Pool Competition

Last saturday I invited Ming, Dixon and Gopi to join me in a pool competition, playing at Newmarket Tenpin Bowling place. Had some free chinese buns then we quickly jumped right into it. There were a total of 12 players including us, we had to play each player twice and record down our score, the one with the most points at the end wins. I did pretty bad when vsing my friends, Gopi 1-1, Dixon 0-2, Ming 0-2 (sunk the black ball but called the wrong pocket). However I did the best out of us when playing against the other adults there. The adults there were pro as, they will always sink at least 3 balls before you get your turn again. I managed to draw 1-1 with most of them with the occasional 2-0. However none of us made it to the top 3 which was quite disappointing.

Newmarket Tenpin Bowling pool area

After pool we went to get some chow, had some pretty good dishes from the Newmarket food court. Then still didnt feel like heading home, we rocked up to Giga internet cafe and started some action on Left 4 Dead 2. Nothing like killing zombies with 3 friends for stress relief (or maybe it builds up stress, especially if you die lol). Anyway it was a fun day, look forward to it again next year!

Transformers 3 - Dark of the Moon

Went to watch the new Transformers movie Dark of the Moon last night and I've got one word for it, epic. Shia LaBeouf said "It is the best one we've done" and I couldnt agree more. This movie is like a level above both of the previous ones, in terms of almost every aspect. So before I put down my thoughts on this movie, I would like to point out the obvious. Yes there is no more Megan Fox and we have a new blond model instead. Apparently, Megan and the director just couldnt work together which is a shame since I prefer her. I mean she was in the previous 2, her role was already integrated into this series but well, apparently not lol

Anyway moving on, I'd start of with the story. For the first two movies, the story was pretty straight forward however in this one they added a nice twist into it, like I didnt even see it coming. There were also way more emotional parts in this movie which made it more intense. The action, boy were there plenty of actions. The stunts they pulled of this time was like I said, a level higher than it's previous ones. The robot graphics has improved significantly, you could actually see how they are fighting and not just metal parts smashing into each other. I also liked how they had a few slow motion scenes so you could really understand what was going on.

I watched the movie in 2D because I dont believe in 3D movies these days however there is a chance that this movie in 3D wouldnt have been that bad due to the improved graphics. The soundtracks they used during the movie was really nice, I enjoyed it and is thinking of downloading it. Although the overall movie wont get spoiled if you watched the trailer however I recommend that you dont, you get to enjoy the movie more that way, more suprising epic scenes :) I've decided to dish out a 10/10 for Transformers 3.

Welcome to the NHK

So finally finished exams! This series of exams is probably the toughest one yet I've experienced in university. Anyway due to the late start of our first exam, I've managed to finish Welcome to the NHK. I've heard this anime being one of the best every so often and now here are my thoughts on it.

The story revolves around the main character Sato who is a hikikomori, a person who basically refuses to go out and stays in his house for life. A random girl called Misaki approaches him and wishes to cure his hikikomori lifestyle. Along the series, he fell into a lot of the traps which made him even more antisocial.

Comedy is probably the best part in Welcome to the NHK, there are so many randomness in this anime that just makes you go wtff and burst out laughing. Since Sato is a hikikomori, its hilarious when he comes into contact with new things he has never experienced before. Another thing which this anime has that a lot doesnt is it portrays life. In normal anime, we see that exciting event always happen around the main character however its a bit different in this anime. The things they do are like a lot of the stuff we do every day so I find the anime extremely easy to relate to it or be in their shoes.

However because this anime reflects on life, you also get disappointments, just like in real life. Like in every other anime, main character will always succeed in accomplish their goals. Welcome to the NHK is not like that type of anime, sometimes they just fail and they just have to move on. I find this slightly unappealing since I watch anime to see scenarios thats NOT happening in real life lol. In summary this anime has been enjoyable to watch, been rated high all over the net and gets an 8/10 from me.

X-Men: First Class

No more management reflections! Actually to a certain extent they did help with my learning cause the only 303 materials I know right now is from what I wrote. Anyway after submitting our 370 lab reports and studied hard for a few hours, Dixon, Dennis, Jp and I went to watch X-Men: First Class. To be honest I was actually looking forward to this movie, the whole "Before he was Professor X. Before he was Magneto" thing really sparked my interest. Good job to the advertising department lol

Since this movie is fairly new, I'll try to keep the spoilers minimum. To start off I really enjoyed this movie. It realy showed the beginning of the entire X-Men series, the past of both Charles and Erik. It showed how their friendship is considered top above anything else. We always knew that Charles and Magneto had some sort of past together and finally this reveals it. You also see how some of the original X-Mens come about like Mystique which was pretty interesting.

I thought the soundtrack used was nice, it really suited the way the battle turned out. I also liked the guy who played Charles, a much better job here compared to when he was in Wanted. He seemed confident and really portrayed the image of Charles Xavier, his passion to help to mutants. One thing I didnt really like was the mutants powers, I think they're starting to run out of ideas lol. They reused old ones and the new ones were pretty random... But overall, I recommend to watch this movie, cinemas, yeah if you want the good effects and sound but definately worth downloading x) 8/10

Management Reflection - week 10

From last week's lectures, I learned most from the the topic of knowledge innovation. There are two types of knowledge, tactit and explicit. Tacit knowledge is knowledge based on one's experience and feelings on the matter while explicit knowledge is written facts and figures presented to you. The lecturer then moved on to knowledge flows, saying that interactions between tacit and explicit knowledge can create numerous flows.

A simple conversation could be the start of a knowledge flow, where one talks about his experience or his way of doing things to another person. Socialisation is the form of tacit to tacit knowledge flow. Externalisation is from tacit to explicit and the most obvious example for it is teaching. Teachers are taking what they know and presenting it to you by putting it on powerpoint slides or notes. The opposite of that is internalisation; explicit to tacit. This is when you take what you learned from what you read,start making it into your habit and adding your own variation to it. Lastly there is combination, explicit to explicit. An example of this could be summerising what you have learned in class, like writing this reflection on learning.

Management Reflection - week 9

Last week we went over the topic of innovation. Innovation is basically bringing something new in, it could be useless and weird but it is still an innovation. The concept is similar to evolution, if one does not change with the world, it will be left behind and will not survive. The lecturer showed an example of this by showing us the S-curve of technological development. Section 1 shows the initial slow growth of a technology eg. phone. Section 2 is the rapid increase in the use of it. Lastly section 3 reaches a limit where people just got bored of it and the slope of the curve dies off. Here is when innovation or evolution comes in. A smart company will take their products to their next level eg. iPhone 4 to iPhone 5. Just before the product reach it's limit, they will release a better version of the product so the curve can continue rising and not die off.

Another point I learned was the Business Model Innovation. It is when a business takes a whole new approach in marketing their products. I had to agree with the example the lecturer said about Nokia was advertising their phones by showing simply how great their technology was. However Apple marketed their iPhone through applications. Through the use of applications like Facebook, the customers realise how great this piece of technology is. The two models has a slight difference however this extra step can determine whether the business suceed in the market or not.

Management Reflection - week 8

Last week, the focus for the course was on marketing. The market research section seemed familiar to me because I often participated in the research without realising it myself. The purpose of market research is basically to help companies understand the opportunities and problems between themselves and the customers. To do research before launching a product seemed pretty self explanatory to me because why would anyone buy your product, if it was not what the customers were looking for?

Then the lecturer talked about the different categories of market research. Exploratory, descriptive and causal, each differ in terms of the magnitude of the research. Causal is simply compare product A to product B, an experimental research. Exploratory research is when the company is unaware of it's problems therefore doing research on finding out where it is going wrong. Descriptive is when the company is aware of it's problems and therefore doing research on how to solve it.

The lecturer mentioned the site Smile City, how they conduct market research on selected individuals. Being a member of the site, I recalled the different kind of surveys I had received and now understands how the research works. Occasionally I get surveys which falls into the exploratory area while other times I get yes, no questions which means they are descriptive or causal questions.