The Evolution of Communication
As I write this blog post, I am hiding in a little corner of the office. My phone is safety tucked away in my drawer and I have closed all other applications on my notebook. This is necessary because I am easily distracted, and under normal work conditions there would be a million bells, buzzes and whistles that go off every minute – the phone ringing, incoming text messages, instant messaging pop-ups, calendar notifications, TweetDeck chirping, my iMobster push alerts (yes, I am addicted to iMobster!)… oooh the list really does go on and on. I am not blessed with the ability to multi-task unlike some of my colleagues… so from now until this blog post is completed, I’m in my hermit-meditation mode. *Ooommmmm*
Ironically, it is all these bells, buzzes and whistles that I want to blog about – the evolution of communication. I am no histogram… ermm… historian or whatever you wanna call it (clearly not a linguist either), but I would imagine the earliest forms of long-distance communication were the beating of drums and smoke signals – pretty decent reach if you are within range, but the speed of delivery and ability to communicate details were limited. When the steam engine was invented, new opportunities for postal services came about, and Kevin Costner no longer had to ride his horse the entire distance to deliver mails. The written word coupled with postal services had great range, but the reach was limited. Morse code came along (which is an evolved smoke signal) and soon after that, the telephone. Then the radio, the TV, fax machines… the Internet and emails. Each method of communication is unique and has its own set of pros and cons. My fascination is not whether one medium will render another obsolete, but I like observing how communication in itself continues to evolve.
For personal social communication, I went from writing 4-page letters (to get maximum ROI for the stamps), to writing emails just 1-2 paragraphs long, to chatting on mIRC,… <lots of stuff happened in between… like breaking up on MSN> …to replying 1-liner messages on Facebook like “Beer is on me becoz j00 da man!” …and now, compressing what I have to say into 140 characters on Twitter, or sometimes not even producing any original content at all – I just retweet! Oh wait… if “LOL” is considered original content, then yes, I do that… e.g. “LOL RT @dog_ears …” I am slowly losing my ability to spell korectly.
Personally, I don’t think any particular communication medium is obsolete. It might have been replaced, but it isn’t obsolete as costs, accuracy, speed of delivery, reach, amount to communicate, location and demographics are all variables that need to be considered when delivering a message. Smoke signals for example are still being used in remote areas where there are no telecommunication services. Another example is my neighbour using a variation of morse code on the walls to tell me that my music is too loud. I may not know what they are saying, but I understand them loud and clear!
Anyway, to end this blog post, my Tech Team wants to send a message to one of our most loved clients, all the way in the US of A. They have supported us for many years and have been great clients. Smoke signals aren’t likely to work in this case, so…
Topics: Idle Chat |
Social Media for Social Good
Social networking now accounts for 11 percent of all time spent online in the US.
Twitter’s audience growth occurred during the first few months of 2009 – at one point jumping from 4 million visitors to 17 million visitors between February and April.
One in four (25%) US Internet page views occurred at one of the top social networking sites in December 2009, up 83% from 13.8% in December 2008.
(Source: The 2009 U.S. Digital Year in Review by comScore)
Those are just a few of the statistics on how social media use has boomed in the past year. Social media fits perfectly into the lifestyles of today’s fast-paced citizens, as 3G technology becomes more readily available, and as the media takes a turn to be more consumer-centric.
Different people use social media for various reasons, including to keep in touch with old friends, to meet people with similar interests, to gain new information and news, for business purposes, as well as to create awareness and rally support for a certain cause.
The topic at SMCKL #4 last week was on using social media for social good. The speakers, Datin Paduka Marina Mahatir, Niki Cheong, and Hakim Albasrawy shared inspiring insights with the audience on how social media has been a useful avenue for them in gaining support for various causes (read more here).
(Source: SMCKL Facebook photos)
Although using social media for charity has been around for some years now, it is increasingly being used today, as more people hop onto the social media bandwagon. Moreover, it presents the element of personal touch, thus reinforcing trust, as the activist is able to communicate with people who are interested, in contrast to when help is solicited through more traditional means, such as reading about a cause in the newspapers or watching it on television. It is also more convenient and is a great way to complement existing social work.
There are many ways social media can be used for social good. One amazing example which was highlighted by Alex in his blog post, Helping the Homeless via Social Media, introduces to us InvisiblePeople.tv, a website by Mark Horvath, who himself was once homeless. Today, he ventures the streets to speak to the homeless, telling their stories through his camera lens.
From Alex’s blog:
So, how exactly does Mark use social media? Sites that are frequently updated include: his blog, Twitter, Facebook, Whrrl, MySpace, YouTube, uStream, Vimeo and Flickr. They serve as his own broadcasting channels to reach out to the public and update them on-the-go. Through the true-to-life updates, he has caught the attention of many and this has served to further propagate the message and his mission.
Stats to date: CNN reports more than 1,000 videos are watched per week on the Vimeo channels and the project has more than 10,000 followers on both his Twitter accounts (@hardlynormal and @invisiblepeople). Mark has been featured on Huffington Post, CNN and loads more media as a result of him being extremely social with a fantastic mission.
He’s raised sponsorship and donations from many companies amongst which are Ford, Hanes (they give out socks to the homeless) and Virgin Mobile. Truly, it’s a powerful testimony of how one man has shared the stories of hundreds of homeless people with the world and brought smiles to those who are in need.
Indeed, social media is an awesome tool through which we can give back to our communities.
To gain more insight on how social media can be used for social good, check out these articles:
- 10 Ways to Support Charity Through Social Media
- 5 Events That Have Used Social Media for a Good Cause.
“Imagine what the Web 2.0 community can do for these organizations. Blogs, web sites, pocket video cameras, and BlackBerries; as well as electronic and physical communities, everyone has the power to create powerful stories and intentional content that will spread into the world, raise awareness, and cause change.”
- Amanda Koster, photographer & founder of SalaamGarage.
Topics: Uncategorized |
Chinese New Year Angpow Giveaways
Every year, it’s a tradition here at Integricity for the directors to give away angpows to unmarried Integricitizens during Chinese New Year. The 3 directors would put various amounts of cash into red packets, which are then mixed together and randomly picked by the staff (who all hope to get the angpows with the 3-figure amount)! 
Warren shuffling the angpows.
Following the Chinese tradition, the oldest gets to pick first.
Someone made a joke about holding the angpows up to the sunlight prior to selecting them!
Time to take a peek inside the red packets!
One of these girls got an angpow with the 3-figure amount! Guess who’s the lucky one? ;P
We hope you had an awesome Chinese New Year – whether you were giving OR receiving angpows!
Have a prosperous year ahead!
Topics: Beneath The Red Hood |
Your Internet Lifestyle
Wireless Internet has changed the way we work, learn, play and live. Whatever our lifestyles, it is not impossible to assimilate the wealth of information provided by the World Wide Web into our daily lives.
Celebrating this, Maxis Broadband recently launched a campaign called Something for Everyone. As part of the campaign, a series of interviews are conducted. Every fortnight, online personalities are interviewed to represent the 7 kinds of internet users in Malaysia: the Explorer, Traveller, Smart Shopper, Online Buddies, Blogger, Entertainment Enthusiast and Gamer. They share their experiences with wireless broadband and their internet lifestyles.
Check out these behind-the-scenes shots of the interviews, in our very own Integricity Studio!
The team busy setting up the equipment.
Camille and Ean preparing for the interview.
Watch these interviews with the Explorer, Alex Lam (Managing Director of Integricity Ventures!), and the Entertainment Enthusiast, radio DJ Ean – perhaps you could also learn some tips and tricks on various ways of using the Internet from them!
Besides that, play the Maxis Mission Possible game on Facebook for a chance to win iPhones, BlackBerrys or a trip to the Gold Coast! Game ends 25th March 2010. Click here to play now.
Post a comment below to share with us your internet lifestyle. 
Topics: Beneath The Red Hood, Tips, Tricks and Howtos |
Of Portraits & Cupcakes
The Integricity Visuals team took on yet another challenge when they recently packed their bags and flew to Pangkor Island to shoot some pre-wedding portraits for a client.
The couple wanted sunrise as well as sunset shots by the beach, and wanted it to be something different. Over the packed 2 days, the team had lots of fun, and the following are just some of the finished products!
(More photos can be found on http://stories.my)
~~~~~
Besides shooting people, the team also recently shot the oh-so-pretty cupcakes at Cupcake Chic!
Check out Cupcake Chic’s website to find out more about their Haiti “I CARE” cupcakes, where RM 1.00 from every cupcake sold would be donated to the World Vision Emergency Relief Fund.
Topics: Beneath The Red Hood |
IT Managed Service
One must always see the silver lining in a bad situation, and in this case, traffic jams. Today was one of those days. Fortunately, I had Ben in the car and we both killed time discussing and debating anything that came to mind. It was fun sparring with Ben – it sure as hell beats sitting alone in a traffic jam!
The topic we discussed most was how Apple (with iPods and iPhones) has managed to lock their consumers in with iTunes. We both agreed a phone can be sleeker, faster and shinier (um, the two that come to mind are Motorola DRIED and Samsung EXTINCT HD) but there is one thing which they can’t topple overnight and that is iTunes. I’m not saying everyone on the street owns an iPhone; Nokia is still the current market leader for smartphones (based on Q2 figures) …sorry my mind wanders…this wasn’t even the real issue I meant to bring up but you get the point, right? Gigantic applications and music vault available at your fingertips give reason to own the device…and keep it!
(Forget the rest, the real discussion starts here.)
From there, Ben and I started talking about how record labels (EMI, BMG, SONY etc) should have spent more time collaborating and building on ideas like iTunes when Napster and Kazaa were making headlines. Instead, record labels felt it was better off to battle piracy. Court cases, legal documents – weapons of the past which they were familiar with. It was a foregone conclusion – sure, they did win some court cases, but everyone knows the record labels were fighting a battle with catapults and arrows when the P2P applications were soaring 30,000 feet above sea level. They weren’t even fighting the same battle! Meanwhile, the P2P applications just kept growing and growing, and eventually led to torrents! Yeeehawwwww!
Although Napster and Kazaa seems like oh-so-very-long-ago, one must remember this happened during a time when broadband was just starting to take off and a large number of people were still on 56k dial-up (well, I was, at that point in time). Audio files like mp3s were ideal files to share because they weren’t too large compared to the proportion of bandwidth available. Fast forward a few years and we’ve got blazing fast bandwidth (not in Malaysia though) and people are exchanging movies. What are the major film studios (FOX, Warner Bros., Paramount etc) doing about it? Piracy crackdown all over again! Court cases, legal documents – pretty much the same old story. I would have imagined the lessons learnt from the music industry would have had all these big boys scrambling and collaborating to beef up the hottest and newest movie vault but … *shrugs* … too late. Why haven’t we, or rather THEY, learnt from previous costly mistakes?
(Here comes the part where I try to sell you something!)
Every couple of weeks, I am bound to bump into a small- to medium-sized company that is plagued with incompetent IT support services. Most of the time, the problems they face are pretty much the same. These companies have 15 to 50 employees and most of these employees have computers. A company this size does not have the means to hire a full-blown IT Department with a growth strategy and work methodology, so they engage a young technically sound guy* to maintain their IT infrastructure. It takes the technician a few months to stabilise the entire infrastructure and just as he is starting to become useful, he gets bored without a leader to push him, without colleagues who speak the same lingo, without a proper training plan for him to upgrade his skills, and soon decides to resign. The company, then, goes through a messy period of about 2 months or so before they find the next replacement, and the cycle repeats itself. This is not only disruptive to the business operations but highly costly as well. Strangely enough, while important lessons should have been learnt and new strategies applied to fix the problem, these companies are quite happy to repeat this costly and painful process.
Fortunately, Integricity Technology can fix this! Our team provides “IT Managed Service”, which basically means you let us worry about your IT infrastructure. Our team is well-trained (yes, we have the relevant certifications to back us) and we CAN end this painful cycle of rehiring and retraining technical people for your company! End your misery and read more about our “IT Managed Service” here. Let us fight your battles with the right solutions and tools!
*Note: Based on the cases mentioned, all the technical people were guys! So I’m not being sexist! Purely factual.
Topics: Beneath The Red Hood, Biz Productivity, New-fangled Tech |
Our New Fanatics
Back in early January, Integricity welcomed to our family two new interns, both of whom were born in 1990 – which makes the rest of us feel really ancient! After a month here, they share about their experience with us…
I heard of Integricity through a friend of mine. I felt very welcome during my first week. There was something in the atmosphere that screamed, “Welcome to the Family!!!”. People at Integricity are vastly different in personality, but somehow go well together and are ready to help if I should run into any difficulties during assignments given. And. They. Love. Food.
During the initial interview with Eugene, he told me that at Integricity, they learn new things every day. It’s true.
When I’m not researching on a client project, I’d be assisting the Design team with little projects. So far it’s been good. When I leave this place I’ll be a person bombarded with information from different departments!
Well, so far my first month has been interesting (excluding the dull moments), from visiting Souled Out for the very first time to helping Grace out with a video shoot. My life has changed, yes it has – I must now muster the discipline to sleep early to wake up early. Given a taste of working life, I somehow prefer it to college. There is interaction and hands-on work rather than just sitting and listening.
Here’s to a good 2nd month here, eh?
Well, I am not sure of what to say, but if there is really one thing that I have to say, it would be: “I have definitely gained quite a bit of experience just from working in this environment.”
I was first introduced to this company by my mom, who is a friend of Alex Lam (Managing Director of Integricity Ventures)’s mother. It was through her that my mom told me about this company, and after looking up the company website, I was compelled to join Integricity, as I assumed it would give me a hands-on experience of what it is like working in an IT firm, and also to prepare me before I go to university to pursue a degree in Computer Science. As a matter of fact, my assumptions really did come true!
Although I am an intern and my focus is more towards the technological area (where I have learned and gained valuable experiences from working together with the tech guys), at times I am busy doing other things for the different divisions that make up Integricity Corporation, which I believe also contribute to a whole new experience that is so different from what can be learned from textbooks and in classes.
It is definitely exciting, and here’s to a month left before I leave to further my studies!!
Topics: Beneath The Red Hood |
A Serve-ing of Health
A smash. A dropshot. A serve. Any of those words sound familiar to you? Well, they haven’t been part of the vocabulary for most of us Integricitizens for years, until now. Two weeks ago, eight of us made a date to play a game of badminton. And so our journey to pain began.
Typically, an hour before our game was scheduled to begin, the skies opened and there was a downpour of rain – almost as if it was a sign that it was not meant to be! Nevertheless, we made it to the courts (albeit half an hour late), and started our warm-ups.
We were all pretty rusty at the beginning, but as the first hour wore on, we were hitting our stride. The sound of badminton racquets hitting shuttlecocks was oddly therapeutic, knowing that each stroke meant more calories burnt for the day.
The following day, back at the office, we exchanged stories of our aches and pains! Some had aching arms, while others had aching legs. We moved around as though we had aged twenty years overnight!
Today, after having played badminton for two weeks in a row, we’re planning on making it a weekly session to promote exercise within Integricity, and also so that we can indulge more in our other love (FOOD!) without feeling guilty. So, all’s well that ends well, a little pain in the beginning will hopefully result in healthier Integricitizens in the year 2010!
Topics: Beneath The Red Hood |
Postcard from Over the Seas!
We’ve received a postcard all the way from across the seas, from one of our fellow Integricitizens who’s left us to backpack around Europe! With all the technology readily available nowadays, you’ve gotta admit that it’s pretty nice to receive actual handwritten mail once in awhile.
As I type this, another Integricitizen is busy sightseeing around London, while another is traipsing the streets of ever-exciting Amsterdam! Hmmm…maybe we should create a wall for postcards in the office.
Topics: Uncategorized |
Project365 for 2010
How time flies! Hands up if you feel that 2009 went by in a flash.
As we grow older (and hopefully wiser) this year, many of us are setting goals for the new year:
Eat healthily. Exercise more. Spend more time with loved ones. Give to charity. Live life to its fullest.
This year, many are starting out on a Project365, and I’d like to challenge you to it too.
What is Project365?
For those who have not heard of it, Project365 is simply taking a photo a day. It could be of something significant which happens in a day, what interests you, what you eat, or a photo of yourself (check out Noah Kalina’s photos of himself for 6 years!) – actually, anything at all!
For starters, you can find great tips on how to do it here. Next, select an easy (and yes, free is nice too) way to upload your photos. If you decide to sign up with Flickr, join the Project 365, Project 365! or 365 days group pools. It’s a great way to meet others with similar interests as well as to keep yourself motivated. You can also post your photos to Facebook, your blog, or other photo sharing sites. Lastly, don’t forget to share your new photos on Twitter by using the hashtag #project365.
A few of us here at Integricity have hopped onto the boat, including Alex, Grace, Eric and Ben Israel. Alex also has a compilation of links to several Project365ers, which can be found on his blog – check ‘em out to get inspired!
At the end of 2010, it will be very rewarding to look back at all the photos you took. Sounds awesome, no? These days, with all the technology freely available, it should be pretty convenient; no more hassles with long-winded journaling. Besides, a picture is worth a thousand words!
Topics: Design-speak |