Anna Effect

There was a lot of euphoria about Anna Hazare breaking his fast. It was no mean feat to go 13 days without food - most of us cant last a day.

However, now that things are simmering down, and the Govt. is after the group associated with Anna for various petty reasons ( in-spite of a much greater stashes of money being siphoned off), the question that comes to my mind is whether the Anna Effect will last - and if so - for how long ? Will it lead to a transformation of society ?

One sure thing about the last month or so is that the Nation has got to know about the larger issues of Corruption. I dont think everyone necessarily agrees with the dictacts of the LokPal Bill, but they do agree that our Country is riddled with corruption - and it is in each and every rung of the society.

Talking with a few cab-drivers on a recent visit to Bangalore , got some insights into their mind.

The one in Delhi had gone to RamLila maidan to be part of the movement. He was adamant that changes will come, and he and his group of friends will not be a part of the corruption. The cab waala in Bangalore was equally vehement and was feeling miffed that he had paid Rs500 as bribe to renew his driving license.

But, once the euphoria settles down, I fear that we will just go back to our old ways. People will rather part with Rs500 than stand in multiple queues trying to get things done the right way. Call me a pessimist, but the behavior of our countrymen does not inspire much optimism in me. I had seen the demonstrations during Mandal commision and the more recent OBC reservation policy, and have seen that people have short term memories and easily forget the pledges they have made when the reality of life strikes them.

What are your thoughts ? 

Impersonation round 2

A year back I had written about some loser impersonating as me.

Well, he and his crones are back again. Here's mails that some of my friends have recieved.

From: Vibhu Rishi <rishi.vibhu@gmail.com>

Date: Thu, Jun 4, 2009 at 8:06 PM

Subject: BN is shutting down.

Yes guys, you read it right, we are shutting down. Will keep you all posted on future updates.

The email id is the dead giveaway. Its the wrong way round.

So, if you get a mail from this A*****E, ignore it. If you do reply , make sure that you change the reply to address to rishi.vibhu , as this loser has set the reply to address to my original id.

Twouble with Twitters

Found this amusing clip about Twitter ! :D

What is Recession?

An amusing anecdote that came via email. Enzoy!

This story is about a man who once upon a time was selling Hotdogs by the roadside. He was illiterate, so he never read newspapers. He was hard of hearing, so he never listened to the radio. His eyes were weak, so he never watched television. But enthusiastically, he sold lots of hotdogs.

He was smart enough to offer some attractive schemes to increase his sales. His sales and profit went up. He ordered more a more raw material and buns and sold more. He recruited more supporting staff to serve more customers. He started offering home deliveries. Eventually he got himself a bigger and better stove. As his business was growing, the son, who had recently graduated from college, joined his father.

Then something strange happened.

The son asked, "Dad, aren't you aware of the great recession that is coming our way?" The father replied, "No, but tell me about it." The son said, "The international situation is terrible. The domestic situation is even worse. We should be prepared for the coming bad times."

The man thought that since his son had been to college, read the papers, listened to the radio and watched TV. He ought to know and his advice should not be taken lightly. So the next day onwards, the father cut down the his raw material order and buns, took down the colorful signboard, removed all the special schemes he was offering to the customers and was no longer as enthusiastic. He reduced his staff strength by giving layoffs. Very soon, fewer and fewer people bothered to stop at his Hotdog stand. And his sales started coming down rapidly and so did the profit. The father said to his son, "Son, you were right". "We are in the middle of a recession and crisis. I am glad you warned me ahead of time."

Moral of the Story: It's all in your MIND! And we actually FUEL this recession much more than we think.

2009 Wish List

First and foremost ! Welcome to the new year ! If you are from hyderabad, you will be especially excited about the new year as it ends in 9 - and Hyderabadis just love that number ! 

What were your resolutions for the year ? Great ! And now you have broken most of them ;) Ha Ha Ha ! Thats the way they are supposed to work ! 

Anyways, my post is not about resolutions. Its about a wishlist from this year. In no particular order ... 

I wish 

• iPhone would become cheaper in India. Then i can pick up a 16GB one for 20k INR. Sweet. who cares if it does not have FM. That brings me to the next point.
• FM channels which dish out only hindi songs should have the presenters speaking in Hindi. I just don't get it - they talk a lot in Marathi and then play a hindi song. Sounds out of sync. If you are talking in marathi please play Marathi songs. If you want to play Hindi songs, speak in Hindi. Its like you are listening to a Rock channel and the presenter starts talking in Hindi about Creed or something ! 
• Chandni Chowk to China lives up to my expectations. I care shit about critics. Its easy to be a critic. You will get a full gamut of them in your office. 
• The police does something to combat terrorism and make the common man's life easy, instead of treating all common people like suspects. 
• Also I just don't get it. After each bomb scare the Traffic Police gets all pompous about PUC and NOC checks ! I wish they first learn to do their jobs and take traffic policing seriously, and be able to get better road sense into people. 
• People should become more helpful. Currently people just dont care. Yeah. someone will leave a comment that look at how helpful mumbaikars were after the blasts. My wish is different. I wish people were helpful without having blasts to wake them up. 
• I wish the MotoGP season rocks. I don't get turned on by the F1 cars, but the MotoGP is something I greatly like. Motorcycles in my blood you know. Which brings me to
• the Indian motorcycle companies should launch some bikes in the 250cc segment. Currently we have low end bikes - think splendors, pulsars, or , very high end bikes - the R1, etc. I want something in the 2L bracket boasting a VTwin engine. 
• I wish the roads become better to run the above bikes on. :) . Also if the Traffic Police do their jobs, and get people to drive sanely, and not walk on the roads, it would be a pleasure to ride/drive your machine.
• But people will walk on the roads. There are no footpaths . I wish that the municipal officers actually start thinking that unlike them in their govt cars, people do go about their day to day activities on foot or public transport. Heres a toast to footpaths and metro system in each city of India. 
• I wish we get a good leadership. Dr. M looks like a sweet man, but he is highly ineffectual. Does he ever talk ? Or is it Madamji doing all the talk ? I with for Rahul Gandhi to create his own party and getting younger and like minded people with him. Why are we ruled by people so old that if they were in a govt job they would be retired by now ?
• I wish for politicians to get superannuated . Nobody above 60yrs should be allowed to run for a post. 
• I wish India become an economic superpower ! Ha ! If we are good in economy we don't have to worry about the world suffering economic crisis
• I wish some great new game comes up which tears me away from World of Warcraft. Well, Diablo3 is slated to be out this year. Hoping for this one ;)
• I wish BN becomes the best place for bikers in the world. But with the current website it has, not going to happen. Do you know anyone who can sponser my pay so i can sit and code ;)
• I wish for some great movies from Bollywood which are hatke , like RockOn. 
• I wish for a mild summer. I don't want to get scorched. Anyone know if that would create problems with crops ? 
• I wish PMC does something about water problem. This region gets lots of rainfall, and yet we get water cuts and powercuts. 
• I wish people in India realize that being 1+ billion people is not an achievement to be proud of , but to be wary of. We have a limited set of resources. 
• I wish people stop living in the glory of the past, and start creating today's glory. Be a hero day should come into effect ! 

phew ! Ran out of breath. Whats your wish list ? :D

What kind of thinker are you ?

Your Thinking is Concrete and Random

You are naturally inquisitive and curious. You're excited by new ideas, and you are a true independent thinker. You are interested in what is possible. You like the process of discovery. You are often experimenting, challenging old ideas, and inventing new concepts. Rules, restrictions, and limit don't really work for you. You have to do things your own way, and you can't be bothered to explain yourself.

What Kind of Thinker Are You?

Happy Holidays !

This year, in office we have a year end break. Woowee ! unfortunately, it does not extend to the year end but only for the week of Christmas. Oh well. Whatever ! 

Happy Holidays ! 

Pics from a peace march on 3rd Dec at Gateway of India

Outrage against the politicians over the recent attack. I don't want to forward the emails I am getting, so I just uploaded it here.

At the end of it , I am not sure if all the demonstrations will help. Its just going to simmer down and die out.

Observation Powers

This video is amazing. First seen on rearset.

Expressions with Flags

The forward comes as :

A Norwegian diplomat Charung Gollar was asked to present the UN with a graphical representation highlighting the main problems faced by the world in 2004.

He presented a set of 8 pictures entitled "The power of stars" and was applauded for the simplicity of his idea. In spite of having no pretension at all, his work was presented to participate for the Nobel Price of Political Marketing.

 Unfortunately, a search on the web, cause i wanted to link to wikipedia or some such thing throwed up that Charung Gollar does not exist ! Well, whoever made these flags - brilliant work ! 

Angola

Brazil

Burkina Faso

China

Columbia

Europe

Somalia

USA

Kabhi Khushi kabi Gham

Life is so unpredictable. One moment you are enjoying your sister's wedding, thankful that it is finally over, and the next moment you get a call that one of your very good friends has passed away.

Do I now enjoy or be sad ? Knowing my friend, he would want me to have been enjoying... but a part of me feels sad that i will never get the phone call starting with 'namaskar sirjee'.

May his sould rest in peace. Chinmey, I will miss you.

Boo to Reliance

I have a reliance broadnet connection.

My advice to you - dont go for it. More often than not, its not working. For the last 2 days no net connection. Zilch. Everytime I call up customer care - they tell me it will be fixed as soon as possible. Its been 2+ days - and it is still not 'as soon as possible'.

Looking for alternate connection now at my place.

Broken Internet

Last week saw some frustrations in the office with the internet going for a toss. Initially I thought it was something wrong with our network, and just a week before I had raised the issue of the net being slow. However, by evening info trickled in about the fibre cut near egypt. The news channels picked up the info, but then quietly went silent with India losing miserably to Australia.

Today, digging up a bit found out an article on what happened, along with a fabulous map of the wired connections across the globe.

Trapped

Sometimes I feel like the little kid in Taare Zameen Par. Trapped. Trapped inside the room, with people droning on about the presentations, the deadlines to reach. Trapped, while my mind shifts to places outside the window. Trapped, thinking that 'hey, is this supposed to be my life?'

The Ant and the Grasshopper

Got this as a forward...

OLD VERSION...

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

MODERN VERSION...

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving. NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

The World is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house.
Medha Patkar goes on a fast along with other grasshoppers demanding that grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter.
Amnesty International and Koffi Annan criticize the Indian Government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the grasshopper.

The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the grasshopper (many promising Heaven and Everlasting Peace for prompt support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance) .

Opposition MP's stage a walkout. Left parties call for "Bharat Bandh" in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Enquiry.

CPM in Kerala immediately passes a law preventing Ants from working hard in the heat so as to bring about equality of poverty among ants and grasshoppers.

Lalu Prasad allocates one free coach to Grasshoppers on all Indian Railway Trains, aptly named as the 'Grasshopper Rath'.

Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act [POTAGA]", with effect from the beginning of the winter.

Arjun Singh makes Special Reservation for Grass Hopper in Educational Insititutions & in Govt Services.

The ant is heavily fined for failing to comply with POTAGA and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the Government and handed over to the grasshopper in a ceremony covered by NDTV.

Arundhati Roy calls it "a triumph of justice".

Lalu calls it 'Socialistic Justice'.

CPM calls it the 'revolutionary resurgence of the downtrodden'

Koffi Annan invites the grasshopper to address the UN General Assembly.

A FEW YEARS LATER.......

The ant has migrated to the US and set up a multi billion dollar company in Silicon Valley.

Thousands of grasshoppers still die of starvation in India...

Numa Numa

In case you cannot see the video link above, click here

l33t talk

Most people by now are ok with the sms talk. 4 xmpl : ut ?

However, I recently came across the l33t talk ( leet talk) ... and I predict this may also become part of our future talk, cause most of the kids who will be tomorrows workers are getting a healthy talk of this.

l33t talk is the shorthand of online games. I play WoW and this is where I am picking up these things, and oh boy, they can be applied so easily to everyday life. So, here goes a small dictionary of the leet talk.

133t : Elite
In the game many of the monsters are elites, which means that for the same level as you, they are 2-3 times more tougher. Now, elite is too long to write, so it got converted to leet ... which got converted to 133t ( e=3) . Normal day usage would go like :" I own a zma, but oh man ... the busa is l33t!".

woot ! : expression of joy
Derived from loot + wow + other expressions of joy. Now, in the game, when you kill a l33t he drops some loot. It ranges from somthing mundane to something amazing. When you get something amazing, its like omg ! amazing ! i got it ! . That's when you say woot ! e.g. on my character Brahmos, I have the 'Greaves of Desolation' which dropped after killing a l33t - woot !

wtf : what the f***
No explanations needed. Its quite prevalent.

omg : Oh My God
The phrase probably made famous from the FRIENDs series. Too long to write it is now abbreviated to omg. Notice no use of '.' . e.g. "OMG! the new 200 fork cracks !"

ty : thank you.
Well, you thank people who help you.

gg : Good Going !
said to people who have played well. usually said after running an entire instance. Real life usage : "GG Hitanshu for making it to Leh!"

gtg : Good To Go.
This one flummoxed me a bit initially as I work in the Good Technology Group (gtg) ;) . Its basically said by people who are travelling to the same destination, usually to play instances or raids.

omw : On My Way
Again a team talk. I am on my way

k : OK
ok is small. k is smaller.

ftw : For the Win !
Its usually to show supremacy. E.g. "ZMA FTW !" (would mean the same as ZMA rules !)]

n00b : new person
Normally a new person is called newbie. This got converted to Newb, to noob to n00b (its got zeroes instead of 'o' similar to the substitution in l33t). E.g. "That n00b on the 200 could not take the curve and crashed!"

Thanks for going through an irrelevant post which I just felt like making ;)

Vibhu FTW you N00B!

Hurry Home

Crossposted.

Plea for help

Do we live in a tolerant society ? Do we really follow what we preach ? Guess not. Indian society has a lot of inhuman faces hidden deep inside. This is what happened recently to a friend of mine :

• A Desperate Call for help

If you can do something, or you know someone who can help, please contact Shantanu on his blog.

Your genes are patented.

YOU, or someone you love, may die because of a gene patent that should never have been granted in the first place. Sound far-fetched? Unfortunately, it’s only too real.

Read the article by Michael Chrichton at the New York Times.

Patents were started as a means to protect the inventor from having his ideas filched. However, the way patents are working now - it looks like we will be in a zone of little innovations.