External Pitching Session

On Monday we heard quite a few presentations. Here are my comments:

Dreams Heartland & HDB project
The concept of bonding the youth and to spread awareness about environmental issues is good. However, do we really need such a platform to bond our youths, and will it work? I think CCAs and hanging out after class is fairly successful at bonding don't you think.
Nice to see that effort is being put in to engage the younger generation, but I'm afraid the approach might be wrong.

household.sg
Very interesting and cool! If it catches on maybe it can revolutionize the way we shop for groceries in future. Kinda reminded me of Tesco, this Korean company which display their real supermarket layout on subway stations and allow users to browse and shop while waiting for the train. Different idea, but both intend to provide even more convenience for regular citizens to buy their groceries. Went to check out their website and was impressed by the general layout and look and also the delivery time and range of products offered. Looks like a company that knows what its doing.

Burpple
I don't really get the whole food blogging/diary. I thought its somewhat a niche thing. Out of every 50 people I know, maybe 1 or 2 is into it. But if it points me to good food, I'm all for it!

ChalkBoard
I don't get how it works, except that it is fairly widely deployed. And then I got completely lost when the speaker said they pay publishers to use it? How does this work exactly, anyone?

YouTell
Cool idea...

Social Annotations/Teamie
Interesting and ambitious attempt to bring interactive learning to the online platform. This will definitely add value to the learning experience. For example, when lecturers make mistakes on their slides, they can annotate it and update it live. Definitely useful!

The Magnate + Candlestick
Gamification of education seems like the in thing nowadays. Sounds like he's trying to do something like the Cashflow 101 board game. Honestly, I felt the game was lame. I believe investing is a complex topic, and gamifying it might be a bad choice as it will either end up being too trivial, or too technical and deep that it won't be fun anymore, defeating the use of gamifying it in the first place. I think to effectively use games to teach such concepts, the target audience should be kids. But that idea has already been done with PlayMoolah, a company started by one of the NOC alumnus. As for Candlestick, I'm guessing many amongst us had similar skepticism about it. If it worked, one could easily and quietly amass an unbelievable amount of fortune. Besides, the stock market is an open system, affected by the speculators' actions themselves. While activities of this minuscule level won't have a visible effect, in general it holds true. I subscribe to George Soros' view and theory of reflexivity more than purely relying on technical analysis.

A Shocking Game!
Always heartening to see noble souls like Dr. Dana trying to save lives. The name is somewhat a poor choice though.

2359 Media
Really interesting project and opportunity.

Module Review
Idea is there. There are a few problems though - the app will only be relevant twice a year, when people need to bid. Also, I don't foresee students wanting to pay to use such a service so monetization would be a huge problem. Of course, it would be nice to integrate the currently available tools like CAP calculator, timetable builder and also add on things like a checker that tells you what you need to graduate. It is never a problem for me but I  know of many who had to constantly figure it out. The module review idea itself seems flawed though, as I foresee it will be more of "This module very easy to score A!" kind of thing, rather than "I really learned a lot from this module. It can be tough but its worth it." And sometimes it is just difficult to articulate what a module is like. The best way often is just to talk to peers who took the module before to tell you a few things and usually "Aiyah. It's difficult to say la. When you take it you will know la!". I think at best it would be a nice-to-have-but-don't-have-also-nevermind kind of app.

Cliquefund
Brave plan. The venture capital scene does need some major changes. VCs are mostly viewed as vultures, preying on and trying to rip off the hard work of young entrepreneurs. Not exactly sure how they will do it, but I wish them all the best.