Warning: "Interface Global"

They are giving TechAsia out for free? But the cover says US$25. (Seriously!). See, it DOES pay to pay more for better editors!

quote:
Originally posted by Torrid: In 2002 we are launching five glossy magazines - the latest of which you are welcome to pick up for free on June 3 at Computex - the title is Tech Asia.

I guess if you give something away for free and the price tag says US$25, people are going to be more impressed than if it were 25 Turkish lira.

US$25 for a magazine? What, is it 5,000 pages?

quote:
Originally posted by sandman: ...one the finest organs ever to roll off the presses

However good or bad it may be, with all that gleaming black rubber, it must be one of the glossiest magazines there is. As such, it should appeal to Torrid. What effect does it have on your organ, Sandman?

quote:
Originally posted by Juba: What effect does it have on [i]your[/i] organ, Sandman?

Think of the kittens, Juba, won’t somebody please think of the kittens!

http://www.the-kittens.co.uk/music.html

A fine record - by a fine bunch of lads.

Trade Winds/Interfarce latest news:

Not content with changing its name twice, Trade Winds/Asiatrademart/Interface Global is now ending its year-long residence at Yahoo’s hand-me-down office in Jianguo South Road and moving out to sunny Xindian. One way of dumping a few more people who can’t commute there. At the same time, its Zhanghua office is to be merged with the Taizhong one.

Self-appointed IG spokesman Torrid has gone in for a bit of name-changing, too, dumping his original Oriented ID “Chingmei.”

After a short period calling himself “Chingmei”, Interface Global’s self-appointed champion has reverted to his old name of Torrid. Perhaps that is just a side-effect of Oriented’s transformation into Segue. What is more interesting is that he has gone AWOL from Interface Global and got sacked. A few weeks ago, he was sent on an assignment to interview advertising customers in Zhanghua. After coming back to Taibei, he didn’t go back to the IG office. When phoned, he said he was writing the articles at home, but (according to other people working at IG) he never sent them, so IG had to give him the boot. Daniel Foong, who was “promoted” from the editorial department to public relations, has now been “promoted” again - back to the editorial department! - Presumably to pick up the pieces left behind by Torrid. So how long did you stick it out at IG, Torrid - 4 months, or was it 5? If you think anything I have said here is unfair, Torrid, send me a private message and I will consider editing my post.

Note (18 September): Torrid/Chingmei/Wurst told me a different story in a private message, but he doesn’t want me to say anything about it here.

I’ve got Turgid’s humble pie heating in the microwave, Juba, let me know when you need it served! Hopefully, somebody else will provide a big helping of crow to go with it! :laughing:

Looks you were right all along!

Nice idea about the microwave Mr Sandman but i think, as the Sicilians say, revenge is a dish best served cold.

Interface Global was set up in March 2002. It hasn’t been paying national health insurance contributions for its employees. The amount owed to date comes to about NT$800,000, and that is not including the amount owed by the two previous incarnations of Trade Winds. This amount is correct as of today (19 September 2002.)

This can be verified by opening http://oatb.nhitb.gov.tw:8020, clicking on “unpaid insurance contributions of units and individuals” and then “category 1” in the left-hand frames, entering the national insurance number (baodan haoma) of the company and clicking on the left-hand grey button:
Interface Global: 129026366
Trade Winds mark I: 121811676
Trade Winds mark II: 127259527

Also, wages due to all employees on 5 September have not been paid up until now.

Other sources tell me that they have a history of not paying wages on time. Strict cash-control there, huh?

Turgid loves those guys, doesn’t he? Why isn’t he on here sticking up for them like he was before?

Oh, riiiiight! He wigged out and got fired, didn’t he. Hey SUCKAH! Should have listened to ol’ Uncle Juba all along, shouldn’t ya? :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:

that’s pretty funny. f-ed up, but funny.
that guy (t’rrid) was proclaiming the virtues of TW/IG at maximum verbosity for the few months he worked there and then just stopped showing up? :shock: what kind of childish behavior is that (as if his petulant posts weren’t childish enough!)?
i wanna know what the PM to juba said…
or should we just speculate?

[color=green]Now you have the chance to join the long line of editors who’ve spent just long enough at Interface Global to find out how f*cked up the company is. They are advertising for an editor again on Segue right now. Just click the link![/color]

www.segue.com.tw/viewtopic.php?t=5607

Perhaps they have been enlightened by your posts and will take you back with open arms – giving you a huge raise in pay and your own cattle-prod for uncooperative employees…

Have a look at Baring Communications Equity Asia, click on Portfolio and scroll down. Eventually you end up at the bit about Interface Global. Note, they claim “a clientele base of more than 10,000 companies.” If they mean advertising clients, then no way! - I would guess the figure is in the low hundreds. Maybe they count every hit on their web site as a client! Their U.S. and European agents have quit, because they didn’t get paid or something. Whether their China office is anything more than a broom cupboard with a fax machine, I don’t know. I am told Barings has stopped putting any new money into IG, because it is a bottomless pit.

IG has still not paid its national health insurance and is totting up fines for late payment. The amount owing on 5 December 2002 is NT$717,676 for IG, NT$268,870 for Trade Winds International and NT$321,019 for Trade Winds Inc. Barings doesn’t seem to be interested in covering these expenses.

That’s right. Up until December 2000, salaries were paid by bank transfer on the 5th day of each month. In January 2001, nine months before I was sacked, only part of the salary was paid on 5th. The rest was paid by cheque later in the month. From then up until now, salaries have not been paid on time, i.e. TW/IG is borrowing from its employees in order to keep the cash flowing. Wage cuts were also made. However, as admitted to me by general manager Herbert Chen himself, they will pay new employees on time for the first month or two to give them the illusion that the company’s finances are normal. Three or four months later you stop getting paid on time, but by that time you are “involved” and it’s not so easy to get up and walk out. I imagine that’s what happened to Torrid and the three or four other foriegn editors who have had the misfortune of working for IG since I left.

The wheels of justice sure do turn slowly. My colleague Huang Jinglian (an advertising executive) just got NT$100,000 severance from Interface Global as an out-of-court settlement. She fought her case without a lawyer. My joint case with advertising executive Cai Haiming is nearing a conclusion. Unlike Ms. Huang, we have a lawyer who gets a basic payment plus a percentage of whatever we get out of Interf*ck.

Click through some of the “product” and “supplier” links in Interfraud’s computer section - ha ha.

:moo:

Check the first image under “computer workstations”. If computer workstations look like that - I want one! Image too small? Click here for full size!

:shock: :smiling_imp:

Notice also how a lot of the pages contain the code 8859-7 in the HTML head - which makes your browser think the page is in Greek! So much for the tech wizards at IG!

I just noticed an ad on tealit that looks suspiciously like the Inter Global job. It’s located in Shenzen and you can look at it here. The name is similar to the one Juba mentioned last year. What’s Juba’s response to this new job posting?