If The American Idol judges were Project Managers

Unless you've been living under a rock for the past 5 years, you know who these three people are. They are on TV three times a week, influencing millions of Americans on what phone number to dial. What if your Project Manager is like them?

The Randy Jackson Project Manager. This is your buddy Project Manager, your hangout pal. He takes interest in your life outside of work. He wants to know your playlist on Last.FM, the stories you Digg and whether you caught that TWiT episode when Steve Wozniak was on. When you pass his desk on the way to the rest room, he would greet you with a "What up, Dawg!" without fail. When your module passes unit test, he would slap you in the butt and exclaim "That was hot!"

The Paula Abdul Project Manager. Project Manager would be a misnomer because she is more of a cheerleader than somebody that leads or manages. She believes happy coders are productive coders. She does not direct or coach, nor does she know what stage the project is in. When you can't figure out how to tune that stored procedure to finish under 3 minutes, she would pull you in for a pep talk and tells you that she sees a little Tom Kyte in you. She gives such generic kudos to everybody all the time, you wonder if she ever noticed the weekend work you put in to install the patch to fix that annoying crash when more than 2 people log in at the same time.

The Simon Cowell Project Manager. This is the manager who always lets you know whether you're in the doghouse or the penthouse. He doesn't mince his words. When you get your performance evaluation, you will not be surprised because he's been giving you constant feedbacks since day one. When a lot of your bugs are spelling errors, he will gladly give you a kick in the pants. When you don't sound confident during status report meetings, he will tell you so. Sometimes you wonder why he picks on so many little things and sometimes his feedbacks de-motivates you. Sometimes you hate him and even fear him. But you know that if you don't take his criticisms personally he can make you a better code monkey.

Singapore is best city for Asian expatriates to live: HR survey

Via The Straits Times newspaper:

ASIAN expatriates have ranked Singapore as the best place to live in the world for its safe and clean environment, while Europeans chose Copenhagen, a survey showed on Tuesday.

Spore is best city for Asian expatriates to live: HR survey

I can testify to the above, being a resident alien in Singapore myself. I came from Jakarta to live in Singapore in June 2007 and so far the experience has been pretty good. Here are the reasons why Singapore is great for expatriates:

• English is the primary language -- This fact cannot be understated. Being in a foreign country and able to read street signs, understand restaurant menus and ask questions to some random person on the street can give you a sense of control.
• Excellent public transportation -- Singapore has a network of well-maintained, air-conditioned underground trains (MRT), buses and taxis that cover pretty much the whole country. Do you need to know when the next bus will arrive at your stop? Look it up with your mobile browser. Need a taxi? Call them up and most of the time they will arrive within 5 minutes. With all of this, you won't need to buy a car when you first arrive in Singapore, which translates to lower moving cost.
• Low crime -- Being in an unfamiliar and foreign country can be an exhilarating experience. Being in an unfamiliar and foreign country fearing for your own security is quite another feeling. It's easy to take security for granted, but you have to remember that in some countries you cannot just listen to your iPods or talk on your hand phones while riding the city bus.
• Affordable apartments are widely available -- I know Singaporeans bitch a lot about the cost of property, but the truth is, livable accommodation is still pretty much affordable. If you spend the same percentage of your salary on housing, you will find a nicer place in Singapore than you would in Jakarta, for example.

For me particularly, Singapore's close distance to Jakarta enables me to travel back and forth without needing to do serious planning. I can fly off for a weekend trip and be in Jakarta after an hour and 20 minutes flight. Ticket price is pretty affordable too.

In 2000, "there will be no C, X or Q in our every-day alphabet"

Via Leo Laporte, here is an actual prediction made in 1900 about the world in 2000. It was supposedly first published in the Ladies Home Journal magazine (click the picture to the right). In case you're wondering, this is an actual magazine first published in 1883 (according to Wikipedia) -- apparently still going strong and has an online presence at www.lhj.com.

Undoubtedly, predicting the world 100 years ahead is extremely difficult. But some of their predictions came very close. Here's one example:

"Photographs will be Telegraphed from any distance. If there be a battle in China [...] snapshots of its most striking events will be published in the newspaper an hour later."

That's actually a pretty good prediction. Of course, by 2003/2004 people are snapping pictures with their camera-phones and sharing photos all over the world in a matter of seconds.

Social Networking Popularity Around The World

Here's a partial map depicting the popularity of social networking sites around the world. The full picture can be found at this Le Monde web site.

You can barely see Singapore, but I believe Le Monde is saying that Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore are owned by Friendster. Interesting. Although I think this is accurate, from what I see in the three countries, the trend is definitely moving towards Facebook.

Update 3 March 2008: Via the Buzz Out Loud podcast episode 670, here is a more detailed version of the social network popularity map.

Technorati Tags: internet,socialnetworking

Free bed frame and mattress

You spend a third of your life in bed, so I always believe that a bed is something you should spend good money on. When we moved to our apartment about three months ago, the previous tenant left a queen-sized bed previously purchased from Ikea. Imagine a wooden bed frame that comes in a box which you have to assemble yourself. Now, I'm a big 120-kg guy. The bed creaks and I get anxious every time I turn over in my sleep, thinking I would break one of the legs.

So me and my wife went to Courts and found a nice spring bed with independent coils, latex and the whole whiz-bang technology guaranteed to give a good night's sleep. Now, what to do with the old bed? I posted an ad on Facebook Marketplace -- free for whoever wants to take the bed.

The first response came a few hours after I posted the ad. That was quick, I thought. After checking availability, the person asked whether she could have two. "Two?", I asked. "I'm afraid I don't understand what you mean. I only have one bed to give away."

"Oh... You mean the bed is not new?"

A few seconds of awkward silence... Yes, the bed is used. Do I look like Santa Clause in my Facebook profile?

Technorati Tags: life,living,facebook