Oh well… the battle was fun while it lasted, though it didn’t carry on for too long. Upon arriving in Beijing, China, I was presented with an Internet connection in my hotel that totally blocked YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Blogspot and many other sites (I wrote about it here). Sure I had heard about the issues before arriving in China, and I was determined to get around them.

The solution that several sites stated was to sign up for a VPN service BEFORE entering China. I realised that many of the VPN sites were already securely blocked by their awesomely-amazing-annoying-firewall. Anyhow, while doing my R&D on circumventing the firewall, I stumbled across 2 sites that were decent and reasonably priced too.

Enter Astrill and Vpntraffic.

Armed with a snazzy, professional website, they promise to deliver, and deliver they do. I signed up for a 7-day trial account (you need to register for an account, then activate via SMS and request for the trial) to test it out, and it surely worked well. They offer a choice of IP addresses from USA, UK, Canada, Germany, France, Netherlands, Australia, Portugal and Ireland.

Importantly, they support many platforms – I was surfing Facebook on my iPhone and MacBook Pro with ease. Of course, they support PCs and Android devices too. Using a Mac, I had to install their software which would then initiate the VPN connection with their servers. Simple and easy setup, even for non-techies.

Sorry, I didn’t test the PC connection, but I did test the iPhone. When connected, it would show me a VPN icon in the top bar.

Everything seemed to work well, and I’m impressed. I highly recommend you test it out for yourself with their 7-day trial (no credit card required), then sign up.

Cost: USD23.36 for 3 months

While I admit I did not sign up for this service, nor trial it out, their promise is impressive and so is the price! Reviews scattered all over the Internet rave about the ability to get online and access Hulu, Facebook, YouTube from China, and it must be good.

You get to choose an IP address from 11 countries, namely USA, Australia, UK, Canada, Spain, Russia, Italy, India, Japan, Korea and Hong Kong.

As for operating systems, they support Windows, Mac OS, iOS, Android, Windows Mobile and Symbian!

Overall, I’d say their website is horrible, but their brand promise and price are good. Who can ask for more, when they merely charge USD5 PER MONTH! If you’re only in China for a short period, sign up for their 3 day package at a mere USD0.99. The packages get even cheaper if you sign up long term.

And with that, I conclude the battle has been won. Internet freedom is restored, but only if you know how to, and only if you’re willing to pay a little. It’s a small cost for freedom.

The day will come when The Great China Firewall will crumble. I’m sure of it. Till then, viva VPNs.

And so… I have arrived in China, and have already been warmly welcomed by The Great China Firewall.

Facebook, nope. Twitter, nope. Gmail, nope. Blogspot, nope. And many other websites – all NOPE!

Only Foursquare and LinkedIn work, among a few other international social media websites. It’s no wonder the local Facebook / Twitter clones known as Weibo and RenRen are thriving.

I’ve declared war on it and will endeavour to get around it. When I do, I’ll share more on the methods you can employ to restore PROPER Internet access when visiting China. As it is, many VPN sites that offer services around the firewall have been blocked. Let’s see how I go after a day here.

THIS IS WAR!

Here’s what I’m greeted with for many, many websites I try to access.

Thus far, it’s been a pretty amazing ride and I’m about to unleash this blog post while traveling at 110km/h while dodging accident zones like this one that happened 30 minutes ago.

I love being mobile and doing work on the go. Thankfully I’ve been blessed with the ability not to get dizzy while reading or typing in moving vehicles – perhaps I should have been an astronaut! Some years ago, I bought myself a car inverter that converts the 12V DC current from the cigarette lighter into 240V for my notebook – this now enables me to not worry about lack of juice for my notebook and can even power 3 machines at once.

Here’s 2 of my toys that I love traveling with – the car inverter and a simple USB charger for my iPhone / iPad needs.

On the highway, they’ve got YES billboards prominently displayed and it’s a good thing the service seems reliable here, otherwise… Here’s my dongle sticking out of my MacBook Pro with 2 other favourite things in my life – the Chicken in a Biskit and my wife, of course… @Shootdiva

I’ve not gotten disconnected once, and I haven’t tested voice calls but thus far it seems excellent for surfing and replying emails. If YTL can beef up their connectivity throughout Malaysia, I would say they have a fighting chance against the traditional telcos. For now, there’s still work to be done. 1 month ago, I was unable to connect to the YES network while giving a talk to an audience of businessmen while at Hilton by Doubletree. Slightly embarrassed, I veered into a different topic and never mentioned Internet connectivity again!

For the geeks out there, I did do the regular speed and ping tests. Seems fairly stable overall.

64 bytes from 209.85.175.147: icmp_seq=1695 ttl=53 time=406.940 ms
64 bytes from 209.85.175.147: icmp_seq=1696 ttl=53 time=331.983 ms
Request timeout for icmp_seq 1697
64 bytes from 209.85.175.147: icmp_seq=1697 ttl=53 time=1036.891 ms
64 bytes from 209.85.175.147: icmp_seq=1698 ttl=53 time=1096.385 ms
64 bytes from 209.85.175.147: icmp_seq=1699 ttl=53 time=96.160 ms
64 bytes from 209.85.175.147: icmp_seq=1700 ttl=53 time=96.024 ms
64 bytes from 209.85.175.147: icmp_seq=1701 ttl=53 time=121.061 ms
— google.com ping statistics —
1704 packets transmitted, 1697 packets received, 0.4% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 36.570/130.734/3079.317/203.967 ms

Alright, here’s TheBackpackr signing out and hoping we get to Malacca REAL SOON. Happy Lunar New Year, folks!

Four years on, I received the invite to attend the prestigious launch of Yes 4G, the much talked about offering by YTL Communications that costs RM2.5 billion! Being in the technology industry, I attended to keep abreast of what was going on, and also meet some of my industry brethren. In a nutshell, here is a slideshow of the launch.

Driving to the Marriott, buildings were clad in large banners, streets were dressed up and it seemed the air was thick with impending excitement on what would be launched.

As I arrived at the ballroom, it was packed beyond packed! It was obvious, many were there to seek for better Internet connectivity. The backdrop for the event was a panaromic LED screen and it was pretty awesome. Yasmin Yussuf hosted the event and began with a video conference to UK where our Malaysian ambassador was, with some Malaysian students. Video quality was clear, and so was voice – this garnered the rousing approval from everyone.

Speeches were kept to a minimal with Tan Sri Francis Yeoh (MD, YTL Corporation), Dato’ Seri Utama Rais Yatim (Minister of Information, Communications, and Culture) and Wing K. Lee (CEO, YTL Communications). Both Tan Sri Francis and Wing are extremely good presenters, rousing applause upon applause from the audience.

Watch the actual launch on video here.

We then proceeded to a demo of the service, where Malaysians in UK made a phone call from a regular mobile phone to the Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister. Call quality was pretty poor, much like Skype on a bad day, but the video was fine. I hope they beef up the systems before they launch multi-party voice and video calls in December. Wing Lee announced that multi-party up to four streams for video and six for voice would be available.

Rates for Yes 4G are straightforward. There is a minimum monthly usage value of RM30 imposed, but no contracts to bind you to. Yes prides itself as charging merely for what you use – don’t pay a flat rate for data that you will not use anyway.

9 cents accords you:

1 SMS
1 minute for a voice call
3 mb of data transfer

On top of that, there are rebates that can be enjoyed for data usage too.

For using 2.5GB, you will get a rebate of RM9.
For using 3GB, you will get a rebate of RM23.
For using more than 4GB, you will get a rebate of 30%.

Here are the men (yes, no women!) behind-the-scenes who made all the audio-visual wizardry come to life. It’s a massive team!

At the end of the launch, we then took a walk to the new Lot 10 Yes flagship store, where it embodied an open concept, much like an Apple Store. Once again, there were swarms of people trying out the various gadgets and doing speed tests. (Can you spot our full-time Malaysian blogger LiewCF in the photo below?)

Huge digital panels were everywhere! This really is the future. The screen below is supposedly an interactive screen, where you are able to touch it and play with the display – however, no one was touching it, perhaps they didn’t know it was for play.

Interestingly, there were throngs of early adopters in queue who were pledging their dollars for devices.

By the time I left, it was dusk, but it gave me the chance to catch the “Yes cube” that sits on the Bintang Walkway.

There was so much hype about the service, and traffic must have surged to their servers. The yes.my website has been down intermittently till now.

My take on their service is that it’s a good alternative to mobile Internet, but for those who download a lot, stick with TM Streamyx or Unifi (even Wing Lee unashamedly said this during a soft launch preview I had). As of now, switching to a 018 mobile number and using it for voice is probably going to be less than satisfactory. YTL still has 1,000 base stations to launch, and it will definitely improve the service when done. To all those ranting away, cut them some slack – Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither does anything revolutionary.

Want to watch their feel-good 1Malaysia type promo video?

On the street I saw a small girl cold and shivering in a thin dress, with little hope of a decent meal. I became angry and said to God; “Why did you permit this? Why don’t you do something about it?” For a while God said nothing. That night he replied, quite suddenly:

“I certainly did something about it. I made you.”

For many months, I have been silently following a website that is interestingly called InvisiblePeople.tv. It is an interesting play on how humans shun away from looking at something they wish to eradicate from their minds. All too often, we walk quickly past the people begging on the streets, stealing a glance or two from the side of our eyes.

We’re afraid – that’s the truth. Afraid of being asked for donations, afraid to be caught staring, and worst of all, afraid to care.

This project heavily invests in social media and uses it to make the invisible people, visible. Mark Horvath, the man behind this project was once known as the Lizard Man of Hollywood Boulevard, when he himself was once homeless. Mark had strong media beginnings as a Hollywood distribution executive, but lost it all to drugs and alcohol. In a nutshell, thanks to the LA Dream Center, he was set right again and freed from the bondages he once had.

Today, he goes out to the streets armed with a small camcorder, mic, laptop and iPhone. Mark posts raw unedited footage (sometimes deemed too raw) of the people he interacts with as they share their homeless stories with him.

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.

Is there any magic to it? From what I see, there isn’t: it’s about being true to your project and being as transparent as possible. Picking the right social platforms is probably very important too, as you would want to target the relevant audience through it. Frequent updates help too, and we can see videos are uploaded very often on the InvisiblePeople.tv site.

With so many platforms to manage, I was very curious as to how Mark manages them and sent him a couple of tweets. Here’s his down-to-earth reply.

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.

More importantly, via social media, an entire movement has been formed, out of people who are more aware that these problems exist. To all those who are interested in making a difference, Mark in a very practical way asks them to start helping in their own neighbourhood. There’s little point in helping out halfway across the country when the problems are prevalent in your own backyard.

May the invisible become visible, via the power of social media.

Sure, I was uploading a porn photo, or trying to bet on my favourite Thai horse, or I was planning to assassinate the king. All I was doing was merely posting this article on presentations. I think they need to upgrade their filtering processes and hardware. I wonder what they REALLY censor.

On the other hand, Thailand is wayyy ahead of Malaysia in terms of broadband connectivity. Here’s a banner that I encountered at a local Chiang Mai shopping mall that touts 10 Mbit broadband connections at a mere 1490 Baht per month (at present, that’s about USD43.80 or RM154 per month). In Malaysia, there isn’t even an option for anything beyond 4 Mbit! So much for progress.

Fast forward to 2009, our minimum packages offered by Telekom Malaysia (oftentimes referred to as Terrorkom Malaysia) are now errr, still 384Kbps, while the fastest are 4.0Mbps. Wayyy to go, Malaysia.

Now, let’s look at our neighbours, Singapore. A quick check on Starhub shows they offer 100.0Mbps for a mere SGD$124.12 per month!

Streamyx packages - they suck

Starhub, oh so glorious!

With packages like those offered by Telekom Malaysia via their product Streamyx, it’s a wonder we have any e-commerce at all in our country. How do you expect progress for a nation like ours?

Why oh why do you think many companies choose to set up office in Singapore (paying more for rental and staff) and not our Multimedia Super Corridor? My belief is that the Internet hindrance is one of the major factors.

Couple that with our Science and Technology minister, Datuk Dr Maximus Ongkili who in a recent interview, comes up with statements like “I think that the target speed of 20Mbps for the high speed broadband for the commercial sector and not less than 2Mbps for the general population especially for Sabah and Sarawak can be achieved within the next three years. Price is difficult to determine but the proposal of PIKOM i.e. RM30 per month is a reasonable target to achieve.”

We have to WAIT for 3 years before the general population gets 2Mbps? Are you kidding me? Are we aiming that low? What becomes of the quote by Les Brown which states: “Shoot for the moon, even if you miss it you will land among the stars.” A quick look at our neighbours shows once again, that they are aiming for 1Gbps for every home in Singapore. Read more, and weep here.

Furthermore, not only do we have SLOW broadband, we also have bad connectivity. The fact we have 384Kbps connections is made exponentially worse by the erratic behaviour to the Internet. Some days we can access interantional websites, and some days we can’t. We should set up a gambling ring just to bet on speed of connections, and whether we can get access or not. How’s this table for a start.

Take a gamble on Streamyx

Days like this, I have virtually no access to international sites, and you can witness the effect on Twitter, but of course, no one at Telekom Malaysia will be online to monitor it (not even their PR/ad agencies are). In the last hour, here’s a list of tweets with the hashtag #StreamyxSucks.

StreamyxSucks hashtag on Twitter

Come on, Streamyx and all those with fancy titles in front of your names. Do something for your country lah, Datuk-Datuk, Tan Sri-Tan Sri.

I was interested to see what he would have to say and how live the interview would be. I was deeply unimpressed as there was really no form of active interaction between the audience and him. For all we know, he could have been asleep at home, while all this was going on.

There was more life in the Twittersphere and there were active conversations going on. Here is a transcript of the live interview, for those who might have missed it. And at the end, are some responses from the Twittersphere.

3:36 The Star Online:

Good afternoon and thank you for joining The Star Online today for our exclusive live blogchat with Datuk Dr Maximus Ongkili, Science, Technology and Innovation Minister. Dr Max has kindly taken time out of his busy schedule today to respond to some queries that you folks out there might have.

3:37 The Star Online:  We are getting Dr Max ready to reply to questions, so we’ll be ready to begin in a few minutes.

3:40 The Star Online:  The theme for today’s chat with Dr Max is “The Internet: Is speed all that matters.

3:40 The Star Online:  We would like to invite all of you tuning in here to leave your comments and questions for Dr Max, and we will try to fit in as many as possible over the next hour. We will also be posting several questions from readers of The Star Online who responded for our call for advance questions for Dr Max.

3:43 The Star Online:  Along the way, we will be uploading segments from the earlier video interview we conducted with Dr Max at Studio V at 1-Utama Shopping Centre in Petaling Jaya earlier.

3:47 The Star Online: It appears that Dr Max is ready to join us. Welcome Datuk.

3:47 Dr Max: Hello everyone, thank you for having me here today.

3:47 The Star Online:  Datuk, we have questions coming in live, and some advance questions as well. The first one comes from Shermaine.

3:47 The Star Online:

Hi Dr Maximus,

The Internet is the basis of much technological development. It’s not surprising that while Malaysia has a wealth of IT talents, and has been actively investing in technology and education, Internet usage still falls behind. Two factors plays a vital role, cost of internet and speed, this is largely due to lack of competition. The last time I was home, about a year ago, Internet service start from RM67 per month (not including phone line rental), mobile broadband costs a whopping RM 130 a month (apologies if these numbers are not exactly accurate). I am currently based in London, my Internet costs £15 a month, which after coversion to RM still works out about the same if not cheaper. This means Malaysians are paying London rate!
What are plans in the pipeline to at least make Internet connection more affordable and reachable for Malaysians?

Regards,
Shermaine

3:49 Dr Max:  Thanks Shermaine for your valuable input and questions

3:49 Dr Max:  Actually it is a chicken and egg situation.

3:51 Dr Max:

As I said earlier, the infrastructure for broadband is only starting to roll out. Hence, it has been costly for the existing infrastructure. We need major roll out of the broadband plan in order to reduce costs. PIKOM has proposed that the cost should be no more than RM30 per month to makebroadband accessible to all and increase Internet access.

3:51 Dr Max:  Once the broadband roll out is completed, the costs will average out and achieve the PIKOM proposal.

3:52 [Comment From Gabriel] what is the fucntion of MDeC within MOSTI and how does it differ from MSC Malaysia?

3:53 Dr Max:  MSC Malaysia is the flagship for the development of Multimedia Super Corridor and MDeC is the agency that spearheads the MSC development.

3:53 [Comment From Bob Chua] Good Afternoon Datuk – Glad to see you in Cyberspace. As a fellow Sabahan, do you see Sabah playing a role or having the opportunity to position itself as an ICT hub, perhaps via SDC (Sabah Development Corridor) or MSC Sabah?

3:56 Dr Max:

Thank you Bob. When there is a development, there is always an opportunity for the use of ICT to drive modernisation. I have already asked the Sabah state government to submit   a proposal for an MSC centre as a start before we talk about MSC Sabah. I understand that the proposal is being prepared and MOSTI will do its best to take the necessary action.

3:56 The Star Online:

This is another advance question, Datuk, from Fikri Salleh from the University of Melbourne.

Dear Dr. Ongkili,
I am an Electrical Engineering undergraduate from the University of Melbourne, currently majoring in telecommunications. In Australia they charge you for download quotas, where the more you download, the more you will have to pay, say 100 GB @ $100 versus 20 GB @ $20, after which the speed is throttled down (slowed). By charging more for more quota, this can improve overall connection quality. The heavy downloaders can still download, but now they have to pay more. Thus we normal users do not have to put up with the network being bogged due to these heavy downloaders, because there will be fewer of them.

Regards,
Fikri Saleh

3:58 Dr Max:  Hello Fikri, thanks for your comment. I totally agree with you. I will convey the concern and proposal to my colleague Information, Communications and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Utama Dr Rais Yatim.

3:58 The Star Online:  Datuk, this is a follow up question to your response earlier on the broadband rollout.

3:58 [Comment From Jerome] Hi Dr, when will be the projected completion time for the roll out? Surely we have an expected time line, don’t we?

3:59 The Star Online:  While we wait for Dr Max to respond, if you would like to listen to the earlier exclusive interview with him, please refresh your page and click on the audio links available.

4:02 Dr Max:  Thank you for your question. The whole broadband initiative will take 10 years to complete. But the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC)  has organised the period into two-year plans. Priority will be given to Zone 1 i.e. the business, commercial and residential sectors. Of course, we are asking that the rural sector i.e. Zone 3 should be given attention at the same time. I will not agree that we have to wait 10 years to enjoy the Internet spoeds enjoyed by developed countries.

4:02 [Comment From CHEWLP] How can the ministry play a role to make sure consumer get what they pay for ?

4:06 Dr Max:  As I said, MOSTI deals with technology and content of the ICT and Internet services. We will voice out to the Cabinet and the relevant ministries our concerns regarding making Internet access as affordable as possible. In   fact, we have already done that.

4:06 [Comment From Firedauz]

Good evening, Dr Max. How do you see the future of Internet service in Malaysia? Will one day we will be able to grace the ultra-fast, fiber-optic Internet speed of Japan, which only cost around RM50 per month for the consumers? I have been based in Tokyo for several years now, enjoying the luxury of the quality services and speed of Sofbank and Yahoo! BB, which is why I hope that one day for the average citizens of Malaysia, I see them enjoying the same benefit as I do. Thank you — Firedauz.

4:09 Dr Max:  Thank Firedauz. My desire is to ensure all Malaysians could enjoy the same Internet speed as what developed countries like Japan enjoy. It is possible with the political will of the Government and the cooperation of all key industry players including state governments. As I said, we should not wait 10 years to enjoy that level of Internet speed in developed countries. My own expectation is that there will be a major achievement within the next three years.

4:09 The Star Online:  This question from Azlan, Datuk, is a follow up question on the broadband rollout replied earlier.

4:09 [Comment From azlan] What speed do we get in 10 years? and will the price be reasonable?

4:12 Dr Max:

Thanks Azlan. I think that the target speed of 20Mbps for the high speed broadband for the commercial sector and not less than 2Mbps for the general population especially for Sabah and Sarawak can be achieved within the next three years. Price is difficult to determine but the proposal of PIKOM i.e. RM30 per month is a reasonable target to achieve.

4:12 The Star Online:

Here is another advance question we received.

Datuk, can you elaborate a little bit on the MyIdeas portal?

Thank you, – JR

4:18 Dr Max:  Hello JR. About MyIdeas portal, it is to be launched by the Prime Minister in the next two weeks. It is a portal aimed at inviting the public to submit ideas to MOSTI regarding 2010 Year of Creativity and Innovation. The public can submit ANY ideas  regarding how we should solve the economic, social and technological problems that Malaysia is facing. Excellent ideas will be developed further by scientists and the final idea patented or ‘copyrighted’  to the original proposer. Such ideas or innovations will then be showcased during next year’s Year of Creativity and Innovation. So watch out for the portal launching on July 8th and please participate and submit your great ideas.

4:18 The Star Online:

I  would suggest some community/rural area projects to be implemented at a lower cost such as the design and development of a broadband/satellite services for a wireless connection at a lower cost for rural areas. This will benefit many like teachers, students, and people who are unable to travel or get connected. This will also indirectly motivate and make full use of ICT applications.

We also need to have applications for video conferencing, distance learning, VoIP, internet education and community service besides e-Government applications.

Thanks and best regards,
Dinesh Wasoo

4:20 Dr Max:  Good afternoon Dinesh. I share your concern and proposal. That’s why for broadband for the general population (BBGP), we are proposing that we should opt for WiWi technology i.e. combination of Wimax and Wifi through the use of satellite infrastructure rather than laying out fibre-optic lines.

4:20 [Comment From Xtina] Hello Datuk, you proposed a National Innovation Foundation when you first became the MOSTI Minister. What has become of that plan?

4:24 Dr Max:  Hello Xtina. The National Innovation Foundation (NIF) has started to roll out its activities. The MyIdeas portal will be managed by NIF. It will also spearhead the organising of the 2010 Year of Creativity and Innovation. As part of the preparation, there will be creativity competitions at district and state levels. It will also embark on innovation awareness programmes for students, youths and woman groups  commencing in August 2009. NIF website will be up and running by August 1st and the public will be able to visit it and participate in the various programmes planned.

4:24 [Comment From Chee Yan Kuan] National Innovation Policy is good.How do you monitor the progress of the National Innovation Policy?

4:28 Dr Max:  Hello Chee. A national implementation committee chaired by the Chief Secretary to the Government has already met three times in the last one year to spearhead implementation of innovation policies and programmes. Various briefings at sectoral and state levels have been undertaken. Exhibitions and competitions on innovation are held twice yearly.

4:28 [Comment From John] Hi Datuk, I always heard about CyberSecurity Malaysia in the radio station. what is the function of CyberSecurity within MOSTI

4:33 Dr Max:  Hello John, thanks for the question. If you’re in the Peninsula I   invite you to visit CyberSecurity Malaysia and have a first hand feel of the latest technologies used to keep cyberspace in Malaysia safe. CyberSecurity Malaysia is the national specialist centre delivering and ensuring cyber security. It deals with education and awareness programmes, training, digital forensics, certification, international networking and collaboration and policy research, and acts as a help centre including Cyber999. I will be launching Cyber999 on July 7th. So hope you could make it there, John.

4:33 The Star Online: One last question, Datuk.

4:33 [Comment From MD] Datuk, will foreign player be allowed to roll out broadband services here?

4:36 Dr Max: Thanks MD. Malaysian infrastructure industry has always been open to national and international players. You can see that from the number of service providers in the country that are foreign-based. As usual, priority will be given to national ICT companies that have international networking and partnerships.

4:36 The Star Online:  Sorry folks, but that’s all the   time we have with Dr Max today. We have received many questions and comments from you. Those that we have not managed to pose to the Minister today will be forwarded to MOSTI.

4:36 The Star Online:  Just a reminder, the video on the exclusive interview will be uploaded shortly. In the mean time, the audio version is already available. For those of you who are not able to see the link, please refresh your page.

4:36 The Star Online:  Thank you for your time, Dr Max.

4:37 Dr Max: Thank you for giving me the time to answer your questions. If you still have further questions, please send me an email listed on MOSTI’s website at www.mosti.gov.my or directly to me at ongkili@mosti.gov.my. Take care and have a good evening everyone.

4:38 The Star Online: Thank you all for joining us today and for sending in your questions. Please make use of the two email addresses provided by Dr Max to send in your queries and comments. Have a good evening ahead of you.

Polls held during the live interview…

Random tweets…

Post interview tweets…

The problem – the government now selectively limits what site we are allowed to access and directs the Internet service providers (ISPs) to abide accordingly. As of the 27th of August 2008, access to a prominent and controversial blogger’s website – Raja Petra’s Malaysia-Today.net was blocked.

An initial investigation showed that the DNS servers for our national ISP ceased to point to the right location, which was puzzling as it has never happened before.

Soon after, MalaysiaKini reported the following snippet.

What does the MCMC really stand for anyway? I decided to take a peek at their manifesto, which is extracted from their website.

So… which part of “promoting access to communications and multimedia services” do I enjoy? Perhaps I should reword it to “promoting access to SELECTED communications and multimedia services”. And also, “Ensuring consumers enjoy THE GOVERNMENT’S choice and a satisfactory level of services”.

Or even better, read the MSC Malaysia Bill of Guarantees (which my company Integricity has obtained) which the government is promoting. Point number SEVEN specifically says, “Ensure no Internet censorship”. What then does this mean for us? We can endorse one thing and yet do another? Malaysia tentu boleh (Malaysia surely can).

What will be next? Blocking of freedom to Michael Backman’s website because he condemned Malaysia in his article “While Malaysia fiddles, its opportunities are running dry“? Are we afraid that Malaysians will wake up and realise, “crikey, this country is horrible!”? Too late – those who do, already DO!

Rather, should we not focus our time and energy on improving the nation, rather than wasting precious time and energy on fictitious story-telling in the press, as we have witnessed lately (which are a lot better than some fairy tales I heard as a kid)?

“Selamat pagi, Malaysia” and “sila bangun dari lena” (good morning, and please awaken) – let’s realise that blocking Internet access is not going to work.

After all, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out how to circumvent this amateur block by using the following methods as listed on Integricity’s blog.