Greek Complexity

The argument over Internet freedom

...aka piracy, depending on who you talk to, is fast becoming a hot-potato issue.

Even in sedate Singapore. Entrepreneur Bernard Leong makes his case to the Singapore government as to why they should not enact a law similar to SOPA. You'll find his piece here. He says:

The burden of reviewing every blog post, tweet and video submission is impossible to manage for any company. This is similar to the situation in China, where video sites such as Tudou have to hire people to monitor content uploads 24-7 to ensure that no sensitive political content is uploaded.

SGE‘s opposition against SOPA/PIPA legislation is not focused on freedom of speech arguments which have been brought forward by many digital advocates. You can read about these elsewhere. Our concern is that such legislation has profound implications to our economy.

He later says:

There has been strong resistance against both bills not just from many technology entrepreneurs from the start-up space but also from multi-national companies such as Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Twitter and Facebook.

...meaning that the opponents of such legislation are, as one would expect, those who would suffer most from SOPA-like legislation. Now, The Economist said in their usual forthright style a few weeks ago that:

The bill’s supporters want this [how content should be distributed and paid for] to change as slowly as possible, so they have time to adapt. Opponents want to see more rapid changes in business models to speed up overdue innovation: cheaper pricing in poor countries, more use of on-demand digital services, less exclusivity in distribution, and ultimately, less reliance on selling albums and DVDs. Yet self-interest is at work on both sides: many of the bill’s critics are trying to create just these kinds of business.

A related issue is now boiling over in India. Global Internet companies are in effect being held accountable for things that their users said, even though a law had previously been passed specifically to clarify that Internet companies and other intermediaries could not be held liable for their users' misdeeds (as long as certain conditions were met). See Is India Ignoring its own Internet Protections?.

So who's right? I'd rather focus on the freedom-of-speech argument that Bernard eschews. High-minded? Idealistic? Yes and yes. But that doesn't make the argument any less valid. In fact, focusing on dollars and cents cheapens the issue.

Note also, as The Economist implies, that arguing purely on economic grounds is to pick winners and losers. Who is to judge whether Google's and Facebook's claims are more valid than counter-claims by Newscorp and CBS? On what basis can one pick one side over another?

Taking the freedom-of-speech tack will probably not have much effect in Singapore (possibly the reason Bernard avoids this argument to begin with) but I think this is the right argument as a matter of principle. Possibly the only right argument. It certainly doesn't have the conflict of interest of the economic arguments advanced.

Top 3 myths about immigration

Short and informative video about immigration:

This is about America not about Singapore but I can't imagine the conclusions would be that different for Singapore or anywhere else.

It's finally that time

Time for me to capitulate and create a Politics category for this blog. I tried to sneak this in a while back by creating a "Government/policy" category but I might as well go the whole hog.

And for my next trick: a copy-paste of a short discussion I had on a friend's Facebook page (minor edits done for sake of flow and grammar).

Friend's post: Now Singaporeans remember, we need another 900,000 foreign workers on work permits

[a few inconsequential comments followed by...]

Person A: Guys, a huge portion of them fill the construction industry. Without them, who to build our ever increasing housing demand?

Blood on their hands

Those of you who read this post of mine the other day may be interested to know that the Straits Times chose not to publish my letter, never mind apologising for publishing inflammatory letters as I pointed out. Not that I expected any more. They would rather publish letters from, to take an example at random, someone complaining that he didn't get to participate in a lucky draw while shopping. One person's $ over the lives of thousands? Welcome to Singapore!

I'll give them this: they did publish brief letters from other cyclists but no major rebuttal of the arguments in the original letter and, of course, no explanation for why such an irrational letter was printed to begin with. One of the letter-writers told me privately that his letter was heavily edited before publishing.

The next time there is a casualty on the roads because of road rage or a plain ol' sense of entitlement, the Straits Times and Dr Terence Teoh will have blood on their hands.

In slightly more positive news, this saga has caught the attention of readers outside Singapore too. See this and this, both websites with large followings in the cycling world.

Anti-anti-cycling

Anti-cycling sentiment in Singapore scaled new heights yesterday with the publishing of this letter by the Straits Times, Singapore's largest daily.

One wonders why the sentiment. After all, as a friend of mine said:

There seems to be some misconception that cyclists cause congestions. Next time you are stuck in a jam look for the cyclist causing the jam. You won't be able to. Cars cause jams.

There also seems to be a sense that since cyclists don't pay road taxes, their right to use the roads is somehow diminished. I've heard this point being made ad nauseam but hang on a second: the purpose of road taxes is to fund road investment and maintenance. They don't confer any road use rights on the tax payer. The roads are public property. Bicycles are used by far fewer people and don't cause the wear and tear on roads that other vehicles do to begin with. This is the same reason pedestrians don't pay road tax every time they cross the road or use the footpath (which I imagine are maintained using the same taxes).

I wrote the following letter to the Straits Times today in response to yesterday's letter.

Dear Sir,

I refer to the letter, “Curb recreational cycling on roads” dated March 1, 2011.

Even as a motorist myself, I fail to understand Dr Teoh’s argument.

• Is he saying that all road users not proceeding to work or back home must be banned from the roads, presumably including himself?
• If I were to commute to work by MRT instead of by road, would I have the right to order joyriders off the train for my personal comfort?
• The bicycle was invented before the motorcar and cyclists were on the roads before drivers —this right was not accorded recently, as Dr Teoh seems to say— so where would we be if cyclists reversed the argument and began ordering cars off the road?

The logic is unappealing. The roads are public property and no one person has any larger claim on them than any other.

If Dr Teoh were to recognise that he, like all other road users, is part of a system and equally responsible for traffic (or arguably more, since four cyclists occupy less space than a car), and if he were to suggest improvements for the system as a whole, I would support him completely. For example, he could agitate for wider roads, higher ERP charges, more flyovers, public transport improvements, higher fuel surcharges, etc. Targeting just one group is unfair and sets a precedent — tomorrow he may be the target of the next “improvement”.

Even if no such systematic changes are made, when faced with slower traffic of any kind, all road users have choices: overtake safely at an appropriate distance (1.5m is the legal requirement taught at driving schools for all traffic, not just cyclists), wait a few seconds to allow the route to clear, take a different route, commute at a different time, use a different form of transport, etc. I’m sure Dr Teoh exercises one or more of these choices when faced with large vehicles and taxis stopping for passengers — why not cyclists too?

I would thank the Straits Times not to print such inflammatory letters. We have enough accidental deaths on our roads not to add to them by inflaming people’s passions with misguided arguments.

Murli Ravi

Let's see whether they publish it. I do question their judgement in publishing the original letter to begin with. It's not like we have a paucity of road rage in Singapore. We could learn a lot from Malaysian drivers.

If you would like to express your own views without going to the trouble of writing a letter, please take this Straits Times survey and choose what you think is the best way forward.

If I were to choose just one, my least-worst choice would be "Fund and create a self-governance culture..." but adding drivers to the mix: neither the problem nor the solution lies with cyclists alone surely? Along these lines, one notes with a sigh that the starting assumption of every survey response is that cyclists need to do something to remedy the situation, not road users as a whole (the usual ST survey full of leading questions). Even so, something is better than nothing, I suppose.

Sign of the times

From eBay:

Own half of a house for $16,000 and receive Income

This is how it works;

You put up the $16,000

We go in halves on a house in the Palm Springs Ca. Area using yours and my income to qualify for the mortgage.

1. I pay the down payment and closing costs out of the $16,000.
2. I make ready the house to rent.
3. Until rented I pay the mortgage.  
4. I rent the property to a third party
5. The rents go into a joint account.
6. The joint account pays the mortgage, Property Taxes, Insurance and any other expense we may have.  Anything over that amount is profit and can be paid out to us.  The monthly payment will be around $550 a month.  We will be able to rent the property for $950 a month.   And that is how you can own half a house and get a second income at the same time for $16,000.
7. But in this case there is more; you see these properties sold for over $300,000 in 2006 before the housing crash.  We will buy for under $100,000 if we act now.  So there is a good chance the value of the property could double in around five or ten years for a really nice profit when we sell.
8. There is no other legitimate investment that is this safe and pays this much over time.
9. For best results Act Now while the newest houses (built between 2003-2007) are still available.

Interesting. And what makes this joker think anyone who is willing to put up $16,000 while he puts up zero will be willing to give up half the rental income and capital appreciation?

To the pedants out there: I know he says he will pay the mortgage until the property is rented out, but there's nothing preventing him from renting it to a passing hobo for a dollar a day. Also, note the fine print about how the initial $16,000 is used.

Global financial crisis? No, Western financial crisis

Kishore Mahbubani, an outspoken former diplomat (there's a contradiction for you) and current academic in Singapore, is a person whose views I usually find myself detesting, their generally being of the aggressively far-right variety, continentalistic (as an analogue to nationalistic, if I may be allowed to coin a neologism) and full of just plain preachy know-it-all-ness. Imagine therefore my surprise when I read an article by him in the FT yesterday, in which he comes across as quite reasonable and accurate. My favourite bit was:

Indeed, if the Thais and Indonesians did not come from inherently polite societies, they would say to the US and Europe: "The time has come for you to administer the same bitter medicine you prescribed to us: stop living beyond your means."

The article makes several other very good points, which I won't bother quoting here because then I might as well copy-past the entire article here.

The one thing I still disagree with him pretty strongly on is his notion of Asianness, something I consider quite nonsensical. As I've ranted before in a different context, there is no such thing as Asia. Or to be more specific, there is no one correct definition of Asia beyond the purely factual geographic one (and even that isn't clear -- is Turkey part of Asia? Is Australia? Eastern Russia?). So for someone to claim to speak for all of "Asia" is silly at the very least. For someone who happens to come from one of Asia's smallest countries to attempt to assume this mantle is just absurd.

Still, this article is very much worth a read.

Link: Asia has had enough of excusing the west

More groundnotes

Sorry for three posts in two days linking to the same blog but this guy's stuff is golden! The best, totally sardonic quote from this post:

The sum total of our national identity is Katong laksa and the Orchard Road experience. Clearly we’re about to take our place at the table of great nations.

Patriotism in the Inauthentic Nation

Economists and historians

Gideon Rachman writes in the FT that economists need to be swept off their throne. He says:

Joseph Stiglitz, another Nobel prize-winning economist, has suggested that: “If science is defined by its ability to forecast the future, the failure of much of the economics profession to see the crisis coming should be a cause of great concern.” Yet Prof Stiglitz’s conclusion is disappointingly mild: economists must simply search for new “paradigms” – and then presumably go back into the business of scientific prediction.

For somebody educated as a historian, there is an obvious alternative conclusion to draw from Prof Stiglitz’s opening observation. And that is to conclude that the entire attempt to treat economics as a “science ... defined by its ability to forecast the future” is misconceived.

[...]

Some might respond that such a critique exaggerates the hardness of “hard” science and the softness of economics. Maybe so: but then again buildings constructed according to the laws of physics seem to stand, whereas policies and trading systems constructed according to the “laws” of economics have a nasty habit of collapsing.

There's not much that's new here. Others have raged against economists and economics in the past, though few may have made the case for historians in economists' stead.

What Rachman doesn't state explicitly is that human memory is short. We don't remember most things beyond a couple of generations (we just weren't there) and forget many things that happen within our own lifetimes. That's where the systematic study of history comes in.

Link: Sweep economists off their throne

An old interview with David Marshall

I just discovered this but his thoughts remain relevant today. Which speaks of our progress or lack thereof.

THINK HAPPINESS: Meeting David Marshall In 1994

Some quotes:

If every year we have more death sentences, how can you say death sentence is a deterrent? If it were, there should be less death sentences.

You talk of Asian values. I only know two Asian values and, I wish someone would really pinpoint them instead of pontificating ponderously in humbug and hypocrisy.

I’d like them to also understand that justice is a meld of law and humanity. Law and humanity; decency in concepts; if we administer law by the soulless logic of the computer, we aren’t on our road to progress.

For me, the punishment must not fit the crime, the punishment must fit the criminal and the punishment must fit the needs of society.

Our society has no soul, no passion, no real intellect. No civility. Too true. But, hang on, we can mandate these into being! Anyone for a Get Soul Movement?