Rest in peace, moonwalker.

On the day when an iconic part of music died, I dug out Off The Wall and Thriller from my record stash, cued them up and listened for hours – something I had not done for years.

And I marveled at the purity and joy of the music created and delivered by young Michael Jackson back then.

Those were exuberant days for MJ. His music blended R&B hooks, clever pop, daring rhythms, emotional and extraordinarily beautiful singing, funk, disco and rock, and yet all of that delivered free of schmaltz.

Here’s a secret. Normally you need to have an online ST subscription to read the full length of ST articles online. Those that you get to access for free are usually only short snippets of the full version.

But there is Red Nano. (rednano.sg) Red Nano is SPH’s (the media giant which owns ST, BT, TNP, Zao Bao, etc) search and directory service which lets you view any SPH news article that was published in the last 12 months and any reviews of products with no time limit. The articles will appear under Red Nano’s archives a day after the news went to print. If you search for it on the day itself, you will be directed to say straitstimes.com. Once you are out of Red Nano, you cannot view it for free.  Unfortunately, Red Nano needs some training to learn how to use it this way. Here’s how to do it.

We just heard from the folks at Microsoft on its Windows 7 Upgrade Option Program, availability and pricing offer for Asia.

According to the software giant, from June 26, anyone who buys a PC from a participating manufacturer or retailer, and which runs Windows Vista Home Premium, Business or Ultimate, will receive an upgrade to Windows 7 at little or no cost. The upgrade offer will vary by PC manufacturer and retailer (a small fee for shipping and handling may be charged). Consumers should check with manufacturers and retailers for specific details.

The Windows 7 Upgrade Option program will be available until January 31, 2010 and the offer is redeemable until the end of February 2010.

PC manufacturers will start shipping Windows 7 PCs in all languages starting from October 22. For the full package product, Microsoft will make the first 14 languages including English, Spanish, Japanese, German, French, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese & Traditional Chinese (HK) available on October 22 and all other languages (including Thai) available on October 31.

Existing Windows customers can purchase Windows 7 Home Premium (Upgrade) at an estimated retail price of US$119.99. The full version of Windows 7 Home Premium (Full) is available at an estimated retail price of US$199.99.

What do you gain by upgrading from a pair of $100 earphones, say my trusty Sony MDR EX85LP, to a pair of cans worth some $2,200, like the Sennheiser HD800? To picky ears, things to watch out for are many, including such aural qualities as warmth, punchiness, frequency extension, detail, soundstaging and, well, you name it, the audiophile lexicon is a very large one.

To me though, there are two crucial qualities, and they are – if you allow me to indulge in more audiophile jargon – timbre reproduction and air.

Having the right timbre, simply put, means sounding right. For instance, the percussive tap of each grand piano key ringing true with sumptuous overtones. Or the singing human voice having body, bite and breath. Of course, naturalness does not tend to excite, and hence top-end headphones may be underwhelming at first. But they reward with an unfatiguing sound and long-term listening pleasure.

Once in a while, a phone can come along and seriously wow you just by its looks.

HTC’s new “hero” phone, aptly called the Hero, is one such gizmo that is just begging to be carried in your hands. Dressed in white and dark brown, this looks at first like a HTC Touch Diamond 2 with Google Android in its DNA. But look closer, and you’d find a few surprises.

Announced yesterday, the 135-gram phone comes with the a generous 3.2-inch screen, 5-meg camera, 7.2Mbps 3.5G downloads and many other goodies.

Singapore’s Ministry of Health has sent expired Tamiflu supplies to the general practitioner’s in Singapore.  Tamiflu, which comes in boxes of 10 pills each, is the anti-viral drug for the H1N1 flu. According to the report and to my own sources as well, these Tamiflu meds hve expiry dates of 2007, and was manufactured in 2003. MOH has added a sticker that says that these meds can be used beyond their shelf life – to 2010.

MOH’s circular to the GPs say this:

“We would like to assure you that the extension is with the approval from the manufacturer (Roche), U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and our Health Sciences Authority. This extention  is  made possible due to our stringent conditioning and maintenance requirements in our storage facilities. The efficacy of the drug is not compromised in any way and is fit for usage.”

Straits Times has done really well to get doctors to give their response. 

Dr Wong Tien Hua, a general practitioner in Sengkang, said an expiry date can vouch for a drug’s effectiveness only for that period. ‘If it is past the expiry date, the effectiveness of the drug might not be good,’ he said, adding that someone with the H1N1 virus might take longer to recover if given ‘expired’ medication. (from ST)

Agreeing, Dr Vincent Chia, deputy director of Healthway Medical, said although it is a national stockpile, the onus will still be on the doctor to explain to patients. ‘Tamiflu is not without its side effects…so when that happens we won’t know if it’s because the drugs are expired or because of the side effects,’ he said. (from ST)

For the full story, go to ST.com here, if you are not a subscriber use red nano here.

For years, Apple fans have lambasted Windows for being insecure (which is true) while boasting that their own Macs “had no viruses.” It’s not that Mac had no vulnerabilities, its market share was just too small to make it worth the hackers’ time. But with iPhone and ipod Touch now taking over the world, it is only a matter of time before the viruses will appear.

What is interesting about the iPhone 3.0 OS is that while it is free for iPhone users, iPod Touch users like me ( I only bought it because I thought my wife would like it) have to pay US$9.90 for 3.0. Now 3.0 has a host of nifty features which in Apple’s principle justifies charging users for the update.

Of course only Apple gets away with this rubbish, charging users for updates to the operating system of their machine as they have done with Mac OSX for years with fancy Big Cat names to updates. Imagine if Microsoft  charged for Windows Vista Sp1 – the world would probably descend onto pandemomiun. 

We are one year old!

This tech blog, hatched from an innocuous discussion between a few of us grumpy tech scribes bitching about life over a Bishan Junction 8 Crystal Jade dim sum lunch, has ticked into its second year this month and we are still loving every minute of it.

Its been a terrific learning experience for all of us, and frankly, we have been astonished by the spritely life Techgoondu has taken, the fun – and angst – we’ve had blogging through this platform, and the heartening responses from you readers who have obliged us invaluable eyeballing time and thoughtful comments over the past 12 months.

Thank you all!!

Turning one is as much a thrill as it is a time to reflect. To blog about matters that are close to our geek hearts has been our biggest thrill. Writing on a platform that’s a distinctly alternative one to what our day job presents has been equally rewarding.

Communic Asia has been a busy week, with IDA press updates on the iN2015 rollout, extension of wireless@SG for another three years (yay!), and launches of phones by both Sony Ericsson (Satio) and Samsung (Jet).

But sometimes just walking the showfloor can uncover interesting technology gems and surprises, and I came across some cool stuff at Broadcast Asia 2009, a sister event to Communic Asia held concurrently at Expo. At the Singapore pavilion at Broadcast Asia in Hall 8, I came across the 3M Vikuiti rear projection film technology being distributed by Singaporean firm GG Alliance.

What you’re seeing is a video being projected on a glass panel that has the 3M Vikuiti film stuck to it, a thin film layer (about 0.3mm) that can be cut to any shape and stuck to any glass panel from the inside. The projection is behind the glass panel (not in front as I originally thought), and the film is easy to both apply (self-adhesive) and remove.

Yes, the star were there – Pierre Png, Flying Dutchman, Andrea D Cruz, Dick Lee and some magician called Cyrus from Japan.

But for me, this was the worst phone launch I have attended this year. The media invite says 4pm, so I reached there at 4.15pm. But the doors were closed and like many other tech journalists there, we had to wait like idiots while Sony Ericsson got ready to start.

At about 4.45 pm, the celebrities turned up while the local tech journalists,  who were basically ignored by the PR minders, went to buy their sugar cane at the nearby hawker stalls and at Pacific Coffee at Red Dot Museum, waiting for the damn show to start.