Monday, November 29, 2010

2010 Intel CPU IQ Blogger Challenge....quite the challenge!


A friend was kind enough to invite me to participate in this 2010 Intel CPU IQ Blogger Challenge to answer some questions regarding Intel. Though I hardly think I can win the prize, it was actually quite fun and invigorating. The whole challenge was to answer the questions within 2 hours of receiving them via email - very "Mission Impossible" style. This was a brilliant way of increasing the awareness of Intel products and capabilities. 
Try the questions for fun, increase your knowledge of whats actually inside your computer and post your answers in the comments. Maybe I share my prize with you (if I win).
1.       What are the Intel® Unlocked SKUs available in the market today?
a.       I7-980X
b.      I7-970X
c.       I7-875K
d.      I5-755K
e.      I5-655K

            Answer:

2.       What is the memory support on the Intel® Core Extreme processor 980X?
a.       3 ch DDR3 - 1333
b.      3 ch DDR3 – 1066
c.       2 ch DDR3 – 1333
d.      2 ch DDR3 – 1066

Answer: 

3.       How many PCI-e channels are supported in Intel’s Core i5-655K processor?
a.       2x16
b.      1x16
c.       2x8
d.      4x8

Answer:

4.       How many cores and how many threads does the Intel i5-760 processor have?
a.       4 Cores 8 threads
b.      4 Cores 4 threads
c.       2 cores 4 threads
d.      2 cores 2 threads

Answer: 
  
5.       Intel® HD graphics is built into the family of Intel® Core™ processors launched in 2010. Which of the following are true? (select all relevant answers)
a.       The CPU and graphics are in a multichip package
b.      The CPU is manufactured on 32nm manufacturing process, and the graphics is on 45nm manufacturing process
c.       The CPU and graphics are both manufactured on 32nm manufacturing process
d.      The CPU and graphics are on a monolithic piece of silicon

Answer:

6.       Which of the following are true? When Intel® Turbo Boost technology kicks in for Intel® Core™ i5 processors based on the workload and other parameters:
a.       The working core can go above the rated frequency to deliver the required performance
b.      The CPU will remain within the rated TDP
c.       The process is completely automatic and users don’t have to do anything
d.      All of the above

Answer:

7.       Is it true that with xvycc on Intel® HD Graphics, you can show a wider shade of rich colors, up to 256?
a.       True
b.      False

Answer:

8.       Is it true that using Intel® HD Graphics on the Intel® Core™ processors launched in 2010, you cannot play back multiple Blu-ray streams (picture-in-picture)?
a.       True
b.      False

Answer:

9.       Are the new Intel Core processors launched in 2010 on 32nm?
a.       True
b.      False

            Answer: 

10.   Are Intel Core processors launched in 2010 a Tock? 
a.       Yes
b.      No

Answer: 

 11.   Is it true that Intel Turbo Boost Technology is available on Intel Core i3 processors?
a.       True
b.      False

Answer:

12.   List out the TDP(s) of the standard voltage Intel Core mobile processors?
a.       Dual core
b.      Quad core
c.       Extreme Edition

Answer:
Dual core (  )
Quad core (  )
Extreme Edition (  )                

13.   Is it true that Intel Core processors for laptop PCs support up to DDR3-1066MHz memory?
a.       True
b.      False

Answer:

14.   What is the matching desktop chipset for unlocked Core CPUs? 

Answer:

Sunday, November 21, 2010

The Unfair Life

Life is not fair, but the fact that it has been so much more fair to us than it has been to so many people is one we tend to often forget. Being blessed with much more than what we earned or deserved, there is this propensity towards taking things for granted and crying foul at relatively minor sufferings and normal vicissitudes of life.

The following excerpts serve as a reminder of how small the problems which bother us are in comparison to the blessings we already possess. It give us an inkling of people who would actually be able to present a reasonable argument in favour of being dealt a weak hand in life:

"I once saw a young slave girl dying soon after the birth of a child nearly white. In her agony she cried out, 'O Lord, come and take me!' Her mistress stood by, and mocked at her like an incarnate fiend. 'You suffer, do you?' she exclaimed. 'I am glad of it. You deserve it all, and more too.'

The girl's mother said, 'The baby is dead, thank God; and I hope my poor child will soon be in heaven, too.'

'Heaven!' retorted the mistress. 'There is no such place for the like of her and her bastard.'

The poor mother turned away, sobbing. Her dying daughter called her, feebly, and as she bent over her, I heard her say, 'Don't grieve so, mother; God knows all about it; and HE will have mercy upon me.'

Her sufferings, afterwards, became so intense, that her mistress felt unable to stay; but when she left the room, the scornful smile was still on her lips. Seven children called her mother. The poor black woman had but the one child, whose eyes she saw closing in death, while she thanked God for taking her away from the greater bitterness of life."

"Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" by Harriet Ann Jacobs



"It is easy to find out, on that day, who clothes and feeds his slaves well; for he is surrounded by a crowd, begging, 'Please, massa, hire me this year. I will work very hard, massa.' .............

But to the slave mother New Year's day comes laden with peculiar sorrows. She sits on her cold cabin floor, watching the children who may all be torn from her the next morning; and often does she wish that she and they might die before the day dawns. She may be an ignorant creature, degraded by the system that has brutalized her from childhood; but she has a mother's instincts, and is capable of feeling a mother's agonies.

On one of these sale days, I saw a mother lead seven children to the auction-block. She knew that some of them would be taken from her; but they took all. The children were sold to a slave-trader, and their mother was brought by a man in her own town. Before night her children were all far away. She begged the trader to tell her where he intended to take them; this he refused to do. How could he, when he knew he would sell them, one by one, wherever he could command the highest price? I met that mother in the street, and her wild, haggard face lives to-day in my mind. She wrung her hands in anguish, and exclaimed, 'Gone! All gone! Why don't God kill
me?' I had no words wherewith to comfort her."

"Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" by Harriet Ann Jacobs



"one of the plantation slaves was brought to town, by order of his master. It was near night when he arrived, and Dr. Flint ordered him to be taken to the work house, and tied up to the joist, so that his feet would just escape the ground. In that situation he was to wait till the doctor had taken his tea. I shall never forget that night. Never before, in my life, had I heard hundreds of blows fall; in succession, on a human being. His piteous groans, and his 'O, pray don't, massa,' rang in my ear for months afterwards. There were many conjectures as to the cause of this terrible punishment. Some said master accused him of stealing corn; others said the slave had quarrelled with his wife, in presence of the overseer, and had accused his master of being the father of her child. They were both black, and the child was very fair."

"Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" by Harriet Ann Jacobs



"Corsetti explains that Bagram was a very tough prison: 'Each prisoner has in his cell a carpet measuring 1.2 m by 2.5 m. And they spend 23 hours a day sitting on it, in silence. If they speak, they are chained to the ceiling for 20 minutes and black visors are put on them so they can’t see, and protectors are put on their ears so they can’t hear. They are taken down to the
basement once a week, in groups of five or six, to shower them. It’s done to drive them crazy. I almost went crazy myself,'

Corsetti recalls.
'In Abu Ghraib and Bagram they were tortured to make them suffer, not to get information out of them.' And, he adds, the fact is that at times the torture had no other goal that 'to punish them for being terrorists. They tortured them and didn’t ask them anything.'

Other torture included using extreme cold and heat: 'I remember one of my prisoners trembling with cold. His teeth wouldn’t stop chattering. I put a blanket on him and then another, and another, and his teeth never stopped chattering, never stopped. You could see that the man was going to die of hypothermia. But the doctors are there so that they don’t die, so as to be able to torture them one more day.' At other times, he says, 'they put them under blinding lights that worked mechanically, giving out flashes.'

Another important practice was psychological torture, administered by psychiatrists. 'They tell them they are going to kill their children, rape their wives. And you see on their faces, in their eyes, the terror that that causes them. Because, of course, we know all about those people. We know the names of their children, where they live. We show them satellite photos of their houses. It is worse than any torture.
Sometimes, we put one of our women (female US military personnel) in a burqa and we made them walk through the interrogation rooms and we told them, ‘That is your wife,’ And the prisoner believed it. Why wouldn’t they?"

http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2007/12/21/former-us-interrogator-damien-corsetti-recalls-the-torture-of-prisoners-in-bagram-and-abu-ghraib/



The prisoner, a slight, 22-year-old taxi driver known only as Dilawar, was hauled from his cell at the detention center in Bagram, Afghanistan, at around 2 a.m. to answer questions about a rocket attack on an American base. When he arrived in the interrogation room, an interpreter who was present said, his legs were bouncing uncontrollably in the plastic chair and his hands were numb. He had been chained by the wrists to the top of his cell for much of the previous four days.

At the interrogators' behest, a guard tried to force the young man to his knees. But his legs, which had been pummeled by guards for several days, could no longer bend. An interrogator told Mr. Dilawar that he could see a doctor after they finished with him. When he was finally sent back to his cell, though, the guards were instructed only to chain the prisoner back to the ceiling.

'Leave him up,' one of the guards quoted Specialist Claus as saying.

Several hours passed before an emergency room doctor finally saw Mr. Dilawar. By then he was dead, his body beginning to stiffen. It would be many months before Army investigators learned a final horrific detail: Most of the interrogators had believed Mr. Dilawar was an innocent man who simply drove his taxi past the American base at the wrong time.
(image above shows Dilawar's father and daughter)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/20/international/asia/20abuse.html?ei=5088&en=4579c146cb14cfd6&ex=1274241600&pagewanted=all

"Post-Mortem:

One of the coroners later translated the assessment at a pre-trial hearing for Specialist Brand, saying the tissue in the young man’s legs 'had basically been pulpified.'

'I’ve seen similar injuries in an individual run over by a bus,' added Lt. Col. Elizabeth Rouse, the coroner, and a major at that time."

http://freedetainees.org/resource-us-report-brutal-details-of-2-afghan-inmates-deaths



While General Hamid Zabar was being questioned in Iraq, his interrogators decided to arrest his frail 16-year-old son in order to produce a confession. After soldiers found the boy, he was stripped, drenched with mud and water, and exposed to the cold January night while bound and driven about in the open back of a truck. When presented naked to his father, he was shivering due to hypothermia, clearly needing medical attention.

"George W. Bush, war criminal?" by Michael Haas



My hand is to me what your hearing and sight together are to you. In large measure we travel the same highways, read the same books, speak the same language, yet our experiences are different. All my comings and goings turn on the hand as on a pivot. It is the hand that binds me to the world of men and women. The hand is my feeler with which I reach through isolation and darkness and seize every pleasure, every activity that my fingers encounter.

"The world I Live In" by Helen Keller



"Nothing is entering or leaving Gaza, and now the funds to purchase what is available there are also drying up, bringing the dire situation of its people to a new and febrile crisis.

Karni is officially closed because the Israeli army has declared a security alert for the Jewish Passover holiday. Yet it has barely been open this year. The effect is a paralysis of Gaza's commerce and severe shortages of basic foods .... Israel's policy was summed up by Dov Weisglass, an adviser to Ehud Olmert, the Israeli Prime Minister, earlier this year. 'The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger,' he said."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/apr/16/israel



"Born in 1938 in Beit Daras village, he saw it conquered, leveled and erased, except from the memory he took to his grave. A captive in his own land, he lived years as a Gaza Nuseirat camp refugee, raising his family including son Ramzy, dreaming always of going home, struggling as a freedom fighter to end decades of conflict, violence, occupation, and oppression, what Edward Said called "a slow death," shattered hopes, and inexorable toll of its incalculable horror to so many."

http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2010/10/life-in-palestinian-refugee-camps.html




"The Mission focussed (Chapter V) on the process of economic and political isolation imposed by Israel on the Gaza Strip, generally referred to as a “blockade”. The blockade comprises measures such as restrictions on the goods that can be imported into Gaza and the closure of border crossings for people, goods and services, sometimes for days, including cuts on the provision of fuel and electricity. Gaza’s economy is further severely affected by the reduction of the fishing zone open to the Palestinian fishermen and the establishment of a “buffer zone” along the border between Gaza and Israel which reduces the land available for agriculture and industrial activity. In addition to creating an emergency situation, the blockade significantly weakened the capacities of the population and of the health, water and other public sectors to react to the emergency created by the military operations.................


The Mission also examined the intense artillery attacks, again including white phosphorous munitions, on Al Wafa hospital in eastern Gaza City, a facility for patients receiving long-term care and suffering from particularly serious injuries..........

The Mission investigated several incidents involving the destruction of industrial infrastructure, food production, water installations, sewage treatment and housing (Chapter XIII). Already at the beginning of the military operations, the Al Bader flour mill was the only flour mill in the Gaza Strip still operating. The flour mill was hit by a series of air strikes on 9 January 2009 after several false warnings had been issued on previous days.....


Israeli forces also carried out a strike against a wall of one of the raw sewage lagoons of the
Gaza Waste Water Treatment Plant, which caused the outflow of more than 200,000 cubic
metres of raw sewage into neighbouring farmland............

The Namar Wells complex in Jabalya consisted of two water wells, pumping machines, a generator, fuel storage, a reservoir chlorination unit, buildings and related equipment. All were destroyed by multiple air strikes on the first day of the Israeli aerial attack."

http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/specialsession/9/docs/UNFFMGC_Report.pdf



"When the white powder started falling from the sky, the soldiers were puzzled. Usually the American planes dropped bombs. Now, they were unleashing clouds of something that looked like fog, smelled like garlic and burned their eyes........

First sprayed in 1968, Mr. Vinh was plagued by muscular and skeletal disorders. But after the war ended in 1975, his health deteriorated rapidly. By 1994, he was paralyzed and spent six months in hospital, being fed liquids through his nose......

Dioxin interferes with reproduction, so Mr. Vinh's nightmare swept up his children and grandchildren as well. One son is blind and mentally handicapped. Another is deaf. A third has spinal problems. One daughter is partly paralyzed, another mentally handicapped, the third chronically weak with children born blind.


Vietnam estimates 400,000 people were killed or maimed by the defoliants, 500,000 children have been born with defects from retardation to spina bifida and a further two million people have suffered cancers or other illnesses."
(In the image above Phan Thi Hoi bathes her 14-year-old son, Bui Quang Ky. She was exposed to Agent Orange when she was in the North Vietnamese Army during the war.)

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/archives/article697346.ece




"CAMILE. All right. The calling in of artillery for games, the way it was worked would be the mortar forward observers would pick out certain houses in villages, friendly villages, and the mortar forward observers would call in mortars until they destroyed that house and then the artillery forward observer would call in artillery until he destroyed another house and whoever used the least amount of artillery, they won. And when we got back someone would have to buy someone else beers. The cutting off of heads--on Operation Stone--there was a Lt. Colonel there and two people had their heads cut off and put on stakes and stuck in the middle of the field. And we were notified that there was press covering the operation and that we couldn't do that anymore.

Before we went out on the operation we were told not to waste our heat tablets on food but to save them for the villages because we were going to destroy all the villages and we didn't give the people any time to get out of the villages. We just went in and burned them and if people were in the villages yelling and screaming, we didn't help them. We just burned the houses as we went.

MODERATOR. Why did you use the heat tabs? Did you just light off the villages with matches or just throw the heat tabs in so it would keep burning?

CAMILE. We'd throw the heat tabs in because it was quicker and they'd keep burning. They couldn't put the heat tabs out. We'd throw them on top of the houses. People cut off ears and when they'd come back in off of an operation you'd make deals before you'd go out and like for every ear you cut off someone would buy you two beers, so people cut off ears. The torturing of
prisoners was done with beatings and I saw one case where there were two prisoners. One prisoner was staked out on the ground and he was cut open while he was alive and part of his insides were cut out and they told the other prisoner if he didn't tell them what they wanted to know they would kill him. And I don't know what he said because he spoke in Vietnamese but then they killed him after that anyway.
.............

CAMILE. The main thing was that if an operation was covered by the press there were certain things we weren't supposed to do, but if there was no press there, it was okay. I saw one case where a woman was shot by a sniper, one of our snipers. When we got up to her she was asking for water. And the Lt. said to kill her. So he ripped off her clothes, they stabbed her ***********, they spread-eagled her and shoved an E- tool **********, an entrenching tool, and she was still asking for water. And then they took that out and they used a tree limb and then she was shot.
..........

we were about 5 miles down the road, where there were some Vietnamese children at the gateway of the village and they gave the old finger gesture at us. It was understandable that they picked this up from the GIs there. They stopped the trucks--they didn't stop the truck, they slowed down a little bit, and it was just like response, the guys got up, including the

lieutenants, and just blew all the kids away. There were about five or six kids blown away and then the truck just continued down the hill. That was my first day in Vietnam. As far as the crucified bodies, they weren't actually crucified with nails, but they would find VCs or something (I never got the story on them) but, anyway, they were human beings, obviously dead, and they would take them and string them out on fences, on barbed wire fences, stripped, and sometimes they would take flesh wounds, take a knife and cut the body all over the place to make it bleed, and look gory as a reminder to the people in the village.
............


He asked me if I would like to accompany him into a village that I was familiar with to see how they act. So I went with him and when we got there the ARVNs had control of the situation. They didn't find any enemy but they found a woman with bandages. So she was questioned by six ARVNs and the way they questioned her, since she had bandages, they shot her. She was hit about twenty times. After she was questioned, and, of course, dead, this guy came over, who was a former major, been in the service for twenty years, and he got hungry again and came back over working with USAID, Aid International Development. He went over there, ripped her clothes off and took a knife and cut, ********** almost all the way up, just about *********** and pulled her organs out, completely out of her cavity, and threw them out. Then, he stopped and knelt over and commenced to peel every bit of skin off her body and left her there as a sign for something or other and that was those instances.


The bridge got a radio call that they had supposedly received a sniper round from this village. So the Lt. on the bridge told them to sweep the village. They swept the village and they called back that there was nothing found. There was nothing found, I mean, there were just people in the village and so the Lt. told them to burn the village. From my position, which was about 150 to 200 yards away, and there was a tree line in the way, smoke started coming up over the tree line and about this time, I guess about three minutes after the smoke started showing, there was a lot of screaming and just chaos coming from the direction of the village and a lot of people started running out of the tree line. From where I was standing, I saw maybe two or three male villagers and the rest were women and children--some of the children walking and some of them young enough to be carried, I would say under a year, maybe. The last thing I heard as a command was the gunnery sergeant told them to open fire to keep them back. Their village was on fire and they were in panic; they didn't stop, so they just cut down the women and children with mortars, machine guns, tank, snipers were...
........

MODERATOR. Mr. Camile, you have testimony here of napalm being dropped on villagers. Could you go into this and kind of let us know what napalm is and how it was used and any of the results?

CAMILE. I really don't know that much about what it is or what it's made of. I just know that when it gets on you it burns and when they drop it from the planes, they usually drop two big canisters of napalm at a time. It just burns everything up, including the people. Many times we've called in air before we'd go into a village, or if we had a village where we'd lost people because of booby traps, we'd call in napalm and it just burns down the village and the people.

QUESTION. In terms of practice does that mean that women were treated especially rudely? You said "double everything."

PANELIST. Yes, I would say so. Because it makes a lasting impression on some guy--some "zip"--that's watching his daughter worked over. So we have a better opportunity of keeping him in line by working her over."

Winter Soldier Investigation (http://www2.iath.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Resources/Primary/Winter_Soldier/WS_entry.html)

Thursday, August 19, 2010

PTCL Strike - MAXCOM Sellout - Problems Galore!!

It was by chance that I discovered that one of the largest service providers (because it has a monopoly) had actually decided to go on strike leaving all it's customers (basically all of Pakistan) in limbo. It all started when my telephone line went dead killing my internet connection with MAXCOM. When I tried to call MAXCOM to lodge a complaint, it was quite swiftly done so and similarly PTCL complaint numbers also attended my call quite efficiently. It was the next day that revelations of the strike appeared.
The next day when I discovered that no progress had been made in regards to repairing my internet or telephone line, I began calling PTCL and MAXCOM complaint numbers again only to find that both numbers had a recording which stated "All representatives are busy at the moment...". After waiting for over 15 minutes hoping that the representatives can attend my call, I gave up and called one of the MAXCOM technical employee directly. When I asked him about the delay in complaint handling, he narrated the following:

PTCL took over MAXCOM approx a month and half ago and recently PTCL announced that they will be going on strike due to insufficient salary increase. They had come over to MAXCOM's office and forced them to also shut down the office. Hence, all complaints will only be handled after they reopen.

What is surprising is how this has not been highlighted in the news, nor has our justice bench been able to intervene to amend this critical issue pertaining to the only service provider of telephone service. It seems wrong that the complaint numbers are playing recordings that deceive the customer into thinking that all representatives are busy when actually they are not busy attending customer complaints but rather attending rally's and sit-ins.
I am afraid that the good service provided by MAXCOM will now suffer and sadly one of the best DSL internet providers will begin to lose customers just because of an association with PTCL. I myself have begun to look around for alternatives because at the end of the day, us customers demand service.

I wonder, would PTCL or MAXCOM wait for an extended period of time before I pay my bills?? After all, I was on strike and did not get paid this month......so would they be as forgiving as they expect their customers to be??

References:

PTCL Workers Website
PTCL Strike - Interview Video

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

"No. 1 Nation in Sexy Web Searches? Call it Pornistan" - Call it irresponsible reporting!!

It seems the ratings of Fox News have been dropping for them to start publishing articles to discredit entire countries without any concrete evidence. Why else would they want to hand over a topic for investigating and published to an intern still wet behind the ears in the industry?
This piece of trash writing first came across when a post was displayed on my Facebook feed by a friend. This lead me to a page on Facebook that showcased a strong answer to such distasteful writing. Please find below the entire response as it was published:



‘Pornistan?’ only if you believe one foxy intern from the United States of erotica
By S Kamal

A couple of weeks ago, Fox News published an article on their ‘World’ section titled ‘No 1 Nation in Sexy Web Searches? Call it Pornistan’. The article has subsequently been the source of much discussion online, and has been published and circulated to a fairly wide audience. While the point of the article was unclear, the article called Pakistan the ‘world’s leader in online searches for pornographic material’ and stated that “Google ranks Pakistan No 1 in the world in searches for pornographic terms.”

My reaction to reading the article, particularly some of the lewd terms for which Pakistan ranked #1 in, was bewilderment. Perhaps this was why Pakistan’s economy is in such poor shape? It appeared that that everyone was seeking the wrong type of stimulus.

That is, until I started checking a few facts. Reader comments on the article on the Fox News website were promptly disabled, so I couldn’t voice my thoughts there. Finally, I contacted the author of the article – who, as I discovered, was an intern at Fox with quite a vivid imagination.

Some facts: None of the rankings in the article were published by Google. Rather, every single absurd term reported in the article (‘donkey sex’, ‘horse sex’, etc.) was manually typed into two Google tools called ‘Google Insights’ and ‘Google Trends’ that gives statistics for where in the world certain searches originate. In other words, every single term reported in the article was a term that the Fox News intern who wrote the piece CHOSE to search for.

Now, if I were writing an article on the irony of a government that is passing laws against online blasphemy while its citizens engage in watching porn online (presumably the point of the story – although this hardly seems like a dramatic, newsworthy phenomenon), searching for ‘donkey sex’ would certainly not pop into my mind first. So, I posed this question to the author on her blog, for which her response was: “I did not think up the searches on my own. They were brought to my attention from an outside individual. I am going to respectfully end my engagement in the discussion.” Ah. So her “source,” if you can call it that, is an “outside individual.” Must be quite the colourful character.

The method used to produce these results is obviously flawed. Interestingly (but not surprisingly), minor variations of the search terms on Google Insights yield dramatically different results. So I did a 15 minute exercise on Google Insights. First I looked at slight modifications of the terms in the article, to see how countries rank. As an example, let’s take ‘Donkey sex’, where Pakistan ranked #1, and change the search term to ‘Sex with Donkey’. The US ranked #1 for ‘Sex with Donkey’ for 2006, 2007 and 2010, and #2 in 2008 and 2009, while Pakistan does not appear in the top five countries for this search term in any of these years. Now, if one were to ascribe scientific certainty to such a finding, as the author has done, one could argue that ‘Donkey sex’ (where Pakistan ranks #1) could refer to a search for donkeys reproducing with each other, while ‘Sex with Donkey’ (where the US ranks #1), is, well, less ambiguous.

In this case, it seems that the Islamic Republic of Pornistan has a lot of catching up to do with the United States of Erotica.

Along similar lines, the US has also been ranked #1 or #2, for the period 2004 through 2010, for the following terms that are slight modifications of terms in the original article: ‘Sex with school child’, ‘sex with farm animals’ and ‘sex with camel’. Pakistan was not ranked in the top ten countries for any of these search terms.

To further demonstrate the ridiculousness of this methodology, I’ve documented some results from my own “research”. Let’s just say that an outside source tipped me off that Americans fantasize about having sex with their vegetables. So, I put this to the test. The results, according to Google: The US has ranked #1 for 2004 to 2010 in searches for the following terms: ‘tomato sex’, ‘corn sex’, ‘cabbage sex’, ‘spinach sex’, ‘celery sex’, ‘sex with vegetable’, and even ‘chicken sex’ and ‘tractor sex’. The US also ranks highly in several other searches, “not suitable to publish here.” Surely, these results have deep philosophical implications on the psyche of the average American?

And the gem? The author claims in her blog that: “I contacted the appropriate [embassy] officials and attempted to contact multiple individuals in Pakistan.” Ah. So no one at the embassy responded to her interview request. Yes, we should certainly take our Embassy chaps to task for not paying due attention to this groundbreaking scientific research; and wasting their time instead on trifling issues such as the war on terror, strategic dialogue with India, internal political strife, Pak-US relations, etc. As another commentator pointed out on the author’s blog, a more reliable source for information on Internet use in Pakistan may have been to contact the Internet Service Providers Association of Pakistan. The author may have found them through a simple Google search – if she wasn’t too busy Googling her sex search data.

I could say that this is journalism at its worse. But, to be frank, this is not journalism. This is a dishonest and irresponsible story, written in very poor taste.

As a respectable news source, Fox News needs to publish a retraction of this story, or at the very least, some clarifications on the intent of this article and the methodology employed. I believe this is in order, lest the general public conclude that they are in the business of cheaply seeking attention through controversy.
The author can be reached at sxkamal@gmail.com

Source : Daily Times

I must give credit to Mr Kamal for taking this issue seriously and actually providing quite a satisfactory response to the inaccurate article published by Fox. The article published by Fox can be found here :


In addition to Mr Kamal's findings, I quickly visited some statistics websites and realized another reason why Fox's article is absurd.

How can the intern be correct when :

Pakistan Population : 177,276,594
Internet users: 18,500,00
Hence internet penetration: 10.4%

United States Population : 310,232,863
Internet users: 239,232,863
Hence internet penetration: 77.3%


How can a country, that has a meager 18.5 million internet users manage to beat all the rest of the countries including CHINA on pornographic searches? How can we beat them on any search??

An american just proved once again how dumb they can really be!! By the way, isn't prostitution legal in some parts of America? Doesn't America have a thriving pornographic industry? Or how about the fact that which country has the highest number of cases of child abuse? or how about the divorce rate? or better yet, the average age of an american when he or she first has sex? 

Why can't people simply understand this simple fact:

People who live in glass houses should not throw stones.


Saturday, June 12, 2010

Coke Studio

At the risk of sounding like an attempt to advertise for Coke or do a bit of PR for their massive success of Coke Studio, I must give due credit where it is deserved. In 2008 when it was first being launched with season one, a great deal of skepticism was shown by a majority of my friends including myself.
Our first thoughts were that of a typical Pakistani; the real movie won’t be anything as good as the trailer. Basically we did not think that Pakistan has the sufficient talent to pull something as grand as bringing multiple musicians and musical styles and merge them to create a masterpiece. But that is exactly what Coke managed to do, create a masterpiece show which highlighted some of the best music that has ever come out of this country. What’s more amazing is that they managed to do a better job with season two which was aired in 2009. And finally they have made this a hat trick by launching season three.
Coke Studio embodies a musical fusion of exciting elements and diverse influences, ranging from traditional eastern, modern western and regionally inspired music. Bringing alive the magic of live recordings and performances, Coke Studio prides itself on providing a musical platform which bridges barriers, celebrates diversity, encourages unity and instills a sense of Pakistani pride. Coke Studio is an inspired step by Coca-Cola for having created a platform where renowned as well as upcoming and less mainstream musicians from various genres can collaborate musically.
I must tip my hat to the directors, producers, musicians, Coke and their agencies and every person who made this program into a tradition which every Pakistani is proud of.




Wednesday, June 9, 2010

iPhone 4

Just yesterday I stumbled upon a video on youtube in which Steve Jobs (CEO of Apple) was standing in his cliche black t-shirt and announcing some new iPhone that Apple was going to launch. I didnt pay any special attention to his blabbing until he actually showed the audience a picture of the new and improved trend setter. I have always wondered what makes the iPhone so attractive but with the new iPhone 4, I do not need to wonder any more.

The phone screams out style, sex and premium. The curves and full glass body cries for the fingers to caress and glide across the panel and use the many functions it provides. Upgrades such as:

  1. Two cameras, two views. iPhone 4 has two cameras: One on the front, which focuses on you. And one on the back, which focuses on everything else. FaceTime lets you switch back and forth between them at any time during a video call. All you have to do is tap a button.
  2. The Retina display on iPhone 4 is the sharpest, most vibrant, highest-resolution phone screen ever, with four times the pixel count of previous iPhone models. In fact, the pixel density is so high that the human eye is unable to distinguish individual pixels. Which makes text amazingly crisp and images stunningly sharp.
  3. iPhone 4 introduces a whole new way of multitasking. Now you can run your favorite third-party apps — and switch between them instantly — without slowing down the performance of the foreground app or draining the battery unnecessarily. This smarter approach to multitasking is available only on iPhone.
  4. Shoot your own movies in high definition. Capture impressive video even in low-light settings, thanks to the advanced backside illumination sensor and built-in LED light. Then edit and create your own mini-masterpiece right on iPhone 4 using the new iMovie app — with Apple-designed themes, titles, and transitions.
  5. Take beautiful, detailed photos with the new 5-megapixel camera with built-in LED flash. The advanced backside illumination sensor captures great pictures even in low light. And the new front-facing camera makes it easy to take self-portraits.
  6. iPhone 4 is the first phone with a built-in three-axis gyroscope. When paired with the accelerometer, it makes iPhone 4 capable of advanced motion sensing such as user acceleration, angular velocity, and rotation rate. Translation: More motion gestures and greater precision for an even better gaming experience.
  7. Apple engineers designed the A4 chip to be a remarkably powerful yet remarkably power-efficient mobile processor. With it, iPhone 4 can easily perform complex jobs such as multitasking, editing video, and placing FaceTime calls. All while maximizing battery life.
  8. Created from an alloy, then forged to be five times stronger than standard steel, the CNC-machined band is the mounting point for all the components of iPhone 4. The band provides impressive structural rigidity and allows for its incredibly thin, refined design. It also functions as both iPhone 4 antennas.
With the new iPhone packed with so many new features, it is hard to fight off the temptation to hold back and not invest in this beautiful piece of hardware. This new iPhone is clearly evolutionary rather than revolutionary.

Search Amazon.com for iphone

Source : Apple

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Entrepreneurship at its best

It was a casual conversation with a friend that led us into the topic of virtual stores as a platform for aspiring entrepreneurs. It seems Pakistan is at the verge of beginning to properly exploit the great World Wide Web. We have begun to realize the potential of virtual shopping/stores. It allows men and especially women to convert their hobby or skills into a business venture that knows no borders. We have now begun to offer a various range of services to expatriates and immigrants in various countries around the world and have made it so much easier for them to enjoy locally designed clothes, local food and even services such as documentation.

This friend that I mentioned earlier informed me of his new venture into a similar field. Here is an excerpt from our chat on his brilliant business idea:
 
TAKEONECLUB is an alluring platform for all Fashions designers, beauticians, models and HS crowd, offering them a spectacular opportunity to play their roles in the world of ‘style’.
The talent of our country has now no more to worry about being underrepresented due to lack of appropriate media coverage. At TAKEONECLUB, our primary focus is to manage your social media needs, promote potential models, talented clothing designers, makeup artists, hairstylists and many more, who in any capacity, have already or want to, contribute devotedly to the fashion industry.

An entire group of these enthusiast professionals, with establishment of TAKEONECLUB, will be at ease in interacting with their counterparts all over the world .This is just a beginning from our side to build the largest virtual fashion network of Pakistan.

So if you are a beautician, model or a fashion designer and you aspire to take part in the growth of the fashion industry you certainly need to join the group : TAKEONECLUB

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Fun Science (Really cool stuff)

Today I found some interesting videos that I thought would be appropriate to share. It's amazing how a few simple objects used in daily life can have such various uses...I really liked the Pencil Light :)

How to make a survival fire from a battery and a staple

How to make a pocket USB battery

How to get 6 AAA batteries from a 9V battery

How to turn a pencil into an emergency light

How to make a soda can stove

How to make a burning laser

Really cool stuff right? If you find any such videos then please share the link by commenting on this post.

A special thanks to my new favourite website Wonderhowto and Videojug

Thursday, May 13, 2010

You call that dinner??

It seems the new fad is to open a restaurant and overcharge the customers for smaller than usual helpings which are as bland as eating paper.
Every couple of weeks later we hear that a new restaurant has opened up in Karachi and how the theme and atmosphere is "to die for!!”. Did everyone get to know that 'The Diner' opened up at Shahbaz Commercial DHA?? Has anyone been there?? Quite sophisticated...no?? But the helpings are pathetic and a total overkill on trying to provide the natural flavors!! I was still hungry after I walked out of the restaurant having ordered a pepper steak!!
Now if I was to order a pepper steak from Maxim's or even Arizona Grill, or Gun Smoke I would not mind paying the hefty price tag that comes with it because those steaks are delicious and filling. But if a waiter brings me a 2 bite steak and charges me Rs 500 for it, that’s just insane!
What’s wrong with people?? Is making a fashion statement and being part of the 'IN' crowd matter so much that we throw away money on tid bits?

Where have I experienced this, you might ask? Well, as I mentioned earlier The Diner but the others I had the misfortune of trying were Sawadika, Fuchsia, Butler's Chocolate Cafe and N'eco's Natural Store and Cafe. The last one really was the extreme....I ordered a beef steak sandwich for 350 and got two small bread pieces with table spoon size beef bites, some lettuce on them and a side bowl of some form of boiled pulses. And worst of all was that it was tasteless. I think they took the natural thing too far.
Basically, I feel that restaurants need to bring a balance in providing good food (taste, quality and justified helpings), theme and comfortable sitting and of course price. Some restaurants that I find to be exceptional in providing these characteristics are Chairman Mao (Best home delivery), Cafe Zouk, Kahva (Amazing food), Koel Cafe, Studio Cafe, Expresso, Cafe Flo, Chatkharay, BBQ Tonight, Lal Qila, Village, Arizona Grill, Copper Kettle, Gun Smoke and Baan Thai (Amazing food).

I must have missed out on a lot of places to eat, so how about you providing your quick reviews of places to go or not go.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Burning the Country Down

I was going though the newspaper today and I came across this picture of a group of people chanting slogans and burning tyres as part of anti-KESC protests being held in Karachi's Pak Colony. I couldn't help but notice how majority of the people were smiling and enjoying themselves be a part of this barbaric and self-inflicting act.
Why don't people understand that burning tyres, closing shops, holding strikes etc all hurt the country and the population itself. Besides the loss in business hours, asset destruction and lower investments, these images of destruction are carried across the electronic media and showcased as the average citizens of our beloved country. So when I next have a meeting with a buyer/supplier from the west, I first have to explain that we all arent barbaric and I won't end up buring tyres or throwing rocks at his building incase a deal goes sour. In short, we are horrible marketeers of our own country and people. It is a shame since we all know that our region houses the smartest people in the world. Then how come we aren't smart enough to figure out that our "demonstrations" are ill-percieved by the rest of the world??

Friday, April 23, 2010

Energize

So yesterday the orders came out that the government would be taking drastic measures to reduce the loadshedding in various parts of the country. These measures were

- Close commercial centers by 8PM
- Govt officials below grade 20 will not be allowed to use air-conditioners in the office
- Billboard lights to be reduced
- Saturday and Sunday to be official government holidays

So I was thinking....what more proof do we need that our government officials are actually illiterate and constantly high? How can they make such ludicris statements?

Lets examine the first measure:

Close commercial centers by 8PM....yeah right! Do they realize that in our country, where tourism is obviously non-existent, most of the shopping by the local population is done after 7 PM. This is not usually by choice but by the nature of the working hours that the men of the households have to endure everyday. The usual scenario would be that once the husband arrives from office he takes his family out shopping. Now lets discuss this impact on the hard working shop owners. How will the shop owners, especially those who have rented expensive shops in large commercial centers, be able to earn and pay their rent when the husbands with their credit cards are not going to be able to come and spend?? The traders have just announced that this decision is unacceptable and the traders will be going on a 48-hour shutter down strike.This certainly was not thought out.

-Source : Dawn News

We are assuming that the government offices and officials would be willing to work in the heat which is quite fantastic...much like shrek, or alice in wonderland. I wonder will the Nadra offices, license offices, tax offices, passport offices etc turn their air-conditioners off? I THINK NOT!!

Billboard lights to be reduced....good step....but now our roads will be in total darkness, since the billboards were what used to light up the road for the traffic in the first place...besides, how will companies react to this since they have paid advertisers in advance for the billboard space.

Saturday and Sunday to be official government holidays. Thats just great...so now if I need to get any work done, pay my taxes or asset transfer I need to take a leave from office. Oh....how about I come to office in the morning...sign-in and then leave for my personal work....and then come back later in the evening to sign-out?? Thank you government for forcing me to be un-ethical.

So like I was saying....what are these people smoking??

Oh and the best statement was that the government is going to inject 116 Billion Rupees into the energy sector of Pakistan to reduce the circular debt by June this year. How in blazing are we going to do that when the budget deficit is already off the mark by a huge amount and we cannot subsidize since IMF will not allow us to do so?

As you can tell by my writing style...I am quite angry with how the government is handling our energy needs. We need some direction, we need some educated decisions...we need a revolution!

Saturday, April 17, 2010

BBA, Hobbies and Friends

Everone seems to have some defining moment in their life when they realize that they are capable of something much more. That moment enables them to strive for perfection, creativity and an overall sense of responsibility dawns upon them to be the trend setters. Such a moment came in my life while I was a student in one of the best universities in Pakistan; SZABIST. This moment not only changed my life, but had a deep impact in 5 of my very close friends.
It was during an introductory course of marketing when me and five other guys came together as a group and made history happen. We were given the task to launch a brand new product and since all us friends loved to play video games, we decided to launch GTA: Karachi. I cannot explain the level of synergy we displayed in executing our project. We used each other's strengths to achieve what no other group had done so in the history of SZABIST. What did we do, you might ask?

1) Shot a complete introductory video of 5 mins which included authentic police chase scenes, arrested, in-game graphical amendments to read "GTA: Karachi"
2) Booked the multimedia room and invited the dean, and administration
3) Dressed up with leather jackets and chains
4) Took permission and brought a smoke machine so that it can be used to introduce the group at the start of the presentation
5) and finally, we launched RIDGE STUDIOS

Ridge studios was a brain child of all 6 of us. It stood for Receptive, Innovative, Distinctive Graphical Entertainment. We were a group that wanted to give ourselves a brand name. This brand name was to represent us as exceptionally talented directors, editors, animators, presenters and writers. We stood by each other during every challenge.
It was after this presentation that RIDGE Studios became a group of people who were known for being highly creative and highly loyal to the group. Every presentation made by any or all of the 6 friends was branded as RIDGE Studios. Please check the links below to view some of the videos made by us :

RIDGE STUDIOS INTRO
CTRACK
FAIR AND LOVELY
MENTOS
PEPSI
RED BULL
BLOOPERS

Looking back at our time spent together, I feel that this initiative made us the confident individuals we are today. I urge all my readers to be inspired by this and leap forward. Studies can be fun, if you make them into a hobby and enjoy it with friends. I wish Basit, Faizan, Hamza, Quresh and Zahid the best of luck and hope we remain the friends we were when we launched GTA: Karachi.

Monday, April 12, 2010

Facebook Etiquettes


"Driving to the market ", "Heading up the ladder", "Falling down", "Just came back from the washroom". These are some of the weird Facebook status updates that one gets to read every now and then. I myself very rarely keep a status on my Facebook since I believe it is primarily used to highlight some major discovery or event on one’s life or used as a gentle reminder to all your connected friends that you are alive and well.

Facebook is rapidly become one of the most visited websites in the world today, feeding a society hungry for social connecting. It caters to the young as a perfect method to remain in touch with their friends. It allows career oriented individuals to increase their networking circle, and the elderly to remain connected with their long lost relatives/school friends. Some people have faced security breaches and suffered "hacked" profiles, "fake" profiles and defamation attempts though this has not thwarted addicted users.

Facebook is a perfect tool to interact and build a strong social network that helps a person remain connected to all of their family and friends. But one must understand that continuously misusing this tool by posting juvenile status updates, astrology readings, quiz answers and application announcements makes 80% of the wall content to be useless and does not deserve a glance.

Let’s start becoming a little bit more responsible....please!! I want to look at my wall and actually pay attention to the content!! Don't you??

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Do we even have roads?


There are quite a few theories behind what would qualify a city to be called a metropolitan city but it is safe to say that Karachi passes through flying colors to be given the prestigious right of being in this ever expanding list. According to a table I found on Wikipedia, Karachi is ranked the 20th most populated city in the world having a population density of 10,727 (people/km2). Even if these figures are not accurate, this shows that Karachi is no small city by any definition. Then why does our infrastructure foster riots, dissatisfaction, insecurity and a general feeling of dread?

METROPOLITAN CITY RANKINGS

One cannot deny the fact that our latest city nazim made dramatic improvements within our beloved city, most notably in our transportation system. But shouldn't have all these upgrades and new roads been a constant endeavor of our government? Many people may argue that we are on the right track but then answer me this, why now and what will ensure that we do not lose our track again?

Roads, traffic, water, electricity, security, cooking gas, sewerage...name one utility in Karachi that is not suffering. Why? Simply because we choose to keep sleeping till it became an absolute necessary...the government woke up when it realized that there was no gas in their mansions to heat their teas, or water to take their baths (I predict it's a monthly activity).

No area, no income class, no education class is safe from the horrors of Karachi. The prestigious DHA can be better called Destructive Housing Authority with roads being dug up because they have nothing better to do. Malir has water shortages and Gulistan-E-Johar has no electricity.

Though our generation has very little hand in the predicament we are in, this attitude will keep us from progressing. So how about we try saving some electricity by not turning on excessive lights or fans, how about using water wisely and lets try to dispose our waste properly rather than dropping it in an open sewage.

I sincerely believe that we are a very hardworking and intelligent nation that can achieve anything that we set our minds too. I just hope we open our eyes before it is too late.