A Journey Called Life

Funny Life Quotes

2010-11-01T16:24:00.002+05:30

Here are some funny quotes about Life.
Life will throw you a lot things, from gold lumps to lemons. It is upto us what to make of it. Some of us let ourselves be injured with the gold lumps, while some make lemonade out of the lemons. Some of us take it too seriously, while some take it lightly. When we are not going to come out of it dead, why take it seriously anyway. Here are some funny Life quotes to take a Dig at the journey calle life.

Here is a test to find out whether your mission on earth is completed. If you’re still alive, it isn’t finished yet.
~Unknown

Life is like an onion; you peel off one layer at a time and sometimes you weep.
~Carl Sandburg

Life is something to do when you can't get to sleep.
~Fran Lebowitz

Life is just one damned thing after another.
~ Elbert Hubbard

Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.
~ Benjamin Disraeli

Any man who is under 30, and is not a liberal, has not heart and any man who is over 30, and is not a conservative, has no brains.
~Sir Winston Churchill

Life is what happens to you while you're working for your future.
~ Anonymous

If variety is the spice of life, marriage is the big can of Spam.
~ Johnny Carson

Life is like a B-movie script. It is that corny. If I had my life story offered to me to film, I’d turn it down.
~ Kirk Douglas.

You only live once, but if you work it right, once is enough.
~Joe Lewis

Halloween 2010

2010-10-29T18:20:00.004+05:30

Halloween, according to Wikipedia, is an annual holiday observed on October 31, which unfortunately is a Sunday this year. Not sure if it is a Holiday for adults, but if it were, well it is a Sunday. Halloween is celebrated across the United States, Canada, Ireland, and the United Kingdom.

Even though I have seen pictures of Halloween theme parties and other events organized by adults, I have no particular plans for the Halloween. I think it is a Kid's Holiday, and I would just buy a bunch of candies and stock them up since I live in an apartment complex. I had planned to visit a friend, but realized that he has a Kid and might have plans. I will most probably be watching some horror Movies.

For those who don't know much about Halloween, these are some of the common Halloween Events and Activities:

Trick-or-treating, wearing costumes and attending costume parties, carving jack-o'-lanterns, ghost tours, bonfires, apple bobbing, visiting haunted attractions, committing pranks, telling ghost stories or other frightening tales, and watching horror films. Horror movies is what I will be doing :)

Here are some Halloween Quotes in case you want to send Text Messages or twit or update your statuses with some funny Halloween Quotes, and of course with the Thanksgiving just round the corner here are also some Thanksgiving Quotes .. have a great Holiday..

Vanishing Jobs and the Downturn

2009-03-27T14:10:00.000+05:30

The recession is for real down, and some experts are saying that this could turn into a depression anytime soon.
Whoever invested in the stock markets have burned themselves way above their fingers.
I experienced what they call catching a falling knife when I reinvested everything around July August 2008 even though I exited at a good time earlier that year. And the job market is just horrible.

The US legislators are reaching for the throats of Immigrant workers and their visas, and free markets are re looking at their model.
Never mind that the unemployment would have worse in the US if they had not outsourced a lot of their jobs thereby giving the developing countries a share of their unemployment.

All the jobs that have been shed in China and India would have been in the US but for outsourcing. Add to the fact that if they hadn't outsourced, their profits would have been even lesser or the losses more and that would have contributed to the job loss.

Back to India, the job losses are getting real. One of friends had bought a house on a monthly EMI of 50K and now he has been out of work for the past 4 months. There are rumors that some companies are having 25% salary cuts. Some have delayed or cancelled new hiring.

And friends and their friends never stop send me a resume or two every day. And these are all people with great academics and past performances, but hey are looking out at a time when people stick to where they are and no one is looking at their resume. The situation is bad, but when you write a resume that just don't stand out and which is 4 pages long, no one would look. Least of all in times like this when hiring is low, and there are lots of good people on bench.

But, that doesn't mean no one would hire. Many people won't know, but companies do look for people in times like this, because these are the times when great assets can be found without having to pay outrageous salary hikes. People get reasonable in times like this and these are the best times for talent acquisition. But how do you tell your potential recruiter that you are an Asset worth acquiring even in the bad times. You haven't even met your hiring manager? All he sees is an inbox full of potential candidates.

It is your resume that he sees before he decides to talk to your a position. And it is very important that you give an impression to the hiring personnel what kind of a person you are. Even before you have talked to him, you should have created a mental picture of yourself in his mind so that he remembers you from your resume.

It should be 1 page long, 2 at most and must tell in a few lines what you are capable of? The manager doesn’t actually want to read the description of your project but what you have achieved doing that project, what your MAJOR contributions were. You should also remember to mention all your pat achievements. That you stood first in a class of 80 should come clearly too.

And if you sound like what you written in the resume, then downturn or not you would have got the job!

Cutting down on processed food!

2009-03-26T16:04:00.001+05:30

I was talking to one of friends who is an amateur naturopath but a professional evangelist of naturopathy and as usual he started talking about how he reduced 13 kilos (25 pounds?) And so we started talking about cooking food with lesser quantities of oil. And that you can actually lose 7-8 pounds by eating about 3-4 hours prior to going to bed. This was interesting, because you don't need to make a drastic change. Just start eating your dinner early early, which seem to be the first step towards a Healthy Eating style.

And it works in a very simple way. We all burn energy while we sleep, and if there are some food in the stomach while we sleep, then our body just uses that food, whereas if your food is already digested, it will try to get energy from your reserves thereby burning those extra calories.

Then we talked about salt and how harmful our daily intake of salt is since we do take a lot of salt. I wondered how am I going to manage without salt when he said that it just takes 10 days to get used to it. Start have lesser and lesser salt everyday and at the end of 10 days, you will not even feel it.

Another thing he suggested was to reduce out intake of processed food. We all do know that processed food has a lot of preservatives and other stuff that do no good for our body, but it also contains a lot of salt. Just because ordered the pizza with a discounted price using dominos coupons, it doesn't come with less fats. And I have been trying hard these past couple of days to not buy any more canned and processed food. And I am taking lesser oil. That is the least I can do since its been 4 months that i stopped going to the gym, that reminds me to start hitting the gym.. Ah... Why do we have to go through all these :)

Please visit the WP blog

2008-05-06T08:18:00.002+05:30

Please visit my new blog on wordpress. I will be giving commentary on Business, Technology, internet and boy toys :)

Feel free to update your feeds.

And do check out this hot new super model, Denni Parkinson.

42nd Plastic Surgery For Brazilian Model

2008-01-29T02:34:00.000+05:30

Brazilian model and carnival star,Angela Bismarchi, is getting ready for the upcoming 5 day Carnival blowout in RIO real hard. She wants to have a beautifully scuplted body for the carnival, and sculpted she had, 4 times already since she was 21. She is 36 now.

For the carnival she will have her 42nd plastic surgery, on her way to beating the guiness world record of 47 Plastics surgery.

For this carnival, which has an Asian theme, she will make her eyes slant.

Much more about her here

Top 10 Weird Ways We Deal with the Dead

2008-01-28T08:06:00.001+05:30

Here is something I came across in digg, more ways besides burials and cremation to deal with the dead.eg: Zoroastrians bring their deceased to to a ceremonial "tower of silence", usually located on an elevated mountain plateau, and left exposed to the animals and elements.Groups in Australia, British Columbia, the American southwest and Siberia were known to practice tree burial, which involved wrapping the body in a shroud or cloth and placing it in a crook to decompose.Weird, no?

read more | digg story

10 Examples of the iPhone Making People Crazy

2008-01-27T08:10:00.000+05:30

From Gizmodo:
The iPhone is making some people go nuts:
waiting in line for days to get the product
dressing up like the gadget for Halloween
selling cheap knockoffs
completely ridiculous accessories.

read more

Some cool Love quotes

2008-01-06T08:14:00.000+05:30

“Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.”
~Jane Austen

“You can’t put a price tag on love, but you can on all its accessories.”
~Melanie Clark

[source of this love quotes]

iPhone unlocked on camera from start to finish

2007-09-11T10:41:00.001+05:30

Yesterday I posted a Link about iPhonesimfree's acquisition by an unknown buyer. Here is more on unlocking the iPhone. Another link. A real iPhone software SIM unlocked from start to finish.

read more | digg story

iPhoneSIMfree acquired by Undisclosed Buyer

2007-09-10T11:27:00.001+05:30

Yes, you can use any SIM card on your iPhone, without having to go to a Hacker. Yeah, iPhoneSIMfree, is a company that allows you to use any Sim card on your iPhone. As they say "the worlds first (and only) software driven sim unlocking service for the iPhone(tm). No need to open your phone. No need to solder.". Well, in a recent development, "the company that lets you use any SIM card in your iPhone using software", has been acquired for an undisclosed amount by an undisclosed company.We will know soon, who bought iPhonesimfree?

read more | digg story

Monica Medi jail nude Pictures have been banned

2007-08-26T22:14:00.000+05:30

The supreme court has banned Nude Pictures of Monica Bedi, taken while Monica was lodged in a jail, to be telecasted on TV and other media.

The Supreme Court barred the media on Friday from showing nude photographs of former actress Monica Bedi, said to have been taken by a camera hidden in the bathroom of the jail where she was imprisoned over a forgery case.[Source]

The scandal starved Media would have shown it anyway, but it is good that the supreme court is stopping it. But will the supreme court be able to stop some website from posting it on the net, on some torrent site or download site.

There are many websites that posts torrent links or such movie clips for downloads. By banning it, people must bu now be frantically searching for the said videos, and people who would want to view the pictures or videos would have had it anyway.

But, Who would have filmed someone in the jail bathroom?

Easy to produce inexpensive solar panels

2007-07-20T08:44:00.001+05:30

One of the reasons why solar panels have not been used popularly have been the huge upfront cost. Govts have subsidized it so that people embrace solar energy as an alternative source of energy. Not it might become a little cheaper.Researchers at New Jersey Institute of Technology have developed an inexpensive solar cell that can be painted or printed on flexible plastic sheets.

read more | digg story

Are you the next Internet Celebrity?

2007-07-18T07:47:00.000+05:30

Beat Paris Hilton to become the next net celebrity at nextwebstar!

Sholay Aur Aag!

2007-07-17T07:22:00.000+05:30

Ram Gopal Varma's Sholay will now be called Ram Gopal Varma's Aag. So much for trademark. Sholay should now be Sholay©.

More than the name, Sippy and party should be more worried about the theme, the story line or in other words, the content? Copying or remaking a Movie, isn't it akin to plagiarism?

Ah but then, Sholay was a mashup of the spaghetti western which again was influenced by another Akira movie.

No wonder, they could only go after the name.

Porn banner Ads on Rediff

2007-07-07T13:41:00.000+05:30

When a major website, that caters to a mainstream audience streams such an advertisement, as is shown in the screenshot here, I would like to question the quality department or the ad sales team, if this was intentional, or have they sold out to the porn industry. I know you that rediff just turned profitable recently, and rediff's main source of income is online advertising, but I am surprised that they are allowing some ad serving company to serve such an ad.

Look carefully, it looks like two girls engaged in a mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, but none of the two seemed to have just been drowned, so I would think it was an ad from a lesbian site, keeping in mind the caption also which says "College Girls Are more fun". When I clicked the banner, it returned a site called perfspot.

I would like to think that the ad server ads.yieldx.com is the url, served the ad by mistake, but Rediff should take a stern action against such an advertiser.
The post was not written with a intention to trash Rediff, and I respect rediff a lot, but they should be more careful about their advertisement partners.

Unlike the late 90's dot com boom, when websites that sprung up with advertisements as the sole source of revenues failed miserably, leading to a recession that extended to the whole IT industry, there are many dot coms today that are not only sustaining, but making profits on online ads alone. And there are thousands of ad servers and advertisement solutions company today that provides, online advertisements starting from PPC, CPM ads, CPAs, and affiliates.

PPC or Pay per click is the most popular today with company like Yahoo and google providing Pay per Click advertising, where they serve what is called contextual advertisement [I use google PPC advertisement], wherein google or yahoo will serve text based advertisement which are relevant to the content. Advertisers will pay google everytime someone clicks on the ad, and google will pay the website owner that money after taking its cut.

CPMs are impression based where advertisers pay the website based on how many times the ads are served on the website. These are basically the banners ads which is the point of the post here today. Many Banner ad solutions provider don't accept porn ads, so I was surprised when rediff show such a banner ad. These comapnies surely pays a higher CPM or cost per impression, eg when a clean banner ad would pay 100 rupee per thousand visitors, a banner ad that allows porn might give a higher payout of 120 rupee.

But I am sure rediff won't want to squeeze all it advertisement space to the extent of serving porn ads. What next? Adult friend finder affiliates?

The said banner ad would surely offend a lot of regular visitors to Rediff.

Here is the link to the ad, this is a referral link, but this is the link that served that ad .

And here is the LINK to the page which served the porn banner ad. I got a Jeevan Sathi dot com advertisement the second time.

Click on the picture for larger picture

Infosys Wants CapGemini

2007-06-29T08:06:00.000+05:30

Just the Kind of news I want to hear.
Music to my ears.
And the Top Indian IT services Companies, on account of better delivery models, better Human resources(the high attrition not withstanding, which is good and shows that the sector is VERY healthy) and cost effective solutions, are today much more valuable than the US or European Counterparts in terms of Profitablity, and Market Caps Obviously.

I had predicted that it won't be too far off when Indian IT Cos Bid for 3X their size US and European Counterparts. I thought that TCS with the TATA's experience of LBOs would be the first to move, but Infosys seemed to have taken the first step here.

Take it on Infy...

How To Get Aquired By Google

2007-06-23T11:52:00.001+05:30

The Zenter.com guys explain how they did it. About 6 months back Crosby and Walker arrived at Mountain View, rented a small apartment, and started coding Zenter, and was acquired by google. * Don't focus on getting acquired. That's like being a single woman who desperately wants to get married. Of course you want it to happen, but 99% of the time if you purposely try to get acquired (or married), it won't. "Stick to your knitting," says Paul Graham, a founding partner of Y Combinator, the startup factory that funded Zenter. "The way to get acquired really fast is to not focus on it. If people get the impression that you want to get bought, you won't." * Instead, focus on the user. This is possibly the single most important thing for entrepreneurs to remember. "Every startup that dies fails to do this," Graham says. "A lot of startups focus on their competitors or lawsuits, but what really kills startups is if users think it's boring. It's a much quieter and dangerous reason, but if users don't care about your product, that will just kill a company." * Ignoring limitations lets you tackle problems from a different angle. It's not enough to just build an existing offline product (ie. Microsoft Word or PowerPoint) and port it onto the web. Zenter looked at how they could build a slideshow application that really takes advantage of the Internet, like adding community slideshows, delivering presentations online in real-time and dragging and dropping content from the web into a presentation. * Don't be afraid to tackle the giants. Big companies like eBay (EBAY) and Microsoft (MSFT) may have more manpower and financial resources, but they also have disadvantages. A company like Zenter doesn't care about hurting Windows. All they want to do is make the best application." * Pay attention to the details. When your product is 80% done, that means you have another 80% to go. "To get something pretty close is easy, but you need to concentration on the little things. * Have a really understanding spouse. Crosby's wife was four months preggers when he left to join the Y Combinator startup school in Mountain View. "She was extremely patient through the whole process.

read more | digg story

Elgato Turbo.264 Graphics Accelerator: First Look

2007-06-22T23:53:00.001+05:30

CHECK OUT THE The Unofficial Apple Weblog, TUAW'S first look review of Elgato's external h.264 encoder, the Turbo.264.

read more | digg story

Hotel Industry Boom Awaited!

2007-06-12T07:52:00.000+05:30

Real Estate Boom or Bubble not withstanding, that there is a huge scarcity of hotel rooms in India is a big fact, and is here to stay for a long time. No wonder everyone is investing, from Mphasis' Jerry Rao, to Mallya to Ex BPL's Chandrasekhar.

Ideally, Hoteliers like Bharat Hotels', ITCs, the Tata's and of course Leela's should be leading the pack, but why does the sector seem subdued.. We don't hear too much noise. Perhaps building and selling off rooms, read apartments, seem more logical at the moment then b uying land at huge prices and own the rooms.

The hotel industry will not see a huge spike untill the real estate industry cools off, me thinks.

Be following the hotel industry closely.... there is money to be made..

Hottest weekend of my life.

2007-06-11T23:00:00.000+05:30

Saturday was to be the hottest ever delhi in the past two years. And this was my first summer in delhi.

Give a good reason for not wanting to pack and run.
I was virtually roasted. The AC had to be tripped on Friday night, which was spent fuming over the AC company. Waited for the AC guy for whole saturday, yeah I experienced the heat, and i just waited and waited, and he came at 6 pm. Apparently the heat had caused some short circuiting, How I wouldn't now.

I took out all the DVDs i had and stayed the rest of the weekend home. The movies were the only high part. Oh the Fosters gave good company.

I reran, Akira's RAN, Fellini's La Strada, Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs, and watched Casablanca for the n'th time. Couldn't finish Omar Mukhtar or the bit of work that I brought home.

Is India's Inflation Wrong?

2007-06-08T07:47:00.000+05:30

Via Rediff:

Some economists assert that India's method of calculating inflation is wrong as there are serious flaws in the methodologies used by the government.

Economists V Shunmugam and D G Prasad working with India's largest commodity bourse -- the Multi Commodity Exchange -- have come out with a research paper arguing that the government urgently needs to shift the method of calculating inflation.

DLF will Join IPO Boom afterall!

2007-05-25T07:24:00.000+05:30

With the stock markets Up and then down, and then up. And soothsayers sayers, both bears and bull, giving their verdict only after each climb or slide, but never before.

It is as if the World Economy changes overnight. One week the fundamentals are very strong, the next week the markets are overheated. One week, we see nothing wrong in the sustained correction, the other week, the market is beating the trend.
I should I should also become a market analyst.
They never seem to go wrong, because they always do posts analysis.

It made DLF, the largest real estate major real worried. DLF have been mulling with the IPO for ages now, but the market always go the wrong way, there is a correction, and then the real easte stocks also took a beating. Last few weeks have been good, and now DLF don't want to wait.

They are comming with a 2 Billion Dollars Plus issue. 8750 to 9625 crore to be precise. 500 to 550 per share. All the best to you all.

Of Retail Chain and Big Corporates

2007-05-24T07:56:00.001+05:30

Shop keepers, what they call Retail chains, become big corporates sometime. So Big, at times, that a string of shops started buy a shopkeeper called Sam Walton is today's Biggest Corporate, with revenues more than the GDP of any medium sized nations.

And so are some other retail chains.
At least in the US, and Europe where Big businesses have thrived, and some Asian countries where Big businesses have begum to thrive, Big businesses have rarely tried to build a retail or shops of thier big corporates.

I mean Retail Chains have become Big Corporates, but have seen any big corporates becoming retail chains? GE, The GM, Nike?

For that matter even Virgin?

Then, why are all the Indian Corporate Biggies rushing into the Retail bandwagon?

I will bet on pantaloon Retail and Subhiksha anyday over Reliance and Birla.
Bharti!!! They are the smarter of the lot, are they? Supply Chain and Intrastructures and all that?
In the californian Gold Rush, the ones who sold shovels made the fortunes.

Why I am worried about Big corporates going retail is that Retail is a low margin Business, and many Many Retailers going bankrupt in the past. Only one retailer can squeeze the margin, and it hits the rest.

For a traditional company making an X% ROI, starting a new venture from scratch, that will give less than X% ROI don't make too sound business sense, does it?
Core Competence anyone?

Mahinda Renault Logan

2007-05-23T07:41:00.000+05:30

Saw the New Logan yesterday on the road. It looks very ordinary for a newly launched car. I wouldn't want to buy it.

Been thinking of going for a diesel car, what with my car giving 10-11 kms with the AC on in the delhi heat.

Then I did a little maths, and found that paying a couple of lakhs or about on a diesel car don't make as good an economic sense as we percieve. [I am not taking about the Logan here which is not too expensive]. I was comparing Verna Diesel and Petrol. 1.5 lakhs is about 3500 more on the EMI. Driving 1000 KMs a months, diesel would only save you as much... So it is the same after all.... :)

Reliance woos Bata

2007-05-23T07:34:00.000+05:30

For a tie-up..

Reliance wants to sell BATA footwear and wants BATA to sell Reliance footwear. What a fit?
As I keep saying, Realiance was good in commodities marketing, to industrial buyers. The consumer face of reliance have never been... umm like other consumer facing companies. It has a stodgy, PSUis feel to it. So does Bata, what a Fit!!

Health Conscious Anthony!

2007-05-22T07:58:00.001+05:30

Did I mention that I have started to run.. After a long time..

Today was my second day, and I actually enjoyed. My limbs took to running quite well.
But then I had started gym also, some weeks back.. Ah Egg whites and all that.

I grew up in a boarding school, and running was actually a ritualistic punishment from which we got a break only on sundays.. The shrill whistle that broke our early morning dreams, and man, the best dreams only used to visit in the early mornings... Dreams with the favorite teacher I had a crush on blah blah blah :)

I am up at 6 AM past 2 days, and plan to do so for a long time now... I just sit tooo long in my work hours. Need to run for my life....

Health Conscious Anthony!

2007-05-22T07:58:00.000+05:30

NTPC Airs Wind Energy

2007-05-22T07:21:00.000+05:30

Vinod Midas Khosla maynot think that wind might be as good a moneyt spinner as Solar Thermal power plants, but PSU giant NTPC is looking at wind energy when it decided to diversify its power portfolio. NTPC might have been looking at Suzlon and the Likes and their stock prices, but Solar thermal plants would have made more long term economic sense.

Solar thermal Power plants use concentrated solar heat, much the way kids use a lens to burn papers. It uses millions of mirrors to focus solar ray to produce heat which will produce steam to turn turbines.

I have read about a smelting furnace somewhere in France. Couldn't google it just now.[Oh here it is ]My school project was multiple mirror solar cooker. My dream have been to concentrate wind power by using the concept of nozzle, as a school inventor :)

Productivity of US and Indian IT professionals?

2007-05-21T23:04:00.001+05:30

US IT Professionals More Productive than Indian IT professionals?

That is what a report says based on revenues per employee.
I won't go into explaining how the profitability of many Indian IT companies are better than US IT companies lest I should digress.

But that US IT Professionals are More Productive than Indian IT professionals is grossly mis-stated/analysed.

Revenue Per Employee of an US IT company can not be compared to an Indian It company. The day the two becomes comparable, US Lobbyist and IT professionals will stop crying about being bangalored.

A thousand dollars is still a lot of money, the appreciating Rupee not withstanding, and so, Indian IT companies are OK when they bill an US client 2 thousand dollars for an Indian programmer, because we are going to pay the prgrammer 1000 dollars for the same kind of work that his US counterpart who leaves office at 4 PM on a friday, does, and yet gets paid 5000 dollars . To pay 5000 dollars, taking the same logic(The figures are just hypothetical, I can give exact number if you want), the US IT company needs to bill the client 10000 dollars... That is 5 times.. :)

That is why INDIA is such a hot destination. If Indian Companies start billing the client as much as the US counterpart, the Industry will be dead before the Estimate hits the inbox of the client.

The report was fine, and going by the definition of productivity defined in terms of revenue per employee it is fine, but the report needs to be interpreted in a more logical way, no?

Disclaimer: I work for an US IT company, and have wokred for Indian IT companies as well, and have been actively involed in Estimatation process. The numbers I quote are just figurative to drive home the argument.

And yes, on output terms, and delivery, Indian IT pros are very good.

Moving to own Domain??

2007-05-20T18:58:00.000+05:30

Been thinking of moving to my own domain, and publish using wordpress for sometime now.. OK why I haven't been posting too often.. I have spending most of my waking hours at work place... and Blogger is not accessible.. and general lethargy too..

A new domain might break the inertia, and motivate me to start posting again. I do have a blog domain, that I registered. I wanted a couple of Like Minded Happy People to start posting. The idea was too if I could have that as a separate blog. Well, it grounded after a few weeks..

I am planning to blog there full time.

Lets see..

The Stock market's been hot Like crazy..
I am making money on good stocks and losing on speculative derivatives.
How many times have I told myself that if there were even 1% luck factor, I would be unlucky...

Despite getting good returns on things I am certain about, the Uncertain never ceases to tempt me.

Search 'H1B official website' on Google!

2007-04-10T09:14:00.000+05:30

Hi All!!

Search for 'H1B official website' on Google. Some Anti-Outsourcing group has, using SEO and google bombing techniques, made a anti-outsourcing website, the Number one result in the Google Result Page. The said website, [send them back.org] (and please don't link to it), starts with ...
"Are you sick and tired of seeing your country turned into a Third World sewer by immigration? Are you tired of seeing your standard of living drop and our jobs exported to China? Are you tired of armies of H1B workers being imported from India to take what few jobs we have left? Are you tired of having to skip 1 for Spanish and 2 for Chinese? Are you tired of pressing 3 for English and getting a receptionist who barely speaks it?".

This is a kind of hate website, but google will not ban it from its serp, since it is apparetly not spamming. Since google display the results based on an algorithm, it is easy for us, IT workers to beat this website in their own game.

What we can at least do is try to beat this website from at least the number one spot on the Google Search Engine Result Page, with a little SEO. Search Engine Optimisation, for those came in late.

One very basic technique is to link the genuine H1B websites with the anchor text as 'H1B official website' .

Below is a list of the other seach results on google search results page. If you are a blogger, please provide hyperlink to the links below with the anchor text 'H1B official website'

http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis
http://www.infinitilaw.com/h1bquotacount.html
http://www.buchanan.org/blog/?p=618

Write a blog post on H1B and link to the above websites, with the anchor text, 'H1B official website'. I suggest that you link to these sites on your home page, on the sidebar or the footer also.
It will take only a few minutes..

Please spread the word.
Many of the Indian Blogger are from the IT industry, and I hope it will be pretty easy to unrank this website.

Are you game for it?
Start Spreading the word.
Fast!!!
And the Link should look this:

1. H1B official website
2. H1B official website
3. H1B official website
4. H1b Official Website

And please don't hyperlink to [send themback.or g], the link will make our effort futile...
Timesofindia story on the same.

Flash Advertisements or Quick Commercial Breaks!

2007-04-07T15:52:00.000+05:30

One more quick Post.
I used to write regularly, then I got busy with work, and saw that it was difficult to write more often on my blog. Then I got busier and busier. Past few weeks, I have been even more busier, then something happened. Like they say that an Idle Mind is a Devil's workshop, an active mind is a Blogger's workshop. The more I get busier, the more ideas I get for blogging, and then I just couldn't stop myself... Expect an avalanche of post as I get busier....

I am not one who spends a lot of time watching TV. Maybe it is the time, maybe because I don't stay home much. Either I am at work or am en route to and from work, so the few times I watch TV, I watch more commercials than Content. It irritates me when they just stop during a suspense build up to break for a commercial. Obviously, I surf during that time, and get to see more commercials, talk about cartels.

Poor advertisers fails to grab the attention of their audience. Failure of Advertising, is it? Soon, they will realise how false the DATA provided by the Cable TV companies are, on the exposure of the said advertisement to such and such demographics.

It irritates anyway that we get commercial breaks, unless the commercial is downright funny, but that too won't be funny after the third day.

Why is it then, that nobody has thought of Guerilla Commercial breaks.
Flash Advertisements.

Stop abruptly, show only one commercial, make it short so that it is not worthwhile for the viewer to change the channel or mute it. There might be less commercial time slot, so as not to IRRITATE the audience too much, but advertiser will surely be willing to pay a premium for a commercial which will not be Muted or skipped.

Indian IT Services Companies are the Future!

2007-04-05T18:57:00.000+05:30

In net income, IBM, HP, ADP, Accenture, CSC, TCS, Infosys, Wipro, ACS and Atos Origin lead the global pecking order, while the top 10 list by m-cap includes IBM, HP, ADP, Accenture, TCS, Infosys, Wipro, EDS, CSC, and Cap Gemini. [source]

TCS might muscle itself into the top 10 IT services companies' club sooner than it anticipated. Though the Top three Indian IT services companies are nowhere near in terms of topline, The Top Indian IT companies comes in the top 10 in terms of net Income and Market capitalisation. Two parameters that is used in acquiring compapnies. These companies have been playing around with acquisitions for sometime now with small sub-100 million dollar acquisitions. Perhaps they were warming up, but with the kind of Cashflows and Market Value of the Indian IT cos, it will not be very far, let me even go on to say 2007-08, they Big companies like Accenture, EDS become take over targets of Infosys, TCS. These companies might not want to sell out, but there are some companies(in the top 10) that are already struggling with slow growth, and losing Bids.

Financiers are willing to back Indian companies in LBOs, Indian companies which were never in the radar, in Industries where we hadn't even proven ourself.

Outsourcing however is a different story altogether. Indian IT industry pioneered outsourcing. Not so long ago, Industry Oracles lamented about how Indian IT companies might lose out to American MNCs since they were based out of where the clients are. During that time, the US MNCs knew that more than their vicinity to clients, they needed to build up capacity in India. They were imitating what the Indian Comapnies were doing. Now who will the Financiers back?

It is not a question of which companies will be acquired. It is just a matter of which Company will be the first to move amongst TCS, WIPRO, Infosys and Cognizant. Perhaps Wipro going by past records, or perhaps TCS going by recent records.

India and Software Product Companies

2007-04-02T07:36:00.000+05:30

I was reading an article in Business Today, on India's Hottest Software Product Companies (Link requires subscription), which lists companies like Sasken, Ittiam, iFlex and Infosys (Finnacle). One thing was common with all the companies. They are not even minnows. Finnacle's Contribution to the topline of Infosys is not even worth a mention. But just I saw it, I saw an article today that Infosys is eyeing some foreign acquisitions for strengthening its stance in the product space.

Sources said SmartStream, with over 1,000 clients, presents an ideal target for Infosys, which in has admitted to looking for acquisitions in mature markets to propel its banking solution product Finacle into global play. Its main competitor, Flexcube from i-flex, has got Oracle as its majority stakeholder giving it the much needed impetus in the global banking market.

Most of the Indian Software Products company are small time enterprise software companies filling a niche, or with some Financial Applications company serving an unserved market, with the exception of market leader Iflex, but then even Iflex grew by serving underserved markets, namely the Unites States of AFRICAS.

Having worked in a Mid-tier IT services company, trying to build an enterprise Software Application, read product, in the core team, I can understand why Indian IT product companies fail. Oh wait! We didn't even try, to fail. That IT servcies is where should grow, and that If at all we must look at Products, we should look at Internet Products, deserves a full post and I will write a full post on that.

Product Development entails huge investments, is risky, and takes a long gestation period time. There are only two ways to do this. You should be part of a conglomerate, like the TATAs to be able to invest huge sum of R&D dollars.. (TCS should actually spin off a Product company.) or The idea that you have should be that of a super product. Something that will change the world, to put it easily, in which case there will be investors queing up to wait till it starts to pay off.

When Indian IT behemoths tries their hand in product, they do it as a mix of product-services. They want to develop a product like they do a fix bid Applicaton Outsourcing or Software Project. If Infosys wants Finnacle to Suceed, and the market is huge, they should spin off a Company, and use some of the CASH lying in their books to aggresively market the product and fix it proper. Infosys can always generate extra revenues on maintenance and Implementaion.

As for why Consumer Software never took off India, it is just that it just never happened. If the idea behind Skype or Youtube was to come from India, nothing would have stopped it. Not that Indians are less creative, but it just never happened. Expect it happen sooner than not, though...

Recover Data from scratched CDs and DVDs!

2007-03-29T21:12:00.000+05:30

Tips on how to recover data from scratched CDs!

Don't you feel like crying every time you add another disc to your pile of scratched discs. Trashing that disc which contained your favorite songs, pics, files, games or videos is not easy.

Read-on, if you find yourself wishing for a miracle every time your fav CD is scratched:

Home Remedy :
Rub a small amount of toothpaste on the scratch and polish the CD with a soft cloth and any petroleum-based polishing solution (like clear shoe polish). Squirt a drop of Brasso and wipe it with a clean cloth.

Technology to the rescue

There are many softwares available on the net, which enable the recovery of the CD data. BadCopy Pro is one such software, which can be used to recover destroyed data and files from a range of media.

Just a few clicks is all it requires to recover the disc from almost all kind of damage situation; be it corrupted, lost data, unreadable or defective.

DiskDoctors is another popular company, which offers both software and solutions to recover data from a scratched CDs and DVDs.

General Tips:

* Always wipe the CD from the center outward with stratight spoke-like strokes. Wiping CDs in circles will create more scratches.

* Do not scratch the graphics layer as you cannot repair the disc.
HINT: Hold the disc up to a light with the graphics layer facing the light source. If you can see light thru the scratches at any point then the disc may be irreparable and or exhibit loading or playing errors.

* Clean your Disc players lens regularly with a suitable product to ensure optimal viewing pleasure.

* Always use soft, lint-free cloth to clean both sides of the disc. Don't wipe in circles or randomly, wipe in a straight line. Start from the centre of the disc towards the outer edge.

* If wiping with a cloth does not remove a fingerprint or smudge, use DVD disc polishing spray to clean the disc.

* Handle the disc by its outer edge and the empty hole in the middle to avoid fingerprints, smudges or scratches.

Statistics:

*Fingermarks/prints cause 43% of disc (CD/DVD) problems!
* General wear & tear causes 25% of disc (CD/DVD) problems!
* Player-related issues cause 15% of disc (CD/DVD) problems!
* User-related issues cause 12% of disc (CD/DVD) problems!
* PlayStation 2 machine scratches cause 3% of disc (CD/DVD) problems!
* Laser rot (a manufacturer error) causes 2% of disc problems!

NOTE: I got this tips in an email forward today. Thought I should share.. Enjoy!!

Happy Women's Day to my lady readers

2007-03-08T07:59:00.000+05:30

How about a Men's Day? Where is Suhel Seth Now :)

You don't need a special day to celebrate and all that but what the heck Enjoy!!!

Skoda Fabia or Swift?

2007-03-02T07:37:00.000+05:30

All the Hatchback lovers, and you will certainly love hatchbacks if you drive in India, Skoda will be comming out this year the Fabia, whic looks very much like the Maruti swift, and even though Swift was there in the market earlier, Skoda's Technolgy might prove hard for Maruti Swift to sustain the market share, if the price is correct.

Budget, the day after!

2007-03-01T07:46:00.000+05:30

Malist need take up arms. The govt. still discriminates againts the Male species. We still have to pay more taxes, despite the fact that some B Schools closing the placements with women MBA's getting more average than the Male. Um um ahmm.

IT honchoes are crying that Previously handed benefits are being taken back.
Good that the farm sector got due concern..

The reduction on customs duty have been very well taken. The inflation have been a boon in disguise.

Oh! You can now consume more oil and get fatter..

And I am all for a good education, but that Cess, Will it fund the Education outlay, or is it going to Fund Scheduled Tribes and Castes going to IITs and IIMs??

Insurance and Pensions to Boost Infrastructure

2007-02-28T07:38:00.000+05:30

As I keep saying that only Insurance and Pensions will help fund the Infrastructure boom of India, The economic survey also suggested the same.
India needs a massive 320 billion dollars to be invested in infrastructure over the next five years and the requirements could be met through insurance and pension funds, the Economic Survey suggested on Tuesday.

Stock Market Correction Worldwide on Budget Eve!

2007-02-28T07:29:00.000+05:30

As I write this all the markets are plunging like nine pins. Emerging Marekts are plunging ina global meltdown that is making me sit up. Most of the Indian ADRs are also losing 5-10% upwards. Icici Bank ADR is already down 11% China is down 8.8% as of now. Mexico down 6%, Nikkei down 600 points, Dow is down 400 points. Blood Bath?

What is dangerous is the fall is thye chinese market. Holy Cow 8.8%.
The budget will be irrelevant after all.

An incorrigibale speculator, I had betted big on a n0n-populist, market friendly budget and had taken huge long positions. But the Global Meltdown is Huge. Even a 100% cut on corporate tax will not do any good on Sensex today, I guess. Chidambaram save me...

Am I comfortable with Nishabd!

2007-02-28T07:00:00.000+05:30

I love Watching Amitabh Bachchan. He just fills up the screen, and this charisma that is hard to miss. So it was in (KBC)Kaun Banega Crorepati. He was never a friend like Shah Rukh Khan now, but more a father.

Oh he had a blip, during those mid life crises days, when he had not quite aged gracefully. Sagging skin, but trying to act young like the son in Suryavansh. The father was very convincing though.

My love for Amitabhjee Goes a very long way. I got my name from one of his movies. So, I have alsways had this certain connection with this Man, and have loved all his movies.

Except Black. Specially that Kissing scene. You can't imagine your Dad kissing some young girl, would you?

And now Nishabd. I get goosebumps thinking about this movie. Oh Yes, I love oldperson-young person sex scenes, and I have had my fair fantasies when I grew up. And I loved Lolita. But Amitabh is quite a father figure...

Of course, he clarified that Nishabd is not at all at a take at Nabokov. It is the story about an affection of a young girl for an older man. I hope it is not dirty geez.. As Abhinav rightly puts it, Amitabh Bachchan’s demi-god status will prevent him from fully exploring the role of a dirty old man. [via]

Indian and Air India to Merge

2007-02-22T17:08:00.000+05:30

Wasn't it just yesterday that I wrote that the need of the hour of the Indian Airlines Industry is consolidation. Quickly.

The Indian govt. has also okayed the merger of Indian (Airlines) and Air India to create a behemoth.

The stage is set for the merger of Indian Airlines and Air India. An empowered group of ministers on Wednesday cleared the proposal to create a single national carrier — a move first mooted more than 20 years ago for providing muscle to the public-sector carriers to take on private and international airlines. The merger, expected to be completed over the next three months, will create an entity with a fleet of around 120 aircraft. As new planes join the fleet, some existing ones are phased out and those on lease returned, the carrier will have over 125 new-generation aircraft by 2010.

What I really like about the proposal is that some existing aircrafts wil be phased out.. Badly needed! And please please, enforce an age limit on the flying staffs. I am not discriminating, but that is what the customers want.

Why Apple's iPhone will Sell!

2007-02-22T06:55:00.000+05:30

iPod earpin is great, gives out amazing sound. But is it as good as Sony ear plugs? Perhaps yes, perhaps not, I am not sure. It sure is not the iPod earpin that makes iPod such a hot cake. It is just another portable mp3 player, though with a cult-attracting design, and it is the design that sells the iPod. Not just the looks, but the User Interface. The Apple UI is intuitive. It responds to you. It is also Different.

When Apple launched the iPhone, I dismissed it as a desperate attempt at riding on the success of the iPod, and they Apple will just about sell enough iPhones just from the spillover effect of the iPod Brand.

What more innovation can you add to Mobile Phone. Nokia and Sony-Ericsson have tried all there is. Blackberry have filled the gap that Nokia left out.

All that iPhone has to offer, we already have, with multi-billion branding efforts to back them. What is new that iPhone is offering?

Then I saw the iPhone launch video closely only recently. And then I remembered this post by Kathy Sierra at HeadRush. About the Dog ear User Experience Model, of how great animators and good animators can be different. When a Dog Jumps to catch a frisbee, and stops mid air to catch that frisbee, her ear will keep going.. Follow Through.

The UI designers at Apple realised this, and I could see it at the Iphone launch video..(which I will post here tonight). You can actually push the screen, drag a menu, and the iPhone will just follow you.

MP3 Players are as generic as it can get. Store MP3 music, play it from the play list, maybe toggle ( Apple Shuffled it).

Mobile phones are much less generic, and with such an UI, and if the software don't get hung as much as symbian (I trust Apple with that), iPhone is a sure winner. Expect iPhone to exceed the sales of iPod in the near future.

The iPhone UI will actually speak to you, feel you.
Half the feature in my Nokia is left unused, because it is slow, get hung mostly, and not easily accessible.. The mother-child Folder is so very legacy now...
Apple intuitive UI will rule Mobile Phones.
Move over Nokia...

When is it comming to India???

Year end Investments, Insurance or Mutual Funds?

2007-02-21T17:45:00.000+05:30

This is the time that Insurance Agents and Mutual Fund salesman love the most. Instead of the usual pestering phone calls from the call center agents of Banks and Insurance companies, Hawking for Mutaul funds or Insurance, It is the investor who frantically calls up friends to ask for the friendly advisor's number who gave him a discount (** Rebate or discount by Insurance agents on the Premium paid is Illegal). The companies Bulletin baord is full of messages asking for contact details of Insurance agents.

It must be a heyday for the Agents and Insurance companies. Insurance Policies are usually hardsold..

I suggest that You should not buy Insurance for the purpose of savings, and tax savings. You stand the chance of getting wrong-sold, or buying the wrong policy just to save on Taxes. If you want to buy Insurance, do a proper research, and buy for protection of your Family. The tax Incentives are given for just that, Incentives. Incentives for you to buy Insurance. What policies to buy blah blah..... Just buy WHole Life Policies or Term Policies. Fist get adequate cover, and think about the other frills of Insurance.

For Investment purpose, we just happen to be in very lucky Times. We don't have to anymore allocate 10000 on pension plan, 10000 on Infrastraucture bonds, another 20 on National Savings Certificate blah blah Blah.. You can put the whole 1 lakh on any savings instruments Like Tax savings Mutual Funds also called Equity Linked Savings Scheme, Insurance premia, Bonds etc...

If you are running amok for last minute Investment, chances are that, you are a young professional, who forgot to save... I invested in Mutual Funds. There are a hosts of Mutual Funds to choose from, and I chose three Mutual Funds where I invested. These Mutual funds had good allocations into Certain Mid Cap Stocks, and since I am investing for at least 3 years, some of the mid caps could reap huge dividends.. I have chosen SBI Mutual Fund's Magnum Tax Gain, Icici Prudential Tax Plan-growth, and HDFC longnterm advantage fund.

Icici Prudential Tax plan hasn't grown yet, but the other two have started to grow exceptionally wel even in a short time..

If at all you are buying Insurance, SBI life sells very cheap Term cover. Get yourself a 50 lakh term cover. You will sleep in peace.Max New York life has a very good whole Life Plans.. You can try them too.

Kingfisher Airlines, Jet Airways and Indian!

2007-02-21T14:15:00.000+05:30

Earlier My favorite Airlines used to be travel by Air Sahara. Air Sahara has a very warm ambience, or so it used to be. But combined with its internal troubles, and the industry in general, it would be a difficult comeback for Sahara now. Any other time, ie in absense of the price undercutting in the industry, any good marketing guy could have turned it around (Hush Hush about the financials). And Air Hostesses at Air Sahara Still had that old charm, untill stewards ran them over..

So now, about the only airlines left are Jet Airways, Indian and Kingfisher Airlines, and if you book at the right time, the economy fares offered by these airlines are not very different from that offered by the so called budget airlines. Of the three, Jet airways is clearly the market leader, with good service and a percieved brand Value. I have had only good service from Jet except for the fact that the Air hostesses are relatively rude. Rudeness Factor is clearly a parameter that Jet Airways consider when recruiting Flight Attendents. I long the golden days of Air travel when Air Hostesses were no less than Super Models, and some even marrying into Industrial Houses and with Actors.

Indian, is not coping well with the sudden opening up of the skies. The over aged Air Hostesess and Flight Stewards, and their fake smile have become an eyesore at best. And if you happen to fly by Alliance Air, god help you. Other the service quality and the rest, it is the ricketty condition of the Aircrafts that is most disheartening. In fact a weak hearted might have a heart Attack. The other day I came back by Indian Airlines, and the plane was giving out a VERY strange Noise.. It was indeed scary to be listening to sounds when you on board an aircraft, and the aircraft is about to take. I asked the Air Hostess who politely told me that it was the baggage handling system, and I was calmed. And the flight took off well.

It was when we landed in the Delhi, and the plane was taxiing, ie, the baggage handling system was no where close to the aircraft, and we just touched ground when that Creaky sound came again. I promised myself that it was an Airlines that I should avoid.

Only about the best thing Indian Airlines is that if you have extra baggage, it is the only airlines that allows 30 Kilos for domestic travel. But that creaky sound was too much a price to pay for a few extra baggage huh!

In another Indian Arlines flight, the toilet was dirty, and add to it, some fellow passenger had dropped Chewing Gum Wrappers and a small empty water bottle in the sink. Of course, I have photographs of the same..that I took with my Camera phone.

Kingfisher is however is an exception.
Service quality relatively much better.
Umm.. Air Hostesses attractively dressed. And well recruited.
I mean, take out the air hostesses, and there is no fun left in travelling :)
Inflight entertainment, which will pay for itself with inflight promotions..

I expected it to be nothing more than a Huge flying bill board , and a Massive surrogate advertising campaign for Kingfisher Beer. But, with the whole industry in troubled waters, Kingfishers might come out a clear winner. At least they would be selling more beer even if the airlines run into losses. And it will hold out longer than any other Airlines in the case of a price war going out of hand...

Fly the Good times.

Pimping on Orkut!

2007-02-20T16:35:00.001+05:30

I had written about some very obvious solicitations by Gigoloes on orkut. Today, I got the shocker of my life when a friend sent me mail asking me to be more discreet and not transactions with pimps on my scrap book.

This Said gentleman, offered me sexy gals, Aunties and Housewives for sex with prices starting from 1000.. Any discounts?

He even gave his phone number. Since solicitation is a crime by Indian Laws, I could have this guy arrested. I could report to the police, but I am afraid, they might want to ban Orkut... So I politely deleted the soliciting scrap...

Will The Indian Airlines Industry Bleed to Recession?

2007-02-20T13:38:00.000+05:30

Ummmm!!! Those days, not the early days of the Internet, when I wasn't too used to reading off the Computer Screen, and when I took out printouts if an email was too long( stories from Desi Fantasy too at times shhh!!).. Those days were before RSS became popular, and Dave Winer was busy figuring a way out to bring RSS to the public. And my daily dose of reading included Fortune, Time, Businessweek, and all Indian Magazines.. Now I read so many many feeds in so less time, I don't even know what I am reading, and my habit of copying Intelligent Bloggers' OPML lists keeps my feed list grow at a pace I can't seem to control, or monitor..

Oh, and there was no delicious nor Digg, so I couldn't bookmark that article. Or perhaps I read that at several places.. Something about the American Airlines Industry.. In a few years, severe undercutting by competitors, had bled the US Airlines Industry all the profits that the Industry had earned since the Inception of Air Travel....

It, would be faster for the Indian Airlines Industry, I am presuming, unless something is done real quick. Things like fuel prices, regulations etc are out of their control, but things that are in control, the Industry leaders must control..

Looks like the customers have never had it so good though..
Or do they?

Low prices notwithstanding, the service quality today are comparable to some state owned transport corporation.
Long queues, Delays, Rescheduling (WTF.. I had booked a ticket on monday morning so that I can reach office on time, but they rescheduled it... one day in advance, and it wasn't even a no-frill Airlines... I reached office at 2 PM) and hostile cabin crews..

With near full occupancy, and costs squeezed wherever possible, Budget airlines can't make the tickets any cheaper, and there is no sign of a profit in sight. I am not the "perfect customer for cheap airlines" but I have promised myself never to travel by a Budget Airlines, and I have met many people who swears the same.. Perhaps we are not part of that target market... Are the seats Cramped at Air Deccan?

The airlines are bleeding, and service quality is becoming worse.. Add to it the Airport woes... There was joke today on times of india, about someone who has earned extra miles for hovering over delhi skies waiting for permission to land.. The point is, how long can they bleed?

The only Airlines that sem to be doing exceedingly well is Kingfisher. I am not sure if Mallya is even looking at a Profit.. His Aircrafts are Giant Hoarding for his BEER brands, All the passengers are exposed to the Kingfisher Brand for the whole duration of the flight, and with no remote control to switch to another brand... And The airlines commercials are the Biggest Surrogate marketing Campaign in the History of Surrogate Advertising...

When the rest of the Airlines bleed to bankcruptcy, Cases and Cases of beers are being sold.. It won't be long when Mallya buys out Virgin :)

As for the rest, they should look at consolidation quickly, before the government intervenes. After all INDIAN is also at stake.

Orkut Allows Video Upload using Youtube and Google Video

2007-02-02T08:06:00.000+05:30

Orkut now allows video upload on your orkut profile, next to your album, in a very smart integration of other google offerings with orkut.

Share and enjoy!!

Tata Bags Corus for $11.3 Bn

2007-01-31T10:11:00.000+05:30

Tata Steel of India won the battle to control Anglo-Dutch steel maker Corus with a £5.75bn ($11.3bn) offer on Wednesday, after more than eight hours of head-to-head bidding against Companhia Siderúrgica Nacional of Brazil.
Tata was declared the winner with a bid of 608p a share in cash, against CSN’s highest bid of 603p a share. The Tata bid valued Corus at about £6.7bn including debt, said a spokesman for the company – far above earlier analysts’ and market estimates. Corus shares closed in London on Tuesday at 565p.[source]

A moment of Pride Indeed. Mittal Steel is not an indian Company, never will be. It just is run by Indians and happen to be founded by an indian. What's so new about that.. There are many other companies based in the silicon valley started by people of Indian Origin. Tata whereas is an Indian Company..

Only I had hoped that CSN would win the bid, pay for Corus outrageously, and when the steel cycle comes for a downturn, Tatas would buy the combined CSN-Corus for a song. That is how Mittal Steel grew.. Buying Steel Plants and companies for cents during downturns..

Tata bought it when the troubled Corus started to turnaround... for a price much higher than intended.
But it is still a moment of Pride Indeed.

FDI in Insurance to rise, Left to Protest !

2007-01-19T12:00:00.000+05:30

Finance minister P Chidambaram indicated on Thursday that the government would introduce a legislation in the Budget session of Parliament to hike FDI cap in insurance sector to 49% from the existing 26%, triggering fears of a fresh policy feud with the Left.

Reacting to the suggestion, Left vowed to kill the latest attempt to relax the ceiling percentage — seen as a big put-off for international majors in the sector. It is likely to put up a stiff resistance with CPM's Prakash Karat insisting that communists had not diluted opposition to such proposals. [source]

The mistake that the Finance Minister is doing, despite knowing the fact that India needs 100% FDI in Insurance, is by indicating that the FDI cap will be increased to 49% and not 100%.
He knew the left would protest, but it would have been much easier to convince the left to accept say 74%, if they were protesting against 100%. Now, if our Finance Minister does yield to the left, there won't be much room.. Ah! the art of negotiation.. He should shop from Karol Bagh more often.

I have always maintained that the FDI cap on Insurance should be raised to 100%, the sooner the better. We already have a strong regulatory body. And there are BIG Insurance companies already knocking at our doors. Also, LIC is already BIG enough that it shouldn't be scared of competition. With the kind of brand recognition, penetration and trust that LIC commands in India, it shouldn't really be a big deal. LIC needs no protection from the government, and already with sovereign guarantee, which is far more protection than any Public Company would ever need.

Opening the FDI in the insurance sector would be good for the consumers, in a lot of way.
Not opening wouldn't benefit anyone other than the employees of LIC, for whom it was expected that the LEFT would protest.

Why India Needs an Increase in the FDI on Insurance?

By only Increasing the FDI in Insurance, we could even wait out a little longer on the FDI caps in other sectors. The CEO of a Private Insurer once told, that increasing the FDI in Insurance would take care of the year's FDI target of the country in one go.
But that is not the reason why I say that increasing the FDI in insurance only would affect a lot of other Industries in a positive way, and that we could even do without the FDI in many other sectors for sometime, Real estate for one.

FDI in insurance would increase the penetration of Insurance in India, where the penetration of Insurance is abysmally low with insurance premium at about 3% of GDP against about 8% global average. This would be through better marketing effort by MNCs, better product innovation , consumer education and so on.

How would it affect the economy?
India is hungry for Long term capital needs to fund the building of infrastructures, which is the need of the hour.

Infrastructure, or the lack of it has been the brake, which have hindered the leap of the Indian Economy. Despite shortcomings, Indian Economy has come a long way, but every industry leader would crib at the infrastructure bottlenecks that they have face everyday in their effort for growth.

Unlike new and progressive government policies that the left would jump into protest at every opportunity, investment in infrastructure is something the government won't face any protests. It would employ millions directly, and more millions indirectly. The only bottleneck being long term funds, infrastructures being very Huge and very long term investments. Even Public-Private partnerships wouldn't be sufficient, and how much can the world bank lend, without strings?

The answer lies in raising long term capital from the masses, and come to think of it, Insurance is about the only avenue where people put in money for as long as 3o years even more. An Increase in FDI in Insurance would indirectly be a boon for the Indian economy, the investments not withstanding, but by making more people invest in long term funds to fuel the growth of the Indian Economy.

With, good infrastructures, industry leaders would agree that they can gallop!!!

Chinese Destroys Satellite with Missile, US worried!

2007-01-19T07:30:00.000+05:30

China last week successfully used a missile to destroy an orbiting satellite, U.S. government officials told CNN on Thursday, in a test that could undermine relations with the West and pose a threat to satellites important to the U.S. military.[source]

US is very worried because
"If we, for instance, got into a conflict over Taiwan, one of the first things they'd probably do would be to shoot down all of our lower Earth-orbit spy satellites, putting out our eyes," said John Pike of globalsecurity.org, a Web site that compiles information on worldwide security issues"

eh?

But the US has the capability to shoot down satellites for decades now. Now that USSR is gone, they want to be undisputed King of the Space. How about India? Software to Spaces huh!

Hugh MacLeod On Entrepreneurship

2007-01-16T15:09:00.000+05:30

Hugh's Pearls of Wisdom on Entrepreneurship:
Says he is "certainly not in the same league as people like Fred Wilson or Jason Calacanis"

But what he has to say are Pearls that are fun to read as well.
Some points I liked ( I liked all but I liked these best)

9. Some people think that once they secure venture funding, their problems will be over. Wrong. That’s when your problems REALLY begin.

11. If an average guy in a bar can understand what you do for a living, chances are you’re halfway to becoming a commodity.

12. It’s easier to turn an ally into a customer than vice versa.

And the BIG Pearl:

If you’re happy in your career before the age of thirty, you’re probably doing something wrong. Heck, if you’re happy in your career before the age of seventy, you’re probably doing something wrong.

Despite The perks and Hikes, I am not yet happy. I am restless...
And I am Glad for that.
And I am glad Hugh put it so well.....
There is Nothing wrong!!!!

Many more Pearls.

Guru, Lucky for Aishwaryra and Abhishek

2007-01-16T10:27:00.000+05:30

Hmm....

How was Guru?
I guess I went with a lot of expectations .. So, I would say, the movie was just about OK.
But not worth watching twice, and I watch many movies many times over.

Movie was directed well, I should say, and Vidya Balan Looked good as ever.
Lets not even start about Aishwarya Rai, and Abhishek Bachchan and Aish looked very much like husband and wife.. Though I overheard that Abhishek looked more at home with Rani Mukherjee. Back to Ash, I have always dismissed anyone who said anything remotely bad Ash as mere jealousy. She is just so beautiful. I guess she is not liked because she looks so perfect and breaks the "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" myth.. She looked all the more better in Guru. She is looking better and fresher as she ages.

She acted well, but she would have been much better if she acted a little lesser. She should stop thinking that she had to be perfect. All she has to do is just be normal..

Abhishek Bachchan leaves much room for improvement.
He should stop imitating his father as well. I know it is natural "Ai". But he needs to come out of that Shadow. He will grow, he will mature, and he is get better.... He needs much refinement though. He delivered much better in ...what was that godfather remake... Yeah Sarkar (Had to google ).

His lopsided smile was not too convincing..
Every one is going ga ga over Abhishek, but Guru didn't deliver the promise because of Guru himself..

Mithun was great, Vidya Balan's role was small but sweet and apt, Madhavan's was as expected, saala Abhishek main maar khaa gaya. Direction was good by bollywood standard...

He is the most promising star though..
Or is it the case of the country of the blind?

Congratulations again to Aishwarya and Abhishek on the engagement.

This Blog is Number 1 in Blogsearch for Keyword Anthony

2007-01-15T11:26:00.000+05:30

Google shows 149000000, yes that is 149 Million, results for the word anthony, and 24 million results for the keywords "Anthony+Blog".

But do a blog search on search.blogger.com for the word Anthony, and this insignificant blog is the number one blog. or Is that a random result?

Even above the main results, it shows up on the highlighted results.
Very unfortunate that people hardly use blogger search, and people hardly search for Anthony.
Many people come looking for Journey though!

Wedding at Gun Point!

2007-01-15T10:35:00.000+05:30

And I thought it happens only in Manipur.

Samman, an educated guy from Mumbai visits a friend in Bihar at a wedding. There, he meets Kakul, the pretty daughter of a politico-business magnate from Patna and charms her with his flirtatious ways. So far, so good. But soon realizes that he is a consenting, yet mute spectator, at his own wedding with Kakul at gunpoint! [more]

In Bihar, in perfect opposite to dowry system, if a guy is liked by the daughter of someone high and mighty, it is mighty easy to get the boy's consent for marriage. In Manipur, if a girl can pull the right strings, it is not at all uncommon to see guys being forced to get married to the girl. Happened that, a girl turns up on a guys wedding, much like movies, with militants, and get forcibly wed to that guy coz they were seeing each other at some point of time.

But then Bihar and Manipur are a lot similar. Similar ailments, albeit different symptoms. Poverty, political breakdown, economic famine and goons. Who once said that a place where Policemen are prosperous can never be peaceful..? And Policemen in both states are very prosperous indeed.

Solicitations in Orkut. Gigoloes galore

2007-01-13T11:36:00.000+05:30

He has even put his Mobile number there.

And only 6000 Rupees.

For Unsatisfied Woman.

He is energatic(sic).

Viagra Startup companies: Doubling valuation

2007-01-12T17:48:00.000+05:30

Peter Rip General Partner, at Early Stage Venture capital firm, Crosslink Capital, shares some very intersting insights about approaching a VC for funding. Be Focussed.

Pick one application; serve one type of customer and be in that business. Show how you can conquer a specific set of competitors by virtue of the technology, but don’t be in the technology business. If you can persuade your investors that the first beachhead is attainable and interesting, you will get credit for subsequent applications and the big, horizontal play. Tell a story that shows you understand who your customer is, how to get to them, and why they will buy or use your product/service. Show how powerful the technology and team are, but stay on message about the focus.[more]

Delhi Bloggers Meet 3rd Anniversary

2007-01-12T16:03:00.000+05:30

Come one Come All!

The Delhi Bloggers Meet DBM XV, the third anniversary of DBM..

More on the delhi Bloggers Meet Blog.

13th January
2 PM onwards
Lodhi Gardens...

Don't miss it..

Contact details : Twilight Fairy :Deleted :)
Amit Ken : Deleted :)

iPhones trademark Infringement battle

2007-01-11T10:59:00.000+05:30

Intellectual property is the lifeblood of Silicon Valley and we all have to protect our property.

The iPhone trademark is owned by Cisco. We (Cisco) had hoped to reach an agreement to share our trademark with Apple, yet they decided to use the name without our agreement, so we, unfortunately, are having to go to court to stop them from using the name. John Earnhardt, Senior Manager of Policy Communications for Cisco Systems. [via: Siliconvalleywatcher]

Steve Jobs said that they were in talks with Cisco about the trademark, when they decided to go ahead with the launch of iPhone. Seems like the talks weren't going so smooth.

Since Cisco was the first the park the domain, oops, trademark, iPhone, despite everyone talking about iPhone for the past 2.5 to 3 years. Well iPhone had to be the obvious sister for iPod, and even before Apple said anything about it, everybody assumed that it won't be long before Apple came out with the iPhone. Only, the name was spoken for .. and no, apple doesn't hold the trademark rights to i+*wildcard* and Cisco was lucky. They have the trademark since 2000 when acquired a company called Infogear technology, which had developed a product that combined web access and telephone. .

But it so reeks of domain parking. I rather start registering iCar, iShoes, iCondom eh...

Not that there is anything wrong, but Cisco had to know that iPhone is a trademark apple would want, though for no obvious reasons, or is it obvious?

So much for iPhones. I definitely would love one though.. Wouldn't they tie up with airtel or something? The price might seem steep to a rich American, but not to a yuppy new age middle class Indian. We have been paying as much for every new Nokia releases.

Hey Steve, the iPhone would be such a killer here in India. Tie up with Airtel, we will get it from the grey market. Screw Cisco.

On Feminism and 80 Kilo suitcases

2007-01-11T09:34:00.000+05:30

It all started when desipundit linked to this post , and Curious Gawker responded in his trademark style, Ash responded well, but when falstaff responded , "I'm also firmly of the opinion that anyone who packs an 80 kg suitcase deserves to have to carry it herself / himself". I can't but laugh.

How so true.. Out of courtesy, as gawker mentioned, hmm I always help carry luggages of my female friends, and I always insists. But my brother never does.. Different or not, many girls tend to pack these 80 kilo suitcases, and my brother being a light traveler, never carries more than 2 pairs of dress, just in case and his toiletries. And so whenever he comes or goes back from his vacation when in college, and they used to travel in groups. Him with his almost empty rucksack, and his female friends with their baggage. And he always lets them know that he travels light because he don't want to carry any luggage. And the most courtesy he extends is help bargain with the porter.. It was a long time away, and falstaff reminded me of an old sweet conversation with my brother.. thanks.

Blogwatch

2007-01-10T18:27:00.000+05:30

I discovered digital Inspiration via technorati. When I looked for blogs tagged with India. It was quite a long time ago, and Amit was a quite blogger, then. He never came up in the Indian Blogosphere Buzz, untill the recent ban. Well a few months before that. But, his was a Big Blog. Counting the technorati links, and in most Blog parameters. I quitely admired his blog. The second in the list of the blogged tagged with India came far below. And it was very unusual for an Indian Blog to have such huge Links. Usually, US, Australian, or Chinese blogs get such number of links. Of course, there are similar blogs (very similar) now on Technology new snippets, like Quickonlinetips , with good number of links on technorati.com/blogs/india ( Quickonline tips have also been around for a long time).

The point is that I found out about such blogs only via technorati.com/blogs/india, and didn't think there would be other more popular(linkwise) Indian Blogs. Indian Bloggers don't like to link out.

And Wait! he lives in Australia!

Today again I was doing a search for popular blogs as I was updating feeds, and did a technorati.com/blogs/internet, and surprise surprise, I saw another Indian Blog with.... Links more than Digital Inspiration.

This Blog, according to Technorati has 2069 blogs linking to it as against amit's 1849. Wait wait, he don't even post that often, and his feedreader count is way below Amit's.

His secret was a 3 column k2 wordpress template he created .
With 10000 downloads, it is no wonder that he attracted such a huge number of links.
Want links, learn designing nice templates...

How to Download videos from Youtube

2007-01-10T12:05:00.000+05:30

When Ronaldo's ex girlfriend tried to sue and threaten youtube for posting spicy videos of herself and her banker boyfriend, on youtube, the Daniella Cicarelli video clip was duely removed from Youtube last week, though it has moved to google video.

When news of the lawsuit broke out, everyone rushed to Youtube to search for the video. But you can only watch the video or embed it on your website. And since you know that youtube might remove the video, you so wanted to save it... But how do you save it?

Download this small addon from firefox, VideoDownLoader .

Some of the sites that the Firefox VideoDowLoader supports are:

Youtube, Google Video, iFilm, Metacafe, Dailymotion, Myspace, Angry Alien, AnimeEpisodes.Net, Badjojo, Blastro, Blennus, Blip.tv, Bofunk, Bolt, Break.com, Castpost, CollegeHumor, Current TV, Dachix, Danerd, DailySixer.com, DevilDucky, Double Agent, eVideoShare, EVTV1, FindVideos, Free Video Blog, Grinvi, Grouper, Hiphopdeal, Kontraband, Lulu TV, Midis.biz, Music.com, MusicVideoCodes.info, MySpace Video Code, Newgrounds, NothingToxic, PcPlanets, Pixparty, PlsThx, Putfile, Revver, Sharkle, SmitHappens, StreetFire, That Video Site, TotallyCrap, VideoCodes4U, VideoCodesWorld, VideoCodeZone, vidiLife, Vimeo, vSocial, Yikers, ZippyVideos...

enjoy

Will the Real Estate Correction Start soon?

2007-01-10T09:36:00.000+05:30

Good News,

Despite rising income levels, bankers said rising property prices have had an impact on home loan growth rates. Property prices have increased by about 50% to 60% in the last one year, though in some pockets the rise was as much as 100% to 150%.

"We could see a correction of around 20% to 30% in real estate prices in 2007," said analysts. HDFC chairman Deepak Parekh had said property prices could see a 15% to 20% correction. However, builders and developers do not seem to buy this argument.

"Growth in home loans has been slowing this year. This is largely on account of rising property prices and higher base," said Rajiv Sabharwal, senior general manager, ICICI Bank. The home loan portfolio, which has registered a growth rate of about 30% year-on-year, has dipped to 25% this fiscal.[source]"

Which means fewer people are buying homes, though the construction never stops, and of course land acquisition. The reason could be the rise in home loan rates, combined with the irrational rise in property prices. Genuine buyers won't be hurt, though they might feel some dissonance. Real estate companies won't be hurt either. Most of them have raised good money from the market at the right time. And anyway, they can now grow upwards. As the developers add more and more floors upwards, it will beneficial for all. But if there be speculators who have leveraged to invest in the property boom directly, and have entered in the last one year, they migth be hurt, and I have no pity for them.

Times of India, delhi also reported a news about yesterday's DDA auction which went for a lower than expected price ( It doesn't mean though that it went below the reserve price, but it was below the market price). Another Signal??

This good for Home buyers who have been waiting for a correction. The same article above also mentions a correction of about 15-20%, which is not new though. I see more correction than just 15-20%.

I won't exit the housing stocks just now though. But soon enough. Time to switch to Sugar.. Damn cheap I tell you.

MyBlogLog Bought by Yahoo!

2007-01-09T12:19:00.000+05:30

MyBlogLog now joins the Yahoo developers network.
Techcrunch Reports that MyBlogLog the Link tracking software turned amazing widget that provides a faceroll as well as integrate your comments with the faceroll to give a face to commenters, has been bought by yahoo for a consideration in the neighbourhood of 10-12 millions.

JEREMY welcomes the MyBloglog team.

Can a New Search Engine Replace Google?

2007-01-08T14:21:00.000+05:30

“The more Google starts to think about taking on Microsoft, the less it is a pure search play, and the more it opens the door for new innovations,” said Mr. Moldow, A partner at the Foundation Capital, a Venture capital Firm which have recently invested in a new search engine, Powerset, aimed at taking google's business away when google is busy competing with Mirosoft...Richard at Siliconvalleywatcher reports.

Now perhaps a better mouse-trap might not be enough to replace google, and google is not a just a better search engine, but already a name synonymous with googling, oppps, searching with billion of dollar warchests and a work place that attracts the best talents..

But then everybody says that about a King!!! And there is always a new King... If google topples Microsoft, someone else has to topple Google. That need not be a Search engine. Or perhaps it is a search engine after all, user validated results? . Afterall, the flavor of the new age have been the USERS.

Imagine, search results, that are edited by a million volunteers... Volunteers validating backlinks, keyword relevance, linking neighbourhood etc etc...

Toshiba Portable USB External HDD

2007-01-05T10:32:00.000+05:30

I so very want one of this.. I recently bought a seagate laptop hard-drive, fixed up inside a casing, and looks quite like this toshiba, from nehru Place. The assembled drive costs me something like 4000 INR, about 100 dollars, for 80 GB. It also has USB and powers up with the Laptop... Only the USB port was loose despite having changed the casing again, so that I need to keep it on a flat place and not move while I use the same.

This Toshiba external HDD reportedly comes for about 140 Dollars for a 100 GB drive. I'd say it is a good bargain, and toshiba is always good.

I use a Toshiba Portege R150 and I love it, despite the speed, when running heavy applications. I have added an extra 512 MB of ram which I am thinking of upgrading to an extra 1 gig.
[Via]

Fiction to Reality, Ito Ora!!

2007-01-04T16:12:00.000+05:30

Heard of Ora Ito? or rather ito morabito.
Read About him long time ago in a magazine article. I was talking to a designer friend, and casually mentioned Ito, and she hadn't heard about any Ito. The article had so caught my fancy then that I remembered everything about the story. I had to google the article today..

Ito is a Design School Drop-out who wouldn't hired by any big brands. He was a kid, and had no credentials.

But he knew a thing or two about designs, and what he was create fictional designs for some well known brands, like louis vuitton and Apple, and published them on some fashion Magazines, in a creative media stunt.

When real people started ordering his fictional products online, the brands took notice. His website was getting 200,000 visitors a day within the first few weeks of the publication.

This alluminium heineken bottle won awards for design, and boosted sales for the beer giant. Within months of the bottle's launch, Heineken doubled the number of French outlets that carried its aluminum bottles, to 2,000.
The Fictional designs are below.... Amazing designer!! He calls his designs "simplexity".

More of his designs here.

Google Might Kill Digg and Delicious!

2007-01-04T09:53:00.000+05:30

Or perhaps buyout Digg! Del.icio.us might be dead for sure.

And just when I just started using Google reader. I have the habit of analyzing popular blog's referral logs, and google.com/ig and google reader have been popping up quite a bit here and there, and since it is Google I decided to set my homepage to Google homepage on my browser. So very convenient. Little like page flakes, but not as heavy, for whatever that mean. I find google homepage lighter(Both use Ajax, don't they?). I never got used to pageflakes.

About killing Digg, Delicious and all other lovely sharing and bookmarking sites, It is being discussed in the A-Listers Blogs that, with a slight tweak in the Google reader Algorithm, and they have the resource bandwidth, they can easily beat the shit out of all sharing sites by aggregating and displaying how many people Shared each post and then calculated the most popular ones.

Scoble thinks, " the result set is more diverse than TechMeme (more Z listers, yeah!) and more focused than Digg (less noise, more tech)".

Now most of this sharing sites, survive by acting as Google's distributers , and as a sensible manufacturer, google should let them be and focus more to be a better searcher. After all Search is the future, PPC and contextual might just kill good ole marketing as we knew it, and Google is the reigning Caesar.

But of course, in a user ruled world, if Google can provide us with more User Delight, we won't complain.

Why Google Will Dominate the world!

2007-01-02T18:49:00.000+05:30

Read this convincing post by Rich Skrenta.

Points like:

Google is the start page for the Internet.
(Maybe we switch on the computer and instead of windows starting up we can expect Google Starting up)

Google's CPMs are $90-120, vs. $4-5 for an average browse page view elsewhere.
(That is the ad on google serach results page againts other websites like this blog)

How zero switching costs paradoxically yield a winner-take-all market.
( This one is interesting. If switching cost were zero, since u only have type the url to switch between Google and a new Search engine, won't it be easy for someone to just switch the moment better search engine comes along? Not quite!!)

Brand Perception, "users who see Google's logo on top of Yahoo's results perceive the results to be of higher quality; users looking at Google's results with Yahoo's logo on top view them as having less relevance."

Yahoo Could make an extra $ 1.5 Billions by partnering Adwords.
(Ego should never mix with business eh!)

Microsoft isn't a player online any more than IBM is..??
( This was Nice... IBM?)

All Hail the New King Google.. But Of Course.. I have always agreed :)

I have shifted to New Blogger

2007-01-02T18:01:00.000+05:30

Anthony's Mirror shifted to new blogger.. Labels and all that. I thought of shifting to wordpress, but decided that I will keep this as is, on blogger instead of shifting and maybe start a new one on Wordpress if need be. This is a directionless blog, much as my mind is, and hence the variety in topics. I know a few things about a lot of things, and maybe I will start a few topical blogs.

This blog started as a journal of my life and hence will remain so. When I do start a new blog, it will be on my own domain, as my cook blog is, and the group blog on Life that is yet to take off. General Lethargy, and well my work schedule, but then I have some spare time during the night. I don't sleep much, anyways..

Blogging will only take on newer highs..
I have a couple of projects in mind that I want to start.. Let's see what Time has to say about it..

Now this was so a journal Entry :)

Man Sues Girlfriend for Blogging about their Sex Life

2006-12-31T12:44:00.000+05:30

It is always fun to read cat blogger, and their sexual escapades. But one girl landed into a legal soup after blogging about her sexual Life with her Boyfriend. Her boyfriend sued her for blogging about sex life..

When Robert Steinbuch discovered his girlfriend had discussed intimate details about their sex life in her online diary, the Capitol Hill staffer didn't just get mad. He got a lawyer.

Soon, though, the racy tidbits about the sex lives of the two Senate aides faded from the front pages and the gossip pages. Steinbuch accepted a teaching job in Arkansas, leaving Washington and Jessica Cutler's "Washingtonienne" Web log behind. [source]

How Google makes Money from Longtail!

2006-12-30T12:18:00.000+05:30

OK Amazon and Netflix makes quite a few Millions from long tail, by selling products that are in low demand or have low sales volume but can collectively make up a volume more than the current bestsellers and blockbusters, if the store or distribution channel is large enough. Made all the more easier with the reach of the internet.

Now keyword gurus target keywords that are not competitive or "best selling", and bid for thousands or even millions of keywords that makes up the long tail of search, but that is how people make money off adsense and adwords.

The topic said, how google makes money from the long tail. Now this is a different longtail. A post on valleywag about a disgruntled small adsense user, who makes less than the minimum payout of $ 100 by google. Now, as with long tail, there must be thousands if not millions of such publishers whose money Google is holding.

OK eventually, google will payout the money to the publishers, and some google won't pay, if the publisher quits before he/she reaches 100$, but google charges advretisers as soon as the click happens, and already they have a one month Float even with big publishers. So, Google holds in its accounts Millions or perhaps Billions of unpaid dollars that will generate a huge sum of interest Income. Interesting indeed. There are companies like gift certificate operators, or food coupon operators like Ticket Accor that survives on interest income from float.

No wonder, people are predicting that google stock will touch 600$ by 2007 end.

Technorati tag:: Adsense : Adwords : Long Tail

Performancing Blogging Plugin Rebranded as Scribefire

2006-12-30T11:20:00.000+05:30

The Performancing Blogging Plugin which was not part of the acquisition of performancing by Payperpost, has been rebranded as Scribefire.. The site will be launched shortly [Breaks Techcrunch]

Technorati tag:: Performancing : Scribefire

Yahoo News Message Boards Closed!

2006-12-30T11:07:00.000+05:30

The Yahoo News Message Boards - a forum to discuss the articles on Yahoo News - have been closed today, seemingly due to trolls and other vocal users ruining the experience for everyone else. reports mashable!

[Troll image Courtesy: santharia ]

Saddam Dead. Has Been Executed

2006-12-30T10:28:00.000+05:30

Saddam Hussein has been Executed, hanged.

Saddam Hussein has been hanged, state-run television reported Saturday.Saddam's lawyers had asked a U.S. judge to stop his execution. He was sentenced to die in November for the murders of nearly 150 people in Dujail after towns people attacked his motorcade in 1982.Saddam met with his two brothers Thursday and reportedly handed over his will. Iraq's prime minister wouldn't allow a delay in his execution. [source: here]

Technorati tag:: Saddam : Iraq

BBC's Best Tech Picks of 2006

2006-12-29T17:27:00.000+05:30

BBC's panel of technology experts gives you thier best Tech Picks of 2006. The Panel includes Fraser MacDonald, Editor, Stuff magazine; Martin Lynch, Editor, GIZMODO; Katie Lee, Editor, Shiny Shiny; Gina Trapani, Editor, Lifehacker; and James Beechinor-Collins, Editor, T3 Magazine.

1. Fraser Macdonald : Sony Playstation 3 or PS3

2. Martin Lynch : High definition projector.

[Many people think that the only way to get high definition content into their living rooms is by forking out for a LCD or plasma HDTV. There is an alternative though and it comes in the form of a high-definition projector.]

3. Katie Lee : Nintendo Wii

[I think the PlayStation 3 will be the gadget of next year, but for 2006 it definitely has to be the Wii.]

4. Gina Trapani : Parallels, a computer that runs both Mac and Windows operating systems.

5. James Beechinor-Collins : Nintendo Wii

[source]

What is Zapak !

2006-12-29T10:15:00.000+05:30

Zapak! Sounds like the sound of something flat being pasted on the wall? You are near. That is what comes to my mind when I see the zapak.com billboards being pasted across the cityscape. Get gaming, it says.

Today I saw Salman Khan telling me to visit Zapak. And I just did! Zapak is a Free Gaming site, and have huge plans in the offing. It is Owned by Anil Ambani so many is not a problem. Get the eyeballs, he must have told Mr Rajesh Sawhney, President, Reliance entertainment Ltd. Or rather, their finger on the keyboards..

It so very reminds of the Hometrade.com days. All those Billboards with Hritik Roshan, Sachin tendulkar, and who not? Hometrade died, maybe for the wrong reason but it died.

Ok but then Hometrade was started in the wrong time, and the owners were seedy.

And eHarmony have proven that TV and other offline media can be used to build an online brand, and generate revenues and scale. But then what eharmony did was to use the money they generate from membership fees to get more customers who paid membership fees.

And Indian Internet users are still wary of paying for some online service, unless it is for finding a suitable groom or bride. Even then, the matrimonial sites are going offline as well. Some converting the free members into paying ones won't be a wise idea for Zapak.

Zapak do have plans to start Kiosks all over the country, and is investing a whopping hundred Million Dollars, unheard of by any Indian Internet Company. The kiosks might not be a bad idea, what with most of the reliance webworld users being gamers ( on a casual observation, 1/3rd the seats in most R-world cyber cafes are playing games). But then, would gamers only want to play games at zapak.com, the gaming portal?

About the only thing I like about Zapak, and this press release, is that the $ 100 million investment will also be used to set-up a development centre. With such Investments, I can see, zapak growing or evolving into an IT services company on the Gaming Vertical, with a few products, but mostly outsourced Product development.

The post started with how the "zapak- get gaming billboards" are splashed all across the city, very hometrade like. Which means that primary target for the gaming portal is for the Indian Market. With the kind of Investments they have have in mind, they would be better off targeting the Asian Markets, and restrict their Advertisements to PPC campaigns.. Afterall, Gamers are still a Niche, however large and Niche are best targetted by PPC campaigns, since this Niche use the internet to play games.

Even with all the Billboards, alexa traffic shows that they have yet to cross Amit agrawal's Digital Inspiration, however inaccurate some people might claim Alexa to be.

Note: I have a feeling that few Indian Users have Alexa toolbar installed, unlike US users, though I don't have the data, a site with vistors from US and europe majorly will have a better Alexa ranking.

Delhi To Grow Upwards, Skycrapers coming to town!

2006-12-28T11:59:00.000+05:30

I had recently posted that the only way the Real Estate Market in India will rationalize is by letting it grow upwards. Not to restrict on the number of Floors that can be built, if technically viable. Economically it is much more viable. Seems like the developers knew it all along.. Time to buy Ansal Housing Stocks huh!! [The stock had been hitting the upper circuit the past few days after some Analyst lady came on CNBC and explained that it was trading way behind its peers.. Man, we can be such herds!!! ] {By the way, they signed some agreements with the UP Govt *wink*}

The city skyline could change dramatically, with Centre planning to allow re-development of certain areas by allowing up to eight-storey apartments and permitting construction between 20 and 60 floors at locations earmarked for new development.[source]

And once the master plan comes public, the prices of houses might come down, and if lucky, like nine pins. I'd wait for a little longer now.. The cost you are paying is now for a house is not for the construction cost, but for the number units per hundred crores paid for that land. With 60 storey house, the number of Units will multiply, like bunny rabbits?, and well the prices might just rationalise.

Another Delhi Girl Gangraped in a Running Car!

2006-12-28T07:20:00.000+05:30

Another Running car, another lift, another gang-rape. Rape capital, still!

A 17-year-old girl was allegedly gangraped by four men at Janakpuri in west Delhi on Tuesday. While the medical examination report is still awaited, the girl has alleged in her complaint that the four accused, two of whom were her friends, abducted and raped her in a moving car. [MORE]

Two of them are friends of the victim!

US Death in Iraq crossed 9/11 Count

2006-12-27T11:42:00.000+05:30

It all started with with 9/11, to save more lives, but The US Military Death toll in iraq has exceeded the 9/11 count[more].

What Wo(men) can do for SEX!

2006-12-22T16:31:00.000+05:30

One Tiffany Gwen Weaver forged documents of an Annapolis attorney Amanda Sprehney, to gain entry into a prison to have sex with one of the inmates. The poor attorney who was on leave when the incident happened got a letter banning her from the prison for having sex with an Inmate.[more]

Rodents Hibernate, Computers too, But Men!!

2006-12-21T12:22:00.000+05:30

We all studied that rodents go into their holes during the summer to Hibernate, whole winter. Now, even computers Hibetnate :)..

But have you heard of men Hibernating?

Mitsutaka Uchikoshi survived a near freezing temperature for 3 weeks by going into a state of hibernation when he went missing.

A man who went missing in western Japan survived in near-freezing weather without food and water for over three weeks by falling into a state similar to hibernation, doctors said.

Mitsutaka Uchikoshi had almost no pulse, his organs had all but shut down and his body temperature was 71 degrees Fahrenheit when he was discovered on Rokko mountain in late October, said doctors who treated him at the nearby Kobe City General Hospital. He had been missing for 24 days.

"On the second day, the sun was out, I was in a field, and I felt very comfortable. That's my last memory," Uchikoshi, 35, told reporters Tuesday before returning home from hospital. "I must have fallen asleep after that."
Full report

Filed under Crazy Events

Virgin Giving Birth around Christmas

2006-12-21T11:03:00.000+05:30

Virgins have been reported to give birth since 0 BC, around Christmas. It is no different this christmas too. A virgin KOMODO Dragon, named Flora, at a zoo in Chester, northern England, is expecting eight babies around this christmas.

In an evolutionary twist, Flora has managed to become pregnant all on her own without any male help. It would seem the timing is auspicious: The seven baby Komodo dragons are due this festive season.

New IIT to open in Andhra Pradesh!

2006-12-20T10:53:00.000+05:30

Rediff Reports that the government has OKayed the opening of a new IIT in Andhra Pradesh in Medak district.
Medak District was once represented by former prime minister Indira Gandhi in the Lok Sabha.

The union human resource development ministry has sanctioned an Indian Institute of Technology to Andhra Pradesh, Chief Minister Dr Y S Rajasekhar Reddy said in Hyderabad on Tuesday.
Making a statement in the State Legislative Assembly, Dr Rajasekhar Reddy said, "I am happy to inform this House that I have just received a communication from Arjun Singh, Union HRD Minister, informing that one IIT is sanctioned to AP in response to our sustained request for locating an IIT in our state. This acceptance to locate one IIT in AP is a part of the Eleventh Five-Year Plan agenda to start three (new) IITs in the country."

The union HRD ministry has requested the state government to identify and allot 500 to 600 acres of land free of cost, having physical and social infrastructure, which includes road, rail and air connectivity.

"Therefore, my government has decided to locate the IIT in Medak district, which was once represented by former prime minister Indira Gandhi in the Lok Sabha, as it will satisfy the requirements laid down by the HRD Minister," he pointed out. [source]

My Blogging Journey through 2006 and My blog resolutions for 2007!

2006-12-20T09:42:00.000+05:30

I have been blogging for since September-October 2003 and that is about my only claim to blogging fame. So to say I was left behind, or rather this blog. Page views have dwindled faster the frequency of my postings. Comments have become an alien word.

But the beginning of 2006 was good for me… and then slowly it started its decline. End of 2005 through early 2006, I used to get 25 to 30 comments on many posts. I was a BLOGGER. What then happened?

It was the time when I suddenly got good workload, at work of course and I was trying to prove myself at work. And my Blog got left behind! But that was not the only reason.

The main reason was another Blog I started. A food blog that I started just for fun, before knowing that there were food blogs, saw a sudden spurt of visitors. I guess I wrote funny, and I saw that I was blogrolled by a few popular food bloggers, and then every other blogger followed suit. There were some 200-300 referrers daily from different food blogs. The sudden attention was too much for me, and I just put in all my blogging effort into the food blog.

It was not surprising. My few months old blog was getting 3-4 times the visitors of my more than 2 year old blog. It was a conscious decision that this blog got lesser attention from me, but I was busy keeping up with the other blog. And general Bloggers and Food Bloggers are totally different species. I thought my food blogging pals would visit this blog, and pals from here would visit the other. I couldn’t let this blog down though… and I kept it up with news snippets and links, while my food blog grew on its own.

With all the blogrolls and links and visitors, though my food blog never reached the status that this blog had. Through the later part of 2005 and early 2006, my blog got linked in major websites and got quoted by some mainstream papers. In fact Mumbai-Mirror had my blog post featured a number of time like this and this.

How I want my Blogging Journey to be in 2007?

This Blog will remain a general topic topic blog.
Topical Blogs will be started on the Sidebar.

But posts will be more frequent, and more conversations will ensue on the blog.

I will also revamp my Bachelor Cooking blog in a big way. I have taken my own domain, but the shift has been delayed.

I will start some Niche Blogs, and hopefully a Blog network.

I shall take part in more Blog events.. Mostly onlines.

I shall Identify more niches..

Update: Here is a list of all participants in the group writing project.

Speculator Initiated Life Insurance Policy

2006-12-19T11:48:00.001+05:30

I don't know if SpinLife or Speculator Initiated Life Insurance also known as Stranger owned Life insurance (SOLI )or Investor Owned Life insurance ( IOLI ) has reached the Indian Sub-continent, but the concept of Buying Life Insurance for Investment purpose is getting notoriety in the US, with many BIG Investors buying Insurance policy with Huge Premiums as a Big Gamble.

OK, now you must have had Pesky Insurance Agents trying to sell you an Unit Linked Insurance Policy as a Good investment Option.. Don't be confused, Unit Linked Policies would look like Sovereign Bonds when you compare it with this High risk Policies called SPIN Life.

In SpinLife, the gamble is on the Life of a Person and not on the future earnings of a stock Company.
It all started when Insurance Agents who are also Financial Planners saw that many Rich Old people had Huge Life Insurance covers but their dependents that are already mature are independent enough that they don't really need the Life Insurance proceeds.

You are old, and you are paying huge premiums... The Insurance proceeds will however go to your Sons and Grandsons who are already well off! So Why not use the money yourself?
But then, as in insurance contracts, you only get to see the money... well your dependents will get to see the money when you are dead. You have to be dead to enjoy the proceeds of your Insurance that you have been paying all your life..

This is where this SPIN Life Investors come in.
They will buy the policy from you!
They will pay you a lumpsum which you can use to enjoy in your old age.. Surgery, Viagra and what not :)

In return they will get the insurance proceeds when you are dead.
They will just hope that you die soon, because now they will start paying your premium also.
Fair deal.. You get to enjoy your money.. And the investors have a good way of earning way above the market rates.. You see elderly people do tend to die :)..
The investors will get a better return the sooner you die.
Fair Deal.. Everyone wins.
But as long as it is in the hands of genuine Investors.
What if Crime syndicates starts investing...
They would just Kill!!!!
I guess SPIN Life will be banned one day or the other though!

eg: You have Policy worth 1 crore ( this Transactions only happen on Very High value Policies)..
You have already paid a premium of 5 lakhs...
These Investors will say pay you 25-30 lakhs, and a promise to pay all the Future Premiums.
They will recieve the 1 crore when the Insured is dead.

If the contract is properly designed, the investor can design it such a way that he will never lose the principal and earn at least a minimum return even if the Life were to survive very long...
Death is a Certainty.
That Infosys will continue to make profits is not..
And here we are, raking our minds on how to double our money from the Stock Markets.
I think SPIN Life practice will start in India..
Or maybe it is already started...

Spin life will be very popular with Term Life Insurance where getting life quotes is also very easy.

Manu Sharma may Escape Death Penalty

2006-12-19T10:32:00.000+05:30

.....because his was not a ‘premeditated’ crime, but one committed in a fit of anger after he was denied whisky.
Heard of killing in fitful revenge after getting raped, or seeing ones loved one raped or Killed. But "Fit of anger after being denied Whisky" and so angry and He kills someone????

Google and NASA to work together

2006-12-19T09:45:00.000+05:30

NASA and Google have signed an agreement to "work together on a variety of challenging technical problems ranging from large-scale data management and massively distributed computing, to human-computer interfaces".

NASA will provide Google with interesting data, like statistical data on atmosphere, that will be available in Google Earth. Other plans include: "real-time weather visualization and forecasting, high-resolution 3-D maps of the moon and Mars, real-time tracking of the International Space Station and the space shuttle. This agreement between NASA and Google will soon allow every American to experience a virtual flight over the surface of the moon or through the canyons of Mars."

[source]

Manu Sharma, Vikas Yadav and Tony Gill Convicted

2006-12-18T16:06:00.000+05:30

Its been raining justice of late... Manu Sharma, Vikas Yadav and Tony Gill have been Convicted in the Jessica Lal Murder case .

From DNA :

"We have no hesitation in holding Sidharth Vashisht alias Manu Sharma guilty of the offence of murder," a two-judge bench said.

A Division Bench of Justices RS Sodhi and PK Bhasin convicted the son of former Haryana minister Venod Sharma, under Sections 302 (culpable homicide amounting to murder) and Section 201 (destruction of evidence) of the Indian Penal Code.

The sentence is likely to be announced on Wednesday.

The court also convicted Vikas Yadav, son of former Rajya Sabha member DP Yadav, and 'Tony' Gill of the charges against them under Section 201.

The judgement was on an appeal by the Delhi Police, which challenged the acquittal of Manu, Yadav, Gill, former cricketer Yuvraj Singh and six others by a sessions court.

Late but came it did!! Justice, I mean.

After Bengaluru- Jabalipuram, Bhojpal and Indur!

2006-12-18T14:18:00.000+05:30

After Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Thiruvananthapuram and Bengaluru, the Jabalpur Municipal Corporation has passed a resolution to rename the city to Jabalipuram.

The BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh government is also mulling renaming Bhopal to Bhojpal and Indore to Indur.

Reads a newsclip in our bulletin board. I guess the news in the Time of India..

Making Money in a Faling Stock Market!

2006-12-11T14:12:00.000+05:30

Warning! Please Don't indulge in Deribatives trading without first understanding what Derivatives are, the difference between Options and Futures and margin trading.

And yes, you can of course make a lot of money in a falling stock market the same way you can make money in a rising stock market.

As you can see from the picture (click to enlarge please), State Bank of India went down by 5.8%, the above picture show a rise of 137% (currently it further went down to 7% and the put option premium went up by 180%).

I didn't buy the option at 37 rupees. I paid 42 ruppe for the same :-) There was an impending correction in the offing and I believed that large caps including Reliance, ICICI Bank and SBI will lead the correction. Of the above stocks, SBI had gained the most so I concluded that it might fall the most. I never expected it to fall this much in a day, but then RBI had been in my favor just this once. ( I lost during the P-Notes announcement since I was bullish), and I was bearish not because I knew that RBI would increase the cash Reserve Ratio.. I was just plain Lucky with the news though a Correction would have come anyway...

Trade in Options at your own risk!!!

BAIDU starts Blog Search!!

2006-12-11T10:13:00.000+05:30

Baidu, the chinese answer too google has come up with blog searches..

The Chinese Internet company Baidu has launched a search service to help
Internet surfers navigate through the millions of Chinese bloggers and their
sites.
Baidu's is the first Chinese search service dedicated to blog
searches, the official state news agency Xinhua said. As the largest Chinese
search engine, Baidu officials hope to expand into the growing market, analysts
said. [source]

Is Sony PS4 in the Offing?

2006-12-07T09:48:00.000+05:30

Cnet informs that a senior Sony executive is hinting at a future Sony playstation Console or a Sony PS4.. Australian tech news outlet SmartHouse is reporting that a Sony executive has already been talking about future PlayStation consoles[more].

Public Dieting, Blogs and Japanese Ministers

2006-12-05T11:13:00.000+05:30

In a drastic step againts ummm... obesity? Two Japanese Ministers are going on a Public Diet and their progress will be minitored on a blog.

Vice-ministers Noritoshi Ishida and Keizo Takemi have pledged to shed at least 5kg (11lb) each.
They will chart their progress in a blog on the ministry website over the next six months.
The site will include information on how much exercise the men take each day and what they drink.
"I can't run or hide any longer, once the blog starts," Mr Takemi said.
The vice-minister, who is 166cm (5ft 5in) tall and weighs 84kg, said he had to lead from the front.
"Considering my position as a vice-minister of health, I felt I had to do something about it," Japan's Yomiuri Shimbun quoted him as saying.
Mr Ishida says he will walk for 10 minutes every day and stop using elevators.[more]

Should we suggest the same to our Aviation ministry? It would be such fun! Only Desi Voyeurs will have a heyday!

Who Bought the Blog Herald?

2006-12-03T11:23:00.000+05:30

Just ten months after The Blog Herald was acquired by Blog Media Inc from Duncan Riley, It is being resold to an undisclosed Buyer.

Blog Media will focus on its core competency of blog consulting! Goes on to prove that consultants don;t make the best businessmen :)

Walmart Enters India via Bharti Finally!

2006-11-28T09:52:00.000+05:30

And yes, retail is one sector which will immensely benefit the customers, as more and more players come in. Some players will even die out under cutting each other, but the customers won't complain.

I hope it don't heat up the already heated up real estate market. Walmart, fo course, usually sets up shop out of town, but the competitors in a mad rush to compete will set up more shops in the not-so-out-of-towns.
In the news,

After months of waiting for a policy change that would allow foreign companies to enter multi-product retailing, Wal-Mart, a company with annual sales of $312 billion (Rs14,00,000 crore), threw in the towel and tied up with telecom bigwig Sunil Mittal for a 50:50 joint venture.

Wal-Mart would, ideally, have preferred to come to India on its own, but the current policy allows foreign companies entry only into single-brand retailing or wholesale trading.

The Bharti-Wal-Mart agreement, announced on Monday, will thus have Bharti running the shops and Wal-Mart managing the backend sourcing, supply logistics, and wholesale cash-and-carry businesses. But contrary to what people believe, the real power of Wal-Mart, the company that pioneered everyday-low-prices for shoppers to become the world’s biggest retailer, lies in its backend process.

Over the next few years, Wal-Mart will be making investments to the tune of $1 billion to make its presence felt across the length and breadth of the country. [more]

And yeah, its been a surprise that Bharti tioed up with Walmart.
Suni8l Mittal had once told that, now that Airtel is on an auto pilot mode, he is looking at more business opportunies. His Agri Business is also doing very well, what with his knack of tieing up with the best of the industry. Even in retail, I couldn't have expectd anything less than Walmart. Walmart will eventually want to run the show on its own, regulaters willing, and by that time Bharti would have learnt the ropes. After all who could have started a telecom empire from selling telephone sets.
Expect something different from Bharti.
Perhaps the biggest agri-products supplier to Walmart?
Logistics providers to all the Retailers?
Or with Indian Companies becoming overly acquisition happy, it would be good to see Bharti staging a bid for Walmart. Ah!! India will have arrived.

What is Ratan Tata Doing?

Will Real Estate Bring Down India's Growth?

2006-11-24T09:51:00.000+05:30

Just a thought...
No research. no home work.. Top of the mind as they say...
You don't even have to believe what I write :)
... at your peril !

When we were in Engineering college, and a senior got a job with HP (Hewlett Packard) for a princely sum of 25000 per month, which was more than my IITian cousin got at that time( it was ages ago), many of us refused to sit for the campus interview for the 13-15 K jobs. Some even declined after getting an offer, starting the mad rush for Bangalore. When this said gentleman bought a Fiero ( the TVS -SUZUKi Bike), it was rumoured that he bought a Cielo.

25000 could buy a lot of stuff, definitely not a Cielo, but 25000 could buy you alot of stuff then. It was not even too long ago. And 25000 could definitely have afforded you the emi for a House then. A good one at that. In bangalore. In 2003, Houses still were affordable. Another friend bought a pigeonhole for 800,000. He was paying a rent of 6000 per month, and the pigeon hole was what his rent when converted to an EMI bought him. A similar apartment in that area today goes for no less than 25 lakhs, when i last enquired. In Pune.

I doubt if someone with a 60K salary could afford a decent House today. That is Indian Real Estate Scene today!

End of the LIG:
With Land prices so high, I don't know if there ever will be the LIG housing schemes, tomorrow. LIG housing schemes or Lower Income group's Housing schemes were built so that the LOWER Income people could afford a house. The Houses came cheap because the house were built cheap, adjacent to land where there were Medium Income and Higher Income Group Housing complexes. The cost of housing was brought down by not providing luxurious Amenities', no frills as they say, but with a large portion of the cost of building houses going for the land acquisition, how will one bring down the cost of housing.

One way is Growing up. Skyscrappers!!! But there will master plans and policies before that!!!!!
What the hell is FSI?

FDI in Real Estate:
FDI in any other sector had more or less translated to benefits to the end consumer. Take the case of telecom, and more visibly Retail. If walmart came to India, there will be discounts galore. Prices won't shoot up.

Why, then have the prices of real Estate shot up with the opening up of FDI in the real Estate. The answer is quite simple I guess. Where as the Foreign Funds in all the other sectors were used to fight for a market share with reduced Prices, or in other words SELLING, the FDI in Real estate was being used in pushing up the costs. They were BUYING up lands, and lands are the scarciest resources. Supply and Demand mechanics.

Lots of money chasing the same piece of land. As a result the land prices shoot up. The same Builders are bidding for the new HIGH Priced (FDI Induced) land and they have to get the money some where (well everywhere) and the end consumers are the best choice. And prices have shot up unlike other sectors.

Same solution. Grow Upwards... prices should come down when there are more units of Apartments per square feet of the land.

Let me plug in a small personal opinion.
FDI is good, and moeny is always welcome but given a choice between Insurance and Real Estate, Insurance should have been the better Choice.
World over Infrastructure developments which takes a very long gestation period needs very long term funds and Pensions and Insurance are about the only source that could provide cheap funds for 20-30 years even more. Without good Infrastructure, there would be no roads to apraoch the Skyscrappers, no water to bathe the residents and no lights to pull the Lifts. And Chidambaram jee and Manmohan Singhjee Know this. Does Sonia and Yechuri ?

So it is not the NRIs buying up flats that have shot up the prices but the bulders buying up land. With Apartment prices skyroketting 100-200% in the last 2-3 years, the profit margin of property developers should have shot up, but the profit margins have remained flat.. Never mind the topline and the net worths.

The Investors are also fueling the Real estate Inflation in a way. We value the Real estate Stocks way too high, giving them money to bid higher and higher for land. That doesn't mean I won't apply for the IPO of Shobha Developers :) ..

Indian Real Estate should grow upwards for the prices to grow downwards.

Will Real Estate bring down India's growth?

Say what you, India's growth have been fueled by low cost. Skilled Low cost resources.

Exports of IT, ITES, Auto Components, textiles that are fueling the growth of the nation have all been because of Low cost. Salary in the IT and Financial services might have skyrocketted, but average salary of a skilled engineer at Bharat Forge and Bajaj Auto are still as low as that of an unskilled worker in medium developed countries ( This I read in an old swaminomics article today morning).. When your basic need of housing becomes unaffordable, you will join the next company that is giving you a better hike and the company will have to hire a replacement at a higher package than your previous salary because more often than not, your replacement will also come from a different company for a Hike.

And all resources being scare, this salary hike war will continue as is continuing, and the cost advantage of India won't be valid too much longer..

Why do I blame the real estate?

Well, but for movie tickets and petrol, I don't see any drastic price rises in any other thing than Housing. In fact, Mobile phones, Mobile phone calls, Food, Laptops, all have become all the more cheaper and when I see people cramped in 1 room houses but each with a laptop, I can clearly see where the real estate prices will bring us.

If only the real estate prices were rational!

Earlier, when I believed that the Inflation in real estate was due to bulk buying by NRIs, I thought the prices will come down eventually. But, then I saw that the Mills owners are not going to return the 100's and 1000's of crores back to the Developers, and those crores have to be recouped back :)

The prices will not come down as long as they building don't grow skywards.
For those who are waiting for prices to come down, it will be a real long wait.

>>Vote this on Indian Pad.

Anil Ambani's Global Buyout Fund

2006-11-22T12:19:00.000+05:30

While other Indian Companies are busy shopping in the Global M&A Bazaar, Anil Ambani is lining up a Multi-Billion Buyout Fund aimed at the global markets. He had tasted blood in the domestic market as an equity investor in many small firms. Now he wants to go after the Big fishes in the telecom sector. Anil Ambani is said to have putin $500 million of his personal wealth. Good going. More from ecotimes:

Anil Ambani plans to launch a global buyout fund of about $5 bn aimed at telecom and related sectors and is in talks with billionaire speculator George Soros, private equity giant Blackstone group and Singapore’s Temasek for participation. Mr Ambani has already contributed $500m of his personal money to the fund as anchor investor.

He has received commitments of up to $2.5 bn from several investors. Mr Soros, Blackstone and Temasek are likely to participate soon, people familiar with the developments said. The name of the fund has not been decided but it is likely to be headquartered in Singapore.

While Mr Ambani will be the fund’s main sponsor, the management team is likely to be separate. The money Mr Ambani has invested is his personal wealth, sources said. The fund will focus on buying companies in sectors like media, communications technology and software, IT-related services, BPOs, telecom or broadband services.

The mandate will be global and the fund will not operate in India. The objective is to take advantage of the vast opportunities in the global telecom and communications space. With a large corpus on which additional debt can be easily raised and with the backing of investors with deep pockets, the fund could look for big-ticket acquisitions in Asia and the Middle-East

How to Deal with Nosy Neighbors?

2006-11-21T17:58:00.000+05:30

The landlord have been extremely nice, and went all over to please me.
He even brought me his spare LPG cylinder and told me I don't need to apply for a new connection. I only need to phone him, and he is at the doorstep.

He asked for 8K for a roomy 2.5 room flat.
I said I can only pay 6.5 and he agreed.
Strange mate!!
I usually try to be good to others, but when others are acting good, my alarms bells start to ring.
Ah!!! There .... He did mention that I should ignore the neighbour, who was a little crazy!

Now she can't be that crazy!
She was doing it intentionally.
Second day at the house, and when I met her outside the door, she was quite rude.
OK, she was extremely ugly, but it was only my perception ( it is a different matter that your perceptions will match mine) and she tried to act her looks. To the sound!

She told me not to talk on the phone outside the house near the common gate. It disturbs her!
The scooters passing the narrow passageway next to her bedroom all day don't disturb her perhaps!
Then she started speaking foul about the landlord for keeping tenants.
She mumbled to herself or someone in her house( she was outside) or was she speaking to me?
She said that she had called the police because girls used to visit the previous tenant.
They also played Music!

I was a little pissed, but I find it hard to reply back to foul mouthed Ladies. I never could.
I talked to another neighbour, and she confirmed that she did called the police though the girls were the tenant's cousins, confirmed by parents!!!
She has done that quite a few times..

Third day into the house, she was quite nice. Maybe because I was quite, and don't disturb her. And my music is not loud. She came out as she heard me closing my door.
She smiled and me and I was shocked.
The, she told me, "You flush makes noise". Can you have it mended!

I told my real estate agent to get me a new house, where I don't have meddling neighbors .
I just paid the token money to a new house.
Much smaller, with 4 flights of stair and 500 more rent.
But more peaceful I hope!

How else would you have dealt with her?
I thought of waiting till she dials 100 and counter charge her of harrassment. That she was harassing not me, but the landlord so that he sells the house to her cheap! But I thought escape was the better route since I had the choice!

The landlord indeed said that he was sorry I had to go through the same.