Songcraft - Singapore's Songwriting Circle

I've attended writing circles before, but never for a music-related one. So when I learned of Songcraft, set up by a Singaporean no less, I was really curious.

Nine people (including myself) turned up at the Substation for the meetup yesterday evening, on 27 Apr 2007, 7.30pm. Most learned about the group via the Songcraft blog.

For more information on the participants, click on the image to view the notes at Flickr.com

The Songwriting circle was exactly like a Writer's Circle. You come prepared to share your songs and/ or listen to others and give constructive suggestions. Or just sit back and hear what others have to sing or say.

Jeremy did a fine job facilitating the session. The group laughed when he shared how he would be asking probing questions.

I was quite surprised that most didn't record and edit their music using computers. Not all were familiar with Creative Commons concept.

I've recorded some of the pieces and discussion from the session. Will post them soon. I think it was Betty or Sanny (two sisters who turned up) who asked what sort of recording equipment I used. I'll post something up on that as well.

How did I learn about Songcraft in the first place?
It was about a week after the launch of the Social Media Directory. I noticed a new entry for a group blog called Songcraft, a Songwriting Circle. Intrigued by the purpose of the group, I contacted the guy who started it, Jeremy Yew.

After a few emails, I invited him to join a screening of the Homegrown Bands documentary (that I'd arranged for the Friends of Yesterday.sg at library@esplanade).

At our first face-to-face meeting at EPCL, Jeremy said he wasn't sure what to make of the Songwriting Circle. The group hasn't really started but he'd arrange for it to happen. He'd expressed some doubts as to whether the group would take off at all.

I remember telling him that so long one stranger turned up for the session, it would have been a success.

Someone's got to do it first
So Jeremy paid for a room for three hours. He also brought a synthesizer, an amp, and a guitar. By 8pm, nine people had turned up. Five of them were new to him. I'd say that's pretty good for an event that was only advertised via his currently rather low-key Songcraft blog.

He's obviously happy about the first meetup. Heh.

My interest in Songcraft
I'm interested in their group because (1) of my own personal musical hobby, and (2) there's a good collaborative opportunity here between a group like theirs and library@esplanade. Definitely along the same lines as what the library can do for groups like the recent Ruby Brigade meetup.

Now that I've attended their first meeting, I'm even more convinced something can be worked out. Will be talking to the manager of the library and my colleagues to work out the details.

If you don't know a librarian, you should

Christopher Kenton wrote:

My wife is a librarian. If you don’t know a librarian, you should...

When I look at the library profession, exemplified at large by the American Library Association, I see a profession that is fully engaged with society and with their peers. They don’t always get everything right, but they’re on the ball.

(Thanks to Melvin for alerting me to the post.)

The real point of Christopher's post was how marketeers in the US, and the American Marketing Association, should also re-brand itself like what US libraries did.

I bet his post will get him quite a bit of attention from librarians in the US :)

It's interesting to me because here's a marketeer using libraries as a benchmark for brand positioning. Granted he's talking about libraries in the US, and the American Library Association (ALA) is a influential and respected organisation worldwide. But generally speaking libraries aren't usually associated as powerhouses of branding and image marketing.

Or have we libraries and librarians, just experienced a paradigm shift and we don't even know it?

Heh.

Otters holding hands

If this doesn't bring a smile to your face, then you must have had a really, really, bad day. Make sure you watch till the last 18 seconds or so. :)


Hat-tip to Kevin for the video.

Poem: "Why I blog"

I feel compelled
To leave

bits
of
me,

My ideas,
Like graffiti on the broad walks
Of life.

Written in March 2007
(Additional info on how the poem came about, at MyRightBrain).

"How to Buy a Green PC" and other stories

"Topics on environmentalism and 'going green' would be popular, thanks to Al Gore", said a colleague, two days ago, at a meeting to discuss strategies and directions for library programmes.

Yesterday, I received an email on "How to buy a Green PC, and other stories". The email, sent by Siva via the ME@N list, included links to related articles. The one that seemed most interesting was by Singaporean Jasmin Malik Chua, titled "An environmentally friendly computer will help preserve the environment — and save you money".


I was hooked by the words "save you money" rather than "preserve the environment". Some might say this is a Singaporean trait. I agree Singaporeans tend to think from their pockets first, but I'd argue this isn't uniquely Singaporean Thinking.

*****

I'm reminded of my channel-surfing a few days ago, where I caught Fox News' "Your World with Neil Cavuto". A man called Bob Murray (designation,"Energy CEO") was being interviewed.

Bob Murray asserted that “Al Gore is a very dangerous man” because Gore's ideas about the effects of Global Warming would lead to a loss of job in the US. He said further legislation to control the pollutive effects from using coal would lead to higher energy costs for many US industries and households. China was not imposing those restrictions, Murray continued, so the US would hence be eroding their competitive advantage over such countries that didn't care about the environment.

Hmm... that's like saying "It's OK to pollute the river, because everyone's doing it anyway", isn't it? See, it's not just Singaporeans who thinks from their pockets first.

*****

I requested Siva to pass me the URL if he was going to publish the email on his blog. I offered to help spread the message.

Here's his post. And he had this to say about Landfills and seeping poisons.

"I experienced Pulau Sakeng mangroves in the early 90's. Shortly after that field trip, they were destroyed to build an offshore landfill linking it to Semakau. That was a dramatic lesson about the absence of landfill space on mainland Singapore. So I get uncomfortable about computer waste since we consume so much. What we cannot dispose of, we've probably sold for shipping and disposal elsewhere; that hurts to think about!"

In the last four to five years, in speaking to friends (and people like tour-guides) living in Singapore, South Korea, China, US, UK, and Europe... we all seem to agree on one thing -- weather patterns have changed noticeably. The seasons (where they have seasons) are colder or warmer.

During our holiday in Beijing, my wife and I learned first-hand from our tour guide that Beijing was in danger of turning into a desert. Our guide, who's lived and worked in Beijing for more than 30 years, said the winters wasn't as cold as before.

Snow could not form. The top soil that used to be covered by the compact snow in winter was gradually being blown away by strong winds that always came in during winter.

A German librarian told me that during her recent skiing trip in her home country, the ski resort had to deploy snow machines to churn out snow. This was in winter. It costs fuel and manpower to generate that artificial snow. I'm sure the resort operators would pass the costs over to customers.

In Singapore, even the money-pinching me had to reluctantly agree with my wife that air-conditioning in the home was no longer a luxury but a must, given the increasingly regularity (and unpredictability) of the warm weather.

The change in weather patterns is already hurting our pockets.

I don't know Bob Murray. He seems to be a controversial figure. I haven't watched "An inconvenient truth". It's been said it's propaganda. But aren't they all? It's only a matter of degrees.

I look around. I read what's being said and written out there.

• A CEO with a spine (New York Sun, 3 April 2007)
• CNN gave coal company CEO a platform for Gore-bashing, did not report company's labor and safety violations (MediaMatters.org, 10 April 2007)
• Media Watchdog Claims CNN Gave CEO ‘Free Ride’ (blog post by Bob McCarty, 10 April 2007)
• Al Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" Movie: Fact or Hype? (National Geographic News, 25 May 2006)
• Scientists OK Gore's Movie for Accuracy (Washington Post, 27 June 2006)

I look at my monthly utilities bills.

It's around the national average for similar-sized households. It helps that I have a Green Computer already.

I wonder if I can save more by leaving the computer off for longer periods of time at home. It would mean blogging less. But then I could hit the books.

In any case, the truth is often what we choose to see. Then we choose if we want to act or not.

Alternate Worlds - Fantasy Genre Guide illustration

This was done last year (9 Feb 2006) for the library’s “Alternate Worlds - Fantasy Genre Guide”. Composed, drawn and illustrated entirely with Photoshop Elements on a Windows PC.


Details on how it was done, over at MyRightBrain.wordpress.com.

A Singapore librarian remembered: Lim Kek Hwa

I don't know the name Lim Kek Hwa. She was retired long before I joined the NLB. I remember reading about her passing, via my RSS feed reader, from the Singapore Libraries Bulletin Blog. It was posted on 14th December 2006.

[Undated picture: Lim Kek Hwa at Reference Services, NLB]

At that time, I'd thought, "This was a librarian who's left a deep impression on some people". Not many. Only some.

There were no comments at the post then.

Some five months later, I somehow found my way back to the post. As I write this, there were 79 comments. The first comment was posted on 25th December 2006. A flood of comments came on 26th March 2007. The latest I read was posted on 12th April.

I wondered if the comments were posted by the individuals. Or that someone received the replies and posted them on behalf of the senders. But that's besides the point.

At the back of my mind, I'm also thinking, "Isn't blogging wonderful? What a way to remember and honor a colleague and a friend". But of course that's also missing the point.

The point is that while I don't know Lim Kek Hwa personally, I'm proud to be associated with a profession in which she was in.

To be honest, reading the post still doesn't make me know her. Because I've never met her. I've never heard about her (until the post). I've never read her words or heard her. speak.

What moved me were the number of people who remembered her. Her friends and ex-colleagues (many who are now based outside Singapore), an eight-year old nephew, and even her doctor. The many lives that she's touched.

That was apparent.

That's what made me blog about it now.

Thank you, Ms. Lim. You're an inspiration. To librarians and non-librarians alike.

Brief update on the Singapore Social Media Directory

Brief update on the Singapore Social Media Directory:

I've expanded the Individual categories from four ("A-G", "H-N" etc.) to 13 ("A-B", "C-D" etc.)

Initially I wasn't sure if the wiki would be updated. Too many unpopulated categories might frustrate users (who click and find a blank page). Now that there's enough entries for each of the 13 pages, I might as well expand the categories now, since the social experiment hasn't crashed and burned. It hasn't exactly taken the Singapore Blogosphere by storm though, but that wasn't the point.

It's been an eye-opener for me so far. I'll post more details on the observations and learning points at a later date.

BTW, here's a feature for those not familiar with wikis (it's something I learned as part of the experiment): The cool thing about a wiki is that it allows users to track changes and compare versions.

For instance, to see the changes made to different versions of the navigation page, click on the "history" tab of that page, then choose the two versions to compare against.


For Wikispaces.com, the insertions and deletions are highlighted in green and red respectively.


Until I started using the wiki with an end in mind, I wasn't able to fully appreciate the usefulness of this feature.

OK, more updates soon.

Post event reflections: Singapore Ruby Brigade Meetup at CLL

[See previous post: Singapore Ruby Brigade Meetup at CLL, 18 Apr 2007]

• "How many lines of code to patch to make KRJS work?"
• "Have the affected the codes?"
• "Any one here does test development? How do you manage without Hpricot Forms?"
• "What have you been using FX Ruby for?"
• "Why are we letting the Phython people sit in front?" [Laughter]
• "Was it complicated to understand the Flickr API?"

I didn't understand a word. But it didn't matter. I learned what I sought to discover. One of which was, "What makes this community tick?"


I would describe the participants as a group of like-minded individuals interested in learning and sharing what they know about Ruby On Rails.

One guy patiently explained, in a nutshell, what Ruby on Rails was. So now I know 'Ruby' is a programming language (like Java and C++). And Rails is a... framework.

I think.

Here's Choon Keat sharing tips on performing functional tests on code written using Ruby.


He showed lots of code.


And more code.


He ended his presentation by asking if anyone was lost. The room remained silent. I had the feeling I wasn't the only person who's lost. Heck, I wasn't even with him in the first place (I said this to Choon Keat and he laughed good naturedly).

That's the whole point of the Ruby Brigade meetups. Ruby isn't something taught in schools. At least not yet.

It's a Learning Community for people into Ruby on Rails. It's an informal classroom. It's organised by the community, led by the community, for the community.

Sausheong presented on something I didn't quite catch.


Then he showed this neat screen-saver program he wrote using Ruby. It pulls images from Flickr.com. Now that, I get! But it runs only on Windows though. :|

After that, there was the familiar networking geek-bonding sessions (just kidding).


And ideas being propagated.



Not everyone was into software development, as I learned during the self-introduction session. Not all were experts. Seven people raised their hands when Douglas asked who were using Rails full-time. The rest seemed to say they were "playing with it".

These people who have learned Java (some of them anyway) and are now adopting Ruby/ Rails.

Lets see... there was a Software developer, Systems Integrator, a few Programmers, a Web designer, an owner of a software company (who teaches inmates in Changi Prison!), someone who's starting an email portal (and considering if he should adopt Ruby), a freelance PHP programmer, one guy who's been "playing around with Ruby for three years and taking up Rails", a Java programmer, a self-confessed "recovering Javaholic", and another who said he was a "reformed PHP programmer" and passing through Singapore. One guy said he was there to see if Ruby was something he needed to learn. One fella into Jango, another guy working on internet project (not a programmer), more freelancer programmers (projects for SMEs), one full-time Rail developer (Choon Keat), and a Web developer in a design company (Douglas).

The word "guy" comes up quite a bit, doesn't it? :)

Another fella made an even deeper impression. He introduced himself as "Mohan", from Chennai, India. He arrived in Singapore only two days ago. First time in Singapore. Working for a financial company here. While in India, he was searching for information about Ruby/ Rails. Found his way to the Googlegroup, where he learned about the meetup. And so there he's was, at the meetup, on his second day in Singapore, in the library for the first time.

Nice chap, that Mohan. He arrived early. Helped set up the notice board, and even collected it back at the end of the session. I told him about he can sign up as a library member. I think he'll get a lot out of the public libraries here.

So...

The main question in my mind was, "Do they need the library for their activities?"

I counted about 30 people in the room. Choon Keat said they usually didn't get such a turnout. Their previous meetings were at coffee joints, so presentations like tonight wasn't possible. These guys were sharing stuff that isn't taught formally. And Ruby is something that's apparently gaining ground among developers and programmers.

Apart from providing the venue and facilities, the library can supporting their sessions with books and related materials. And who better to recommend related books to such a community than the practitioners themselves. This group can easily be an informal advisory panel to the library in selecting related Computer & IT materials for the collection.

I told the group there's a definite possibility that the library could work out some regular arrangement to facilitate a learning community like theirs. I'm pretty clear on how it fits the library's 2010 plans. Now I've to think of ways (with the help from this community of course) to convince my colleagues why we should do this.

Either that, or start a dating service for some of these guys! Just kidding, fellas.

Podcast: We Stand Unbroken (2007)

powered by ODEO
unbroken |ˌənˈbrōkən|
adjective
not broken, fractured, or damaged

Listen/ download from Odeo.com or Archive.org. Highlights of "how its done" at My Right Brain.

Why did I call it "Unbroken"?

It just felt right. It's about facing and overcoming adversity. Doing what we must in spite of our fears.

No, I didn't do this piece because of the Virginia Tech Massacre. But for what it's worth, I'm dedicating it to the victims.

Thanks to Lunarin for inspiring this piece. I heard one song from their Chrysalis album and was hooked. Bought their CD. Was inspired by track two, "Dry", and wanted to create a track with that sound. It's nowhere as good as theirs though, but that's not the point :)


I tell my friends Lunarin's music is "New Age meets Heavy Metal". They even have a Wikipedia entry. I've added them to the Singapore Social Media Directory (under Group A - N).