[CWHK] The cashed-up Hong Kong govt must fund smarter IT initiatives
John Tsang, our Financial Secretary, unrevealed his second budget in February and said that “preserving jobs” was his objective. The theme surely resonates with the public, but the content of this budget does not justify its stated goal.
Those who criticize the Hong Kong government for neglecting its citizens’ hardship during the current downturn have a point. Governments around the world are enacting aggressive economic stimulus measures. But our government seems to be sitting idle in spite of record fiscal reserves.
Hong Kong: cash-rich, initiative poor
At the end of January 2009, our fiscal reserves reached a record-breaking HK$543 billion, while accumulated surplus of the Exchange Fund was around HK$500 billion. According to a government press release, as at 31 January 2009, the financial position of the government stands at the enviable level of HK$49.8 billion surplus. Instead of the fiscal deficit of HK$4.9 billion that the government estimated in the budget, we may end up with a huge surplus at the end of this financial year.
Taking into account this possibility of a huge surplus, the meager initiatives proposed in the budget are even worse than when they first meet the eyes. On the ICT front, although the government has increased its ICT spending, the effect on alleviating the industry’s hardships is inadequate.
Perhaps more so than in other industries, our ICT sector faces dwindling demand, an professionals are under threat of layoff day and night. Yet prices—for products, services and manpower—are falling. This is the perfect opportunity for the government to improve our information infrastructure, in order to provide better public services, help sustain demand, and preserve jobs.
The government must recognize the irreparable damage that will be caused to the ICT industry in financial downturns, as ICT skills are harder to maintain than most other professional skills if a professional is out of action for a year or several months. Our industry and indeed the entire Hong Kong professional workforce will face a shortage of ICT talent when the economy recovers—similar to the post-SARS situation.
E-health scheme not enough
The only bright spot is the appropriation for the territory-wide e-health records (EHR), which will go a long way to establish Hong Kong as a center of health information system development. But the ICT industry must be further and better engaged in the setting up of the strategy and direction of EHR, so that the ICT industry will be able to participate, contribute and benefit from this sizable investment.
The “MyGovHK” project, which allows users to customize the government portal, is another idea I previously proposed in my “Ten Information Infrastructure Projects.” The government finally accepted the need for Hong Kong to have a clearer policy to support the development of data centers—also welcome news, after years of lobbying from the industry and myself along with former LegCo member Sin Chung-Kai urging the government to remove restrictive barriers in their land and innovation support policies.
Hiring for specific needs
But the government’s responses to our other recommendations in other policy areas, such as education, transport, food labeling and so on, have fallen short of the industry’s expectations. For instance, the budget earmarked HK$63 million for a one-year education program on online safety, which will create 500 jobs.
But the fund could be much better utilized if each school hires a single IT assistant: a trained tech to alleviate the heavy workload of teachers who must handle IT support chores in addition to teaching. Instead of the unclear motives and clearly one-off nature of the proposed program, what teachers and students really need is the government’s commitment to support them in a sustainable way.
The Financial Secretary has indicated that he may announce further mid-year initiatives, opening a door for further supportive measures. It’s high time for our sector to unite behind a common cause: urging government to recognize the ICT sector’s importance to our economy and financing more concrete measures to re-ignite our momentum, so that Hong Kong can realize our potential when we emerge from this crisis. This “worst of times” is indeed the best of times to make this investment on ourselves, and we must realize that this is a once-in-a-century opportunity we are facing, not a crisis.
從印度到中國 Chandni Chowk to China 今年HKIFF所看最後一部，最無厘頭的印度Bollywood中國功夫片，小人物變大英雄，是永遠不變的方程式，作為搞笑片，別要求太高，算係咁。導演也說是受了《少林三十六房》和星爺的《功夫》影响，香港電影可別自滿，未來十年，我看好Bollywood over中國或香港電影，就是因為其獨特風格加adaptability這個完美mix。
警方正在調查事件中，若這些少年人觸犯法例，按法定程序將他們交予法庭便可，但學校卻反而要小心處理。首先，他們很可能並非在校內犯事，教師校長們不能因學校「聲譽受損」而找理由懲罰他們，倘若他們真的找到 學生有犯校規，也必須弄清楚因何故懲罰學生，不應打擊他們對科學的好奇心。有時真令筆者想起英國搖滾樂隊 Pink Floyd 三十年前的名曲《Another Brick in the Wall》的歌詞：「Hey! Teachers! Leave them kids alone」。
緬甸起義－看不到的真相 Burma VJ - Reporting From a Closed Country 緬甸學生和人民1988年示威，被鎮壓，令人想起中國八九民運、六四屠城。2007年緬甸僧侶帶領遊行，再被武力鎮壓，當中這群地下VJ，就是把真實過程用鏡頭拍下，透過互聯網和衛星偷運出境的錄像記者(video journalists)。影像中可見不止這群VJ們，緬甸人民也是勇敢的，佛教僧侶們的正義感也值得尊敬。不禁再想，我們偉大站起來的中國政府是怎樣的助紂為虐，除了緬甸，今天還在攬北韓，不知所謂。
天水圍的夜與霧 Night and Fog 沒看過許鞍華之前的《天水圍的日與夜》，但看《天水圍的夜與霧》前電影公司朋友已「警告」這片是「死人冧樓」之作，的確，早知悲劇結局的電影，氣氛只可沉重。張靜初演得很好，任達華也經很努力，但對角色他始終太「型」了。這片只算是平鋪直序，平實不華的小品，也許這才貼近天水圍的題材。不過，電影假設了觀眾認識天水圍是什麼，已局限於本地市場，這是與電影節中看過其他外國片不同的。我也在想，內地觀眾若看罷這片，會怎想。
風塵三俠決戰地獄門 The Good, the Bad, the Weird 請想像，韓國人的西部牛仔片，騎的由馬變成鐵騎，美國西部改為中國東北滿州國，韓國明星也講吓中文(像《玉戰士》)。橋段故事算了不要提，但全片動作及影像心思十足，似兩小時的Active MV，至少過癮滿分。這種「風塵三俠」片，不是八十年代港產片所長？今天我們的幻想力、創意去了哪裡？是否回歸後重挑過重的文化包袱，太過緊張大陸市場，和太懶了？
紅日風暴 Storm Under the Sun 第一部記錄「胡風案件」的影片，這段歷史我其實不太懂，但《紅日風暴》交待得很清楚，很深入全面，是無價的歷史紀錄。「1955年5月，毛澤東發起了一場全國性『肅清胡風反革命集團』運動。運動的中心人物胡風先生，曾在三、四十年代創辦了左翼雜誌《七月》和《希 望》，是著名的文學理論家和詩人。...78人被定為“胡風分子”，2100多人受到牽連。」這些人是無殺傷力的文弱書生，但也是中國最優秀的知識份子、作家、文化人，最忠心的馬克斯信徒，最愛國的青年，被瘋子毛澤東為首的共產黨玩了廿幾年，老年放出來一句「對唔住」都冇，算是重獲自由，平反？哈。
凶心人在寶萊塢 Ghajini 未看此片，在心中已與在2007年HKIFF看的"Don -- The Chase Begins Again"比較(評)，看後還是覺得"Don"好些，尤其在故事方面較強，歌曲舞蹈也較這部"Ghajini"為佳。這片與其他印度大片一樣，比較長(三小時)，開始時以為是動作片，以復仇為主線，但倒敘部份變了溫馨愛情小品，才是最好看的。看見印度片常常突然唱歌跳舞，不少本地觀眾會不禁發笑，但實情是Bollywood is in！有heart，有style。廿幾年前遇在外國有線電視台看見的Bollywood製作，還很粗糙，現在已不一樣；反觀港產片多年來原地踏步，可惜。事到如今，連最有型、靚仔靚女明星，也非這裡尋，都是在印度。服未？
魔幻女兒國 Tears For Sale 從未看過塞爾維亞電影，原來是法國大導Luc Besson的製作，第一個感覺是東歐版《大魚傳奇》("Big Fish") 。第一次大戰後塞爾維亞村落的男人全部死了，變成「女兒國」，民間傳奇加幻想創意，色彩明麗的影像，但故事較薄弱，片長只有不足個半小時，但仍有在拖的感覺，可說是有點後勁不繼，但尚算值得一看。此片又是三級片，只因幾個裸露女體和很graphic的造愛鏡頭，因此而要十八歲以上才可進場？無聊。
「…今天很多的網民網齡也不足 20 年，只知道 Web 或 www 而連 World-Wide Web 也未聽過的，相信大有人在！」
萬維網二十歲了！屆指一算，Web 這東西在 1989 年被發明，至今已經出現了 20 年，今天很多的網民網齡也不足 20 年，只知道 Web 或 www 而連 World-Wide Web 也未聽過的，相信大有人在！
萬維網的發明者是 Tim Berners-Lee，他當時在瑞士日內瓦的 CERN物理學實驗室工作，1989 年 3 月他寫了最早的一個成為後來的萬維網概念的建議書，1990 年 11 月他與當年的拍擋 Paul Cailliau 再更詳細地把以「超連內容」（Hypertext）為核心的萬維網（當年還是稱之為“WorldWideWeb”一個字的），利用瀏覽器（Browser）的軟件，把互聯網與 DECnet（可見當年迪吉多 Digital Equipment Corp 的影響力還有多大）兩個制式世界的電腦裡的內容，連接起來。
1990 年，Berners-Lee 使用一台 NeXT 電腦（這是喬布斯 Steve Jobs 當年離開蘋果電腦後開設的公司的產品，後來他當然是回歸了蘋果）開發了第一個瀏覽器，真的叫作 WorldWideWeb，開通了第一個萬維網侍服器（Web server），第一個網頁的內容，就是形容這個計劃本身。1991 年，他把這項目的介紹放上了一個新開啟的 alt.hypertext 新聞組（Newsgroup），以後的就是大家從歷史所見證的了。
筆者首次接觸到萬維網是 1993 年，當時在美國工作和生活，剛到了太陽電腦（Sun Microsystem）當軟件系統工程師，在公司的內聯網看到 Mosaic 玩意，也就安裝來玩玩，結果一生結緣，在 Sun 工作使用的操作系統自然是 SunOS，當年的網頁還是純文字為主。有萬維網之前，筆者玩的是新聞組，有了萬維網，最早發現的比較有趣的網站是來自史丹福大學的《Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web 》，這網站後來就變了今天的雅虎（Yahoo!）。
