Bad Dog: “Totally Creative Graphic Studio” steals Cynthia Arre’s design
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 30th, 2010
An obvious steal. Click on the image for a bigger version.
It would be nice to hear an explanation from “Totally Creative Graphic Studio” on why they have ripped Cynthia Arre’s design onto their commercial material. This was done without permission. Oh the irony. They should rename their little design outfit to “Total Ripoff Graphic Studio.”
Here’s the link to their Multiply page with heated comments from Luis Katigbak and company.
Cynthia is a friend, as well as an award winning designer. This hurts her. Thought you could get away with it? The Internet knows all!
AudioBook Picks of the Month
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 28th, 2010
and …
Been saving my Audible credits — finally let go of two to download these two hits: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and Nurtureshock. If you’re after a gripping murder mystery, grab this book. If you’re looking for a new “controversial” book on parenting, Nurtureshock is the “Freakonomics” of raising kids.
I am Nitrox Certified!
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 28th, 2010
I finished — and passed — 23/25 correct answers! I’m now certified for Enriched Air diving, which means longer bottom time before decompression kicks in. Great for wreck diving and long live aboard dive trips!
TORQUE TQ800 Trinity: Triple SIM, WiFi, Mobile TV (below PHP 8,000.00)
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 28th, 2010
PRICE UPDATE: Below PHP 8,000.00
This landed on my desk tonight. It is called the TORQUE TQ800 Trinity. Say bye bye to dual SIM: this one has slots for three SIM cards. They call it “triple SIM, triple standby” which simply means that while one of the SIM cards is in use, the other two lines remain active. Essentially, you can have up to six numbers on this phone as it also supports GSM-based “wireless landline” numbers.
That’s not all. It also sports WiFi and mobile TV. Although a lot can be improved with the browser, it does access Facebook, Twitter, GMail and the rest of your daily social networking staples. I’m honestly impressed. TORQUE has always been pure comedy when coming up with a real estate design and this time around they’re copying a BlackBerry with a Pearl trackball as the center navigation instead of a joystick. Although response time lags a bit, the phone is still functional. In fact, they’ve even copied a bit of the BlackBerry UI.
Here are the specs:
Triple SIM, Triple Standby
WiFi
QWERTY Keyboard
Trackball
Free-To-Air Mobile TV
Quadband GSM 850/900/1800/1900 MHz
2.4 inch QVGA LCD screen (320 x 240)
Dual Cameras: 2MP compatible camera with video
JAVA/ WAP 2.0 / GPRS
BLuetooth 2.0 with A2DP (you can listen to audio wirelessly using a headset)
FM Radio
MicroSD expansion up to 8GB
Motion sensor
I’ll have a more comprehensive hands on as I get to play with this little thing. It doesn’t feel like an AAA grade phone, but the feature set is impressive. It works fine. No pricing yet. I’ll update you guys.
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A Piece of Childhood
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 26th, 2010A couple of years ago I downloaded The Ur-Quan masters, a rerelease of a game I used to play heavily in my grade school years on the PC. It had a checklist that fulfilled a sci-fi geek’s wish: lots of ships, lots of aliens, a commentary on man’s struggle against insurmountable odds, explosions, and yes — even more aliens. Star Control II was also unique as it was the first (and maybe only) game that had audio software that simulated a Sound Blaster PC sound card. In other words, even if you were on PC Speaker, you were enjoying 16-bit audio, albeit dumbed down in quality. But still.
Star Control II was nominated as one of the greatest games of all time by both Gamespot and IGN and as i said above, was re-released as an open source community project in 2002. It ran on Linux, Macintosh, XBOX, PSP, and the PC. Wait a minute — if it ran on Linux, there probably would have been a version in development for other iterations of Linux. So I searched for a Maemo version.
Eureka.
Star Control II on a Nokia N900. Grab it before Fwiffo does!
Congratulations to Benj and Vangie!
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 24th, 2010You know, it’s been a WHILE since I got comments that could serve as actual blog posts. You know, I wish I could have given away more tickets — I really wish I could! But the reality of the situation is that I only have two. And these two go to Benj and Vangie.
I chose Vangie (Banggigay) because of her apparent (and overflowing) passion for the ocean, coupled with her advocacy to hasten the adoption of solar energy in the Philippines. I chose Benj because when I first met him, he didn’t strike me as the kind of guy who would care, until we got to hang out a bit more and on one weekend, actually got to dive. Both of them are also in positions of influence (not that the others aren’t) which means that, metaphysically, “the good tends to spread” so I hope the good spreads faster with the two of them attending the talk.
This is not to say that I paid no heed to the comments of the rest — everyone did a good job, especially alongside the exchange of whether we should really “open” our marine treasures to more tourism. I wish I had more tickets to give out! 
I’d like to quote from the comments:
Man has only been around for quite a short amount of time – if the entire history of the earth were to be scrunched into 24 hours, man wouldn’t appear until the last second before the clock strikes midnight. Yet as it stands, it seems like the brief stretch of time that man has threatens the very existence and future of many organisms that came way before man. It’s a sad reality.
It is only through looking this humble perspective and this lens does one understand how minuscule he or she is as far as the world is concerned and how important it is to not harm anything in the eighty or so years that he’ll spend as a living organism on the planet. We are but a drop in the bucket – in an existential sense, it may sound very drab and somewhat depressing but that’s what it is and we have to take it for what it is. It’s calming to be part of a collective and to consider yourself as something that is one with nature and one with the only certain truth – the earth allowed millions of years of processes and evolution and for some reason, fate has allowed you to be you – at this time and at this moment.
Once you think about it that way, everything seems to feel a lot different. (from Benj)
Call me pessimistic, but part of me is glad that not many people know about the Philippines being in the center of this biodiversity.
Jayvee, I’ve spent months admiring your photographs and personal documentaries of these spectacular reefs. Sure, it would be wonderful if we market the Tubbataha, Apo Reef, and San Agapito Reef, but doesn’t it make you shudder to think about what would become of these spots when mainstream tourism hits in? (from Kate)
One of the more effective conservation projects done, although, this was outside the Philippines used the community approach. Before one educates one must first understand the community its culture and its society. The community was encouraged to re-seed giant clams and protect each area. The people believed and associated the reef as the home of their ancestors an spirit and guarding it was part of their duty.
Its more effective to convert and educate at the same time. (from Juned)
I think I understand what you’re trying to say–the Philippines’ beautiful diving sites are a bit underrated, considering that it’s relatively better (if not the best) compared to other diving locations. It is a bit frustrating too that we Filipinos don’t know this fact for ourselves. Even I have to admit that I wouldn’t have known that our country has the cooler “diving features” than other spots out there until I’ve stumbled upon your blog. (from Joben)
I believe there is nothing wrong in Philippines’ attempt to showcase its world-class dive sites to entice tourists – both local and foreign. Its marketing shots, albeit mediocre relative to its fellow Coral Triangle members, have specific, defined and viable potential. However, the absence of sustainable ecotourism program poses danger, or at worst destruction, to fragile natural marine ecosystem.
The real challenge is the formulation of specific programs and the effective methodology to ensure long term viability or sustainability of ecotourism. Marketing development and Return of Investment of Ecotourism should be put under microscopic lens to fully identify its enveloping intricate feasibility and responsibility.
Excessive and rapid development of coastal tourism (as the case of Puerto Galera, Boracay, etc) without consideration for sustainable ecotourism is approaching its breaking point that would lead to its serious decline of its surrounding water quality or may lead to further ecological problems like beach erosion retreat, runoff water to seas that affects balance of marine ecosystem and extending polluted sea area.
Ecotourism can be an important growth point of national economy (like that of Maldives, Phuket etc.) BUT we need a solid program that carries out effective sustainable ecotourism. We should have established guidelines to reduce ecotourism’s environmental impacts (if not totally eliminate) using measurable parameters. We need to take series of measures to promote ecotourism whilst effectively protecting marine ecosystem. This should not exclude grassroot level approach in educating about the sustainable strategies to those living along the coastlines, who are the actual stakeholders in the equation. It is through vigorous training and education of these stakeholders, real and absolute results can be achieved. (from Vangie)
I have to admit that I was pretty cynical about your endeavors, I mean with limited time, I have more important things to do (read: work, bills, relationships, etc) and being aware of my surroundings is far from my mind, parang let DENR and Greenpeace take charge.
but then this blog came along and i realized that at twenty five years old, I am missing a lot of important things, diving under the sea including. thanks to you guys, i became curious and started to read stuff about diving and taking it the extra mile like making use of decommissioned cars as substitute corals and yeah meron palang under the sea basura scavengers (akalain mo) but i wont be doing that yet, certainly not alone and not to soon. but for the meantime i will lessen my yosi intake from four sticks to five, that way i lessen my carbon footprint and that means, less chances of coral bleaching and more happy Nemos and Dyesebel out there. (from Marvin)
Hi Jayvee. I really admire people who dive and not just dive BUT do their share in protecting out marine environment. I tried diving once but my fear of deep see water & other sea creatures (maybe due to trauma when I was bitten by a jellyfish when I was a kid!) kept me from doing it again. Nevertheless, it doesn’t mean that people like me cannot do something for our environment, right? And thanks to people like you – we need to EDUCATE more and more people how to protect our environment. I am looking forward to see more education campaigns on this.
One of the things on my to-do-list-before-I-die is to do something meaningful for the environment (aside from being a mother to my 2 kids)… something for the future generations…something for our country…in my own little ways. I don’t know if that will happen but ever since I fell in love with our very own Philippine handmade papers, I began to see the path to my dream. I hope through my work, I am doing something for the environment and our country. It is my dream to be in this event but I have 2 kids to send to school next month so the budget for the ticket went to tuition fees & books Nevertheless, I am happy that more and more people are going GREEN! More power to your blog…(i’m an avid reader ) Sorry for the long post…na-carried away lang po. (from Airees)
Overflow
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 21st, 2010The machinations of Philippine commerce is rooted in sponsorships. A sponsorship is not a gift. It comes attached with a string, more often than not a tight one. It tugs. It demands. It does so in exchange for something of greater or equal value. But it does so with a smile.
On the other hand, a patron is someone who wants nothing in return for art. He recognizes art for its own sake, a valuable gift which cannot be repaid — and continues to funnel resources for that very purpose — the pursuit of art.
When blogs were born, they became an effective medium to shake the status quo. As they grew, a lot were drowned in sponsorships. One after the other. Amidst the smiles, the glamor and the coverage, they cry, knee deep, that silent scream for Freedom.
Kevin Costner saves the oil spill: channels Waterworld
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 18th, 2010
What I find simultaneously epic and funny is that the device he’s using quite resembles the contraption he used to filter urine from fresh water in his blockbuster hit, Waterworld.
Warning (GRAPHIC): Sniper kills red shirts in Thailand
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 18th, 2010
Harvest
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 18th, 2010
It came to the point where I had to move a little bit of rock to get the sorry little buggers out of the crevices. Floating from an angle, I motioned to Denise that I wanted to give it a shot and grabbed the BBQ tongs to pry the crown out of its strong velcro-like grip on the coral. Try removing a piece of velcro using tongs and you can imagine how hard that is. Do it while trying to stay buoyant, with a video camera rig dangling from your jacket. Do it while trying not to harm the surrounding coral life.
We were deployed in Santelmo, a marine protected area, which had a higher density of Crown of Thorns starfish. The other cove, Etayo, was swept for garbage. The raw footage is over 30 minutes of video and perhaps my longest dive to date on a 3,000 psi tank of air. We were underwater for over 70 minutes at a maximum depth of 50 feet, explaining why we had so much. Surprisingly, the cove to the left of Pico de Loro had much to offer: coral patches with fish, lobsters at 40 feet, and a school of over 25 cuttlefish hovering by. Maybe we were just lucky.
The Crown of Thorns extraction is a project of Pepsi’s Sarap Magbago campaign in partnership with SM’s Hamilo Coast and the WWF Philippines. I am a WWF donor, volunteer diver and “video guy” for this cleanup mission.
I’m on a boat
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 17th, 2010
Crap. I thought I had my camera inside the car’s glove compartment. The joke’s on me. So it was just me and the Nokia N900′s camera. I took a hundred or so photos inside the Costa Romantica. After all, I’m on a boat. Click for more photos.
