Monday, June 14, 2010

My World Cup Journey - continue..

South Korea vs. Greece
  • Tipped SK to win and the result is Greeks lost dearly.
  • Thought SK was one of the average participants in the tournament based on history, however, the result turned out to be Greece, once the EU Cup Champion, is definitely the weakest team so far. 
  • Greece had no speed, no tactics, no technicians, and most importantly no clear mindset on what they were doing on the pitch. They were not only completely outpaced by the Taiji Tiger, but also rhythm-led throughout the whole match. 
Argentina vs. Nigeria
  • Tipped Maradona's boys to win and result is they beat the African Eagles.
  • Argentina didn't show a clear tactics during the match as they probably didn't have one. When you have several Maradonas on the pitch, the one thing you can leave behind is tactics. Don't know how far they will go in this tournament, but qualifying from the group doesn't seem unrealistic. 
  • Nigeria played individual football, no team play at much. When you play individually and play an opponent like Argentina, you are meant to lose.
England vs USA
  • Tipped USA to beat England, but the result is a draw.
  • USA played a better football than the English. At least they played modern football with a role clearly defined for every one from the team and the execution was excellent. England salvaged a draw for having so many stars, nothing else.
  • The English goalkeeper shouldn't be much to blame. He made a stupid mistake but also redeemed himself from saving a goal that could sink England all together. However, a mistake is a mistake, the world cup ball is not the culprit.
  • Another fact I have observed is England is still the old England that has weak competitive mentality. When they lost a goal, everyone started playing nervously giving ball easily to the opponents. Well, no wonder they lost so many times in penalty shootouts!
Algeria vs. Slovenia
  • Tipped Slovenia to win and they did win over the desert fox by one goal.
  • It is worth remembering that Slovenia got their first ever world cup win yesterday thanks to Algeria.
  • Algerian team is like a group of adolescent boys, running all over the place without a clear objective, having so much energy but no thoughts. Slovenia, on the other hand, played typical European football that held the play structure well and sealed the opportunity when it rised.
  • Also I am not surprise Algeria got one man sent off. Again, adolescent males make stupid and unreasonable mistakes.
Germany vs. Australia
  • Tipped on Germans and socceroos didn't disappoint me by losing to them with 4 goals conceded.
  • It was a comprehensive win by the Germans over the Australians. I knew before the match that socceroos would have little chance to beat Germany, but didn't anticipate it was a four-goal cushion.
  • Tim Cahill got sent off as a matter of fact, this guy didn't learn the lessons from the friendly against New Zealand. When you play bully football on the world cup stage (not A-League or EPL) in front of Latin or South American referee (Mexico in this case), tackling from the behind with two feet, you would expect a straight red.

My World Cup Journey

Four years on the roll, here comes again the world cup (you know which sport I mean here), in South Africa. June 12 to July 12, the spring festival for football fans all over the globe, let's enjoy!

Never believed before the cup and still not convinced today that South Africa would have the experience and capability to properly organize a global sport event like the world cup. The opening ceremony seemed already proving that. Well, everyone gotta have their first time and those excellent matches will eventually lure critics eyeballs away from the off-pitch.

Let's examine if my understanding of football and tipping ability still live to the promise today. Four years ago, my tipping earned me the fifth place in Viator' internal tipping competition. Today I am participating Macquarie Group's tipping comp with another 100 colleagues.

South Africa vs. Mexico
  • Tipped a draw and the result is a draw. Like Mexico to win though.
  • One of my all-time favorites, Cuauhtémoc Blanco, at the age of 37 helped organize the salvage goal for Mexico.
France vs. Uruguay
  • Tipped Uruguay won but the result is a goalless draw. Still not believe France would have had the team morale to win, not because they lost to China in the pre-cup warm-up though.
  • Both played crappy football without a clear intention to win. Understand why Uruguay would play defending football, but France was way too conservative, even when an Uruguayan was sent off. You can't make too far with this kind of tactics and guts.
Why is the cup important to me? Every four years marks a personal milestone for me. Four years ago, I was a young coder working in a ambitious travel technology company tipping the socceroos draw Croatia to qualify from the group stage. Four years after, I am working in the investment bank of the country, thinking over my own venture that is going to take place in a few months. When you are young, don't give up the opportunity to make progress, strive and develop yourself. Everyone has a gift, it is a matter of whether you realize a gift is not a gift until you take effort to uncover it. Four years is a good period range to check how your gift discovery journey is going. It is a balanced combination of micro and macro.

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

苹果公司被曝歧视华人 华裔顾客购iPad屡遭拒绝

据美国世界新闻网3日报道,上市首周全美国狂卖50万台的苹果iPad是现在最火的电子商品,然而购买过程却让部分华裔消费者满肚子火。
  苹果推出的iPad挟带着iPhone与iPod的优点,功能介于智能手机与笔记型电脑之间,为避免热卖断货,苹果公司规定每人限购两台iPad。在过去一周中,陆续有华裔消费者投诉苹果员工层层盘问、刁难、甚至有不公正对待,以回拒顾客购买两台iPad的要求。
   在美国工作的台湾青年邰威廉4月21日中午前往苹果在曼哈坦苏荷区(SoHo)分店,当他告诉店员要买两台64G的iPad,店员却说‘等一下,我要请 经理来’,他随即被带到一旁角落等候,20分钟后经理才出现,反问他‘你为什么要买两台’、‘要做什么用’,邰威廉深感不受尊重,回应‘这不关你的事!’ 最后经理拒绝卖给他,当邰威廉不满地问‘为什么?’经理不回应,也不愿意透露姓名,迳自离开。
  邰威廉说,排在他前面的一对亚裔男女青年,英语不流利,‘店员马上开口说不能卖给他们’,邰威廉气愤表示,最后这对年轻人无可奈何地离开,‘因为不懂英语,连基本的消费权利都无法获得尊重’。
  除了苏荷区,来自台湾、就读纽约帕森斯学院的陈姓学生21日下午5时半,前往位于曼哈顿14街与9大道的苹果店购买iPad,店员检查了她的附照片的纽约州身分证件和学生证后,竟然要求她必须再带护照来才能购买iPad,面对这般刻意刁难,陈姓学生愤然离去。
   美国媒体记者也在苹果销售店现场目击了苹果店员拒绝香港顾客购买要求的一幕。此外,苹果在曼哈坦第5大道旗舰店官网同样出现批评店员歧视顾客的文章。亚 裔青年Brett在文中描述,4月17日前往第五大道旗舰店,当时他正在长长的队伍中排队,突然一名男性经理走向他,告诉他不能购买iPad,还在公众场 合大声说Brett‘貌似’转卖商。Brett对于没有证据的指控感到愤怒,他提出愿意交出信用卡调查过去在苹果的消费纪录,或店家调出监视画面证明自己 过去出现,以证明自己并非转卖商,经理先是全盘拒绝,也不愿透露自己姓名,便迳自走入办公室。气愤不已的Brett向纽约市消费者事务局投诉,并在该官网 留言‘没有证据的指控就是歧视’。
  邰威廉电邮苹果公关说明事发情况。他表示,事发两天后苹果公关和他联系,之后苏荷区分店另一名经理致电向他道歉,并表示愿意提供折扣,“但我告诉他,我已经不想买了,不过对方随后仍寄了一张100元礼卡”。
  苹果公司公关部人员Dow强调,公司严格规定员工对所有消费者均一视同仁,绝不允许因性别、种族、语言等因素造成顾客的差别待遇,他表示新上市的iPad出售要求条件较严格,民众不得以现金购买。他希望双方的不愉快只是单纯的沟通误会,将尽快与分店联系了解问题所在。

Thursday, April 22, 2010

韩寒博文犀利批上海世博:快来吧,快走吧!

最近,老是有媒体要关于世博会采访我,我觉得很为难,如果我赞美他吧,估计我良心不安,如果我批评他吧,估计我寝食不安。鉴于世博会将要开幕,我就在博客中集体回答关于世博会和上海的任何问题,以下便是我的态度,以后类似的问题就不要问我了。
 
1:你觉得世博会会给上海,给中国带来一些什么?你能用什么来比喻一下世博会呢?
答: 觉得不是世博会会给中国带来什么,而是中国会给世博会带来什么。因为本来世博会并不是一个规模如此大的展会,随着信息的流通越来越便捷,世博会正在渐渐 式微,是中国将世博会升格了。如果一定要比喻的话,有点像某些在国内非常火的品牌,经过了宣传,你穿在身上觉得牛逼的不行,奢华的不行,出国一打听,原来 是二线的。
 
2:那你如何评价世博会的吉祥物——海宝呢?
答: 认为海宝是一个让人非常头疼的东西,暂且不说海宝的形象如何,但是当时大家看到的海宝都是平面的,这给那些要将海宝立体化的人出了一个非常困难的问题, 那就是海宝的背面究竟应该是怎么样的,海宝有没有尾巴,有没有屁股,有没有股沟,这些都是未知的,所以我们看到的在城市中矗立的海宝雕像,正面都是一样 的,但是背面你可以发现,有的海宝没有股沟,有的海宝有股沟。但是最近以没有股沟的海宝居多,因为股沟已经宣布离开中国了。
 
3:世博会的会馆等结束以后就要拆除,你认为这个浪费么?
答: 认为不浪费,当时动迁,我们国家自己建设会馆,帮别的国家建设会馆,杂七杂八政府化了不少钱这些会馆留在上海也没有用,也不能当成政府办公楼,拆了平 整平整,好把这一大块地给卖了做房地产,所以到最后,其实这届世博会既不是政府开的,也不是企业开的,而是房奴和炒房客们开的。
 
4:那既然如此,为什么政府还要留下几个展馆不做拆除呢?
答:当然不能全拆了,全拆了这块地就不能叫世博板了,到时候就卖不出一个好价钱。
 
5:有一些人反应世博会期间,外地车辆进上海,需要排队检查,经常拥堵几公里,排队两三个小时,你认为有更好的办法么?
答: 这个我也没有办法,因为政府防贼,防恐怖分子,防反动势力和防老百姓这四防是处在同一个安全标准的,虽然我也不好说每辆车每个人都安检到底是在防谁,但是 我知道如果我是坏人,我一定不会乖乖的在安检口抱着炸弹等着接受检查的。城市与城市之间的边界不像国界线那么严密,很可能相隔的就是一块稻田,有心的话很 容易进出,我不认为这样的安检能检查出一些执意要干坏事的人。但也许政府觉得这样显得比较有威慑力,让坏人闻风丧胆,那大家就活该排队吧。
 
但是无论如何,我都支持更好的安保,只要你政府估算好了得失,我愿意接受任何的安全检查。间接为了世博会,这个城市已经有不少人被工程车辆所害,所以我不希望再有任何人的生命会因此堪忧。
 
6:你认为世博会会为上海吸引多少的游客?
答: 这个我不好说,专程为此而去和顺便到此一游是不一样的。官方说这半年里会有六千万人次来到上海,不过我估计,上海本身就是非常有吸引力的一个城市,就算没 有世博会,在那半年里也会有五千九百万人次因为别的事情来此来到上海吧。反正如果我去国外旅游,这个国家正在举办不举办世博会并不对我的行程产生任何决定 性的影响,可能外国人没见过什么世面,都想来看看吧。当然,我身边也有不少朋友是期待世博会的,他们都希望去看看,这些我也非常理解。世博会的场面应该会 很大的,因为中国人天生都喜欢赶集,车展都有那么多人看呢。当然,我也非常能理解很多上海人希望世博会早日召开,因为如果有很多外国游客或者外地游客的 话,他们可以展示给游客们看,我们上海是多么厉害的一个城市,房价五万一米,停车二十块钱一小时,油价超过一美元一升,看病吃饭坐车买东西什么都贵,生活 成本是你们的五倍,工资是你们的五分之一,但我们活下来了,还欢天喜地高高兴兴的迎接五湖四海的游客。他们才是这个城市里最牛逼的展览品。我建议挑选一些 市民代表作为艺术品陈列在中国馆里。
 
7:如何评价上海这个城市。
答:我出生在这里,我始终热爱这里,希望这个城市真正美好,虽然我的老家已经被严重的污染所占领。公正的说,如果你有钱,上海是个好地方,无论是购物,规模,消费,玩乐,上海都不错。从经济上,总体来说,这里是冒险家的乐园,这里是老百姓的地狱。
是上海是一个没有什么文化的地方。别的国家大都市,你可以说,我们这里有什么建筑,什么酒店,什么大街,什么豪宅,这些上海市的领导也可以自豪的宣布,我 们这里也有,但当人家要说,我们这里有什么作家,什么导演,什么艺术家,什么艺术展,什么电影节,上海的领导就没话说了。
 
8为什么会造成这种状况呢?
答:发展真正的文化就必须放开尺度,放开尺度必然百家争鸣,百家争鸣必然开启民智,这是多么糟糕的一件事情啊。
 
9:官方一会说转基因食品无害,一会说要严禁在世博园区里出现转基因的食品以免外国人误食,这是一种自己对自己的歧视么?
答:胡说,这明明是一种自信,是对我们中国人虎躯的一种自信,我们天天呼吸着这样的空气喝着这样的水,都是大风大浪里过来的,人家老外喝一口农药就死了,我们要喝三口才死。所以你这种说法是不对的

Friday, April 9, 2010

Couple of things you need to know when setting up SSL on Weblogic server

  • Choose 443 as your default SSL Listen Port.
  • Put this into your start.cmd - -Dweblogic.security.SSL.ignoreHostnameVerification=true. Wonder why? If you use weblogic for local development sandbox, then that line will help you get rid of annoying "failed hostname verification check" error.
  • If you use a nodemanager, then instead of -D line above, use this line in your nodemanager script- -Dweblogic.nodemanager.sslHostNameVerificationEnabled=false
  • There are two trust stores by default in weblogic, one demo trust store, another jdk one. Don't use the jdk one as it probably would throw you a  sun.security.provider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException: unable to find valid certification path to requested target. Instead, set -Djavax.net.ssl.trustStore=%WL_HOME%\server\lib\DemoTrust.jks in your startup script. There is no need to specify a passphrase, i.e. -Djavax.net.ssl.trustStorePassword is not required.
  • If you encounter issues with SSL at runtime, adding this -D will help you troubleshoot with more debug information printed out, -Djavax.net.debug=ssl,handshake,trustmanager.
The goal of this post is to get you started quickly on enabling SSL on weblogic, so that you can focus on your application development or problem resolutions.However, setting up proper SSL, either one or two-ways on weblogic for production environment is a different kettle of fish. It requires more thorough planning and execution.

Mac is Hot!

Thursday, April 8, 2010

任志强的一些话

但励志首先要立志,没有了志又何来的励。

年轻人要先立志,才不会浪费了青春

 
不同的人走上了不同的路

从学步到跑,几乎没有人会不摔跟头、没有人会一帆风顺,那些大多数开始太顺利扩张的企业则大多今天都不见了。

华远、四通、联想几乎都是同时出现在市场上的一代,而更多当时知名的企业则在大浪淘沙中一去而不返了,差别正在于走自己的路还是跟在别人屁股后面追赶。齐白石先生说“学我者生,似我者死”,其意在学的精神与灵魂,而绝不是形似的临摹。

从计划经济到市场经济的过渡并非是一件易事,尤其是我们这些曾经只留下了大量计划经济残余的一代人,要彻底的改变过去的一切就更是件难上加难的事情了。但 我们闹过学生运动、打倒权威的领导(也许是错的),在毛主席的一挥手中上了山、下了乡、耕过田、种过粮,在全国学习解放军中当过兵、扛过枪,在恢复高考后 上了学、留了洋,也有些在改革中入了狱、撞了墙,但仍在跌倒中爬起来重新摸索。这些经历与磨难恰恰造就了他们铁一样的筋骨、钢一般的意志,走出了一条中国 摸着石头过河之路。

毕业后集中于大、中城市,力争进入不到10%的人口居住的城市,而不在关注生养自己的父母乡亲和那片热土。他们热衷于在网络上寻找生活中的乐趣,也热衷于 在虚拟世界中热议房价和社会问题,他们开着小型的私家车浪漫于山间田野,一面自豪的看不起那些乘大车去采摘的同事与同学,一面又高声的叫骂着市中心豪宅的 高房价,似乎这已经成为了他们的一种生活方式……

李彦宏、马云、冯军都是年轻一代的榜样,尽管他们不是被称为是80后的一代,却是最接近于这一年龄层的一代佼佼者,可以无愧于所有中国人的骄傲。但也许由于他们的形象太高大也让许多人认为是高不可及,反而放弃了对榜样的追求,让许多人对榜样失去了关注。


而我则用一生的体会深知“靠天靠地不如靠自己”“从来就没有什么救世主”,只有勇敢的面对和不懈的努力、认真的学习和积极的参与、在竞争中拼搏,才能享受生活的快乐、体会人生的价值。

重要的不是酒瓶上写着的是五粮液还是二锅头,而是瓶子里的就是真的还是假的,我想做的只是将真实(或我认为真实)的认识告诉社会,而不是用好看的标签来掩盖真相。