First lets see what’s a tweetup. In my own words, its a mashed-up for meet-up that happens for people using Twitter. Hence tweetup. Simple right? So when I came to know about the first sgtweetup by @CarlGriffith, my immediate impression was, “Yeah! I’m going to meet more new people!” And that’s what happened. (For me!) I got to catch up with old friends, especially nice seeing @emoh whom I knew back in my days at Made With Love, and I met lots of new ones too! *waves!!* I regretted not getting to meet everyone there. There will be a next one I’m sure! In fact @inrsoul has already started the next tweetup with beer and tapas on 21 May! (Sorry guys, can’t make it for this one. Heading to BKK the next day.)

Perhaps if the organisers had read about this before sgtweetup, the not so accidental hiccup wouldn’t have happened. Still kudos to @CarlGriffith for starting this and it was really a great turn-up! Just something to share from experience, if there’s going to be any form of plugging or presentation happening at such gatherings, everyone would have been more understanding and appreciative if it was made known to us from the start of the invitation. Coming in as a form of “surprise” for this usually turns the attendees off. Especially in social media, these things may get blown up pretty quickly if not handled well. And it just doesn’t help when the models had no idea what Twitter was about nor what they were expecting to do and meet at sgtweetup.

For those who don’t know what’s happening, search for sgtweetup on twitter (and go all way back to tweets from 14 May 2009). You can also read about it from Ingrid’s post, Daryl’s thoughts and Ian shared his views too.

So to answer my own questions from my opening:

Was it good? – Well in my opinion, I achieved my own purpose of being there and so its good.

Could it have been better? – Definitely! As Carl puts it, its his first time organising sgtweetup and surely lots of room for improvement. (This one I know best! Because I’d organised quite a number of social media gatherings like this.)

And what’s the difference between #smbsg #websg #sgtweetup and Tweet! Tuesday? – This question I’ll need a paragraph or two to discuss. So read on if you’re keen to find out…

Here’s my take on the brief introduction of the various gatherings/ events (in 140 characters):

#smbsg is like a corridor where neighbors meet to share about social media and how people are generally using them.

#websg is where the real hardcore web developments enthusiasts and designers meet to improve the usability of the web.

#sgtweetup is a gathering of tweeters in Singapore to meet, chat and be merry (with no agenda nor plugging hidden).

#tweettuesday is Not another stand-around-and-network-whilst-eating-free-food session. Its where people meet to share and learn about twitter and perhaps anything social media.

Out of the above four social events surrounding the new media (social media) or web scenes, I’m involved in two of them, #smbsg and #tweettuesday. And of course, there’s Blogout!, Barcamp and many other social events too. IMHO, all of them exists for a reason, and all can co-exits in the already small populated community of digital users here in Singapore. But like all social events, any agendas should always be made known to participants prior to the date so that they can come prepared and expect things to happen. Perhaps also because of the many types of events surrounding the same few platforms, participants are confused. And some would have already set their expectations when they attend. Organisers for future such sessions, it’ll be good to spell out the agenda (if any) and what to expect in the event page or invitation.

Well, I hope my post has shed some light to the blurred situation that was tweeted on and on after #sgtweetup. Looking forward to what’s coming up next here in Singapore. For me, I’ll be first looking forward to my trip to attend Barcamp Bangkok next weekend! Anyone reading this will be there? We should gather and go for drinks while we’re there! Or shopping at Platinum Mall anyone?

On a side note, after all that happened, I’m very upset that many of us actually helped tweeted and spread the words out to so many people about #sgtweetup! And someone just conveniently brought in his/her brand/client! Now I feel cheated!

Updates

• Photos by @inrsoul are up in flickr!
• with more updates to come I hope…

Recently I spent a little too much time on facebook games. Every night, at least an hour is devoted to clicking on my mouse on clearing crystals from Bejeweled Blitz. I tried to conquer the score board, but it just seems impossible. After much cursing and swearing playing, I’m still always being ranked right at the bottom among my other friends in facebook. I felt frustrated and this kept me playing and the harder I try to push myself by clicking faster and trying to get as many hits as possible, the worst I perform. Than I became bored and will eventually give up.

Bejeweled Blitz is quite a popular game amongst my list of friends in facebook. And because of the number of competitors you’ve got to beat in order to rank high up in the score board, the harder it is for you to reach there. After many nights of playing, you might also just give up and not want to continue anymore.

Just last night, I saw a friend’s scoring in another game call Chain Rxn in facebook. Out of curiosity, I went to check the game out. And after less than thirty minutes of play, I’m ranked 4th among my friends who are playing! That of course makes me happy.

Because there were lesser friends playing Chain Rxn, my chance of getting bumped up the score board is much easier. Just like in, for example, a golf tournament. An average female player gets to bring home the trophy because there were only four other players competing. So the chance of winning is much higher.

Than the thought of blogging came to mind. There have been much talks and thoughts going on on blogging and how much better the blog will perform if its content is focused and niche. The rarer and lesser people blogs about that topic, the better your blog will perform. And for all topics, no matter how rare or niche, there *will* be a community out there who are interested in it. You just need to keep the faith of sharing about that niche topic which you’re knowledgeable and passionate about, one day you will be noticed and you will succeed.

And because of the rarity of these content, people who knows about your existence will be more active in participating in the discussions on your blog, helping you spread the words to those they know, and the journey to being known in this community as a thought leader is also shorter. Of course, the initial struggle will be hard to pass, but good things always come to those who wait.

Are you waiting to be discovered? Or have you already succeeded in your small but niche community?

Total of about 60-70 close to 100 people turned up at SMB6 held at Tangs Island Cafe. There were the usual social media breakfast participants, bloggers, practitioners, and also a handful of first timers. Having talked to a few of them who were there for the first time, they were quite puzzled at what was happening and everyone behind couldn’t hear nor see what the panel was discussing. Even if everyone were to remain quiet, those standing behind the pillar will not be able to see nor hear anything. That’s perhaps why everyone choose to talk among themselves instead. I’m guilty for this too. But really, this cannot be blamed. What do you expect those behind to do? Also saw a handful of people who came and walked away soon after as the place was overcrowded. If you were one of them, apologize for the lack of space. Hope to meet you at future social media gatherings.

After five successful SMBs and good feedback, this one came as quite a punch to the team (including myself). So what really went wrong?

The Venue
Tangs being located at Orchard seems like an ideal place to hold such gathering. Everyone knows exactly where Tangs is and getting there isn’t much of a hassle. But when there’s a space constrain for an expected crowd of 50 (at least), the venue might not be the most suitable. Add on a panel and launching of the Tangs Secondlife store, the venue is surely not appropriate.

The Agenda
To be very honest, I have no idea what happened on the other side of the room. I tried hard to listen and see what was going on, but I couldn’t hear nor see a thing. By the time I went in after helping at the registration, all the seats were taken and the limited standing space (to see the panel) was already cluttered with people. This means SMB is growing and many people are really interested in the discussions and knowledge sharing, but this also means we’ll need a much bigger venue for future SMBs! Its hard to find a suitable location and with our zero budget, the challenge is surely there.

Would really love to hear from those who were seated in front to share about your thoughts about the discussions. Looks like it was a chatter about consumers on facebook and loyalty card program.

Earth Hour
When the lights went off, half the crowd was gone! Wasn’t it supposed to be a networking and catch up time instead? But seriously, not easy walking around in the dark and introducing yourself. There were people tripping on other’s feet! Good thing no one got hurt.

SMB6 sure is a good learning point for the team. And really thankful to those who stuck by us after so long and for your understanding and feedback. The team is always learning and growing. So we need your feedback! Please spend 2 minutes with SMB6 feedback form. Or drop your comments below…

Here are the updated slides which I shared during Blogout! 2009 last Saturday at 8Q SAM.

The problem with such kind of slides is that if I upload the exact deck used during the session, 90% of viewers will probably not understand what I am trying to convey. That’s why, I’ll try to edit it and make it sensible for those who wasn’t there in person to hear my sharing.

After doing two sessions of sharing about my discoveries and experience in blogging and social media, I’m kinda missing those days where I teach my kids in school. Guess somewhere deep down in me, I’m still having the mind of a teacher.

Perhaps one day, after god-knows-how-many-more-sharing like these, I might be able to get invitation to share in schools. Even if its not locally, just pay for my flight and accommodation and I’ll be there! This I got to learn more from Preetam.

Hope these slides will come in useful. Especially if you’ve just started blogging or are planning to. I created this with my personal experience and knowledge, so treat it like a story while you scan through these slides. It should tell you my story.

My first encounter with Barcamp was Barcamp SG II in May 2008. No posting found in this blog on that because that event didn’t interest me enough for me to share? Nope. I didn’t blog about it because I left within an hour after arriving. It was one that targeted at the developers and I kinda got lost in there.

Good thing we’ve Preetam onboard this time round, with his experience with many Barcamp sessions from different countries, we know this was going to be a great one. And it was!

Here’s my experience, breaking down into 1) as a planner, 2) as a speaker and 3) as a participant.

As part of the planning team for Barcamp SG

I don’t know how I got involved in the first place, got an email for a gathering of various thought leaders and community leaders in Jan. That session was rather unproductive imo. Group was too big for any proper discussion to get through, and there wasn’t much of an agenda or structure set prior to the meeting. Somehow the only thing that got through from that session was the date of the event.

Discussion was supposed to take off and be carried out online in a google group, but after a month of waiting, nothing seem to be happening. That’s when some of us got worried and decided to just take up the planning part and get Barcamp going.

After a couple of hour discussion with Preetam, Bill, Kelvin and myself at a cafe, things got started and planning finally took off. The Barcamp SG3 wiki was up, registration forms up, sponsors started to come in and Preetam spent much of his time organising and putting pieces together.

And as all Barcamp, there’s really nothing much to worry about on the camp day. Everyone just help themselves to whatever was there and get themselves engaged. IMO, the beauty of Barcamp is for learning and interaction to take place in a messy yet structured environment.

See! No one’s needed to mend registration too!

Our aim is to shift Barcamp to become a less tech/ developer centric event, and hope to bring in more people from different walks of life together. There’s no money to pay, nor money to waste. Just lots of engaging conversation, sharing, learning and fun! I can’t wait for the next camping session!

And I concluded… you don’t need a big team to get things done. Small team can work wonders too! Its the quality not the quantity that matters.

As a speaker

Barcamp is really about sharing and provoking thoughts with participants. And that’s what I hope my sharing did. Interestingly, I signed up for a pre-scheduled session via the Barcamp SG3 wiki and also put up a by-voting session. So I ended up hosting two Barcamp sessions in the same Barcamp! One was on “How i Live Blog” and the other on “How facebook communities cannot work for your brand?”.

Guess those who came for my “How i Live Blog” session mistook my title. It was really meant for a session where everyone shares how “i” (they) live blog. But only one of them in the room had done live blogging before! And I wasn’t prepared to conduct a live blogging workshop. So instead, the session became a discussion of the tools for live blogging and how twitter and various hashtags feeder help improve interactions between people in a live set-up. If you’re wondering why we use #barcampsg3 in our tweets, that’s to consolidate all tweets from Barcamp SG3 together and these can be viewed at hasttags. Users can also follow live updates during such events with #tags at http://tweetgrid.com/ and http://twitterfall.com/. Personally, I prefer http://twitterfall.com/ and will sure be using it more often!

The session was pretty interesting and I think many of us learned couple of new things during that 25mins. Love the spontaneity!

I’ve some thoughts in mind about live blogging. Will post that up in another post sometime next week. It should an interesting piece for discussion.

The other sharing which I’d spent 8.5hours preparing was on “How facebook communities cannot work for your brand?” Again, the session was meant to be a trigger for participants to see and reflect on how they have used facebook and how they can improve and better engage their audience. Perhaps I should have structured my sharing in a more direct and less thought provoking way.

For those who were at my session, mind sharing your thoughts and feedback too? I would love to hear from you. You can drop me a note in the comments or contact me directly.

I did some tweaking with the slides since it’ll probably make less sense to those who wasn’t there. So here I’ve uploaded an updated version with more slides on the thoughts and minus the introduction part about myself.

Here’s some of the reminding people at my sharing…

I will be sharing the full findings from my “How do I facebook?” survey in another post. Perhaps, I might do a Part 2 with some of the questions you all asked that day. If you have any in mind, do share them here too so we can compile and do a “How do I facebook part 2″ together.

As a participant

So how was your Barcamp Singapore 3 experience? Share them here and also help with this simple survey too.

The beauty of social media… more links to follow about Barcamp SG3…

• Speakers slides are available at Slide Share
• Photos from Barcamp SG3 on flickr
• #barcampsg3 on twitter at hashtags
• Join Barcamp Singapore in facebook

Other blog posts on BarcampSG3…

• Barcamp SG 3 – “How to produce & publish your music album online, practically free, without a music production company or distributor” by Ivan
• BarCamp Singapore 3: a truly socially constructed experience by Kevin
• Live from Barcamp: How to bluff your way through an interview on Information Architecture by Brian
• Live Blogging from BarCamp 3 afternoon session by Farinelli
• Barcamp 3 at Singapore by Chin Yong
• Barcamp Signapore 3 by Coleman
• Barcamp Singapore 3 by Minggen
• Barcamp SG 3 by Aaron
• anymore to add to the list?

That’s the end of Barcamp SG3! Next up will be BlogOUT09!!! Have you registered already?? I hope to see you there too!!

Started my blogging journey with them in September last year and had contributed a little ever since. But it sure was an experience that any blogger should at least try once. (Or more because once is never enough with the new facelift!)

Let’s first take a look at the overall view of the new Yesterday.sg…

What do you think of it?

At first look, I already felt that its very familiar and an easy to use and navigate site. The commonly seen content on the left, and sidebars with all other information and links on the right. The top navigation bar leads you to the highlights of the site. If you’re regularly reading blogs, this interface shouldn’t be hard to get used to. But than, the more I look at it, the more I feel that the sidebar on the front page is a little too cluttered.

I showed it to my relatives after our dinner last night, and they were kinda lost surfing the site. Although all of them said its nicely designed but almost all of them just scrolled up and down the first page and didn’t know what to click next. The site only managed to capture less than a minute of their attention. If you’re lost too, why not just check out the following pages I’m recommending here first to orientate yourself.

The Heritage TV (HTV) page

Here’s the video of what goes on behind the scene…

Talkback (aka Forum)

And finally the Gallery

Few more things to share about the website. Two things that attracted me from the sidebar is the “Today in history” and “Did you know” portions.

Like any social media platform, registered users get a profile page. And here’s how mine looks like…

Overall I like the changes and improvements made to the website. Its way much better than the old Yesterday.sg. But still rooms for improvements. Perhaps a admin/backend page too for users who’re not familiar with wordpress.

Like all sites and communities, the next challenge for the team is to build the followings and engage their participants.

All the best to the team!

Go check out the site yourself! And register to take part in the discussions too! Check out Yesterday.sg.

I may not have seen the worst, but I have seen enough…

1. The parent who couldn’t afford to buy a proper meal for their children.
2. The parent who can’t accept the reality that their child is autistic.
3. The parent who can’t understand why their perfect child isn’t able to learn like other children.
4. The single mother who is trying to get ends meet, had to make her 10-year-old daughter to work with her at the coffee shop serving beer to the uncles and men.
5. The child who has no one to turn to at home because her parents are always no way in sight.

All these and much much more. There are simply too many problems, family and children in need. Most of the times, the children in these cases are innocent and were brought to the situation by the lack of love, concern, care and support from their parents and family. But there is still hope. You can help them!

Singapore Children’s Society – http://www.childrensociety.org.sg

M.I.L.K – Mainly I Love Kids – http://www.milk.org.sg

The above are two local initiatives who are here to help these children. But it takes more than just their love, support, time and programme to spread out to so many children out there. Yes, there are fund raising events, flag day, donation drives and charity runs organised to help raise funds and awareness. But now, there is one more way for you to help…

Samsung has set aside USD700,000 for total of 21 beneficiaries from 5 countries. All of them already will receive a base sum set by Samsung. But now, you can help Samsung decide how they can distribute the remaining sum. Help them by pledging your hope at Samsung Hopes Take Off.

I have made my pledge. Have you?

If you have a blog too, you can help spread the words out…

Wear a badge of support (Simply copy and paste this code into your blog)

<center><a href="http://www.samsunghope.org/"><br /> <img src="http://www.samsunghope.org/img/badges/200x80-HopeTakesOff-button.gif" width="200" height="80" alt="Hope Takes Off !" /> </a></center>

So today, I’ll be talking about my social media journey. Which can roughly be rounded up with the following table…

It has been quite a special year and it’d changed so much of me. The people I met, the relationship formed and the things I got to learn about through all the talking, sharing and understanding. I’ve managed to learn a lot from many people’s experience and lessons. (Both the good and the bad.) All just made me a more focused and strong person.

It didn’t come as a shock to me when I finally decided to start my own company. Its not done without any serious thoughts and thinking (except the fact that I totally forgot about the tons of bills to pay) for me to take this step.

Everything seems to be falling into place pretty nicely now. Just a couple more barrier to overcome and things will be stabilized. Thanks to all those who have helped me one way or another! You know who you are! *winks*

Looking forward to a great year ahead!

I seriously need to turn in for tonight. Long day later! I hope to be able to post up my final two R&R posts before 2009 comes! *puts reminders and alarms in my innov8 to remind myself to write those two posts*

This one week of reflection and resolution will end on 31 December 2008, just in time to welcome the new year.

For a start, here’s a reflection of (some) events and gatherings for the people by the people.

(Did a calendar for myself with the collection of photos over the year. Looks pretty nice so I’m using them here in my first post…)

Chinese New Year celebration with blogging friends

Pizza Anyone?

Yebber’s Anniversary Party

Social Media Breakfast | Singapore at ACM

Hei! Hei! Hei!

Ping.sg 2nd Anniversary Party

My Birthday Celebration with friends

Craving for hotpot?

Friends, beer, snacks, and laughter

SMB at URA Gallery

SMB at Samsung

SMB at Samsung

So much have happened and changed within a year. What’s in the past, should be kept in the past. Its time to move on and have a better year ahead in 2009!

Merry Christmas!

And ever since my family learned and acceptable that I’ve stopped consuming pork, I feel guilty when we gather for family dinner. Being a Chinese, pork is an essential dish on the dining table especially during Chinese New Year. I’m not asking everyone to stop serving or having this meat because of me. I just don’t touch them and eat all other dishes that have no pork in them.

I grew up living with my grandma. My favorite food prepared by her are ngioh hiang, a peranakan dish that has pork, onions, chestnut and some other stuff wrapped in a dried beancurd skin, and rice dumplings. Because of me, she started preparing these two food with chicken meat instead so that I can still enjoy them. I love grandma very much! She’s always loving and caring and never complain about the trouble she’d to go through to prepare two versions of rice dumplings with the chicken one specially for me and the pork meat one for everyone else in the family.

I’ve stopped consuming pork for more than 5 years now. And many have been asking me if I’d gone halal. My answer is no. I still drink, gamble and eat non-halal food. I’m a Chinese and no I’m not a Muslim. Whether or not I will eventually become one, is still unknown. And I hope people will understand that this is a choice that I’ve to make on my own. If I’m not ready to convert, no one should force me to just because I’m going to marry a Muslim. I respect all religion and I do believe that there’s god. And I also believe that god will never force anyone into devoting oneself to them if the person isn’t ready to. So I hope everyone around me and my Abang will understand this. And I really hope to get everyone’s blessing when the time is here, no matter if I’m one of them or not. Abang and I have come a long way together, going through much obstacles and adventures together. No matter what we decide to do, I sincerely hope everyone will understand and respect our decision.

Together always…