Beauty and the beast in sports

Sports is a beautiful thing and sporting success is even more wonderful. But what do we do about the spoilsports that always dog the big events?



IT was a crazy night, wasn’t it? Yes, like everybody else, I am talking about last Sunday when the two giants of Manchester and the London upstarts called Queens Park Rangers took us all on a roller-coaster ride of emotions.

One minute, City were taking the title with QPR going down; the next, it was United taking the title and QPR staying up – and just when it seemed that all had been settled bar for the drunken celebrations on the red side of the town, everything turned on its head.

And City are the champions and QPR are staying up. Thank God for that — the QPR bit, I mean. I don’t care too much about City being champions although it’s nice to see the Devils off their high-horses for once.

The way the emotions ran that night, I almost wished QPR had just stayed down the season before. It’s just too much excitement for people like me.

And I’m sure I wasn’t the only one. But in all that excitement, we all forgot that other big game.

What other big game, you ask?

Well, Sunday was also the day when the national hockey team became Asian champions — for the first time ever, and at any age-level.

It was an achievement we should have been shouting about, a crowning glory for a side that has always been overshadowed by the South Asian giants Pakistan and India and, even the South Koreans. Those pesky Koreans beat us at everything, and it was great to see our boys whip them 6-3 in Malacca.

Now, we have to salute the young juniors who overcame the odds, beat the Indians in the semi-finals and the Pakistanis in the final to bury those old ghosts. And one of the players was still in mourning. His father had died just days earlier.

We also have to salute the coaches, the once-mercurial Minarwan Nawawi (who has never won the title even while playing in a star-studded team) and the ever-steady K. Dharmaraj.

Dharmaraj almost lost his job as coach but survived and went on to this.

Absolutely glorious for him and Minarwan. And it brought back memories of that fantastic fourth place finish in the World Cup in 1975. And we can now dream of greater glory at senior level.

But there always has to be an ugly side.

In Manchester, there was that dumb Joey Barton doing what he did — and after being red-carded!

And on the hockey pitch after Malaysia had become champions, the crowd went crazy. They surged on to the pitch. And guess what? They were not joining the boys in celebrations.

They were stealing the players’ hockey sticks!

Five players lost their sticks and Dharmaraj had to hastily hide his wallet for fear that it may be snatched from him.

What do we do about these crazy goons? It’s a problem that’s been dogging sports for years.

I remember in a veterans’ football tournament in Penang, a spectator came over to ask a winning player if he could take a look at his medal. When the guy handed it over, this young chap coolly walked away with the medal!

When all the other players caught him and forced him to return his medal, he brought a bunch of gangsters to beat up the players.

And they say Barton is a lout.

Talking of controversy dogging sports, that’s exactly what is happening with the next extravaganza we are waiting for. Euro 2012 has gotten ugly.

Ukraine and Poland are jointly hosting Europe’s greatest show. And to make sure it puts a fine face to the visiting world, Ukraine has decided to clear its streets of stray dogs.

So what do the authorities do? They round up the dogs, hit them with poison and then burn them in mobile incinerators.

And there have been claims that the dogs are still alive as they are set alight. It seems the dogs are being hanged as well.

There has been a huge outcry in the Internet. An online petition has been signed by thousands, and many are suggesting that the Euros be taken someplace else — some place where there is not that much cruelty to animals.

And Pamela Anderson is hot — under the collar, that is. The sex bombshell with the now less-than-extra-large chest has written to UEFA president Michel Platini to react to the mass slaughter.

She’s not the first sex symbol to be pained by the killing of dogs.

During the 1988 Olympics and the 2002 World Cup Finals in South Korea, the government had to tell its citizens not to eat dog meat. And butchers were also told not to hang dog carcasses in the windows.
It was Brigitte Bardot who complained then.

> Malaysia has its own dog woes, what with a jogger being killed in an attack and with authorities brazenly killing the animals in many places.

Why Not? By D. RAJ

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HP on More Layoffs!

Hewlett Packard, CEO, Meg Whitman may announce a major layoff with next Wednesday’s earnings call when she also details a company restructuring plan. Whitman could eliminate 30,000 workers out of a total of 325,000 or 9% of the workforce. Whitman is repositioning the company away from PCs as smartphones and tablets displace desktop computers. HP may add to sales, product development and R&D. The New York Times reported the news.

Stop the Bleeding

HP needs innovation to staunch the slide in revenues and profits. Revenues could decline 4% to $122 billion this year from $127 billion in 2011.

Aggressive cost cutting by former CEO Mark Hurd may have disadvantaged the company by reducing products in the pipeline. Then, major acquisitions by Whitman’s immediate predecessor, Leo Apotheker, who was with the firm for less than a year, reduced the cash hoard but did not contribute to financial performance and earnings fell sharply. HP spent $40 billion in acquisitions over four years, but was not able to monetize them.

HP has mature product lines in decline. It dominates in PCs that face dwindling demand, margin pressure and intense competition from Asian suppliers. HP also dominates in printers, which generate cash but are fading. About 75% the services business is tied to printers, so that baby goes out with the bathwater. HP may combine the PC and printer units. HP does not play in smart phones and tablets.

Cheap and Getting Cheaper

HP has the lowest valuation of the large cap technology companies. Competitors Cisco, IBM and Oracle have market capitalizations of about 2.3 times revenues, but HP’s market cap is one-fourth its revenues. HP invests less in R&D than its rivals. On the average, Cisco, IBM and Oracle invest about 9% of revenues in R&D while HP invests 2%.

Unlike its competitors that have a vertical integration strategy, HP partners with Microsoft for operating software and with Intel for processors. Investors do not consider Microsoft and Intel to be innovators. Because HP does not control all the processes, it is slow to adopt new technologies. More than a decade ago, HP announced a vision to integrate all the entertainment devices in the home, including the PC and TV. But Apple made the vision a reality, not HP.

Tough Competition

In the consumer market, Apple and Google have the majority of share in smartphones and tablets. Apple leveraged  its iOS operating system that allows devices to synch up and interplay to lock customers into the brand. Apple controls the software, microprocessor design and manufacturing. The vertical integration allows it to beat rivals with advanced technologies.

Competitors have blocked the enterprise too. IBM trumped HP in consulting, security and systems management. Oracle beat HP in software, like big data, storage and analytics. And, Cisco controls networking and cloud gear. What is left?

About her plans, Whitman said in BusinessWeek in March that “We need to move quickly to capture emerging opportunities in areas like cloud, security, and information management,” Whitman continued. “We’ve already assembled some formidable assets. Now we need to align our portfolio to deliver a new generation of capabilities. We see a once-in-a-generation chance to define the future of technology and position HP as a leader for decades to come.”

By Susan Kalla, Forbes Contributor

 

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Facebook? No thanks!

As Facebook grows, millions say, 'no, thanks'
 

(AP) NEW YORK -- Don't try to friend MaLi Arwood on Facebook. You won't find her there.

You won't find Thomas Chin, either. Or Kariann Goldschmitt. Or Jake Edelstein.

More than 900 million people worldwide check their Facebook accounts at least once a month, but millions more are Facebook holdouts.

They say they don't want Facebook. They insist they don't need Facebook. They say they're living life just fine without the long-forgotten acquaintances that the world's largest social network sometimes resurrects.

They are the resisters.

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"I'm absolutely in touch with everyone in my life that I want to be in touch with," Arwood says. "I don't need to share triviality with someone that I might have known for six months 12 years ago."

Even without people like Arwood, Facebook is one of the biggest business success stories in history.

The site had 1 million users by the end of 2004, the year Mark Zuckerberg started it in his Harvard dorm room. Two years later, it had 12 million. Facebook had 500 million by summer 2010 and 901 million as of March 31, according to the company.

That staggering rise in popularity is one reason why Facebook Inc.'s initial public offering is one of the most hotly anticipated in years. The company's shares are expected to begin trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market on Friday under the ticker symbol "FB". Facebook is likely to have an estimated market valuation of some $100 billion, making it worth more than Kraft Foods, Ford or Disney.

Facebook still has plenty of room to grow, particularly in developing countries where people are only starting to get Internet access. As it is, about 80 percent of its users are outside U.S. and Canada.

But if Facebook is to live up to its pre-IPO hype and reward the investors who are clamoring for its stock this week, it needs to convince some of the resisters to join. Two out of every five American adults have not joined Facebook, according to a recent Associated Press-CNBC poll. Among those who are not on Facebook, a third cited a lack of interest or need.

If all those people continue to shun Facebook, the social network could become akin to a postal system that only delivers mail to houses on one side of the street. The system isn't as useful, and people aren't apt to spend as much time with it. That means fewer opportunities for Facebook to sell ads.

Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, says that new communications channels - from the telephone to radio, TV and personal computers - often breed a cadre of holdouts in their early days.

"It's disorienting because people have different relationships with others depending on the media they use," Rainie says. "But we've been through this before. As each new communications media comes to prominence, there is a period of adoption."

Len Kleinrock, 77, says Facebook is fine for his grandchildren, but it's not for him.

"I do not want more distractions," he says. "As it is, I am deluged with email. My friends and colleagues have ready access to me and I don't really want another service that I would feel obliged to check into on a frequent basis."

Kleinrock says his resistance is generational, but discomfort with technology isn't a factor.

After all, Kleinrock is arguably the world's first Internet user. The University of California, Los Angeles professor was part of the team that invented the Internet. His lab was where researchers gathered in 1969 to send test data between two bulky computers -the beginnings of the Arpanet network, which morphed into the Internet we know today.

"I'm having a `been-there, done-that' feeling," Kleinrock says. "There's not a need on my part for reaching out and finding new social groups to interact with. I have trouble keeping up with those I'm involved with now." Thomas Chin, 35, who works at an advertising and media planning company in New York, says he may be missing out on what friends-of-friends-of-friends are doing, but he doesn't need Facebook to connect with family and closer acquaintances.

"If we're going to go out to do stuff, we organize it (outside) of Facebook," he says.

Some people don't join the social network because they don't have a computer or Internet access, are concerned about privacy, or generally dislike Facebook. Those without a college education are less likely to be on Facebook, as are those with lower incomes.

Women who choose to skip Facebook are more likely than men to cite privacy issues, while seniors are more likely than those 50-64 years old to cite computer issues, according the AP-CNBC poll.

About three-quarters of seniors are not on Facebook. By contrast, more than half of those under 35 use it every day.

The poll of 1,004 adults nationwide was conducted by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Corporate Communications May 3-7 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.

Steve Jones, a professor who studies online culture and communications at the University of Illinois at Chicago, says many resisters consider Facebook to be too much of a chore.

"We've added social networking to our lives. We haven't added any hours to our days," Jones says. "The decision to be online on Facebook is simultaneously a decision not to be doing something else."

Jones says many people on Facebook try to overcome that by multitasking, but they end up splitting their attention and engaging with others online only superficially.

Arwood, 47, a restaurant manager in Chicago, says she was surprised when colleagues on an English-teaching program in rural Spain in 2010 opted to spend their breaks checking Facebook.

"I spent my time on break trying to learn more about the Spanish culture, really taking advantage of it," she says. "I went on walks with some of the students and asked them questions."

Kariann Goldschmitt, 32, a music professor at New College of Florida in Sarasota, Fla., was on Facebook not long after its founding in 2004, but she quit in 2010. In part, it was because of growing concerns about her privacy and Facebook's ongoing encouragement of people to share more about themselves with the company, with marketers and with the world.

She says she's been much more productive since leaving.

"I was a typical user, on it once or twice a day," she says. "After a certain point, I sort of resented how it felt like an obligation rather than fun."

Besides Facebook resisters and quitters, there are those who take a break. In some cases, people quit temporarily as they apply for new jobs, so that potential employers won't stumble on photos of their wild nights out drinking. Although Facebook doesn't make it easy to find, it offers an option for suspending accounts (Look for a link under the "Security" tab in "Account Settings.")

Goldschmitt says it takes effort to stay in touch with friends and relatives without Facebook. For instance, she has to make mental notes of when her friends are expecting babies, knowing that they have become so used to Facebook "that they don't engage with us anymore."

"I'm like, `Hmmm, when is nine months?' I have to remember to contact them since they won't remember to tell me when the baby's born."

Neil Robinson, 54, a government lawyer in Washington, says that when his nephew's son was born, pictures went up on Facebook almost immediately. As a Facebook holdout, he had to wait for someone to email photos.

After years of resisting, Robinson plans to join next month, mostly because he doesn't want to lose touch with younger relatives who choose Facebook as their primary means of communication.

But for every Robinson, there is an Edelstein, who has no desire for Facebook and prefers email and postcards.

"I prefer to keep my communications personal and targeted," says Jake Edelstein, 41, a pharmaceutical consultant in New York. "You're getting a message that's written for you. Clearly someone took the time to sit down to do it."

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