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The Fiesta is Built Ford Sexy.

April 5, 2011 By View Comments

Backview. Photo taken by Tony Wong.

One morning, on my way to work, a bright orange Ford passed by that made me take a second look. I don’t remember Ford cars looking this good and I posted about it on Facebook. The next day, an email from the head of marketing at Ford Malaysia came asking if I would like to take it out for a spin and I eagerly said yes.

So after a weekend of the best Ford-play I ever had, I can tell you the Ford Fiesta is the sex. I can’t tell torque from cork but I can tell you the sound system rocks. There are two audio presets that can direct all the sound toward the driver and another that spreads it out evenly for all the passengers to enjoy.

The UI. Photo by Tony Wong.

First thing I did was paired my iPhone with the car so that I could play any song from my playlist via Bluetooth. I could also play any radio station in the world through an app called Tunein Radio. I also had Wolfgang’s Vault and Last fm going. Suddenly, the Fiesta wasn’t a car any more, it was a live rock concert in Madison Square Garden or a bar playing the smoothest jazz from Nawlins. It was incredible, I could stay in the car all day wishing the jam would last forever. Thunderstorm, bring it on.

Ford is also pushing all the right buttons by taking away a lot of the usual buttons, knobs and levers. There is no door lock thingy on each door. It’s centralized into one button on the command center (pimped out dashboard). One push and all doors are locked to outsiders but passengers can open their doors at any time. There is also no lever to open the gas tank which Ford didn’t tell me so I spent a good few minutes looking high and low for it at the gas station. The attendant helped me with it and we found that it opens from the outside and there is no cap to cover the tank, you just stick the nozzle in and pump away. Woot. No more forgetting, losing or struggling with the cap and breaking a few expensive french-manicured nails.

Talk button. Picture by Tony Wong.

I get a kick out of machines talking back at me. I only wish the voice was a guy’s, like Colin Firth’s. The Fiesta comes standard with a female voice in British accent. Kinda like the voice you hear from an answering machine, “For English, please press 1.” Voice recognition was ok. It had no trouble recognizing the numbers I say out loud but when it comes to names – slight problem, especially names in Malay, Chinese or Indian. It’s still great for answering calls, dialing numbers and talking hands-free. The voice control also lets you change radio stations, play a cd or play from an external device like an iPod, iPhone or Android. It is not Ford SYNC® but it’s close enough. No other car in this price range comes with a voice activated control.

“But what about the driving experience?” you ask. The car handles very well on the road. Pickup is gradual but fast and sometimes too fast with a little jerk forward. Have to learn how to press the accelerator. The steering is fantabulous. The few friends I have passed the keys to to test drive agrees. It was very responsive and stable at sharp corners. I could almost turn the wheel with a finger and yet it stays straight when I’m going straight.

So, do you have to trade-in a kidney to buy a Ford Fiesta? If you want to but it’s pretty a-ford-able. The only thing stopping you from taking one home today is the waiting list which can be up to 3 months depending on the color you choose. White and Aurora Blue are the best selling colors. Honestly, take the Chilli Orange. The Fiesta looks best in bright colors.

Built Ford Sexy. Picture by Tony Wong.

For more information on the Ford Fiesta, go to http://www.ford.net.my/.

Thank you Ford for a lovely experience in the Fiesta. Especially to E.S. Lee, Hazel, Steven Tan and Vivienne Huang from the Ford family. Thanks also to Tony Wong (who took photos), CW Loh, Ramesh V, Azizi J for the feedback and inspiration.

No more blind spots with this side view mirror.

Filed Under: Design, Feature, Reviews, Tech Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Yes, it’s 4G.

November 11, 2010 By View Comments

Folks, the wait for YTL’s 4G service will soon be over, especially for those outside the Klang Valley and up north.

In a private event at Lot 10 last week, well, not so private after all of us checked in to Foursquare and told the world where we were, YTL Communications introduced YES, the name of the new 4G service.

It was pretty much a see-and-no-touch event. We got to see the logo and pictures of the 4 new modem/mifi/dongle/phone devices that will be rolled out with the service on November 19. What was immediately or available soon after the event was a page where folks could register for their Yes IDs.

As I was tweeting and updating Facebook with what’s happening I was getting feedback from friends. The noise was mostly on the service being called 4G. Dhillon K. wrote on my wall “It’s not 4g please don’t call it that….” Some folks on twitter started getting personally, putting all 4G service providers into a basket called blasphemy.

And today I read Zach Epstein’s article on fake 4G. He summed it up well “it’s not lies, it’s just marketing.” Yes, it’s a marketing ploy. What better way to say “new and improved” than calling it 4G. For 4G’s sake when it really comes I think it should change to a new series eg. 4X or something. Then 5X, 6X etc. The G series is kinda screwed.

So it’s fake 4G but let’s be real. I asked on Twitter, ‘Are people not going to subscribe to fake 4G even though it’s many times faster than 3G but no where near 4G standards?’

Replies:

@bytebot (Colin Charles): i think people care about speed. I don’t think people care about marketing messages. Call it whatever, just provide throughput

@yoonkit: I’m awaiting the sharp discounts / promos they do.

I agree. Speed and price will be deciding factors for a lot of us and we won’t care whether it’s called 3G, 4G or 10G. Could ITU be blamed for dragging their feet on the 4G definition? Possibly. Whether it’s 11mbps or 100mbps, the great unwashed can only understand “faster than what is currently available” and faster by how much? Like, Star-Wars-Princess-Leia-holographic-projection kind of fast or YouTube-HD-videos kind of fast? And what’s it going to cost? Whoever can deliver the value proposition clearly will win.

All that Yes has to offer will be revealed this November 19. Wing Lee, CEO of YTL Comms said Yes4G will have no strings attached. I wonder if that means no contract and no bandwidth cap. High speed broadband does not work with 3GB or 5GB bandwidth caps. If unlimited data is an unsustainable model, I hope to see the limit pushed much higher than what’s in the market now. I’ll be comfortable with 20GB – 50GB. What do you hope to see? What would make you sit up and say “now this is a broadband service that makes sense, sign me up”?

Filed Under: Business, Feature, Marketing, Tech Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

When it comes to Twitter names, less is more.

September 5, 2010 By View Comments





AirAsia.com announced on twitter a couple of days ago that they had managed to “get back” the name AirAsia and AirAsiadotcom is no more.

That got me wondering. Why did they say that? Did they start out with @AirAsia then somehow lost it so they had to work with @AirAsiadotcom until now? Whatever the story may be, I’m all for the shorter name and though it’s 50K followers and 2K tweets later, it’s never too late to change for the better. Good job Air Asia.

Why short is good:

1. It’s easier to remember. And let’s face it, who goes around calling Air Asia dot com by its full name? We naturally like shorter syllables that’s why we prefer KFC over Kentucky Fried Chicken.

2. Twitter has a limit of 140 characters and if you like your message retweeted, you have to drop it down to 120 characters. So the shorter your name, the more room the message gets.

3. It also shows a brand cares about making its customers’ lives easier. Here’s another thing about the word “cares”. When your name is @CompanyCares, I think you don’t really care that much.

Verbs attached to a brand name can be quite problematic. People can easily confuse “cares” with “care”. This may surprize you but it can look the same to a lot of people. Another word is “Comms”. I once tweeted @MaxisComm not knowing it was actually @MaxisComms. Needless to say, they never responded which made me even more upset.

When brands choose to go with names like that, they should monitor both names even though one doesn’t belong to them. That’s because the customer could get it wrong. If you’re not paying attention, you have lost a chance to engage.

One last thing about names. Choose a name that makes sense. If your brand is Sheraton Hotels and Resorts go with @Sheraton or @SheratonHotels or @Sheraton+country abbreviation, for example. My advice is to drop the “Resorts”. Don’t abbreviate it to “Res” which is also used by restaurants. Avoid confusion as much as you can.

We know choice names are hard to come by these days. Like, given a choice, I would prefer my twitter name to be @cc. Point is, so many brands could have picked better names on twitter. And if a brand really cares, it can show it by responding to customer problems quickly and not by spelling it out. Drop the word “cares”, keep the name short, meaningful and easy to remember.

Filed Under: Business, Feature, Marketing Tagged With: , , , , ,

The first local business with an offer on Foursquare

April 18, 2010 By View Comments

We finally see the first local business on foursquare to offer a mayor deal. I expected to see Starbucks or some other franchise but a food court business got there first. Amazing. Hidangan Pantai Timur, if you weren’t so far out in Kajang, I would go be mayor and support your bold move into Foursquare.

So I thought I’ll  interview the mayor to see what it’s like to claim the first Foursquare offer in Malaysia and I noticed the mayor of Hidangan Pantai Timur is also the owner of the stall, who has probably checked in no less than 19 times. If Seme continues to do so, would any of their customers be able to enjoy the offer? Seme, if you offer a mayor deal, the idea is for your customers to become the mayor, not the owner.

Some business owners have been checking in to Foursquare and using it to push out notifications and tips to promote their businesses.  Once you are ready to offer a mayor deal, could you perhaps delete your own and your staff’s checkins so that your customers can be rewarded?

Filed Under: Business, Marketing, Reviews Tagged With: , ,

Deja-hoo: Yahoo! is finally in Malaysia.

November 26, 2009 By View Comments

The Yahoo! Youreka campaign has ended and ‘somewhat officially’ launch the Yahoo! Malaysia portal. Never mind that they are a decade later than MSN and Google. In the past few months, we’ve been seeing the folks from Yahoo! come down from their offices in Singapore to engage the community of developers and users in Malaysia. It’s great and they have no competition from the other two in winning hearts and minds by meeting Malaysians face-to-face.

But I can’t help feeling like it’s 1999.
The landscape may have changed quite a bit. This time, eyeballs are locked on sticky social media/networking sites, IM chats happen in twitter, email comes through Blackberries and news through RSS readers. If you use Netvibes, you could even get all the above into one dashboard. Why is Yahoo! using aging tech to reach new users. The segment Yahoo! is targeting is not an aging group at all – late teens to 25. Is Yahoo! being arm-twisted to do this by our aging Deputy Education Minister? Or does Malaysia have a third world classification online as well so here’s the best of Yahoo’s third world tech?

I am a paying customer of two of Yahoo!’s services. They also throw great parties, engage the community and give away awesome schwags. I love Yahoo! but they need to do more than just localize a news portal. I don’t remember the last time Yahoo! has announced a new feature or a major product improvement.  Is Yahoo! going forward by going backward? Odd strategy.

Yahoo! Youreka found its winner at a party held at KL Live last night. Semi-finalists who found the elusive tag online, gathered for their final torture, I mean test, to prove their worthiness. They wiggled and pushed their way (as well as pushed JJ to the ground)  in a game of musical chairs to get to the “Sumo” round. Dressed like sumo wrestlers, the pair battled each other to see who’ll be first to form the word Youreka from the jumbled letters. The worthy one went home with a Macbook Air and an iPhone. Congratulations to the winner.

Thanks for the party Yahoo! and welcome to Malaysia.

Filed Under: Events, Feature, Tech Tagged With: , ,

Is Malaysia finally on track towards an innovation and knowledge-based economy?

November 16, 2009 By View Comments

Innovation is a topic close to my heart. I’ve known, seen or met Malaysians who are innovators and are doing great work outside of Malaysia. I often wonder why they don’t do it here instead and I’ve been told that this country hasn’t encouraged innovation. There are no tax breaks or government support for R&D.

When I was invited to attend MSC’s 12th International Advisory Panel (IAP) Learning Symposium earlier this week, I was excited. The theme for this year was on innovation. Will we finally see the government doing something to promote innovation in Malaysia?

There were two half day tracks running simultaneously. Each track had a panel of speakers with solid track records and experience in driving innovation in education or in business. These gentlemen were also brought together by MSC to be on the advisory board to influence policies that could help the country reach its goals.

The business track, which I attended had on the panel Datuk Seri Dr. Maximus Johnity Ongkili, Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation (I only just found out that we now have a minister of innovation); Dr. Ya-Qin Zhang, Corporate Vice President of Microsoft Corporation and President of Microsoft China Research; Christopher Forbes, Vice Chairman of Forbes Publishing Co.; and Dr. John Gage, Partner at Kleiner Perkins, Caulfield & Byers, also formerly of Sun Microsystems.

For a detailed account on what each speaker talked about, head over to  Hillary Chan’s write up on CNET Asia. Hillary highlighted an interesting observation. There wasn’t a single Malaysian on that panel. Oh wait, they are all in jail according to Datuk Ongkili. I also noticed there wasn’t a single woman on that panel. Is there no room for women in a knowledge-based economy?

To me, the panelist did not tackle the challenges ahead as clearly as I thought they would. With all due respect, Dr. Zhang presented Microsoft’s roadmap and stressed on their $3 billion R&D commitment outside of the US with a list of cities where research centers are set up. Malaysia is not on that list and there are no short, medium or long term plans to include this country in that roadmap. Datuk Ongkili believes Malaysia isn’t lacking innovators and a lot of them are in prison. With that kind of statistics, we should maybe refocus on prison sourcing next year? Chris Forbes (funny guy, I like him) thinks taking a printed magazine online is innovation but it’s not, that’s evolution. The New York Times is innovating printed news delivery online. Finally we have John Gage (I like him too) who talked about innovating to bring more happiness to the world. People want to buy happy. I like where Gage was heading with that idea. Even if I’m jobless, I guess I would like to be happily jobless. Gage paints a utopia that technology can play a part to bridge the gap but again, little to hold on to as to how we can get from zero to hero.

I was hoping to hear more concrete plans or plans with more common sense. A gentleman I spoke to after the conference told me how Malaysian innovators are not being heard. Instead of an online repository for ideas like myideas.my how about a forum for innovators to post their feedback and opinions? Is the government even interested to hear and fix their pain points? How does an international advisory panel know what to fix or how to help? There is also a lack of recognition for innovation. Could the media have offered some help with a regular column or TV program highlighting innovation in Malaysia? How about an annual Innovation Award?

How about improving our broadband infrastructure? The price companies have to pay for larger pipes is incredible. Surely faster speeds can work in tandem with the government’s efforts in increasing broadband penetration in the country. Why must everyone wait for penetration to reach its target before we can see faster connections? People are increasingly mobile – John Gage also mentioned this. Can the government encourage telcos to eliminate the 2-3GB caps on mobile data plans?  This cap does not help knowledge workers one bit.

So the people have been asked to innovate and pick up speed to compete with the world but is anything being done about the speed bumps all over this roadmap (or lack of one) to an innovation and knowledge-based economy?

Filed Under: Business, Events, Tech Tagged With: , ,

The Rahman Code

August 20, 2009 By View Comments

Apparently there’s this Rahman Code that guides the selection of Prime Ministers in Malaysia. Nah, it’s just a coincidence. Right? I asked my muslim friends including Amir himself and was met with “What, you haven’t heard of this before?” Well no, seriously, I haven’t. Amir by the way gave a brilliant presentation at the recent Pecha Kucha Night in KL.

Now I’m wondering if there are more “codes” running the country. Enjoy the video, celebrate our filmmakers while they’re still alive (that’s Amir) and long live Najib.

What is Pecha Kucha Night?
Each presenter is allowed 20 images, each shown for 20 seconds each – giving 6 minutes 40 seconds

Filed Under: Feature, Humor, video Tagged With: , , , ,

Climate change affecting the workplace. Is intelligence sustainability at stake?

March 13, 2009 By View Comments

In the news today, another company lays off 20% of their workforce next to news of another road accident. Like what’s new, right? It seems almost trendy for companies to layoff people. Reason/s, take your pick – bad investment into a volatile market, cut-throat competition, declining market share, in anticipation of the coming recession, reorganizing for a more effective organization, etc. And the majority being laid off are women because it’s the Malaysian thing to do.

On the same page, the government tells everyone “Recession? What recession? We are not in a recession” but introduces the largest economic stimulus plan in history and calls it a mini stimulus plan. Maybe stimulus plans are also very trendy these days. Other countries in Asia have one so we must have one too. I don’t understand our government so let’s get back to “trendy” companies.

The legendary fail whale.
Life’s a beach and then you die.

I can’t help but draw parallels between what’s happening in corporations today to whales that have lost their sense of direction and found themselves beached, 500 miles off course. And in a state of panic, they swim even harder only to find themselves driven further inland until there is nothing left to do but hope for high tide soon…(so that they can swim further inland perhaps?). You can’t really blame the poor whale. It’s in a state of panic and driven by the need to survive, there’s just no room for common sense or intelligence.

Not unlike corporations who have to look at numbers first so that the chief can breathe easier at the next shareholder’s meeting, sometime in this financial year, which isn’t too far away. Think ‘short term’ QUICK! Reduce workforce by 20%! But wait, shouldn’t you be looking at reducing 20% of your payroll and 1% of your workforce might just solve that problem? My bad, I forgot, no room… Damn, having shareholders suck too. Well, you can borrow money (also very trendy) to buy back the company’s stock and get the shareholders off your back. If you’re government owned – nice, you can go back to your game of solitaire during office hours.

I’d like to know where the smart companies are. I’m sure they exist but are they in Malaysia? Umair Hague wrote a great piece in the Harvard Business Review called the Smart Growth Manifesto. If poor whale could read, it might have reached fertile sea by now.

In summary:

Yesterday’s incumbents are beginning to fail en masse, while these revolutionaries remain resilient. Why? As our research at the Lab suggests, getting smart is a better choice than staying dumb: smart growth results in more creativity, innovation, effectiveness, and power than dumb growth.

Filed Under: Business Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,