Temasek Engineering School, Singapore

thx for all the support.. for those who had join, u’ll have a great time ahead..

Launched in early 2004, the construction of the tower by

South Korea’s Samsung should be completed at the end of 2008 and cost one billion dollars, according to Greg Sang, the Emaar official in charge of Burj Dubai.

Burj Dubai already has 79 stories, taking its height to more than 200 meters (656 feet). But even after having gone that far, Emaar is still not revealing the tower’s final height.

“At the moment, we are not answering. We’ll say it (will be) more than 700 meters (2,296 feet) and more than 160 stories … The people who need to know, know,” Sang, a 40-year-old New Zealander, told AFP.

The world’s tallest inhabited building is “Taipei 101″ in Taiwan, which is 508 meters (1,666 feet) tall.

“At the moment, we’ve got around 2,500 workers on the tower site alone. We expect that to peak about a year from now at over 5,000 … And for the whole site … at any point in time, when the whole Downtown Burj Dubai district is under construction, there will be 20,000 men working here,” Sang said.

Some 2,500 of these laborers hired by one of many firms working for Emaar downed tools for two days earlier this year and demonstrated in protest at poor working conditions and delays in the payment of salaries.

The protests degenerated into riots during which equipment and cars were smashed.

According to Sang, the protesting laborers did not work on the tower site and construction was therefore not affected.

“We actually work very closely with the contractors and with the authorities to ensure conditions for the labor are adequate and good. So we were a little disappointed that they weren’t completely satisfied,” Sang said.

He said the average wages of the south Asian laborers, who work in summer in temperatures reaching 50 degrees Celsius (122 Fahrenheit), are “probably in the range of a couple of hundred US dollars a month” for a shift of “eight to 10 hours” a day, six days a week.

“They can get overtime if they like,” Sang said.

But he stressed that it is the contractor, not Emaar, “who employs the workers, and it’s his responsibility to provide them with accommodation and pay the salaries on time.”

Emaar, which is listed on the Dubai stock exchange and boasts of being the world’s largest property company by capital, is setting great store by this flagship project.

The figures bear out its confidence. Emaar, in which the Dubai government has a 32.5 percent stake, is seeing its profits climb.

The real estate giant posted record net profits of 437 million dollars in the third quarter of this year, a 39 percent increase on the same period in 2005. It posted a 21 percent hike in profits in the first half of 2006 compared to the first six months of last year.

Business cirles attribute the steady rise in profits to the sustained sales of apartments in Downtown Burj Dubai, a trend helped by a law allowing foreigners to become freehold property owners in certain areas of the Gulf city state which went into force this year.

“Certain buildings take on iconic status, like the Eiffel Tower and the Empire State Building, instantly recognizable and instantly associated with the city that they are placed in,” Sang said.

“I hope the same happens with the Burj Dubai. It’s definitely going to be very unique,” he said.

But Sang admitted that he did not expect Burj Dubai to remain the tallest building in the world forever.

For it will face competition in Dubai itself, where the city’s other property development major, Nakheel, has announced it will launch the construction of “Al-Burj” or “The Tower” — whose projected height also remains a closely guarded secret.

PARIS : Ma Lin of China won the men’s table tennis World Cup for the fourth time on Sunday, leading a Chinese clean sweep of the podium.

The 2005 World Championship silver medallist hit back from two sets down to defeat compatriot and 2004 Athens Olympics silver medallist Wang Hao 6-11, 8-11, 11-7, 11-7, 11-9, 4-11, 11-4 in the final.

The match for third place was won by 2005 World Champion and top seed Wang Liqin defeating Vladimir Samsonov of Belarus 11-9, 8-11, 12-10, 6-11, 11-9, 10-12, 11-7.

“My next goal is to do well in the Asian Games (in Doha Dec 1-14),” Ma said.

“There will be a lot of top players in Qatar but I am full of confidence at the moment. I just need to keep up my form.

“My number one objective, however, remains the 2008 Olympics at home in Beijing.”

The Chinese men’s team is coached by Liu Guoliang, former world champion and 1996 Olympic champion at Atlanta.

“It doesn’t matter which of our players wins, the main thing is to reach our objectives as a team,” he said. - AFP/de

SINGAPORE: Scientists at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) have developed a tiny circuit, which runs on light, and is able to carry and process a vast amount of data at an ultra fast speed.The team aims to use the technology in everyday devices like your mobile phone and personal computers.

In five to 10 years’ time, machines could be processing data 10 times faster than today’s maximum of 10 gigahertz per second.

Currently the fastest method of carrying data is using light in fibre optics.

The Nano-photonic method also uses light, but in much smaller circuits, resulting in higher processing speeds for many applications like computers and mobile phones.

Nano-technology, which works at levels tens of thousands of times smaller than the width of a human hair, is involved in getting the laser chip into small devices.

Scientists manipulate the laser in a miniature circuit, so the light can be channelled in the right direction, carrying vast amounts of data at high speeds.

Associate Professor Liu Ai Qun, School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, says: “We want to change the application of the traditional electronic circuit to the photonic circuit. Then we can use the optical photonic light for faster transmission, for communication and computing and to totally change silicon technology.”

heard frm my supervisor that this friday there’ll be some sort of an open house for selected etcm 1.2 students, to let the students get a better view b4 the streaming exercise, on wat they’ll get to do for fyp when they join our course. it’s quite a sudden move for mi, coz i haven touch up my project design recently, & still some way to go =x  onli left with 3 days to getting the best out of my project but nowadays more & more projects being piled up. alreadi feeling the stress up my nerves b4 i even start on them.

anyways, streaming students, pls give us ur guidance & choose ur course wisely. n_n

“With effect from October 2006 Semester, students who do not meet the current stipulated 85% attendance requirement for a subject will be eligible for both the main, and where applicable, supplementary examination/assessment. However, affected subject for which attendance requirement of 85% is not met will be awarded with only a maximum grade of P (non-graded pass) at the main or supplementary examination/assessment, with an associated grade point of only 1.0………..”

Entrepreneurship & Effective Cross Culture Communication Seminar

Want to set up a business but don’t know how?

Learn the ropes from a real-life Entrepreneur, Mr. Iain Ewing, CEO of Ewing Communications.

Having difficulties communicating with your international friends?

Let Dr. Rosemary Khoo, President of University Women’s Association of Singapore teach you to break down those barriers.

Date: Saturday, 11 November 2006

Venue: Temasek Business School, Lecture Theater 19

Time: 10AM – 1PM

Fees: GCC Members $3

TP Students $5

To register, please email your particulars to gcc_ronald@yahoo.com.sg.

Door gifts and refreshments will be provided

See YOU There!

Hey guys… other than Funan and Sim Lim… anybody got lobang to any electronics store not !!!

 i need to buy headphones for myself.. the kinds that the DJ’s use, but a little low key !!! Hows the new VIVO CITY AH !!! anybody been there yet… maybe gt some Lobang there….

thanks

where i last left you…IT LAGS THE WHOLE DAMN THING !!!!

But i guess i’m being subjective here… u guys might be using a faster modem or server than me so that isn’t really a prob for you.

Anyways, my uncle once taught me that it’s easy to be complaining, but difficult to actually help in solving the problem… Nowi’m quite sure that i cant change anything on friendsters, cause it’s NOT MY SITE !! but i can do the next best thing… and its a thing that S’poreans love to do, and it does work (In S’pore only !!!). And that thing is to feedback or give suggestions !!!! hehehe

 So my suggestions are. Firstly, i think Friendster should come up with ways in which members and friends can communicate with each other REAL TIME… something like what GMAIL has done. Ok, i know i know, the idea might not be ORIGINAL, but at least it beats writing messages to friends on which takes a WHOLE DAY to reach them….

 Maybe what the friendsters people can also do is allow means in which members can send files and play games with their friends (again not ORIGINAL) but at least it’ll allow more intereactivity between members. I mean, thats what Friendsters was made for right!!!! to allow contact between people……

 What Do You Guys Think???

Yo ppl:

i’m writing this blog with a MISSION !!! and the mission is simple but really hard to attain for me because i am a man of few words. My mission is to write MY longest POST EVER !!! but it cant be of just my boring life, i also want to be discussing a topic which would have ALOT of responses.

So now i have to decide on a topic… uhhhhh, maybe i can talk about…. NO NO not good enough (i’m talking to myself btw…) UHHHHHUUHHHUUHHH !!!! i got it ! I’ll write about FRIENDSTERS !!! interesting enough topic, but more importantly, its a topic where everyone has something to say.

Dont you all think that friendsters is getting a little boring… alot for me!!! i mean all you do is look for friends of yours, check out their pictures (which are hardly updated), read their testimonials and then simply add them… and thats it !!!!

I mean there use to be some excitement (a long time ago) when u would be looking out for your friends and all… but what do you do now that u’ve added most of them.

 I think the problem is there and the friendsters site managers know it and they’ve even come up with solutions. For example, u can view the pictures in a slideshow form, you can upload videos, and even start a blog of your own with the same account !!! Handy i suppose… but it just create’s another problem… IT LAGS THE WHOLE DAMN THING !!!!

To Be Continued