Before reading this, please see the disclaimers at the bottom.
What is wrong wth the Malaysian IT scene can be dully observed from one of the most significant ICT event here in this country called the MSC Malaysia International Advisory Panel (or IAP) meeting. Here's the website of said event: http://iap-portal.msc.com.my/ .Surf the website and you'll see what I mean.
1)It's the the people, stupid
Browsing through the IAP website, we have the impression that it is just a business event. Nothing "techie" about it. In fact, asking around, it seems that the Malaysian tech communities are blissfully unaware of such event is going on right now under our collective hairy noses in PICC this week.
How on earth can the most important part of the tech. industry (i.e. the tech. people) are not even informed, heck, are not even welcomed to the biggest MSC event this year?!
Is it just me or is MSC a place where techies are regarded as second class citizens compared to quote unquote businessmen? How on earth can MDeC justify limiting their allocation for tech. employees under their pre-seed and iconity grant to only RM 1500 per month (irregardless of qualifications or experiences)? BTW, just to put things in perspective, the government of Malaysia recently declared that families earning RM 3000 or less per month and are living in cities are called the urban poor. If two techies, a boy and a gal, working for a preseed or iconity recipient companies decide get married, they superchalafragilisticexpiallodociously become the urban poor. And MDeC lament about the lack of talents in ICT, who wants to work hard during their University days and end up being declared poor!
Have these guys never learn?!
Build a strong community and business will come. That's the lesson of Silicon Valley that has somehow escape the collective brains of our policy makers. Silicon Valley started with the universities in the area. These universities have been building tech communities and when the electronic/transistor revolution came into the picture BAMM!!, the magic happens. But it started with communities. Not businesses.
The MSC brand has been a failure because it was attached to companies. MSC companies are known today as companies that do not pay EPF, do not give salary on time, try to treat their employees as slaves (gee, I wonder where they learn that from) by asking them to do extra hours and not getting paid for it. Companies are soulless money making machines. They would cut corners and take advantage of any loophole just to get another dime on their balance sheet. This can be seen by companies opening up "ghost branches" in MSC status area (such as Cyberjaya) just to escape paying taxes.
Communities on the other hand live and die by the spirit of its people. They rely on people being truthful, honest and willing to sacrifice. And yet, MDeC is blind to these sacrifices. In fact, some of our community leaders are so pissed poor, they can't even afford to buy LRT tickets. Some have to beg for jobs and some got so upset they left the country for good (good for them, bad for Malaysia). Those who bite their lips and stay are riddled with redtapes and unfulfilled promises that its not even funny anymore.
If MDeC would have spent as much on building the soulless MSC companies as they would on building communities, we would have gone further by now!
2) The locals are just as good
Looking at the talks and the programs listed on the website, I was really wondering "Gee, I can do that talk too. Heck, I can even do it better since I know the local context".
I mean gosh!, it says "international" but are the locals too stoopeed to advise MSC and how to go about doing things? Isn't Dr. Mahathir's main message to the world is that we want to be strong, but we will do it OUR WAY! Somehow that message, that twitt, does not reach MDeC.
Are our collective brains still clogged with the imperialist white-men fetish that we can't even see how much our own people have grown over the years?. Somehow, just because you're white, no matter how stupid , incompetent or evil minded you are, you are always correct. "Yes sir Mr. Balmer sir, you can rob my country and kick my butt to boot. It's ok because you're an American and you're the CEO of Microsoft"
Stop this stupid nonsense! I can give more relevant advices to MSC and I'll do it for free (heck, I even said it outloud here and here) and yet, just because my butt is the wrong color, no one gives a crap!
3) So much more
I have so much more to rant but tears are running through my eyes watching how much my beloved country is wasting yet again an oppurtunity to turn things around. I really hope our future leaders would have enough insight to consider my rant. Hopefully, things will get better. We have no other choice, we either get better... or die ...
DISCLAIMERS
If you are an MDeC employee, please do not think of my rant as an attack on you personally. I do think that people in MDeC are also individuals (and thus part of the community) who choose to work with MDeC when they can pour their talent somewhere else (and probably get better pay). Heck, I know a few good people in MDeC who were courted by oversea companies and yet they decline the offer for the love of the country. If anything, they are more into it then us developers. I believe that people in MDeC are heroes but some of the policies are real time-wasters.
What is wrong wth the Malaysian IT scene can be dully observed from one of the most significant ICT event here in this country called the MSC Malaysia International Advisory Panel (or IAP) meeting. Here's the website of said event: http://iap-portal.msc.com.my/ .Surf the website and you'll see what I mean.
1)It's the the people, stupid
Browsing through the IAP website, we have the impression that it is just a business event. Nothing "techie" about it. In fact, asking around, it seems that the Malaysian tech communities are blissfully unaware of such event is going on right now under our collective hairy noses in PICC this week.
How on earth can the most important part of the tech. industry (i.e. the tech. people) are not even informed, heck, are not even welcomed to the biggest MSC event this year?!
Is it just me or is MSC a place where techies are regarded as second class citizens compared to quote unquote businessmen? How on earth can MDeC justify limiting their allocation for tech. employees under their pre-seed and iconity grant to only RM 1500 per month (irregardless of qualifications or experiences)? BTW, just to put things in perspective, the government of Malaysia recently declared that families earning RM 3000 or less per month and are living in cities are called the urban poor. If two techies, a boy and a gal, working for a preseed or iconity recipient companies decide get married, they superchalafragilisticexpiallodociously become the urban poor. And MDeC lament about the lack of talents in ICT, who wants to work hard during their University days and end up being declared poor!
Have these guys never learn?!
Build a strong community and business will come. That's the lesson of Silicon Valley that has somehow escape the collective brains of our policy makers. Silicon Valley started with the universities in the area. These universities have been building tech communities and when the electronic/transistor revolution came into the picture BAMM!!, the magic happens. But it started with communities. Not businesses.
The MSC brand has been a failure because it was attached to companies. MSC companies are known today as companies that do not pay EPF, do not give salary on time, try to treat their employees as slaves (gee, I wonder where they learn that from) by asking them to do extra hours and not getting paid for it. Companies are soulless money making machines. They would cut corners and take advantage of any loophole just to get another dime on their balance sheet. This can be seen by companies opening up "ghost branches" in MSC status area (such as Cyberjaya) just to escape paying taxes.
Communities on the other hand live and die by the spirit of its people. They rely on people being truthful, honest and willing to sacrifice. And yet, MDeC is blind to these sacrifices. In fact, some of our community leaders are so pissed poor, they can't even afford to buy LRT tickets. Some have to beg for jobs and some got so upset they left the country for good (good for them, bad for Malaysia). Those who bite their lips and stay are riddled with redtapes and unfulfilled promises that its not even funny anymore.
If MDeC would have spent as much on building the soulless MSC companies as they would on building communities, we would have gone further by now!
2) The locals are just as good
Looking at the talks and the programs listed on the website, I was really wondering "Gee, I can do that talk too. Heck, I can even do it better since I know the local context".
I mean gosh!, it says "international" but are the locals too stoopeed to advise MSC and how to go about doing things? Isn't Dr. Mahathir's main message to the world is that we want to be strong, but we will do it OUR WAY! Somehow that message, that twitt, does not reach MDeC.
Are our collective brains still clogged with the imperialist white-men fetish that we can't even see how much our own people have grown over the years?. Somehow, just because you're white, no matter how stupid , incompetent or evil minded you are, you are always correct. "Yes sir Mr. Balmer sir, you can rob my country and kick my butt to boot. It's ok because you're an American and you're the CEO of Microsoft"
Stop this stupid nonsense! I can give more relevant advices to MSC and I'll do it for free (heck, I even said it outloud here and here) and yet, just because my butt is the wrong color, no one gives a crap!
3) So much more
I have so much more to rant but tears are running through my eyes watching how much my beloved country is wasting yet again an oppurtunity to turn things around. I really hope our future leaders would have enough insight to consider my rant. Hopefully, things will get better. We have no other choice, we either get better... or die ...
DISCLAIMERS
If you are an MDeC employee, please do not think of my rant as an attack on you personally. I do think that people in MDeC are also individuals (and thus part of the community) who choose to work with MDeC when they can pour their talent somewhere else (and probably get better pay). Heck, I know a few good people in MDeC who were courted by oversea companies and yet they decline the offer for the love of the country. If anything, they are more into it then us developers. I believe that people in MDeC are heroes but some of the policies are real time-wasters.
1 comment:
Azrul,
I am abit late on the scene (too much kampung politics some years back). Can you provide us with real names or cases who actually went hungry and then left the country? I like to look out for them.
red1
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