Our Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak is an instant hit on Facebook. I’ve just checked his Facebook - it showed that he had joined the network in the middle of October and to date (November 23 2009) has had 30,000 supporters!

Najib joined Facebook, which enjoys increasing popularity in Malaysia — as another channel to reach out to the people. The Prime Minister’s Facebook page can be viewed at www.facebook.com/najibrazak.  

“As is the case with this blog and my Twitter page, I will be using Facebook to communicate my thoughts and activities to you. In addition to posting status updates, I will be sharing links, Flickr photos, video from YouTube and information on my personal interests such as my favourite dish and pastimes,” he said in his latest posting in his blog.

Najib also urged the people to visit his Facebook and to share their thoughts on how to make the page better.

“Please do visit my Facebook page when you have a moment, and let me have your thoughts on how I can make it better. I look forward to receiving your feedback, and to seeing you there as a fan!” he added.

The prime minister said that encouraged by the amount of followers on his Twitter, he would continuously update his thoughts and whereabout via Twitter.

His postings which mainly related to current issues in the country also invited tremendous comments from viewers. On the information section of Facebook, Najib also put up his personal information and interests including favourite songs and music, movies and favourite quotes.

“My life is very hectic, but I love it. In my spare time I focus on Sunday family lunches, watching TV with my kids and going on holidays”.

He also listed out his late father and second prime minister of Malaysia Allahyarham Tun Abdul Razak as having the greatest influence on him.

“But I admire Sir Winston Churchill’s oratory skills and never-say-die attitude, Nelson Mandela for the sacrifices he made and for never flinching in the face of adversity and JFK,” he added.

Social networking websites like Friendster, Myspace, Tagged, etc, and especially Facebook, have significant implications for business owners, marketers, and entrepreneurs. To keep your business current, you should at least be familiar with the latest conversational marketing techniques and viral technologies, including Facebook and its powerful features.

10 reasons to use Facebook for Business:

1.    Meet friends. Now Facebook is not just for school kids. Members are typically older and more mature than on other sites, and there are more professional users.

Let’s take a look at some of most popular websites and the proper methods for selling things via the Internet in Malaysia.

AUCTIONS

Auctions are a great way to sell things as you sometimes get more than you expect.

• eBay

The most recognisable website for online buying and selling is, of course, eBay. The online auction site has been available in Malaysia since 2004 and has been gaining in popularity over the years.

Registration is free and eBay Malaysia does not charge insertion fees or final value fees. However, the site will charge you if you want to add an extra picture or subtitles for the item you are selling.

• Tip!: It is important to have multiple views of any item, particularly for expensive products where it is best to have high-resolution pictures from different angles to increase the chances of finding an interested buyer.

eBay owns PayPal and it is one of the more popular ways to pay. PayPal allows the buyer to transfer money from his credit card or bank account (note: In Malaysia only credit cards are allowed) to a PayPal account and then send payment to the seller’s PayPal account without exchanging sensitive financial information.

In Malaysia, however, once the money has been transferred to the sellers PayPal account, the money cannot be withdrawn from a bank and can only be credited into your credit card account.

Other payment methods include bank transfers and cash on delivery.

Advanced users hoping to start a side business online may want to consider signing up for an eBay store.This allows users who meet the requirements to create their own customisable eBay page and even gives them the option of selling fixed price items. Setting up a store will incur an extra monthly fee and only users with a fixed number of ratings and verifications will be eligible to rent one.

• Lelong.com.my

Another auction site that is popular amongst the local audience is Lelong.com.my. The site is fashioned much like eBay and even has a similar user rating system.

Established locally, it is a lot more Malaysia-centric as there are options to pay specifically via Maybank2u and shows which state in Malaysia the item is in.

Lelong is also pushing its virtual stores to people who meet its rating requirements. You pay a small yearly sum for your own page and store logo as well as an inventory mechanism provided by the site. Again, this is for advanced users looking to take online selling to the next level.

Lelong also does not charge fees on items sold on its site. You are only charged if you wish to add more than one picture.

• Tip!: The best way to get around paying too much for extra pictures on eBay and Lelong is to take several photos and merge them into one picture as effectively as possible.

FIXED PRICES

There are websites which allow you to sell things at a fixed price to any interested party. The difference here is that you have the prerogative to sell to whomever you please, not necessarily to the highest bidder who may not have hiked the price to a satisfactory level.

• Lowyat.net

Arguably the most popular fixed price website is Lowyat.net. This website deals primarily with electronics such as computers and computer parts, MP3 players, speakers, and essentially anything that requires some form of electric energy to operate.

The site is free to sign up and it is probably the most straight to the point for selling stuff. It is forum based so you can ask questions immediately and a private messaging system for more detailed inquiries.

The site offers trade at no cost at all as there are no charges for extra pictures, (although the quantity is limited) or a final value fee. Reputation as well as amount of items sold will be taken into account in assessing a user’s reliability.

• mySimplifieds.com

A relative newcomer to the realm of online trade is Digi Telecommunication’s mySimplifieds.com.

Launched in February, it hopes to offer Malaysians yet another venue to buy and sell their items. Advertised as a classifieds website, this site allows users to advertise a wide range of products and even extends to property. Many houses, apartments and rooms are up for sale or rent on Digi’s site within months of its launch.

Currently, registration and usage is completely free and it remains to be seen whether that is subject to change. The site offers some interesting services such as a built-in Facebook feature designed to notify your friends about your posting. Also, links to YouTube will be allowed for further product or property demonstration via video.

Internet marketing is a very broad subject. If you understand how broad offline marketing and sales is, it is the same for online or internet marketing. Therefore, in order for your online marketing campaign to be successful, there must be a group of marketers that truly focus on doing it. It is complex and the methods are variety. Fortunately there are few distinguished techniques for you to start. While the others, they can be implemented later accordingly.

1) WEBSITE - Why having a properly designed website is very important to optimize your online marketing?

The purpose of marketing is to create leads.  Once you have leads, then it is up to the sales team to close the deal. Among the leads, there are people whom you can close them right on the spot. For others, there must be some leads nurturing effort before they are convinced to engage on your products or services.

The campaign that you make to get people to visit your website is called marketing. It can be via both ways; online and offline or just one at a time. Once the visitors are at the home page, your website is taking the role of a salesman. Therefore, it is not wrong to say that your products’ website is your online sales men. That factor alone is a very good reason for you to invest for a well designed website.

Now, you’ve understood the function of your website. Let’s get to understand in brief about what are the visitors’ expectations and behaviours about any website:

• People come to web sites to satisfy goals, to do tasks, to get answers to questions.
• They come for information, for the content that they think (or hope) is there
• Answers a question or helps them complete a task
• Information is easy to find and easy to understand
• They expect the content to be accurate, up to date, and credible
• They don’t read much, especially before they get to the page that has the information they want.
• Even on information pages, they skim and scan before they start to read.
• They want to read only enough to meet their needs.

Let’s discuss about the vital points to consider….opps! I’m sorry. I have to catch an appointment now. We’ll continue later, ok?

With the revoutionary Google Earth software, everyone can now see the entire earth as if he’s looking down from a satellite, all through a computer screen. Below are 5 interesting images that people have captured using Google Earth.

1. Firefox Logo. This Firefox crop circle sprouted up in a corn field in Oregon, but its origins are no mystery. In 2006, the Oregon State University Linux Users group created the giant logo — spanning more than 45,000 square feet — to celebrate the Web browser’s 50 millionth download.

2. Cruise Missile. Google Earth has plenty of examples of planes, helicopters, even hot air balloons, caught in flight, but this cruise missile, thought to be fired during military training exercises in the Utah USA mountains, might be the most unlikely capture yet. If it is, in fact, a cruise missile. Many dispute the image and say it’s merely an airplane. You be the judge, but if you look closely, the “missile” appears to have wings.  

3. Blood River. This blood-red lake outside of Iraq’s Sadr City garnered a fair share of macabre speculation when it was discovered in 2007. One tipster told that he was “told by a friend” that slaughterhouses in Iraq sometimes dump blood in canals. No one has offered an official explanation, but it’s more likely the color comes from sewage, pollution or a water treatment process.

4. Music Guy. It looks disconcertingly like a face from above, but this formation in Alberta, Canada is entirely natural. Dubbed the Badlands Guardian, the “face” is actually a valley eroded into the clay. Some say the man looks like he’s wearing earphones; that’s merely a road and an oil well. Even the Badlands Guardian, it seems, isn’t immune to exploratory drilling.

5. Nazi Swastika. When builders of the Coronado Naval Amphibious Base in San Diego planned this complex in 1967, satellite imagery was probably the furthest thing from their minds. But in 2007 Google Earth sleuths found that four unconnected buildings on the base formed an unfortunate shape when viewed from above: a swastika. The Navy says it’s spending more than $600,000 to mask the shape. “We don’t want to be associated with something as symbolic and hateful as a swastika,” a spokesman said.

Just today, Maxis has finally announced that it will offer iPhone 3G 8GB and 16GB from 20 March onwards. Looking at the plan, you can even get the iPhone 8GB for FREE!

So what is the buzz with iPhone 3G? iPhone 3G actually combines three products in one – a revolutionary phone, widescreen iPod and breakthrough internet device. With fast 3G networking, GPS mapping and support for enterprise features, iPhone 3G puts even more features at your fingertips.

One of the best things about iPhone is that you get access to the groundbreaking App Store, which provides access to tens of thousands of applications like games, social networking, financial planning, health management, etc. It has generated more than 500 million downloads to date.

I know many of my friends have been eagerly anticipating this revolutionary phone. Some of them have even bought their iPhones from the US, European or Singaporean markets.

Maxis will offer the 8GB and 16GB iPhone 3G models with 4 new postpaid plans called iValue, starting from RM100 per month. For customers who sign up for iValue 4 plan, the iPhone 3G 8GB will be free of charge. I think these bundled voice and data plans are the first of their kind in Malaysia. Below are the new service plans.

 Looking at the prices above, the iPhones are much cheaper than the ones you get from outside of Malaysia. Most of my friends bought their iPhone 3G for around RM2000. But these Maxis plans monthly charges are on definitely the high side - the cheapest is RM100/month. Plus, you’ll be bounded by 24-months contract too.

Anyway, it’s about time iPhone is finally sold in Malaysia especially with all the iPhone fans we have here. Actually, iPhone 3G is now already available in over 70 countries around the world. I am still puzzled as to why it took so long for iPhone to be offered in Malaysia.

You can learn more, or book an iPhone 3G at www.maxis.com.my/iPhone. The launch will be held at 7pm on March 20 at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre, where customers can collect their pre-booked iPhones. Walk-in customers may also book iPhones there.

The internet is full with the geek jargon  such as “social media”, “blogging”, “RSS”, “Web 2.0″ and their like. The Web has created its own set of words, but their popularity change over time.  More and more jargon being created meaning it getting harder for all of us to catch up.  Pingdom had the effort to compile this trend and you can see the full list on their website. Here is some major trend that hits us the past few years.

• “Web 2.0” peaked in 2007 and has been decreasing in 2008.
• The ever-popular “cloud computing” actually dropped sharply late in 2008 after having been increasing rapidly since late 2007.
• While the interest for “blogging” hasn’t changed much over the last couple of years, “microblogging” has seen a rapid rise since early 2007 (presumably due to Twitter).
• “Blogger” has been increasing four years straight.
• “Ecommerce” is decreasing.
• “RSS” is decreasing.
• “Affiliate program” saw a sharp increase during the second half of 2008.

I personally hope that Aidan will continue upgrade itself to keep-up with this everchanging trends.

Either we want to accept it or not, internet is not the safest place to be (yet!) . Untill we (the developers) really pay attention to the error on the code we wrote.

Security experts have released a list of what they consider to be the 25 most critical errors made while coding software.

The list was released so programmers can check their code for the most common errors that produce security vulnerabilities.

The top two coding errors were improper input validation and improper encoding or escaping of output,  I believe those particular errors earned the top rating for good reason.  It’s the basic security features commonly overlook by the developers.

To read the whole list and method to fix em, head to Sans Institute Web site

I came across a news that Malaysia’s very own information kiosk utilising the touchscreen concept, e-ryza, was launched in KL Sentral yesterday.

Tourism Minister Datuk Seri Azalina Othman said the kiosk, called the Brain of Malaysia, would serve as a platform to promote “Zoom! Malaysia”, the ministry’s campaign to promote domestic tourism.

The news claimed that the kiosk has web access, video mail, bill payment and e-ticketing services, among others. It also provides Internet access at a low rate, 20 sen for every two minutes.

So far, 100 kiosks have been installed at various places like the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, the Low-Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT), KL Sentral and a few shopping malls in Klang Valley. Another 100 units will be installed this year at public areas in all states and airports.

With the cost of RM40k per unit, I really hope the kiosks will be fully utilized..

How can information system be used to achieve strategic advantage at the industry level? By working with other firms, industry participants can use information technology to develop industry-wide standards for exchanging information or business transactions electronically, which force all market participants to subscribe to similar standards.

Such efforts increase efficiency, making product substitution less likely and perhaps raising entry costs-thus discouraging new entrants. Also, industry members can build industry wide, IT-supported consortium, symposium, and communications networks to coordinate activities concerning government agencies, foreign competition and competing industries.

Looking at the industry value chain encourages you to think about how to use information systems to link up more efficiently with your suppliers, strategic partners, and customers. Strategic advantage derives from your ability to relate your value chain to the value chains of other partners in the process. For instance, if you are Amazon.com, you want to build systems that:

• Make it  easy for suppliers to display goods and open stores on the Amazon site
• Make it easy for customers to pay for goods
• Develop systems that coordinate the shipment of goods to customers
• Develop shipment tracking systems for customers

In fact, this is exactly what Amazon has done to become one of the Web’s most satisfying online retail shopping sites. The Interactive Session on Technology discusses how Amazon.com developed and executes this business strategy. It also shows that Amazon.com had to revise its strategy several times in order to remain competitive. Internet technology has made it possible to create highly syncronized industry value chains called value webs.

A value web is a collection of independent firms that use information technology to coordinate their value chains to produce a product or a service for a market collectively. It is more customer driven and operates in a less linear fashion than the traditional value chain.  These value webs are flexible and adaptive to changes in supply and demand. Relationships can be bundled or unbundled in response to changing market conditions. Firms will accelerate time to market and to customers by optimizing their value web relationships to make quick decisions on who can deliver the required products or services at the right price and location.

AidanTech’s sister company, ArdentEdu, has just succesfully registered the ArdentEduKit brand (”ardent edukit“) and tagline (”fun science in a box”).

Thomas Jefferson, the 3rd American president, was also the first US patent commissioner. He spoke of patents as “locomotives that run industry“.

Mark Twain once wrote “a country without a patent office and good patent laws is just a crab and couldn’t travel anyway but sideways or backwards“.

With a patent, an inventor can control the design, manufacture, licensing, distribution and copying of his inventions. Patents can prevent your competitors from practising your invention.

Simply put: The purpose of patents is to keep others from duplicating your invention.

Benefits of a patent
• Marketing. Customers are always looking for the “next new thing”. Patents represent “newness” as “novelty” is the key to successful patent applications. Patents also represent “R&D”, which everyone likes. Patents are also third-party endorsements as they need to be vetted by the unbiased officials in patent offices worldwide. Read rest of story…

We tend to think the security threats to a business originate outside the organization. In fact, company insiders pose serious security problems. Employees have access to previleged information, and in the presence of sloppy internal security procedures, they are often able to roam throughout an organization’s systems without leaving a trace.

Studies have found that user lack of knowledge is the single greatest cause of network security breaches. Many employees forget their passwords to access computer systems or allow co-workers to use them, which compromises the system.

Malicious intruders seeking system access sometimes trick employees into revealing their passwords by pretending to be legitimate members of the company in need of information. This practice is called social engineering. 

Both end users and information systems specialists are also a major source of errors introduced into information systems. End users introduce errors by entering faulty data or by not following the proper instructions for processing data and using computer equipment. Information systems specialists may create software errors as they design and develop new software or maintain existing programs. 

Can’t stand CNN? Don’t want to keep Googling for news? Pop open a browser window and leave a Twitter search for “mumbai” running. People are posting photo links and group-sulking, rather than the usual sort of “if only they had used Twitter more in Mumbai, none of this would have happened” chatter. You can always go to Poynter for that stuff.

The most basic distinction in communication networks is that between analog and digital signals. There are 2 ways to communicate a message: either an analog signal or a digital signal.

• An analog signal is represented by a continuous waveform that passes through a communications medium and has been used for voice communication. The most common analog devices are the telephone hand set, the speaker on your computer, or your iPod earphone, all of which create analog wave forms that your ear can hear. Oh yes, your ear is an analog device also.
• A digital signal is a discrete binary waveform, rather than a continuous, waveform. Digital signals communicate information as strings of two discrete states: one bit and zero bits, which are represented as on-off electrical pulses.

Computers use digital signals, so if you want to use the analog telephone system to send digital data, a device called a modem is required to translate digital signals into analog form. Modem stands for modulation/demodulation.

Now, I guess all of us understand why the heck we need the streamyx modem, huh?

Suppose you wanted concise, reliable information about the current operations, trends, and changes across the entire company. If you worked in a large company, obtaining this might be difficult because data are often maintained in separate systems, such as sales, manufaturing, or accounting.

Some of the data you needed might be found in the sales system, and other pieces in the manufacturing system. Many of this systems are older legacy systems that use outdated data management technologies or file systems where information is difficult for users to access.

You might have to spend an inordinate amount of time locating and gathering the data you needed, or you would be forced to make your decision based on incomplete knowledge. If you wanted information about trends, you might also having trouble finding data about past events because most firms only make their current data immediately available. Data warehousing addresses these problems.

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