Vietnam’s E3 / Comdex and Booth Babes Recap (Vietnam Computer Electronics World Expo 2010)

Sunday, July 18th, 2010

Ngan Ha and I and the Samsung Booth“Vietnam Computer Electronics World Expo 2010” is Vietnam’s equivalent of E3 and Comdex. I guess I would say it has the name to sound like a Comdex, with some of the big international vendors that would be at a Comdex (Canon, Sony, Samsung) or E3 (VTC’s Games, Logitech), but the rest is whomever else (companies selling juice- well, maybe that’s for the demographic that attends, massage chairs, and other random things.) wants to be there that can pay the fees.

Anyway, “Vietnam Computer Electronics World Expo 2010”. That’s a long title. I guess we could also call it VCEX, pronounced VSEX. Or Just CEX = Sex. CEX 2010! I feel like the long title is some kind of insecure way to compensate for the lack of actual expo content.

To recap my experience, I figure we can just review my live updates from Mimo, in sequential order, from when I got there around 10:30 AM:

By the way, I really hate the term “booth babe”.

Canon had a good booth in which you could take a photo, have it printed for you (friends got it) instantly, with its own souvenir frame. Samsung tried the same thing, but they in turn, were a lot more rude (I took a photo for this one), and then told us to come back 5 hrs later to pick it up (no thanks). I didn’t bother checking out Logitech because I didn’t feel like trying anything they had. Halo Shop, however, was there as well, but not selling anything. That was probably for the best as the convention wasn’t the best fit to mention mass piracy, but disappointing nonetheless. VTC had a big stage to promote their games like Audition and FIFA online. I saw a guy with an unofficial Guitar Hero controller (in the pictures), but not sure if he was going on stage with it or just


silly.

I got through the hall in about 1.5 hrs, and thought there’d be 2 or 3 more halls, but that was it. The biggest and best in Vietnam in 1.5 hrs. The actual convention center only has 1 hall. And this was in the super new convention center built in Phu My Hung-if Saigon really does become huge, they will have to rebuild a new center or expand by 2015.

Overall, it was interesting. I enjoyed it. Would have liked to see more interactive exhibits and more space. For most booths, there was nothing to do, or if you were there to see something, you had to really fight to see that one phone or that one TV. Also, I thought there would be a better retail sales presence, but nothing to really buy. One vendor had special convention prices that were more expensive than their normal prices!

The pictures!

The Sony Gran Tursimo 5 booth. I guess I am not sure if both the TV and Playstation 3 were 3D, or just the PS3. I couldn’t see much of the racing with other cars because the players were all so brutal.

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VTC / Audition Both and Stage. Despite the pictures, I didn’t actually watch any of this.

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Next to the VTC booth was Guitar Hero guy
..

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A young kid playing a game (kind of looked like Lemmings + SimCity) and me checking out the Dr. Care booth.

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More ladies.

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Anitvirus – Back Khoa and NOD32

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Ladies.

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More.

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And more. I think the girl on the left in blue was maybe the best looking girl I saw.

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A Look at Mimo.vn – Vietnam’s Twitter?

Wednesday, February 24th, 2010

MimoLogo thumb A Look at Mimo.vn – Vietnam’s Twitter? (Disclosure: I know someone who works for Mimo- he invited me to check it out a few months ago while the site was in a much rougher state and asked me to give some feedback and suggestions before I wrote this post)

I’m a big Twitter user- not that I have a ton of followers or anything, but I like to post. A big thing about using it in Vietnam is that it was hard to use it via mobile- there are all sorts of stupid things I want to say when I’m in a taxi or just out and about, random things I want to take pictures of and have them posted immediately online (it’s not the same to post them hours or day later, it’s all about the moment). I’d love to do a better job of sharing my life in Vietnam with friends and family over in the US.

Like I said, Twitter is not really so practical via mobile here (think of the costs to send a SMS internationally), and thus I’ve been hoping for a solution to this for a while, and it didn’t necessarily have to be free. There was a free Twitter/SMS option I saw sometime last year, but they would always embed their tag in your post, which I didn’t like so much.

I then started using Mimo. Mimo is Twitter. The Vietnam Twitter (the site is hosted in VN, and the default language is Vietnamese). And when I say it’s Twitter, it really, really, looks like Twitter. And while that might scream “knock-off” or “clone”, I think it’s actually pretty good. I’d actually call it more of a Twitter Plus.

Mimo = Twitter Plus

Mimo has a ton of features that a lot of people wish were already in Twitter, while at the same not making the UI overly messy nor removing anything that people love about Twitter. To me, it’s obvious the Mimo team has used Twitter or at least researched how people use it.

  • SMS Support: this is the big one for me. It’s 500 VND (about the same price as a normal SMS, I believe. 500 VND is 2.7 cents in USD) to send an SMS, but free to receive SMS from Mimo. So you can follow a ton of people and get their posts on your phone at no extra cost even if you never post. You can do a ton of things via SMS, like follow, private message, block users, even register. It’s a bit much for me, but I think you could basically use Mimo without going to the website at all if you wanted. The only bad thing I’ve found is that MMS is not supported, so you won’t be seeing silly pictures from me. Yet.
  • Sync with Facebook and Twitter: since I’m on both Facebook and Twitter, this is pretty important to me as well. Now I can send a SMS update to Mimo for less than 3 cents, and my sister in the US sees it on her Facebook instantly. The sync works both ways, I’ve confirmed- if you post on Twitter or Facebook, it’ll come back into your Mimo.
  • Language Support: Mimo supports both English and Vietnamese, and the English has been done really well! No signs of broken Google-translated English anywhere.
  • Attachment functionality: up to 20 MB per post, supporting basically any file format you want. It’ll show images and play music files inline as well. Thumbnails next to the post text make it obvious when there’s an attachment. You can’t watch videos on the site yet, though, there will just be a download prompt.
  • Webcam: support for avatars and uploads. Too bad you can’t record videos yet though.
  • Apps: Mimo has a seriously ridiculous amount of apps ready for it. I use TwitterFox for Twitter, and Mimo has a version of it out already. They’ve also got apps for Adobe Air and Windows .Net, and you can use Yahoo Messenger (it’s the number 1 IM client here) with it. Now they just need an iPhone app, and they can go claim themselves king.

In terms of the UI, and not messing anything up, let me give you an example:

MimoUI

Mimo UI Basics:

  • Top Center: Pick your Language. UK flag for English, Vietnamese Flag for Vietnamese.
  • Upper Right: If you like to type with diacritics (accents), click that.
  • Left of Avatar: Webcam uploads, Attachments, and Character Count.
  • Upper Left: (below Mimo logo) autocomplete username on replies – it’s like Facebook when you search! When you start typing @ and the beginning of someone’s username, Mimo will suggest people based on whom you’re following for the autocomplete.
  • Individual Posts: Favorite / Reply / Copy. Copy is basically Retweet- they do it the old school Twitter style, adding RT and copying the text of the post into the text entry box.
  • Right Navigation Menu: If you have a new reply or Private (Direct) Message, it will let you know in an obvious manner (like Gmail). I always thought the total Direct Messages count you see in Twitter was useless- I could never tell if I had something new because I don’t remember what the count used to be.

Here’s an example of what a post with an attachment (photo thumbnail on the right) looks like:

Mimo Attachment Post

Now, here’s Twitter’s UI:

TwitterUI thumb A Look at Mimo.vn – Vietnam’s Twitter?

Super familiar right? But that’s what I mean by Twitter Plus. If you already like Twitter, getting into Mimo is easy, and it has some nice small enhancements that make the experience a good deal nicer. I’m going to be using both Mimo and Twitter- Mimo to post updates and interact with my Vietnamese friends, and Twitter to monitor what my American friends are up to in the US.

Some negatives:

  • I am not sure Hot Topics is working right. I like the Twitter one, where you can see all the new trending and hot topics. I hope they can fix this, as getting real time insights into what Vietnamese people are thinking and doing would be pretty awesome. Imagine stuff like when VN has a big football (soccer) match, and everyone’s getting ready to go out in the streets, or everyone is excited to see Avatar 3D at Megastar, but can’t get tickets.
  • No Free SMS – ok, so I’m being picky. That’s not really a negative, that’s just me being greedy. Maybe they can have an ad-supported version in which you can send SMS posts for free. You could opt in to receive 2-3 SMS ads per day, and then you would be able to post to Mimo for free.
  • Already mentioned: MMS not supported yet, no direct video playback, no video through webcam, no iPhone or Mobile app (so what if I don’t have an iPhone), but there is a WAP site, m.mimo.vn. GPRS in Vietnam can be super slow though, I’d rather stick with SMS.
  • It took me 3 hrs to update my Twitter badge on the upper right (below the header) with a Mimo one. Why is this a negative? Because I am lazy and like to complain.

Some people to follow:

  • SaoNoiTieng: trash talking gossip.
  • QuaCauMaThuat is like Magic 8 Ball. I tried it (alright, I was a little drunk) with a friend via mobile, answering it random questions, and it would give me those random answers like back when we were kids. It does support English, it just depends on what language you have selected in the Mimo UI.
  • Eduard Kazanov and Tommy Tran: Eduard and Tommy are listed as two of the Suggested Users when you register for an account. They’re celebrities/VIPs as models/actors, and they’re actually very nice. I happen to know them and for whatever reason, they got me a pass into the Hard Rock Cafe grand opening. So that’s a plug for them!

Of course, feel free to follow me on either Mimo or Twitter:

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Pickup Basketball in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)

Friday, February 19th, 2010

755009841 gdqC4 M Pickup Basketball in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)

Hi there! Looking for a basketball / streetball game in Saigon? Not sure if you always want to play with locals? There’s nothing wrong with that as locals can be quite good, but the style of play is often quite
different.

I play with a group of expats, and while we’re not good, we do like to play and stay in shape and pretend that we’re not old. We can’t cover up that we’re short though (I’m 5’6).

We play in District 11, over at Phu Tho Stadium, the Lu Gia Street Gate (Ly Thuong Kiet and Lu Gia.). Right next to the Phu Tho Horse Racing Club (Click for Google Maps). If you’re going by taxi or xe om and don’t know much Vietnamese, type this in to your phone and show the driver:

“San thi dau Phu Tho, duong Ly Thuong Kiet, Q11, cong Lu Gia”

We reserve half or full court (full whenever we can) on Thursday nights and a weekend night (based on availability), and all pitch in for drinks (water, sports drinks) and court rental (Very affordable: a little over $5 USD per hour for the full court. That’s not per person, that’s total.). As far as I know, Phu Tho is considered the best place for basketball in the city. It is far for most people though, but it’s worth it if you really want to play basketball.

We’ll play each other (we’re mostly Americans but also play with Taiwanese friends), and sometimes pickup people to join us.

(EDIT: March 6, 2010

BasketballSaigon Pickup Basketball in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)I opened a Mimo account (think of Twitter for Vietnam) to list out when we play. As soon as I receive confirmation of a time, I’ll post it to Mimo. To get the latest news, you can either check our page, or if you register for your own Mimo account, you can follow us, and get the updates delivered to your mobile through SMS for free.

We’re @BasketballSaigon.)

(EDIT: April 24, 2010

A quick note. In case you come to Q11 and don’t know where to find us, I’m almost always wearing an old-school Vince Carter Toronto Raptors jersey, and we’re the only ones speaking English.)

So, whether If you’re in town for a visit or living here, and would like to play, we’d love for you to join us, just leave me a comment below or contact me over at the About Me page. It’s also a good opportunity to network (hint, hint).

By the way, the picture above is at Phan Dinh Phung (PDP) Sports Complex in District 1 on Pasteur. They have a pretty nice court there, but like most good courts in Vietnam, very hard (virtually impossible) to reserve- they’re usually set aside for public (school) leagues or teams and can’t be used for pickup. If you want to do pickup there, you’ll have to do so at what are their almost quarter-like courts. You’ll understand if you go by there.

I’m also always happy to post more information on good pickup games to share if I get it. We’re always looking for more court options for games, but we want to be able to reserve a court, because true pickup (get in line and hope to get on) is too hard when you’re working and have a tight schedule.

I personally would pay $100 a month for a court/gym I could play at and practice by myself for couple hours a few times a week.

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