Some people just don't get the internet

"The worst fish head curry in the known universe"

Back when I was in primary school, I was thought something called universal truths, things like the Sun rises in the east, or a cow has four legs were universal truths. They were truths that would remain constant over space and time. Unfortunately, I learnt later on in life that there are few (if any) universal truths. A couple of billion years from now, the star we call the sun would expand to become a red giant, a star so big it would completely cover the earth and burn us in the process. Cows by the sheer nature of evolution, may or may not continue to have four legs, and there will come a time where the species we call cow will cease to exist.


However, while universal truths remain a distant memory from school, some truths remain too hard to swallow. Consider the case of Jothys fish curry, a small restaurant in a small town that was on the wrong end of a blog review at sixthseal.com. One blogger in particular didn't quite enjoy the fish curry, but ranted that Jothys had been underwhelmed by customers, had non-succculent prawns, served fish roe that tasted like cardboard and worst of all...was deemed to be avoided like a bad case of herpes.

I imagine Tharumaraj Sivaperumal as the managing director of Jothys felt compelled to protect the dignity of his restaurant by suing the blogger. I wasn't quite sure what the owner was suing it for, the author (just like you and me) should be entitled to our opinions. Our opinions do not constitute universal truths, but they remain truths nonetheless. If I said I didn't like the color blue and thought blue was boring, then that is my opinion and I am entitled to it. It is also my entitlement to "proclaim my faith" by chastising blue and showing all you blue lovers the error of your ways...but it remains my choice, because it is my opinion. It remains my opinion and as long as I declare it as my opinion, I am the last and only authority on the authenticity of that claim.

The point though is that Jothys didn't just sue the blogger, they sued the giant search engine we all love ..GOOGLE. I'm not entirely sure why, but it was along the lines of "search for Jothys and you see the offending blog but not on Yahoo or Bing". Now as ridiculous as this sounds, the owner would have had more luck suing the host of the website rather than Google. In fact, by suing the blog owner and Google, all the owner is doing is push the page rank on the offending blog higher up in Google. Making it even more likely for people to end up on the offending blog. As more people read about the ridiculous lawsuit, more people search and find it on google and as more people click on that link, Googles algorithm pushes the blog higher up it's rank, making it more visible whenever someone searches for Jothys. Thus, the owner is in fact, doing more to harm his brand than the original blogger.

That's how the internet works. No one person can change the internet, it's built on the values of democracy and trust, that's why Wikipedia is the leading encyclopedia and NOT Encarta. An encyclopedia dependent on a lot of 'little guys' seems to beat out the big guns. Unfortunately, the truth is hard to swallow...especially if you're a Dog Abuser.

Dog Abusers beware..if Malaysians catch you abusing a dog, they will find you.

Last week a video circulating around the internet of a Man abusing a small poodle was highlighted by a local Chinese daily. Now Chinese newspapers don't really enjoy that big a reading circle in Malaysia so to depend on the couple thousands readers that the daily has to find the abuser would be futile...fortunately we have Facebook. A couple of hours after hitting social circles some parties seemed to have found the offending culprit. One Facebook page has claimed that they know the exact identity of the culprit. Not just that, but they claim to know the dogs owner who was shooting the video, and her ex-husband as well and son. It looks like there's no holds barred here.

Once the identity was published, thousands started the usual witch hunt for the culprit. Not one of those who posted vial messages on facebook threatening the owner with grievous bodily hurt ever bothered to lodge a police report. This reminds me of a colleague who promoted political facebook pages while she herself had not registered to vote. You can like all the facebook pages you want, but if you're not a registered voter you're completely missing the point. It all seems now that whatever happens in facebook is more important that what happens in ...real life. Social-network justice seems more important than Social justice.That's why Jothys is more concerned about it's online presence than it's actual presence.


Apparently, actual proof is not neccessary in Social-Network court. It all works on the concept of social proof (popularized by Robert Cialdini in his book Influence). If enough people believe it to be true, then it is true. It's the same reason we don't stop to help accident victims along the highway, because if no one else is stopping, it must be nothing. So if enough people believe that you abused a dog, the you abused a dog. There was no trial, just one very big jury and an extremely quick execution.

Execution was swift and just (or so they say). Death threats looming and tombstones abound. Yet, the cowardice of it all, is that none of those posers on Facebook bothered to lodge a police report, could it be because there is no law in this country to protect the rights of animals? There is the animal act of 1953 that was amended in 2006. Yet none of these 'valiant' defenders of the dogs ever did it. It was either they believed that someone else would report it or that maybe they got the wrong person, either way it's probably something you checked out first BEFORE you created your hate filled facebook page.

But there is hope, if these are indeed the people, then without Facebook we would not have found them. Bravo Facebook.

In fact some parties even gave an offer of Rm5,000 for whoever could find the abuser, well in excess of the maximum Rm200 fine one would get for violation of the animal act of 1953. Which brings me to the final point, if these bunch of cowards and retards can get their act together on Facebook and try to save a dog. How come Haris Ibrahim had to literally beg for money so that the family of R.Gunasegaran could get a second autopsy on what is the 1805th death in custody in Malaysia? Why is it we were willing to go through such extreme emotional punishment on a dog abuser but not on the murderers of Kugan?

Is it because we view these guys as less than dogs? Could the life of humans who have died in Police custody be worth more than a poodle being punished by a tatooed dumb ass? How can society look itself in the mirror, when we look out for dogs more than ourselves? What about Teoh Beng Hock?

There is a silver lining though. Haris managed to raise Rm10k , well in excess of what was required. Bravo Malaysia, you've made me proud. But that dark social network cloud and the level of stupidity involved in all this makes me wonder, is the internet becoming more important that 'real' life, and if so, why do some people not get it?

That's my 2 cents. Don't spend it all in one place.