Monday, June 30, 2008

Walkabout

Went shooting with Ron the other day, but unfortunately we didn't really have any idea where to go, so here are the results:

Kicking off with the railway station. These are railway switches.

Tracks. The sky sucks when you don't put on the polarizer.

View along the outside of the Station Master's office.

Kitten!

After that, it's the district and land office. The jury's still out on the performance of my recently bought EF 28-90mm III lens though. Some shots like this one came out surprisingly sharp - much sharper than my 18-55mm kit lens in fact. What you see here was just cropped, with no software sharpening done.

But some like this weren't that sharp and I had to rely on a little software sharpening.

Hate the govenance, love the country.

The nearby local council building.

Macro shot of some insect I found hiding in the nearby bushes.

The south face of the land office.

Another angle of the same face.

At the lake gardens. Just love this shot, with its warm evening colours.

Water running down some rocks. Too bad the pipe was in the way.

View of one of the lakes. Took a shot of the same lake a few weeks ago.

Like I said, mixed reviews from me about the 28-90mm. Aside from the occasional sharpness streak (instead of being sharp all the time), it also suffers from a focusing problem, often focusing on the background instead of the object when the aperture's wide open. But I guess one gets what one pays for, and for SGD60, a mint condition lens to bridge the gap between my 18-55mm and 90-300mm isn't too bad at all.

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Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Pyramid Schemes

Oh, those suckers at the top are gonna have a windfall now that the Malaysian economy is going in the tank. Those bastards at the very top of these pyramids. Reminds me of that bloke based in Hong Kong.

Anyways, I hope I don't sound too arrogant or anything, but I get really pissed when I realize how some nice people around me can be so gullible and actually think schemes that involve parting with your money and recruiting people to do the same for a commission can be profitable, considering the nature and the law of exponentials. And they're not uneducated people. These are business grads, engineering grads, university students - all young urban professionals.

I mean c'mon people, it's simple math! Simple math that will tell you such schemes will not last due to the limited people that can be recruited - or conned, considering the obscene amounts of 'success stories' they tell you and fast cars they show off during their introductionary 'seminars'. If you're still too lazy to do some research or calculations, here's a diagram from Wikipedia to show the unsustainability of it:

See? And most of the time, a huge percentage of the 'recruitment' fee goes right to the top to the sucker who started this and probably counts his money while laughing away at how stupid you people can get. It also doesn't matter if actual goods (like 'medicinal' lamps) get sold during the process. Most of the time they're highly marked up from the original pricing so the suckers at the top can milk more money from the recruited cows at the bottom. Yes, this very aspect involving the transfer of items probably also makes it legitimate from a legal standpoint, but from a morality one, it's highly unethical. And so are the dubious recruiting tactics:

i) Brainwashing 'seminars' where people are invited on the basis of attending a simple business talk (which cost me RM20, by the way. The price of giving face to a 'friend'...);

ii) Ridiculously high amounts of false hope dispensed involving lots of luxury cars, success-made-simple stories, bragging about buying RM50k Rolex watches (I kid you not!), etc;

iii) Belittling your current financial status - questioning whether are you getting the money you deserve, how your current job and life sucks cos you ain't making enough money, how your boss is taking you for a ride by getting the big bucks while you're working your ass off for shit, etc;

iv) Avoiding simple questions about sustainability and profit potential through ambiguous statements like "in every business you have to work hard," or "RM[insert amount] is a small amount to pay nowadays to start a business";

v) Avoiding questions about failure rates (those who failed to break even and hence lost money) but instead, blaming these failures for their lack of effort though it's obvious that it's not an easy task trying to persuade a person face-to-face to part with a large amount of money. Which is why come to think of it, they'd rather avoid telling you immediately their 'business model' but instead prefer if you come to their 'seminars' where they can convince you with crowd pressure and other psychological factors;

vi) Making it sound as if it's an opportunity to you by wanting to share their wealth making technique since you're a friend/relative/[insert relation], when in actual fact, they're more interested in the commission they will get once you join;

vii) Fill these seminars with their members (poor sods who have been brainwashed) who engage in overenthusiastic welcomes, cheers and actions in order to give an appearance of trust and success to outsiders new to this;

viii) Tell you that this is a chance to be your own boss;

ix) Members, even those you don't know, are extremely friendly and overenthusiastic about getting you started, which logically, will not happen in a perfectly honest business. I mean which business would want more competition unless they have something to benefit from this competition?

x) Masking their schemes under names like 'network marketing' or 'multi-level marketing' to lend it a sense of legitimacy;

xi) Calling it a franchise because for the amount you pay, you get some really overpriced items and the right to sell these items. After that, the cycle repeats itself when you recruit people and sell them items and the right to sell these items. And they will repeat the exact same thing later by recruiting and selling to someone else. Confusing? Well think about it this way. In a real franchise like McD, I don't exactly get the right to sell Big Macs just because I bought one, do I?

Look, I have no problem with them if everything is done in an honest manner without all the added sugar. I have no problem if during these 'seminars', a business plan is outlined and people are made aware of how the 'business' (if you can even call it that) works.

What I have a problem with, is the secretive (read: lying, ambiguous, double-faced) nature of the way they work. More specifically, not making clear certain things when they invite you to their 'seminars' or not telling you from the start how they actually make their money. Ask yourself this question, o' potential investors: what kind of business is this if it does not even have the guts to tell you their plans face on but instead, prefers to subject you to a two hour show of chest thumping rags-to-riches nonsense before giving you an idea of what they're doing? Oh, and they will probably tell you after the 'seminar' - just like they told me - not to tell anyone else about their business under the reason that the general public might misunderstand them.

But why the need to hide in the dark if this business is perfectly legit? Instead of the truth, what you will get after the 'seminar' is a teaser: come to this whatever one-day thing we're organizing and you will get a clearer picture of how our business works. All fine, until you consider the RM150 or someting you will have to fork out for what I will assume is another uber-brainwashing session. But I guess that's how the scheme works - by flooding your brain with delusions of riches and taking advantage of your greed, which I will admit, is something everyone has.

If you're still not convinced by this point as to why you shouldn't throw a penny at these schemes, ask youself this question: can you live with the fact that you're making money by selling people false hope? By asking them to 'seminars' to have them brainwashed so that they will part with their money and you then get a cut of it?

Legit in the eyes of the law this scheme may be, but I know I'd rather be poor and ride my beaten down C70 for the rest of my life rather than make money out of people through dubious means and drive a BMW Z4 - especially if those people happen to be my family and friends. Its a syn...I mean sin, no matter how you look at it.

Finally, to my 'friend' who may be reading this, I say you know who you are. And just so you know, here's my middle finger and a big 'f*ck you'. Shame on you for trying to get an old friend to one of your 'seminars' without telling him exactly what he's in for. If you had the balls to tell me from the start it will be about the business you're in and that I will have to fork out RM20 to attend it, I probably would've attended it anyway because you were honest and I'd give you face as a friend. Not telling the entire truth isn't lying, but it's cheating nontheless. I hope you realize this before you lose all your friends.

"If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is,"

Opportunity my ass. Guess for once my pessimism actually saved me from being conned.

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Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Ah...physics!

Does anyone else besides me find this funny?


Edit: something else I found in my hard drive:


Didn't know he rocked, did you?

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Saturday, June 14, 2008

Circumzenithal Arcs

"The circumzenithal arc or cicumzenith arc (CZA), also called the Bravais' arc, is an optical phenomenon similar in appearance to a rainbow and arising from refraction of sunlight through non-terminated, horizontally-oriented ice crystals in certain clouds. It takes the shape of one-quarter of a circle centered at the zenith and parallel to the horizon, on the same side as the sun. Its colors run from blue near the zenith to red towards the horizon; it is one of the brightest and most colorful halos."

- Wikipedia: Circumzenithal Arc



Some CZA shots taken from the front yard, before and after PP. The 'after' shots were autolevelled, autocontrasted and autocolored to bring out the CZA more clearly...and somewhat more eerily too if you ask me.

Shot #1: Before


Shot #1: After


Shot #2: Before


Shot #2: After


Shot #3: Before


Shot #3: After

Conclusion: There are more things than you can imagine in the sky if you'd just bother to look up - in my case, accidentally.

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Friday, June 13, 2008

Euro Blues for the Azzurri Fan

And the tournament hasn't even progessed beyond the group stages yet! Shitty Italy lost to Holland 3-0 and shitty Germany just had to lose to 'ikan Bilic' Croatia. Darn. At least Spain are firing on all cylinders though. Hope they keep their form up and go all the way to the finals - where they lose to Italy of course! I've been saying time and time again that Man Utd should've buy Torres and Villa. Scousers got the former, isn't it time the reds got the latter?

Forza Italia folks!

And here's a self portrait just to show that I've been busy with my camera and Photoshop when I'm sure there are more productive things to do during the holidays:

Post-match edit: The Italians just drew with Romania. Shit.

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Saturday, June 07, 2008

Taiping Lake Gardens, Part Deux

Went back to the lake gardens a few days later on June 4th to see what I could get on a weekday morning and also to help my bro snap some pix for his school project. Most pix here are also my personal experiments in photoshopping:

Tranquility

Walkway

Walkway, this time in B&W.

Overlooking the lake towards the northwest.

Same angle, slightly different subjects.

The same walkway, but this was photographed after the bamboo stuffed Chinese bridge.

Across another section of the lake. This is looking westwards, I believe.

Greens and blues. Okay, I think I may have overdone the color adjustments on this one...

An underexposed shot that's here cos I kinda like how it turned out.

One of the many lakes. Love the tree on the extreme right...

And this is what you'd get if you shifted your gaze towards the right. They sure as heck don't call this place the lake gardens for nothing!

More greens and blues with such great weather and light that morning.

A path into the trees. Used a simulated yellow filter on this one.

Surprisingly this shot came out well. Gotta love those circular polarizers.

The grass somehow looks inviting from this angle.

Once again that nice tree I mentioned earlier. Would've preferred the tree branches to be out of the sides of the pic though. My bad.

And by this stage, I really am tempted to make another "fuyoh...macam Switzerland," remark.

Cheers, folks!

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