Madspeak

The job of a journalist is based on news, news is work. To expect a journalist a specific number of hours in a newspaper office is absurd. Putting hours does not make news. Only when something happens which can happen at any time that is when a journalist is expected to work. It is a royal waste of time and energy to expect to put in 7 or 8 hours even there is no news. --------------- News item: A man gets fired for eating left over pizza. Opinion: What a flimsy excuse for throwing people out of jobs. Employers should not be allowed to have so much power as to throw people out on a whim. Employees should have rights, the quality of their work should determine whether they ought to stay in a job. Besides would it have killed the owners of the company if someone ate left over pizza? Firing people on such things is essentially inhuman if not absolutely evil.

At first I use to imagine that there was something wrong with my computers, both at home and office - that all the emails I sent to my famiy and friends in the USA were returning and there some error message which said that email address could not be found. I kept trying and continued failing, using my own ISPs email service or the various email services available on the World Wide Web. I found out I was not imagining anything, my family, friends and colleagues were all having the same problem. There was simply no way for anyone to contact anyone in the USA. I talked to the ISP people and they said all their clients were suffering the same. Then a few days back I received a phone call from a friend, who lives in the USA, he was furious with me. "What is wrong with your computer? I have been sending you emails for past several months." I did not know what to say, I do not have the technical expertise on this matter. But it is obvious that not only can anyone send emails to ...

A publication called 'sach bolna jurm hai' was banned and all its copies were confiscated. The literal translation of the title of the publication - Expressing The Truth Is A Crime. By confiscating the publication and banning it, only proves its publisher's point, that expressing the truth is definitely a crime. Even by losing his licence to publish and having the copies his recent edition destroyed, he has won - but the stupid the government is too stupid to realise this. There is obviously there is not cure for this insanity - as the saying goes - power corrupts........

What could be more obscene that Shaukat Aziz the prime minister and Chaudhry Shujaat who had promised that the Wage Award to the newspaper employees, which has been pending for the past five years would be paid this month in August. Instead these two 'leaders' left the country on their 'official' visits. How long with this injustice last, how long with the newspaper employees have to wait til the Wage Award is paid along with arrears of the past five years?

Minister Awais Ahmed Khan Legari in 2003 in a move to 'preserve public decency' ordered that all 'objectionable' websites be banned. Instead of improving thing it did exactly the opposite - the number humiliating crimes against women bmany times more. The present military regime supports the outrabegously obscene of sentencing women to gang rape - it they do not adhere to tribal laws. In these two years more violent sex crimes have been reported - simply because manic intolerance of any kind is being promoted. Whether 'objectionable' websites are bad or not - 'Objectionable' a euphamism for pornographic, at least instead of going around on a rampage to hurt others, people sat in front of their computers and watched what was being shown. The on going catch phrase these days is -"don't watch do something about it" - it is being encouraged officially particularly by people like Minister Awais Ahmed Khan Legari who is a known woman...

It is strange to learn about how employees are treated. Close circuit cameras are not meant for security purposes, they are used to monitor employees. A worker is required to 12 hours or more standing - with not a minute to rest. If any employee is seen sitting down, or leaning against the wall to take a breather is immediately fired without a moments notice. It is as if people are machines are expected to perform as such. They are also underpaid. What also has gone is the concept of the monthly salary and pensions are out of the question - people are fired prior to the time they reach retirement age. A person is useful only as long he continues to work at his peak level, his prior performance is of no consequence. In such inhuman environment there can be no respect and loyalty towards the employer. Why should anyone work with absolute dedication when he (or she) knows that he could be fired at a moment's notice? An employees previous performance is treated as history a loyal worke...

The entire Internet service had collapsed recently. The problem is said to be the damage to the undersea cable. But it could very well be entirely different reason. For several years the Internet was easy to access and the government did not resort blocking websites. The collapse of the Internet could most likely be because of the result widespread blocking of websites by government. Internet experts had warned that the Internet access would be slowed down to a crawl because many websites were being blocked. The slowdown of the Internet coulc eventually have resulted in its eventual collapse. The Internet's collapse was not due to a cable fault but when data flow is hindered intensely filtered. It would have been best if the Internet's operation had been left alone and this dabbling in interfering in data flow is dangerous. It is impossible to tell which every website contains, so the government resorted to massive blocking of the Internet. If the government continues to b...