Kenny's Cafe Corner
Saturday, September 23, 2006
Selected pictures from that paintball game.
Clockwise from top: Jeremy, Terrence, Fion, Derick, Michelle, Kenny (that's me!), Li Mun, and Janice.
That's me yelling out for 'blood'! Or paint. It's pretty hard trying to shout under a face mask. Even harder to maintain situational awareness when it fogs up and limits your field of vision.
Right behind us is the playing field for an attack & defend game called 'Vietnam'.
It's filled with tall grass bushes, huts, boulders, trees and according to the girls in our team...leeches! Hooray!
I almost never take photos of myself alone.
So....
Here's lookin' at ya kid! ;)
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Why Top Employees Quit - by Dumb Little Man
Perhaps this is of relevance to us right now.
Perhaps this is of relevance to us right now.
Sunday, September 17, 2006
PC Killed the TV Star
aka How Not To Become Bored At Home
It's Sunday morning after church and here I sit in my kitchen stirring hot Milo, Diana Krall crooning from my PC speakers, watching my guinea pigs try to burrow under that fresh layer of newspaper I just laid under their cage.
A stray thought wandered into me: "Why am I not watching TV? Now? Or at least have it switched on for ambient noise. In the background."
Nah. I just don't feel like switching on the boob tube even though there's nothing wrong with my TV set.
And it just dawned on me, I don't even watch TV anymore! I get my news through the Net, watch the shows I wanna watch downloaded online, and for some background music, I just start any of my playlists of MP3s.
The TV is an appliance and it works everytime I turn it on and terrestrial broadcast signals are usually clear enough with no interference from the weather...unlike satellite or cable.
So why is this reliable source of entertainment sitting cold and silent in my living room?
Well, the PC is superior to the TV in many ways. I surf for the news I want when I want it. I can have it pushed to me in feeds and aggregator sites. Then I have a choice of only following links to news articles I truly want only.
Sometimes even have video streamed to me...
Downloaded video though, I mostly view as entertainment. Some of the most creative and funniest clips can be viewed at Youtube, iFilm, Google Video and various other such sites. TV shows, documentaries and movies can be...shhh!...*downloaded*. But that doesn't mean I don't still buy original movies or go to the cinema. On the contrary, I seem to spend more of my money watching movies with friends or sometimes even alone at the cineplexes (last one I saw was 'Click'). I also still buy original DVDs such as 'The New World' of which I just bought last week from Speedys for just RM12.90. It's a good movie by the way! ;) So contemplative and relaxing.
So why do I have to watch the TV? For all the outdated movies and lame reality shows? Do I still have to run home after work just to catch a favorite tv sitcom or crime drama? They're all heavily censored in Malaysia anyway, and peppered with advertisements that doesn't quite seem interesting enough anyway.
The TV is passive media. You sit there and view...sometimes with food munching in your mouth...and sometimes until you fall asleep. It's lazy way to consume media. About the only interactivity and choice you have is to pick up the remote and channel surf. If I want something I could ignore I'll just turn on the radio or Internet radio.
If I feel like working, I'll check my e-mail, or do some word processing, or play around with some interesting code I downloaded from the Net. Or write on my blog!
If I feel like playing, I'll download a game or play via the web browser, chat on any instant messaging service, and even when the Internet connection is slow, I'll just fire up Prey, or Quake 4 and frag some polygonal zombies.
So how do you play on the TV if you don't have a console machine like an XBOX, Playstation or Nintendo?
The PC revolution has come and not gone but stayed. Permanently.
The PC as media center is already here. Forget Microsoft's concept, it won't fly. The PC will stay on the desktop reminding us of how technological convergence can and should be. People want control, choice and interactivity.
So what if the broadband enabled PC bluescreens every once in a while? Or the hard disk dies with all your 'precious' data on it?
I can always go back to watching my piggies play....or read a book.
aka How Not To Become Bored At Home
It's Sunday morning after church and here I sit in my kitchen stirring hot Milo, Diana Krall crooning from my PC speakers, watching my guinea pigs try to burrow under that fresh layer of newspaper I just laid under their cage.
A stray thought wandered into me: "Why am I not watching TV? Now? Or at least have it switched on for ambient noise. In the background."
Nah. I just don't feel like switching on the boob tube even though there's nothing wrong with my TV set.
And it just dawned on me, I don't even watch TV anymore! I get my news through the Net, watch the shows I wanna watch downloaded online, and for some background music, I just start any of my playlists of MP3s.
The TV is an appliance and it works everytime I turn it on and terrestrial broadcast signals are usually clear enough with no interference from the weather...unlike satellite or cable.
So why is this reliable source of entertainment sitting cold and silent in my living room?
Well, the PC is superior to the TV in many ways. I surf for the news I want when I want it. I can have it pushed to me in feeds and aggregator sites. Then I have a choice of only following links to news articles I truly want only.
Sometimes even have video streamed to me...
Downloaded video though, I mostly view as entertainment. Some of the most creative and funniest clips can be viewed at Youtube, iFilm, Google Video and various other such sites. TV shows, documentaries and movies can be...shhh!...*downloaded*. But that doesn't mean I don't still buy original movies or go to the cinema. On the contrary, I seem to spend more of my money watching movies with friends or sometimes even alone at the cineplexes (last one I saw was 'Click'). I also still buy original DVDs such as 'The New World' of which I just bought last week from Speedys for just RM12.90. It's a good movie by the way! ;) So contemplative and relaxing.
So why do I have to watch the TV? For all the outdated movies and lame reality shows? Do I still have to run home after work just to catch a favorite tv sitcom or crime drama? They're all heavily censored in Malaysia anyway, and peppered with advertisements that doesn't quite seem interesting enough anyway.
The TV is passive media. You sit there and view...sometimes with food munching in your mouth...and sometimes until you fall asleep. It's lazy way to consume media. About the only interactivity and choice you have is to pick up the remote and channel surf. If I want something I could ignore I'll just turn on the radio or Internet radio.
If I feel like working, I'll check my e-mail, or do some word processing, or play around with some interesting code I downloaded from the Net. Or write on my blog!
If I feel like playing, I'll download a game or play via the web browser, chat on any instant messaging service, and even when the Internet connection is slow, I'll just fire up Prey, or Quake 4 and frag some polygonal zombies.
So how do you play on the TV if you don't have a console machine like an XBOX, Playstation or Nintendo?
The PC revolution has come and not gone but stayed. Permanently.
The PC as media center is already here. Forget Microsoft's concept, it won't fly. The PC will stay on the desktop reminding us of how technological convergence can and should be. People want control, choice and interactivity.
So what if the broadband enabled PC bluescreens every once in a while? Or the hard disk dies with all your 'precious' data on it?
I can always go back to watching my piggies play....or read a book.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
My Piggies in Action
Waynes loves Rooney...from behind.
Waynes loves Rooney...from behind.
