the calm after the storm...

im going back to Cebu later today. it's been a week since my MBA graduation here at AIM.  I've been busy packing my stuff and organizing my digital files, still i'm not yet done.  After 16 months of blood, sweat, tears and CP, the thrill level goes down. I'm now the young MBA graduate but still jobless.  I guess all the HR people are still partying.

One thing I will remember in the graduation is the batch name coined by Madhu, our distinction graduate in his speech.  The previous batch which was the last of the 2-year MBA called themselves the last of the Mohicans, and  Madhu then called out batch as the first of the Conquerors.  I had tried to email the whole batch about a consensus on what our batch name is supposed to be but AIM always has fail points to consider, in this case group email.  Although Madhu's coined batch name, even though not done by consensus or popular vote is okay.

I've been staying in the dorm up to now andit feels weird that the walls and hallways do not echo the pressure of the past 16 months.  The nooks and cranny of AIM is devoid of the familiar faces who either greet you with sweet, drunken or sleepy smiles.  I miss my batch mates.  My experience in AIM, although not the best, I think thats what makes it  beautiful.  It calls to my mind what a friend told me once about falling in love, "Its not the pretty face which makes yoou fall in love, it's the small quirks and annoyances that endears the person to you."

After 16 months, I believe AIM has given me more than a diploma.  But one thing that must be addressed is the "unofficial/official" policy on cheating.  The cheating must stop and the cheaters must be penalized regardless of cultural differences.  

*(I wasted 800php on the worthless official photographer)

the battle of the UMPCs (part 2)

MSI Wind is actually a worthy contender for the top spot of UMPCs.  But the keyboard real estate for the period and comma key which is half of the normal size restricts the functionality of the unit.  Everything else is the same, the screen is okay although the speakers is really loud.  And then there's the cheap and small touchpad.  In terms of installing a hacked OSX, the Wind is the most stable but the wifi card doesn't work but instead they use another internal wifi card.  I think the card is from Dell.  These hacker guys actually created a new distribution called WINDOSX.  Check the torrents for it.  Another downside for the Wind is the 3-cell battery that comes with it.

The Lenovo Ideapad s10 has a lot of hype but it died down later on during the launch.  So far it is the thinnest of the other mentioned UMPCs.  But it doesn't have any distinguishing feature worth mentioning.  As a johnny-come lately in the UMPC, it doesn't offer much to switch to the Ideapad.  It did have a good love story a marketing video in youtube.  Somewhat like the laptop version of BMW's The Hire series. 

An interesting update on the HP mininote 2133.  HP just unveiled the HP mini 1000 which dropped the VIA processor and is now sporting and atom 1.6Ghz processor.  And the other good news is that: NO MORE VISTA for it.  I haven't seen it personally but based on my experience on the HP 2133, the keyboard real-estate is the best there is.  Let's hope its still the same.  The touchpad on the other hand could have been bigger.  Let me update this in a few days when I get to feel a test unit. The picture looks mighty nice. 

seeing Red (Mobile)

August this year I got a free uMobile sim card.  the concept was a network that was ad-driven but you can still load credits. The sim had a free 100php load each month for 6 months, but unfortunately I didn't really use it because : (1) it couldn't text to Globe Telecom and (2) I only have 2 celfones.

In the Philippines, the mobile phone user generally has 2 handsets/units.  The primary being a Globe/Smart sim while the secondary being a Sun Cellular sim.  Now why the need for the secondary unit with a Sun sim?  Well, it's a cost issue.  Sun Cellular offers unlimited texts and calls to other Sun Cellular sims for a set fee.  Unfortunately, the signal is spotty in certain areas and sometimes the bandwidth is full.

So here comes uMobile.  But then the concept of being Asia's first ad-funded mobile didn't work. They were unable to get 10K users by the year end. Connectivity Unlimited Resource Enterprise, Inc. (CURE) which owned uMobile was at a loss because it needed to jumpstart their 3G offering or it loses its license.  Now here comes Smart Telecoms to the rescue.  They basically bought CURE to expand their 3G license.

Red and 3G.  Red Mobile is positioned to go after the secondary phone segment, those with  Sun Cellular sim cards.  Well to rationalize it first, to carry 3 phones is crazy.  So instead, dislodge the current secondary phone network.  The offering of Red Mobile to Red Mobile  is very interesting.

But then the need for a 3G mobile unit.  Hmm... Red Mobile/Smart is poised to take on Sun Cellular by giving the consumer more quality at an incremental price of 50 cents per text/MMS/call minute/video call minute to another Red Mobile user.  Furthermore Smart has an extensive network compared to Sun.  Let's face it, Sun Cellular's service although spotty and at times very busy saves users a lot of money from using their Globe/Smart credits.  But then again, how much are we willing to pay for reliability... at a cheap rate?

I personally haven't decided yet if I am moving to Red Mobile.  My free sim hasn't arrived yet.  I would predict thought that Filipinos will stay with Sun Cellular.  Free is still free, as long as its cheap (hell yeah!).