Friday, October 19, 2012

free counters

Miss Myanmar

There's a competition, Miss International, taking part in Japan each year. This time for some reason, they decided to send the photos to Flickr. The photo getting most votes, which in this context meant 'views', would be the winner. Myanmar (Burma) has not taken part in anything like this for 50 years, so many are eager for her to win. It was not  just one vote per person, these people sat for hours at their computers clicking away until they got to 16.777.612, when the numbers stopped growing. Consternation! They came on Flickr Help Forum to ask what is going on. Flickr is not a voting machine and views have never reached such high numbers, so the servers probably would not work after that. So they put in another photo hoping they would be counted together.
This was a draft, but I want to publish it too, with some different information.

Miss Myanmar in Miss International pageant.

nankhinzayyar by bluesky@
nankhinzayyar, a photo by bluesky@ on Flickr.
These are some competitors of c. 40 beautiful ladies taking part in Miss International competition in Japan, this year in Okinawa. I do not know how official it was to use Flickr as a ’voting’ site. It is a photo sharing site and not equipped for voting . Myanmar people have the first chance for doing anything like that for 50 years. They stayed at their computers and internet cafes clicking away. When the count reached 4.777.126, the Flickr servers could not manage any more. That caused consternation and questions: Why? So they added a copy of the photo and started ’voting’ on that. The closest competitor was Miss Macau who in the end also reached the limit of 4.777.126. People also wrote comments, mostly :We love you, Miss Myanmar, also : fighting!
” no matter how we face bully and unfair condition, we are bad up giving up… non sleep tonight for miss myanmar,
sleeping can get the next day,
voting only tonight”
Now at last the voting finished, the result: Internet view count poll for Miss International Internet poll award is officially over. Myanmar stands first at 16,777,216 +4,852,624 view counts vs Miss Macau at 16,777,216 view counts. The Flickr poll had to add a second picture of Miss Myanmar as the view counts reached over the maximum number of clicks.Waiting for the official announcement of the winner.
I do not know what effect this 'voting' has on who is going to win, anyway, as it seems that the final of the competition will be on Sunday with judges and all.
missinternational-okinawa.com/final/  Bluesky@ called Miss Finland "doll face". I hope that means a positive thing in Myanmar culture.

Thursday, October 18, 2012

Berkheya cirsifolia White Surprise

Even this late in the autumn, the Oslo Botanical Gardens present some wonderful flowers, as this one from South Africa. I had taken some photos a couple of months ago and went there to find a nametag for a flower and stayed to take a few other photos seeing new flowers.