Sole Soul

Ego makes and breaks !!

2012-01-16T11:25:00.000-08:00

Ego, in its various forms, is driving the world. People are continuing to secretly bind themselves to their ego and other's egos. Even the preachers and the naysayers are unknowingly pulled into this intricate web. Thus, Progress, corruption and all other human actions are nothing but a consequence of the ego.

- My views on the intricate force that drives great men insane.

Will you do Community Service ?

2011-11-13T20:13:00.000-08:00

Live life for yourself - you will be your brain.

Live life for others - you will be your heart.

Is the brainless heart or the heartless brain

That will define you, oh worthy one ?

Dual Pull of the Mind

2011-11-03T02:18:00.001-07:00

Ahoy Sailor !

Do you see the cannon being shot?

To run or to stay, the question in mind,

Answer this way, for you are in grind.

The mind is at war,
The war is ever-ending, yet never-ending.

While it is Yes sometimes,

It is naught other times.

There is no incumbent, there is no permanence.

Life is but temporal, one might say.

The philosopher and the devil fight,

Day in and day out, Victor thy rise.

Philosophers deem their principles right,
Mind rules over matter,
Matter, thou must be present,
To make this sane philosopher right.

What is right and what is wrong ?

The devil or the philosopher,

It all depends on You, my child.

The loving child of humanity.

- Madhavan R Sriram

India with Anna Hazare

2011-08-21T12:56:00.001-07:00

A life to wish, a life to act, a life to succeed or fail,
Man is not based on success but on action,
We have stood by a man who has acted,
A man who has voiced the nation's thought.

Madhavan R Sriram

Location : Freedom Park, Bangalore, KA, IN

Date : 20/08/2011

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Drive to the top

2011-08-15T06:27:00.001-07:00

Federer wins comfortably today; i think today is his lucky day. I again see him winning comfortably tomorrow and for the rest of the year . This makes me gape in awe .

It is fascinating to watch Federer, Sachin or Messi perform. This is because we know that they are the best and they will prove once again that they are the best in the world.This consistency in their victories makes me think as to what is so different with them ? Is it that they have realized their strength early and have directed their efforts properly in that direction or that they have been born with extra talents and powers? Even the personality of these “greats” makes me wonder as to what keeps them going after attaining so much success so early in their life. Is it fame or excellence or mere existence that drives them? So, what makes the difference between these people and the other people who are caught in the rat-race.

Mankind has not been kind to everyone and nor can it be. That is why Communism is a failed theory – Not everyone is the same and cannot be accepted to be the same. It might be our desire to want to be the Alpha-male in any group but desire and prowess are different. As an illustration, think what would happen if 100 hundred males are kept together in the same level. The males differentiate themselves based on their prowess and settle down in roles comfortable to them – the like-minded fight it out and the best one wins the role. This is the universal logic – there can be only one best and no one better.

Bagepalli – A gift indeed

2011-08-08T12:54:00.001-07:00

The Romantic will always look at the bright side of life. Even in destruction, he will view future construction .

Last Thursday, while i was at office, I received an email from Aashaiyen Foundation asking me whether i wanted to participate in the “Gift your village” activity that Saturday. I quickly checked my schedule and saw that i had absolutely nothing planned for the weekend. Only involved in urban community development till then, this event posed as a refresher as it was located at Bagepalli, a village 88km from Bangalore. I figured out that I will be experiencing Karnataka’s raw culture and meeting a new sect of people who had a different outlook of life. So, thinking on these lines, I enrolled myself for the event and had a quick conversation over the phone with the organizer on the logistics and transportation.

The activity was planned for Saturday and I was told to arrive at Sivaji Nagar at 6AM for helping out with the loading of the books that were to be distributed to the students in the village schools. However, I was able to make it only at 6:30AM and most of the loading was already done by the other volunteers. We had a quick round of introductions followed by which some of us went and parked our motorcycles at a nearby trustee’s house. We were all set to leave to Bagepalli by 7AM.

Morning time in Bangalore is always a visual treat ;the sky is a mild blue at that time and the dew drops that lay on the road and grass gives the landscape a contrasting hue. We savored the beauty for a short while, after which we embarked on our trip to Bagepalli via NH7. The national highway has its own share of stunning visuals and we were lucky to get some fantastic shots of Nandi hills and Skandagiri peak. We made quick time and reached the local coordinator’s house at Bagepalli by an hour and half. We got acquainted with him and came to know that he was a retired engineer who had worked abroad prior to retirement and had returned to his village after retirement to utilize his expertise and skills to develop the place. We were offered a breakfast of hot idlis and chutney, after which we drove to Penamale Higher School,which was a half-hour drive from there. As we were getting down from the Tempo-Traveler at the school, we heard cheering from a huge student crowd. I and the other volunteers saw around 250 students cheering and clapping at us – surprising as we were not expecting a welcome at all. After quick introductions with the village headman, we were directed to the makeshift dais, where we were made to sit along with the village headman and other important folk of the village. The faculty of Penamale Higher Secondary School honored us by presenting each one of us a fresh red rose picked from the garden. One of the volunteers had a Nikon SLR D3100 and we started clicking pictures of the students, the function and the rural environment. We heard several speeches made by faculties and by the headman on the importance of education and importance of outside involvement to develop the village’s standard of education. After hearing the speeches, we took over and started distributing the books to the students. We totally made a contribution of 1300 books to the Bagepalli village. After completing the distribution of books, we went for a stroll in the village. The village-folk were very hospitable and invited us to their households. After tasting few delicacies of the Karnataka-type village households and roaming through the village for a solid one-hour, we decided that it was time to leave back to Bangalore. So we bid adieu to the village children, who were following us, and returned back to the local coordinator’s house to drop him. We were about to say our goodbyes when the coordinator’s wife called us and requested us to have lunch with her and her husband. They threw us a mini-feast, in which we had a complete Karnataka-style lunch with sweets and kheer.

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We bid byes to everyone there and started to Bangalore once again. The ride back was fun as we had gotten to know each other better. We played a few travel games and recounted our experiences of volunteering to each other. The trip was unforgettable to me as i not only enjoyed immersing myself in the Karnataka-style hospitality but also contributed to the rustic society. Hope to be back to the village to do further work with them..

Indian Poltics is becoming a ?

2011-02-08T12:25:00.000-08:00

Indian Politics has gone from crazy to dangerous over the past decade. Sentiments of caste have grown rather than fallen across the country, a condition growing with more community based politicians entering the foray. Increase in corruption,thefts and daylight robbery is tarnishing the image of a once-beautiful country. Are these standalone problems that are causing us to worry or is there a bigger picture somewhere lurking in the corner?

I realized that i would not award any of the above problems as the primary source of worry among citizens -- Complacency is the primary source of worry. Complacency, not only on the part of politicians, but also on the part of citizens is the most dangerous concern today. Politicians are growing complacent by neglecting the affairs of the people, and with a few achievements to their resume for that term, they start thinking about ways to wrench money. Any mishap or concern is immediately assuaged by the politician by announcing a public service scheme (only announcing!) or a free gift. The affected people are immediately cajoled by providing compensation amounts. Moreover, we can see that politicians will announce most of the schemes during the election year because people remember events that have recently happened. An illustration of this would be the offering of free television for votes, 3K-10K money distribution,saree and land distribution etc to households during election year in exchange for votes. The irony here is that not only politicians, but also citizens are growing complacent by simply paying taxes correctly and not expecting anything in return. If the government builds a small flyover, we immediately think that a great progress has occurred. Well, if this is the attitude, we can expect a great deal of stagnation in development and corruption in the state affairs. I guess most of you would have been told from childhood to expect less always. Its time to revise that. Expect more. You will be denied 100 times but you will definitely be rewarded the 101th time. After all, perseverance exists where hope is there.

I am sharing an interesting article, by Chetan Bhagat that makes one think about the solve the ongoing political problem in our country.

Note : These are my views alone and bear no ill-will to anyone. It is an earnest citizen's appeal to the people to think in retrospect about the path crossed. There have been too many ups and downs.

Mysore Road Trip

2010-06-23T13:15:00.001-07:00

Six IT Guys, geared up at six in the morning is a rare sight to see. Well, for us we got to experience Bangalore City at 6am for the first time. We kick-started our weekend trip with a dutiful chaaya at the local tea shop and assembled at Mathikere Petrol Bunk. After filling our tanks, we started through Outer Ring Road and cut into Mysore Road. These roads, in the early morning, are completely different from what one sees later on. No Pollution, no traffic and dew-laden landscapes mesmerize you and your eyes lay transfixed in the amazing scenery that the city has to offer. We set up our first checkpoint at Bidadi where we had a breakfast of Bidadi Special Idli-Vada. (The only choice of Food in Bidadi is Idli-Vada)

We made a move soon and we were revving our bikes through the towns of Ramnagara, Channapatna and Maddur. We didn't stop for long in the towns as we had been to some of the places already. The Ramnagara area offered trekking and mountain climbing opportunities to amateurs. Channapatna, also known as the Land of Toys, is famous for the bamboo and wooden toys that are sold there. We can see foreigners from all over the world in this town. Maddur is famous for the Maddur Vada which is a flatter and crisper version of the original Vada (A south Indian delicacy). There is a Buddhist Monastery (Bylakuppe) en-route where we can experience the way of life of the Buddhist monks inhabiting the monastery. We stopped for short breaks every 40-50 km; the road was wide and sceneric making the journey pleasurable.

After an hour or so, we reached Srirangapatna. Srirangapatna is very well-known for its historical monuments. Two must-visit places here are the Daria Daulat (summer palace of Tipu) and Sangam. The Daria Daulat is nice for experiencing the essence of the historical town while Sangam is breath-taking just to watch River Cauvery conjoin with its tributaries. The Sangam offers boat rides in Round Bamboo Shoot boats where on-request the boatman will rotate the boat very fast as to make us dizzy. It’s a good place to visit but for the huge crowd that flocks in this holy spot. The Nishamba temple is located on the Sangam and would be good to visit if you are travelling with your family. We took an off-road from Sangam which led us to a Lord Vishnu Temple atop a hill. The locals called this place Karikatta. This place was amazing as it had a comprehensive view of the surrounding areas and there were huge rocks and boulders on the hillside which we started climbing immediately revitalizing the adventure spirit within us. The surrounding area is very lush and this is a great place to take out your camera and start clicking photos of yourself and your buddies with the hill in the backdrop. After spending an hour here, we started off to Rangantittu Wildlife Park.

Rangantittu Wildlife Park welcomes us with an Arc giving us a Jurassic Park kind-of Feeling. We have to travel further for one and a half kilometers to reach the parking. There is a decent vegetarian restaurant where we had our lunch and proceeded to the wildlife park. It is one of the few bird sanctuaries in the country where man has not spoilt the natural environment. The birds can be viewed in their natural habitat; there is a ferry which takes you to the small islands where we can see different kinds of birds and animals. There are crocodiles in the water, thus requires restraint in our part from dipping our hands into the water. The large crocodiles can be seen lazing on the rocks and swimming innocently past you in the water. After a couple of photo sessions, we got ready to set forth to our next destination - Brindavan Gardens and KRS Dam.

The Krishna Raja Sagar (KRS) Dam is one of the largest dams in Karnataka. On one side of the KRS Dam, we can see the mighty Cauvery River with its serenity and expanse. On the other side, we can see the world-famous Brindavan Gardens. The Gardens are Mughal-Styled and allow the visitors of the park to inhale the essence of the life of the Mughal Lords. The highlight of this park is the Musical Fountain - The Fountain has water rhythmically moving in tandem with the music that is being played. The park is best at night (Before 8pm).

We reached Mysore at around 8:30pm and we checked into the hotel we had booked. After resting for awhile, we strolled a bit, had dinner and returned in time for the Soccer World Cup Match.

The next day, we started from our hotel at 7am and went to Chamundi Hills. Chamundi hills, apart from being one of the most sacred spots in the country, are also one of the most beautiful spots. The countryside and the scenery from atop the hills are unmatched in beauty and splendor. We did face problems in Mobile connectivity in these areas but that was a price everybody was ready to sacrifice. We started back to Mysore a while later and went to the Mysore Zoo and spent a few hours with the animals. We skipped the Mysore Palace as we had plans to enjoy the day in Balmudi Falls - A small dam where people come to play and swim in the water for relaxation. We started from Mysore and reached Balmudi Falls in an hour and swam in the neck-deep waters for three hours. After that, we were exhausted and arrowed to the Kamut hotel in the Mysore-Bangalore Highway. We started back to Bangalore from there. We made short breaks in Maddur and Kingeri while returning for Maddur Vada and Coffee respectively.

There will be a good deal of traffic once you near Bangalore. Try to take care while driving in this highway as driving can be rash. Also, don't forget to get your biking gear as the weather is inconsistent. Enjoy your biking trip and waiting to hear your experiences too…

REFLECTIONS FROM A FALLEN MAN

2010-03-14T12:13:00.001-07:00

“I am dying”,I whispered to myself.

“God loves thee for living this way”, The Preacher had foretold.

“No, Not dying but conjoining with God” I corrected.

“Alas , you are all mistaken”, God whispered alone to me

The veil surrounding me suddenly collapsed as i lay down in my own pool of blood. I tried to get up and adjust to the new surroundings but my body refused to do it. I could see the soldiers hurtling towards me in slow motion when life played a movie for me to watch; the last one it is, i decided to watch it. The fields, the maidens and the kids ran past me and then came the beliefs and decisions in my life. I could see a dark vortex growing in one side of the screen and every image that shot across my mind were thrown into the huge pool of darkness. The soldier knocked me out and God whispered the words to me. Alas, I could tell no one the truth !

I had been an inquisitive man. Questions zoomed past me in these tense moments and i jotted them down mentally..Why did God have to keep making changes to life of men and see them writhe in agony as well as laugh in joy alternately. Why doesn’t a happy man stay happy always and a sad man stay like that forever. Won’t there be a balance then and wouldn’t there be a full-stop to this craziness in the world -Won’t people be content with themselves then and stop meddling in others business ?

I am suddenly having radical thoughts. I was fine before but please do not ask me when. My mind is too tired to reminisce when. All i can try now is to recount some of the incidents so that you too would understand the deprivation i am facing now. I could remember vaguely that i too was happy once, I could remember huge meadows, friendly playmates and long playtimes but that was too far back. Thinking about it itself makes my heart sick and long for the dark solitude place that was growing so that i could be by myself and teleport myself to such realms. I would see a village with maidens filling water in their clay pots and see young kids playing around these maidens throwing small pebbles at each other and making faces at each other. Kids could be seen playing in the stream and the fields, Farmers can be seen chasing away the kids from the orchids who come in search of ripe fruits. However cherished these realms are, I was unable to teleport myself there because I had a duty to perform.

How does this world care for one person? Isn’t always a plural more powerful than an individual. Ahaa,No. God has designed the world for every one of his creation and it is not that every one of his creations are sacrificed for his sake. I am called a terrorist by some, a jihadist by others, a fanatic by some others and also heretics by some, but chosen ones have always learned that no matter who is by your side, God is !! While we see that plural gets more weightage than singular when it comes to negative circumstances like fifty people have died due to a bomb blast, singular gains precedence in positive scenarios like Edmund Hillary- first man to peak Mt.Everest (Even though he was with Norgay, Norgay was sidelined by Edmund because Edmund understood human psychology). Likewise, I have been selected singularly by the Gods to uphold their honor.

The terrorist died not alone, but amidst a battalion of soldiers. He was declared a heretic, a terrorist, a fanatic by the state but God took him into his arms as the terrorist realized the working of the world and regretted that he couldn’t share his newly found wisdom with the world. The World was not decided based on God’s laws, It is based on Man’s superior thinking. While there were no other species as dominant in the world as the human being, it is natural that his enemy remains himself. His wisdom, his craftiness is reflected in the world through butterfly effect or chaos theory. Alas, only if Eve didn’t insist on having the apple.

PAIN OF SUCCESS

2010-03-13T08:09:00.001-08:00

“I had written this entry when i was in third year of college; Found it while browsing through files in my computer,,, Read and Enjoy !!

I found it missing once again when I needed it the most. I was in dire need of courage, which was lacking with me at the moment. I found with me a lack of faith that I definitely needed to surpass the mountain of worry which was piling on front of me. The situation on front of me was tense and everything slowly became less familiar and soon blacked out.I woke up much later as a wiser and experienced man.

I was standing on the podium with several other participants, watching the crowd cheering on us. Everyone was giving their best encouragement possible. The crowd settled quickly and the microphone was given to the host. The host welcomed everyone to the auditorium and bid the participants good luck. I was really flustered at the moment for the situation was intense and the silence was simply electrifying. The participants could be seen expressing their anxiety by either biting their nails or rubbing their hands together. The host slowly and smoothly came down and introduced the jury for the event. The competition was ready to start and the participants were asked to begin. I took the opportunity to make an impression and opened my account with a quote by a famous historian and slowly ate my way into the topic. I abstained from too many details and simply made the base for future discussions.

Mr.Srinivasan, I heard the calling of my name incessantly .I turned back to see a young balding man of late twenties, one of the quieter hosts, calling me. He rushed up to me and told that he was sorry for everything that happened. I simply put on a grimace and left the scene quietly. I reached home late that night after having a few swigs of alcohol, I reclined on the arm chair that I had recently purchased and thought about the proceedings of the day. “What a day?”, I grumbled repeatedly to myself and slowly dozed off.

It was about 6am when my daily alarm started buzzing. I snoozed till 6:30 and then completed my morning chores. The whole scenario came streaming on to me along with tears for I knew this was a performance I could never forget. I could visualize the remarkable start that I provided to the discussion and the repercussions of it. The discussion was going on fine until a red-haired guy had disrupted the discussion. The discussion which was moving smoothly suddenly became inchoate and everyone started to blaspheme each other’s views and the topic soon went out of hand. There were several attempts for amending that but the limit had been reached. I was thoroughly disgusted by the happenings as I was touted to win and even grimaced at the organizer of the “Brain-watch” contest.

Being a management consultant was a difficult task for a person who had a dream of being a top notch orator. I worked throughout the day with my clients and advised them on their projects and the nights were duly spent on this dream. I spent about four hours daily reading on philosophy and other abstract topics to develop my thinking. I spent up all my free time and money on better and effective methods to communicate with the people. I started small with participations at major conferences and conclaves where orators and politicians from different parts of the world talked on various topics. The topic had never concerted me at any point but the speaker had always did. It is said that the orator is a person who perseveres in not communicating facts but in sharing interest. Slowly I started presenting at conclaves and after few stutters I went on to become one of the familiar and yearning figures in major conclaves. I travelled around the globe and added awards from major conferences and conclaves to my name when I finally heard of “Brain-Watch”. Brain-Watch was organized by Harvard University in association with American Writer’s Guild. It was considered to be one of the prestigious events in the literary and management sector. I grew passionate about this competition and applied almost immediately. I started persevering almost immediately for this and soon became nostalgic about the world. I stopped working for awhile and concentrated my efforts for the cause. I cleared the preliminary rounds with ease and moved on to the forthcoming rounds. Slowly, the mass decocted and only us connoisseurs remained. Again, several rounds saw the elimination of interesting, yet palpable personalities. Finally, only few remained and we were considered to be the elite among the literary world.

We were publicized among the literary world and the winner was to be entitled to a small fortune but money hadn’t really appealed to me; it was the title of “Churchill’s Successor”. I worked hard and savored the beauty of the tense position that I would be faced during the final discussion. “That would be the most inspiring oration that I will ever present”, I thought and smiled at my own confidence. I mentally imagined myself being conferred the title that the entire literary world craved at the moment and took an oath to win it at any cost.

The grand finale was to be taking place on the grandest hotel in the city of Boston. We were ushered into a room and were left alone for some time. We were just socializing among ourselves when the host welcomed us to the podium. We sat in the room to face a million people and a thousand national cameras recording our every reaction. That was when the red-haired man sitting on the edge of the room disrupted the discussion and everything went into chaos.

Sorrow and grief seemed to engulf me completely after this incident and soon I was too morose to do anything. I lost all faith and felt like I was destined to be doomed. It was at this instant that strange and foreign ideas engulfed me and I was forced to reminisce about the dark past that I thought would never reappear to haunt me. I remembered the first time I found it missing when I needed it the most. I remembered my graduation day with its grandeurs and horrors. It was on that spiteful day that I was unexpectedly called upon stage to deliver an oration in front of the press and my fellow students where I faltered and broke down. I lost my courage and became depressed. However time, being a slow healer saw me through it. I came back with a thirst to become one of the best orators of all time. The drive to this dream was constantly fueled by the occasional failures and my will to succeed.

I write this story today as the management executive of a major food processing organization to tell everyone that success is how one perceives it. If I had won that day, I would have definitely been successful and become a top notch orator but then would my interests be fueled by some other thirst to win, that I am uncertain of. However, today I am successful on different terms because I thought of a change to management. That change could have been the right decision as life is full of changes or maybe I should have persevered a little more as perseverance is the road to success. That I do not know nor care for it is the decision that has shaped my life.

Photographs (Essence of Time)

2010-02-12T10:35:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer: I am sure that when you look at the photos,you wouldn’t have a single emotion in your mind. That is solely due to the fact that you were not a player in the game. If you notice however that you are a player in the game, then i am sorry to have put up your photo..

Requisites

1.Personal Album

2.Any distant relative would do.. If you feel that you don’t understand yourself properly , that would do.

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“A Photo has a lot in common to cotton string ; one leads to another and by the time you know it, a flurry of emotions and memories flood your mind”

Far from going out of fashion, the camera is not only getting more powerful but also being integrated into every other device that we use.The camera’s popularity is attributed to the perception that it is a memory-clincher, not a photo- clincher. These photos(memories) are all part of a bigger canvas called life that we have sewn together in our lifetime.Basically , we are all tailors in profession; here also we have good as well as bad tailors.

A photo of a bird in flight could be viewed as a natural beauty for a nature lover, freedom for the suppressed, or a Kingfisher for a teenager. What one perceives wouldn’t be perceivable for the other because of the way he has been exposed to.

“Google and The Human Brain work in the same fashion. Any input you provide to your brain is run as a query and the relevant memories start flooding your brain”

Photos do pose some social problems too. I am sure those with large families have faced this problem before. Relatives that you meet once or twice in your lifetime start showing you their family albums and introduce you to each and every character in the album with such fine detail that you would be able to tell their entire horoscope when you are finished. Well, the time spent thus is(I am not a fan of calculations but this is for the left brain junkies out there..)

Number of such relatives *2*100*3

2= Meeting such a relative twice, ie, if you are unlucky.
100= Average no. of photographs per visit
3= 3 minutes is the ideal time that is spent on each photograph. You try to rush it through but they too are the relentless type; the struggle eventually always ends up at 3 minutes..

“I am a big fan of taking photos but am not the die-hard type to have a photo for every memory. Some memories are best played back in the mind”

I am sure that you would be wondering why i have uploaded these photos, that's easy, these are the worst digital photos that could be uploaded online without getting marked off as vulgar by Google Crawler. Each photo captures the essence of the characters at that time and would be lively to do a comparison in a few years

Bye folks and thank you for patiently reading my entry..

Apple Versus The Rest Of the World

2010-01-12T01:48:00.000-08:00

Several weeks before Apple is expected to weigh in with a multimedia device with 10-inch touch display, Hewlett-Packard unveiled the prototype of a slate-type computer during Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's evening address at the Consumer Electronics Show here.

The HP device, also touted as a multimedia device with video player, e-reader and multitouch, should be available this year. No name or price were announced.

It's "a beautiful little product," Ballmer said. He showed a demo of the slate PC running Kindle software for the PC, which made the slate look much like a Kindle but in full color.

Earlier, Lenovo introduced what it claims is the first hybrid PC for consumers with a detachable screen that can function as a multitouch slate tablet or a clamshell laptop.

"We are seeing the next wave of technology -- the convergence of the Internet, Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity, and its impact on everything from smartphones to netbooks to slate computers," says Rory Read, president of Lenovo.

Both had better be good, analysts caution, because Apple's tablet is expected to make a big splash. Apple has declined to comment on its plans.

The new entries should invigorate the middling $950 million U.S. market for tablets, says David Daoud, an analyst at IDC. Sales declined 25% in 2008, and were expected to drop again in 2009. "Apple could do for the tablet market what it did for smartphones with iPhone," Daoud says.

Indeed, Apple could help define a decade-old market interpreted as anything from a large phone to a Kindle or slate device, says Mike Stinson, vice president of marketing at tablet manufacturer Motion Computing.

Ballmer's second address as Microsoft CEO focused on new PCs, software and product momentum, most of it tied to Windows 7. He said PC sales jumped 50% the week of the Windows 7 launch on Oct. 22. Holiday PC sales surged 50%, year-over-year, largely due to Windows 7, according to market research firm NPD.

Ballmer was joined onstage by Robbie Bach, head of Microsoft's entertainment division. Project Natal, Microsoft's controller-free gaming and entertainment system for the Xbox 360, will be ready for the holidays in 2010. It lets gamers play through spoken commands and gestures.

Courtesy:USAtoday.com

Penstroke and Keystroke

2010-01-08T04:58:00.000-08:00

While the power struggle has existed for quite long, it is in the near past that the keystroke has shown overpowering dominance to the pen stroke. While Magazines and Newspapers had once routed power from telegraphs and radios, it is time for another power transfer to take place. Today you can find several newspapers migrating to the digital realm. With Google expanding his access to many newspapers and Microsoft not trailing far behind, even news giants like Rupert Murdoch are facing the tremors.

After the recent digital boom,we can see that each keystroke is landing massive punches in the information sharing space. It is as if everyone has a space to share their thoughts. If Facebook can show a growth of more than 1000% this year and we can see new blogs and sites springing up daily, it leads to one conclusion- that the internet is spawning a new turn of information exchange. This form of communication (through online forums, web blogs etc) was always anticipated to be a major breakthrough but the response is overwhelming with major organizations promoting forums and sites. Online forums are promoted by organizations (eg Java by Sun, eclipse by IBM etc) so that the popularity of these forums increase the popularity of the product discussed in them. This form of advertisement, though very popular and successful, is isolated to a small group of people and the reach isn’t global yet.

Organizations across the globe are now unraveling the power of the Internet to boost their revenues. While organizations like Google and Microsoft have already made it big here, other product based organizations are utilizing the existing frameworks to generate additional revenue for their organizations. I am at present working in a pilot project in our company that uses web 2.0 and social networking sites for generating revenue. Even though we haven’t faced a lot of success, the results are encouraging as we are seeing continuous improvements in the online market space. We also find a nascent deal of activity from other organizations. Although not measurable in the vast internet, we occasionally brush each other during our online activities. It will be remarkable to see how this is taken up across organizations globally. One thing for sure, the Internet is a complex child of several brilliant human brains and it would be a dishonor to them if a simple solution be provided to beef up the commerciality of the internet.

Thank you and wishing all of you a Happy Pongal !!!

100% Natural

2009-12-26T11:52:00.001-08:00

I have been in Karnataka for the past six months but it was just two weeks ago that i got the chance to explore this magnificent state. Having been in several uninteresting trips in other states of India, we had a ZERO expectation from this tour; that was the only disappointment for me in the entire tour.

“ The command that nature has over our heart is surprising, two completely contradicting forces created ; The calmness pervading in nature can be matched only by the turbulence pervading in our hearts ”

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Two days of nature in December’s cold climate is a treat for everyone. My fruit of the basket would be Talacauvery and Madikeri. The beauty of the Coorg mountain was enhanced by the colorful girls who played and danced in the streams and dew-filled green meadows. The Talacavery is exceptionally beautiful in the early mornings as we get to see the revelry of the mist. In a couple of minutes, the mist brings about so many visionary changes to the landscape that it delights photographers and others equally. It covers all god’s creations with a translucent white blanket and even the most clouded of hearts obtains clarity for a couple of moments. As the mist fades from view, it regains form in our hearts allowing us to continue our mindless struggle

I shouldn’t forget the most sarcastically impressive place in the trip – Nagerhole National Park. No regrets on not being able to see many wild animals as we got to see a lot of domesticated wild animals( oxymoron is a must here). We got to see a overly civilized kind of deer (breed i am unfamiliar with + photo added) which would eat chips and bajjis but wouldn’t accept grass or straw. There were other relatively wild deers and shy elephants that we encountered in our safari trip. They claim that there are panthers there and as i heard the standard answer as to when they saw them was 3 days ago.

Overall this trip was excellent and is a must go for everyone who has a weekend and a 1500 rupees to spare. I hope our guide is the permanent guide of this trip as he had a soothing voice and an amazing vocabulary of some language he spoke ( I think he mentioned Welcome and Ladies and Gentlemen somewhere in his loquacious speech)

Trip Details

del.icio.us Tags: Karnataka,trip,Nature tour,Splendor,India,Madhavan,blog

Dreams on fire 24x7

2009-12-10T07:48:00.001-08:00

There is a stark difference in me in the past few months. I cannot discern what the change is but i can feel it within me. I feel that i have to delve deeper into myself so that i can find out the reason.

I stood thinking for a while and then stopped standing and took a seat. After some time , I felt sitting doesn’t stimulate my brain and took out my headsets and put some Hip-hop music(don remember the name) and lying down started to think about this topic at hand. I thought about it for a maximum of two seconds and switched my brain on to several other topics that usually fill up any youth. Thinking on such lines, I started delving deeper into the realms that i didn’t want to permeate but was forced to as i fell deeper into it.

Jerking off, I again steadied myself and called on to say that i had a task at hand and shouldn’t stop at any chance. I started thinking about the topic of the change and the dreams started off once again. There she was standing , in a pleasant day with sunshine pouring over her. Yes, Indeed, she was a splendid sight. Dressed in Orange and Black, there she stood ready to go. I felt that i was the luckiest man on the world for getting her. I mean how many people dream about her every day and night but here i was holding my palms over her.

It was exactly three months since i met her and decided at that moment she was mine to take home. However, she was adamant on staying there for a few more days before coming with me. I just love my new bike Apache RTR FI 160.

I bought the bike three months ago . I decided on my first try itself that she was perfect for me and was what i wanted. I had to consider the fact that i had to shell out 70K for this beauty, but who would go for the beast when you had such a beauty. I bought it 2 days later and after another couple of days, she was officially mine(registered in my name). I have already crossed the 1800km mark and she was been relentless in her delivery till date( lets keep our fingers crossed).

I have this peculiar habit that whenever i have a experience, i like to share it with the sea. As it is generally possible due to proximity of the sea from my house, I took her for a spin and showed her off to the envious public. I took her down the ECR and completely forgot about the rest of the world . At that moment, it was only me and her. I was in cloud 9. This feeling of ecstasy was short-lived as i had to come back by an hour.

On a fine tuesday morning , I lay fidgeting in my bed thinking of what kind of atrocities they were committing against her. Powerful she was, yet beastly they were. I decided that the tension was too much to bear and called up the beasts on what was her status and they said she was finally there. Happy with the news, I took a bus to KPN Travels and awaited her arrival. On the back of the truck, I saw her tied and gagged up. Worrying about the safety of her vital parts, I checked her over. Happy with the results, I paid the guys for transportation from Chennai to Bangalore.

Her first service is over now and it would be due in a month for her second service. We have had a rollicking time till date. She is a wonderful social animal, I must accept. She creates the most wierdes

t situations for the owner. If some stranger approaches her, she knows that her owner will look after her and would sit smilingly and there would be one fuming owner censuring some poor chap who just came to have his hair duo checked. However, she completely believes her owner’s judgment and loves the people he does.

The Big FIght IBM Google Cisco Microsoft

2009-12-08T04:35:00.000-08:00

I had recently gone through some market studies that attest the dynamic nature of the markets. The World's premier organizations are groveling all over the floor in an attempt to dominate one another. One slip and we can say good bye to that company. Being in one of the companies, I can see the intense level of competition and the volatility of trust that exists between them

A wonder in all this is that it is still unbelievable that they co-exist in this turmoil. Apart from this regular feature, there are the recessions to also look out for. All companies invest into risk so that they obtain maximum dividends from it. There is a saying in Finance which goes " The more risk you are ready to take, the more money that you can earn" and we can see the the major organizations ready to invest greater percentages in risk . But before we take the literal meaning of risk, we got to understand that there is no risk that companies jump into the well without knowing its depth. The only concern that is present is whether they should or should not take these calculated risks. The benefits are innumerable but they do have their shortcomings. One major risk that had spurned this recent recession was the suprime crisis. Lets discuss that later on another post but coming back to our mainstay topic.

A typical example of such rivalry is between IBM,Google and Microsoft. Now, we have found that Cisco also wants to join this elite group with its new product WebEx Mail.It iss a hosted e-mail application that lets customers move from Microsoft Exchange but continue to access e-mail through an Outlook client if they desire. Enterprise Collaboration Platform is a hodgepodge of tools with which companies are already familiar, including team spaces and communities, profiles, a corporate directory, and social networking tools. Cisco also unveiled a Show and Share video app and a tagging solution called Pulse. This is coincidental to google's recent unvealing of Google Apps Sync which allows people to shift to Google Apps using either their own interface or that of Microsoft Outlook.

Cisco is pitting Enterprise Collaboration Platform as an alternative to IBM Lotus Connections and wiki platforms from MindTouch, Socialtext, Jive Software, Awareness and others that have similar tools. Show and Share has promise, given Cisco's enterprise video chops.Yet Google has Google Video for businesses, and MindTouch offers an extension to Kaltura to offer video for enterprises. Pulse is nice, but IBM Lotus Connections has offered its Dogear bookmarking tool for a few years now. According to Cisco, collaboration world has been focusing on documents and PCs within the confines of the company firewall. He argued that Cisco is bringing video collaboration not just to PCs, but to phones and mobile devices using telepresence between corporate firewalls.

So, while previously Cisco focused on letting employees within big businesses work together efficiently, Cisco is applying its network security provisions to its collaboration software to let colleagues, partners, suppliers and customers work together across their firewalls.This "intercompany collaboration" is the theme for Cisco's Collaboration tool. Pulse, he said, is a search app that analyzes network data in motion, looking at who is talking to whom to "learn the social graph" associated with corporate networks. Pulse, for example, indexes Web surfing behavior and YouTube videos and tags them based on social relevance. They can tag information and assign it social relevance based on the info flowing through the network, don't have to be in the application either on the server or on the client.

Fair enough. So how is Show and Share different? Cisco said the app was built with enterprise scale from the start.Unlike Google video for enterprise and others of its ilk, Show and Share is on-premises, not hosted. It also boasts several security permission levels, from department to workgroup to companywide.There is also one-click recording from telepresence solutions like Cisco WebEx Connect, Cisco's Flip consumer digital camera or smartphones. Users can create chapters or upload a transcript, making clips more production-ready.This makes editing much easier and is a departure from apps such as Adobe Premier. Finally, Show and Share can work with enterprise content distribution networks from Akamai.This means large businesses can push the video clip into a branch, so that when people press play, they can watch the video without impacting the wide area network because the clip is local.

Pulse and Show and Share sound like unique products, but they also seem as if they were meant to work together: social tagging with enterprise video. Pulse and Show and Share, while not currently interoperable in their first release, will be integrated to work together.

Consumers will eagerly wait as their choices are multiplying with newer technologies pouncing upon each other to gain the upper hand in the market. This is a good time for a company to invest in one of the products as all of them are eager to sell fast to prove their unquestionable dominance..

Wall E - No more a dream

2009-12-08T02:47:00.000-08:00

I read through an interesting blog today that shows how reality is shifting towards the fantasy that we have only fathomed through films and books. Well, This year's mega blockbuster animation film is definitely not only a fiction.

Check these links for more information:

Wall- E
Robo Fish

Drive Bangalore Weekend What Masti?

2009-12-05T04:01:00.000-08:00

Today was a no fun day as i was to be in office for support. I went to office as early as 10:30 and found the entire floor to be empty. Being a bit sad about the prospect of being alone in the entire floor, I switched on my music player and started listening to songs while the computer was booting. However, It still hasn't stopped playing. I saw my mails and found that there wasn't much for me to do today except being physically present till 7pm. I started whiling my time by going through social networking sites in succession and chatted with a few friends. However, time decided to slow down and i had no company after about 1pm. I kept saying "Madhavan, you can do it !! you can sit through like a vegetable through the day" and motivated myself for the inevitable. Five minutes had passed since then and i started playing with the sensor lights that illuminate our floor. IBM had devised sensors near the lights so that if there was no activity near them, they would switch off. These switches were effective and would switch off only when there was no activity in the cabin, thats the success scenario. However, when there was a less number of people in the office, the switches would automatically switch off since there wasn't enough activity; How much activity can a software guy do.. besides typing on the computer. All this took me to 2pm and that was when i decided that i wanted to go out.

I took my bike at 2 and started towards an unknown destination. I started off towards Murigeshpalya because it had less traffic in afternoons. The weather was good with the sunlight filtering through the clouds and descending on us mildly. Of course, i am used to Chennai and Madurai heat but I never enjoyed them really. I wasn't guided by anything other than instinct and took it straight to HAL. The road was simply awesome with trees enveloping either sides of the road. There wasn't much traffic and i was able to cruise without too many brakings till Marathalli. I didn't want to venture into Marathalli as i knew about the bad road there and traffic . I defintely wanted to move to outer ring road but was reluctant to do so because i had to be back at office. I returned through the same road ( A distance of some 35km was travelled on that road today) and wanted to check out a few more areas. My office, being in Domlur, I was familiar with the adjacent areas except proper Domlur layout. So, for the first time with a definite plan, I guided us to Domlur layout. It was a fine place to live in as there was all a bachelor would want adjacent to your home. Guessing the general direction of my office, I went that way and got into slums and all kind of roads thinking i was on the verge of discovering the shortcut. I definitely did find the shortcut , but not to Domlur but to MG Road. I saww the road just travelled and saw my speedometer. I was approximately 20km away from my office now and was deciding on what to say if my team lead had called. I came back to office in half an hour and came up to my seat. Seeing that no one had even tried to call me, I pondered whether it was time for lunch. Lunch and blogging, that brings me to this time.

I have to leave in 10 minutes after handoff to my US manager .After that, its Pizza Hut with the guys followed by events that i cannot predict.

Soul Stirrers Memory Unleashed

2009-12-02T04:28:00.000-08:00

Music is a very powerful form of expression that has been around for several thousands of years but only for a few decades for me. I used to hear only Bhangras, Dabbankuttus and Hard Metal but recently about 5 years back, I heard a soft melodious song that transferred my liking completely. I heard the song on radio but couldn't catch the name of it.Iwould hum the tune from time to time just so that i wouldn't forget it. It took me a full year for me to find out the song;It was Addicted from Enrique Iglesius..

After that, my taste changed slowly and i incorporated more of soft music into my ipod. I began by becoming a follower of MLTR and Metallica. This change surprised me rather than simply accepting the fact that people change. I had seen people and their tastes change but I felt that this change was too drastic. I started pondering over this completely random thought and I remembered several people's opinions that buzzed through my mind that he had changed and is no longer the person he was or she was like this and like that before blah blah..... From this, I figured that people had a problem coping with change. Is it true that after a change everyone starts to alienate others who had liked the previous you. However, if you are able to delve deeper into the human psychology, you will be able to realize that it is completely natural for one to change.

"Behaviour Change is Permanant and transient at the same time".. Definitely for the simple fact that in order for a person to evolve or in simpler words to grow, he is expected to change. Now how can one say that change is transient; People tend to retain some of their dominant characteristics that make his character;these fundamental characteristics never change and still lie active generally,dormant in certain cases.I related my taste for the fairer kind of music( I call melodies as fairer kind since they are the more sensitive and touching) to be like one of the more transient forms of changes, the changes that change at regular intervals. I developed my taste over scores of compositions from Coldplay,Enrique,ARR,Yuvan, Roxette and Sting etc .

Now too, I listen to new kinds of music, whether it be Hip-hop or Alternate; but the trend is yet to shift. I still like to lie down on my cot , putting on some headphones and listen through the night to those lazy beats.

PS: Thats why my mobile and ipod are always short of charge... I tend to exhaust them often.

Google Knowledge Life Power

2009-11-30T04:19:00.000-08:00

It has been only a couple of days, that too a weekend, since i came to office. Yet,It seems like an eternity. I was googling through some articles today and i came across an executive summary of Louis Gerstner's Who says Elephants cant dance? . I had recently heard about the book and wanting to know more about my company,i started off with this summary.

Reading through the pages, I was shocked to see how so less number of pages could hold such great a wisdom. I came to a conclusion from the script that people had been exaggerating a lot. I definitely do not mean Louis here but the people who claim Louis to be a god. Indeed he is one for resurrecting IBM but reading thorough his accounts , you come to a conclusion that he is more human than some of his compatriots and has also been bold enough to open up his fears, focuses and experience with everyone. That was not all that was revealed in this book, there was a deep secret that had been underlying beneath the printed alphabets . This secret known to few, was practiced unknowingly for centuries.

The secret though practiced was not written down to my knowledge... So,remember that you heard it here first.

History has a way of recording events , call it luck, call it chance or call it destiny; It has not always been the most powerful who has been the most successful, it is the lucky ones who have claimed destiny's cup of life... Why do you think monarchs of old used to record their events in stones and rocks. They wanted their records to be passed safely down the generations. It has always been known that knowledge is power .It could very well be that we are revering the world's biggest loser as the mightiest god of all. Chance and destiny allowed this person's events alone to pass the trial of time and reach his successors. We also know that history has a habit of re-inventing itself.The Hero whom you revere today can be dethroned tomorrow. It happens often too.History also metaphorically keeps correcting itself , but for all you know,it could keep getting it wrong.

I know you are all wondering how Louis Gerstner came into this picture. There is only one law and that is "He who makes others know that he knows is He". You could have the biggest gun in the world but unless you blurt it out, no one would know that.. Louis Gerstner was not the reason for the kings to record the events nor was it the reason for them to become a revered god, It was the ever consuming power of communication and chance that had brought them to this position. What i am trying to say is that, a simple human being can become a god if he has destiny written in him.Louis Gerstner may have made it big at IBM but thousands of years down the line, IBM could very well be misinterpreted to be a country or a culture (It is a culture) and although great people have slogged much harder than this fellow, he could very well be the revered one..

Another truly interesting class of people are the politicians. They are the people who effectively utilize the various forms of communications available. Whether it is the jan yatra or blogging, they do it for the people..Could this be the elusive quote Democracy,for the people.... Have you ever wondered why politicians never officially write down their political goals for a term.. By doing so, they commit themselves for it. Aren't we forced to read self-improvement books like Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective people. Shouldn't some of the training be provided to them prior to assuming such powerful influential roles. After all, the image of the country is in the hand of these few people . For this sake alone, I simply love the Jaago re ads . They might be using this sentiment selfishly to promote their product and i totally acknowledge it. Instead of using beautiful women to promote their product, using things which could educate the people is an avenue which is worth it. The Jaago re ads have created a stimulation (using this word coz it actually creates a stimulus whenever you see the ad) that has poked the guilty nerve of every Indian. The Politician ad is exceptionally good because of the powerful message it transmits. After all, nowadays politicians only come up onstage and talk about the positive things that have occurred during their term( adding the effects that would occur naturally.. like in 9 we have successfully reduced birth rate by 0.001% , he himself not contributing to it at all), demeaning the opposition and about what they would do the next term. Why not write it down somewhere official and have people feedback it during the course of their term. An official study can show the effectiveness of the politicians. There are so many management principles that HAD revolutionized the world, but somehow India remains non-aligned in that too . Their life happily spent on public money because their father was a national leader and as if they are worth it, they come up with a book of their life reiterating the facts that have made him a bodyless head.
Louis Gerstner, I salute you for spinning inside me such opinions that i thought i had never had before..Chow !!!

Madhavan R Sriram

2009-11-12T02:45:00.000-08:00

I have developed a new fascination over my middle name.. I dont know why but ever since it appeared on my profile page at office, i got a fascination of using it as it is.. Well, now that i have cleared it to all that this is the same old Madhavan you know and this is a public blog, you can enter with all the calculated risk.. Well for the others, there isn much for me to say.. coz you are gonna understand how difficult and crappy my writing is..btw i have an aspiration of becoming a writer.. so if you like it please comment below so that i can mail you back saying you have excellent taste and will go a great way in life..I will be using these short forms as much as i can coz i hate the backspace key and a hundred other keys in the keyboard..but definitely the backspace is the worst... I mean,, who would like to take their smallest finger and cover the largest distance diagnolly across the keyboard so that you can not add but delete what you wanted to say !! God save the people... :)

Well thats my first blog entry in this new blog of mine and i just wanted to thank you for skipping this blog on the way to the next..
TC for now..

Sony Ericsson W580I

2008-06-23T09:03:00.000-07:00

SE has launched a wonderful and trendy mobile for a price of around Rs 10000. The Sony Ericsson W580i has swept the mobile phone market and is the main contender for the MotoRokr E6. The W580i has certain added advantages over the E6 but is out performed in certain functionalities. The E6 was reviewed in my previous posting . The W580i has a wonderful 2MP camera which is quite better than E6, even though it also doesnt have any auto focus.The W580i is also a moddable cellphone. Its already captivating looks can be modified to make it look heavenly and out of the world.
Modding can be done by the use of Phone XS++ or Far Manager wits its SE Flash Plugin. I have personally used the XS++ software and is very easy to use. Beginners are requested to start with the FSK module and then move on to the flashing as the latter one has the capability to brick your cellphone.I will be also writing a post on modding of SE and motorokr cellphones later on.
The W580i has good soung quality and is a true Walkman series phone. The looks score 100%. The phone is a bit on the frailer side, even though it is even stronger than its predecessor, the W580. The phone is really excellent and is worth every penny.

Note: Please Read the Instructions before modding any mobile phone as bricking may occur. I am in no way responsible for any problem in your mobile phone. For more details, visit SE-NSE Forums.

The MotoRokr E6

2008-06-18T08:40:00.000-07:00

Motorola released the E6 in its prime Motorokr series. The E6 has outdone its sales expectation and is bidded to be the best phone in its range. Priced at about Rs 10000, the Motorokr E6 is a wonderful buy. The important features are the availability of a large screen with a nice sensitive touch screen. This phone is a pure business phone which has a superb PDF and DOC reading capability that can prove extremely useful for working professionals and students.Apart from this, a premium edition of the E6 involves a stereo bluetooth headset or a snoop device which is both trendy to look at as well as effective for listening to music.
The Motorokr E6 is to be suceeded by the E8 which has wonderful touch sensitive pads and haptics enableed screen,ie,a response is given back ,like a vibration or so, to the user that a key has been pressed. The best thing about the motorokr E6 is the fact that it can be easily modded.The modded phone can then incorporate several new applications and themes that can transform the cellphone to the user's taste.
Now for some more information about the Rokr E6, it is based on Monte vista Linux. The modding can be done through several methods, which are explained effectively and clearly in www.modmymoto.com or www.motorolafans.com..
It has a 2 MP camera which offers high class photos and videos.Its a pity there isnt any auto focus available. The speaker sound and the phone speed can be increased by certain mod packages available. The MotoRokr E6 is a wonderful phone and let us just hope that Motorola comes back to its feet to produce many more phones of such calibre..

Tata Nano->Behind the scenes

2008-01-20T03:15:00.000-08:00

Behind every successful Entrepreneur is the "Will to Suceed"

CLASSIC CARS DOWN THE YEARS Top to bottom: Ford Model T — 1908 Volkswagen Beetle — 1938 Morris Mini Classic — 1958 Swatch-Mercedes Smart — 1998 Tata Nano — 2008

In early 2003, five engineers from Tata Motors trooped into the main conference room at Bombay House, the Victorian sandstone building that houses the headquarters of the Tata Group. They had been summoned at a day’s notice from the Tata Motors factory in Pune by company Chairman Ratan N. Tata, who had just made a promise the world said would be ‘impossible’ to keep.

Tata had told a Financial Times correspondent on the sidelines of the Geneva Auto Show that he was thinking of making a car that would cost about € 2,000. Adjusted against the then exchange rate of the rupee, that translated to Rs 1 lakh. Tata says he had never really defined the project in his head exclusively by its pricing. “It was the media that said it,” says Tata. “But we decided to accept the challenge….” With that resolution, Tata imprisoned himself and his engineers in a promise to fulfil which they would have to all but rewrite the principles of automotive engineering.

When the engineers walked into the conference room that morning, they knew that the meeting had something to do with Tata’s statement about a small car that they vaguely remembered reading about in newspapers a few days ago. Little did they realise then that the next four years of their lives would be dotted with moments of agonising failure and heady success, between which they would eat, drink and catch up with their families. The worst: the engineers would not be able to share with anyone, even their wives, what was going on inside their second home, the drab block of concrete called Engineering Research Centre (ERC) at Tata Motors’ campus on the outskirts of Pune.

Jai Bolar, senior manager for development at Tata Motors’ ERC, recalls that the team entered the conference room armed with just a 60-slide presentation on all the low-cost modes of personal transport. The vehicles included motorbikes, autorickshaws, scooters and the company’s own Indica. “We had no clue as to what we were supposed to do,’’ says Bolar. “So finally, we asked him whether he could tell us what he had in mind.”

The next few minutes will, forever, be imprinted on the team’s mind. Tata, or RNT as he is affectionately called, held forth, exhorting the team to dream of building a low-cost car that would cost only marginally more than a two-wheeler and revolutionise personal transport in India. Show the world what Indian engineering is truly capable of, RNT told the engineers. “Make me also part of the team. Only in a country like India or Pakistan can a low-cost car be made,’’ he insisted. The motivational talk worked. “We came back from the meeting all charged up,’’ says Nagabhushan R. Gubbi, head of engineering for passenger cars. Gubbi did not know, nor did the others, that they had just been impelled by arguably India’s most visionary businessman to create history.

INSPIRED LEADERS: RNT with (right) Tata Motors Managing Director Ravi Kant
(Tribhuwan Sharma)

Spluttering Start

The team made little progress over the next year and a half. It tried to source parts from around the world, even toyed with the idea of an open car with plastic or canvas sheets for protection (see sketch below). The problem was it was still thinking of making the motorcyclist safer. Two-wheelers continued to overtake the image of a car in their minds.
“The biggest challenge when the project started was there was no brief, no benchmarks, and it had never been done before,’’ says Bolar. Even RNT had only the disturbing image of a family of four riding a scooter on wet roads and an unclear dream to help such families as benchmarks.

In August 2005, Girish Wagh, an easy-going, but intense 35-year-old with a reputation for building teams and trucks, entered the scene. Wagh, a mechanical engineer by training, had just helped build the runaway hit Ace. He arrived at a time when the first ‘mule’ was ready. A mule in auto parlance is a vehicle that comprises the engine and transmission, driving a mock-up addled with electronic sensors. It moves like a vehicle just for testing purposes. The first mule had a marine engine that delivered 20 brake horse power (bhp).

“We wanted to see whether such an engine would work,’’ says engine man Narendra Kumar Jain. It did not.

Cranking Up
At Tata Motors, Jain is regarded as a pioneer. He is credited with the first gasoline engine that Tatas made. For two years, Jain scoured the world looking for an engine that could fit a small car. He even tried motorcycle engines, but finally decided that RNT’s common man would need an engine not yet invented. Jain then went to work with a clean sheet of paper.

THE IDEA STAGE: (Left) An early vehicle layout for the occupants, and (right) the sideview rendering of Nano during its design phase

He started off designing a small engine that would deliver 20 bhp, but realised midway that it would not be enough. So he increased the engine’s capacity to 554 cc, which delivered 27 bhp. The engine still did not have enough zing and its driveability was not satisfactory. So, Jain redesigned the engine and increased its capacity to 586 cc. That appeared to be peppy enough and satisfy all parameters. The team, swelling in number as new tasks were incorporated and specialists taken on, was working to meet three parameters — acceptable cost, acceptable performance and regulatory compliance, not only current but also future.

While Tata engineers worked on the engineering of the car, Italian design house I.D.E.A., which also designed the Indica, was chartered with styling. Guided by RNT, the styling kept changing. Though in an interview with BW, RNT underplayed his own role in the design, Wagh says he was intimately involved in the styling and made some alterations even a few days before the launch. “Mr Tata was present at every testing and he made all the decisions,” Wagh says. “He was very focused on what the customer would like’’.

In December 2005, the second mule was tested, and by mid-2006, the first prototype or alpha was ready. After testing the prototype, which ran on the 586-cc engine, the team found the vehicle wanting. “We felt it needed to be longer,” Wagh says. “RNT wanted changes in styling, which meant changes in body design, which increased safety performance.” It was decided to increase the length by 100 mm. It meant redoing everything that was done until then. The team was back at the drawing board.

Beat But Not Beaten
That the project did not have any specifications, and was never tried before, worked both in its favour as well as against. With only three parameters to guide them, the engineers kept coming up against failures. Jain says the biggest support from the management was not to hold a failure against anyone. “The hardest part was continuing to believe we could do it,’’ RNT said. “I never felt the project won’t go through. I was scared I won’t meet targets — price targets, time targets, the auto expo…’’

Bolar says that since there was no precedent to the project, everybody had a number of concepts. “The management remained open, but the most challenging task was to define the specs,” he says. The Maruti 800 was the only benchmark to go by. And it cost more than Rs 2 lakh on the road.

As the team struggled with constant change, which often put them at their wits’ end, RNT and Tata Motors Managing Director Ravi Kant played a key role in preventing creative fatigue. “We were like a football team,” says Gubbi. “The leadership was where the ball was. Everyone was playing for everyone.”

Nano’s
Vital Statistics

Engine

624 cc, 34 bhp, rear-mounted

Design

Four-door monocoque

Fuel efficiency

20 kpl

Top speed

105 kmph

Gearbox

Four-speed manual

Length

8 per cent smaller than Maruti 800

Inner space

21 per cent larger than
Maruti 800

Safety

Survived frontal crash
at 48 kmph

Emission

Bharat III and Euro IV
compliant

Ravi Kant put in long hours of work and was always available to take decisions, monitor progress and keep the team motivated. “We exposed our people to

products of competitors by tearing those products apart and analysing the good and bad and comparing them with our own, thereby making people see why customers buy someone else’s products rather than ours,’’ Ravi Kant told The McKinsey Quarterly in a recent interview.

Abhay M. Deshpande, general manager for vehicle integration, says though there were time and cost pressures, the collective leadership kept the engineers completely insulated from them.

Sometimes the work was repetitive and tedious. In designing the engine, Jain did 150 thermodynamic simulations, each of them stretching eight to ten hours. Body systems expert R.G. Rajhans, who had built the body of the Indica and also the new Indica, had by then built about 10 different floors for the car.

Finally, in October 2006, Jain hit upon an optimal engine design. His creation had a capacity of 624 cc and squeezed out 34 bhp of power. “It was the first time that a high-pressure die-cast engine was made in India,’’ says Jain. In comparison, the first Maruti 800, which was powered by a 796-cc engine, delivered only 37 bhp.

Jain’s computer prototype was cast into a real engine in January 2007, when it was first fired. With a multi-point fuel injection system developed by Bosch calibrating the gasoline flow, the heart of the car was ready. Jain filed 10 patents for the engine. By the time the car was finished, the company had filed 34 patents in all; and some more are in the pipeline.

YOUTH POWER: The average age of the 500-member team that delivered the Nano is a mere 30 (Subhabrata Das)

Miles To Go...
E. Balasubramoniam, head of sourcing for the project, was not a popular man with vendors. “We had several heated arguments,’’ says Balasubramoniam, a former Maruti hand with a wry smile and a negotiator’s demeanour that doesn’t give away anything. His job involved constantly hand-holding vendors as well as haggling with them on cost reduction and engineering changes. “We really gave them a hard time. But to their credit, they stuck on and delivered.’’

To achieve its ambitious cost reductions, Tata Motors had to get vendors to pare margins and persuade them to produce components at lower costs. The vendors had to invest in new processes and methods to reengineer their products to specifications that were rigidly guided by cost, performance and regulatory compliance. Many of them would not make profits for years. For example, P.K. Kataky, director of battery maker Exide, was reported as saying that the company’s margins would be thin and it would start making money only after two or three years.

Balasubramoniam says getting suppliers, who were mostly clustered in auto centres such as Pune, Chennai and Delhi, to invest in Singur, West Bengal, which Tata Motors had chosen for its small car plant, was difficult. “But now about 15-20 vendors would finish their plants along with ours (Tata Motors’),’’ he says.

Singur itself was a dark chapter in the project’s progress. People from several quarters decried how West Bengal gave Tata Motors subsidised land. In the wake of the violence in Nandigram, West Bengal’s main opposition party, the Trinamool Congress, also criticised the ruling Communist Party for acquiring land from peasants on behalf of a private company. RNT himself was uncharacteristically aggressive in saying that vested interests looking to scuttle or at least delay the project were behind the problems at Singur and vowed to show them up “at the right time’’.

For a while, the tension over Singur made life so difficult for the project that at the Nano’s launch RNT joked that the car could have been called “Despite Mamata”, after the Trinamool Congress’s leader, Mamata Banerjee.

While political gamesmanship fuelled the fires in Singur, the engineers at Pune were battling to bring costs to nano levels. Young blood can bring innovative ideas, but there are some things that only experience can teach. That came from experts such as the ebullient Nagabhushan, who had decades of experience building commercial vehicles, and K.K. Mirasdar, the deputy general manager of prototypes and manufacturing, a veteran with a raspy voice. The group held workshops where experts from the commercial vehicles arm found ways to lay alternative fuel lines, make better use of plastics and build better lamps.

Since the project was inspired by two-wheelers, people who had worked in the two-wheeler industry were roped in, especially in sourcing. Rakesh Mital, who came from Yamaha, came up with the idea of using instrument panels similar to those in motorcycles. The panel in Nano’s dashboard was inspired by the minimalism of the clusters on the heads of motorcycles. Ideas for suspension, cables and lamps were inspired by scooters and motorcycles. The tall-design car has McPherson struts stabilising the front and uses a suspension similar to that of motorcycles at the back to balance for a higher centre of gravity and a rear-mounted engine.

An Idea Is An Idea
Often ideas came from unexpected sources. The team was struggling to reduce the cost of seats while complying with safety norms when RNT, a passionate pilot, who often shuttles between Mumbai and Pune by a chopper, had a brainwave. He thought the reclining and sliding mechanism of helicopter seats could hold a solution for the Nano. The engineers at Tata Johnson studied the mechanism and designed one for the car. The window winding mechanism of the car was also inspired by helicopter windows and done by IFB and Shivani.

The manufacturing team also introduced pokayoke, a Japanese term for mistake-proofing. Mirasdar, who made the prototypes, almost always had a suggestion that would end up reducing costs and simplifying processes.

Sometimes the cost reduction was so drastic that it surprised the engineers themselves. “We found that the door handle of the car had 70 per cent less parts than one of the cheapest European cars,’’ says Mital.

After the engine design was frozen, things began to fall in place. The dimensions had been fixed and the layout of the transmission finalised. Sona Koyo and Rane Group came up with hollow steering shafts, saving cost and cutting weight. Sharda Motors and Emcon designed the exhaust system and MRF tweaked the tyres to bear extra weight on rear wheels.

“At every stage, we tried to cut costs by reducing the number of parts that went into each component,’’ says Wagh. As the team succeeded at this, they began to see the “impossible” dream morph into reality. But outside the factory, scepticism and discontent were growing.

If the Nano was one of the most anticipated events in automotive history, its launch has set the industry aflutter. “It’s a problem for Detroit,’’ wrote The Washington Post, “which is racing to enter India’s booming small-car market but will now have to completely revolutionise its production and distribution to compete.’’ Perhaps the most important comment came from Ford’s Executive Vice-President John Parker. “It is a groundbreaking product,’’ he said. “The Nano will cause people to think differently about the car. I have a lot of respect for Tata.’’ It seemed like poetic justice that the praise came from the company that had revolutionised personal transportation with the launch of the original ‘people’s car’, the Model ‘T’, exactly a hundred years ago. Curiously, every ‘people’s car’ has been launched in the eighth year of the decade (as noted on page 36).

However, Tata Motors still needs to align the commercial imperatives behind the car, analysts say. The company has invested Rs 1,700 crore in creating the Nano, which will yield wafer-thin margins. Analysts are concerned the company will have a hard time achieving the volumes before the Nano returns a profit. In fact, Tata Motors’ stock has been downgraded by rating agencies on this count as well as concerns over RNT’s bid to acquire the Jaguar and Land Rover for $2 billion. Analysts also seem unsure if a company can straddle a spectrum of products that ranges from a $1-lakh car to a Rs 1-lakh car. “That car doesn’t have airconditioning, power steering, air bags and other features. Do you dare to buy that kind of car?’’ Wang Chuanfu, chairman of Chinese carmaker BYD, was quoted as saying at the Detroit Auto Show.

But RNT emphasises that the Nano is not just a Rs 1-lakh car, but a platform that will be used to create further high-end models that will sell for more and yield comfortable margins. Tata Motors will also foray into electric and hybrid cars, using the Nano and its future variants as a base, RNT says. He adds that he has also received invitations from at least two countries to set up Nano manufacturing plants there, which will also help recover the car’s R&D costs. More impressive are the intangible benefits RNT’s dream car has achieved for Tata Motors. For one, he has put the fear of Indian engineering into carmakers across the world. In a single stroke he has also made the Tata brand known in every corner of the world, something no other auto company has ever done. In fact, the publicity the Nano has garnered globally would be worth more than Rs 500 crore.

SECRET UNVEILED: Three Nanos were shipped to Delhi in utmost secrecy in containers and remained under cover until the night before the launch at the Auto Expo (Tribhuwan Sharma)

The Last Mile
The launch was perfect, but the Nano has to go some more distance before it reaches the customers. The last stage of cost reduction is expected to happen in distribution. Tata Motors is developing an assembly kit for distributors who would stock completely knocked-down kits of the car at warehouses and assemble them on site. Carting CKDs to different parts of the country is expected to bring down costs as more parts can be transported in the same space that a fully built car can be moved.

To enable cheaper assembly at the distributor’s end, some parts of the car would be glued together instead of welded. “Usually those who make a small number of cars do such distributed manufacturing,” says Wagh. “Sometimes others do it to test the market. For the first time, it would be tried on a large scale.’’ Also, the car is still at the beta stage. Wagh says there would be more tweaking done by the time the first car rolls out of Singur later this year.
Already newly converted cynics are describing the car as revolutionary. The only person not fully satisfied is RNT himself. “It is not as revolutionary as I wanted,'' he said. “I wanted the car to be made from new materials, use new techniques, in a sense completely re-envisage the way cars are made. In that sense I am still not satisfied,'' he told BW.

For the moment, however, the cute-as-a-bug Nano is the cynosure of all eyes. And Ratan Tata has undoubtedly entered the hall of fame of automobile manufacturing.

GIRISH WAGH Head, small car project, Tata Motors
“At every stage, we tried to cut costs by reducing the number of parts that went into each component’’
(Subhabrata Das)

Revving Up
As the car got closer to completion, the media, including BW (see ‘Tata’s Small Car, 1 Lakh Unanswered Questions’, BW, 6 August 2007), started speculating. Many reports were cynical; some were guarded, as if leaving room just in case they were proved wrong. Environmentalists such as R.K. Pachauri of The Energy Research Institute and Sunita Narain of Centre for Science and Environment began raising concerns about how a million small cars would impact urban congestion and air quality. But Tata was privy to information that his car had survived a frontal crash test and met Euro IV emission norms several months ago.

Japanese auto giant Suzuki, which makes the ubiquitous Maruti 800, also spoke out with derision. “What is it going to be? A three-wheeler with a stepney?’’ Suzuki’s Founder Chairman Osamu Suzuki had quipped when Tata announced the project. In February 2006, Suzuki again took a shot, saying that it was impossible to make a reliable car for Rs 1 lakh.

But within a year of Suzuki’s comment, the Tata team had reason to pop the bubbly. A beta prototype was ready by the middle of 2007 and to maintain secrecy, it was tested at foreign locations, such as test tracks in Germany and the rough terrains of Australia.

Just about 10 days before the Auto Expo at New Delhi’s Pragati Maidan where the car was to be unveiled, RNT joined the team in Pune. He camped there until the launch, overseeing the finishing touches. He personally drove it, and made several last-minute changes, including changes in the seat covers and air vents, as the team prepared for the big day.

While the media wildly speculated about the look and features of the car, even carrying all kinds of sketches about the car’s looks, three Nanos were shipped to Delhi in containers and remained under cover until the night before the launch. In the wee hours of 10 January, the car was rolled into Tata’s pavilion in hall 11 of Pragati Maidan right under the noses of several TV vans stationed nearby. But they missed the action. RNT, who later admitted he had spent a sleepless night preparing for the launch, and Ravi Kant, were present when the cars arrived.

That day will go down as a red-letter day in Indian automotive history. Using a three dimensional hologram created in Germany, a ‘virtual’ RNT spoke to the huge crowds deluging the Tata pavilion about the car he had dreamed of and which was finally about to be unveiled.

Then, the real RNT, his over 6’ 2” frame comfortably ensconced in a white-coloured Nano’s driver seat, drove onto the stage what the world now acknowledges as a path-breaking car. As the crowd roared and cheered, a visibly tired but moved RNT took the mike to assure them of one thing — the car, despite the protestations of many in the press, would cost Rs 1 lakh. “A promise is a promise,” RNT said, sealing his place in the hearts of millions, whose aspirations of owning a car were now reality. As Tata stood modestly enjoying his success on the stage, a foreign journalist was overheard saying to another: “We are lucky to be here’’. The other replied, “Yes, at least we can tell our grandchildren that we were there.’’

Sonys Bio Battery

2008-01-20T02:08:00.000-08:00

Sony's turned Phil-anto-phist

-The ant lovers

Electronic consumer giant Sony has developed an environmental-friendly prototype battery that runs on sugar and can generate enough electricity to power a music player and a pair of speakers. The bio batterys casing is made of a vegetable-based plastic, Reuters has reported.

It measures 3.9 cm (1.5 inch) along each edge and works by pouring sugar solution into the unit, where enzymes break it down to generate electricity. Test cells had an output of 50 milliwatts, Sony said.

"Sugar is a naturally occurring energy source produced by plants through photosynthesis," Sony said in a statement. "It is therefore regenerative, and can be found in most areas of the earth, underlining the potential for sugar-based batteries as an ecologically-friendly energy device of the future." The company aims to produce the batteries for commercial use, without specifying when.

GTA San Andreas

2008-01-19T22:06:00.000-08:00

GTA San Andreas is the next in line in the famous gore series of GTA.The Big and Bad are back in this mind blowing series with bigger badder police and villains.CJ relly Cs(sees) the J around him.The entire course of events are determined by the players skill.Great GTA fun,Realistic and Bad....

GTA: San Andreas

Vice City won many Game of the Year awards, it set a really high standard, and the next game had to be better. That next game was bigger in every sense of the word: it included a state called San Andreas, with three major cities. It was designed so that the player would be roaming all the cities for missions and side-quests. was really big -- in fact, it was a little too big. The game was based on CJ or Carl Johnson, who is called back home after his mom is murdered. The main plot revolves around CJ trying to figure out the mystery behind his mom's murder, and it reveals many more things in the process.

CJ used to live in Liberty City; back home in the city of Los Santos resides his family and gang. He comes back to his gang in a really bad shape courtesy rival gangs and the police. He takes charge and decides to get his gang back to glory.

There were many RPG elements to San Andreas, like the attributes given to the main character. You could make CJ a fit and fine guy with high agility, or you could make him really fat and slow. There were tons of customizable options; there were many vehicles, as well as jets that CJ could fly. You could use a jetpack, and for the first time, you could swim in a GTA game.

The game was a major success and sold millions of copies; it set the benchmark even higher for the GTA series.

Wireless USBs

2008-01-19T21:48:00.000-08:00

Unwiring the USB

There are no strings attached anymore to your USB. Wireless USB has finally been accepted as a standard, and the first lot of products is already out

Monday, September 10, 2007

USB is officially untethered now. What allowed you till yesterday to plug in your digicam, MP3 player, or any other hardware device, now requires you only to place your device within a definite radius around your PC, to perform the same USB functions. In other words, you no longer need a wire running to your PC. Thanks to Wireless USB (WUSB).

According to Universal Serial Bus-Implementers Forum (USB-IF), Wireless USB is the first wireless personal interconnect technology, which is backward compatible with wired USB, and allows users to connect up to 127 devices, and promises a bandwidth of up to 480 MBps at a range of 4 metres and 110 MBps at 10 metres. It is based on the WiMedia Alliance Ultra-Wideband Common Radio Platform, and its development began in February 2004, with the formation of the Wireless USB Promoter Group, which consisted of Agere Systems, HP, Intel, Microsoft, NEC, Philips Semiconductors, and Samsung. A year later, the Wireless USB specification was completed and in June 2006, the USB-IF carried out its first ever demonstration of the WUSB, using an Intel host adapter, by transferring a HD video from a Philips wireless semiconductor system, using an XP OS.
Though not directly, WUSB has a connection with the WiMedia Alliance, a body that regulates and sustains interoperability of Ultra-Wideband (UWB). Presently, WUSB uses UWB platform, while other protocols like Bluetooth are expected to follow soon.

In the same league
The obvious comparison for WUSB would be with Bluetooth and WiFi, and though one might like to believe that all three are doing the same thing, the idea of WUSB is to provide a high bandwidth protocol. It works for a shorter range than WiFi, but with higher transfer rate than Bluetooth, which works on the same 2.4 GHz radio device. Subtly put, the idea of WUSB is to trace the middle path between Bluetooth and WiFi.
Interestingly, the only other company that has embarked into the WUSB space is Motorola powered Freescale Semiconductors, with its offering called Direct Sequence UWB, which transmits a series of low power pulses at frequencies in the range of 3.1 GHz to 10.6 GHz. However, no manufacturer has begun making products that use this protocol yet.

The most important element of WUSB is the Micro-scheduled Management Command (MMC) that helps 'seek and find' a Wireless USB cluster (a virtual wireless network formed by wireless devices found in the area), understands its working, manages power, and schedules data transmissions as fast as possible. WUSB also contains a UWB information frame, with multiple elements, each taking care of a particular function. Unlike USB, WUSB does not use the Start of Frame (SOF) mode of sending information as packets to the device for synchronization. In turn, it uses MMC to transmit information queries to the connected devices at regular intervals.

Looking back
Wireless USB, in a way, is a product of natural progression that was to happen sooner or later. What began as a first generation plug-n-play system that operated at a speed of 12 mbps, morphed in 2000, into a high performance data transfer mechanism called USB 2.0, which currently delivers up to 480 mbps�a 40 fold rise in data transfer rate. USB exterminated a term called 'parallel port' from the hardware engineer's dictionary, and most peripheral devices chose to make do with this system, offering their products in only the USB compatible format. More than anything, it was the printer manufacturers who embraced USB the most, besides lifestyle portables. The next obvious graduation would be to make these devices 'talk' to your PC or laptop wirelessly.

First line of products featuring wireless USB (clockwise)-Lenovo Thinkpad T61, D-Link USB 4-port hub, IOGEAR USB hub with adapter kit, and Dell Inspiron 1720

Compatible products
Coinciding with the official launch of WUSB, the USB-IF announced a list of hardware products that passed its compliance and certification tests. Dell's Inspiron, and Lenovo's Thinkpad have been the first to incorporate WUSB to their machines, with D-Link and IOGEAR being the first to create connectivity hardware. This includes Dell's Inspiron 1720, priced upwards of $900 internationally, which is powered by Intel's Core 2 Duo T5250 chipset, an anti glare 17 inch display and a 120 GB SATA hard drive. The Thinkpad, however, seems to be getting a bad reputation of a 'station wagon' since it's a little bulky for its class, but claims to be the first to incorporate WUSB compatibility. It gives customers the option of choosing an Intel or nVIDIA graphics card, and is positioned as a business-only machine.

On the other hand, D-Link's wireless adapter and hub has an interesting concept to back it . hub is essentially something which allows you to connect multiple devices with it. The adapter, however, has a flip that you open and plug into the USB socket of your PC or laptop, after which it wirelessly syncs up to the hub, in turn connecting with any device found in the range of 30 metres.

Adoption
These devices are only the initial handful to embrace WUSB. What one can really expect here to find many applications around WUSB coming up, in a few months. Take Bluetooth for instance. What began as a short-range mode of communication between two devices, Bluetooth saw itself being known as the mobile connectivity technology. An estimated 600 million Bluetooth devices were shipped world over in 2006 according to a survey conducted by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group. Now picture a technology that communicates with your mobile device 500 times faster than Bluetooth, and works more efficiently at shorter ranges. All we need for that to happen is somebody out there to sync up WUSB for mobile applications. This is assuming that the upcoming models of digicams, music players, printers and other hardware devices will come with WUSB compatibility.

The road ahead
For now, the biggest compelling thing that stands out is the fact that Wireless USB is backward compatible. According to a survey conducted by corporate analysts, In-Stat, there are 11 million wireless devices in the world today, and this number can easily be expected to double, by 2010. In absence of WUSB, it would simply mean so many more wires, crisscrossing each other and creating one big jungle of wired devices. The way things are going currently, WUSB is well capable of becoming a standard every hardware manufacturer swears by, and in the long run, may reduce manufacturing costs as well.

But data errors could still be a concern, especially if the information packets are bigger, and if you try to send it to the last mile। Anyways it still scores over the wired USB for which the range is zero.

P.S: This article has been taken from PC-QUEST.. Hope all of you enjoy it...

The Revolutionizing MP4 Watch...

2008-01-18T08:17:00.000-08:00

The MP4 watch has been revolutionizing the present watch industry. movies being able to be played on the hand is actually a attractive offer to us techno geeks.however eventhough there are several features that are available with these watches , there are certain things which may seem inane to us.

First of all,let us see the good news

The MP4 Watch is a multi-media marvel on your wrist. It is of course a watch, but aside from its rather cool watch face, it also plays MP3's, Movies and shows off your Photos! With 2GB of internal memory and a 3.8cm colour screen, you can now watch movies, display your photos and listen to your favourite tracks all from your wrist. The watch charges up from the mains, has a USB cable for downloading your music, picture and video files from your PC, and shuffle, volume, mode, play and pause are all controlled easily by buttons on the side of the watch. It comes with all the software you need (PC only), a set of bud headphones, has an eight hour playback for music and video, and even operates as a Dictaphone - it's a multi-media centre on your wrist.

Features

A sleek black digital watch that plays MP4 videos.
An onboard memory of 2GB.
A 1.5inch colour screen.
High resolution pixel image 128 x 128.
Displays the time and date in digital format.
Supports MP3, WMA, MP4 (NXV) and JPEG formats.
High quality digital recording and playback function.
5 equaliser modes.
The watch sports buttons for; Menu, Play, Forward, Back, Mode change and Volume.
A USB cable for downloading music, pictures and video files from your PC.
Headphones.
8 hours of playback.
Charge the watch with a mains adaptor (UK adaptor included) or USB cable (included).
Requires a USB port.
Requires Windows 98/SE/ME/XP.
CD with set-up software.
The watch is black in colour with rubber straps.
Suitable for ages 14 years+.
Size: 28 x 4 x 1cm.

The above features are cool and mind-boggling,yet this chinese brand is better let gone than bought. There are no signs of ownership in this watch and would definitely be of those Chinese upstarts that mix quirkness with brilliance. However rich the watch may seem to you, it is simply a pain having to watch movies or videos with one arm up.The USB is not fast enough and takes aeons to get videos to be transferred to the watch.The MP4 watch is supposed to play NX-AVI format, which in practice means nothing will work unless you use the bundled software. The software doesn't take much time to convert files, and could manage all the avi files we threw at it. However, while playing back you have to take the watch off, or else it's damn uncomfortable. The small size of the screen only makes matters worse. While resizing, the video gets squeezed and the characters take on an elongated alien look.

You can play MP3 and WMA formats, which are done perfectly, and there's also support for WAV. The FM radio is kinda nutty. It doesn’t auto-scan, and the reception isn't that good! If you're indoors, just forget about it. The player has 6 preset EQ modes and a voice recorder. The player can also read text files, but using this feature can be a pain.

Sound clarity is pretty decent and can manage through. This watch is for all James Bond enthusiasts who would go nuts over to just buy a watch that would be difficult to see time but cool on the looks and gritty on the features.

P.S: The screen automatically switches off after 2 minutes if it remains idle. The watch has to be switched on once again by pressing the MODE button continuously for about 2 seconds..

Scrabulous calls the quits

2008-01-18T08:04:00.000-08:00

The companies that make the board game Scrabble are trying to shut down Scrabulous, an online version that is one of the most popular applications on the social networking site Facebook.

Hasbro Inc., which owns the rights to the crossword game in the United States and Canada, and Mattel Inc., which owns the rights elsewhere, believe the online game, developed in India, infringes on their copyrights and trademarks.

Scrabulous listed more than 600,000 daily active users on Facebook as of Wednesday and is one of the 10 most used applications on the site. People can also play at Scrabulous.com.

Hasbro and Mattel jointly issued cease-and-desist notices to four parties involved in the development, hosting and marketing of Scrabulous, according to a letter Hasbro is sending consumers who have contacted them about Scrabulous.

In a separate written statement released Wednesday, Hasbro did not name the four parties but said it was reviewing a number of options with them and hoped to find an amicable solution.

"If we cannot come to one quickly, we will be forced to close down the site and its associated distribution points," Hasbro said.

Scrabulous' co-developer, Jayant Agarwalla, said in an e-mail that he usually does not comment on legal issues. Facebook did not return several requests for comment.

While there are authorized Scrabble games online, Scrabulous has gained popularity because it is free, easy to play with friends and easy to access on Facebook.

The game was developed by brothers Rajat and Jayant Agarwalla, from Calcutta, India, who say on the Web site that they created it after they could not find an online version of Scrabble that they liked.

News of the toy companies' action prompted Scrabulous fans to start a "Save Scrabulous" group on Facebook and urge others to lodge protests with the companies by posting Web links to the Hasbro and Mattel sites.

In the letter Hasbro is sending to those who protest, the company urges Scrabulous fans to switch to legal Scrabble sites.

"We are not surprised that fans have thoroughly enjoyed playing Scrabulous on Facebook.com," the letter says. "What consumers may not realize, however, is that Scrabulous is an illegally copied online version of the world's most popular word game."

John D. Williams Jr., executive director of the National Scrabble Association, said the group was hopeful the companies could work out some sort of agreement. While most competitive Scrabble players do not play Scrabulous, he said the online game was a great way to introduce young people to the traditional board game.

"We're thrilled over anything that gets people playing more Scrabble," he said. "Our goal is to recruit them from the Internet and get them playing on a Scrabble board with a person sitting across from them."

Sole Soul

Ego makes and breaks !!

Will you do Community Service ?

Dual Pull of the Mind

India with Anna Hazare

A life to wish, a life to act, a life to succeed or fail, Man is not based on success but on action, We have stood by a man who has acted, A man who has voiced the nation's thought.

Madhavan R Sriram

Drive to the top

Bagepalli – A gift indeed

Indian Poltics is becoming a ?

Mysore Road Trip

REFLECTIONS FROM A FALLEN MAN

PAIN OF SUCCESS

Photographs (Essence of Time)

Apple Versus The Rest Of the World

Penstroke and Keystroke

100% Natural

Dreams on fire 24x7

The Big FIght IBM Google Cisco Microsoft

Wall E - No more a dream

Drive Bangalore Weekend What Masti?

Soul Stirrers Memory Unleashed

Google Knowledge Life Power

Madhavan R Sriram

Sony Ericsson W580I

The MotoRokr E6

Tata Nano->Behind the scenes

Sonys Bio Battery

GTA San Andreas

Wireless USBs

The Revolutionizing MP4 Watch...

Features

Scrabulous calls the quits

A life to wish, a life to act, a life to succeed or fail,
Man is not based on success but on action,
We have stood by a man who has acted,
A man who has voiced the nation's thought.