Happy Diwali !!

Wishing each one of you a very happy and prosperous deepawali. May this year brings you lots and lots of happiness in life and fulfill all your dreams.

Above is Rangoli, we made at office.

Enjoy !!

October 27, 2008 | Filed Under india | 2 Comments

Elephanta Caves

Yesterday I visited Elephanta Caves which are beautifully carved shiv temples out of solid rock mountain. These caves dates back to 5-7 century A.D. You can reach there by a ferry from Gate Way of India, Bombay. The ferry ride was awesome with beautiful view of sea, Gate way of India, Taj hotel and mountains along with refreshing and cool breeze.

For more pics check my picasa album

February 10, 2008 | Filed Under image, india | 1 Comment

Inovation in India/IITs

I read this interesting article by Bernard on State of Inovation in India. I agree with him that lot have changed (improved) but still we have yet to see Google/Microsoft from here(IITs). As he mentioned one of the main reason is playing things safe.

The fundamental issue in India is the risk/reward equation. It is simply too easy for a young developer in India to get paid a lot by an outsourcing firm; then enjoy being headhunted every year for more money.

One more issue is difference between IITs and Stanford providing inovation to world. Important difference in giving good startups is because lack of implementation of ideas here in IITs. In IITs atleast some good projects (Mtech & Btech projects) are worth transforming into good business opportunities but they die as you pass out from there or after its being graded. I will agreed with comment made by Amit that

There are many socio economic reasons why young people in India hesitate to implement an innovative idea. Current trend of high paying jobs in MNCs will make entrepreneurship ever lesser attractive… especially in software.

January 2, 2008 | Filed Under india, tech, web | Leave a Comment

India To Offer Free Broadband by 2009

Economic Times: Broadband to go free in 2 yrs
Economic Times: Broadband initiatives: Speed it up

The government proposes to offer all citizens of India free, high-speed broadband connectivity by 2009, through the state-owned telecom service providers BSNL and MTNL. While consumers would cheer, the move holds the potential to kill the telecom business as we know it.

Read disscussion regarding this on Slashdot.

April 28, 2007 | Filed Under india, news, web | 2 Comments

Network Ban !! You need to interact !!

Last night we lost out internet connection(includeing LAN)…which now we will have ot face everyday from 11PM to 12:30 PM.
Read more about it..

Techdirt: Indian Engineering Students To Have Internet Cut Off Each Night To Encourage More Social Interaction

CNN : Stop surfing, make friends, Indian students ?????

Update :
IBN Live :will web restriction help??

March 13, 2007 | Filed Under india, web | Leave a Comment

India leads Asia billionaire club

“India has the most number of billionaires in Asia with a total wealth of $191bn between them, according to Forbes magazine. With 36 billionaires, India has overtaken Japan’s 24 billionaires, after two decades of Japan topping the Asian rich list.”

Forbes’ 2007 ranking of worlds richest.

Lakshmi Mittal, 56, is the fifth richest person in the world, according to the magazine. The other Indians in the list include Mukesh and Anil Ambani of Reliance, Wipro chief Azim Premji, Bharti Group chairman Sunil Mittal and Aditya Birla Group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla.

Check who made it to list from India (Asia)

Also check The World’s Billionaires

March 10, 2007 | Filed Under india, listing, news | Leave a Comment

Happy Holi !!

Google Holi Logo

Once again ..Happy Holi to all !! Enjoy !!

March 4, 2007 | Filed Under india, offbeat | 1 Comment

Open source is key to reaching 500 million Indian children

An interesting article by Mark Rais on role of open source in making education available to the large youth population of india. And a greta initiative by CII-Shiksha.

To support more than 650,000 villages and one half billion youths who need education, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) created a nonprofit organization called Shiksha India in 2001. One of Shiksha’s primary initiatives was the creation of a collaborative online Web portal, which the president of India launched in a formal ceremony last month. The new e-learning and collaboration portal uses open source technology such as Moodle, Drupal, and MediaWiki.

In my opinion the reason behind its success can be attributed to mainly: its free of cost availabilty which is big issue in regard to country like India, where population(half billion) which need attention is much higher and money involved if proprietary softwares are being used. And other important aspect which article mentions is in the ability to customize and provide products in local languages (including Hindi and Tamil) along with chosing most suited among vast available resources.
Another important issue which can be solved with open source is large scale piracy, currently software piracy laws are not so strict in india but still piracy is a getting a major issue.

“The bad side is that with so much available, a newcomer to OSS is bound to get confused about what to use.” He says this is often exacerbated due to some projects being fixated on proving that their product is best.

Other than that at present, their are linux distributons like Ubuntu, which is quite user friendly and its available in many flavours. Also earlier there has also been efforts in shifting towards linux and other open source mediums like :
LIC opts for Linux
Taking Free Software to the Farmers and Fields of India
Kerala logs Microsoft out

Linux.com : Open source is key to reaching 500 million Indian children
Program Details for Shiksha India

February 26, 2007 | Filed Under india, linux | Leave a Comment

India Poised

Times of India group has started “India Poised” campaign in honor of 60 years of free India.
India Poised Anthem :

There are two Indias in this country

One India is straining at the leash, eager to spring forth and live up to all the adjectives the world has been showering recently upon us

The other India is the leash

One India says give me a chance and I’ll prove myself. The other India says prove yourself first and then maybe you’ll have a chance

continued >>

Watch Amitabh Bachchan recite
the ‘India Poised’ anthem
View clip Download

Source : Hindu Mommy :India Poised

January 28, 2007 | Filed Under india | Leave a Comment

Creative Commons, India launched on 26th Jan at IIT Bombay

The project celebrated its official launch today at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Bombay. The launch is part of Asia’s largest technology festival held in Mumbai – Techfest. Now in its tenth year, the two day festival offers a smattering of workshops, exhibitions and lectures to students to explore advances and opportunities in modern science and technology.

Speakers at the launch event:

Mr. Joichi Ito [Chairman, Creative Commons]
Dr. Catharina Maracke [Creative Commons, Global Coordinator]
Mr. Nandu Pradhan [President and Managing Director, Red Hat, India]
Mr. Shuddhabrata Sengupta [Sarai-CSDS]
Prof. Deepak Phatak [KReSIT, IIT Bombay]

Mr. Ito will speak about the importance of Creative Commons for a growing global digital culture in light of the launch of the Indian creative commons jurisdiction on January 26th. The intimate interaction between technology, law and culture in digital products is creating new challenges for enterprises, individuals and other organizations. How is the digital landscape getting altered with the emergence of licenses such as creative commons?

For more information about this project and its launch, visit CC-India’s website. To learn more about this year’s Techfest, click here.
Read More :
CC Licenses Launch Today in India
Creative Commons Launch
Creative Commons India
Creative Commons @ techfest
Joi Ito’s Web: India[Chairman, Creative Commons]