Tuesday, April 1, 2014

April Fooled

Today's the day when print media used to plant a fictitious story as a joke, and everyone has fun in spotting the spoof. But the humour is lost when they hike the utility charges on one page, and talk about offsetting the suffering in another.

As the numbers go, 800,000 households are supposed to receive up to $45 million in utilities rebates. The Ministry of Finance calculates this should cover 3 to 4 months of utility bills for families living in one- and two-room flats. That's approximately less than $20 per month for these folks. After the 3 to 4 months of relief runs out, they may have to resort to washing up in public toilets and using candles for illumination. That's not funny at all.

The permanent secretaries who perpetuate this one-hand give, one-hand take charade sure has a sick sense of humour. A cynical salesman who demonstrated the Draco set-top box (STB) - which is needed when digital television broadcast is finally rolled out by end 2016 - said that when they waived the $100 television fee, they were already planning to rip us off on pay-TV charges. The cable or mioTV option costs more than $20 a month.  There's good reason the newer public housing flats don't have a central master antenna, free to air (FTA) broadcasts is going the way of the dodo.

The Draco STB retails at $129. Or you could buy a new TV with a digital tuner conforming to the DVB-T2 standard. Early adopters who bought the DVB-T tuner just got plugged. There's talk the STB will be provided free for the needy; electricity charges are extra costs.

Maybe those folks whose utility bills are in the region of $20 a month weren't supposed to watch television. Maybe they are supposed to stay quietly in their darkened room to save energy; every hour for them is a lights-out Earth Hour. And since their homes will be kept in the dark, no one will notice there are poor people in developed countries like Singapore. Kishore Mahbubani, who has just been named by leading British current affairs Prospect magazine as one of this year's top 50 world thinkers, was the first to say poverty in Singapore has been eradicated. Now that's funny.

27 comments:

  1. don't believe the sh*t about digital set-up box. Use this. It works!!!
    http://makezine.com/projects/digital-tv-coat-hanger-antenna/
    or this
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?hl=en-GB&gl=SG&v=EWQhlmJTMzw

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The coat hanger, rabbit-ear and the HDB master antenna all can receive the UHF signals, but only in the analogue form. You need a digital tuner to decode the DVB-T2 broadcasts and take advantage of the HDTV content and features. After 2016, all analogue broadcasts will be stopped. Starhub and mioTV uses DVB-C, which is highly compressed and inferior to DVB-T2. That's why Mediacorp has to install repeaters all over the island, and taking so long for the roll-out.

      Delete
  2. If Mahbubani is all we've got, then heaven help us. He embodies the answer to his book, Can Asians Think? (Note that his latest edition omits his pose as a thinker, an irony indeed.) The increasing use of the device of "rebates" and handouts appears deliberate to engender as sense of gratitude. Remember that paper general's call to wage war against the citizens at every street corner. The GE is looming and the desperation is evident.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Mahboney once said the average family will not need to have a car in Singapore but I don't recall him ever telling us why he himself need to have a car. Maybe he takes public transport but if anyone sees him driving a car, please remember to ask him why he needs to have a car himself if our public transport is already so good as what he insists ?

      Otherwise he is as hypocrite as the rest of them.

      Delete
  3. Hahaha

    Maybe the intention is to keep the low income households in the dark without TV, information wise, I mean.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Singapore Fairy Tale #1
    -------------------------------------------
    PAP and PM Lee is on our side.

    Singapore Fairy Tale #2
    ------------------------------------
    Singapore is just a barren piece of rock (or fishing village) until Lee Kuan Yew founded Singapore.

    Rejoinder:
    So the British must be very stupid lah. Spent so much resources trying to defend a barren piece of rocl / fishing village against the Japanese in World War Two.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Singapore Fairy Tale #3a
    ---------------------------------------
    Singaporeans "own" their HDB flats.

    Singapore Fairy Tale #3b
    ----------------------------------------
    Singapore has the highest home ownership rate in the world at more than 85%

    Singapore Fairy Tale #3c
    -------------------------------------
    HDB flats are heavily subsidized.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. IF sinkie has the highest 85% public home ownership (HDB) here, then it also means foreigers/PRs have the highest 85% private (condo/landed) home ownership lah..!

      So who is dafter?

      Delete
  6. The MDA has apparently banned April Fools Day jokes by the news media. What a pity. What are the fools in these organisations going to do?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Because they found that there is no need for a special joke day.

      Delete
    2. Because the Singapore media is one big joke every single day.

      Delete
  7. Singapore Fairy Tale #4
    ------------------------------------
    It takes 56 man years to expose a fairy tale.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Every day April fool day in Sinkapore. $1.80 chicken rice, $2.50 nasi pandang, $0.50 drink. DPM Teo, I live at your ward Seng kang but cannot get that chicken rice price you mentioned. What do you think?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. What do I think?
      I think you are not DPM Teo that's why.
      Membership has its privileges.

      Singapore Fairy Tale #5
      ------------------------------------
      Singaporeans can buy chicken rice for $1.80 in Singapore

      Singapore Leap Of Faith #1
      -------------------------------------------
      DPM Teo can get chicken rice at $1.80.
      Therefore Singaporeans can also get chicken rice at $1.80.

      Delete
    2. one tiantian chicken rice is already $4.50. Another plate of veg is another $3-4. 1 lunch meal a day for a worker in cbd is easily $7-10. Given all those ntuc designer/upmarket food court they are easily in those price range. Gone are the $2-3 hawker food. Just ask that $1.8 chicken rice stall how long can he hold out his promotion. And why did he leave his previous stall..rent increase?

      Delete
    3. My favourite chicken rice stall at my neighbourhood hawker centre has increased their prices from S$2.50/S$3.50 per plate to S$3.00/4.00 per plate, an increase of over 20% at one go.

      Hey wait a minute, this is hawker centre prices not foodcourt prices leh.

      Just wonder whether our idiot Vivian should remind the relevant PAP Minister to increase the allowance for those on PA Assistance to keep up with the inflation ?

      Delete
    4. And $8 can go for a heart bypass. Maybe this guy got no heart in the first place.

      Delete
  9. Singapore Leap of Faith #2
    ---------------------------------------------
    The $1.80 chicken rice can offset all the other price increases that has occurred under DPM Teo's term of office.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. $1000 income can own a 3room flat. According to tarman.

      Delete
  10. A REAL first world government in a real first world country in action:

    "Germany bans managers from calling or emailing staff after work hours"
    http://ibnlive.in.com/news/germany-bans-managers-from-calling-or-emailing-staff-after-work-hours/461070-79.html

    ReplyDelete
  11. If Kishore Mabubani is one of the year's top thinkers, I dread the prospects for the world. Even in Singapore we have better thinkers than KM although credit must be given to him for publishing his meager thoughts. I have yet to see a favourable review (from any respected expert) of his opus outside Singapore and very few within Singapore. I do have to respect his networking skills though.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You are absolutely correct. Just read Ian Buruma's review of the book, Can Asians Think and Professor Emmerson of Stanford University's review of his other book "Convergence". The vacuous titles should be enough to put anyone off. These gentlemen rightly dissected the simplistic and ridiculous assertions of his pontification. A state-paid hack, as his mentor LKY would say.

      Delete
  12. Did the prospect magazine named him on Aprils fool day?
    So much is said lah..

    ReplyDelete
  13. sinkies, pse don't complain la! our statistics show you workers' average wage went up 7% last year, top earners only go up a meagre 3% last year, so you all ok right? Seriously, do people even notice that the primary and overwhelming source of inflation is your friendly garmen? But then hor, inflation is suppose to be good right? Puck you, every year the Japanese enjoy cheaper everything, until this sucker called abe comes along and somehow thinks inflation is super for the country, phuck abe and all the garmen sperm secs who dream up crooked schems to generate inflation.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Who is the Mah-Boo-Baloney ?
    Why is he so full of PAP shit ?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Singapore Fairy Tale #6
      ------------------------------------
      In Singapore, the average family does not need a car.
      Why?
      Because our MRT and buses our so reliable that's why.

      Delete
  15. everyday is april fools day in Singapore under the PAP

    ReplyDelete