively smaller community.

I think iOS has 2 important system changes – Control Center and Multitasking improvements. Control Center is a long overdue update. Yes, Android had it first and still features a more powerful control center. I don’t care if Apple rips off Android or Samsung rips off Apple, etc. This is a step forward for iOS. The same goes with multitasking improvements. Again Apple seemingly ripped off WebOS. It doesn’t matter. iOS may actually multitask better than Android in this case. It is all about execution and refinement, not originality. This is true for the tech world.

Conclusion

If not for the iOS 7 facelift, this would have been a very boring WWDC. iOS received minor features and some system tweaks. OS X received a few new features. MacBook Airs received the same update as every other laptop OEM. Smaller Macs were unveiled but there was no date given for purchase.

But, the key point here is iOS 7’s facelift. I think it is the right move. It is not over yet for Apple. Ives must continue to iterate on the design. iOS 7 is just the midpoint of a change in design language and I can understand why Apple wants to tread very carefully here. Surely, iOS 8 is the right time to complete that design transformation.

WWDC 2013 is centered on Apple’s continuity. The market has remained constant. Both Android 4.2.2 and iOS 7 are not game changers.

Apple will not win new users with the software announcements made in WWDC 2013. There was nothing that would give itself a leg up over Android in the mobile space or Windows in the traditional computing space. Its moves are currently defensive. As such, Apple will not lose users as well. It will keep its user base which is sufficiently large enough to keep profits and revenues flowing.

WWDC 2013 is centered on Apple’s continuity. The market has remained constant. With Android seemingly stagnant as well, the question now turns expands to a broader front: Are we seeing the consolidation stage of the mobile era?

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

Americans went up in arms when a program managed by the United State’s National Security Agency (NSA) called PRISM was leaked to the media. PRISM is a secret espionage program that monitors valuable foreign communications that passes through servers located in the United States and possibly even those located offshore but owned by companies based in the United States. The revelations showed that this program was extended beyond foreigners to also cover Americans. In a country where civil liberties are highly prioritized and any form of government surveillance is heavily rejected, you can imagine the magnitude of the storm that swept through the United States in the past week.

The main problems with PRISM was that it allowed the collection of granular US citizen information without requiring a warrant. Audio and video chats, photographs, emails, documents and connection logs could be monitored. It is the usual two edged sword argument. While PRISM gave the NSA a treasure trove of information that would allow greater protection of national interests, citizens were rightly fearful of how the government would handle such information.

However, I feel that the entire uproar over PRISM is a little overblown. There are obvious problems that must be rectified but there’s no need to panic the way some media outlets are encouraging its readers to do so.

Always Been There

Information is power. It gives you space to react and allows you to put yourself in a more advantageous position. As such, governments always keep tabs on their citizens. PRISM spawned off the Patriot Act which had multiple precedents in the century past. The US government was always spying on its own citizens. You can reduce the severity of the word with euphemisms like monitoring, preemptive protection, etc. It has been there for a long time.

It is naive to believe that no one is keeping watch on you. In reality, everyone is keeping watch of each other.

It is naive to believe that no one is keeping watch on you. In reality, everyone is keeping watch of each other. There are those who take greater effort to observe their surroundings. This allows them to read individuals with the multiple data points they have picked up. The act of careful observation is an active effort to glean information that is otherwise unobtainable and this is done by everyone to everyone. The question is simply how effective one is able to do that.

PRISM’s problem is that it is so effective it can be scary. The NSA is able to dig deep into a person if they need to. It is not just the United States, every country has a similar operation and they declare their agencies as one that provides internal security. When you join sensitive jobs, you can be sure they run background checks on you. This actually spans a large number of jobs. The fact that they can run background checks on you means that they have monitored everyone so much so they simply need to reach in for your file and run through it. In short, your file was always there. Yes, even before PRISM.

The dichotomy between perceptions and reality is probably what keeps people sane. But we should wake up and see the world as it is. Don’t be naive. If you believed that everything you did was private, you are very sadly mistaken whether PRISM existed or not.

Noise

Continuing on the same lines, let’s be realistic about the information that the U.S. government has access to. One of the  biggest fears is that the government has access to everyone and anyone. What this also means is that the data is 95% noise, useless to security officials. When gathering data, whether be it on people or simple statistics for a harmless academic project, any student would tell you how hard it is to get good data. There’s plenty of information out there and more of it in not necessarily better. It means more work sorting out what is relevant and what is not.

More data usually means plenty of worthless noise to sieve through. You are not as attractive an information dataset as most self indulgent human beings think they are.

Scope can actually be a great hindrance to the security operations in the United States. The FBI, CIA, NSA, etc may be huge organizations but they do not have the capacity to monitor every single citizen. They are likely to focus on no more than 1% of the population. More data doesn’t mean better data. And more data usually means plenty of worthless noise to sieve through.

Don’t jump the gun and think that someone is scrutinizing your every move. Maybe they would if they could but the fact is they can’t. Unless you fall in that 1%, the relevant U.S. agencies have no time to dig things up on you. You are not as attractive an information dataset as most self indulgent human beings think they are.

Data Sources

Let’s turn our attention away from the now rather absurd ‘spy-on-everyone’ theory and focus on the data sources. The PRISM programme was simply one that encouraged tech companies to cooperate and hand over user data to state agencies. There’s an important point here. The government (at least in this programme) is not actively collecting information on you first hand.

The information that is available on Google’s, Microsoft’s, Apple’s, Facebook’s, etc servers are all provided by you. I have written in the past that everything you do online can be easily reversed engineered and searched through. You should always be on your guard online just as you would when you step out of your house.

I personally give Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Twitter plenty of data about myself. I make scheduled efforts to erase data that is over 30 days old but I am fully aware that this data will probably remain in backups. So, I make sure that I am perfectly fine with people crawling through whatever I post or store on any of these platforms. If I am not, then that piece of data doesn’t go online.

Many homebrew hackers can do what PRISM does and are more interested about you than the government will ever be.

I can understand that people with plenty of secrets would have issues with this argument. But do ask yourself this. If you have plenty of secrets, you should only have a small group that you share these secrets with. Having secrets with many people destroys the entire notion of secrets. Tongues are always found wagging and such propensities increase with the number of people you share secrets with. Therefore, if these secrets are sensitive enough, you and those you share with should be a close knit bunch that do not mind meeting face to face. The government is not the only one able to intercept your electronic communications, many homebrew hackers can. The later is likely to be more interested in your personal life than the former.

In short, keep all forms of electronic communication free of your secrets. If you have secrets, you should only be sharing them with a small bunch anyways and this should not be a problem. If the above is not true in your case, you should carefully evaluate how you handle your so called secrets.

The Problem With PRISM

PRISM has its issues. The most pertinent issue is transparency. NSA officials have come out in defence of the programme saying that there is sufficient checks and balances and that multiple facets of the leadership is ensuring that the system is not abused. This, of course, includes both the legislature and judiciary. But the problem is that people on the ground did not know it.

Due to the sensitivity of surveillance issues, it is clear that the United States have chosen to skip asking for permission.  If they had gone that route, the programme would never have been passed. Also, this programme is not necessarily the most cutting edge one out there. Other competing countries have done better. The United States needed to get a leg up in this competitive global space.

The US should take time to explain the system to a degree that is sufficient for public knowledge.

This is probably the right move but now that PRISM has been blown open to the public, the US should take time to explain the system to a degree that is sufficient for public knowledge. People need to know that their data is accessible by law enforcement officials. They may not need to know the how but they need to know that it exists. This is the biggest problem with PRISM but one that can be rectified.

What’s Next

Most people want the system shut down. That’s a crazy move. The lack of surveillance is a prelude to a lack of accountability. If people are free to do what they like, the country becomes a magnet for more shady activities. Just look at the safe havens in Sweden in the banking sector. Who ended up using those banks? No, not people concerned with privacy but people concerned with tax evasion and hiding proceeds from illegal activities. The United States would not want to be the first country to fall behind in this area and also turn into a safe haven for such untoward things.

It is in human nature to be more careless and inconsiderate (to put things mildly) when you know you have space to use and abuse without accountability. As much as the government wants to keep its citizens honest, the necessary details of PRISM must be made known since it can directly affect citizens. Making parts of it known will also act as a form of deterrence which could make would-be criminals to think twice before attempting to do something in the U.S. or via U.S. services.

Don’t Freak Out, Execute Better

In short, there’s no need for the general public to freak out over this. Tech media outlets have gone absolutely bananas because this is their core area of interest. The issue requires immediate attention but it also has to be done with balance and context.

If you have secrets to keep, then do your secrets a favour and handle them properly.

It must be made transparent that the instruments are available but it must also be understood that there’s no way the government have the funds, time or capability to monitor every single one of its citizens. People who raise red flags will be monitored as they probably deserve to be. Besides that, take good control of what you do online or even over the telephone. If you have secrets to keep, then do your secrets a favour and handle them properly.

Remember, before the internet, there was always a mail man or an operator. The existence of a middle man severely depreciates the privacy of whatever you are sending.

Don’t get paranoid. Get real and handle things better.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

The last time I wrote about a transition was in 2009. I was finishing up my relatively long temp job before starting on my Economics journey at the National University of Singapore (NUS). Time flies. Four years have passed and here I am at yet another transition. The time lapse between this transition and the next will possibly be 30-40 years. This is working life. This will span most of my adulthood.

The Education Journey Ends

It is rather exciting for me. I have consistently done better at work than at school. Exams are not my cup of tea and I feel very fortunate to have been able to complete my honours unscathed. I really dislike exams. I love projects, presentations, etc. But to be cooped up at a desk to solve a couple of problems within an hour or two is not my cup of tea.

I think things gradually got better looking at the PSLE right up to exams at the university level. PSLE was a nightmare even though I was coasting along in Primary School. ‘O’ levels was again another nightmare. ‘A’ levels was a change in fortunes and university exams were a lot better than the former ‘big’ exams.

Again, I am glad that is over, thankful that I survived the Singapore education system. I spent a full 17 years in it. I will don my (incredibly weird looking) academic dress in July. Toss that square shaped hat and end it on a high note. It is a blessing that a non academically inclined person like me barely deserves.

Employed

I have begun my permanent job. I went through a couple of interviews that spanned quite a period of time before landing the job I wanted before my examinations were over.  The first few days have been a blast. I have never enjoyed myself so much at work which is something considering that my past working experiences have been really enjoyable.

My new colleagues are afraid that I will be overwhelmed but things have gone swimmingly. I hope to be a fully productive member in the shortest time possible. It’s all about efficiency and being productive. Heck, that is why I am trained as an economist.

This Blog

It is no secret that I love to write. I was starved of that during the 4 years at NUS and I turned to writing on this very blog. I am glad that I will get plenty of writing time in my new job as a research analyst.

There will be implications for this blog as well. I think I will keep this blog updated but not as frequently as before. I still follow technology and football very closely and will write a post or two every week.

Other Developments

There are other important developments that will take place soon now that I have the burden of education off my back. Some of these will be revealed in the coming weeks. Some of these have been a long time coming.

It is a mixture of relief, joy, freedom and excitement. Stay tuned!

With more people using tablets and smartphones for simple computing tasks, it becomes rather obvious that a touch keyboard is not an efficient manner to get work done. It may not get you through media processing tasks but a tablet or smartphone is perfectly capable of word processing and even minor spreadsheet work. These two tasks are basically what 90% of the world’s office workers deal with everyday. It is not surprising that bluetooth keyboards have become very popular as required accessories for these mobile devices. I have reviewed and own a total of three bluetooth keyboards and this will allow me to make a comparison with Logitech’s Bluetooth Illuminated Keyboard K810.

The K810 is the only bluetooth keyboard on the market that is backlit. I am a huge fan of backlit keyboards having used them for over 8 years. It does not matter if you are a fast typist and if you can touch type without looking at the keyboard, having backlit keys is always handy. It is in this area that the K810 stands out against its peers. I will test the K810 against the Microsoft Wedge Keyboard and Apple’s bluetooth variant. The Logitech Bluetooth Illuminated Keyboard retails at S$169.00.

Keys

The K810 has the smallest keys which allows a greater amount of space between them. The chiclet keys are well spaced out and are clearly modelled after the exact key layout of Apple’s bluetooth keyboard. As such, it lacks the wider variety of keys available on the Microsoft Wedge keyboard.

The K810’s keys felt the most sturdy of all 3 keyboards. The keyboard is built for Windows machines in mind as clearly denoted by the Windows key and other more Windows centric keys. It is important to note that the K810 will also work on Android, iOS and OS X. The brushed metal finish on the base was aesthetically pleasing and gave the keyboard a touch of class.

On the function key row, Logitech has chosen to make the function keys work only when the Fn key is depressed. This is similar to how the Microsoft Wedge works. It irks me because I am very used to using keys such as F2 and even the Alt+F4 combination. However, most users do not utilize any of the function keys and Logitech’s decision is probably the right one for the masses.

Size & Battery

The keyboard is larger than Apple’s and Microsoft’s. However, this allows it to give the most room for typing. Those with large fingers will appreciate the extra room. The keyboard is also the flattest of the 3. This is because the keyboard uses an internal battery instead of standard ‘AA’ sized batteries.

The K810 is charged via a micro USB cable. The keyboard, even when backlit, lasts for a very long time on a single charge. As such, wearing out the internal battery with recharge cycles should not be a worry.

Backlight

The keyboard senses whether your hands are near. This enables the activation of backlighting. The backlight intensity can be toggled and lighting is even across the entire keyboard.

This is everything you expect a well made backlit keyboard to be.

Logitech also allows auto adjusting illumination which is what I set the keyboard to do. It worked well under different lighting conditions. The back light also peeks out at the edge of each key. In short, this is everything you expect a well made backlit keyboard to be.

Pairing

Another strength of the K810 is its ability to pair with multiple devices. You can pair it with 3 devices and switch effortlessly between them. The first 3 keys on the function keys row allow you to swap when needed.

I had the keyboard paired to a desktop, tablet and phone. It was really useful to be able to switch between devices as and when I needed. It felt almost like having a KVM switch installed. Users that utilize multiple devices will love this feature. I hope more manufacturers set this as a standard. Logitech has been pushing this for quite a few of their devices including their music options in the Ultimate Ears line up.

Conclusion

The K810 is slim and light albeit slightly larger than Microsoft’s and Apple’s options. It is well crafted and feels great to type on. Logitech has got many parts of building this keyboard right. It is not a surprise considering their experience in making keyboards.

The price for the K810 is significantly higher than Apple’s and Microsoft’s options but the K810 does a lot more. If you do plenty of typing under low light and you want to use your keyboard with multiple devices, the K810 is the best available out there and is worth the extra cost.

The Media Development Authority announced new guidelines that will require additional licensing for current affairs orientated sites with a large Singapore viewership. I think it is important for those who are interested in this change of rules to read the factsheet verbatim from MDA’s site. Context is important, please do click on that link and read before continuing.

There is one very clear message that can be read from MDA’s statement. Online news platforms have arrived. Sufficient proportions of Singaporeans are utilizing online platforms to read and respond to local affairs. Note that MDA’s calls this move one that brings online content on par with the traditional press. My thoughts will be focused on this area.

Singapore’s Internet Code of Practice

I am aware that many Singaporean bloggers and readers have responded with heavy criticism. I can see where this is stemming from but it will be out of my depth to term this move as censorship. Even if it is censorship, not all forms of censorship is bad. The term itself is subjective to social norms. Censorship can range from politics, racism, radicalism to even child pornography. Obviously some forms of censorship is needed but how much and to what extent varies from individual to individual. Let us take a closer look at this:

3. The new Licence provides greater clarity on prevailing requirements within the Class Licence and Internet Code of Practice, and explains what MDA would consider “prohibited content” in the existing Internet Code of Practice, e.g. content that undermines racial or religious harmony. As the sites are already subject to these requirements, no change in content standards is expected to result. The Licence also makes it clear that online news sites are expected to comply within 24 hours to MDA’s directions to remove content that is found to be in breach of content standards. The only other additional requirement is that online news sites are required to put up a performance bond like all other individually-licensed broadcasters, and the sum of $50,000 is consistent with that required of niche TV broadcasters.

All sites, including the one you are reading now, is subject to the Internet Code of Practice. The preceding link is a three page PDF from MDA’s site. It’s a short guideline, read it. It is clear that article is targeted squarely at upholding social norms on sexuality. Pornography and any sexually explicit materials are banned (Point 4.2a to 4.2d). Point 4.2e prohibits LBGT which is not accepted in the country. While this may irk some, it is not surprising considering how conservative our country is. This issue is contentious even in more liberal countries. Point 4.2f is on cruelty and violence. This one is an easy pass. The final point (4.2g) covers ethnic, racial and religious harmony. I think most Singaporeans both offline and online will accept all the points without batting an eyelid. There is little connection to politics here. Even if there is, we would not want sexual, ethnic, racial or religious issues to creep into politics both online and offline.

Content Licensing

The Internet Code of Practice is not an issue. However, some sites will be moved from this to one that is apparently stricter. They will fall under the Broadcasting Act. This article is nine pages long and again you should read before reacting. The document covers both Internet Service Providers and Content Providers. What we are interested is on Content Providers which begins at Point 3 on Page 5. The article is worded carefully and is linked to more general documents such as general laws and statutes. I will not continue linking all of them. The message is clear, MDA wants popular online sites to operate under the same guidelines traditional news agencies.

The truth is none of these will really affect content providers.

The truth is none of these will really affect content providers. This entire storm was unnecessary caused by a poor PR move by MDA. Online bloggers already knew they could be hauled up for posting articles or even comments that they could not back factually. Responsible journalism and accurate reporting must be upheld no matter the stature of the publisher.

Nonetheless, there are some who will be affected. These are sites that I followed a few years ago. I will not name them but the content they generate is pathetically one sided. As much as the traditional media is seen by many to be pro government, these same sites were so blatantly anti government some of their content were highly questionable.

There are a few viewpoints to this issue. Some believe that having two extreme sides will even out the score. Some believe that we should actively prevent such ends from occurring. Others believe in natural selection, citing that extreme ends will never be supported by the mainstream. There is no right or wrong short run answer to this. We can only tell with time.

Wrong Mindset

However, there is one fair conclusion that we can arrive at. MDA has misunderstood online platforms. Choosing to bring online sites under the same jurisdictions as traditional media shows a complete misunderstanding of the issue. This is not about censorship, this is about perspective and management.

By using a one rule fits all, it shows naivety and inability to grasp the nuanced differences.

Online media operates and functions very differently from traditional media in many ways from procurement to editing and publishing. Adopting a one-rule-fits-all method shows naivety and inability to grasp the nuanced differences. They have to be treated separately. Pushing for unified legislation will yield little benefit to even the lawmakers in the long run.

Most disagreements are caused by misunderstandings and this is painfully apparent in this issue. One can only hope that our nation, both its leaders and citizens, will mature and understand how to utilize and govern new platforms. Quick adaptation is always the key to survival. The only difference today is that the required pace of adaptation has been severely hastened.

We cannot afford to fall behind.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

It is a foolish time to buy almost anything within the technological sphere. As the tech geek among my family and friends, I have been asked many times whether it is a good time to buy a new phone, or a desktop, tablet, etc. The answer has not been as easy as it is right now. If you can help it, don’t buy any device at the moment. We’re in a lull. A boring lull but one that will save your pockets. Here’s why.

Phones

There are four major operating systems competing for market share in the smartphone space. Android has a monopolistic lion’s share of the market followed by iOS, Windows Phone and Blackberry. At this point in time, all four operating systems are not worth investing fresh cash in. Let’s look at each of them.

This represents a lull in Android progression.

Google I/O has just passed and there was no mention of Android 5.0. Instead, Android 4.3 is on its way with some changes but nothing too groundbreaking. This represents a lull in Android progression ever since Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0). We have seen 4.1 and 4.2 Jellybean in the past year. While changes in these versions have been lauded, I do not find the progression from 4.0 to 4.2 something that you must absolutely upgrade to. This means that your Android 4.0 to 4.2 device is already one of the best phones on the market. Whether you own a Galaxy S3 or a One X or variations from LG and Motorola, you are not missing out on anything new. I expect the next huge update to Android to come next year. It will be a quiet year for the most popular mobile operating system and there is no reason for you to part your cash at the moment.

The iPhone 5 is more than 6 months old. This means we are less than 6 months to the iPhone 5S / 6. The operating system (iOS 6) has been stagnant with new features such as the much maligned maps and Siri not living to its hype. The good news is iOS 7 promises to be a major refresh. Looking at Apple’s track record, new versions of iOS do not usually run well on old devices. Since iOS 7 will be an exciting refresh, buying an iPhone 5 will not be a prudent move. If you want an iPhone, wait for the next one. It will be launched within 2 quarters and it will run iOS 7.

Since iOS 7 will be an exciting refresh, buying an iPhone 5 will not be a prudent move.

Windows Phone is an operating system that bears a lot of promise but is still not ready for prime time. There are major features that have yet to be added. On top of that, the app ecosystem remains poor. Microsoft is facing monopolistic moves from Google and is finding hard to get the most crucial apps on its operating system. Windows Phone 8 is a good upgrade over WP7 but it is still not enough to justify a purchase. Wait for WP9. I expect WP9, Windows 9 and the XBOX One to realise Microsoft’s single OS vision. This means that WP8 devices are not worth your time as yet.

Blackberry made a massive effort this year. BB10 is what the former mobile giants hope will return Blackberry to the top. Unfortunately, BB10 is a version 1.0 product. It is Blackberry’s first foray to a touch only OS and there are many kinks to work out. BB is one step behind Windows Phone and I can’t recommend the later as well. It is not yet the right time to get a Blackberry. Wait for version 2.0.

Tablets

The same deal occurs in the tablet space mainly because Android and iOS are pretty unified across both phones and tablets. The Nexus 7 and 10 are the devices to get if you desperately want an Android tablet. However, both of them are over a year old.

The iPad 4 was a move that shocked iPad 3 buyers. It relegated the later to an old product within 6 months. I am sure the iPad 4 will have a full year to run but we are already in mid cycle. If you wish to get a full sized iPad, wait for the 5. The iPad Mini is an interesting case. It is selling well, cannibalizing the sales of its larger sibling as expected. However, the iPad Mini is also in mid cycle and the next update should feature a high resolution screen. As such, hold the cash and wait for a few months.

Windows tablets are devices running Windows RT and not Windows 8. Windows 8 mobile devices are hybrids or laptops. As expected, Windows RT is not worth your time at the moment. The operating system is well made but app support is still low considering it is barely 8 months old. Give Windows RT tablets a pass at the moment. The OS is not ready and so is the hardware. Most RT tablets run on nVidia’s Tegra 3 processor. It is already dated and does not serve too well even on Android counterparts.

Tablet wise, buying one now is a big no as well.

Hybrids & Laptops

Windows 8 launched a wide variety of new form factors. We saw many types of hybrids, screens that flipped and twisted. Some could be detached or even had displays on both sides. It is a crazy world. The designs are interesting and some of them are innovative. Unfortunately, the hardware just isn’t ready.

Windows 8 is a right move for Microsoft but Intel has yet to catch up. Current processors are either too power hungry (Core i3 / 5 /7 series) or too weak (Atom Clovertrail). You can choose between amazing performance with poor battery life or vice versa. The good news is that Intel will be releasing Haswell (Core series) and Silvermont (Atom series) at the end of this year. Both of them promise good performance with good battery life. Early benchmarks and leaks are very promising and Intel seldom under delivers. If you are in for a Windows 8 hybrid or laptop – wait till the end of the year.

If you are in for a Windows 8 hybrid or laptop – wait till the end of the year. Ditto for Macs.

The same moves by Intel can be applied to Macbooks. The 2012 series is past mid cycle and I am pretty certain that the next upgrade will feature Haswell chips. It will be very foolish to buy a laptop now unless you really need one. This applies both to Windows and Mac. End 2013 will bring irresistible goodies. Wait for it.

Desktops

Apple’s professional desktop line up has been left in the dust. There’s no reason to buy really dated hardware as Cupertino is more focused on pushing mobile products. The iMac line is reaching mid cycle on an old processor. Wait for the refresh.

The same can be said of Windows desktops. Ivy Bridge has not been a huge performance increase over Sandy Bridge. In fact, yours truly is still using a Nehalem chip that is performing very well… for four years and counting. Haswell will not be a tremendous game changer for desktops unless you utilize onboard graphics (or integrated graphics). Intel has pushed GPU performance and you will find significant performance boosts for midrange desktops. That of course will be due at the end of the year.

And so, now would be a poor time to get a new desktop.

Wait, Wait, Wait

This is kind of a downer. As a geek who has just graduated and is about to begin a full time job, I wished I could celebrate this transition with a new device. I could do with a tablet or a hybrid but it will be a poor move to buy anything now.

You should only buy if you really need a new device now.

The economist in me is focused on maximizing returns on each dollar spent. Sadly, technology is in a lull at the moment. You should only buy if you really need a new device now. Otherwise, wait. There are plenty of good things on the horizon. End 2013 and the coming year will be exciting.

For now, your wallet will enjoy some peace.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

LTA’s evaluation of a change in ERP system this week peaked my interest. They are looking move from a single charge entry fee to one that is distance based. There are many sides to the coin here when it comes to a specific set of roads that undergo such charges but I thought it would be interesting to extrapolate this idea and look at how we should better target taxes to solve congestion issues.

Singapore’s taxes on motor vehicles is considered one of the most successful in the world. Putting aside the chagrin of taxpayers, economists agree that the system in Singapore seems to work. It is well known that the income elasticity of demand for vehicle ownership is well over the top. This means that a positive change in income is highly likely to heavily encourage the person to buy a vehicle. Privately owned vehicles fall into many product categories. It can range from a necessity to a luxury good. It can be crucial for getting work done or may be purely a symbol of social status. As such, categories transcend consumer types. This makes proper taxation and controls extremely difficult to target. A poorly targeted tax system will result in tremendous inefficiencies. This is the reason why controlling the quantity of motor vehicles has been a huge problem for Singapore, if not, anywhere in the world.

What matters is controlling the usage of motor vehicles. Notice I chose the word ‘usage’ not ‘ownership’.

Economic theory suggests that road expansions never work. The wider the roads, the more cars you get. You can widen the road infinitely and be amazed at how more and more cars will get on it. This eliminates that argument that congestion is more problematic in Singapore because of our relatively very narrow two to three lane roads. This affects anyone, size does not matter. What matters is controlling the usage of motor vehicles. Notice I chose the word ‘usage’ not ‘ownership’.

Car Ownership

The cost of car ownership opens up a huge jumble of taxes. There is the actual price of the car and the cost of a Certificate of Entitlement (COE). The later almost always ensures that this first set of costs will rise past S$100,000. The COE is a quota ceiling. A predetermined number of cars are allowed into the roads in each time period. At this fixed quota, prospective buyers can bid. Obviously, bidding prices can rise up to astronomical sums as we have seen for many years.

This is where the COE is flawed. It works in absolute terms but fails to align the incentives of the consumers to that of the government.

This quota system is one of the most direct ways of controlling car ownership from the perspective of lawmakers. They get the data of how many cars there are in Singapore and then decide on how much to add in each time period. However, this system makes it difficult for car buyers to understand why they are paying such a hefty amount. Sure, you can tell people that prices are high because quantities are limited. But, they will be inclined to believe that quotas are set artificially high to generate tremendous tax revenues. This is where the COE is flawed. It works in absolute terms but fails to align the incentives of the consumers to that of the government. Public policy is not about getting things done, it is the art of making others see the way you do. Accomplishing this makes sure that people will do what you want them to… willingly.

There are plenty of other taxes, road tax, parking, ERP, fuel, the list goes on. All these simply serve to show one thing, our system of taxation is making it difficult for consumers to understand why prices are so high. We have failed to align their interests with ours. Such inefficiencies must be removed.

Car Usage

What is the actual problem? Is it ownership or usage? This is a basic question that we might have glazed over in the early years of policy formulation. The problem is usage not ownership. The only problem that ownership may cause is that of parking. It does not matter how many cars we have in Singapore if not all of them are in use. A car parked in a garage puts no burden on the road. We must focus on the correct issue here – controlling the number of cars on the road.

The economic value placed in most consumer products focuses on ownership and not usage. We must use this behaviour to our advantage.

With this in mind, the artificially high prices of car ownership makes no sense. Why are we putting so much effort and feeling so much pain from a system that does not target our problems? Focus on the issue. Limit car usage – lower the amount of cars on the road, not the amount of cars in Singapore. Making it difficult or extremely pricey for an individual to own a car limits his perceived freedom to consume.

This is a very important point that cannot be ignored. People want to feel that they are free to own what they like. Owning something is half the battle won. Just look at consumer behaviour over many different types of goods. The economic value placed in most consumer products (homes, clothes, electronics, etc) focuses on ownership and not usage. Many have huge wardrobes of clothes but barely 20% of that gets used. Geeks have tons of gadgets and in reality, only one or two are used daily. The same goes for more durable goods.

In short, people want to own things. Asset ownership creates and captures a sense of accomplishment, adding value to an individual’s life. We should not attempt to curb such humanistic desires. Let people own cars but discourage them from using it.

How

Lower or scrap the COE. As shown above, the COE is not the right way of solving this issue. It is indirect and it causes a disconnect between the people and the government. By lowering or removing COE, you reduce the sunk cost. In economics, the sunk theory means that people will be more likely to use a product if they have already paid a lot for it. This is to maximize the value of the very expensive good they paid for. By dropping the price substantiatively, you reduce this sunk cost and thus the incentive to drive at every opportunity available falls.

Lower or scrap the COE. Create distance based taxes.

To control car usage, create distance based taxes. This is basically the same way public transport usage is being charged. The longer you travel the pricier it gets. This should not occur only in ERP zones, this should occur anywhere in the country (with the removal of the insensitive COE of course).

We have the infrastructure to track vehicles using satellites and GPS. We have the capability to calculate the distance that each vehicle transverses. Change that cash card in the ERP in-vehicle-unit (IVU) to one that is similar to an ezlink card used on buses and trains in public transit. Own any number of vehicles you want. Buy them at their actual prices without ridiculously high COE taxes. But, the further you drive, the more you pay.

This system can be expanded to have different rates for different roads. Pricing can be dynamic, congested zones can be dynamically managed all through a flexible price mechanism. People won’t be stopped from buying what they want but they will be discouraged from using things over extensively and inefficiently. This system lets people own cars but keeps them on their toes about driving too much and thus eating up precious road space.

Benefits

This change in focus sidesteps a few thorny issues. It is no secret that most Singaporeans feel that they should be able to own a home and a vehicle. At least one per household. Most children are told that if they study hard, they will be able to own a house and a car when they transit into the workforce. Allowing ownership but reducing usage will play into this.

Secondly, some people simply own cars as a social symbol. In a lengthy report on car ownership, I spoke to a number of young Singaporean graduates. They felt they needed to own a car to be on par with those who are of the same social circle. There is nothing elitist about it. Singapore churns out a tremendous proportion of graduates each year, this social circle is a very big one. These people are not too bothered about using their cars everyday. They just want to own one. They just want to be part of the social norm. Again, allowing ownership but reducing usage is a better solution.

Make it extremely easy for people to compare the cost of private transport to that of public transport.

Thirdly, the system I proposed mirrors the public transport system very closely for a huge reason. Make it extremely easy for people to compare the cost of private transport to that of public transport. No one should need to a calculator to see if it is more worth it to drive or to ride. When both systems are distance based and the mode of execution is uncannily similar, people will automatically draw comparisons without being told to. They will attempt to save cost and this represents a very powerful way to encourage people to use public transport in place of driving.

Transparency and Efficiency

The role of taxes is to account for inefficiencies in the market. Unfortunately, taxes are innately inefficient. What must be done is to make the system as transparent as possible, one that any individual is able to understand and grasp without afterthought. This is why we need to focus on car usage islandwide instead of a more short sighted solution of controlling car ownership.

It is time Singapore targeted the right problem and worked with its people. Understand the desire of the populace to own cars while ensuring roads remain efficient.

This is not a pipe dream. This can be done.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

The HD Pro C920 is Logitech’s top of the line web camera built for use with desktops and laptops. As it lies in the premium tier, the C920 packs as much as it can in both hardware and software. Its differentiating factor from the competition is its ability to handle H.264 video compression within the camera itself. This relieves the burden on the CPU as video compression can be resource guzzling. In a nutshell, the C920 performs well above most of the web cameras out in the market today. This is not surprising as it is a premium level product. This review is focused on the differentiating points which includes onboard H.264 compression, motion detection and its ability to Skype in 1080p. The Logitech HD Pro Webcam C920 retails at S$159.00.

Hardware

The C920 has a small footprint and easily clips onto the back of any monitor. However, it is a little hefty for use on a laptop. The rubberized clip and hinge is sturdy and there were no attachment issues when using the webcam. Interestingly, the webcam can be mounted onto standard tripods. This is a nice feature that most buyers will unfortunately not use. As the C920 is not a mobile recording device, you will always need it to be attached to a computer. As such, tripod mounting allows you greater flexibility to mount the camera.

Logitech has opted for the Carl Zeiss lens with 20-step autofocus. The autofocus precision is crucial here due to its software capabilities that will be explained later. In terms of audio, the C920 features built-in dual stereo mics with automatic noise reduction. The stereo microphones are located on both ends of the camera facing forward. Lining these microphones are two thin LEDs that light up to alert the user that the camera has been switched on.

The C920 features impressive hardware specifications for a web camera and looks sleek.

Overall, the C920 is a well crafted device that is easy to attach. It features impressive hardware specifications for a web camera and looks sleek being finished in a mixture of matte and gloss black.

Software

The C920 integrates directly into Skype and other instant messaging platforms due to the way Windows handles web cameras in general. Call quality on Skype was good and the C920 was able to push out a full 1080p performance at a respectable FPS. This was one of the best Skype quality calls I have experienced in camera tests. Do not expect the performance to be similar to a 1080p recording off a DSLR or a dedicated camera. The C920 is still a web camera and do not fall in the same league as dedicated devices.

The main software package for the C920 comes from Logitech’s Webcam Software (LWS). The LWS allows capturing of still images and video. It also has a dedicated section for sharing images and videos to web platforms such as Facebook and YouTube. Tests on sharing were positive but performance is heavily dependent on your broadband connection.

The Logitech Webcam Software’s main function is to allow the user to take photos and videos. You can swap between Photo and Video modes. Photo captures were good but not outstanding. Considering that it natively captures images at 1080p before upscaling to a maximum of 15 megapixels, the C920 is unable to beat more common mainstream capture devices such as smartphones. Most smartphones now offer more than 5 megapixels natively while the C920 works out to be just under 2MP native. Nonetheless, the sensor is able to take relatively good images at low light and will make do in most situations. The C920 captures the best photos among web cameras but do not expect it to outdo your smartphone.

The 1080p performance was exceptional as compared to competing web cameras.

The strength of the C920 is in video capture. H.264 compression indeed runs on the camera with little strain on CPU resources. You can capture videos at 1920 x 1080 (1080p), 1280 x 720 (720p), 480p and 360p. All four resolutions produced sharp images with good light balance and frame rates. The 1080p performance was exceptional as compared to competing web cameras. Being able to keep a near steady 29-30FPS on 1080p is an achievement for web cameras. Logitech has auto image enhancement via its RightLight option which helps to compensate rooms that are poorly lit. The only downside is video detail. There was quite a clear lack of detail in certain environments. This may be attributed to its low bitrate. Nonetheless, this requires scrutiny to detect and most users will not notice it.

There are some innovative features in video capturing, you can choose to have the camera follow your face if you record at 480p or 360p. This feature did not work well. The camera moved too slowly for it to be useful. Recording at lower resolutions also allows you to use the camera’s pan, tilt and zoom feature. While this can be nice, it is recommended to stick to full 1080p and physically adjust the camera to get the best out of the C920.

One of the more interesting portions of the LWS is its ability to detect motion. The C920 can be set to record videos the moment it detects a higher than normal amount of activity. This can be calibrated via a slider seen in the screenshot above. You can choose to timestamp videos, turn audio recording on and even hide the recording light indicator. The software has a scheduling option should you require motion detection capture only at certain times of the day.

The LWS allows you to use your C920 as a motion activated security camera.

In short, the LWS allows you to use your C920 as a motion activated security camera. A practical case use is to schedule motion detection capture during the night to record any attempts at intrusion. Tests on motion detection went well. With proper calibration, the LWS performed as expected and was rather precise in starting and stopping on the dot. This can be crucial as some software take too long to start recording, rendering the feature useless. The LWS sidesteps that issue and does its job well in this area.

Conclusion

The C920 is one of the best web cameras available on the market. It improves considerably from its predecessors and leapfrogs competitors due to its onboard H.264 compression. While some detail is sacrificed for a responsive performance, the video, photo and audio quality remains best in class for web cameras.

As the English Premier League of 12/13 passes, we look forward to a summer of transfer rumors and activity. Before doing so, it would be good to take stock of how Arsenal has performed. Benchmarks must be made in two ways – against other teams and also in comparison with the season of 11/12. I hope that this statistically driven write up will reveal the strengths and weaknesses of the squad. The first part of the review is driven by hard data and is followed by a more qualitative (and subjective) review of individual players.

The Overall Picture

Statistics must be taken in context, without which comparisons are futile. Let us begin by comparing the points tally of 11/12  and 12/13. The latest season is marked in black and the former in grey.

A few things stand out in this graph. 12/13 showed a smoother curve that depicted a closer and more competitive league. 11/12 had a much more segmented profile with the top 2 teams taking the lion’s share of points (City and United at 89 points). This time, United was the runaway leaders at the same level of 89 points and only 6 points separated 2nd and 5th place. Teams in the 3rd, 4th and 5th places managed to garner a higher number of points than before as can be seen by the sizeable gap between 11/12 and 12/13. This is testament to the increase in competitiveness of Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham respectively. Of course, the gains in this area were likely to be offset by a rather dramatic fall in points of the team in second position (City).

This graph allows us the segment the league into four parts. It is from here that I will take a first look at how Arsenal performed. The table below shows how Arsenal have performed against four segments of the league. Teams placed first to fifth are United, City, Chelsea and Tottenham (Arsenal excluded of course). 6th to 7th include Everton and Liverpool. 17th to 20th are Sunderland, Wigan, Reading and QPR, all of whom fell below the 40 point mark. And the rest are found from 8th to 16th.

The key takeaway from this table is the ‘% Max’ column. This column shows the percentage of points (out of the maximum) that Arsenal took from each segment. While the distribution of ‘% Max’ is rather logical, it also shows two things.

Arsenal have been efficient at securing points that they were expected to bring home. The collection of 74.07% of points (8th and 16th) and a near perfect 91.67% from the relegation battlers is a good show of efficiency. These were points we were expected to pick up and we did.

However, what is worrying comes from the top end of the table. Arsenal has had a terrible showing against the top 5 teams, picking up only 20.83% of the maximum points available and winning only 1 game (home against Tottenham). The same poor percentage can be seen against Everton and Liverpool where we failed to take maximum points in 3 out of 4 games.

In short, Arsenal performed as expected for a team that finished 4th. They did increasingly well against poorer teams but suffered tremendously against the three teams above them. A huge improvement against the top league segment must be seen if the Gunners are bidding to be title challengers next season.

Form and Momentum

Looking at facts as seen above ignores the crucial element of momentum and form. It is at this point that I will make a comparison of the three teams that battled for third and fourth – Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham.

On first glance, one will not see much of a difference since all 3 teams finished within three points of each other. It is clear that Chelsea started the season the brightest taking close to maximum points from their opening 8 games. However, the bright start was hampered by a poor streak from game 9 to 15. The poorest run of all three teams. Chelsea recovered with a short winning streak before seeing their season see-saw between wins and draws/losses. The early season performance was critical in notching Chelsea its 3rd place.

Arsenal’s and Tottenham’s season started differently but ended up playing out rather similarly. Tottenham had the worst start of the three but showed their best winning steak from games 4 to 7. This was only replicated in games 25 to 28. Arsenal on the other hand endured a an unconvincing start to the season with the team swinging between wins and losses. The turning point came at game 15 which saw Arsenal start a run of 4 wins in a row. This was repeated from game 29 to 32 which came after a confidence boosting victory at Munich. Both Arsenal and Tottenham closed out their seasons very similarly. It was due to this that both sets of fans had a nervy finish to the final whistle.

The charts here show how important it is to get the momentum flowing for the team. Chelsea’s superb start was nearly matched by Arsenal’s superb run at the end. Tottenham did not manage to build sufficient momentum throughout and missed 4th place by only a point.

Goals For, Goals Against

The other way to read Arsenal’s performance is by looking at its goal difference in each game. This can show how well the team performed in each game (or how poor the opposition might have been). The first graph shows clearly how shaky the season started. Besides a morale boosting 5 goal margin win against Southampton (6-1), the Gunners blew hot and cold throughout ending with a 0-2 loss against Swansea. This was the worst defeat of the season (next to the 0-2 loss against City). After Swansea, the team turned around with a consistent push against WBA up till Newcastle. We recorded good winning margins in a strong finish to year 2012. 2013 started off without the same fluency but it was here that Arsenal grinded out important single goal difference wins with three of them coming against Stoke, Sunderland and Villa. The second dip of the season came with a loss away to Spurs but that triggered a positive return in goal margins till the end of the season. Again, many single goal margin victories were key to the Gunners picking up points.

If we extrapolate and sum the margins, we get a rather well and normally distributed curve. Our most common margin of victory was a single goal (9 times). Around 37% of our points were picked up in these critical wins. This emphasizes how important hanging on to a lead was to the Gunners. Steve Bould and Wenger gave the team a renewed focus on defence and that paid off in points. As Walcott mentioned at the end of the season, a strong defence was the critical difference this season.

This bridges our analysis from momentum to goal scoring and conceding. Again, I would like to benchmark Arsenal’s goal for and against in two ways. Let us look at how Arsenal fared against the best teams this season. Then, we take a look at how each of the teams did against themselves in 11/12.

United lead the goal scoring chart this season but did not do as well as they did the season before. They managed to score 3 more goals in 11/12 as compared to 12/13. However, this small difference can be reduced to an insignificant statistical difference. Liverpool and Chelsea were the most improved teams. The former netted an additional 24 goals, no doubt boosted by a rich vein of form by Suarez. Chelsea’s purchase of attacking options resulted in the second best improvement of 10 goals pushing them to the second highest goal scoring team in 12/13.

Arsenal sold their top scorer but managed to return almost the same number of goals as the season before. It was 2 short of 11/12 but again that margin is again too small to be deemed significant. Tottenham scored exactly the same number of goals with a large percentage of it falling to Bale’s excellent form this season.

It is here that we can endeavour to attribute how City fell from being a powerhouse in 11/12 to a considerably weaker force in 12/13. City’s goal scoring tally fell by a massive 27 goals. It is a very significant drop considering that they retained their potent attacking force that notched 93 goals last season. Balotelli was sold only in January.

In defence, Arsenal posted a massive improvement conceding 12 goals lesser than the season past. Again, this ties into our earlier conclusion that single goal victories underlined the importance of an improved defence. Chelsea posted an improvement as well conceding 7 less. However, most teams fell behind defensively with City, United and Liverpool conceding more than they have before.

There are two key takeaways from this. Chelsea was the most improved team in this area. They improved in both scoring and conceding less. This increased their goal difference by a massive 17. Arsenal was the second most improved team with an improved goal difference of 10. Both teams traded second and third places in both tables posting good scoring and defensive records. Unsurprisingly, only two points separated the two.

This brings us to the last part of the data driven review. Arsenal’s goal scoring burden was well distributed as seen below.

While Robin van Persie took a major share of the scoring burden in 11/12, Arsenal more than adequately replaced his goals in 12/13. Walcott improved on his tally by 6 goals, close to doubling what he achieved in 11/12. Cazorla, Giroud and Podolski came almost equal, netting 12, 11 and 11 goals respectively.

The trio are the second, third and fourth Arsenal players who have scored more than 10 in their first season in the EPL. The first is obviously Thierry Henry in his debut season. Also, this is only the fourth time in Premier League history where a club posted 4 goal scorers who broke past the 10 goal mark.

We lost a recognized goal getter for a more distributed share of the load. There are pros and cons to this and I will leave it to you to decide. Arsenal would have liked to have a recognized goal scoring leader but we were definitely not dependent on any individual this season.

Defensively, I have rehashed the data from WhoScored and have highlighted the leading players in each defensive department.

It is not surprising that Arteta leads in two categories – tackling and interceptions. Koscielny was one of our finest defenders as the season closed out, putting in a large share of clearances and blocks in each match. Interestingly, Per Mertesacker did not feature too highly on this table. He managed a high number of clearances, barely losing out to Kosc at 4.8 but his tackling (1) and interceptions (1.5) fell rather short of the leaders here.

However, it is important to note that defensive performances cannot be read from individual figures. Mertesacker’s positioning has been a more important attribute to the team as he read play well throughout the season. This cannot be captured by raw data.

Individuals

I will end the review by highlighting some players that stood out for me.

Most improved: Gibbs & Ramsey

Gibbs was a very important part of the team early in the season. His partnership with Podolski was outstanding and was the focus of most of our attacking play. He was sorely missed when he got injured and Santos was unable to replace him, leading to the hastened purchase of Nacho Monreal.

Ramsey is an obvious pick because he suffered in 11/12 and also in the early parts of 12/13. With his favoured CAM position filled by both Cazorla and Wilshere, he was forced to play on the wings before being given a permanent role as a CM. In short, he took over Diaby’s position. Ramsey is still not a polished CM. He has much to learn and improve on but he has been one of the best improvements Arsenal has seen individually this season.

Most reliable: Mertesacker & Arteta

Arteta and Mertesacker’s consistent presence in the team has been a key element of our defensive solidity. Koscielny has his ups and downs taking time to return to form after suffering two injury setbacks. Thomas Vermaelen faded after a strong start to the season while Sagna also suffered some degree of inconsistency. In face of these, the BFG and our vice captain stood as key defensive players that were ever present in the team. Both possess a good ability to read the game and were pillars of our improved defence.

Most creative: Cazorla

Many have called for Cazorla to be given the title of Player of the Season. While I won’t be dishing that out in this article, Cazorla has easily been our most creative player going forward. His ability to keep the ball under pressure and deliver very accurate passes both short and long is outstanding. He has created many goals and is our second top scorer in the league. The little Spaniard has had his best season ever (statistically). It is no wonder why Arsenal plays well when Cazorla plays well.

Most lethal: Walcott

Walcott edges this out by virtue of being our top goalscorer. The young Englishman suffered a season of up and downs. He started out as a bench warmer before being driven to perform under contract uncertainties. He then suffered a dip in form before roaring back to score important goals including 3 that were scored in the opening two minutes of the match (Everton, United, QPR).

With Giroud being sometimes wasteful in front of goal, Walcott and Podolski were our sharpest finishers. Podolski packed a more powerful shot but Walcott’s accuracy in front of goal was a trademark of his play this season. If he continues to work hard, he may come closer to realizing his dream of being the next Henry.

Looking Ahead

Finishing 4th this season is an achievement only because of the circumstances that led to it. We sold our top scorer and our top provider. In their place, we had untested new players who had no EPL experience. Adding to that, Chelsea and Tottenham made tremendous improvements of their own, leading to a very close finish between 2nd to 5th place.

4th place is a stepping stone. It is an important bar to cross and one that Wenger has to build on. The commercial team seems to have done their work landing good financial deals throughout the season. Wenger is said to have a real war chest for once and he must use it wisely to bring the team up to another level.

4th place is a stepping stone. It is an important bar to cross and one that Wenger has to build on.

It is imperative that we keep the team together and value experienced players. Players like Rosicky, Arteta and Sagna deserve long contracts. Yes, they may no longer play every game each season but their experience counts. The young players need guidance and our 30+ year olds will do well to lead them both on and off the pitch.

What is critical is for Wenger to find ways to inject belief and mental strength when it comes to playing against the top teams. It is clear that this is our area of weakness and challengers for the title must possess both efficiency in killing off small teams while being able to notch points against the top few. We only managed one out of the two this season and the team needs to step it up.

It is all about having a winning mentality and a belief that the team can take on anyone. The win at Munich was critical and we need more of that from the get go next season.

Conclusion

It has been a roller coaster ride. I have covered almost every weekend game of the season on this blog. I have enjoyed your comments via Twitter and this will be my last football related article this season. I hope you had an enjoyable, informative and objective read this season.

Expectations will be raised for 13/14.

From pain, doubts, uncertainty and being written off to qualifying with the best run of form for a long time without help from other teams or relying on a single player, Arsenal have performed ahead of expectations and now these expectations will be raised for 13/14.

How the summer plays out will be the first step forward and I hope to see the team push forward hard for the title next season.

Victoria Concordia Crescit. COYG!

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

It was a tense match. Many fans could not bear to watch it. But we did it. 1-0 to the Arsenal. 1 point ahead of Spurs and we are in the Champions League again. Newcastle brushed aside their horrible home form to put up a very good performance. They quickly surrounded our players and used their physical advantage well. It was a nerve wrecking match but the team made it count, just as they have done consistently in an amazing ten game run, picking up 26 out of 30 possible points.

First Half

Arsenal found it difficult to break forward in the first half. Nerves were clearly showing. Newcastle had better options going forward and were more efficient in their passes and runs. There was a strong sense of hesitation from the Gunners. It was a mixture of attempting to play it safe so as not to be caught on the counter while trying to put an attack together. You can’t blame the team for doing so but we needed a win. Arteta had to be substituted early as Wenger’s gamble on playing the vice captain did not pay off. To be frank, he was not having too bright a match. Oxlade Chamberlain took over as Ramsey covered the role of the deepest lying midfielder.

Newcastle looked fresher and imposed themselves on the game. They could have benefitted from not playing midweek but tiredness should be a non issue considering this was the final game of the season. Nonetheless, they were physically bigger and the defense had trouble dealing with their directness. Mertesacker had trouble coping with players that could both out-muscle and speed past him. At times, you wonder why Wenger stopped signing big, pacey players. Now, we have small and pacey or big and relatively slow.

At times, you wonder why Wenger stopped signing big, pacey players.

The same problem of having players spread too far out occurred  Newcastle had an easy time winning balls because our players had no one to pass to after being closed down really quickly. Many a times, there were at least 3 to 4 Newcastle players between a spread out Arsenal team and this was affecting our build up substantially. The result was long balls that were not really accurate and gave receiving players trouble in controlling them. More hesitation ensued.

Arsenal had chances with Cazorla skewing horribly wide from a Gibbs lay off. The little Spaniard did not know he had time and took it on the fly. Podolski went through on goal only to be flagged offside. On the other end Newcastle had chances of their own with Cisse and Ben Arfa wasting good opportunities.

It was scrappy first half. Fouls were being committed in the middle often that broke play down. Both teams had trouble furnishing fluent attacks and set pieces were being wasted. At the half time mark, all three key matches stood as draws with Arsenal fans getting more nervous by the minute.

Second Half

The second half started the same way the first ended. Attacks went down the flanks on both ends. The middle flank was packed full of players and numerous fouls awarded and missed. There were a few nasty ones that went unseen but the game was largely kept under control with Arsenal focused on ensuring that the result went their way.

Koscielny had scored the winner in the 3-2 win at West Brom in last season’s closing fixture. Today he did it again, ensuring that the Gunners finished ahead of Spurs.

There seemed to be little going for the Gunners until Walcott whipped in a good free kick from the right, near the corner flag. The ball was nudged towards goal where Koscielny executed a magnificent overhead kick to smash the ball into the net grazing the face of the ‘keeper. It was a well taken, acrobatic goal. More impressively, it came from a center back. Koscielny had scored the winner in the 2-3 win at West Brom in last season’s closing fixture. Today he did it again, ensuring that the Gunners finished ahead of Spurs.

The Arsenal fans celebrated. It was relief. We needed 3 points because we were sure Sunderland couldn’t hold out. You have to give credit to Spurs, they have taken three points in the final ten minutes of their games and we were sure they would do it again. And they did. Sunderland was reduced to 10 men before Bale once again gave Spurs a glimmer of hope.

Arsenal was desperate to keep the three points. Newcastle was fired up to win due to a combination of home pressure and Ashley’s $1m carrot. The game opened up. Arsenal sat back, invited pressure and sprung forward on the counter. We had chances to push the advantage but failed to make any count. Podolski and Cazorla were brought off for Giroud and Wilshere. Giroud was getting defensive work done, tracking back, sliding in and keeping Newcastle at bay.

Giroud has no pace but his touches and flicks release fast wingers. Too bad Theo didn’t make the most of it.

It fell to Giroud to win a long clearance with two Newcastle players on him. He managed to steer the ball to Walcott who dinked past the last defender only to hit the post. The fans gasped. Thankfully, we didn’t have to regret that. This is what Giroud brings into the Arsenal game. He is not a good finisher and he has no pace but his touches and flicks release fast wingers. Too bad Theo didn’t make the most of it.

The game closed out soon after. Arsenal were determined and kept a good defensive line. Newcastle did not have much of a chance the moment Arsenal went into lock down mode. 1-0 to the Arsenal. 1 point ahead of Spurs. And Champions League for the 17th season in a row.

Just Did It

It took a great run. League statistics point that we are the most in form team for the past 3 months. We took a massive 26 out of 30 points in that run. Yet, some credit must be given to Chelsea and Tottenham. It was a very close finish and all three teams were in good form. It took an exceptional end of season run from the Gunners to remain in the Champions League. It took many 1-0 victories. It took guts and courage. It took victories when we were down to 10 man. And, it all counted in the end.

This is exactly why I am proud of the finish. We didn’t need lasagnagate, nor did we need a Fulop. The team went out there and got themselves across the finishing line even though the rest of the competition did well.

It took many 1-0 victories. It took guts and courage. It took victories when we were down to 10 man. And, it all counted in the end.

The season is over. It was a roller coaster. It was not an easy ride but that was what made this season’s closure one to be celebrated. There seems much to look forward to. The top three teams will be changing their managers and Arsenal seems to finally have a real transfer budget. The summer looks promising and I am looking forward to it. Not because of possible signings but because I have had my heart in my mouth for too many weekends.

Thank you for ending the season on high. Thank you for doing the job when everyone said we couldn’t.

And of course, happy St. Totteringham’s day!

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

The Logitech Ultimate Ears headphones comprises a family of 3 variations – the UE 4000, UE 6000 and UE 9000. The Logitech UE promise is an attention to detail and sound quality. Audiophiles will know that almost anything (and everything) affects audio performance. It’s not just the drivers but also the manner in which the cans are housed, cables used and much more. How does the UE 4000, 6000 and 9000 hold up? This article is a detailed joint review and cross comparison of the 3 models available. The UE series are priced at S$159, S$319 and S$599 respectively.

Specifications & Differences

The combined specifications have been put into a table for easy cross referencing.

All 3 earphones utilize 40mm drivers. However, drivers are just one portion of the equation. The frequency response stands at 20 Hz to 20 kHz which is again standard across the board. In terms of noise isolation, the higher end models spot a slight increase in noise isolation. However, the increase is minute and rather negligible. Sensitivity is also roughly similar as seen in the table above.

The biggest specification difference is on impedance. Impedance is a tricky specification. It is not necessarily the higher the better. The level of impedance must be weighted by the voltage when considering the power of the device. The UE 4000 and 9000 shares the same impedance while the UE 6000 has a huge jump should the onboard amplifier be switched on. Based on the specifications of the devices, the UE 6000 does have an advantage in this area. This is not surprising considering that it is the only one of the three that sports an onboard amplifier powered by two AAA sized batteries. The specifications do not vary by much, the main differences between the three comes in its feature set.

The specifications do not vary by much, the main differences between the three comes in its feature set.

I will list the differences in point form:

• The lowest end UE 4000 is an on ear headphone. It doesn’t cover your entire ear. The UE 6000 and 9000 features around the ear cups which most audiophiles will prefer.
• The UE 6000 has a unique feature of having an onboard amplifier. This amplifier is powered by two triple A sized batteries. With the amplifier on, noise cancelling is improved. More importantly, amplitude (volume) and  some upsampling occurs. The onboard amp is well implemented because it will shut off when your batteries run out without affecting music playback. Without batteries (or with dead batteries), the UE 6000 reverts to one without the onboard amplifier.
• The UE 9000 has the most bells and whistles but lacks the onboard amplifier of the 6000. What the UE 9000 has is wireless Bluetooth connection to devices. It can pair up to 8 devices which is similar to what the UE boomboxes could. This wireless feature is powered by a built in battery. The battery is non removable and must be charged via a micro USB cable. Battery power is rated at 10 hours of playback or talk time.
• The UE 4000, 6000 and 9000 can make calls via a corded mic on the cable. What the 9000 has is dual mics located on the headphone itself. This means that there is no need for a cord to make calls. The cord can be used when the 9000 runs out of battery. This is a very helpful feature and you won’t be out of options should you forget to charge.

In short, the UE 9000 has an excellent feature set. It is the most complete headphone out there. You can take calls wireless, pair up with many devices and in a worst case scenario, use it corded. The UE 6000 is a corded headphone with an onboard amplifier. The UE 4000 on the other hand is a basic headphone and, like the rest, has the ability to make calls. The differences in feature sets is accounted for accordingly in the retail prices.

Hardware Tests

Putting audio performance aside, the most important test for the headphones is the ease of use. The accessories for the headphones are very similar. They use similar cords and are crafted very similarly. The cord feels sturdy and is crafted to be tangle free. The controls on the cord are built for iOS. You can use the middle button to play, pause and pick up calls on all phones but the volume buttons will only work on iOS.

The build quality on all three headsets is great. The UE 6000 takes the cake for being the most comfortable.

The headphones felt comfortable overall. The UE 6000 felt the most comfortable as it sported the thickest head cushion of all three. In terms of the around-the-ear cups for the UE 6000 and 9000, they did the job without fuss. The only downside is that your ears may feel a little warm over time but this is to be expected of all around-the-ear cups.

All three headphones can be adjusted to fit different head sizes. The mechanism for extension is well built and smooth. The build quality on all three headsets is great. The UE 6000 takes the cake for being the most comfortable.

Audio Performance

In terms of audio quality, the headphones were plugged into a Creative X-Fi Titanium sound card. The X-Fi Titanium was set at 96kHz at 24 bit as that is the best performance the card can offer. I used a series of different audio files to test the headphones. These include six 3,000kbps FLAC Hi Def audio files from HD Tracks and twenty 320kbps MP3 files. The genres range from orchestral live performances, vocals, country, blues, rock and pop. This would allow me to better understand the strengths and weaknesses of the headphones.

Besides pure audio files, I also tested the headphones with a high definition video file. An 18GB MKV H264 1920×1080, 23.976 FPS Transformers II file was used. This master copy utilized DTS Audio (6 channels) @ 48kHz and was the highest quality movie I had.

The audio performances of all three headphones were similar in most situations.

Interestingly, the audio performances of all three headphones were similar in most situations. You can put this down to the almost equal specifications of all three headphones. There is a distinct difference between the UE 4000 and the rest due to the on-ear vs around-the-ear cups. The onboard amplifier did help the UE 6000 create a slightly wider soundstage but it was not too significant.

The audio performance is delightful. It is bright, energetic which makes it well suited for music on the go. However, some details were not as clear when compared to other headphones and speakers. Overall, the Logitech UE headphones performed well, almost equal on all fronts.

Conclusion

The question on which headphone to get is dependent on features rather than audio quality. The UE 4000 delivers good sound without frills. Unlike most headphones, it allows you to take calls which is a very nice feature. If you want an around-the-ear pair of headphones, the UE 6000 is the right choice with a small boost in audio performance. It is also the most comfortable of the lot. The UE 9000 is pricey but it has everything you can ask for on a headphone. It takes calls wirelessly, delivers great sound, has good controls on the headphones itself and its Bluetooth connectivity is top notch. I have yet to experienced a drop out.

Logitech’s UE headphone series is targeted at a balanced performance. It has everything a headphone lover would want and the manner in which each headphone is made enables it to cover varying segments of the market.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

Google IO 2013 was heavily targeted at developers unlike the IOs of the past. There was no real new consumer hardware and glasses did not make an appearance in the keynote. What Google did this year was to tighten the bolts and iron out the chinks. Google has a massive list of products and Larry Page’s appointment was meant to bring things together to unify the different services that could be rather haphazard at worst. That was what IO 2013 was about.

There were three main areas that Google focused on. It’s web services, content delivery and a different relationship with hardware makers. In doing so, its methods of dealing with competing companies – Apple and Microsoft, together with its short term vision of Android was revealed. Here are the key takeaways of Google IO 2013.

Web Services & Google+

The main driver of the keynote was web services. This is Google’s core business and it is good that they are returning to their roots. There were a host of updates from better developer APIs, tools and an OS version independent implementation. On top of that, new consumer focused features were unveiled.

Search and Maps had major updates. Google’ Glass’ ‘Ok Glass’ commands can now be used on your desktop or laptop. This time you go with ‘Ok Google’. Searching has been improved to be more natural where you can use pronouns and they will base results on your search history. This is intuitive and is a step forward. Maps was tweaked to give a user more flexibility in comparing routes amongst other features.

There was also a huge focus on getting Google+ as the front and centre of all Google’s services.The unified messaging platform, called ‘Hangouts’, was launched together with a revamp to the Google+ UI. In addition, Google looked at what made Facebook popular and introduced a more web focused Picasa styled photo manipulation platform. Photos drive social networks and Google hopes that making your photos look awesome automatically will bring you to its platform.

There is no question that Google is the market leader for web services. It extended its advantage today.

Earlier this year, I called for Google to relook their web services and find ways to keep ahead of the competition. After all, Microsoft has been making a huge push on all fronts with Outlook, Bing and other web services. Google has responded. While Microsoft took the first step of unification, Google has kept pace. By expanding its feature set, there is no question on who is the market leader for web services. Microsoft and even more so, Apple, has light years ahead of them. Google pressed its advantage and largely took the right focus in making such services people centric.

Google has also shown distinct monopoly moves. This has been going for some time but none is more evident than Larry Page’s ironic complaint that Microsoft was responsible a standards war. Google in its announcements yesterday, moved away from open standards. Everything now runs through a Google+ account. If you do not have one, you will sorely miss conveniences that Google’s services, such as Search, has in store for you. Google’s unified messaging app ‘Hangouts’ moved away from the XMPP standard into one of its own. They attempted to smooth over it by calling the decision ‘painful’. But this has been Google’s mantra of the recent times. Ever since they became the big boys, they termed their own standards as open and called everything that didn’t work their way closed and obtrusive.

Google knows you the best online. It is scary yet convenient.

Google has pushed the envelope on the benefits of having a massive amount of user data. The expanded feature set of all their web services rely on the fact that they are the company that knows you the best, online. It is scary yet convenient. For the sake of consumer welfare, it must be stated that Google is no longer the ‘do no evil’ company. It is a monopoly and is making Microsoft-esque moves of the 1990s.

Google is playing it right as a firm and its web services are peerless. Google IO 2013 simply extended the advantage.

Content

While this was expected for quite awhile  Google announced its competitor to media services like Spotify, Rdio and Deezer.  Google Play Music All Access is a paid subscription with streaming access to a massive music set. With Google completing deals with three of the major record labels, the intent to take on content providers speaks volumes of Google’s vision. This is traditionally Amazon’s and Apple’s space.

While Amazon has its own cloud music platform, Google now has that and more. The same can be said of Apple. Apple was the company that made legitimate online music viable. Its iTunes store is still one of the most recognized ways to buy music content online. Yet, Apple has dragged their feet over signing deals with labels. I wrote earlier this year that content distribution would be a massive sustainable business model that will overtake their hardware division. Google has stolen in front in this aspect and it is disappointing to see Apple stagnate in the content distribution space.

This is traditionally Amazon’s and Apple’s space.

While it is true that more people will still use Amazon and iTunes, Google is pushing the right buttons because it is now possible to live within the Google universe – something that no other company can claim to do so. Music? Videos? Movies? Docs? Email? Search? Maps? You can do all that and more on Google. Microsoft, Apple, Amazon and the rest cannot claim to come close. More worryingly, most of them have not even started.

Nexus Changes

There were no hardware announcements. No updated Nexus 4, 7 or 10. No new Google TV or Nexus Q. What emerged was even more interesting. Google showed off the Samsung Galaxy S4 running pure Android. It is basically the Nexus experience on a premium smartphone.

My first question was – why would Samsung allow this? Touchwiz is ugly but it is important from a branding standpoint for Samsung. Samsung makes good hardware without a premium feel. It’s strength has always been its ability to make the best Android skin as compared to Sense or Motoblur, etc. I believe that Samsung feels confident enough that features available on Touchwiz would be valuable enough for customers to choose Touchwiz over pure Android.

I think Google is the big winner in this move. A move that Samsung will regret if this catches fire. I will pick pure Android over any manufacturer skin any day. With a Galaxy S4 running pure Android, there’s no reason to get the original Samsung version. If this is made available internationally, I would be extremely tempted to pick up the Galaxy S4 where I can enjoy both high end hardware and a pure unblemished Android software experience.

You can now enjoy both high end hardware and a pure unblemished Android software experience.

Nexus devices have always had the issue of having mid tier hardware and this has now changed. If Google is able to convince HTC, LG and Motorola to do the same, it would be wonderful to see top tier devices running stock Android. I wrote a few weeks ago that Android was slowly slipping out of Google’s grasp. Google responded to that in a big way today.

Competitors

In terms of managing its competition, Google played nice with Apple. Apple is a hardware company and there are very little real points of conflict between the two. Google’s strategy is not to kill iOS or OS X. It’s strategy is to be a trojan. Most iOS users have already replaced Apple’s stock email, calendar and maps apps with Google’s own iOS alternatives. Google aims to do that with Chrome. Replacing Safari will allow iOS users to enjoy WebP, WebM and WebGL integration. The Apple user benefits while Google laughs all the way to dominance. Apple must respond by focusing on its software. It is being eaten from within by Google and Johnny Ive and co have much to do before WWDC 2013.

Apple must respond by focusing on its software. It is being eaten from within by Google.

Microsoft was left out because Microsoft is Google’s actual competitor. They want to be on all your screens, they want to be where you live both online and offline and so Google will not play nice with Microsoft. They didn’t. As Microsoft has chosen to compete on the web services front, it has plenty of catching up to do. This is even more urgent because Google has begun to turn off access to its services on devices running Microsoft software. It is a move that disadvantages the customer but this is what happens when two firms with world dominance in mind goes to war.

Android Maturity

There was no mention of Android 5.0 or 4.3. Android has remained in the 4.x range for two years. ICS was launched two years ago with incremental updates of 4.1 and 4.2 last year. The changelog on Google’s site clearly shows that Android 4.3 will be launched this year instead of 5.0. The simple takeaway is that Google sees no need to push its mobile OS up another level.

Google has been blamed for platform fragmentation and rightly so. Without stiff competition from Apple’s iOS or Microsoft’s Windows Phone OS, Google is taking the chance to consolidate and delay new features. As such, Android 4.3 was not even mentioned during the keynote.

Google sees no need to push its mobile OS up another level.

The hope is that iOS 7 does something to shake up the competition. iOS has fallen behind and Google is getting complacent. Microsoft has to step it up with Windows Phone as well. Partners like Nokia are building incredible hardware devices but the Windows Phone OS is lagging far behind. This is a wake up call for Cupertino and Redmond.

Pressing Advantages

Google IO showed how Google plans to navigate the rest of this year. It has pressed its advantages in web services and mobile computing. It has addressed the challenges on the balance of power by hardware vendors. More importantly, it has also shown a strong desire to attack the content delivery sector.

This is a very ambitious Google and more so because it has shown that it is able to enter a submarket and be dominant. Competitors to Google must respond. For if they don’t, consumers will heavily disadvantaged.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

The question of inequality and economic growth has taken a long and twisted path. Will Singapore drop the Reagan-Thatcher revolution? Twitter is a great platform but it is also a space where people speak in public mostly without thinking. A map of hate has been generated for the United States and hateful tweets by topic are shown in an easy to use map. One of Iron Man 3’s iconic scenes was that of a mid air rescue. That took a lot of video effects work (VFX) together with some good old fashioned filming. DNA and big data are making it easier for people to find out about their history and themselves. More firms are jumping onboard to provide such services. Lastly, UNICEF is fed up with people donating Facebook Likes instead of actual funds or effort. Pseudo donations don’t help.

#1: Are Singaporeans ideological prisoners?

As Singapore undergoes its mighty metamorphosis and develops a new soul and character over this coming decade, one of the biggest challenges it will have to deal with is its position on the vexing and age-old question of “equality”. Is the trickle down effect still valid or do we have to keep a cap on inequality? [via StraitsTimes]

#2: The Geography of Hate

The Geography of Hate is part of a larger project by Dr. Monica Stephens of Humboldt State University (HSU) identifying the geographic origins of online hate speech. Undergraduate students Amelia Egle, Matthew Eiben and Miles Ross, worked to produce the data and this map as part of Dr. Stephens’ Advanced Cartography course at Humboldt State University. The data behind this map is based on every geocoded tweet in the United States from June 2012 – April 2013 containing one of the ‘hate words’. Have a look! [via Humbolt State University]

#3: How Iron Man 3’s Air Rescue Scene was Created

So it turns out that rescuing a bunch of people sucked out of a hole in Air Force One at 30,000 feet is actually harder than Robert Downey Jr. makes it look in “Iron Man 3.” Who knew? The audacious action sequence that occurs midway through director Shane Black’s superhero sequel, known by those on the film crew as the “barrel of monkeys” scene, required a mix of real-world guts and digital ingenuity to pull off. [via LA Times]

#4: Who am I? Answers from Data & DNA

Genealogy’s next phase, which is quickly approaching, is actually its end game. The massive accumulation, digitization, and accessibility of data combined with recent advances in DNA testing mean the questions we have about our families — who they were, how they got here, and how they’re related to us — will soon be instantly solvable. Realistically, the pursuit of family history as it exists now probably won’t be around in 20 years: most of the mysteries are disappearing, and fast. And now, a firm in Provo, Utah is making that happen. [via The Verge]

#5: Give Money, Not Facebook Likes – UNICEF

In the beginning, organizations wanted you to like their Facebook pages. Why? You know, community-building, awareness-raising, general “engagement”-upping. After all, social sharing can do amazing things. But all that effort seems to have backfired in some way. People are giving likes and not cash or effort. [via The Atlantic]

Arsenal secured an important 4-1 win against Wigan that swung the race for Champions League spots back into our favour. The Gunners began strongly before dropping off pace and getting punished. However, a quick 8 minute brace saw 3 goals netted in our favour. Wigan was relegated despite putting up a brave performance for the first hour.

First Half

Arsenal pushed hard early on, controlling the ball well and knocking on the Wigan defence. Walcott was especially active making most of the space on the right wing as Wigan pushed up every time they went on the offence. Wigan had hardly a sniff at goal as the Gunners retained the ball and poked it around to no effect. In the first corner of the match, Podolski nodded into the empty net as Wigan left him completely unmarked. The German scored his tenth league goal from an accurate header that evaded a mass of flailing bodies.

The German scored his tenth league goal from an accurate header that evaded a mass of flailing bodies.

With a goal up, Arsenal continued to push hard denying Wigan space in attack. Wigan was still unable to fire a shot at goal with their attacks quickly breaking down outside the Arsenal box. Gibbs did fairly well against Mcmanaman, restricting him to one good cross that was cut out by the center backs. At about the half an hour mark, Arsenal decided to defend the lead for the last 15 minutes, allowing Wigan to seize control of the match.

Wigan could not create any clear cut chances bar a good long dipping pass that Koscielny did well to acrobatically clear. However, just as things were against Man United, Arsenal conceded just before half time from a set piece. Dean made a controversial call for a free kick outside the box, Wigan’s second of the match. Maloney took it well and some blame must be attributed to Podolski who did not keep his head up when part of the wall. The free kick grazed his stooped down head and Szczesny could not do anything about it. 1-1 at half time and the crowd was disappointed after a strong start.

Second Half

Wigan emerged the stronger team having been lifted by the equalizer before half time. They were winning 50s-50s, showing better pace and strength and looked more likely to score. Arsenal had the usual trouble of having players spaced too far and wide. Passes were easily cut out and players ran into defenders with no options to slip a pass.

Wigan’s main threat, Mcmanaman, was then subbed off due to an injury. This gave Arsenal more freedom to play and liberated Cazorla from having to stay back and aid Gibbs. To be fair to the Gunners, Mcmananman was well marked throughout the game and besides one or two crosses in the first half, he was silent. Wigan had more luck finding space on the right and center as Wenger had clearly told the defence to crowd out the young winger.

Wigan’s high line together with the removal of their most pacey threat played right into Arsenal’s game.

Wigan’s high line together with the removal of their most pacey threat played right into Arsenal’s game. Santi was free to roam and gleefully rotated between Podolski and Walcott. That was how the second Arsenal goal was scored. Santi swapped to the right, Theo went central and Podolski took the left flank. Cazorla found himself in yards of space and sent a brilliant cross into the box. The onrushing Walcott bundled the ball past the keeper and into the net. There was no toe poke, just a flying Theo attempting to use his body to direct the fierce cross in. 2-1.

The game turned on its head as Arsenal scored two more in 8 minutes. Wigan pushed even higher with their backline going close to the center circle. Santi’s dinked pass to Podolski found the German in the midst of a haphazard backpedaling Wigan defence. He burst past the defence and lobbed the onrushing keeper to make 3-1. 11 league goals for Poldi.

Wigan looked beaten at this point but credit to them they continued to push. Their backline was ridiculously high at this point. Santi again turned provider as he slipped Ramsey through near the halfway line (yes, that was how high Wigan played). The Welsh cut into the box from the left with two to three good options to pass to. He had some guts to take it on his own from a tight angle and finally netted his first goal of the season. Ramsey may not be the most skilful or intelligent player we have but he has guts and belief – a never ending supply of that.

At 4-1, the game was over. Wigan looked beaten and their players were out of steam after a physically punishing FA Cup final. Arsenal made a host of changes to shore up the lead. The game played out without major events in the final 10 minutes and Wigan was relegated.

The Champions League target is well and truly on for Arsenal.

Mike Dean

Arsenal has a shockingly poor recent record with Mike Dean as referee. I won’t read too much into it. Yes, the data looks so lopsided it defies certain statistical considerations but correlation is not causation. Dean made a mistake in the free kick that led to the equalizer but he was rather fair in the first half. Dean made a few wrong decisions both ways. Some benefited Arsenal while some didn’t. Obviously, the one that will remain in the minds of Arsenal fans will be the equalizer.

Dean did not have a great game today but there was no obvious bias.

Dean started the second half with a little Wigan bias but it was not game changing. After the quickfire 3 goals scored, there was nothing much for Dean to do and he made the right calls as the game closed off. My point here is simple. Dean did not have a great game today but there was no obvious bias. He made poor calls for both sides. Arsenal benefited at the start and Wigan in the middle portion of the match.

False 9 or Giroud?

Now with Giroud back in the team for the final game, the question for the following few days will be whether to reinstate our French line leader or go with a false 9. Obviously, the four goals in this match will make most fans choose the later. I disagree.

Wigan was playing a ridiculously high line. With such a high line, speedy players like Podolski and Walcott benefited tremendously. It only took a touch outside the box to be through on goal. This very seldom occurs against Arsenal. Most teams we play will have two banks of four buried in their box. A line leader is needed.

Newcastle won’t be an open game like the way Wigan approached this match.

It is true that Newcastle has nothing to play for but they will want to close out their season in front of their fans well. They will sit back and attempt to hit us on the counter. A draw will look good on them. It won’t be an open game like the way Wigan approached this match.

There are counter arguments to the above. Maybe, our front three has finally clicked and have gotten some understanding. Why change something that has worked the past three games? Is Giroud ready to play after being out for three matches? These will be points that will be debated until Sunday’s kick off.

It’s in Our Hands

Win the game against Newcastle and we will finish fourth. If Chelsea loses, we will finish third. A Chelsea – Everton draw with us winning by a two goal margin will also allow us to finish third. However, it is foolish to think that Newcastle will be lying down waiting to be beaten. It is true that they have nothing to play for but they will want to end the season well in front of their own home supporters.

It will be a tight game. Things can change quickly. It’s all on us.

May the better team qualify.

For more posts like these, follow @davejunia on Twitter.

Viber broke away from what most competitors have done out there by creating a desktop client for its messaging and voice call app. Viber was originally a simple communications app launched on iOS and later Android. It differentiated itself from Whatsapp by providing the ability to make calls over the internet via WIFI or a cellular data connection. In Asia, Whatsapp took the lead in popularity because it reached the market first. Whatsapp is not the best messaging app out there but its first-to-market move gave it the critical user base that self propagated even more members. There are many apps in this space, WeChat and Line are two other popular ones but none of them have truly offered cross compatibility beyond mobile devices – until now.

Viber’s move in providing a desktop client changes the classification of this app.

Viber’s move in providing a desktop client changes the classification of this app. Whatsapp, WeChat and Line are no longer its competitors. Viber is now up against Skype and iMessage. In terms of cross compatibility, I will have to objectively remove iMessage from this because you cannot access iMessage from non Apple devices. Viber and Skype on the other hand, run on any operating system (including OS X) and any device. The point of comparison here will be Viber vs. Skype.

Viber on the Desktop

The desktop client works exactly the way you expect it to. It’s a lightweight programme that stays resident on the system tray when running. Opening it gives you four tabs – Conversations, Contacts, Recents and Dailer. The tabs are pretty self explanatory.

Messaging works perfectly. Text and photos are transmitted to all your devices instantaneously. You can zoom in and save photos or even post them to Facebook.

The only downside of the messaging portion is that emoticons and stickers sent from Android / iOS apps are not viewable as yet. This should be brought into the desktop client within the next release as it is not very difficult to implement.

Making calls on the desktop client is straightforward. You can do it via the dialer or by clicking ‘Call’ after right clicking a contact’s name. Call quality was crisp and clear on Wifi and 4G. Some stuttering occurred on 3G but it was no worse (or better) than Skype. A good solid 3G connection will suffice but that is hard to come by in Singapore especially if you are moving between cell towers quickly.

You can transfer calls between your devices if you have to switch from one to another. I tested this by making a call from the desktop client and then using the switch button (next to the hang up button) to transfer the call to my HTC One X. The handover was smooth and I was able to resume my call without disruption.

Similar to Skype, you can continue messaging while making a voice or video call. I did not test the video call feature as it is still in its beta stage. Things would change quickly on this end and reviewing it will be of little value at this point.

The desktop client is the feature that brought me back to using Viber and a large part of it is due to its perfect execution.

The Viber desktop client is polished and clean looking. It offers lesser features than its Skype counterpart as it is unable to make calls to landlines or have a paid subscription option. However, it outdoes Skype in other areas such as delivering a better user interface and experience with minimal fuss. The desktop client is the feature that brought me back to using Viber and a large part of it is due to its perfect execution.

Viber on Android

The Android app remains largely unchanged besides having its UI completely redone to fit Google’s Holo theme. Similar to what Whatsapp had done earlier, the UI has been reskinned and looks more Android like as compared to the earlier version which was essentially a visual iOS port.

You can send video messages which is a nice touch but one that I rarely used. There are also emoticons and stickers. I was hoping that Viber would adopt the Emoji standard but it currently sports its own. The selection of stickers and emoticons is not extensive but there is more than enough for self expression.

Messaging and calling remain as they are. They work as intended without any extra things to note. Overall, the app feels a little less optimized as compared to Whatsapp. It takes a little longer to load and seems to be pinging the server more often than required. These are small concerns as a week’s heavy usage showed no real difference in battery consumption. However, when compared to Skype (which is its actual competitor here – Whatsapp has no call function, etc), Viber again emerges as the better optimized client. Skype gobbles up too many resources and insists on an always on connection on Android.

Skype has much to learn from Viber about building a good app both on Android and on the Desktop.

Conclusion

Viber is in a good place for those who want to be able to send messages and make calls on both their mobile devices and traditional computers. It treads a fine line between apps with a smaller feature set like Whatsapp and giants like Skype. If you are a user like me that spends a fair amount of time on the desktop, the desktop client is a tremendous advantage and makes messaging unified.

The challenge for Viber is to reach a critical mass of users, something that Skype and Whatsapp have done.

I hope competitors like Skype learn from this to keep their apps on all platforms lean with a clean, minimally designed user interface. Other smaller competitors like Whatsapp should rethink their decisions on desktop clients as this opens up the user base to a much wider audience.

The challenge for Viber is to reach a critical mass of users, something that Skype and Whatsapp have done. The moment it is able to do that, Viber will be the client that has got the balance right in making your conversations a lot more convenient.