Oman Mac Users Group

Any one here a Mac user?

Would you be interested in joining up with other Mac users in Oman to set up an Oman Mac Users Group?

The goal of the user group is to begin as an informal group where members can get together occasionally and share experiences and advice regarding Macintosh platform. Eventually the group should set up an online presence and expand its membership and promote increased Mac usage in Oman. The group can leverage membership with the official Apple distributors in Oman to gain discounts on purchases for its members as well.

If interested please reply here.

BLOGGER Meet in real world

Hello all Bloggers and Blog readers,

How about a casual meet?

All bloggers, blog readers, enthusiasts (even curious ones) are welcome. Hope to see some masquerade too!

Choose your dates: 17th / 18th / 19th December (just timing between eid hols and AGCC meet). Do make your response post here.

We are watching this space and taking a head count. Depending on the number location will be fixed and informed later.

You could also suggest what we can be in the Agenda. (Apart from refreshments :-0 )

Oman Blogosphere is calling you.............................

PS: Bloggers please post this news in your blogs too to widen the Net scourge. Tks.

HM's speech in the opening of Majlis Oman

Part 1:


Part 2:


For those like me who missed His Majesty's speech in the annual opening of Majlis Oman (Council of Oman), it has already been uploaded on YouTube and you can see the full speech above. Beautiful speech.

May God bless His Majesty the Sultan and keep him for this great country. =)

KOM's blogging seminar on November 10

MUSCAT: As part of Knowledge Oasis Muscat's (KOM) quarterly Digital Nation program and in partnership with Omania e-Commerce; Nawras; United Media Services; and Infocomm, KOM will host a free seminar on blogging scheduled for 7:30pm, Tuesday, 10 November at the Muscat Inter-Continental Hotel. (more)

The panelists for the seminar:

1. Abdullah Al Jufaili (Intilaaqah)

2. Raed Dawood (Nawras)

3. Haitham Al Busafi (Sultan Qaboos University)

4. Zaid Zabanoot (German University of Technology in Oman)

New era for Fixed-lines in Oman

Oman’s Telecoms Regulatory Authority (TRA) has finally awarded the second fixed-line license tender to PCCW - Awaser Oman Consortium, and it’s coming to an end of monopoly for the majority state-owned Omantel. Pacific Century Cyber Works (PCCW), an Hong Kong-based telecom company joint venture with a Omani partner and Nawras, the 2nd mobile company had lost the bid tender.

That's means new job will be created soon for the Omani Market beside the five mobile reseller companies.

Representing Oman

Many represent Oman in something to be proud of, be it our national team, tennis players, musicians and the list goes on and on... but this way?

I seriously find this annoying and so downgrading, insulting and offending to Oman and its people..Pictures speak a thousand words..


What would your view be on an Omani who appears on TV modeling some Bikinis and other revealing dresses?

Blogger Back!

Quick one, Updating to say that as of last night, blogger appears to be working again.

The outage was due to Omantel Incompetence, I assume.

"Accidentally" Blocking blogger (for, um, like four days!!!!) was not a particularly good move, because it looks like something sinister, no matter what the actual reasons.

Anyway, We can all rejoice now because for the moment at least, blogger is up and runing again in Oman.

Blogger Blocked,

Either Deliberately, or through thier legendary incompetence Omantel has Blocked Blogger access. If you know me, you will already know what I think about this sort of behavior, but since this is a community blog, I'll leave it to your imagination.

I suspect the block will be a temporary, and extremely annoying experience. I am praying for the AP or Reuters to pick up on the story and rain hell down on whatever moron thought this would be a good idea. Accedental or deliberate, it makes Oman look backwards, and puts us in the same league as fabulous places like Saudi, China, North Korea. Oh, wait, we're already in the same league as them on issues like Human Trafficking, so why not freedom of speech as well?

Blue Chi, or others who write for global voices, now would be a great time to update with this news. Please???

Some bloggers have already circumnavigated the block, others will figure it out soon enough.

Kishore has suggested sending emails to Omantel and the TRA, you can read his post here I have sent emails, and it would be great is everyone near and far could be kind enough to do the same.

I am ranting and raving about over on my blog, which you can read about Here

Muscato has also noticed that google services are acting a little funny.

The Undercover Dragon, in a psychic turn of events, posted a list of good ways to get around Omantel's rather feeble attempts to block our access to the outside world. Read it Here, before they decide to block the page entirely.

I would ask for your comments and feedback on the matter, except that they have also managed to block commenting functions on the blogs. SO even if somebody knows what is going on, they would have almost no way of sharing it.

If you want to keep updating your blog despite thier rather pathetic attempts to block access, check with Kishore, Read the Dargon't blog, or drop me an email OtherOman At Gmail dot Com and I"ll let you know a few easy ways to circumvent the block.

You could also migrate your blog to somewhere like wordpress, but then everybody will have to update thier bookmarks.

If you wish to allow commenting on your blog to continue, you can use a programme called Haloscan to replace your standard comments. www.haloscan.com

Good luck guys. And don't forget to email Omantel and the TRA.

Eid Greeting to all!

Here's wishing everyone a very happy Eid Mubarak!

Funscrape.Com | More Eid Mubarak Comments

May this joyous occassion bring for all happiness and prosperity!

Blogging Problems

Do you guys face a problem when trying to publish a blog? It takes a few days to get an article published sometimes and others its on the spot. The only way to check if the blog is not erased / lost is to go the Dashboard area and look for it in the edit section. How do you fix this problem?

It is increasingly becoming difficult to get a house for rent in Muscat. In all the major news papers you will find more people looking for house, than the people looking for a job. Is this house hunt going to end at any point in time? Is there a workable solution for the same?

There has been a trend seen in charging an exorbitant amount as house rent, in addition to that one may have to pay 1 year / 6 months / 3 months advance. House owners even go up to taking post dated cheques for several months.

It makes me wonder if the situation is going to worsen…Is there an issue to shortage of houses? Its so unlikely, a long walk in the evening would make you realize, there are good many number of houses however very less takers, due to the challenges involved in taking a house for rent. When I think aloud “very less takers” may mean that there are houses that are bigger than you want and smaller than you wish…

Are people able to manage? Well, some may feel, yes – people are able to manage, and others may say otherwise. Whatever may be the thought, its going to be clearer day by day……

Ramadhan Greetings to all!

It's almost time again when we enter into the blessed month of Ramadhan...

In Melbourne, Ramadhan starts from 1-sep-08 (Monday) and should finish by the 30th of sep...(runs over the course of September)...I'm not sure about timings for Muscat, but estinates point to a start from either the 1st or 2nd of september...

I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone Ramadhan Kareem...with a prayer that May the blessed month bring for all peace, tranquility and happiness... And May the Almighty accept out endeavours to gain his blessings and mercy. (Ameen)

Excerpts from Communities of Practice: Learning as a Social System

A recent trend in some of the private companies in Oman is “Communities of Practice”. Below are the excerpts regarding the same. Dr. Etienne Wenger is a globally recognized thought leader in the field of learning theory and its application to business.

You are an engineer working on two projects within your business unit. These are demanding projects and you give them your best. You respect your teammates and are accountable to your project managers. But when you face a problem that stretches your knowledge, you turn to people like Jake, Sylvia, and Robert. Even though they work on their own projects in other business units, they are your real colleagues. You all go back many years. They understand the issues you face and will explore new ideas with you. And even Julie, who now works for one of your suppliers, is only a phone call away. These are the people with whom you can discuss the latest developments in the field and troubleshoot each other's most difficult design challenges. If only you had more time for these kinds of interactions.

We all recognize knowledge as a key source of competitive advantage in the business world, but we still have little understanding of how to create and leverage it in practice. Traditional knowledge management approaches attempt to capture existing knowledge within formal systems, such as databases. Yet systematically addressing the kind of dynamic "knowing" that makes a difference in practice requires the participation of people who are fully engaged in the process of creating, refining, communicating, and using knowledge.

Even when people work for large organizations, they learn through their participation in more specific communities made up of people with whom they interact on a regular basis. These "communities of practice" are mostly informal and distinct from organizational units.

Defining Communities of Practice:
Communities of practice are everywhere. We all belong to a number of them—at work, at school, at home, in our hobbies. Some have a name, some don't. We are core members of some and we belong to others more peripherally. You may be a member of a band, or you may just come to rehearsals to hang around with the group. You may have just joined a community and are still trying to find your place in it or you may be a leader of a group in your company or college. Whatever form our participation takes, most of us are familiar with the experience of belonging to a community of practice.

Members of a community are informally bound by what they do together—from engaging in lunchtime discussions to solving difficult problems—and by what they have learned through their mutual engagement in these activities. A community of practice is thus different from a community of interest or a geographical community, neither of which implies a shared practice. A community of practice defines itself along three dimensions:
What it is about – its joint enterprise as understood and continually renegotiated by its members
How it functions – the relationships of mutual engagement that bind members together into a social entity
What capability it has produced - the shared repertoire of communal resources (routines, sensibilities, artifacts, vocabulary, styles, etc.) that members have developed over time.

Communities of practice develop around things that matter to people. As a result, their practices reflect the members' own understanding of what is important. Obviously, outside constraints or directives can influence this understanding, but even then, members develop practices that are their own response to these external influences. Even when a community's actions conform to an external mandate, it is the community—not the mandate—that produces the practice. In this sense, communities of practice are fundamentally self-organizing systems.

Day 1 @ Oman Community Blog

Dear All,

My Name is Vipin Kumar. This is my first day in Oman Community Blog and am very exited to be a part of the community...!!!

Its been a little over 2 months I am in Muscat, however I feel as if I share a strong bonding with the soil....I am sure there are many people who share the same feeling about the city and the country.

I have done my graduation in Computer Science and Electronics. I started my career in MphasiS BPO, as a trainee customer service executive. MphasiS has an exceptional character as a company and I gained a lot in my 3 years tenure, grew as Unit Manager within 2 years, expanded my horizons into services sector, learnt to lead teams into achieving goals, motivating them, the number game of the industry.

The opportunity knocked and I moved into consulting as a HR Manager, worked in Zygon, Focus Management Consultants at various positions. Interacted with clients like IBM, Accenture, SAIC, EDS, Genpact, Professional Access, Zensar, GE.

With my specialization in recruitment, I am here to test my skills and add value to my company and the country (I would be very happy if I can accomplish this).

Photography being my passion, Oman is the best suited place for me, as close to my heart as my home country...

Thank you all...

Sultanate of Oman to embrace the Idol franchise

In few months time Radio Sultanate of Oman and Al Sawadi Beach Resort will lunch its first singing talent show ‘Oman Idol’ as part of Idol franchise such as American Idol and Super Star, for residence of Sultanate of Oman only. The Shabiba wrote an article about it.

Sheikh Saud Bahwan Passes Away

Al Mawaali, over at the Be in Oman Blog broke the story late yesterday.

The Arabic papers were sold out by the time I got to sultan center this morning, but the Times of Oman ( Here and Here) and the Tribune both had lovely eulogies, Far better than anything I could write here. In particular, the papers highlighted Sk Saud's many charitable endeavours. I think you all would agree, that he was a man of extrordinary generosity and business acumen.

According to the papers, Prayers will be performed at the Abu Bakr Mosque, Wattayah. His body will be carried to Al Amerat graveyard and condolences will be accepted at the mosque. In mourning, all the offices, divisions and branches of Saud Bahwan Group shall remain closed from August 20, and shall resume operations on Sunday August 24.

I counted 36 full pages of advertisements from various businesses in the English papers alone. I assume that these are being run instead of the regular adverts, and possibly at a discount. The rates for a full page b/w advert in Al Wattan are roughly 1,200 rials per day before any discount. Assuming a 40% discount, with six newspapers carrying 72 full pages of advertising , That's Maybe 51,000 Rials for Today's edition of the papers. I would expect just as many adverts in tomorow's edition . Call me a cynic, but I can't help wondering if the advertisement divisions of the newspapers high five one another every time someone important dies.

It seems to me that a better way to honor a man and family who gave so much to philanthropic endeavours would be to pull the advertisements for the day and instead donate, quietly, the amount that would have been spent on the advertisemsnts to one of the charities Sheikh Saud established. 100,000 rials in two days would improve the lives of countless disabled children, Diabetes patients, and the less fortunate famalies among us.

Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi rajioon--we belong to Allah and to Him do we return.

One Step Forward : Omantel

Another step towards the right direction from Omantel...according to this article in the Times of Oman, Omantel is revamping the tariff scale for local calls and lowering IDD rates...

Bloggers gathering - August 2008

We had yet another small gathering this evening at D'arcy's Kitchen in MQ. This gathering was unique, though, because we had an honor guest; our fellow blogger MMK080 from Qatar. He was in Oman during the weekend for his first time in the Sultanate, and on his last day in Oman we thought of having a small gathering. It was indeed nice having him between us, and it was an honor meeting him in real life. Hope that he liked his stay in Oman and enjoyed the special Omani hospotality. :-)

Anyways, the gathering was all organized quickly and just via e-mail in the last couple of days, when MMK080 announced last Tuesday that he will be in Oman for the weekend. I quickly e-mailed the bloggers I thought would be interested in meeting up, and they all responded. Everyone came except Muscati who was really looking forward to coming but couldn't make it since he was in Dubai, as he explained to us from the beginning. The bloggers who attended the gathering are: Al-Maawali, Kishor, Blue-Chi, MMK080 from Qatar, our great chief Del_Yahi from the Omani Cuisine, Conceptoo from Oman3D and of course, myself.

And guess what? Blue-Chi and Conceptoo, the founders of Oman3D, gave away some free t-shirts in the gathering carrying Oman3D's logo. So it wasn't only a nice gathering, but we got free t-shirts as well! :-p ..

Again we hope that MMK080 had enjoyed his time in the Sultanate. :-) Wishing to see him again in the future.

UAE Visa for non-GCC Nationals

Is it true that from August the 1st onwards the UAE visit visa for non-GCC nationals is going to cost 50 rials instead of 10 rials only?

We're planning on going to Dubai for a short trip by car sometime in mid-August. Even though we're Oman residents (not citizens) and traveling to Dubai by car, we need a UAE visa which is issued just at the UAE borders and cost 10 rials per person. But I've been hearing from different people that they're raising the fees to 50 rials, does anyone have any idea about this?

If it's true, then I think we're canceling our plans. Because we'd end up paying over 200 rials just for visas for a 4 ~ 5 days visit! Ridiculous.

Happy Renaissance Day

Happy 38th Renaissance Day :-)

Times of Oman is back online

Finally, after being slugged with warning messages on both Google and FireFox 3 for a number of weeks, Times of Oman is back Online...

There is no noticeable change in the content/layout of the website though...it still looks like a website made by a 12-year old in 2 hours (!)

Two-wheeler Schumis

These teenage kids zip around the roads between Wadi Kabir, Ruwi and Muttrah areas in the evenings, and cause a great bit of inconvenience to car drivers. Most of the time, they trespass into the highway and cause a flutter by their helter-skelter riding skills. Not content with highway, they often stay into pavement next to the highway. Call it adrenaline rush or teen passion, they are surely putting their lives at risk. Where are the ROP guys?

Sleepless in Muscat, RIP

I received the sad news late this evening of the passing of Ali Mehdi, known to most of you as Sleepless in Muscat. Ali was without a doubt, Oman's most prolific blogger. He was also an aspiring poet who self-published two books of poetry, and a frequent columnist in The Week and online on the Times of Oman website. He posted frequently on Oman Forum as well. As a blogger, he contributed to a dazzling number of blogs in addition to his own many blogs. He was also the founder of the Oman Community Blog.

Ali's last post on his blog was on May 3rd. It was a poem called Passion's Death.. He fell ill shortly after and was admitted to hospital into Intensive Care where he remained till his passing earlier today. He was 29.

Deepest condolences to his family; our prayers are with them in this difficult time.

Tier three, again

For the second year running, Oman has earned a place amongst the fabulous glitterati of Tier three on the US Dept of State Human Trafficking report. The only entities surprised by this are the ministry in charge of fixing it, and perhaps the courts. The media coverage and press release from the Ministry of Foreign affairs was so shocking, that if I were in charge I would haul up the Minister and departmental heads of the ROP and Courts and demand an explanation.

You can read the report here. One can and should question if the US is a good country to be evaluating the human rights of other nations (Git-mo Abu Gharib, etc...) but the observations in the report are a totally accurate analysis of the current Human rights situation in Oman.

I, personally, am ashamed and embarrassed, because I thought Oman was actually going to DO SOMETHING about human trafficking, instead of throwing a few conferences, issuing a decree which was never enforced and distributing a printed leaflet to illiterate labourers. How hard would it be to actually run an aggressive sting programme to bust companies and individuals who deny their employees their basic human rights? Follow that up with some aggressive prosecutions, some crippling fines, and jail time for the CEO's and sponsors convicted of sexual trafficking, Physical abuse, Non payment of Wages, and withholding Passports. Then publish their pictures in the paper. Front page. Next, set up a small shelter for Victims of human rights violations, as well as local victims of marital violence.

Congratulations one and all. This is certainly a proud moment for our glorious nation.

Show ?! Training ?

I mistakenly come across this video on YouTube this morning. I'm not sure if it's real or it was just a show but for sure it was in SQU's campus. If it's for real then it's scary... and if it's just a show or whatever, then I don't understand why the shotguns and in a university campus?

OmanTel announces new ADSL packages

So the pricing for the new ADSL packages are now announced and can be checked on OmanTel's official website. [Link]

As Muscati pointed out in my previous post, the 8 Mbps turned out to be close to 100 OR. 99 OR actually. It's crazy, even after considering the unlimited free downloads you get with that package. Nobody on his right mind will pay 99 OR on an Internet connection for personal usage.

The other four packages starting from 512 Kbps, 1 Mbps, 4 Mbps are reasonably priced I guess. You can check the packages in details [here].

And yeah.. according to the press release, your 384 Kb/s ADSL connection should automatically upgrade to 512 Kb/s with no charges.

So, what do you think of the pricing ?

Yet another interview with HM by a Kuwaiti newspaper...

(ONA)

The same Kuwaiti journalist Ahmed Al Jar Allah, editor-in-chief of Al Siyasa Kuwaiti newspaper, who interviewed His Majesty the Sultan two years ago, interviewed HM again on Saturday April the 26th, 2008.

It's a quite interesting interview. The highlights of the interview can be checked on Times of Oman newspaper by clicking here. And for Arabic readers, they can check the whole interview in details (Q&A) on the Kuwaiti newspaper: Al-Siyasa [Link].

I wonder why we don't have Omani journalists interviewing His Majesty as often? Or as a friend of mine said, maybe it is because we don't have such capable journalists in Oman?

OmanTel's 8 Mbps ADSL

Does anyone have any idea about the new 8 Mbps and 16 Mbps ADSL packages OmanTel is offering?

The ad above was posted by someone on Sablat Oman (omania2.net), but unfortunately when I checked OmanTel's website it has nothing mentioned about these offers.

Any idea? information? recent news from OmanTel?

(YET) Another Inflation Record Smashed...(but is that all that is to the story?)

Just when some are beginning to think it cant get much worse, in an article published by ITP's ArabianBusiness (click HERE to go to the article in full), inflation in Oman is racking up record upon record ever since the US Dollar started it's fateful slide for the worse...since then, the Omani Rial has lost close to 20% of it's value against some currencies (as I compared here), prices for food and other essential commodites have shot up through the roof (possibly more than just a roof this year)...

According to the article, "Inflation in Oman rose for a ninth month to 11.11% in February, the highest in at least 18 years"...

further adding that "Food, beverage and tobacco costs, which account for almost a third of the consumer price index, surged 19.6% in February, the Ministry of National Economy said on its website on Sunday. Food costs had jumped 17% in January"

And the response was just the usual rhetoric the Omani public has been hearing all along..."There is no quick fix," Omani Economy Minister Ahmad bin Abdul-Nabi Mekki told newswire Reuters on Sunday."We took measures of reducing imports and we also requested wholesalers to reduce prices. Inflation will take its natural course in 2008."

Oman's CPI is now at 120 points, up from 108 from the same point in time a year back. This is reportedly the highest level since 1990.

The final piece of data given is: "Inflation in Oman, which hit 10.12% in January, had risen by an average of 1% in the last 10 years.

Rents rose 14.1% in February, down slightly from 14.3% in January,"

The article then goes into the defensive statements we've been hearing all along...there is an implicit message again that Oman does not intend to depeg or revalue the ailing Rial anytime soon...

What is surprising is the fact that the article mentions a Central Bank official as saying that Oman needs to slow down economic expansion...I dont see how that can be done without raising interest rates and reducing the money supply and liquidity in the market...

That said, I have a few thoughts of my own to add...I dont think Oman is alone in facing rapidly inflating food prices...Prices for food items have been rapidly increasing all around...I've noticed food items in Australia going up as well (Australia faces inflationary pressures as well and annual inflation is at around 3-4% despite measures by RBS including relentless interest rate rises, but some food items like Indian rice have shot up by as much as 20% over a period of months).

prices for food items (such as rice, wheat and perhaps all essential grains) have been rising sharply all over the world since the last year or so...prices are expected to stabilise a bit this year (since Australia is coming out from drought and expects to produce a healthy wheat crop this year) but to what extent they stabilise remains to be seen.

Damn, now what am I going to do with that Free Tibet banner?

I was interested to read in yesterday's Times of Oman about the plans for today's Olympic torch relay. The media and the various ministries seem quite excited about it all, though I am slightly disappointed by the lack of enthusiasm shown by most of my friends and associates.

That's not what this post is about though. I laughed out loud when I read the following :

Oman announced yesterday that the nation is all geared up to host the most peaceful leg of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games torch relay tomorrow. The claim came from Oman Olympic Committee vice-chairman Habib bin Abdulnabi Macki, who addressed a large press gathering at the Crowne Plaza yesterday.

“Our security is tight and anyone trying to put a hurdle will be severely dealt with,” said Habib Macki. “The Royal Oman Police is ready to handle any such situations.”

Did you catch the pun? Hurdle! get it? Hurdle?

After I stopped laughing, I spent another twenty or thirty minutes marveling at his poor choice of words regarding how protesters will be treated. I can't believe that nobody prepped him for the question, or if they did that that was the quote he was supposed to give. That is textbook bad Public and Press Relations.

With the eyes of the world on us today, the OOC would have been well advised to trot out a someone more seasoned to deal with the media, or to have prepared statements that didn't quite present the plan for crowd control so bluntly.

That said, I think it's a real mark of distinction that Oman was chosen to host a leg of the relay. For those of you who want to attend, the relay starts off from the Dhow at the Al Bustan R/A at about 17:00 and continue along the coast through old muttrah, and up through the darsait heights area, then Past the refinery I think and down into Qurum. The relay is scheduled to finish amongst great fanfare and fireworks at around 20:30 tonight, in the floating theatre in Qurum park.

Be there or be square Hip Cats.

A slightly more Caustic version of this is Cross posted on my Blog, Other Oman