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Wot?

2009-07-29T23:47:00.001-07:00

Apa Ni?

Tanjong Pagar

2009-07-29T21:33:00.001-07:00

Technorati Tags: pagar,tanjong

Tanjong Pagar is a historic district located within the Central Business District in Singapore, straddling the Outram Planning Area and the Downtown Core under the Urban Redevelopment Authority's urban planning zones.

Tanjong Pagar in Malay means "cape of stakes", a name which reflects its origins as a fishing village situated on a former promontory. It has been surmised that the name was inspired by the presence of kelongs (offshore palisade fishing traps constructed using wooden stakes and cross pieces) set up along the stretch of coast from the village of Tanjong Malang to what is now Tanjong Pagar. It is possibly a corruption of the earlier name Tanjong Passar, a road which led from South Bridge Road to the fishing village and which appeared in George Drumgoole Coleman's 1836 Map of the Town.

A far more picturesque account of the naming of this part of the coast emerges from the realm of local legend. According to the Malay Annals, there was a time when the villages along the coast of Singapore suffered from vicious attacks from shoals of swordfish. On the advice of a particularly astute boy named Hang Nadim, the Sri Maharajah built a barricade of banana stems along the coast, which successfully trapped the attacking fish by their snouts as they leapt from the waters.

The original name for Tanjong Pagar is also said to be Salinter, a fishing village. When the Tanjong Pagar Dock Company (1864) was formed due to the growth of shipping activities in the 1850s, wharves were built. Tanjong is "cape" and pagar means "fence" or enclosed space, i.e. wharf where ships are moored. Tanjong Pagar probably refers to the location of PSA Gate 3 near Victoria Dock. Around Tanjong Pagar were mangrove swamps which were filled in with earth from Mount Palmer and other nearby small hills for extension of the wharves up to Telok Blangah.

Tanjong Pagar Road is known as tan jiong pa kat in Hokkien (Min Nan), which is phonetic.

Another Brick In The Wall

2009-07-29T21:03:00.001-07:00

Technorati Tags: craporama,crapozoid

All in all we’re just a nother brick in the wall

Heres some links

2009-07-29T20:21:00.000-07:00

Where does it go to?

How about here then

And another one

Where to go for lunch?

2009-07-29T20:17:00.000-07:00

NAsty toilets in the building

Key

2008-06-04T01:52:00.001-07:00

pen keyboard

2008-06-03T23:20:00.000-07:00

DON'T pay. This is what netizens have been telling website owners who received 'pay-up' invoices from a local company for allegedly using its technology.

27 May 2008, The New Paper

But now a netizen has taken a step further by setting up a website, Suevuestar.biz, to encourage others to challenge the validity of a patent owned by Singapore-based Vuestar Technologies.

The patent, held by an Australian, Mr Ronald Neville Langford, 68, is for Internet technology which uses images to link to other websites.

Mr Langford is a major shareholder of Vuestar, which recently sent invoices to owners of small online businesses in Singapore, asking them to pay for the use of its patented technology.

Ms Cheong Lee Sing, a PhD student at Nanyang Technological University, said she set up the website last week to reach out to as many affected website owners as possible.

She said she had not received an invoice, but decided to set up the site 'due to pure outrage that a foreign-originated company would prey on Singapore companies'.

'No one has come forward to organise the companies that have been slapped with the invoice, despite the appearance of many blog posts on this topic,' she said.

Ms Cheong said she also wants to help decrease the likelihood that less savvy netizens would simply pay the licence fee to Vuestar.

The company's actions have caused an online uproar on blogs, news websites and online forums.

Many are asking: Is the company a patent troll?

The term 'patent troll' is used to describe a person or company which enforces its patents against one or more alleged infringers in a manner considered unduly opportunistic.

Mr Langford is associated with at least 14 patents filed in Australia.

These include a patent on a 'digital wallet' - a system which allows Internet users to access financial information after entering a password - according to a search on AusPat, a database of Australian patents.

Mr Langford owned a patent in Australia for the same technology he is trying to charge a fee for in Singapore, and founded a company called Aogami International based in Brisbane to enforce the patent there.

However, the patent has ceased because Mr Langford did not renew it.

He told The New Paper that Aogami International is now defunct and that he is no longer a director of the company.

He said: 'My former principal shareholder and partner died suddenly, hence (I started) Vuestar.'

The business model of Mr Langford's Singapore company is similar to that of US-based Intellectual Ventures, helmed by former Microsoft chief technology officer Nathan Myrhvold.

The company buys and invents patents, then licenses them to manufacturers.

Mr Shane Robison, chief strategy and technology officer of Hewlett-Packard, called Intellectual Ventures a 'very large patent troll' in several media interviews.

Likewise, local and overseas netizens have dubbed Mr Langford's company a patent troll, borrowing from what they had read online.

Asked about this, Mr Langford declined to comment.

In a post on Techcrunch.com, a popular technology website, writer John Biggs described Mr Langford's patent as 'kind of like creating a patent to identify a goat on sight'.

Another blogger described Vuestar's actions as 'absolutely ridiculous', adding that he wondered 'how these patent squatters manage to get their applications accepted in the first place'.

HOT TOPIC

To date, a blog search with the keyword 'Vuestar' yielded more than 1,500 blog entries.

A spokesman for the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore said it is possible for the validity of a patent to be challenged 'by way of defence in proceedings for infringement of the patent'.

On the validity of his patent potentially being challenged, Mr Langford replied: 'Legal action is ademocratic choice of all parties involved. The consequences of success or failure is germane to all.'

The First Post

2008-06-03T21:50:00.000-07:00

Kwa kwa kwa bla bla bla