NEWS: More planned for Apicta winners

KUALA LUMPUR: Winners of this year’s Apicta (Asia-Pacific ICT Award) will not only be going home with trophies but also stand a chance to be nominated for two other international awards.

They will go on to represent the country at the international-level APICTA ceremony, which is in Jakarta, Indonesia, in November. They will also represent the country at the World Summit Awards (WSA) in Belgium next year.

WSA is a biennial global initiative for selecting and promoting the best companies in e-content and creativity. It is held within the framework of the United Nations’ World Summit on the Information Society, and is officially supported by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, and the Global Alliance for ICT Development.

A week-long training programme at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and two scholarships worth RM60,000 each from the Asia-Pacific University College of Technology and Information, await the winners of the Apicta Prime Minister’s Award and Best of Secondary Student Project, respectively.

At the entrepreneurship development programme (EDP) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management, the recipients of the Prime Minister’s Award will learn to create, identify and evaluate new venture opportunities, as well as how to enhance and expand their business networks.

Winners of the Best Secondary School Project category will vie for the two scholarships from UCTI. The scholarships will cover tuition fees for the duration of each course.

Custodian of the MSC Malaysia initiative, the Multimedia Development Corp (MDeC) wants this year’s Apicta to be more than just another awards ceremony.

“We hope that it can be recognised as the “Oscars” of the ICT (information and communications technology) industry,” MDeC chief executive officer Datuk Badlisham Ghazali said, referring to the highest accolade presented to movers and shakers of the international film industry.

Badlisham was speaking at a press conference at the National Islamic Arts Museum last week to announce this year’s Apicta.

MDeC is accepting nominations for all 19 categories of awards until the end of this month. Winners will be announced at a ceremony in October.

For more information, go to www.mscapicta.com.my.

NEWS: Orphans get green lessons

KEPONG: Start young, start now. This is the view taken by ICT solutions integrator Mesiniaga and Mind, a developer community, which have been working together to teach orphans at Rumah Keluarga Kami to “go green.”

They recently showed the orphans the proper way to manage a computer so that its effects on the environment would be reduced, such as putting the PC in screensaver mode or sleep mode when not in use. Other green tips were also passed on.

Mesiniaga and Mind recognise that computers are becoming increasingly important. They hope that by promoting such awareness, the children will also be mindful of the importance of environmental protection.

The speakers were Hazreen Mansor from Mesiniaga, Lim Fun Jin from ISA technologies, and Jayan Arunasalam from Microsoft Malaysia. The event was supported by Institut Integriti Malaysia.

After the lesson, the children were taken to the Forest Research Institute of Malaysia’s canopy walk, where guides showed them the interesting flora available on the grounds.

The orphanage also received a laptop and backpacks from Dell while ISA technologies donated a 1Mbps (megabit per second) Internet-access line. Microsoft donated a copy of its Windows Vista operating system to the home.

Mind, which is sponsored by Microsoft, promotes knowledge-sharing and networking among its members.

NEWS: TM Net music service goes silent

KUALA LUMPUR:TM Net is closing down its music download service by the end of this month, according to music industry sources.

Its Bluehyppo website — where the music download service was offered — carries an announcement that the service has been suspended until further notice.

The Internet service provider, which is a subsidiary of telecommunications giant Telekom Malaysia Bhd, did not return calls for comment.

According to the music industry sources, the TM Net service is likely being terminated because it was only selling about 40 songs a month since its launch in September 2006.

In order to be successful, a music download service would need to sell at least 50,000 songs monthly, the sources said.

The music download market in this country is estimated to be worth RM144mil. Music downloads are expected to make up 20% to 25% of the revenue recorded by the local music industry this year.

TM Net’s service had offered songs by international and local artistes, priced at about RM3 each, and had about 100,000 pieces when it was launched. The start-up cost for the service would be more than RM2mil, claimed the sources.

Several music industry executives that In.Tech spoke to, said TM Net should be congratulated for trying to encourage Malaysians to download music legitimately, but it was an uphill task from the onset.

The biggest hurdle, said Sony BMG managing director Adrian Lim, was the lack of public awareness for TM Net’s service.

“After nearly two years, many music fans in the country still do not know about the service,” he said. “More is known by the public about the ISP’s streamyx service than that there was a huge repertoire of songs available for download at BlueHyppo.”

Sandy Monteiro, Recording Industry Association of Malaysia chairman, said a lot of marketing programmes need to be run to constantly promote music download services to the public.

“You have to push and keep pushing,” he said, citing rival service Guamuzik as an example of how it should be done. “Guamuzik is always creating a lot of activities to increase awareness of its service.”

According to Lim, TM Net should have taken its cue from the local cellular-service operators which are bundling music downloads with their cellphone service.

“This raises awareness for the song downloads part of the business,” he said. He believes TM Net’s download service could have been more successful if bundled with its streamyx service.

“I’d pay attention if TM Net says I can get five free song downloads a month from BlueHyppo if I signed up for a streamyx service package,” he said.

NEWS: 廣州90%小學生上網過暑假

（中國）據最新的“廣州市小學生暑期上網情況問卷調查”結果顯示：逾90%小學生選擇上網過暑假，其中32%首選上網玩遊戲。令人堪憂的是，有39%的小學生每天上網時間超過4小時。

由廣州市少年宮、都市人成長雜誌和廣州電信局聯合公佈的“廣州市小學生暑期上網情況問卷調查” 顯示：91%小學生在暑假會上網，過半數小學生每天上網時間2至3小時，24%每天上網4至6小時，15%者每天泡在網上超過6小時。值得關注的是，有 14%的小學生每次都要家長提醒才會下線，更有4%的“網蟲”家長提醒後也不下線。

在回答“你上網最喜歡幹什麼時”，選擇網路遊戲者佔32%，聊天佔29%，還有人上網最喜歡查詢資訊、瀏覽網頁、看電影等。

調查還顯示，家長未能正確引導孩子健康上網，56%的家長很少就上網問題與孩子交流，16%的家長對孩子上網不管不問。

放假不上學的日子，有些小網蟲半夜兩三點鐘還在網上玩遊戲、和同學聊天，泡在網上至淩晨才睡覺，中午才起床，生活規律完全打亂。

隨著中國互聯網快速普及，青少年沉迷上網已成為普遍存在的社會問題。有網路專家指出，避免染上 網癮關鍵在於防範，家長應把孩子每天上網時間控制在一小時之內。而對於那些已經上癮的孩子，戒網癮工作則要循序漸進，起初階段控制在三小時內就算達到目 的，然後再逐漸減少上網時間。（中新社）

NEWS: 中國網上購物總額162億

（中國）中國網際網路絡資訊中心（CNNIC）最新發佈的《二2008年中國網路購物調查研究報告》顯示，今年上半年，全國19個大城市的網路購物金額達到人民幣162億元。上海的網路購物人數達到375萬，佔各大城市之首。

本次調查覆蓋了上海、北京、廣州、武漢等19個主要城市，重點調查半年內上過網且在網上買過東西的2600名網民。數據顯示，半年內有過網上購物經歷的佔這些城市網民總數的近28%；每月至少網購一次者超過40%，上海逾45%，北京和廣州分列第二、第三。

人均網購消費方面，上海仍居首位，達到人民幣1107元。從性別來看，女性網購人數略高於男性，但網購金額略低於男性的84億元，為78億元。

從網站來看，淘寶網的龍頭地位相當穩固。半年內在淘寶網上購物過的網民佔被調查網民的81.5%，位列第二、第三位的是噹噹網和卓越亞馬遜網，分別為16.6%和13.6%。70.5%的網民從網際網路得知各類購物網站的資訊，搜索引擎是最重要的傳播方式。

使用電子支付進行網路購物的網民比例達到71%，其中又有76%通過“支付寶”完成，第三方支 付已經在電子支付方面佔據主要地位。近80%網購用戶沒有不愉快的購物經歷，在其餘的20%網民中，商品品質與物流問題是網購用戶有不愉快經歷的兩個主要 方面。較多的網購用戶抱怨購買到的商品與圖片不符合。物流方面，送貨時間太長是網民的主要抱怨點。（中通社）

NEWS: Volunteering time

A multinational company initiates a project that enables its employees to engage in voluntary work.

IT’s easy to relegate voluntary work to those who are “passionate” about it. But IT multinational IBM has made it a work culture.

Its “on-demand community” project, started in 2003, is about engaging every employee in voluntary work. IBM marketing director Eric Wong says that the programme aims to “create a spirit of volunteerism among employees, so they can impart their skills, technology and knowledge to the community they work with.”

Currently, 549, or 40% of the company’s employees in Malaysia, are involved in various voluntary projects.

Wong: The company has initiated many programmes for the improvement and development of education.

One of them is Business Service senior consultant Goh Gee Kheng, who embarked on her first project last year. She cleaned toilets at SK Taman Kepong in Kuala Lumpur, where she is a PTA member, together with four other parents. They scrubbed and washed the toilets with washing liquids and brooms brought from home.

Goh says the school has since kept its toilets clean. There is even a mural in one of the toilets.

“We have one project coming up called the Bacathon in which students read to raise funds,” Goh says. There will be a month of competitions, recitals and quizzes. These will culminate on the final day with more activities, and guests will be invited to make donations.

The “on-demand community” programme allows employees to apply for community grants from IBM after clocking 40 hours of service.

“We provide up to RM12,000 per grant,” explains Wong. Employees are eligible to apply for more than one grant so long as they can show proof of the accumulated time spent and the nature of their projects.

“We will assess the project and allocate funding accordingly,” he says.

Goh, who has passed the 40-hour mark through her participation in PTA meetings and projects, recently made a request for a US$1,000 (RM 3,252) grant to buy books for SK Taman Kepong.

“I want to get good English and Bahasa Malaysia books and my target is to have up to 400 books, in the first batch,” she says.

“My objective is to buy classics and award-winning books that will inspire students.”

She hopes to enlist the help of her friends and parents in wrapping the books and to conduct story-telling sessions to complement the existing reading programme in the school.

Goh reading a book to SK Taman Kepong pupils. She will use her community grant from IBM to buy books for the school.

The school management has expressed its gratitude for the books.

This is just one example of how schools have benefited from IBM’s corporate volunteer programmes, says Wong, who adds that the company has initiated various other programmes for the development of education.

“Our end-to-end education framework is comprehensive, and it covers those in preschool to senior citizens. We don’t leave anyone out.”

Providing learning software, educational web portals and a mentorship programme for students are some of the programmes offered.

The company has also launched a Young Enterprise Programme, under which students set up their own businesses to learn about the market place,

Employees can also benefit from volunteering as they pick up new skills and knowledge which can help in their career advancement and mobility, Wong says.

But for Goh, her reason for volunteering is simple.

“When we ask parents for help, they think it isn’t their responsibility but the government’s. However, if we want to see change, it has to start with us.”

NEWS: Shah Alam broadband project takes first step

PETALING JAYA: About 120,000 folks living and working in Shah Alam’s trading centre are now able to connect to the Internet ­wirelessly from anywhere in the business district.

The Shah Alam city council (MBSA), with the help of Internet service provider Jaring Communications Sdn Bhd, ­developed the city’s Wireless Broadband Pioneer Project.

Jaring provides web access to the business district through the ­infrastructure and contributes its know-how on improving the network.

“We are pleased to provide our experience to the Selangor State Government for the design and installation of this new wireless network,” said Dr Mohamed Awang Lah, Jaring’s chief ­executive.

Shah Alam folk enjoy ­connection speeds of up to 384Kbps (kilobits per second) within an area of 112 sq miles, which include places like Taman Tasik Shah Alam, the SACC Mall and the MBSA building.

The service is free until about the end of August, after which a fee will be charged. Both MBSA and Jaring declined to say at this time how much the fee would be.

“We will be working closely with the State Government to ensure the users have a good and reliable ­service,” a Jaring ­spokesman told In.Tech last week.

Both parties also declined to say if and when the connection speed would be increased; the Jaring spokesman said any decision to upgrade the network would be in the hands of the State Government.

Many Shah Alam city dwellers welcome the wireless Internet ­service and say that it is a good move. However, they hope the connection speed can be increased to at least 1Mbps (megabit per second).

“You can’t do much with speeds that max out at 384Kbps. It would have been better if the network coukd offer at least 1Mbps,” said Madi Ahmad, a 27-year-old fast food restaurant manager.

He said Internet connection speeds at some premium cafes and fast food restaurants are already providing their customers with 1Mbps.

“With 384Kbps, I can send e-mail messages and chat online, but I can’t surf to websites like YouTube or make video calls,” said Madi.

Cheah Sy Jin, an 18-year-old student, agrees with Madi that the connection speed needs to be much faster. “I don’t think that with such speeds I can get any research done on the Internet,” he said.

An analyst with a marketing intelligence company, who ­requested anonymity, said MBSA and Jaring may have opted for the low connection speeds because they had to take into account the purchasing power of the majority of the city folk.

For those in Shah Alam who want 1Mbps, there is already Telekom Malaysia’s streamyx package (RM88 per month for a wired Internet connection), he said.

Also, Jaring already offers its own 384Kbps wireless Internet service, priced at RM40 a month, to home users in the country.

There are plans to expand the wireless service to other parts of Shah Alam and later, to elsewhere in Selangor. Expansion work for Shah Alam is scheduled to begin next month.

NEWS: 逾半用戶日傳逾5短訊

（布城）大馬通訊及多媒體委員會去年展開的手機使用調查顯示，無收入階級是最多使用手機的群體，比收入超過5000令吉的就業人士的手機使用率還多出28%。

這份報告同時指出，大馬2100萬名手機用戶中，有超過半數或50.4%每日傳送超過5則手機短訊（SMS）及多媒體短訊（MMS）。

報告顯示，喜歡使用手機短訊的用戶比起2006年的46.1%已經有所提昇，2005年及2004年分別有41.8%及31.7%的手機用戶每日傳送超過5則短訊。

這項調查是在去年6月9日至25日之間由大馬通訊及多媒體委員會電訪中心所進行的。

NEWS: Going international?

WITH a delivery system based primarily on Information and Communications Technology (ICT), it was only a matter of time before Open University Malaysia (OUM) ventured into the international arena.

The first university in Malaysia to provide courses entirely via open and distance learning, OUM has not only managed to attract individual international students, but also provided consultancy and training services on e-learning to countries like Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh.

Said OUM president and vice-chancellor Prof Tan Sri Anuwar Ali: “OUM has been mindful of the fact that international cooperation is seen as an instrument for capacity building, for finding new ways to manage open and distance learning in higher education, as well as for testing new or established practices in many aspects of teaching, consultancy and research.”

With that in mind, the seven-year-old Kuala Lumpur-based institution recently launched OUM International as its brand name and focus point for its international endeavours.

“OUM International is the reference point for all international contacts with OUM as well as the unit responsible for the conceptualisation of projects to meet the needs of international clients,” explained Prof Anuwar in his speech at the launch recently.

OUM International was officially launched by Higher Education Minister Datuk Seri Mohamed Khaled Nordin.

In his speech, the minister said: “’Borderless education’ has become a new buzzword amongst educators, and as such, universities in recent years have expanded their international reach.

“It is reasonable to conclude that such expansion has changed society’s perception of academia and at the same time, encouraged the university to have a new outlook about itself.”

Khaled added that for internationalisation to be meaningful, it should not only be seen as a set of activities catering for international clients, but also a process of integration in all spheres of university management so that the institution is internationally oriented in all its operating procedures.

“I believe that by going international, a university can maintain and benchmark its competitiveness and at the end of the day, achieve international standards and become a respected global player.

“Also note that in trying to achieve this, I must duly stress that the quality of the graduates we produce must be at par with international standards, and I believe this is readily achieved at OUM,” Khaled said.

According to Prof Anuwar, OUM has established partnerships with the Arab Open University in Bahrain, the University of Science and Technology in Yemen and Universitas Riau, Indonesia, to offer postgraduate degrees. The university will soon be offering undergraduate, Masters in Business Administration (MBA) and competency-based certificate courses in collaboration with local partners in Vietnam and the Maldives. – By TAN SHIOW CHIN

NEWS: Team effort

TO improve the proficiency of Maths and Science teachers, a project called Team Teaching was launched recently.

Under the programme a Mathematics or Science primary school teacher will be paired with an English primary school teacher.

The programme is a collaboration by the Education Ministry, HSBC Bank Malaysia Bhd, and the British Council. At the programme’s launch in SK Taman Jasmin, Kajang, deputy chairman and chief executive officer of HSBC Irene M Dorner said that the partnership would help improve students’ comprehension of the two subjects.

“We seek to raise the level of education for our community, especially children.”

Liston, Asariah and Dorner at the launch of Team Teaching.

Also present at the launch was British Council Malaysia country director Gerry Liston, and the ministry’s teacher education division director, Datin Asariah Mior Shaharuddin,

Liston explained that under Team Teaching, teachers from both subjects would be in the classroom together.

“We have used the scaffolding approach so that as the project continues, the support of the English teacher decreases,” he said.

Asariah congratulated the participants selected for the programme.

“We hope that the participants will go back to their respective schools to share what they have learnt with other teachers.”

NEWS: Searching for a star

STUDENTS from Universiti Utara Malaysia (UUM) will be the first in the country to compete in an online reality career development show.

Dubbed D’Graduate, it will feature groups of undergraduates competing in an elimination style competition broadcast live online.

During the competition, candidates will not only be tested as individuals but also as a team in a series of tasks dealing with different disciplines in business.

The elimination process will be via online voting, whereby anyone can pick candidates at the D’Graduate website.

MyPath Sdn Bhd managing director Jenna Loh, the co-organiser of D’Graduate, said its business simulation games will draw out key strengths of participants including their leadership abilities.

“The winners will secure placements as management trainees in leading corporations.”

Loh added that participants would also enjoy free posting of their resumes on the D’Graduate web portal as well as StarJobs Online.

“Through my experience interviewing fresh graduates, I realise that there is a need to help guide them especially those who are ‘lost’ and unsure of which career path to follow.”

D’Graduate can help employers find candidates with the right attitude and aptitude.

“Fresh graduates are not prepared for the corporate culture that exists in these companies, so they have difficulties blending in.”

Programme director Mollie Yeoh said D’Graduate offers a win-win solution for undergraduates and potential employers.

“For the undergraduates, the objective is to gain the necessary hands-on learning experience, self-esteem and marketability.

“For potential employers, the primary objective is to minimise risk and add value to their businesses by getting the right person for a position.”

MIRC Incubator Sdn Bhd CEO Andrew Wong said D’Graduate is a worthy project that seeks to equip undergraduates with the skills necessary for the challenging working environment, both in Malaysia and abroad.

Intrenasionale CEO Andrew Chan said his company is glad to have the opportunity to contribute its expertise and experience to the project.

Assoc Prof Dr Shahizan Hassan, director of the Centre for University-Industry Link at UUM, said D’Graduate is an exciting way to tap into the talents of students.

Jaring Communications, the official technology partner, said it was happy to be associated with the project.

“We want to help equip undergraduates with the right knowledge and skills,” said its CEO Dr Mohamed Awang Lah.

The show will be officially launched at UUM’s Sintok campus on Tuesday. The Star is the media partner for D’Graduate. For information go to
www.dgraduate.com.

NEWS: Ace SPM Sciences and Maths

FREAKING out because the SPM examination is around the corner and you’ve been spending more time on Facebook and World of Warcraft than your textbooks?

Despair not, because experts Sunny Yee (Physics and Additional Maths) and A. Alagesan (Chemistry), together with other Science and Math specialists, have pooled their extensive experience and knowledge to come up with a special six-edition SPM series. The other writers contributing to this must-have pullout are Mallika Vasugi, Alicia Tan and Felicia Puri.

Unlike previous years, these invaluable revision materials will not be published in StarEducation. Instead, starting July 14 till Oct 13, there will be 16 extra pages dedicated specifically to SPM revision in F4F5 — The Star’s Maths and Science guide for upper secondary students.

Published every second and fourth Monday of the month, F4F5 has been bumped up to 56 pages to include Physics, Biology, Modern Mathematics, Chemistry, General Science and Additional Mathematics ‘hot’ exam questions and sample answers.

Learn techniques to score full marks for structured questions. Find out common traps sneaky examiners throw into exam papers to trick students. Find out which topics are “hot” this year. And reap the benefits of in-depth analyses of frequent mistakes by our five specialist writers in the field.

Here’s a sneak peek of how a student can miss the full two marks for this Chemistry question, which appears in July 14’s F4F5:

The diagram below shows two bell jars, A and B.

Bell jar A is filled with bromine vapour while bell jar B is filled with air.

Both the jars are separated by a lid.

State your initial observations. [2 marks]

Frequent mistake:

It looks brown in colour.

Tutor’s comment:

The answer is too vague. Which of the jars, A or B, is brown? This is not specified.

In cases of two or more items being given or questioned in an exam, students should take extra effort to specifically identify the items referred to.

Correct answer:

The content of bell jar A appears dark brown while the content of bell jar B is colourless.

With sample answers and tutor’s simple and direct comments, students will obtain a better grasp of the topic and improve the odds of not repeating the mistakes!

The Star launched F123 and F4F5 this year to cater to students in all secondary levels after the success of its F1F4 pullout in 2006 and 2007. Published during the school term, F4F5 offers syllabus-based Physics, Biology and Modern Mathematics on the second Monday of the month and Chemistry, General Science and Additional Mathematics on the fourth Monday.

Also included are learning tips, enrichment exercises, pertinent notes, activities related to real-life phenomena as well as informative and interesting topics for general knowledge.

The 40-page F123 pullout, published every first and third Monday of the month, contains Science and Maths topics for Form One, Two and Three students in every issue. F123 and F4F5 are included free for schools that buy The Star at a special discounted price. Orders are by school subscription only. Meaning, you’ve got to place your orders through your schools. Students and parents, do talk to your child’s teachers, principal or even the Parent-Teacher Association committee members.

For details and orders of F123 and F4F5, call Star Publications (Malaysia) Bhd’s Customer Care Unit at 03-7967 1777 (direct line) or 03-7967 1388, ext 1152 or 1160 from 9am to 5.30pm, Mondays to Fridays.