gagah.me - Rants & Thoughts of Gagah Putra Arifianto

So Lyft is in the news, they’re trying out a ‘shuttle’ service that’s basically a private version of mass public transport in some cities in the US. Fixed schedule, fixed routes and fixed fares. They’re doing it with a regular car, so it’s not exactly efficient. It’s glorified carpool.

Now, here’s the funny thing. In Indonesia, these ‘micro’ transport service in which a regular car, typically SUV, is used to carry passengers across a fixed routes with fixed fares, is already in place for years, and years already. It’s called Angkot, short for Angkutan Kota (City Transport). And you know what? They suck. They suck really, really hard.

Self-Managed VPN as an Alternative to Paid VPN

March 30, 2017

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Ben Brooks wrote:

The only way to now truly maintain internet privacy (once 45 signs this into law) — even at home — is to use a VPN…
That said, there’s only two VPNs I recommend: Cloak, or Private Internet Access (PIA).

If i’m to add something to his list of VPN to use, i’d recommend another approach entirely: self-managed VPN. The way it works is you buy a cheap Virtual Private Server (VPS), or a cloud instance like from Digital Ocean, Vultr or Linode, and install a VPN software like OpenVPN in it, yourself.

No-Nonsense Guide to SEO Optimization

March 30, 2017

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Tania Rascia wrote:

If a website’s aim is to create as many pages as possible with click-bait titles in order to gain ad revenue, it may see some initial relative >success. However, people leaving the site right away (high bounce rate), a lack of people linking to the site (low referrals) and few people >directly visiting the site (low directs) will ultimately negatively factor into search ranking.

Really well-written and sensible approach to SEO is hard to find, in my opinion, because the sector is rife with so called SEO-expert trying to one up each other with bad, outdated practice.

CS:GO Is a Great E-Sport, But Youtube & Exclusive Right is Hurting It

March 30, 2017

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I’m never really a dedicated sports fan. I followed football (that’s soccer to you in North America) to some extent. Been a fan of Newcastle United since I was a little kid, mainly because my aunt bought me their jersey with Shearer’s name on the back. Newcastle this season is down in Championship after being relegated last season, and there’s no championship football airing on my local television, so no football this season for me, pretty much. But I do follow MotoGP and Formula 1 pretty religiously.

Ryzen Is Here

February 22, 2017

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From GamersNexus:

To get the immediate question out of the way: The processors will be made available on March 2 (shelf availability) at the following prices:

AMD Ryzen R7 1700: $330
AMD Ryzen R7 1700X: $400
AMD Ryzen R7 1800X: $500

Seeing as how rumoured benchmark suggests some of these processors are twice faster than the equivalent Intel model, it’s a holy crap moment for AMD. I’m not gonna hold my breath but it’s gonna be an exciting time if the Athlon 64 success period for AMD is repeated again. But please, this time AMD needs to make some great server processors too. I can’t wait for $10 VPS with Ryzen 8 cores CPU that outperforms Xeon E5. 🙂

It Doesn’t Look Too Good for Ahok, Unfortunately

February 22, 2017

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Gubernatorial election in Jakarta has finished. Well, the first round of it, at least. And the result doesn’t look too good for Ahok.

The gap between candidate number 2 (Ahok-Djarot) and candidate number 3 (Anies-Sandi) is far too close for comfort, and although in their public statement the Ahok-Djarot team sounds ecstatic with the result, i don’t think they’re truly being honest about it. Not for a candidate that used to have almost 70% approval ratings and insanely active grassroot campaigning team (Teman Ahok). I’m not sure if Ahok now regrets the decision to go with political party instead of making a history and going independent.

Lurk More, Fa**ots

February 16, 2017

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Building a community is hard. Online, even harder.

This is what I’ve noticed from recently participating in some online community building. It’s not a big project, just a small online forums for a very specific niche.

And one of the things that surprise me is how important ‘seeding’ the community is.

For example, from talking to several other forum founders, we found that at the beginning, they use bots, to increase the community engagement rate.

Yes, bots. Some fake accounts created for the sole purpose of creating and replying to some threads.

The PC Is Coming Back, Thanks to Youtube and PC Gaming.

February 15, 2017

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This argument is controversial because the sales data of the PC is mixed, to say the least. Worldwide, it’s decreasing. But in the US, it’s slowly coming back[1][2], especially the retail PC market. Apart from the sales figures which I personally think show more about the state of consumer tech hardware industry and the economy, I am slowly seeing more and more about the conventional PC being discussed and talked about.

Personally, I believe we’re in a period of PC renaissance, especially in the western hemisphere, and amongst the younger demographics. A renaissance that in my personal opinion is fueled by the fire of two things: Youtube, and PC Gaming.

Happy Local Election Day, Indonesian

February 15, 2017

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Today marks the first time Indonesia held a nation-wide gubernatorial election on the same day. I’m hopeful the best candidate will win and there’ll be no election riots. I’m also hopeful for the future of our state autonomy. It’s the main reason why we now have some of the brightest people acting as governors and mayors.

And hopefully, Ahok wins the Jakarta election.