NI-Limits Blog

The Astro TechnoloGenius Contest aims to coax-out all you young local web developers who are guarding your applications in fear of the obscene pirating that is taking place with websites these days.

The idea should focus on improving ANY ONE OR MORE of the four following areas:

Here are a few examples:

Education:
How can ICT help to bridge the learning gap between the rich and poor countries? How can ICT help the education system cater more effectively to the diverse learning needs of the individual learners and the needs of their communities?

Health:
In what way can ICT be used to improve medical care to youth and how can they promote their well-being.

Youth entrepreneurship:
To bridge the gap between skilled and unskilled jobs, how can ICT be used to promote the next generation of educated and qualified job seekers who are able to contribute to the global economy?

Governance:
How can ICT help to improve the participation and empowerment of youth in the decision-making process and policies that affect their lives?

The winners will be selected based on the following criteria:

• Concept & Idea 50%
• Innovation 30%
• Feasibility 20%

TechCentral reports on this contest:

Calling all tech-savvy individuals. Astro will be organising a competition for you to exhibit your innovative ICT ideas. Known as the Astro TechnoloGenius contest, the winners will be given the opportunity to represent Malaysia at the Global Forum on Youth and ICT in Geneva, Switzerland.  

It is to encourage young Malaysians to push the technology boundaries even further by coming up with original and innovative ICT ideas.  Astro is in alliance with the United National Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) unit and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) for this year’s Global Youth Forum to be held at the Geneva International Convention Centre from Sept 24 to 26.  

Zainir Aminullah, executive director of Astro Entertainment, said in a press release: “Astro has always supported the nurturing of talented young people by providing them a platform to develop their skills and knowledge in the hope of setting them off on the right footing in life.”  The Astro TechnoloGenius Contest is open to all Malaysians between the ages of 18 and 25. They can enter the contest individually or in teams of up to four people.

As you may or may not know, the largest Microsoft conference to ever take place in Malaysia (Tech Ed SEA 2007) will be occurring on the 10th to 13th of September at the new Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre, and NI-Limits have front row seats along with some t-shirts and caps ready to make our mark and hopefully learn something relatively new in the process.

Tech Ed SEA 2007, Microsoft’s premier & largest annual conference in the South East Asia region, focuses on newly released products such as of Microsoft Office along with content about upcoming releases such as Windows Server 2008.

For four days in September, you can get technical training, information and resources to help you build, deploy, secure, mobilize, and manage solutions.

• More than 120 breakout sessions
  This year’s event will feature even more speakers from Microsoft Corporation allowing you to hear about your favorite technologies from the sources who develop them. Create a personal learning program from 6 technical tracks with more than 120 breakout sessions.

• Hands-on experiences
  Tech Ed offers opportunities to evaluate products both from Microsoft and from 250 of our most important industry partners. Additionally, based on attendee feedback from last year, we will be more than doubling the number of Instructor Led Lab sessions as well as introducing a whole host of new self-paced Hands On Lab content.

• Networking with your peers
  Walking around Tech Ed are more than 2,000 minds just like yours. 2,000 IT pros and developers to meet. 2,000 opinions to consider. Add to the mix Microsoft product team members and industry gurus and you will immediately see why a Tech Ed crowd is like no other.

What happens at Tech Ed SEA that keeps people coming back?
Tech Ed is about meeting new people and getting new ideas. And year after year, technology professionals from around the country find themselves returning for more.

What keeps them coming back?

• Speakers - The majority of speakers who feature in the Tech Ed lineup are from the Product Groups at Microsoft Corporation – the people who build the software and those who know it best; you won’t find anyone anywhere else who knows more about the product than they will.

• Breakout Sessions. Breakout Sessions are where you take a deep technical dive and learn about the latest products based on Microsoft technology. This year, you can choose from more than 100 sessions.

• Hands-on experiences. Tech Ed offers opportunities to evaluate products both from Microsoft and from our most important industry partners.

• Networking with your peers. Walking around Tech Ed SEA are 2,000 minds just like yours. 2,000 IT pros and developers to meet. 2,000 opinions to consider. 2,000 wits to engage. Add to the mix Microsoft product team members and industry gurus, and you immediately see why a Tech Ed crowd is like no other.

Key benefits for IT professionals:
Gain new solutions and new ideas for being more productive from focused sessions, product assessments, and interaction with experts and peers.

• Get real-world learning from IT professionals who work at Microsoft - that is, Microsoft people who use Microsoft products to respond to the same critical issues you face every day.

• Evaluate up-and-coming and released Microsoft technologies before you roll them out, including Microsoft Exchange Server 2007, the 2007 Microsoft Office System, Windows Vista, Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007, and Windows Server code name “Longhorn.”

• Acquire insights from Microsoft and industry experts on the products you work with every day.

• Learn how to solve issues relating to deployment and integration, troubleshooting, and infrastructure management.

• Find answers to everyday problems:
  • Improve your existing IT infrastructure productivity and management.
    • Prepare for the challenges of tomorrow.

Key benefits for developers:
Put yourself on the cutting edge of the latest development trends and gain hands-on experience with the newest and coolest development tools.

• Acquire the skills you need to build more streamlined, scalable, and secure applications.

• Meet and discuss topics of interest with industry gurus, Microsoft staff, and colleagues.

• Explore the issues surrounding programming mobile devices, Windows application development, integrated Web solutions, Microsoft Office programming, and language enhancement and IDE productivity features.

• Address issues such as easier development of applications across client types and migrating applications to .NET.

• Learn new techniques for building a scalable and secure architecture, and designing applications for easier and more effective deployment.

In addition to all of this wonderful information, Microsoft are also running several competitions in an attempt to get local bloggers to help promote the event. For those with a blog and willing to write about the event, please click here, and for those that want the inside scoop on how to win free air tickets to America and Europe, please click here.

TechCentral report on an ICT Conference covering broadband implementation with Malaysia being held at the Multimedia University in Cyberjaya on July the 26th of 2007:

Among those present will be Motorola Malaysia country president Mohd Asri Hassan Sabri, Google Inc Malaysia country consultant Hanson Toh, and TM Group general manager of group corporate strategy and planning Dr Fadhlullah Suhaimi Abdul Malek, who will be speaking at the panel discussion on “The Opportunities and Challenges Towards the Future of High Speed Broadband.” 

Tickets for the conference are RM10 for students and RM13 for others, with closing date for sales as July the 21st, 2007.

For more information, contact
Chin Yik Ming at 012-320 6283
E-mail: chinym33@gmail.com
Or log on to mescorp.mmu.edu.my

As always (meaning to sound sarcastic), plenty of notice provided…