Colin Charles Agenda

Gabey Goh (editor at Digital News Asia) couldn’t have said it better in her column in The Star: A nation of beta-testers. It just got re-published on DNA.

I have consciously decided that when I’m in KL, I’ll only spend my money with businesses that support other local businesses. So with a place like Jaya One, its pretty easy for me to pick only a ChopChop merchant. Its also allowing me to find indie coffee merchants – so the app is aiding my discovery of other local businesses. Why this decision?

Malaysians: when was the last time you looked at something and said, I’m buying/doing/getting/trying this because its Made in Malaysia? We lack a sense of nationalism for many reasons, no thanks to our politicians. People prefer to buy Tupperware over Swordman. In Australia, buying Australian Made is highly encouraged. In the USA, people love it when production comes home. The Swiss are proud of their items. 

Now, Malaysian businesses/startups as a consequence suffer from this sort of mentality. By not trying Malaysian made software, it hurts Malaysian made software producers. I’m not saying you should aid (via crutches) these folk if they cannot compete with an international product. I’m all for trade over aid. Gabey agrees on this too.

But for me, I look at it this way. We all know & love Foursquare. You as a business can offer mayor bonuses or bonuses on every first checkin or every 5th checkin. Great. But as a business owner why not try loyalty products like ChopChop at the same time? Its proudly made in malaysia, and you’re helping a malaysian business succeed (just like they’re helping you, a fellow malaysian business succeed).

Gabey continues to state that if you try something and if it doesn’t work out, don’t hesitate to provide constructive criticism. I totally agree. I’m sure the local business will even give you a free service or something valuable in return.

To all the haters that claim that all malaysians do is copy stuff, I will humbly ask you this: you may copy amazon.com and call it lazada/zalora, and every inch of the design might look alike. Can you copy their back-end logistics? Can you copy the requirements of going into the local market (ads, events, etc.)?

Let’s consciously support local businesses & efforts. Its hard enough for the entrepreneurs to deal with the myriad difficulties that come with having to conduct business in Malaysia. Let’s make it a little easier.

(I don’t get any gains from talking about ChopChop. I’m truly a fan of this product. I’m truly a fan of the team.)

So Vine is all the rage now eh? What Twitter did to quick communication (140 characters), they’re now doing to video (6 seconds). Headlines today are: hardcore porn climbs to the top of vine’s editors picks.

When the porn industry embraces something, its likely to get big :)

I’m guessing this is currently more the amateur porn industry than anything else. There is a website curating based on hashtags (nsfwvine.com) and a twitter account (@nsfwvine – currently with 11 followers, 27 tweets).

Interesting development to watch. 

I’m with Tyler Brule here on the Eurostar – it is the Right Time to Change Track. What’s more interesting is a comment from Boswell:

Here’s another, shameless open ended business pitch Mr. Brûlé’s main business, Winkreative — it will be interesting to see which of the companies referenced here becomes his next client. Note to FT: I hope you are not actually paying this guy for his column given that he derives millions in new business from it all day long. Perhap’s he should be paying you — a wonderful new metric for the publishing industry whereby the “journalists” pay the newspaper for editorial space so that they may attract new business for their consulting firms, etc.

There are many journalists that become names themselves. This must be true since Google’s also launched an Author Rank. Its true for Tyler Brule. Its true for Paul Carr (nsfwcorp). Its true for Sarah Lacy (pandodaily). The list can go on.

I don’t know how many journalists also have consulting firms or do other things besides just writing/freelancing.

What about pundits? I know many pundits in the tech space that act as advisors, board members, etc. thanks to their published writing in tech press. They gain monetarily out of their writing, so why not make them pay to get published?

It is definitely a novel idea for the fledgling media industry to get paid by journalists who also get a regular soapbox.

Long-term I’m bullish on Android. Its everywhere, its like the multiple Linux distributions. I have a preference to Google-sanctioned devices (i.e. the Nexus series), but each and every Android device manufacturer has their own bells & whistles.

The mobile landscape is actively changing. I was in Paris when I watched the announcement that there would be an Ubuntu for phones. I was a little disappointed that the announcement was for the possibility with no manufacturers or no actual device being announced. You’d presume that’s what you would get with the countdown on the website, and all the hype built up around it. To add to my confusion, there still exists Ubuntu for Android, which has been around for quite some time with no one biting. I heard its vaguely opensource so you could run it on a device, but I’ve not seen much.

The idea is amazing (carrying your phone, plugging it in to see a full-featured desktop) and I can’t wait to see what happens in 2014. It seems like the developer environment is Qt/QML for a native feel, but you’ve also got HTML5. They’re going to leverage on the Ubuntu community. I just think the hype around this is being built too early.

However, what’s more exciting is Mozilla’s recent announcements. They have a Firefox OS developer preview phone announced. They tell you how to use Firefox OS today. There are also AppDays happening worldwide. And they have a phone coming soon as a partnership with Geeksphone & Telefonica of Spain. Here it seems clear that your HTML5 apps are going to rock (see the Firefox Marketplace). When I say soon, I’m saying next month, i.e. February 2013. I’ve signed up to buy one.

The mobile landscape is changing. Nokia was the king of phones with Symbian, and today they’re backing Windows Mobile. Most of the top manufacturers are building Android devices (opensource). There are many companies signed up to make Tizen devices in 2013 and beyond (opensource). Now you have opensource Ubuntu & Firefox OS. Apple may have started this modern trend but iOS device sales aren’t stellar (witness Apple’s recent stock drop). iOS to be fair is also built on opensource (itself its closed).

Year of the Linux desktop? Who needs that. You’ve already arrived at the years of opensource computing.

February is turning out to be a busy month. I’ll be giving a talk about MariaDB at the SkySQL Solutions Day in Hamburg, alongside Sergei Golubchik. This happens February 1 2013.

I’ll also be in Brussels for FOSDEM and presenting at the MySQL & Friends devroom. Here I will talk about MHA and how you can get automated MySQL failover. I’ll also be hanging out at the CentOS booth with Karanbir Singh giving away MariaDB stickers all weekend. If you’re at FOSDEM, don’t forget to sign up for the MySQL Community Dinner on Saturday night! Naturally, Friday’s beer activity is something I’ll be at too.

Busy long weekend ahead!

I’ve always enjoyed working at home. It wasn’t until a few years ago that I got myself an office. I still don’t use the office that much, with the exception for storage. I try to check in from time-to-time since I do have a room there, but I’m still largely a mobile worker.

Today, I’m sitting in my parents house and can hear extreme drilling from a house renovating nearby.

In offices, you can’t do drilling/renovation works until the evening and most likely its usually only on weekends. At homes, you can’t do drilling/renovation works unless its confined between the 8am-5pm timeframe.

Overall, home renovations tend to be extensive. Imagine working from home and listening to drilling/knocking/banging for about six months?

As a proponent of using Bose noise canceling headphones (Bose QC-15), I can assure you it doesn’t help.