Monthly Archives: April 2011

1Email: Worst Case Scenario

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(Dealing with “not so up-to-date with latest technology” government servants on official business can be tricky at times – especially when things are not so clear like the use of free, secured emails for official communications. Image source: Flickr)

It may not happen but still, this is the Bolehland that we are talking about. Whilst it is still too early to pour cold water on the myemail initiatives, here’s something we fear may happen.

One fine morning in a Government department sometime in the future…

Tax-payer: Good morning, I would like for my statements to be sent through my personal email since it will be easier for to retrieve it when I am traveling.

Govt Officer: No problem sir, please provide us with your myemail address and we will update our system immediately so that you can get statements effective next month

Tax-payer: Sorry, I don’t have one but I have others like Google email, Yahoo email and MSN email addresses.

Govt Officer: Sorry but we don’t accept other type of emails. You know, because it involves sensitive information, we need to be sure that email provided is secured. As you may be aware by now, myemail account has an authentication service which includes a MyKad-based authentication service layer

Tax-payer: But the other emails are secured as well. Google is one of the leading IT Company in the world which provides the widely used email facility. Certainly they would have taken care of email security before they rolled it out way back in 2007. Certainly 193.3 million users around the world including corporate users could not have gone wrong.

Govt Officer: Err, ok but you will get 25GB of email storage free – that is a lot compared to your gmail’s measly 7GB.

Tax-payer: 7GB is more than enough for me. I don’t intend to keep my sensitive information sitting idle on cyberspace. Once I receive the email, I intend to download or copy over the statements into my 2TB external hard-disc and have a backup somewhere.

Govt Officer: Hmmm, but if you want your statements via email, you still need myemail address.

Tax-payer: But it was announced that myemail is not compulsory and the public is allowed to use own personal emails

Govt Officer: I don’t know about that – I am just telling what you need to do. You know – orders from upstairs.

Tax-payer: Aiseh, leceh lah. Ok, ok…I will register for myemail – damn, I need my statements via email.

Tax-payer: By the way, the registration and use of myemail is free of charge, right?

Govt Officer: Err, ya, it is free in a way. The myemail provider will charge this department 50 cents per email sent.

Tax-payer: Ya, now I remember reading about it. If you accept my Google email address, you need not pay anything. As I recall, the myemail provider said that they are targeting something like 5.4 registered users. 5.4 million x 50 cents (silently doing a mental calculation)…means RM2.7 million per year per email sent. That is at very minimum. Why anyone want to waste RM2.7 million for nothing?

Govt Officer: Sorry, I cannot comment on that. I still need a valid myemail address before we can send you statements via email

Tax-payer: Damn!

I am NOT saying that Malaysians will be somehow be “forced” to subscribe myemail sometime in the near future – we are pretty that the Government will be sensible and intelligence enough to recognize that there are better options out there – options that is far less cheaper than the current proposed option.

However, in the past years, we have seen enough flip-flops from the Government to make us to swallow the “1email for all which will be on a voluntary basis and huge savings for the Government” propositions with a huge doubt

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Holy Man Encounters

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(Sathya Sai Baba, one of India’s most influential spiritual leaders, breathed his last at a hospital funded by his organisation in his home town of Puttaparthi in Andhra Pradesh on last Sunday. He was 85. Image source: http://www.kevinrdshepherd.info)

To many around the world, the Great Guru is dead but here’s the troubling news that often associated with modern day, highly commercialized but dead holy men:-

A scramble has broken out for control of the $12-billion empire of an Indian guru with a worldwide following who died Sunday. Sathya Sai Baba’s devotees included actress Goldie Hawn, the Duchess of York and Isaac Tigrett, the founder of the Hard Rock Cafe chain, Pratibha Patil, India’s president, and Manmohan Singh, the prime minister, attended his last birthday celebrations.

As his health deteriorated in recent months, politicians discussed whether the state should seize his fortune. His nephew, R.J. Ratnakar, and Satyajit, a devotee, who cared for him, are among those reported to be jostling for control over the Sathya Sai organization.

Court documents allege that Sai Baba owned many cars, including Mercedes limousines and a Jaguar, and that the roof of his temple was lined with gold.

(Source)

To be frank, I am not really a devotee of Sai Baba or someone who closely followed his teachings (to an extent I thought that he was already dead many, many years ago) but the name is something I have been hearing since I was still small, often reminded of his name and image by some relatives in the family who consider him as the “Guru”. And who can forget the famous hair-do?

In recent times, other than Rajini’s movie “Baba”, the other “Guru” that made news in recent news was Swami Nithyananda and despite the denial by the Swami, the video evidence was rather overwhelming.

I still recall a long time ago when we were still living in Old Klang Road, my parents would make a short trip to a house situated on a hill along Jalan Morib, just across our housing area (these days things have changed a lot – there is a condominium on the same place now). We kids dreaded the place – not because it was scary but rather it was damn boring. We will walk to the house situated on the house – we loved the walk – the scenery along the road to the house is so tempting. There would be some people waiting at the front of the house, chit-chatting whilst waiting for the Guru (an elderly man with white hair) to be ready.

The Guru would start the session with some words of wisdom which was not so bad but once done, he will get us started on a long mantra session. This is the most boring part for us kids. Whilst the adult comfortably sit down in the hall, lights darken down a bit and everyone then starts the chanting of the mantra – over and over again, we kids would be edging to go out and breathe in some fresh air. We felt like we were drowning in all that chanting. We fought hard to keep ourselves awake – it was not really hard, our parents were by our side to knock us whenever they sense we were falling asleep. And somehow they always know the difference – we falling asleep and we closing our eyes and really chanting.

When the session is finally over, a small meal would be served, some chit-chats among the adults and finally we can walk back home. Thank God!

These days, the closest encounters with holy men would be at the temples and even this is kept to a distance. If one starts talking about religion in a rather passionately way, it merely signals the time to take our leave. Everyone have their sense of commitment when it comes to religion.

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1Email Parody

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Damn, this is a good one! Click here for details

On the other side of the spectrum, Tricubes Bhd has confirmed that it will charge government agencies about 50 cents for every email sent to Malaysians who are account-holders. The irony of things is if you charge the government, you are charging the tax-payers indirectly. So, why need all this nonsense where there are free, secured email options available out there.

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Raining Idiots

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Let’s start the week with a vengeance…

It was raining cats and dogs on the North South Highway yesterday – the traffic was not that heavy but it was still dangerous to drive. Visibility was all time low and there were huge puddles of water on the road in some areas. Still, it was a good opportunity for me to test out the new car’s ride and handling in worst road conditions. I dare say it passed with flying colors.

Then we had this added to our worries:-

(The scary part is you are not being sure whether the sight of a dark item in the middle of the highway is a car still moving or a car has hit the barrier and is lying on the middle of the road)

(Those who put their emergency indicators whilst still flying on the highway at 110 km/h still fared better than those morons who drive expensive cars but do not switch on the lights so that others can see them. Seriously)

(The weather improves slightly but still, should I count my blessing that the drivers who did not make themselves more visible with switching on the lights was driving large, darker colored vehicles instead of one with white or silver paint?)

To tell you the truth, I am lost for words. What these people expect to save by not switching on the lights when it was raining heavily and visibility was low? A couple of headlight bulbs?

We have low visibility and yet, we have some drivers who do not want to switch on the lights to make themselves visible to others. If you are at the front, it is not so bad but you may need to take care when slamming on the brakes. With such a huge vehicle on the fast lane, the outcome would be tragic. But if you are the back, it simply gets worse – it may be too late before you realize that there is a vehicle at the front. With huge puddles of water on the road, try braking and see if you could stop in time.

But then again, who would expect idiots who would refuse to switch on the lights when visibility is low to know about aquaplaning and concern for fellow road users, right?

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Email for Everyone?

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UPDATE 1: Some of the questions raised has been answered in this FAQ by Tricubes Bhd but still, it is a real wonder why spend so much on something is available for free even it involves sensitive information

UPDATE 2: 05.10.2011 – Loss-making Tricubes Bhd has managed to sign up only 3,000 users for the free web-based myemail.my service — some six months after the company was picked to launch the service. CEO Khairun conceded that the target now looked “very, very stretched,” although he remained confident that the service will get “a couple of million” subscribers by the end of next year (Source)

Back to the original post

(Is there a real and valid reasons to have email address? How about when the Government have decided to create one email for all Malaysians? Image source: http://www.itsngenius.com)

You have read about it in the papers by now and you may be in a state of disbelief.

From Malaysiakini:-

Local IT player Tricubes Bhd will invest RM50 million in the 1Malaysia Email Project to provide an account each for official purposes, to all Malaysians aged 18 and above.

“We will focus on delivery of notices and bills, MYEG is about online payment,” CEO Khairun Zainal Mokhtar told a press conference after the announcement. However the description of the project in handouts distributed during the event, said the 1Malaysia email and portal will be a ‘one-stop centre for government services, providing value-added services such as social networking, checking bills online and payment’.

Khairun also said that his company will own the portal and email infrastructure once it is completed sometime in July. However, he failed to address a question as to how the company will recoup the millions of ringgit in investment. It was also not apparent how having an email system as an Entry Point Project (EPP) will help to drive Malaysia’s transformation to a high-income nation.

I still recall when I got my very first email address 10 years ago. It was a hotmail email, first opened to the public in 1997 and with an email address in my pocket, my steps into the online world looked complete (it was not but back then, I was ignorant on what the internet has to offer as well). The hotmail email was my personal email which I used to communicate with my friends. I also had a company email for formal communications. Fast forward to the present day, it will be almost impossible to get on with working life without an email address (I have 3 email addresses now – 2 personal and 1 company emails).

Yes, it will be difficult to get on with our daily routine and communications without a proper email address. And yet, there are some of us without any email address (one good example, my parents). They don’t see the point of having one – they are not applying for any job online and for communications, they just rely on a good phone call and for official businesses, they rather go to the government office and get things done.

So, it may sound good if the Government is taking the initiatives to get an email address for all Malaysians above 18 years old but there are some questions that need to be answered before we, as the tax-payers and probably the end-user of this 1Malaysia email, can roll out the red-carpet.

1. Before we can even talk about emails, first ask – is high speed internet available for all and at the right rate – enough for lower income Malaysians to use on a regular basis? No point having an email address if you cannot retrieve your emails. No doubt the Government has been working hard to roll-out high speed and cost effective broadband services for all but have all areas have high speed, cheap internet in place?

2. Ok fine, let’s assume we have cheap and fast internet available, what is the percentage of Malaysians without any email address? Is it that bad that the Government had to take the steps to provide Malaysians with one? When most of us have a Facebook account these days, what more of a more basic thing called email? If I already have a valid & working email address, can I decline having this dubious 1Malaysia email?

3. RM50 million may be invested by Tricubes Bhd but how they going to recover this huge investment and cost of maintenance? Some form of reimbursement from the Government? Some form of yearly fees charged to the end-users? Intrusive advertisements in emails? Or tax-payers’ money? These days you register for email from Microsoft, Yahoo or Google for free. Why need to spend RM50 million to create emails for Malaysians then?

4. Just how secure is this 1Malaysia email? I am not talking about secure from hackers and spasm – I am sure that all this would be in place before it is rolled out to the public. I am talking about secure to the end-users. Imagine emails of all Malaysians which contain sensitive information & communications with Government all in one place, controlled by one private company. What is the guarantee that the contents of the email will remain private and not opened for scrutiny by certain Government agencies?

And here’s more trouble news with the whole affair:-

Tricubes Bhd’s RM50 million contract to develop the 1 Malaysia email service could be the financial lifeline of the information technology firm which is at risk of being delisted from Bursa Malaysia as early as October 29 unless it gets its finances in order.

(Source)

Does it sounds like a bail-out? How a company who cannot manage its own finances is entrusted to manage millions of sensitive emails belonging to all Malaysians? Having email address no doubt is necessary and also essential but there are far more important things.

A friend IM-ed me with this interesting but valid point this morning “Sarawakians in the interior with no electricity, education, water, health support and welfare but they have government-granted email accounts that they can’t access. Bull”. A point well made!

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