Review on "New Rules for Cyber Cafe Soon"

It's a damn hot and boring day; I should have been in Mid Valley, or Sunway Pyramid, or whatever malls with air conditioning. But here I am, in my hot and stuffy room, surfing Mr. Hen's blog on "Legal" in order to to do my last entry for this boring assignment. Oops! Gee... No offense Mr. Hen or Cik Farah (Our E-Commerce lecturers and tutors). Perhaps it's only because today is a boring day, for me. Believe me, this blogging assignment is absolutely interesting, fascinating, great for it allows us to venture into bloggers' world and learn a whole lot of things. Trust me.

New Rules for Cyber Cafe Soon
The above catchy line caught my attention the moment the Web page completely loaded. New RULES? What NEW rules? What kind of NEW RULES our holy beloved Malaysian's government imposes on Cyber Cafe? This news should be of upmost concern to "Kaki Cyber" (a nickname given to those avid Cyber Cafe's visitors).

So, let's get an idea of what the new guidelines are at http://ecommerze.blogspot.com/search/label/Legal

Well, frankly speaking, I'm not a frequent Cyber Cafe's visitor. Not even once a month. Abandon the comfort of surfing the net, doing assignment, or playing online games at home, and step into a place of hell to do all these is a big NO for me. No way! Why such exaggerated emotion, you may ask. My first experience of surfing net for urgent information in a Cyber Cafe was doomed. And I swore I'll never ever, never EVER, step into this code-red-area. Unless with valid reason.

Imagine, having everyone around you to shout and yell hysterically at the computer screens, feet stomping on the floor and hands thumping on the mouses, as if they are possessed by Satan! (To describe this scene better, download or rent or buy or rob from others "Exorcism"--a movie. Take a look and you'll understand exactly what i meant.) I couldn't stand seeing these. I felt like "deleting" them off, yet they look hilarious in some way...

Furthermore, you can hear people using all sort of colorful vulgarities (in English some more), flying here and there, everywhere. I can assure you, their English is never better! And the one @#$% thing that i could not tolerate is having "chimneys" puffing smoke every here and now, making the Cyber Cafe look as if it's Genting Highlands.

Thus, some new guidelines such as prohibit cigarattes and alcohol being sold (Better still, disallow smoking and drinking in the Cyber Cafe), prohibit unhealthy activities pornography, gambling from being provided, are the good ones. Applause.

However, some of the guidelines, I must say, is absolutely RIDICULOUS!

-Cyber Cafe have to CLOSE BY MIDNIGHT daily

Come on, I don't think the Cyber Cafe will adhere to this rule. Not in the past, never in present, impossible in the future. Unless, strict and CLEAN enforcement are taken. Note the word: CLEAN. Cyber Cafe will still operates into late midnight (although from the outside their doors are seen closed) even though there are some policemen patrolling just outside. The reason being, those policemen are being fed by the Cyber Cafe's owners! No joke. I got this source from friends who frequently visit Cyber Cafe.

In addition, what will happen to those Cyber Cafe that operates 24 hours, and position this as their competitive advantage?

-Those under 12 years old must be ACCOMPANIED BY PARENTS OR GUARDIAN and ONLY ALLOWED TO STAY UP TO 10.00PM.

*Shakes head* My question is, how the government and the legal enforcement team make sure this is exactly followed?

-Prohibited from providing GAMING ACTIVITIES, MUSIC.

Omigod! If gaming activities, downloading and music sharing activities and the like are not allowed to be carried out in Cyber Cafe, then I guess it's time to give a new definition to what is Cyber Cafe?

In one sense, Cyber Cafe has already turned into a source of social-ill. Merely providing new rules and guidelines are not sufficient to combat this problem at hand. Datuk Hamzah Zainuddin, you ought to revise these rules again. Preventing Cyber Cafe from deteriorating the issues of social-ill requires not only more sound rules, but also drastic actions!!

*By Shu*