Seen at the lift landing of a block of flats in Aljunied GRC.  In this times of belt tightening, and amongst the many publicly annouced ‘Green’ schemes to save energy, we see another example blatantly going against these principles.

This electronic noticeboard replaced the usual static noticeboard found at HDB void decks, and I believe the block that I see this is not the only block with this.  The usual notices that used to be displayed uses A4 pieces of paper are now rotated after the message from the MP (Cynthia Phua), and some repetitive fireworks images, so I guess in terms of effectiveness to convey events in the community, this electronic noticeboard is even less effective that the old one.

I wonder at what time this screen is switched on and off everyday, or is it left on for 24 hours?

Who foots the bill for the purchase of the screen?  Who foots the bill for the electricity to power it?

Going by conventional wisdom, it is either the RC (since the noticeboard declares its name so prominently) which in turn gets funding from PA, which in turns gets funding from the taxpayers; or it is the Town Council, which gets half of its funding from the S&CC charges paid by the residents, and another half of its funding from the taxpayers.  No matter what, the taxpayers seem to be the ones footing the bills for this, unless someone tells me the MP herself is paying from her own pocket.

Some civil servant was chided for spending 45K on his vacation, but that has an end to it.  Does this installation has an end to it? Or will it continue to waste the money that is funding it until some enlightened folks say enough is enough?

It is really frustrating when you think that you can throw away your Microsoft IE browser, only to have a government website proclaiming to you that it will not support your favourite FireFox browser. Starting a list here for those I come across:

• LTA – www.onemotoring.com.sg – click on LTA e-Services and you will see a big red “Please login using Internet Explorer (Version 5.5 and above) or Netscape (Version 7.0 and above).”

Bad day. Bluetooth ear piece not working, left wired headset in notebook bag which was left at friend’s place, and received a call from my mother while driving in the heavy rain to retrieve the notebook. I was not able to speak to my mother without a proper earpiece while I was driving, and the loudspeaker mode just did not seem to work properly.

I stopped the car at a carpark and returned my mother’s call. The phone’s speaker at the ear (there is another speaker on the side) for the handset mode just refused to emit any sound. I had no choice but to use the loudspeaker mode, which miraculously worked again.

Called my wife to test the phone after hanging up with my mother. Again I could not hear a thing she said, although she heard me loud and clear. Tried removing the battery. Tried hardresetting. No luck.

Guess I have to bring it to the Nokia Service Centre for servicing. Sigh, and the phone is just a few months’ old.

Is it true that products nowadays don’t last anymore?

Please send comments to totallyconfused: My N80 is faulty!