12/03/2014

Smart City comes too late


I was at MBFC before 8am and someone shouted at me. I turned around to see a grouchy face of a very unhappy man. ‘Brother, no market this morning. Market will open at 12.30pm.’ And he was on his way home. I was a little puzzled. He said he got the news on arrival at the office. I think the news was in the Business Times.
 

On the way from Raffles Place I have flipped through the pages of Today and mypaper but there was not a single piece of news that the SGX would be closed this morning. And I was reading a forum writer talking about how wonderful Smart City will be when news and information flow would be instant. And important news like the closing of the stock market would have been known to all the stake holders and players with the press of a button.
 

In the office there was already a crowd of unhappy remisiers and staff grumbling about the news and wasting their time waking up early to get to office. How nice would it be if the Govt has installed the Smart City yesterday then no one would look so foolish and unhappy? And so many people would not be wasting their time in the office twiddling their thumbs. It would also help to ease the peak time traffic in the trains.
 

This episode also reminds us that even if we have a Smart City, if the people are daft or lazy or negligent, the information would not have flowed to the people in a timely way. What is the point of telling people that the market will be closed for half a day when the people are already in the office?
 

Of course a Smart City would have a lot of stupid problems that they would not tell you. Now they are just telling you the good stuff, the things that you can have but need not have, and may not need or do not want, but have to pay for it. The American intelligence agencies are flooded with information gathered from their snooping around the whole world with all their sophisticated equipment and bugging gadgets. Now, who is going to read them? Who has the time to read them? It would need more than 56 man years to read a day of information collected. It would need thousands of man years to do that. Many people don’t even have the time to read more than two paragraphs of an article in the newspaper.
 

There will be a lot of information available. Who have the time to browse through them or to use them? Just like there are millions of apps in the market. How many do you need and how many millions you don’t need?
Now for the problems that many people are not counting on. You will be paying for the whole system and infrastructure like it or not. You will be paying for the information like it or not.
 

Do you still want a Smart City to tell you that you have forgotten to switch off your lights in the toilet or a bee was found in the Antarctic Ice? Are you smart enough to know what is good for you and what is unnecessary and still you will have to pay for it? Ask, who is benefitting from this Smart City and who is making all the money?

Kopi Level - Green

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

In Sin City only feel good news and sing song with a bit of dancing allowed.

Anonymous said...


Please Lah! Pleased Lah!

We Can Become The Smart City Of The World!

This delayed opening is "Wet Wet Water"!

Cheers.

Anonymous said...

can't even stop cheating in Sim Lim Square.
What smart city technology is PAP talking about?
I think PAP needs "backbone" technology.
Does not seem to have the backbone anymore for hard work and serving Singaporeans.

jjgg said...

Rb..you know there's a programme to high tech small retail shops in shopping malls..so far as I know, 2 of the retailers whom I frequent ,occupying about 300 n 500 sq ft each are wired up n provided with 4 tablets each, 4 cctvs n a nifty cash register...would you believe FOC?? Here's the big mystery..they never requested for it...how did they pay for it? They were given a check by some kind soul and when the check is cleared,they paid over this amount to the installer...how much was the amount?....$80000 fucking dollars!!! Wonder who this kind soul is...btw..the shops are in marina square n Far East square..not some geylang joints..ok....singapore Boleh!! Let's hasten the wiring process n add another few more billionaires to our list....hehe

Anonymous said...

ANONYMOUS 9.31AM pls note that
any country is free to call their
city the Smart City. Pls note...
Talk Talk "Song" only!

Anonymous said...

Y lidat...

ccb lee hsien loong say we r smart... means that we r smart, u daft. Dun argue

Thus when thee say.... hsien loong kan ho ching chao chee by, I also not joking too

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

Don't be lidat lah. Not nice to be so personal. Just talk about policies and issues and stay out of people's private life. That is the least we should do.

Cheers.

IMAGOD said...

@ one swallow doesn't make a summer Redbean:

>>
Of course a Smart City would have a lot of stupid problems that they would not tell you.


Nonsense. You will get a problem now and then, and because of the complexity of a modern city -- an artificial way of supporting orders of magnitude MORE PEOPLE than if we all lived in nature on the Savannah -- many people will be affected form these OCCASIONAL glitches.

But the glitches are soon fixed, and our highly engineered modern life returns to "normal".

SGX glitch...so what? SMRT breakdown...so what? At least a tiny area can still sustain 5.5 million (and counting!) lives at a standard of living human apes on the Savannah couldn't even imagine.

Jesus didn't save your sorry asses lah. Scientists, engineers and entrepreneurs did, and continue to keep you alive every second of everyday!

Count your blessings lah, sad motherfuckers!

Anonymous said...

U nonok?

When u in politics

Everything is public... n of public interests

Look at devan Nair, palmer n luara etc

Anonymous said...

SMRT breakdown got fined. SGX closed down for one whole morning, got fined or not?

Anonymous said...


Please give them a chance.

Please don't break others rice-bowls.

They are trying their best.

Can be quite pitiful.

Towards Smart City!

Anonymous said...

The multi million rice bowls very big. Handle with extreme care. If broken they will be in despair.

Anonymous said...


Please don't break others rice-bowls.

Please don't break others rice-bowls.

Anonymous said...

PAP needs to promote smart cities that help sinkies to do everything for them. Imagine it even help sinkies to automatically vote for PAP, no need for sinkies to vote manually anymore. PAP, what are you waiting for ?

Anonymous said...

At the rate Sinkies are turning daft, it is important to have smart cities so daft sinkies no need to think or do anything. Let the computers do everything for them.

Anonymous said...

Aiya, this smart city thing is to con the Indians to give us some business. In reality however, we are the ones being conned. The Indians will demand that we open up the floodgates for their people to work here !