Cloud

Life has been advancing in hopeless directions that I cannot quite fully understand. Once again I realize that Content at the end of the day really doesn't matter, compared to Why sometimes How does make more sense. Because if you ask Why chances are the final, definitive answer is: because I say so you dumbass. How, on the other hand, allows the same shit to be, in terms of perceived reality at least, not the same shit anymore.

In all seriousness I think my dad is very right, as he elaborated my work is not completely pointless and I really shouldn't be complain about it since I'm paid quite well to do whatever it is that I'm doing. On the other hand, the Western, or more specifically, American side of my rationale has been yelling into my subconscious, screaming at my own sentimentality to change. To embrace the chaos. To become, as I know I am, me. In short I've become more than usually indecisive.

A thought over technology stocks: I've been hearing things about a mobile internet revolution, tech stocks undervalued, etc. This smells really fishy, reminiscent of the dot com bubble at the turn of the new century. The arguments are all completely valid, driving demand for efficiency, greater connectivity and business potentials, exactly like they used to be. I would think that manufacturers of essential parts in mobile devices will continue to do business. But it definitely won't be on the Apple inc. scale, in fact, Apple itself won't be on the Apple scale any more I suspect, as novelty, perfection of design innovations, as pessimistic as it may sound, has a practical limitation. As great as the Iphone 4, it is no where near as ground breaking as the Iphone 3, which was in turn less phenomenal than the now antique Ipod.

On the other hand I'm really more into this concept of the Cloud. Somehow I don't like to add the word technology behind it, as the fundamental appeal of the Cloud seems more social and structural than technical, but what do I know. Anyway, platform is the key word, iTune is a good example with its third party developed Apps, i.e. Virtual Consumables. And this, I see, is the difference between this time and last time. The product chain is being completed, not just the separated dots that it used to be.

CHINA

I had a dream a few days ago. About my director who passed away after working in the same industry for almost forty years, and another one, about the first girl I ever loved reappearing in my life after years of non contact, after that ridiculously non dramatic breakup.

Then I realized those were not dreams. They actually happened; both in the last week. This feels like a rare opportunity to detail and illustrate my emotions but somehow I refrain from doing it, there's not much to talk about, really; things do happen, events do take place, after all. This room, this city, this country, this continent, and even this mind-body duo of mine, seem so claustrophobic I hardly have the energy to breath in the realities.

For a moment or two I almost felt it's romantic. Life, that is.

A few items caught my attention: Chinese foreign reserve accumulation slows down, Trade surplus to record highs, and Google succeeded in renewing operational license in China. The first two would signal an upward pressure for the Chinese Yuan, which some argue that would harm the export sector in a substantial and sudden manner, but I think if we gonna get fucked anyway we may as well get fucked gradually at this stage when everyone else's fucked up. Pragmatic approach I think.

Everyone's been saying that the massive comparative advantage that Chinese has been enjoying by exploiting cheap labor is going to be lost to neighboring Asian countries, which is kind of true, cos most export items remain low tech embedded, but there's much more to business than cost I believe. Such as the collective energy that we display. The China story is much more than an economic one.

Which comes to the Google story. I personally don't see it as a mentionable event, as much political, moralistic, democratic overtone as Western media tries to paint the picture, Google knows, and everyone knows, that Google engine is just bloody useless for the Chinese market, full stop. Whenever you type in the latest IN vocabulary in the Chinese online community, Google always directs you to Baidu, its nemesis and originally a mere copy cat. What Google fails to recognize is that although the technological structure of the search engine is Cloud, the objects of the search, namely the information, knowledge etc, remains an isolated concept that has not engaged the Clouds of people, who cares about the real information if we can't do something about it, leave some personal graffiti on it or leave some remarkably stupid comments on it. I don't know about you but I spend less than ten minutes a day online seeking truth and information and hours and hours on it seeking remedy to boredom.

For the first time I have made consecutive successful trades on my demo account, four in a row this time. I made a resolution that I would not switch to real money unless I doubled my account within a month, and so far, with the many demo accounts that I have practiced so far, none met such goal.

I did make some gains sure, big ones too, but then it was met by larger losses that ruined the whole game. As a result I joined in my web seminars and learnt about the most basic ways active traders would do when they deal with their own money，an idea that I admit abhorred me before.

Now I guess I know better. I must learn how the others do it first, and with practice, hopefully create my own strategy. This refusal to play the others' game is just, after all, isolating myself from the other people.

Japan's having a deflation

deflation is not good at this time.

and this time it's caused by a combination of falling export, lowered business and investment opportunities, and the chronicle low interest rates which encourages people to hold on to the money rather than doing anything with it.

so if Bank of Japan counters this by quantitative easing, i.e. printing money, it should theoretically lower the value of the Yen, hopefully encouraging export and domestic circulation.

I believe that at the end it all comes to what the economy lives on, its role as a exporter and as a world financial center. Export really depends on the US (which i think is not that positive on buying things overseas at the moment) and financial centre (there're too many of them, most in trouble).

I am thinking a gradual bull on USD/JPY.

one thing....

and please, I hope I'm not right this time.

But there is inflation(obviously) and the economy is not going up (staggered GDP etc.), therefore, according to the definition, we are approaching Stagflation? How come nobody on the news mentioned this?

revisited 26/03

alas i think Australia has yet again dodged the bullet. it's a strange picture of house price rising, commodities export better than ever, and domestic business environment in a mix of laughs and tears. one thing's apparent, though, that there are a lot of vacancies ads on Collins Street. Business, real business, is not good.

Finally back to Melbourne.

My life recently has featured nothing but the daily chores of eating, sleeping and going online; but a major element that plays an important part in this unsubstantial routine is the suburb that I'm living in, aka Footscray.

Footscray is a place that has been mentioned very often in news these recent months, as there have been quite a few attacks on ethnic inhabitants, mostly Indians, resulting in deaths and severe injuries, which, in term, spiced up the awareness of this political hot-potato called race in Melbourne, which, until recently, has not been an issue for years.

The phenomenon is undeniably visible. If unfortunately one has to arrive at the Footscray train station after nine o'clock at night, he would witness how fast otherwise casual Melburnians can walk, how everyone is on constant alert of everyone else, and how every dark corner, every small laneway and every traffic lighting intersection, can potentially viewed as safety hazard zones.

Other than this continuous worrying over one's own life, this has been a rather interesting phenomenon for me. What attracts my attention is not the political, moral or the racial implications, as they are way beyond my understandings, but rather, it creates a close environment where everything you learnt about urban design is true.

Take phenomenology, which our friend F kindly described as bullshit, could most of the time fail to be relevant because it inevitably makes some fundamental assumptions: that humans interact with the place that they are in, that humans make subconscious decisions, etc. In a daily metropolitan context, I would say, people make strong, conscious decisions (e.g. where to go, at what speed, etc.) before they even entering the arena of the place, and the information overload of our societies almost guarantee a loss of interaction between people and place. That is, until you come to Footscray at night, one wouldn’t be able to anticipate or make absolute decisions, due to overwhelming environment, and hence, they do become lab rats and do exactly what textbooks say they would do, things like being attracted by warm yellow streetlights and not the cold white lights because it feels safer, etc.