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The number of opportunities for meeting new people slowly diminishes as age catches up with you. You find your usual group of friends deviating from your life, one at a time. Your favorite hang-out haunts become boring. Day in day out, your interaction is only with the same people at work. You find yourself socially stranded in the sea of loneliness. What do you do next?

If you find yourself facing any of the above problems and want to make a change to your social life, try out BunchOut.com.

BunchOut.com is somewhat similar to a dating service. If you are raising an eyebrow to that thought, pause for a moment and allow me to change your mindset. You do not go on one-to-one dates with users of BunchOut, unlike some dodgy dating websites. Truthfully, I had that first impression when the BunchOut Kuala Lumpur version was launched in January 2008. After dwelling deeper into the concept for a month, I think this website has good potential. Come, follow me to the journey of discovery with BunchOut.

BunchOut.com at present, spans 6 locations around the world; San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, London, Singapore and last but not least Kuala Lumpur. Locations will grow when the listing of groups reach to 20. Now, how does this listing work and most importantly how will the listing work for you? Let’s tackle the former question first.

A city needs to have 20 group listings to launch - a pioneer batch of people get on it first, so it will be populated and useful by the time other people from the same city sees it. In a simpler context, you create a listing for your group(s) of friends. This listing will get you in touch with people you want to meet. How? Simple, just hit the “Contact Them” button when you browse through the listing that you like and then, you initiate a contact point with that group. However, the party on the receiving end can choose to ignore the call.

So, now, how does the listing work for you? The keyword is “group”. I’m sure you may have heard of meeting criminals and other shady characters via the Internet. It is indeed a scary world out there. However, by going out in a group of friends, you lower this risk. I’m not implying that there’s no risk at all. There’s risk to everything you do. So, an arranged outing with a new group of friends, this I refer to as a “friendly outing”. Imagine the worst scenario, you meet a group that was out of your expectations with no common interests, you can always flee the scene with your friends. A harmless and most polite way to excuse yourself is to leave with a group. Since a city requires 20 groups to exist, you’ll still have 19 groups to meet if the first one does not meet your expectations. Whoever has had the complaint of meeting new people, surely had not heard of BunchOut.

Next, another discovery about BunchOut.com. As defined by the founder of BunchOut, “BunchOut is a list of interesting groups of people in your city!” Finding the right people who share your passion and hobby is like finding a needle in the haystack. Finding like-minded individuals in today’s hectic society is no doubt a considerable challenge. For instance, you may like a variety of extreme sports, thus you need to join a specialized club/organization that organizes such events to meet people. Where on earth do you find the time to do that? It is definitely not impossible but extremely cumbersome. BunchOut.com creates the opportunity for you to meet this interesting group of individuals all in one place. Best of all, it is free!

So, whatcha waiting for? Start BunchOut’ing now!

Click here to visit BunchOut.com
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We all know how monotonous a long day at work can be, and we all know how easy it is to get caught while surfing the Web or doing anything else other than work at the workplace. If you get drained out and find yourself nodding off at the office, try www.xkcd.com for something to perk you up. Just as long you manage not to laugh out aloud.

xkcd.com is a comic webstrip that is updated thrice weekly and usually with one strip per update. It is titled ‘xkcd - a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math and language’ and is written by Randall Munroe. The main page shows the latest strip published and it provides us with navigation buttons. The very useful ‘random’ button is self-explanatory and the one I click on all the time. When you are at work, sneak a peak at one strip here and go back to work. Most of the time, I find the comic strips exceedingly hilarious and it never fails to perk me up from impending slumber.

The unique characteristic about xkcd is that it focuses on, what I like to call, intellectual humour. Most conventional comic strips make use of visual humour, with exaggerated depictions of characters. In contrast, xkcd employs simple stick figures as the characters and instead, relies on text to deliver the punchlines. Drawings are usually simplistic (I say usually, because there are times when comic strips are published in all their visual glory) but ample to draw a laugh out of the reader.

The crux of xkcd is the writing and mostly it does not fail to shine. Personally, I had a good time trawling through the archives and enjoying a good guffaw at work, as I understood most of the references. Mainly, the inspiration comes from American pop-culture, relationships and even mathematical concepts. However, there were some times when xkcd had me scratching my head in front of the monitor. Some references were rather obscure and I failed to understand the joke completely. This may happen quite often to you if you are not as familiar with American culture or computer terminology as Randall Munroe does have quirky ‘geeky’ inclinations. Many references, although obscure, can still be comprehended by the masses.

xkcd.com does not possess any real storyline, although they are recurring characters. This trait makes it a very good site to pass time in office - you can randomly go in to read a strip or two when you feel like it and you would not be missing anything if you missed an update or two. I would recommend this site to you; if you do have time, try browsing through some of the older strips in the archive, some are really hilarious. The cynical humour and sarcasm is a very delightful change from the conventional Baby Blues and Foxtrot.

Click here to visit xkcd.com
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One of the more important bookmarks, Newegg.com is the one-stop solution to all my electronic shopping needs. Ranging from specific computer parts to general electrical peripherals, Newegg.com stocks a massive variety of brands and products to fully satisfy the needs of demanding customers of this day and age. As this is an online store, there is easy accessibility and ease of use. This is the place to look if you are having difficulty finding specific electronic hardware.

Newegg has a multitude of categories of electronic hardware, ranging from computer memory modules to plasma television sets to game consoles like the Playstation 3; there is close to nothing that cannot be found here. There are literally millions of products that can be purchased. Prices are rather competitive, although not low all the time. However, one thing that the buyer can be sure of is the high standard of quality. Products shipped are guaranteed to be shipped in good condition and promptly and they do offer standard exchange policies for most products.

One impressive point is that Newegg has a huge base stock of older models of products that are not available in many places. For example, I was looking for older modules of DDR1 RAMs (DDR2 being the most widespread, DDR3 being newly launched) but there was little choice and exorbitant costs in retail shops. Even at places like eBay and Amazon, I could not find available stocks for such memory modules. However, at Newegg I was entirely spoilt for choice. They had countless modules readily available from the major manufacturers.

A very helpful feature of Newegg is that it has tie-ins with many prominent tech review websites like AnandTech and Tom’s Hardware. Frequently, reviews are done on newer products that are being launched and Newegg links these reviews on their site for the buyer’s easy access. On top of this, Newegg has a feature for buyers of their products to write their mini review on pros and cons of the products for other customers to see. The reviews are an invaluable help to customers who are unsure of the most suitable type of product for their needs.

One cumbersome feature about Newegg, though, is their acceptance of only American credit cards as payment. I feel that this defeats the purpose of an online store - international buyers are excluded from reaping the benefits. Buyers, like myself, have to make extra effort to purchase products through services like V-Post (a postal service in Singapore). Another aspect that Newegg can improve on is on package tracking. Tracking numbers can be provided to allow buyers to track the status of their products after it has been posted by Newegg. This would be very convenient and reassuring for customers, who do not have to worry needlessly about problems during delivery.

I feel that Newegg should seek to explore possibilities of including the international buyers market and accept international credit card payment. No doubt, the website has its legions of fans outside of the USA and it would be in best interests of both sides if Newegg does eventually accept international purchases. Other than this point, Newegg.com is basically every tech enthusiast’s haven.

Click Here for Newegg.com Clearance Items.
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Fan fiction (fanfic for short) is a term for fiction about characters and/or settings written by fans of original, published works and such works are usually uncommissioned and not published professionally. Fan fiction can be based on anything, from books to movies and even fictional accounts of real-life celebrities. These stories are most often found on websites nowadays, and FanFiction.net is arguably the largest and most popular site where fan fiction is published and archived.

The site is easy enough to navigate as the stories are clearly categorised. Upon reaching the main page, a list of eight main categories are presented to you. Clicking on any of the main categories’ link will take you to a page that lists all the sub-categories under it. This page usually specifies the exact series you are looking for, and you can now filter the page by the first letter of the series you are looking for. Want to find a Harry Potter fanfic? Check under Books and filter to the letter ‘H’ to find the appropriate link.

To make it easier to search for a fanfic to read, FanFiction.net has several functions to help the user. You can sort stories by the date it was updated or published, genre, rating, language, length of story and even status of the story - whether the story is complete or not. For the larger categories, you can even search for stories based on characters. You will also be shown the title of the story, the author and a short summary which is written by the author. Additionally, one can also access the Communities link, located on the top right of the page. Communities are created by authors of the site and they archive select stories. The basis for such archives can be genre, specific characters or even pairings (romantic or otherwise). If you have an account on the site, you can even subscribe to the community and receive email notifications when new fanfics are added to the community.

However, quantity does not always mean quality. It is quite common to hear laments that it is becoming increasingly difficult to search for a good read on FanFiction.net, and as a user of the site for close to 4 years, it is a sentiment which I share. The reason for this is likely to be due to the fact that FanFiction.net allows anyone to create an account to start writing and publishing their works. There is no minimum age for creation of an account, so you may come across the works of pre-teens as you are browsing and see a lot of Internet speak. Also, the only form of quality control - if it can even be called such - is through the review system where readers are able to leave comments and reviews after reading the story. Thankfully, it is often easy to tell which stories are likely to be more worth your time by looking at the story’s title and the accompanying summary, although the summary might not always show whether the characters will be in-character.

Other than being a site for publishing and archiving fan fiction, FanFiction.net has, over the years, expanded its services and improved existing ones. The newest service to hit the shelves is the “Beta Reader” service, where authors of the site can advertise their services to other authors on the site. A beta reader, in short, proof reads a story and makes amendments or gives suggestions for improvements before it is published. This can be seen as another way to improve the standards of fan fiction on the site, although it depends on the author if he/she wants to use the service. Relatively new to the website is also the forum, which allows for anything pertaining to a particular original work to be discussed. Other services include private messaging between authors, a dictionary, a search function and a profile page for each author which is often used by authors for updating readers on their current on-going works.

All in all, FanFiction.Net is a good place to start your journey in the world of fan fiction, as well as for interacting with fellow authors. So if you’re new to reading fan fiction and planning to start, why not try out FanFiction.net?

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You know about the world’s most popular sport. Now, allow me to introduce to you the world’s most popular website (in my opinion) about the world’s most popular sport - ESPNsoccernet.com. Missed a live match on the television? Here, you can find pictures, reviews, match reports and team information about football from almost anywhere on the globe.

ESPNsoccernet is a website fully dedicated to the sport of football. Football played with a round ball, mind you. It publishes the latest reports about happenings in the world of football all over the world. Major incidents are reported within minutes of the event taking place, for example the sacking of Chelsea’s coach Jose Mourinho last year. Reporters from the widely established ESPN are spread out in the numerous countries with major football leagues to provide up-to-date information and gossip in the respective host countries. Galleries of photographs from matches played are updated regularly, giving users a visual feast after reading through the wordy reports.

The website also has a massive database of team information, ranging from titans like Manchester United in the English Premier League to minnows like Xerez from the Spanish Ligue 2. Information about teams includes players, managers, recent form, past achievements and so on. The list is so comprehensive that I still have not managed to browse through all the information available for Manchester United. This is definitely welcome news for hardcore supporters of various teams who want to dig out detailed information about their teams. The use of this wealth of information can be further expanded - by registering for free on ESPNsoccernet, you can actually customize the welcome page, with a toolbar on the right with the latest information about your favourite team. Keeping track of your team’s progress, both on and off the pitch, has never been so easy.

The feature I appreciate most about ESPNsoccernet is the ‘Live Scores’ update section. Ever experienced being stuck in the office while your team is playing live? Stuck at home but your mum refuses to budge from watching her favourite Cantonese drama serial? ESPNsoccernet comes to the rescue. The ‘Live Scores’ feature gives updates on live matches, refreshing every 3-5 minutes. Cautions, bookings, set pieces and goals are all chronologically documented within minutes of it actually happening on the field. Now fans can follow the match even without a television, but of course, without the exciting graphical presentation.

ESPNsoccernet is a very useful website, with a host of informative features. However, the multitude of features and add-on’s make the site cumbersome. Due to the massive volumes of information, the page usually takes quite long to load, especially during peak periods like after a live match. Also, one annoying thing is that the reports lack pictures, or in a few cases only containing one. The reports can be rather lengthy and wordy, and sometimes it can be quite a chore to go through it. I felt that the picture gallery could be incorporated into the respective match reports - at least reading won’t be such a dreadful bore.

All in all, this website is really worth the read. The opinions and insights from the resident analysts are interesting reads and it would make good discussion topics. Everything about soccer under the sun can be found here, and its structure makes it child’s play to track a team’s progress through a cup or the league. I would recommend ESPNsoccernet.com to all football fans out there who have not heard about this yet.

ESPNsoccernet.com can be accessed here.
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