Monthly Archive
Browsing entries posted on June 2007
Sea turtles, mate.
So I went to see the third instalment of that lovely Pirates movie franchise. Frankly, I don’t know what other people are complaining about, I thoroughly enjoyed it. There’s eye candy, action sequences, complex plotlines, and mushy lovey-dovey scenes to keep everyone happy, along with the odd comic relief and references to previous films. It’s really a film that bears repeated watchings, although there will be some who balk at the very mention of sitting through this 3-hour outing.
As much as I would love to tease apart its tangled threads one by one, the fact is it’s already been done, and much better than I ever could do. Why not be frivolous and light-hearted instead? It was so much fun spotting the references. And unlike in Shrek 3, the rehashed jokes didn’t fall flat on their faces - or at least I didn’t have to force a laugh.
- Rum jokes - mild tweaks kept the jokes funny, just like variations on a theme.
- Sea turtles - a reference to Pirates 1.
- Ragetti - everything happens to this poor guy. He loses an eye, gets crabs in his pants, but he can deliver a whispered lover’s incantation like no one else. I wonder where he learnt that.
- Jack referred to Will as a eunuch in Pirates 1, and did it again in Pirates 2.
- At the end of Pirates 3, Elizabeth uses Jack’s farewell line on him, but he hits back with a suave rejoinder. Witty Jack, indeed.
- Davy Jones has a bucket. Many buckets, in fact. Ah, bukkits.
- My favourite word in the film has to be “tentacley”. To be accompanied by wiggling fingers under one’s chin.
- Those 2 dudes from the East India Company, and formerly with the Navy (I think) - they may have brilliant skills of logical deduction, but possess woefully inadequate powers of observation.
- Singapore 200 years ago was apparently much more mountainous. I tell you, erosion is a terrible thing.
- Orlando Bloom cements his stature as the new Keanu Reeves - gorgeous, wooden leading man. Look, all I need from Will is to swashbuckle, kiss Elizabeth and engage in complex power games. Keira Knightley and Stellan Skarsgard already deliver pathos by the shipload *hur hur hur*.
- This is by far the saddest of the Pirates movies - there’s a strong undercurrent of loss running through the film, which is why it’s the only Pirates movie that made me choke up.
- Have your pick of the 3 father-child relationships: One terminated prematurely, one demonstrating that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and the last one finally surfacing after being the dormant thread connecting all three films.
- The reason why Davy Jones’s heart has the power to control the seas can be inferred easily, once you have enough pieces of the puzzle.
- Pirate boots are very sexy. Their removal is even sexier.
Getting serious now, what really stuck with me after the final credits was what the film had to say about love, or rather the difficulties involved in loving someone. Tia Dalma put it best when she queried, “Would you love me if I were anything other than what I am?” It was her inherent nature that caused problems, and yet it’s her very nature that draws her lover.
Will and Elizabeth, meanwhile, face less otherworldly conundrums. Theirs is a simple problem of trust. Instead of relief when he finds out Elizabeth’s unromantic reason for kissing Jack Sparrow at the end of Pirates 2, Will expresses displeasure that she did not trust him with her plans. And as with so many other things in the Pirates movies, Will decides that turn-around is fair play, and answers her later admonishments with her own justification. Therefore, poppets, the moral of the story is: If you can’t trust the one you love, who can you trust? (Especially in that atmosphere of betrayal.)
And a final rumination on long-distance relationships: This movie has the bitchin’ mother of all LDRs, so I guess folks in those days must have been much more patient.
More Money, No Problem
*Paid Post*
PayPerPost just keeps on growing, proving that there is a market for what they call consumer-created content. Their success in linking advertisers and content creators such as bloggers has attracted $7 million in funding from venture capitalists. The press release below:
The PayPerPost Revolution Accelerates, Sponsored
Blogging Marketplace Secures $7 Million Series BDraper Fisher Jurvetson leads round and joins Board of Directors
ORLANDO, FL – (June 12, 2007) – PayPerPost, the leading marketplace for advertisers to reach bloggers and other consumer content creators, today announced it has completed a $7 million second round investment led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson, an investor in the company’s Series A and one of the world’s leading high-technology venture capital firms. The financing brings the total amount of capital raised by PayPerPost to over $10 million, giving the company considerable resources for further development as the industry’s leading Consumer Generated Advertising marketplace. Additional participants in the round include existing investors Inflexion Partners and Village Ventures as well as new investor DFJ Gotham. With this investment, DFJ Managing Director Josh Stein also joins PayPerPost’s Board of Directors.
“PayPerPost created this exciting new advertising space and has established itself as the industry leader,†said Ted Murphy, chief executive officer of PayPerPost. “Although we’ve only used a portion of our first round capital, this added support from investors unlocks significant growth potential. Our content creator and advertiser ROI metrics clearly demonstrate the upside for PayPerPost’s model. We intend to use this capital to build the infrastructure, visibility and professional expertise necessary to reach and retain a greater network of advertisers and content creators than ever before.â€
Since its founding in June of 2006, PayPerPost has signed more than 6,500 advertisers to its groundbreaking service, which has enabled Consumer Content Creators to be compensated for their efforts discussing specific companies, products or services via blogs, videos or other media. The content creators are required to disclose relationships with advertisers on their blog, providing transparency for the end reader. Over 125,000 Internet postings, most in the form of blogs, have already earned money for their creators through PayPerPost’s innovative marketplace. PayPerPost recently released PayPerPost Direct, a disruptive new service that allows advertisers to contract and negotiate directly with individual bloggers they identify through a safe, managed system.
“PayPerPost has laid a strong foundation for the future,†noted Tim Draper, founder and managing director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson. “It continues to attract a critical mass of participants from both the advertising and blogging communities. Analogous to Overture’s sponsored search model, we believe PayPerPost’s business model holds disruptive potential and will enable the company to thrive in the evolving paid-content arena.â€
To mark the $7 million dollar funding, PayPerPost has launched a new website detailing the company’s service offering at http://www.payperpost.com. Bloggers and advertisers can easily sign up at the site and begin leveraging the self service marketplace.
Okay, in case all that is a bit too much to digest, I shall put my precis-writing skills to use and summarise it. PayPerPost is only one year old - it was founded June 2006 - and it’s already accumulated $10 million in total funding. This $7 million injection is the second round of investment, and this time, the MD of the venture capital company has joined PayPerPost’s Board of Directors.
Ted Murphy, CEO of PayPerPost, believes that PPP’s business model is greatly advantageous to both blogger and advertiser, and states that the company plans to use the allotted capital to expand PPP’s reach to more potential content creators and advertisers.
In addition to playing the middleman, PayPerPost has also launched what they call a ‘disruptive new service’, although I’m sure they don’t mean that word negatively. PayPerPost Direct allows advertisers to contact and negotiate opportunities with bloggers through a widget on the blog. Innovations like these keep PPP at the front of the burgeoning business of paid content creation.
PPP takes care of its Posties as well. The company understands our reservations about blog ethics, which is why we must make it clear when a post is sponsored in order to avoid a conflict of interest. The atmosphere of transparency and general sense of community is probably what gives PPP its edge in the business. Content creators want to be treated like people, not just advertising space for hire.
LOLOTR
Okay I’m seriously addicted to lolpix now. Moving up one level from merely consuming them in all forms - lolbots, lolprez, lolgays - I’m now trying to make them. This time around, I used a lolcat builder, because I can’t get that black border around my letters otherwise. I’m too stupid to GIMP it, alright? The continuation of the O RLY saga, and as much as I love lolpix, I hope LOLOTR never takes off as a fad.
P/S: To Ivan, this post was already completed and sitting in ‘Drafts’ when you commented. So you are quite prescient, in a way.
Money Management For Kids
*Paid Post*
I find it somewhat surprising and very regrettable that people my age, barely out of college, can be declared bankrupt due to their credit card debt. Having the freedom to spend but not the understanding that you shouldn’t spend more than you have is a deadly combination indeed. It’s not that credit cards are evil; it’s just that a huge level of financial illiteracy exists among the young.
Given this milieu, the idea of giving teenagers credit cards just sounds like financial suicide. However, there are other options such as prepaid cards and debit cards, and PayJr’s Teen Card is one of them. Besides the obvious benefit of added security since overspending is impossible, parents can also use it to transfer money electronically to their child’s account, which makes it useful for emergencies. As an added feature, there’s a chore management system that pays the child for doing household chores or achieving other goals set by parents, such as good exam results.
Parents can track the card activity to see where money is being spent, and they have the option of suspending the card if the situation arises. Cardholders are protected from fraud and electronic theft with a zero liability program, and the money on the card is insured in case of loss. Hence the teenager has some latitude in spending their money while learning to be financially responsible, but parents retain control so that the child doesn’t end up in a financial mess.
I can has invisible hottie now? kthxbai
After my introduction to I Can Has Cheezburger, I speak fluent lolcats now. It’s not hard to learn - you just have to read through all 50 pages of the archives, and pick up all the caption formulas. After that, you just substitute ‘has’ for ‘have’, and make a few (un)intentional misspellings, e.g. ‘upgarded’ instead of ‘upgraded’.
I realised this today as I was digging through my wallet for a dollar coin. When I found one, I exclaimed, “I has a moneys!” My friends and I like to show each other things. Our things, let us show you them. Yes, indeed my social circle is quite geeky. I haven’t done anything invisible yet, because that’s a visual joke, not a verbal one. But I think it would be funny if I went to Carl’s Jr (for instance) and, instead of placing my order like a normal person, asked “I can has cheezburger?”
Inspired by this craze as well as recent events, I had a flash of insight. One caption is “O RLY?”, added to pictures of surprised/sceptical animals (the term is used on forums to express sarcasm). But a conversation with my sister reminded me that Orlando Bloom is nicknamed “Orly” by his legions of screaming fangirls. Aha, you see where this is going?
And I have one final snippet to add. I was sitting in on the closing ceremony of a conference, and the students decided to informally recognise one of the organising committee members as “Singapore’s Orlando Bloom” by creating quite a ruckus (the girls especially). I feel so vindicated and validated - that’s what I thought too!
The fact that ‘Pirates of the Caribbean 3′ is in cinemas now just made the resemblance more salient. Also, although it’s a bit embarrassing to confess that my maturity level isn’t much higher than that of a high-schooler, I have to admit that I agree with them - dude is quite cute. Would they be trying to take pictures of him otherwise? The poor dears didn’t have the moxie to go up to him and ask outright for a picture, so they were sneakily aiming the camera at him when he was in their vicinity. I know all this because I was seated directly behind them *teehee*.
And as for those who may have reservations as to the actual resemblance, I leave you my favourite Orlando Bloom character to say it best:
Photo taken from here. I claim fair use!
Good Scents
*Paid Post*
Once, a friend and I were talking about the make-or-break qualities we sought in guys. Quite apart from education, money, sense of humour and so on, we each had an idiosyncratic preference for a specific trait. Hers was timbre of voice. She liked men with deep voices, and found midrange tenor voices unattractive. For me, it was smell. I don’t just mean cologne or shampoo, although over time I grow attached to such smells because they remind me of him. When someone just smells right to me, it’s a good sign that I’m attracted - a gut instinct that goes deeper after he’s passed the first evaluation.
Men, on the other hand, have less sensitive noses, which is why women have to douse themselves in perfume to make an olfactory impression. The kind of perfume a woman wears is an indication of how she wants to be perceived. I can’t find any statistics on the top selling womens fragrance so I can’t draw any conclusions as to how most women like to be perceived.
If I had my way, though, the top-selling perfume would be something classic and sensual, along the lines of Chanel’s No. 5, YSL’s Opium or Christian Dior’s Poison. They evoke an image of feminine sensuality, of women who carried themselves regally but with an air of mystique. Or at least that’s what I’m looking for in a perfume.
The scent market now is more adventurous, with the introduction of lighter scents, sometimes with an unexpected twist like the creamy mocha in Ralph Hot. Perfumes like those give off vibes of sexiness, peppiness and youth, but they’re not something you can wear for a lifetime. I would prefer to use one perfume my whole life and make it my signature scent - that’s how you get the boys to notice and remember you, it’s what you’ll wear at your wedding, it’s the scent your grandchildren will remember when they hug Grandma.
Maybe that’s the secret behind the staying power of “classic” fragrances. They can carry a woman not just from day into night - some perfumes are more suited to one than the other - but also through different stages of her life.
Loving Liverpool, Part 1
My cousin, who was away studying in the UK, just sent me an email telling me she’s back, and that she got me the Liverpool Football Club souvenir I wanted. It’s a replica of the “This Is Anfield” sign that hangs in the players’ tunnel, which the team members touch before running onto the field, as a symbolic gesture. Soon it won’t be Anfield any more, because they’re building a new stadium a couple of blocks away.
Looking back, it’s hard to believe I’ve been supporting Liverpool for more than 10 years. I started in the 1995/96 season - yes, I was still in primary school then - because it was an exploding craze among pubescent girls. Back then, there was this huge debate in the teenage population as to whether it was acceptable for girls to follow football, and whether they actually understood anything or they were just ogling the guys. I don’t know where that rebuttal came from - most of the time, if you’re watching the game, you can barely make out the numbers on the back of their shirts, much less be “ogling” them.
So my classmates and I each had a favourite player, and mine was Robbie Fowler, for obvious reasons. Which is why I was so delighted when he returned to Anfield (see this post). And among all the girls, I’m the only one whose football fever never subsided. As secondary school happened and other fads replaced football, girls watching the game became extremely commonplace to the point where it generates no comment at all now. It wasn’t always like that!
Even now, when I meet up with old friends from school, they’re amazed to hear that I’m still watching football and I still support Liverpool, because they’ve lost all interest in the game. I suppose I’m as bemused by their reaction as they are by my continued loyalty. I don’t see what’s so amazing about continuing to support the same team for over a decade, and they probably didn’t think their teenage fad would have had such a lasting effect. Which is where they’re wrong - it was never a fad for me.
Uncrowd Your Hard Drive
*Paid Post*
I just got a message that my D: drive is running out of space. I’m not surprised, since that’s where I keep practically everything - music, movies, photos, documents, games. My Windows is installed in C: so I like to leave that partition alone.
I’d buy a portable external hard disk but I missed out on the good deals during the PC Show, since I was working all throughout, plus I generally try to have as few gadgets as possible. I travel back and forth between Malaysia and Singapore, so the fewer gadgets I have to lug, the better.
I guess Online Storage would be the best solution for me, since I don’t intend to stop putting media on my hard drive, and I can’t upgrade it since I use a laptop. IBackup provides IDrive, a comprehensive data storage solution that’s so much more than just a warehouse for your data.
The interface is drag-and-drop, and your online storage appears as a local drive on your computer so it’s just as intuitive as a physical drive. For those who prefer a web interface, you can even edit certain file types directly, such as Office documents. To complement this, you can share web folders so that everyone in your team has access to files directly, instead of emailing back and forth, or using file sharing.
The feature that would be most useful to me is the ability to stream media files, even creating playlists with media players. So on a lazy evening in front of the laptop, I can stream my movies direct from the virtual drive. It wouldn’t even take all that long to transfer my data to IDrive - their tests reveal a 30% improvement in transfer speeds over that of other storage services. These figures are for Windows, though, although Mac users aren’t left out - there is a variant of IDrive just for you guys. And finally, there’s a trial subscription, so that customers who need further convincing can try before they buy.
Another career choice gone.
I’m just not cut out for sales.
As per a previous post, I had a temporary job selling PC games and software at the PC show, recently concluded at Suntec. Make no mistake about it - I hated that job. It wasn’t the people. My colleagues were young adults, like me, on university vacation and hoping to make some extra cash. They were fine. My manager was an alright guy who tried his best to make work comfortable for us.
No, it’s the very nature of the job that I find abhorrent. Hoping to convince people to part with their money for things which I know aren’t worth all that much - it creates a huge cognitive dissonance that the money doesn’t justify. Okay, so my job is to convince the customer that it IS worth all that much. Fine. But apparently I didn’t do a good enough job, because my sales figures paled in comparison to that of their top salesman. I figured if he could do it, so could I. But no.
Furthermore, the boss was given to random spot checks on his employees, and apparently on one of his rounds he saw me “hugging the pillar”, to quote my manager. *shrug* Okay, fine, be more proactive. Approach more customers, bla bla bla. Hey, you wanna know what I think? If your product is good, it’ll sell itself, and the customers will be approaching me. But hey, I’m just a lowly temp staff getting paid 6 bucks an hour, so what do I know, right?
The last time I did a sales job was more than 3 years ago, it was seasonal (selling cookies) and you know what? We couldn’t keep up with demand. We were constantly restocking, and having to turn away customers because we had run out. Sure we had to push some less popular items (blueberry tarts that tasted horribly artificial, if you must know) but by and large, the items sold themselves. And because we provided samples, no amount of product promotion could convince a customer to buy a tin of blueberry tarts if they hated the taste.
The consumer is wising up. They know when you’re upselling (trying to push more products once you’ve hooked a customer) and it’s an open market, so they can usually find what they want somewhere else. And seriously, I’ve seen a product sell itself with minimal input from me. We put on a demo copy of Feeding Frenzy 2 on the computer, kids came to play, and voila! Out of stock. Frankly, if all the products were like that, the company could save their 60 dollars per person per day, and I could stay home.
But as it is, I dragged myself to work for 4 consecutive days of non-stop standing (although I’ve done 13 days at a stretch), beating down my ideals for the sake of pragmatism. Perhaps in the end that’s what it boils down to. Sales is very much for the pragmatic. Charm people, sell, make money. If they like it, well and good, if they suffer buyer’s remorse, well, caveat emptor. Maybe you could say that the educational software helps the child to achieve his full potential, thus leading to self-actualization, yadda yadda yadda, but I think that’s a bit of a stretch to accommodate my ideals. So, no go.
This is what happens when you take a job solely for the money. It’s very hard-earned indeed.
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