Sunday, December 27, 2009
Sunday, December 13, 2009
UOB Cards Promotion
Plaza Brasserie - 20% off total food bill (valid from Monday to Thursday) 6505 5722
- 10% off total food bill (valid from Friday to Sunday)
- 10% off total food bill (valid from Friday to Sunday)
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Monday, November 30, 2009
YES
YESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYES
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Saturday, November 7, 2009
a picture for you
DSC_1321.JPG
These pictures were sent with Picasa, from Google.
Try it out here: http://picasa.google.com/
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Article I wrote
You’ve Got Mail
“Work from home and transcribe medical documents”
“Natural formula for enhancing effect”
“Dear chen.gee@gmail.com 79% 0FF on Pfizer !”
“Get Stuff In Your INBOX! - Get fr--bies, coupons and samples”
“ Advance Diploma in ACL at $500!”
If you have ever wondered why junk emails mostly land up in your inbox on a Monday or Friday evening, you are probably right if you conclude that the email senders know that we tend to have bad Mondays mornings and will spend the time to “check” through all our emails. This was one of the more interesting things I learned in addition to debating over the use of exclamation marks in the subject line, starting sentences with a catchy verb to capture the readers attention during my one year at a Internet startup called InternetSeer (www.internetseer.com).
InternetSeer’s office My desk
It is free as long as you give us your email
A lot of services that you use on the Internet are free because the companies providing the services have found a way to get someone else to pay for you. In the case of InternetSeer(IS), the basic service (website monitoring) is free as long as you allow IS to send you a weekly newsletter containing products and write-ups from advertisers. IS will earn a placement fee from the advertisers and commission generated from any sales traceable to the newsletter InternetSeer sends out.
The economics of email
It was by all aspects a great business model. IS’s service was popular and it was a never ending source of new email addresses for the email database. Most of the people signing up for the service were also small business owners. This means that IS’s database was a goldmine for advertisers selling office supplies, equipment and other related products and services.
In 2004, it costs InternetSeer USD$7500 to send out 1 million emails or 0.75 cents per person. Most products will earn IS a commission of USD$5 so this means that to breakeven IS will need to sell about 1500 products. If we assume 1500 products were sold in 1500 separate emails, this means that IS will need just a conversion rate of 0.15% (1500 emails divided by 1 million emails sent) to breakeven for every 1 million email sent. The value proposition is even more compelling when placement fees were factored into the equation. So it was no wonder that the company did well.
The day they shut off the Internet
All was well until one fine autumn morning in 2004 when I found the internet connection down at my terminal. It was not just me, the entire office was cut off from its money generating lifeline. Phones were going off non-stop at tech support as irate customers demand to know why they are not getting their web monitoring reports as usual. The weekly newsletter was due to be out in the evening and we are now where near from been able to send out an email let alone one million emails. The CTO(Chief Technology Officer) made a call to our Internet Service Provider(ISP) and we were told that they had decided to shut us down as they were receiving too many automated complains that we were sending email spam. Email spam refers to unsolicited commercial e-mail or junk email. Fortunately there was a plan B, the CTO diverted all our traffic to another ISP(albeit with less capacity) until the original ISP open up to us again.
The cyber arms race and a sucker is born every minute
By 2004, there was already an arms race between junk email senders and companies providing technology to block spam. IS was unfortunately caught in the crossfire when a batch of its emails were wrongly flagged as junk by a filtering software and automated emails were sent to IS’s ISP to complain about the spam. The software used to filter junk email has advanced since then and a lot of the features that you see in email software today are a result of the evolution in the fight to stop junk email from flooding your inbox. For example, email software usually do not display email graphics by default these days as email senders track the opening of an email by monitoring the request for a graphics download to the email. Once a graphics request is detected from an email address, the email senders will know that the email address is active and the account will be a prime target for more ads.
Unfortunately, the most advance email filters is no match for human greed and at times plain naiveté. This are the two traits that junk email senders prey on when they send out emails selling cheap medicine, get rich quick schemes and Nigerian scams.
For InternetSeer, the misunderstanding was resolved eventually and it became the intern’s job to test the newsletters against the leading anti-junk email solutions.
“Work from home and transcribe medical documents”
“Natural formula for enhancing effect”
“Dear chen.gee@gmail.com 79% 0FF on Pfizer !”
“Get Stuff In Your INBOX! - Get fr--bies, coupons and samples”
“
If you have ever wondered why junk emails mostly land up in your inbox on a Monday or Friday evening, you are probably right if you conclude that the email senders know that we tend to have bad Mondays mornings and will spend the time to “check” through all our emails. This was one of the more interesting things I learned in addition to debating over the use of exclamation marks in the subject line, starting sentences with a catchy verb to capture the readers attention during my one year at a Internet startup called InternetSeer (www.internetseer.com).
InternetSeer’s office My desk
It is free as long as you give us your email
A lot of services that you use on the Internet are free because the companies providing the services have found a way to get someone else to pay for you. In the case of InternetSeer(IS), the basic service (website monitoring) is free as long as you allow IS to send you a weekly newsletter containing products and write-ups from advertisers. IS will earn a placement fee from the advertisers and commission generated from any sales traceable to the newsletter InternetSeer sends out.
The economics of email
It was by all aspects a great business model. IS’s service was popular and it was a never ending source of new email addresses for the email database. Most of the people signing up for the service were also small business owners. This means that IS’s database was a goldmine for advertisers selling office supplies, equipment and other related products and services.
In 2004, it costs InternetSeer USD$7500 to send out 1 million emails or 0.75 cents per person. Most products will earn IS a commission of USD$5 so this means that to breakeven IS will need to sell about 1500 products. If we assume 1500 products were sold in 1500 separate emails, this means that IS will need just a conversion rate of 0.15% (1500 emails divided by 1 million emails sent) to breakeven for every 1 million email sent. The value proposition is even more compelling when placement fees were factored into the equation. So it was no wonder that the company did well.
The day they shut off the Internet
All was well until one fine autumn morning in 2004 when I found the internet connection down at my terminal. It was not just me, the entire office was cut off from its money generating lifeline. Phones were going off non-stop at tech support as irate customers demand to know why they are not getting their web monitoring reports as usual. The weekly newsletter was due to be out in the evening and we are now where near from been able to send out an email let alone one million emails. The CTO(Chief Technology Officer) made a call to our Internet Service Provider(ISP) and we were told that they had decided to shut us down as they were receiving too many automated complains that we were sending email spam. Email spam refers to unsolicited commercial e-mail or junk email. Fortunately there was a plan B, the CTO diverted all our traffic to another ISP(albeit with less capacity) until the original ISP open up to us again.
The cyber arms race and a sucker is born every minute
By 2004, there was already an arms race between junk email senders and companies providing technology to block spam. IS was unfortunately caught in the crossfire when a batch of its emails were wrongly flagged as junk by a filtering software and automated emails were sent to IS’s ISP to complain about the spam. The software used to filter junk email has advanced since then and a lot of the features that you see in email software today are a result of the evolution in the fight to stop junk email from flooding your inbox. For example, email software usually do not display email graphics by default these days as email senders track the opening of an email by monitoring the request for a graphics download to the email. Once a graphics request is detected from an email address, the email senders will know that the email address is active and the account will be a prime target for more ads.
Unfortunately, the most advance email filters is no match for human greed and at times plain naiveté. This are the two traits that junk email senders prey on when they send out emails selling cheap medicine, get rich quick schemes and Nigerian scams.
For InternetSeer, the misunderstanding was resolved eventually and it became the intern’s job to test the newsletters against the leading anti-junk email solutions.
Monday, October 19, 2009
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Monday, August 31, 2009
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Ur special monday report
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Monday, July 20, 2009
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Monday, July 13, 2009
Monday, July 6, 2009
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Monday, June 29, 2009
Happy Birthday
Hope you will continue to
have a good job
have a good life
lots of shopping
and a "zhu" in ur life.
have a good job
have a good life
lots of shopping
and a "zhu" in ur life.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Monday, June 15, 2009
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.
Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.
This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.
Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.
This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.
Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Monday, June 8, 2009
Sunday, June 7, 2009
Crossroads
Today was the day I felt the fear..real fear that I've never experienced before...you've made me realized how fragile our relationship is and how weak I was. But then again, your words gave me warmth and assurance. I hope these words are from the deepest bottom of your heart; the truth that i really want to hear. And that you and me can be together forever....
Would you promise me?
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Brain Teasers for your MONDAYBLUES..
A Panda Bear walked into a resturant. He sat down at a table and ordered some food. When he was finished eating, he took out a gun and shot his waiter. He then left the resturant. After the police caught up with him, they asked him why he had killed the waiter. He replied, "Look me up in the dictionary." What did the dictionary say?
Ans:
When they looked up the word "Panda" in the dictionary, it stated, "Panda: Eats shoots and leaves."
Ans:
When they looked up the word "Panda" in the dictionary, it stated, "Panda: Eats shoots and leaves."
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