Wednesday, March 31, 2010
mythbusters and privacy
I shared this video during my 1105 presentation on security and privacy.
strange thing about people is that while they complain a lot about privacy, they want convenience, they want to establish an identity on the internet. yet these 2 actions often contradict privacy.
i look at some of the stuff the kids i taught and my friends post on online, i have nothing to say. i think most people (especially singaporeans) really have no idea on how easy it is for future employers to dig up their information on facebook. even though the security groups feature have been up around, most people's photos can still be easily stalked.
i'm pretty worried for the little ones actually, they are not going to learn the ill-effects of not cherishing their own privacy until they suffer from it. too bad.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
and the nominees are...
most inspirational: tong yee from the thought collective
its extremely comforting to see that in this harsh world of start ups, there are still entreprenuers who stick hard and fast to their beliefs and visions, without comprimise, even in the face of a greater dollar. other than hardwork, its nothing short of god's grace that they managed to do well even when turning down the obvious route to riches just to strongly (albeit a little naively) hold fast to doing the right thing. how often do you hear a successful person who tells you "we don't do this (which isn't even something wrong) because we don't believe in it". its like intentionally adding barriers to yourself. as if the road of an entreprenuer isn't rough enough.
i must say i disagree with tong yee's point that sports do not teach skills that are transferable to the real world. sure, there are no hard skills, but there are soft skills aplenty. values such as tenacity, determination, discipline, teamwork are much better experienced in sports as opposed to the "nerdy" CCA. on the other hand, i think shelfing books, setting up visualisers, sitting in an aircon room can't achieve these as well.
i also have another question/issue - isn't it a tad too dangerous for an organization to be built around one person? i mean (god forbids) that person gets into an accident, then the company is going to disappear? shouldn't there always be transition of leadership, planning for worse case scenario? maybe not.
i'm a little acquainted with the whole NE framework and the problem with teachers, so I must say that its extremely gratifying to know that there are teachers who are out there willing to try to change the system. it is worth noting that in a lot of the independent schools which control their hiring, there are many teachers who are equally inspirational and are interested in trying to shape mindsets. even in the moe, there are good teachers who want to shape their kids beyond the textbook. unfortunately, there are (possibly more) teachers who really don't give a crap.
on a slightly related note about mindsets,
Get fit, get a bonus
respect/adversity award: Chin Leng from SingaporeBrides.com
(i think) for many singaporeans, the story normally ends at the abyss. being adverse to adversity and change is really not going to help our case. can we really have a high adversity quotient in a country that has enjoyed many years great economic success with a government that has done a stellar job in deploying infrastructure? how can we deal with upset, failure and rejection?
i'm quite a suck for "against all odds" stories. Chin Leng may not be the coolest, most eloquent, smartest person around, but he's mighty resilient. and that deserves respect (even Hoong An used him as inspiration).
persuasionFAIL award: Hoong An from HungryGoWhere
prof ben tried something similar for cs1101s. he tried to tell us why we SHOULD not do it. he got seniors to tell us why we should not do it as well. in the end, only 2 (i think) people got off the "speeding bullet train". to any aspiring entreprenuer, i think instead of dissuading them, i'm pretty sure that he reinforced their beliefs. well, most of the time, like Chin Leng said, the brashness of youth allows such advice to be turned into challenges, channeled into the desire to break the mould.
bottomline: i don't think negative persuasion works :P in fact, i think it beckons people to take up the challenge. especially in a class like 3216.
i like his pragmatic approach. if (and a very big one at that) one day, i become an entreprenuer, i would choose his & leslie's route. i think its important to stock up your resources before you embark on a journey. yea, sure, you could bulldoze your way through, but you'll probably going to need a lot more intelligence & resilience. pragmatism oozes from Hoong An actually, if you were like me and were kaypohing around after class, you would be able to see that from all the suggestions and advice he gave.
i-ran-out-of-awards: Ash from Interactive SG
unsurprisingly, Ash was flooded by the most people after the presentation. what impressed me immediately was how he offered everyone who brought an idea to him with a opportunity to go down to his office to pitch to him! opportunities have to be taken when given. in that LT last night, was opportunity to speak with 6 people prof ben considered successful. i think more of us should cherish these opportunities.
one of the highlights of the night was when ash displayed the title of his slide right after prof ben said "there is no formula to success". irony WIN.
other than that, a lot of what Ash said is rather consistent with what 3216 has been trying to tell us. that's cos Ash works in the online space, where the rules of engagement are different.
my personal favorite: Leslie from Redsport
cos i like sports and its about sports. plus i've already talked about redsport the other time :P i'm pretty excited to see how redsport grows with our local sports scene which is progressing at (sadly) a glacial speed.
recurring themes from the night
1) success = pain
its extremely comforting to see that in this harsh world of start ups, there are still entreprenuers who stick hard and fast to their beliefs and visions, without comprimise, even in the face of a greater dollar. other than hardwork, its nothing short of god's grace that they managed to do well even when turning down the obvious route to riches just to strongly (albeit a little naively) hold fast to doing the right thing. how often do you hear a successful person who tells you "we don't do this (which isn't even something wrong) because we don't believe in it". its like intentionally adding barriers to yourself. as if the road of an entreprenuer isn't rough enough.
i must say i disagree with tong yee's point that sports do not teach skills that are transferable to the real world. sure, there are no hard skills, but there are soft skills aplenty. values such as tenacity, determination, discipline, teamwork are much better experienced in sports as opposed to the "nerdy" CCA. on the other hand, i think shelfing books, setting up visualisers, sitting in an aircon room can't achieve these as well.
i also have another question/issue - isn't it a tad too dangerous for an organization to be built around one person? i mean (god forbids) that person gets into an accident, then the company is going to disappear? shouldn't there always be transition of leadership, planning for worse case scenario? maybe not.
i'm a little acquainted with the whole NE framework and the problem with teachers, so I must say that its extremely gratifying to know that there are teachers who are out there willing to try to change the system. it is worth noting that in a lot of the independent schools which control their hiring, there are many teachers who are equally inspirational and are interested in trying to shape mindsets. even in the moe, there are good teachers who want to shape their kids beyond the textbook. unfortunately, there are (possibly more) teachers who really don't give a crap.
on a slightly related note about mindsets,
Get fit, get a bonus
Some firms rewarding workers for keeping fit, recycling, charity work
i think this is ridiculous. why do you need KPIs to make people care about their own health and the world around them :S is this asymptomatic of our education system? no KPI = don't do? its like compulsory CIP hours all over again :S
respect/adversity award: Chin Leng from SingaporeBrides.com
(i think) for many singaporeans, the story normally ends at the abyss. being adverse to adversity and change is really not going to help our case. can we really have a high adversity quotient in a country that has enjoyed many years great economic success with a government that has done a stellar job in deploying infrastructure? how can we deal with upset, failure and rejection?
i'm quite a suck for "against all odds" stories. Chin Leng may not be the coolest, most eloquent, smartest person around, but he's mighty resilient. and that deserves respect (even Hoong An used him as inspiration).
persuasionFAIL award: Hoong An from HungryGoWhere
prof ben tried something similar for cs1101s. he tried to tell us why we SHOULD not do it. he got seniors to tell us why we should not do it as well. in the end, only 2 (i think) people got off the "speeding bullet train". to any aspiring entreprenuer, i think instead of dissuading them, i'm pretty sure that he reinforced their beliefs. well, most of the time, like Chin Leng said, the brashness of youth allows such advice to be turned into challenges, channeled into the desire to break the mould.
bottomline: i don't think negative persuasion works :P in fact, i think it beckons people to take up the challenge. especially in a class like 3216.
i like his pragmatic approach. if (and a very big one at that) one day, i become an entreprenuer, i would choose his & leslie's route. i think its important to stock up your resources before you embark on a journey. yea, sure, you could bulldoze your way through, but you'll probably going to need a lot more intelligence & resilience. pragmatism oozes from Hoong An actually, if you were like me and were kaypohing around after class, you would be able to see that from all the suggestions and advice he gave.
i-ran-out-of-awards: Ash from Interactive SG
unsurprisingly, Ash was flooded by the most people after the presentation. what impressed me immediately was how he offered everyone who brought an idea to him with a opportunity to go down to his office to pitch to him! opportunities have to be taken when given. in that LT last night, was opportunity to speak with 6 people prof ben considered successful. i think more of us should cherish these opportunities.
one of the highlights of the night was when ash displayed the title of his slide right after prof ben said "there is no formula to success". irony WIN.
other than that, a lot of what Ash said is rather consistent with what 3216 has been trying to tell us. that's cos Ash works in the online space, where the rules of engagement are different.
my personal favorite: Leslie from Redsport
cos i like sports and its about sports. plus i've already talked about redsport the other time :P i'm pretty excited to see how redsport grows with our local sports scene which is progressing at (sadly) a glacial speed.
recurring themes from the night
1) success = pain
2) no passion = pain
3) no $ = pain
life is all about pain. beat pain to have a shot at beat life.
one of my favourite shows about pain - Rocky 4:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSzdlL6arH0 - Rocky talking to his son about going one more round in life (from 4:39 till 5.45)
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
ceteris paribus
Cēterīs paribus is a Latin phrase, literally translated as "with other things the same," or "all other things being equal or held constant." It is commonly rendered in English as "all other things being equal." A prediction, or a statement about causal or logical connections between two states of affairs, is qualified by ceteris paribus in order to acknowledge, and to rule out, the possibility of other factors that could override the relationship between the antecedent and the consequent ~ wikipediai disliked econs in JC because of the whole study of ceteris paribus. sure, its required for us to understand basic concept, and isolate individual relationships, but thats really not what happens in real life. don't get me wrong though, i like econs, just not the way it was taught. its good to keep ceteris paribus away when testing web apps. you can't keep everything else constant. the same message was repeated again and again, its not enough for an app to work on one station where all variables are controlled.
i LOVE the hotel buffet example. its pretty fantastic. instead of focusing on just maximising individual performance, looking at improvement at a higher order would be probably more effective - that's what i gathered.
i like how this course tries to make us to think big, look at the big picture, get ready for scaling up. in the post-lesson discussion, prof said that there's probably no way we cant compete with mit, harvard in terms of brilliant minds in research, but we probably have a shot getting a facebook. so beyond programming, its really more about high level perspectives. i don't think any other CS mod teaches this.
i enjoyed the presentation very much. i'm sure many of the more technical people had their appetites satisfied.
it was pretty high level technical stuff, din really get much, but it put lots of interesting ideas in my heads - things to keep in mind as I continue with the other modules.
prof said that zit seng was a "better person to teach [this topic] then me". he probably can deliver the same content, but what zit seng had was real life working experiences. when you sit in such sessions, its quite easy to tell between someone who's simply just read about it, as opposed to someone who's actually done real stuff. that's the whole idea of me wanting to come to 3216 into the first place - doing real stuff, hearing it from real people.
this optimization thing really is an art :)
my driving instructor once told me "i tell you your mistake how many times also no use, if you fail once, you'll remember the mistake." thankfully, i failed only on the trial run in the circuit by another instructor. i guess that's the strange thing about humans, some mistakes or lessons really just need to be hammered into you the hard way. its like how little children will never touch anything hot again after scalding themselves.
sure, the post-lesson lesson was kinda interesting, but i didn't really find it a big deal. maybe its really cos I have an elite uncaring face. i mean if you spend all your time complaining, comparing, speculating (zit seng's example of the guy who gave ACTUAL HARD DATA to back up the SoC lag comes to mind) to do actual stuff, you'll be much better off. i mean, its not like i don't complain.... (i complain a lot in fact), but its important to remember that nothing is really gonna come out of it.
kudos to my wave team! 2 X Guru + 1 X Noob + 2 other awesome members = win!
Monday, March 8, 2010
... and then a miracle occurs ...
One of the most repeated suggestion today was "give clear instructions" (she said it for more than 5 of the apps). When I had to manage little kids, I always remembered to be absolutely detailed in my instructions. Even then, some idiotic kid will still get himself into trouble because he DIDN'T follow the instructions.
The biggest takeaway from the lesson last week was from getHelp's idiot proof step-by-step. Instructions mingled with limited things to view. I think that's an excellent way to "teach" people how to use apps. Instead of having to read a "wall of text", they are guided through the process.
Unfortunately, our extension has lots to improve in this regard. Too bad we din get any pointers from Pamela Fox :P (PLEASE GO ADD OUR EXTENSION!!!!)
Most of the time, miracles are really supposed to occur in our applications. I guess, we just need to remember to help users find it :)
when you've only got 100 years to live
15 there's still time for you
Time to buy and time to lose
15, there's never a wish better than this
When you only got 100 years to live
The past 2 weeks have be CRAAAAAZY. I've never gotten time to take a breath since Chinese New Year. Its been fun and tiring at the same time.
During the Friday Pitching session, Prof said that CS3216 is essentially for us to sit down, spend all our time doing things that we've always wanted to do but never had the chance to do it. (might not be the exact words, might not even be his message... but oh well). I think in some ways that's right and wrong.
Its right because, well, most of us ARE doing what we've always wanted to do but never had the time/opportunity to sit down. But at the same time, I think its WRONG because why do we need a lv 3000 module that's worth well more than the 4 MC its allocated to get our asses off? i think something's wrong here (with us, or maybe just me). What happened to that child like innocence and enthusiasm that we once had to just do whatever we wanted. Now we just find excuse after excuse not to do stuff. Why do we need a module to push us to do things?
Perhaps I only speak for myself. When Prof Ben said those words, I sat there thinking "Does it mean we wouldn't have sprung to action had we not taken this module?" Perhaps thats the strange thing about humans. You need some form of trigger.
I almost chose NOT to go for the pitching session because I wanted to study for my 2100 (which i tanked anyway <.< ) But I'm glad I went for the session. But while its all fun and good to be talking about ideas, I think the true value lies in action on it. Talk is cheap.
I have no real idea why I'm feeling so pensieve, I started on this entry while listening to "100 Years" by Five for Fighting. Originally I wanted to do the usual "what did I learn from the pitching session", but midway it turned into a myraid of disconnected thoughts.
I guess time really flies by. I think we should make use of every opportunity and time we have. Whether its during CS3216 or in the future.
Time to buy and time to lose
15, there's never a wish better than this
When you only got 100 years to live
The past 2 weeks have be CRAAAAAZY. I've never gotten time to take a breath since Chinese New Year. Its been fun and tiring at the same time.
During the Friday Pitching session, Prof said that CS3216 is essentially for us to sit down, spend all our time doing things that we've always wanted to do but never had the chance to do it. (might not be the exact words, might not even be his message... but oh well). I think in some ways that's right and wrong.
Its right because, well, most of us ARE doing what we've always wanted to do but never had the time/opportunity to sit down. But at the same time, I think its WRONG because why do we need a lv 3000 module that's worth well more than the 4 MC its allocated to get our asses off? i think something's wrong here (with us, or maybe just me). What happened to that child like innocence and enthusiasm that we once had to just do whatever we wanted. Now we just find excuse after excuse not to do stuff. Why do we need a module to push us to do things?
Perhaps I only speak for myself. When Prof Ben said those words, I sat there thinking "Does it mean we wouldn't have sprung to action had we not taken this module?" Perhaps thats the strange thing about humans. You need some form of trigger.
I almost chose NOT to go for the pitching session because I wanted to study for my 2100 (which i tanked anyway <.< ) But I'm glad I went for the session. But while its all fun and good to be talking about ideas, I think the true value lies in action on it. Talk is cheap.
I have no real idea why I'm feeling so pensieve, I started on this entry while listening to "100 Years" by Five for Fighting. Originally I wanted to do the usual "what did I learn from the pitching session", but midway it turned into a myraid of disconnected thoughts.
I guess time really flies by. I think we should make use of every opportunity and time we have. Whether its during CS3216 or in the future.
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