sami speaks

The 'Gilmore Girls' Are No More

2007-05-19T11:32:00.000+05:30

After running successfully for seven seasons, the popular American TV series `Gilmore Girls` came to an end on May 15th 2007. Though it can't be termed as an early end to a still popular TV series as it was lucky to enjoy success for seven long years, it definitely was an abrupt end - mostly (I believe) because CW was all prepared to shoot the eighth season if they could work things out with Lauren Graham. The lack of momentum in the last few episodes to mark the end of the long series was duly compensated by a very deserving last episode, which brought back the memories of the better moments that the series had enjoyed and the reason why it had become so popular in the first place.

'Gilmore Girls' started when it had to compete against 'Friends' and 'Survivor' - two of the most popular TV shows ever, and it reached the peak of its success during its fifth season when 'LOST' had debuted and swept everyone off their feet. The TV show is said to be more popular among the family(read female) audiences with youngsters preferring action based dramas more, like LOST and Heroes. But it is difficult to underline the exact reasons behind the success of the series, against such stiff competition, hence I am going to speak just for myself. But first a confession: I started watching the series only in September last year(The first six seasons have been released on DVDs).

The first thing that had struck me about the series (in its pilot episode) was the freshness with which the beautiful atmosphere of the (fictional) town Stars Hollow was captured by the camera. But the strongest reason why I even bothered to watch the second episode was the unique style of humorous and fast-paced dialogue delivery that I had never witnessed before. Then there were numerous references to English literature, classic Hollywood movies, music of all genres, and food from all parts of the world(there is a reference to Indian food too, and gotta love their pronunciation of the name 'Bangalore' ;) ). The generous footage afforded to incorporate the various town festivals(Founders Firelight, Bid-a-basket, and my most favourite: Festival of Living Art) into the main story line is just another impressive aspect of the show. If a TV show can make someone buy and read Proust, go back to watching black & white movies and try out Thai food, it must be one of their favourite shows. While watching its second season, I did call it my most favourite show, ahead of LOST, Prison Break and the other "youth" oriented TV shows.

The TV show also boasts of creating so many memorable characters like Lorelai, Rory, Luke, Sukie, Taylor, Lane, Ms. Patty, Babette, Michelle, Mrs. Kim that got permanently etched in my memory(I personally didn't like the characters from outside of Stars Hollow so much - except Paris). One character called Kirk, played superbly by Sean Gunn, is the stuff of the classics. If nothing else, getting introduced to this extremely funny(quirky?) and likable character is worth watching at least a couple of seasons in my opinion, the character is that good. Here is a sample:

Kirk: This is not how it's supposed to go. I'm supposed to take her out, we're supposed to exhaust my prepared subjects immediately, and then the minute I get up and go to the bathroom, she is supposed to sneak out and leave me here humiliated. Now I have been to the bathroom three times, and I have to tell you, I did not have to go, and every time I came back to the table, she was there and she was smiling, and... hey, did you see her touch my arm? What the hell was that all about?
Luke: I think that means she likes you.
Kirk: Shut up! You take that back!

Lauren Graham, the actress who played the lead role or Lorelai Gilmore, is given most of the credit, besides the creator of the show Amy Sherman-Palladino, for making the TV show such a big success. She did bring in a refreshing perspective to what could have become another stereotypical role and it is hard to imagine anybody else playing that character. Fittingly enough, in recent rankings given by a website to actors brining most value to a character, she was ranked third, behind the inimitable Hugh Laurie as Dr. Gregory House(House MD) and Kiefer Sutherland playing the iconic Jack Baur(24). The other two major characters of the show, Luke Danes and Rory Gilmore, were betrayed by the ordinary performances by the actors Scott Patterson and Alexis Bledel respectively. If these actors were honest to their characters, then they at least weren't charming enough. Rest of the characters were very colourful: Sukie and Michelle were immensely lovable in the first few episodes, Paris was hilarious from the fourth season onwards and Taylor and Kirk were always causing a riot.

All was not well with this series though. After the first few seasons, it kind of became repetitive; there was also a lot of filler material in the last couple of seasons. The entire feel of the show got changed in the seventh season after Amy Sherman parted from the series giving the reigns to David S Rosenthal. The real spirit of the show was finally visible once again, for one last time, luckily, in the very last episode of the series which ends with Lorelai and Rory at the Diner having coffee and Luke making Pancakes for them in the background - so reminiscent of the very first scene of the first episode of the series. I hope to watch the series again sometime in the far future, but irrespective of if that ever happens or not, the sweet memories of 'Gilmore Girls' and Stars Hollow and Kirk will be there with me forever.

Dhoom:2 is Double the Masti and Double the Paisa Vasool

2006-11-29T18:01:00.000+05:30

It's the season of sequels and remakes right now in Bollywood. The good news is that the film-makers are not just trying to ride on the popularity of the original films to make quick money from the sequels, as proved by the sequel 'Lagey Raho Munnabhai', which is making even more business, and earning even better critical reviews, than the original 'Munnabhai MBBS'. Another success story is currently being written at the box office by the sequel of one of the biggest hits of 2004 i.e. Dhoom. In line with the success story of 'Lagey Raho Munnabhai', Dhoom:2 is getting better reviews than its first edition and the industry pundits are predicting that it will be the bigger hit of the two. The age of sequels and trilogies has arrived in India.

If you liked the movie Dhoom, be ready to be completely blown by the Dhoom:2 experience. The primary reason for the success of Dhoom, and now Dhoom:2, is the unique combination of novelty and simplicity. Nobody would've believed that a bike-movie like Dhoom would get such a positive response from the Indian audiences, who are more attuned to the melodramatic movies of Karan Johar and Yash Chopra. Dhoom created a new page in the history of Indian cinema and Dhoom:2 takes the legacy forward in great style. The film of course cannot be compared with the timeless classics like Mother India or Deewar; nor do they come even close to message-oriented serious entertainers like Lagaan and Munnabhai MBBS. Instead, Dhoom quintessentially belongs to the genre of light, fast paced, action thriller movies whose success stands on a simple philosophy: Do not ever bore the audiences. Though not an intelligent or a captivating script, it scores where other similar attempts fell flat on their faces. It is also here where Dhoom:2 also does the job so well; it retains the spirit of simplicity of old Dhoom, yet takes the entertainment levels to the next stage. Hrithik Roshan has bigger star appeal than John Abraham; riding high on the success of the past year, Abhishek Bachhan is much more confident as cop-in-the-t-shirts than he was in Dhoom; Aishwarya Rai's experiment with the new look is refreshing and the film uses a much bigger budget for the action scenes and the picturisation of songs. The viewers are the winners in the end.

Dhoom:2 starts in the same way as Dhoom, with an unbelievable(?!) robbery executed effortlessly by the perfect conman - Mr. A(Hrithik). But more important is what it does NOT start with: Hrithik Roshan growing up as a child in a rural village, where the merciless villain murders his righteous father prompting him to take the wrong path. If he is a thief, he is a thief; no time spared for the justifications. In fact, the viewer is made to love the coolness associated with all his robberies, no place for any moralities here. The robbery is then followed by the dazzling entry of Abhishek Bachhan on a motorboat. The pairing of Abhishek Bachhan and Uday Chopra a second time in this film might take it next to the now legendary pair of Munnabhai and Ciruit. For some reason, the chemistry between Abhishek and Uday Chopra never looks as great as the characters seemed to have demanded. They entertain the audiences with their own style of comedy nevertheless.

Ash's introduction in her new tanned skin look and anime-girl costume is stylish too. She looks as cool as Angelina Jolie from the Tomb Raider series - until she opens her mouth that is. It is one of those aspects of the film that could have been better handled and the criticism should be directed towards the director in this case. A bit more effort in handling Ash might have made her iconic(or at least as slick as Shilpa Shetty looked in Dus). A victim of similar lack of attention or importance is Abhishek Bachhan's character; where every detail of Hrithik's dare-devils is given maximum attention, even the background music doesn't excite the audience much when Abhishek outsmarts Hrithik for the first time at the interval time. In that sense, it is an out and out Hrithik Roshan's film and the other characters are there only to support him in blowing away the audience's imaginations. He was the cynosure of all teenage girls' eyes and they didn't care if they were gasping too loudly every time Hrithik was shown doing the dare-devils on the screen. Uday Chopra did slightly better in this film than in the earlier Dhoom, surprising the audiences by bringing smiles to their faces on at least one out of five attempts. His day dreaming humour continues this time with Bipasha Basu, who has a forgettable role in the first half where she only has to fill the frames with Abhishek Bachhan.

Only one song succeeds in setting the stage on fire - Crazy Kiya Re, and with its fast beats and great hummable tune, not to forget Ash in the brand new look, it might be the strongest reason if you decide to watch the movie again. The last song is also full of energy and brings the entire cast of the film together on the dance floor. The rest of the songs are almost forgettable.

The film is completely devoid of any logic though, so remember to keep your brains at home while going to watch this movie. This is no intelligently written one-upmanship game between the cop and the thief. Hrithik uses one of the dumbest tricks to do all the robberies and Abhishek comes with even dumber ways to catch him. But you wouldn't be watching Dhoom if you were looking for a serious cop-n-thief chase game, now, would you?

On the whole, the film is a completely fun-filled, exciting, roller-coaster ride for those who enjoy light-hearted action films. If attention-grabbing stunts, thrilling chases, heavy background score with minimum bollywood-ish drama is what makes an entertaining film for you, then look no other way; Dhoom:2 will cross all your expectations.

MyToday.com: A Public RSS Feed Aggregator

2006-05-07T18:43:00.000+05:30

(Having a general idea about RSS feeds will be helpful in understanding the following review more completely. If you don't know what RSS feeds are or what their significance is, a simple introduction to this technology is available here. Simply put, instead of having to visit different websites for reading different kinds of information, RSS feeds allow all the information from multiple websites to be collected at one place)

The creators of MyToday.com call their website to be a 'Public Aggregator', differentiating it from the commonly known private aggregators like the popular Bloglines.com service. What is the difference between the two? Basically, its about the flexibility and control in one(private aggregator) and simplicity and ease of use in the other(public aggregator). In a private aggregator like Bloglines, you start with a completely blank slate; you have to manually add every single RSS feed that you are interested in to the aggregator, which puts the responsibility on the user to dig out the most interesting web sources that are present on the Internet, but it also gives complete control to the user about which feeds are actually collected by the aggregator. If you are a control freak, you need something like Bloglines.

But for the vast majority of the web users, the exact source from where the information is pulled is not very important; they may only care about the subjects that they are interested in: like news, entertainment, sports etc. Even otherwise, not everyone may be in the know-how of which websites are the most popular ones on a given subject. This is where a knowledgeable third person('Editor') can play an important role: collect the RSS feeds from some of the best sources on the Internet and then categorise them under different subjects according to the type of content that they provide. The users can then just select the subject of their interest and can get the most interesting content in that category conveniently collected at one place. For example, a user can just go to the "Blogs" page on MyToday.com where the feed content from all the popular blogs(yes, Sepia Mutiny, Desicritics etc are all there) are collected and presented in a user friendly format.

The interface of the website makes use of modern web technologies("Web 2.0/Ajax") which makes it easier for the users to view and navigate through all the feeds in the shortest time possible. Feeds are collected together under different panels allowing a user to expand(or collapse) the select panels to see(or hide) the feeds under only that panel. If you are like me who believes that only "The Hindu" follows responsible journalism practices(just a meek attempt at trolling ;) ), you can make the "News" page look like the following image, with all but the feeds from 'The Hindu' being hidden from the view.

There is also a button at the top of the website that allows all the panels to be collapsed or expanded with a single mouse click. What I did not like in the interface is the way the actual content is presented to the users: whenever you click a feed link, it takes around 4-5 seconds for the 'balloon' to pop up and show the content to the users. Sometimes it appears as if the website is not responding to the clicks at all(I scrolled away from the view so many times!) and some other times the balloon pops-up little away from where you had actually clicked. At least some feedback regarding the content being fetched from the server can be displayed(ala "Loading..." message in the GMail interface) at a corner of the web page. Another thing that I did not find impressive is the completely different look of the home page from the rest of the pages; I think the home page should not be so distinguishable from the remaining pages. There should also be a head/main menu at the top of every page containing the links to all the categories, which will save the user from the pain of having to constantly go back to the home page to select a different category.

A very impressive feature of the website is the concept of "Reader Lists". In a way it directly adds to the variety of the feeds as collected by the core editorial team. A 'Reading List' is a list created from the RSS feeds that someone else is tracking on a regular basic, allowing the other users to see what he/she(an editor of a newspaper, a technology freak, a popular blogger etc) is reading frequently on the Internet. For example, if you want to be the next Aaman Lamba on the South Asian scene, make a start by following his reading list which is available on MyToday.com here. If you think that the RSS feeds that you personally keep track of might be of some interest to a section of the netizens, then send a request to MyToday.com to create a separate reading list for you(submission details are on their home page). With more reading lists thus created in the future, it should be one of the most interesting services provided by the website.

I found it strange to see the official blog and wiki of the website being hosted on free, publicly available services like wordpress.com and wikispaces.com. I don't know what the exact requirements with respect to the blog and wiki were that did not allow them to host these softwares on their own servers, but whatever they were, in my opinion, hosting the blog and wiki outside of their own domain will severely affect their brand image(professional vs casual players).

A surprise is in the store for you: the website is avaiable through the mobile interface too! Just browse to this location through your Internet-enabled mobile phone and enjoy the service on the go. Unfortunately, I couldn't test this feature in time.

Overall, I am impressed by the usefulness of this website for a non-geek user who wants to browse through the latest stories published on the Internet from one central location, through a convenient interface. For the control freaks, they promise to implement the ability to add one's own feeds to the website in the near future. When that day comes, a user can both browse the most popular articles as collected by the editorial team and add their own favourite feeds from the Internet too - a perfect combination of simplicity and flexibility.

For more information:
MyToday Home
MyToday Blog
MyToday Wiki
Aaman Lamba's Reading List
What are RSS Feeds?
What are Feed Aggregators?

IndiaGram: del.icio.us for the desis

2006-05-01T19:45:00.000+05:30

IndiaGram is a new online bookmarking service on the lines of the popular del.icio.us service but with a focus on the Indian community. You can use it in place of del.icio.us to store your online bookmarks or, more interestingly, you can use it to keep a watch on what interesting India-related websites are bookmarked by the other people. The most recently bookmarked websites are shown on the first two pages; and there is a link that will take you to most popular bookmarks too. An added feature of this service is that you can vote for a particular bookmark if you find it interesting, acting very much like digg.com!! This in fact is the most interesting feature for me. Just like del.icio.us, it supports tagging of a bookmark with different labels, but its impressive enough to show the tags using the cloud view by default, which means a better visual idea to the users about which tags have the most number of bookmarks. A user can also opt to keep some of the bookmarks private(a feature that was added only recently to del.icio.us) or can share it only with their friends(yes, you can add your friends to your account!). So a lot of options to chose as to with whom you want to share a particular bookmark.

The registration process is as simple as it is with del.icio.us. Where as del.icio.us remembers you forever after your first login(at least if you keep visiting the website fairly regularly), IndiaGram gives you the option of remembering you for 2 weeks time. It also allows the registered users to post comments on any website that is bookmarked on it!! You can see all the recent comments posted by the users in the right sidebar. It has good help on the wiki(with a guided tour of how to do the basic things; don't believe me? see this!!) and a google group for asking questions and getting relevant support.

If you think that you would like to support this new service, you have several options with you:

Get registered and start bookmarking your sites with it. Vote others' bookmarks that you find interesting. Post comments on your favourite websites that are bookmarked on the site.
Add a link/badge on your website. More details on how to do it are available here.
Blog about it!!(or in simple terms, spread the word about it)

Remember that its still a beta service and your use of the service and your feedback would be very helpful in improving the quality of the service in the final version.

For the techies:

I had come across an interesting open-source product called Scuttle few weeks ago(on a newsforge.com article) which does most of what del.icio.us does, and a few other things, but with the difference that you can actually install it on your own server and then use it. This allows one to think of myriad ways in which such a product can be used: bookmarking for only the internal network(employees of a company, students at a university etc), private bookmarking for a closed group(project work etc), bookmarking for a niche target. IndiaGram is one such service that uses Scuttle behind the scenes to create bookmarking service with the focus on the Indian community. Unfortunately, IndiaGram has nowhere indicated that they are making use of the Scuttle software; they shamelessly copied the about page of Scuttle and replaced their name with IndiaGram. Rakesh informs me that the Scuttle project is indeed credited at this page on the help wiki. Prakash informs me that all the changes that they(people behind IndiaGram) have made to the Scuttle code base are released back to the community in the true spirit of the Free(dom) software - a praiseworthy gesture.

This article describes Scuttle in good detail but it also contains a few mistakes(some of them corrected in the comments). A demo installation of this product runs here. If your server meets the basic requirements of Apache + PHP + MySQL, then download it and give it a try!!

Amitabh Bachchan vs Shahrukh Khan: Google Fight!!

2006-04-28T16:27:00.000+05:30

Ever thought of pitting the superstars of two different eras against one another and see who is more valuable among them? It seems like child's play these days if one knows how to use Google for the purpose. But how many could have imagined that a person would come up with a creative way of finding out the real worth(yes, in dollars!!) of various celebrities from Google's point of view? Soam Acharya takes us on a fun ride in an article published on Desicritics evaluating the price tag attached by Google Adwords to different Indian celebrities if you want to use their names as the keywords for the ads you want to place with it. If you don't understand what I am talking about, you surely need a crash course in Google Adwords! Head straight to Soam Acharya's blog article for more details on that, but here is the interesting part:

Amitabh Bachchan-------------$1.36
Om Puri-------------------------------$0.36
Shahrukh Khan-------------------$0.34
Aamir Khan-------------------------$0.20

Shame on the Khans!! Now that's surprising, isn't it? With Shahrukh being termed as the heartthrob of the entire nation and Badshah of the box office, Google Adwords doesn't seem to share the same opinion. Still, $1.36/per click for Big B definitely looks like a steal, ain't it?

Google Search:
Amitabh Bachchan - 1,690,000
Shahrukh Khan - 2,430,000

Google Fight:

Other interesting statistics awaits in the category of the female actors:

Shabana Azmi-----------------------$0.69
Rani Mukherjee--------------------$0.43
Aishwarya Rai-----------------------$0.28
Kareena Kapoor--------------------$0.25

Phew!! Shabana Azmi more valuable than even all the male actors except Amitabh! Google Adwords seems to have a better taste when it comes to these actors than the Indian viewers it seems ;)

Do read the complete article here. Author's blog is here.

Performancing Firefox 1.2 Released

2006-04-19T21:51:00.000+05:30

Performacing Version 1.2, a blogging extension for the Firefox web browser, was released a few days ago. Its pretty stable and has added a few useful features with this release:

The interface looks good. Or my eyes were not working well until now.
Upload images and files to an FTP site and then link to them from the blogs. Upload images from within Performancing and upload files from anywhere in the browser(its added to the "Performancing" sub-menu of the Firefox context menu.
A button called "Metrics" allows easy access to the metrics of your blog(if you are using Performancing to track your blog).
When you add a new blog to Performancing, it automatically detects the settings for the popular bloggers(blogger.com, wordpress etc).

More details are here. An image uploaded using Performancing's new upload tool is here:

(This is my first post from Performancing 1.2. If you see "Powered by Performancing" somewhere here, then it is also a new addition to this release.)

Update1: thanks to buddy mastmallu for digging this post.
Update2: here is the procedure to add spell-checking ability to the performancing extension. i couldn't get it working though.

It feels good

2006-04-19T17:27:00.000+05:30

Being a positive person that I am, positive developments that have taken place in the country last longer in the memory than the not-so-positive ones. Here I share a few of them.

We all know about the political party Paritrana formed in January 2006 by the IITians. They had announced that they will be contesting the 2006 Tamil Nadu assemblty elections and recently finalised 6 constituencies to contest these elections. They have requested one and all to spread the word about them. Not a lot of voters from Tamil Nadu should be reading this blog, but just getting absolved of the duty of 'spreading the word' is our job, isn't it? I have done my duty and you decide if you want to do yours or not ;)
You can interact with the members of the party at the following forum: Paritrana @ VOA
Story on Hindu. Story on Desicritics. Their Official Website.

Ever heard of an ISO 14001 certified village? Namakkal, a southern district in Tamil Nadu with a population of 53,000 became the first village from India to get such a certification. Thanks to Municipal Chairman S. Gandhiselvan, his associates and the general population in the village, they say:

[it] took three years to put in place a system that brought it international recognition. The certification is given to any organisation that uses technology and maintains internationally acceptable standards in services and develops an environmental management system in which water, air and sound quality are maintained.

Complete story is here.

An initiative on the Internet means it has to be the Indians settled in the US or another foriegn country. The initiatives themselves are good but I have no idea how many people living in India are going to be influenced with them. One such initiative is Voice of Ambition; in their own words:

We at Voice Of Ambition are experimenting with the idea of creating India’s First People’s Radio using the technology of podcasting. You can hear the programs on the site without any hassle for free. As we want people to voice their opinions and desires we have on the site a presentation which will tell you how you can send your audio to us using podomatic.com so that we can podcast it to the world. We also have tutorials and links to help you record audio. So having said this we encourage you to record your audio and voice your opinions to the world.

They have articles, podcasts, forums, pictures from India etc. And a very energitic team which has resolved to make VOA a success. Do register yourself with the website and participate in the forums if India related issues really interest you.

With all the political debates related to South Asia(predominantly India right now), things are getting really heated up at Desicritics. Its a bloggers network(part of Blogcritics.org) and you too can become a member and post articles there if you are blogger. Though it contains quality reviews of the latest books, movies, music albums etc, articles belonging to a lot of other categories too(technology, business, opinions, short stories etc), but the articles related to south asian politics is what attracts the most of the traffic. Head straight to their main page.

Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa: A 10 Out of 10 Movie

2006-04-19T13:51:00.000+05:30

I went to watch this film with very little expectations. That is because i had read Amitabh saying in one of his interviews that this should have been a short documentary and not a full featured film. after watching the film, i must say that he couldn't have been more wrong than that(assuming that the interview was a reliable one).

This particular film was closest to my sensibilities, which only a very few films are. The film was very opiniated one, which means it was that much more difficult to get the nod of a large section of the audience. There are only a few films in which I felt satisfied after every new development in the story and never thinking that it could have been better than that. What more, we were told at the end of the screening(yes, it was a special screeing by Moving Images) that the writer Mahasweta Devi, on whose book this film is based on, had felt that the film version is better than even her book version. Kudos to Govind Nihlani!

The film deals with the complex issue of naxalite upsurge in the West Bengal during the 1970s. Following are the keypoints of the film from my point of view:

1. Young lads from rich and affluent families also became part of the naxalite movement(HKA has a similar theme, in the Bihar setup) hoping for a better future for the neglected sections of the society, carrying a dream to change the entire structure of the world, bringing peace and prosperity to everyone. Jaya Bachan's youngest son, played by Joy Sengupta, plays the character of one such guy.

2. From the point of view of the youth, they are doing the noble deed of cleaning up of the system. From the point of view of the system and the administration, these people are nothing but the criminals. Interesting angle added to this is the point of view of the family and the relatives of such students-turned-naxalites: Joy's father(Anupam Kher) and his siblings treat him as a criminal and consider him to be an embarrassment. The father tries to completely erase him from his memory once he gets killed in the police encounter.

3. Jaya Bachan represents the other side of the society - the part which has no point of view at all. They don't understand what is right or wrong with the system, what is meant by standing against it, what are the rights of the common people and how they are flouted by the adminstration. She loves her child more than anything else but yet fails to understand, or even know what his dreams are. She donned this role with perfection and she looks nothing but the character itself.

4. Seema Biswas represents that part of the society which pays for the sins committed by the others. Her family has one son - a naxalite, and three daughters. As the son would be the torch bearer for the family in time to come, he is the one who is properly fed and properly educated by the parents. With the hope that he will get a job for himself as soon as he completes his education and will then take the burden of supporting the family on his shoulders and will marry off his three sisters. Its a pitiable condition in this scenario for them to lose him after investing in him for 20 long years. The family is deep in the trenches with the father not being alive anymore, mother not in the health to take up domestic work at others' houses, the family having to meet the expenses with the tution earnings of the eldest daughter and by selling off the home utensils. Who will marry off the daughters now? How would they be even surviving for very long? what wrong did they do for having to face all these troubles?

5. The cunning way in which the politicians deal with the naxal upsurge is beautifully handled by the director. No point in explaining all that here though; the moral of the story is that you always are at a disadvantage when you chose the violent path. You don't even know to which side you belong. To give a real fight, especially in a democratic setup, you have to be in the system; otherwise you are doomed.

6. The oppurtunity to have a second thought on what went wrong for them with the naxal movement, why they have failed, should they have done anything differently etc was given to Nandita Das's character. It was a real pleasure to see such a young actress(it was one of her first films*) putting up with such an impressive performance. The scene where Milind Gunaji interrogates her was by far the best in the film. Her first interaction with Jaya Bachan raises a lot of thought-provoking questions which do not have too many obvious answers. These two scenes take the film to a completely different level.

7. The engagement party of Jaya Bachan's daughter is just another high point of the film. It has humour, it has satire, it has pain and it comes at an important phase in the film.

8. The film ends with Raghu's dream (almost) coming true. The difference: his own mother, Nandita Das and the other colleagues now work by being within the system. His mother works on the documentation of the human rights. Nandita Das works with the tribals. so on and so forth.

The film is so strong in the ideology yet its presented in such an interesting and entertaining format, a film couldn't get any better than this, isn't it?

*The credits of the film suggest that it was the first film by Nandita Das. But she had already worked in Fire(1996) before this film.

$ I used the names of the actors rather than the characters as I have forgotten almost all the character names.

Google Page Creator: A Visual Tour

2006-04-17T13:53:00.000+05:30

I just played for a little while with the latest offering from the Google Services - Google Pages Beta. I took some screenshots in the process and am uploading them here. They are all self explanatory, so sparing you people with my commentary.

Google Pages Welcome Screen

WYSIWYG Interface of Google Page Creator

Creating a New Page

Editing a Page

URLs Can Be Validated

Preview After Adding 4 Sample Links

Layout of the Pages Can Be Changed

An Example of a Different Layout

Preview of the New Layout

Manage All the Pages Using the Page Manager

Uploading images and other resources and adding them to the web pages is also possible and very simple to do. Google Pages should come very handy for creating the individual profiles, simple personal websites or maintaining one's todo list. Register with Google Pages to get an invite if you haven't already got one.

Amir plays his next card, supports NBA movement

2006-04-16T16:41:00.000+05:30

Amir Khan is in the news again. His latest outburst over the sensationalisation of the news stories by the media is still fresh in our memories. Most of us had applauded him for the same considering that few superstars had done such a thing before. This time though, he seems to be trying to bite off more than what he can chew.

Don't get me wrong - on the face value I would still call his decision to support the Narmada Bachao Andolan to be a brave step for a noble cause. I have no reason to believe that it wasn't done with the best of the intentions in his mind. If nothing else, it should only give more publicity to a movement which is constantly being ignored by the successive governments(one central and four state govts) formed by different political parties at different times. But how much value is it going to add to the ongoing movement?

The politicians should be a little worried: this might awaken a few more sleeping citizen who were eagerly waiting for Amir Khan's next release Fanaah to a more serious issue. The media should be happy: they can start giving the NBA movement the prime time focus from now on and make it their cover story for a while. The NBA activists should be happy too, for they have one more spokesperson to help their message reach out to the common(read film-crazy) people. In the current equation, there can only be one loser: Amir Khan himself.

Amir has gone on the records that he wouldn't care if its going to negatively impact the performance of his forthcoming films. He has also made it clear that his involvement in the cause would be an active one. What he seems to be lacking in is the experience. He doesn't seem to have done his homework properly before plunging into a serious issue like the NBA movement, where he will have to discover the fact that fighting with the politicians would not be as easy as standing against the media. Here are a couple of examples showing his immaturity:

1. When asked why he thinks the rehabilitation should be a an easy job, he said "Politicians have got so much of wealth with them, can't they build small houses for a few poor families?" I am sure he meant 'government' there and not the politicians(so absurd to expect the politicians to part with their personal wealth to take care of the poor), but pardoning his 'slip of the tongue' for a moment, is he really so sure that the Indian government is so rich that rehabilitating the displaced families in narmada valley is such a trivial task for them?

2. When asked if he will be participating with the other NBA activists in their dharnas to register his protest, he shot back that staging and participating in the dharnas is not his job. Well Amir, we understand that your job is to act in the films, but how does that help in making political statements sitting in the comforts of the air-conditioned rooms and appealing to the common public to come out in the open, in the scorching heat of the sun to join the NBA movement? is that what is your job?

I respect the courage of Amir Khan to have come out in the open with the issues which had kept him bothering in the recent past - better be late than never - but I also hope that he doesn't vanish into the thin air after making some bold statements, by succumbing to the ordeals that come with such an undertaking, or by not being able to stand the rigours of standing against the politicians. The issue also is not a two dimensional one where the politicians could be assumed to be certainly on the wrong and the NBA activists to be on the right side(Govt did rehabilitate a lot of families, they still are trying their best to follow the supreme court directives, the demand to stop the construction of the dam to raise its height is universally condemned etc). Is Amir Khan(also Rahul Bose etc who are supporting the NBA's cause) ready for understanding all the dynamics involved in such a complex issue and take a bold and educated stand about it?

PS: Amir Khan had also visited the office of ANHAD a week ago reaffirming his support towards the studies of the children who had lost a year of education due to Gujarat riots.

Update:
Political parties trying to bully me: Aamir
Aamir Khan Threatened by Politicians
Comments From Another Blogger

ajaxXLS: Next From AjaxLaunch

2006-04-13T12:42:00.000+05:30

i had written about the three Ajax applications released in the last three weeks by ajaxLaunch in my previous post. If i had guessed in it that the next application released by them might just be a spreadsheet, a spreadsheet application it is!

The Ajax spreadsheet application, called ajaxXLS, is scheduled to be released in the next few hours, but they have released a picture of how the application might look like. go catch it here. i will try to update once it gets released.

the announcement was followed by a post with the top 10 questions being answered about the ajaxWrite application; the same post also notes that the ajaxWrite application can be embedded in your Fold web start page - the instructions to do the same are available here. to know more about the Fold service, go here.

Three Cool Ajax Applications

2006-04-09T15:46:00.000+05:30

Some time back, AjaxLaunch had announced that they would be releasing a new Ajax based web application every week from then onwards, and they are bang on their target until now, with three such applications released in three weeks time. we have already seen their earlier Ajax based applications ajaxWrite and ajaxSketch, applications that are similar to a desktop word processor(think Microsoft Word) and a paint application(think Microsoft Paint), but which run completely from with in a web browser. the latest to join is ajaxEyespot, that allows videos to be uploaded and edited(like Microsoft MovieMaker) from a web browser, all without having to download or install any application on the local system. try the following links:
AjaxLaunch - the main website

ajaxWrite
ajaxSketch
ajaxEyespot

all of these are still in the beta stages and support only some basic features.

for those who are yet uninitiated with the Ajax technology, the interface of Google Mail, Google Personalised Home, Windows Live etc are all good examples that make use of it. more info is on wikipedia.

Google also seems to be working on a Yahoo! Geocities like service for their GMail users - Google Page Creator. It allow the webpages to be created in WYSIWYG format, which doesn't require any HTML knowledge on the user's part. Read a simple review by pandia.

any guesses what it will be the next week(12th April) from AjaxLaunch? a charting application? or a jukebox? spreadsheet? stay tuned.

Laws and their abuse

2006-04-02T22:46:00.000+05:30

read a couple of disturbing news pieces in the recent times: one was about a pattern developing in some areas of india where the children are dishing out threats to their own parents and in-laws to hand-over the entire property to them, and then shift to the old age homes. the weapon? the Dowry laws.

the dowry problem in india has been so rampant and so grave, that strict laws were formulated some years ago, to atleast put some powers in the hands of the hapless daughters-in-law, whose dowry-related death cases were on a constant rise. no one could have hardly imagined at that time, that the same laws which were created to protect their own well-being, would be so conviniently (ab)used to gain monetary/material benefits.

the second story belongs to the pakistan higher command, who have a rather simple way of governing the people: see what they show you and listen to what they have to say to you. after banning the indian tv channels, the indian films and a host of other websites, it was the turn of blogspot and wikipedia. that just doesn't make any sense at all. just because the government doesn't want to expose their citizens to a few objectionable items, it can't put a blanket ban on the entire gamut of information!! there is a wealth of information on the blogspot blogs, 90% of the content should be unobjectionable by any standards, so what was the logic behind banning this entire domain? can the pakistani youth afford to be cut down in this fashion from the rest of the world? wikipedia was unblocked after a period of several hours, but no reason was specified why it was blocked for that short period of time. the blogspot domain continues to remain banned however. some people have raised their voice, many others continue to join them in their fight.

April 1st, this season

2006-04-02T22:11:00.000+05:30

gone are the days when "look at your back, something is coming!" was supposed to be the best april fool joke from your 8 year old friend. with age, the jokes start to become more immaculately planned; and much more innocent looking ones. following suit, the most elaborate joke i have ever witnessed was executed by the one of the most popular indian blogs
today - Sepia Mutiny. if you missed out on witnessing all the drama develop, and then fizzle out on the 1st of April, you can catch a summary of the events that took place from these links:
Sepia Mutiny - blogspot
Sepia Mutiny - hoax website
Info
More Info

it featured on desipundit too!! i got to know about this hoax much earlier though, thanks to the efforts of one vikas from desicritics to do a simple whois(duh!) and discover the expiry date of the domain name to be august 2006.

the other april fool joke was played by desipundit itself. see this.
Desicritics had this: Interview with Ganguly
Google had this: Google Romance
Linus Torvalds Joins Debian
A big list of april fool jokes

then there were many others. one of my friends got "engaged" on the eve of april 1st. are we going to fall for it?

Google Video is Now Available in India

2006-04-02T21:58:00.000+05:30

i just wandered to the google video website today and tried to play a file from there. unbelievably, the file played without any errors! surprised, i googled for the news as to when did google make google video service available for the indian users, and found this piece of information from techwhack website:

Google Video in India

it has been available since the 20th of the march!! so no more hacks required now, just go to the google video website, pick your favourite video(or search for one) and play it. the controversies related to indian hindi movies being uploaded to the google video servers and being shared by everyone all around the world, should get more serious with this development.

'Media has become a monster' - Amir Khan

2006-03-25T21:41:00.000+05:30

Amir Khan never ceases to amaze me. to think of it, he is but just another actor. its a commonly understood fact that only dumb people, who can't make use of their brains at all, compensate it by straining the rest of the parts of their body to the maximum. people like amir khan stand tall to defy the same belief.

not a person who has interacted a lot with the media, amir has gone where no other mainstream actor has gone before. talking to the Tehelka magazine, amir has said that "Because they want more advertisements, they are destroying what is a very important part of the society - news reporting. It is wasting important national space that should be used in a more productive manner." well, not just a true statement Mr. Khan, but quite a daring one too. tell me, how many people from the showbiz today would dare to confront the mighty media in such a fearless manner? Amir adds, "[In the beginning,] you were cutting yourself off from fans if you didn't speak to film magazines. I understood that, but I chose to do what was right."
He is not just daring, but sensible too: "The media is meant to be the watchdog of society, not its lap dog! Some restraint you have to show."

this is not the first occassion where amir khan has impressed me - whenever i have read/watched his interviews, we had some very rare opinion to share with one another. like his definition of the Devdas character(that its a weak, not a heroic or a strong character), his take on actors becoming politicians(blame the actors who make for a poor politician, not the custom itself), his understanding of the basic foundation of Lagaan(not a fight against the british, but against the oppression and exploitation by the powerful), the strict rule that he follows to NEVER respond to the rumours about his personal life - because its none of their business etc. i think exactly the same about all these issues. its difficult for me to think of anyone with whom i agree so much on so many points.

"Some news channel has to get up and say I am not indulging in this. It might lose viewership for the first month or so, but it will establish that it is not indulging in all of this, and I am sure people will come around." i promise that, if not anyone else, i would atleast be the one person to permanently switch to such a channel. its a frustrating experience these days to watch any kind of news on the tv news channels. Aaj Tak is the worst of the lot. followed by NDTV and TIMES NOW. CNN-IBN looks slightly better than the others. the less said about Star News, Zee News etc, the better. i currently stick to Headlines Today, which has got the minimum of the "opinions" and mostly a summary of the latest news bytes.
i am too selective regarding the print media; and won't touch anything but The Hindu(daily), Tehelka and Frontline magazines even from a 6 ft distance. all the others are total crap.

overall, amir khan is a thinking and an intelligent person; at the same time a very honest and a courageous person too...which i think shows in his approach towards his work, i.e. acting too. pick up the latest Tehelka magazine, or check this out:
Media has become a monster - Amir
(thanks to one of my friends somsuj for pointing this out to me)

Its raining movies out here

2006-03-21T19:18:00.000+05:30

after a long time, managed to watch some really good films in the past few days. all of them were of top quality, it would be a really tough job if someone asks me to rate them according to the points. so here is the list in random order:

1. Yahaan: an average fair. doesn't compare with the rest of the films. loved the songs and the scenic beauty of kashmir though. urdu was properly pronounced!

2. Black Friday: this was mostly a documentary, not a film in the general sense. i appreciate the impartiality of the film-maker in documenting the events surrounding the bombay bomb blasts without any personal bias. this film was by far the best of the lot, both for the amount of research that went into writing the book on which the film was based, and the effort that went into converting it into such a high quality film. the editing of the film was very confusing though - i need to watch it another couple of times to digest its content fully. a must watch for everyone in my opinion.

3. Anaahat: this has a slow, boring start. but amol palekar always has a surprise or two "up his sleeve." enjoyed the twist in the tale, but thought the end was a bit forced, a premature one, in a bid to give it a happy ending.

4. Matrubhoomi: a completely unapologetic and 'in your face' kind of a movie. the film-maker did not get carried away by the theme of the film - the effort was still there to make it as good as it can get. the screenplay was particularly noteworthy - the camera always keeps the viewer busy and engaged in the proceedings. after watching this movie, when you come across a news item that talks about killing of the female foetus, and if you don't get a scare, then you immediately need to contact your family doctor. insist for a complete checkup.

5. Khamosh Paani: this was also an authentic picturisation of the life in a pakistan village in the 1970s. was as realistic as Black Friday - just the plot was different here. loved the twist in the tale in this movie too. Kiron Kher was at her best - she single-handedly lifted the movie from being an average enterprise, to a really praise-worthy one. screenplay and editing were very good.

what else? couldn't watch Hazaaron Khwahishein Aisi and Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Maara. others to follow in the list are Water and Amadeus.

btw, watched Pride and Prejudice in the PVR Cinemas last saturday. the film was not in the true spirit of the book - film buffs might have liked it, but for a diehard fan of Jane Austen's books, i can never watch Elizabeth Bennett giggling like a silly girl, just like her other younger sisters. Keira Knightley looked good, acted well, but never seemed to have completely understood the character that she was portraying. some of the 'improvised' scenes were very well shot(the party scene where all the music/noise is balanced by the loneliness being felt by Lizzy at that time, capturing the mood of the bennet family through their window panes, some important scenes shot at the lake side etc). amount of footage for the different characters from the book was extremely well balanced - Wickham, Bingley, Collins were hardly visible in the entire film. not even Jane; it was a Lizzy and Darcy show all the way. 4 out of 10 for the movie.

Blog about the other blogs

2006-03-19T19:35:00.001+05:30

this is a blog about some of the other blogs. there are several reasons for me to write this post, which i hope you will discover after reading the rest of the post.

one of my favourite blog writers Vinod Ganesh - the best thing about his blog(apart from being murderously humourous) being the featuring of a pic of his taken at the gun-point, the denial of the same by Vinod not withstanding - has won a cute iPod Nano mp3 player as the award for the best blog by Sulekha.com. what more can i say, no other post deserved the award more - my hearty congratulations to him.

one of my friends maintains his blog here. posts a lot of interesting stuff, sometimes useful too ;) best thing being, most of the posts are short and simple. if not anything else, you gotta love the design of his weblog - powered by wordpress/Travelogue theme and more than 20 plugins installed!! contact the author to get a list of them. the Clustrmap service you see installed on my weblog is a stolen idea from this very person's blog.

not in a mood to bore you with any more blogs that i visit regularly(there is no reason to do so), if you were expecting a big list of interesting blogs in this post, then head straight to Desipundit.com; you can find a running collection of some of the interesting blogs written by indians from all over the globe there. if you are an experienced blogger, and know a thing or two about blogging, then please contribute towards the new wiki project that is started by the same webiste. details are here and you can start contributing here.

(if you still cannot figure it out, i wanted to congratulate vinod for the award, credit my friend for the idea of clustrmap and spread a word about the wiki project started by desipundit. my goal was to take MORE than 30 words to accomplish this ;) )

Best joke ever...

2006-03-16T16:05:00.000+05:30

it continues to amaze me how many hits this " blonde joke" keeps attracting...one year and still going strong. time to include it on my weblog too:

Best Blonde Joke Ever

Three Simple & Addictive PC Games

2006-03-09T14:47:00.000+05:30

SuDoKu

SuDoKu is the new craze the world over today. played since the 1980s in japan and the surrounding places, it did not take a long time for it to be adopted by everyone around the globe. highly addictive, it can be played on a paper, on a PC, even on your mobile phone(that's where i play it...wheneve there is a power cut ;)
you don't need to wait for the daily papers every morning to play suDoKu;
Download a PC version from here
Mobile phone version(series 60 phones)

Mummy Maze

the rules of this game are simple. you move one step and then the mummy moves two steps. you need to reach the exit of every maze without getting in contact with the mummy. not fair? well, if you can't outwit the dumb mummy with your human intellect, there is a game called "PinBall" :)
Download a PC Version from here

BookWorm

Link the adjacent letters together into words and score points. as simple as that. score more points by making long words, take care to get rid of burning letters, make bonus words...then come back here and profess about how addictive this game is.
Download a PC version from here
Play the online version here

Use Google to search for the other versions of the same games. they may have different user interfaces, but the concept is always the same.

Memoirs of Geisha: Treat to Watch

2006-03-05T18:29:00.000+05:30

Memoirs of Geisha is a film rich with the visual imageries. that's the first impression you get when you watch this movie. "lush", "exquisite", "beautiful" are some of the words people will attach to this movie after watching it. every frame is filled with colours and work of artistry, transporting one to a completely different time and age. and place. the soulful background score, able performances, slightly slow but engaging screenplay and top class photography means that you can't miss out on the rich experience of watching this movie. watch it to get a sneek peek into the Japan of the 1950s. watch it to celebrate the colours of life. watch it see the immensely popular book with the same name come alive on the screen. you need a crash course in japanese names if you don't get lost in the names of the characters in the film ;)

warning: the film fails to touch the audiences at the emotional level though. the romance of the book is missing to a large extent. even the pain of separation of the lead character from her parents, and later from her sister, doesn't quite wrench the viewers. the only scene in the entire film with some sting in it:

A long time ago, you took something from me, the only thing I ever truly wanted. Well...now you know how it feels.

the film is nominated for 6 Oscars. this is what colussus.net has to say about it:

There's no doubting that Memoirs of a Geisha is a lush motion picture, and it has much to recommend it, but this will not go down as one of the great screen romances of the 2000s. The love story, although competently told, never soars and, while satisfying, it doesn't cause the heart either to break or take flight. [...] It's not surprising how sumptuous the movie looks, or how rich it is in atmosphere.

Creative Zen Sleek - Impressive mp3 Player

2006-03-03T15:13:00.000+05:30

i have been using Zen Sleek for the past few months and i am completely satisfied with its performance until now. when you are buying a product from Creative, you can be rest assured of one thing - the audio quality. i am a bit picky when it comes to the quality of the audio, and the decision to go with a Creative mp3 player instead of an ipod was because of this very reason. i must say that i am very happy with my decision. casual listeners may not find a big difference between the two, but passionate music lovers should easily be able to feel a significant difference. ipod is a few notches below creative when it comes to audio quality.

Zen Sleek is one of the new models from creative which is very small in size and is also lighweight. it has a storage of 20GB and it gives a battery lifetime of more than 10hrs. the transfer of media is extremely fast using the USB 2.0 interface. the quality of headphones is above satisfactory. the interface is easy to use, including the touchpad, which works best for me when i set its sensitivity to a minimum level. the two added features are the microphone and the FM Radio. the only thing that i miss in the player is a search feature!! the player comes bundled with useful software which makes it easy to copy music and create/manage playlists. either the propriety tool or the windows media player 10 can be used to manage the music. one major complain about this player has been the accumulation of dust inside the screen surface. i have to wait and see for that. a part of disk space available on the player can be used to store general data. if you can afford to go for a non-ipod mp3 player, then Zen Sleek should be a very good choice. read more reviews at:
Engadget
Amazon
CNet

Edit: Added a picture of the player(from Engadget).

Google Video in India

2006-02-26T12:52:00.000+05:30

Google Video is soon catching up with everyone it seems. 7 out of 10 video links that i get from my friends are hosted on google video. but how do i access them when the service is not available in india? i couldn't, until a few weeks ago. one of my friends then told me a way for indians to view the google videos. i was of the impression that i was the last to find this trick out, but yesterday i met someone who was very happy to know it from me. i thought i will share it with some more people.

Click the google video link sent to you by others.
eg: miandad's frog jump.
you may get a message that the service is not available in your country. don't despair.
Click "Put on site" link at the top-right corner of the web page. a text box with some text will become visible right below the "Put on site" link. copy the entire text from the text box(place the cursor in the text box, press Ctrl-A and then press Ctrl-C) and paste it in your favourite text editor.
Search for the text "src=" in the pasted text. select everything between the quotes(") of src attribute and copy it.
for eg: <embed ------ src="phpfrkdjngjfuelfgvf" -------->
here select and copy -> phpfrkdjngjfuelfgvf
Paste the copied text in the address bar of your browser. hit 'Go'(or press ENTER) and enjoy!!

Share it with your other friends.

Update1: when i first started using this some 3 weeks ago, many people had complained that they don't see any "Put on site" link. i was surprised to find some people getting it and some people not getting the link. i was able to find it until one day before i blogged about it here. i don't see it anymore. i am searching for other ways to achieve the same; until then, see if the following link helps:

Download Google Video

Update2: check this for interesting indian videos from google video:

Google Videos - India

Update3: seems that google video is now available in india...atleast partially. i was able to play all the videos that i have tried - just go to http://video.google.com and select a video. or test with this: Penn & Teller on Golf. More info: Google Video Now Available in India

Celebrity gets punished

2006-02-18T15:21:00.000+05:30

finally we see a celebrity being made to pay for what he has done. sanjay dutt's case was all wilderness and confusion, and so were many others, but the transparent handling of salman khan's case should regain the trust of common man in the indian judiciary system. salman khan seems to be keen to knock the doors of higher courts as the next step, but i don't see anything dramatic to happen over there, so some amount of punishment for him looks like a certainty now. it should keep other celebrities on their toes and make them careful and alert about the consequences, before they even think about getting casual with the law of the land.

PVR Cinemas ain't that impressive

2006-02-04T20:31:00.000+05:30

whenever i used to pass through the Panjagutta X Roads, i would eagerly search for some kind of a board sign hung up somewhere over the Hyderabad Central Mall, announcing that PVR Cinemas are now open. the construction had been in progress for some time, and there weren't too many other multiplexes in the city(only one - Prasads) . one morning, when i read in the paper that it is finally open and playing three of the latest movies, i quickly searched if they are playing any of the watchable movies. there was Narnia, and that closed the deal for me.

God concurred with my wish to check out the multiplex that very day itself by cancelling my afternoon classes, which allowed me to run to the theater on a mere 20 min notice. recently opened theater meant tickets were available quite abundantly, but i suddenly felt a big hole forming in my pocket, with one ticket costing Rs.90. before someone who is not living in hyderabad starts frowning at me, let me add that the tickets here cost a maximum of Rs.35, only prasads charging more than that at Rs.60 per ticket(they have changed the rules: Rs.100 per ticket for the first two weeks of a movie release). i did not mind it though, hoping for a real return-of-value experience of watching the movie. but dampener straightaway: the theater being in a commercial complex, created a lot of problems for me to reach the fifth floor, after going round and round with no signs in sight, and with ill-placed moving stairs. 5 points deducted.

finally when i reached the correct place, i was welcomed by...a security personal? he checked me from top to bottom, before allowing me inside. i had to wait, as the cleaning work was in progress, which delayed the start of the show by 5 mins. i was already on a tight schedule - i had to get back in time for my evening classes. 5 more points deducted.

this was the moment i was waiting for...no worrying about the lost points...one breath-stopping visual from the blockbuster movie, with crystal clear sound effects, would make it all a part of the history. but wait...what is this? Nandi Awards? isn't the show already late to start? 5 more points deducted.

Finally. In the magical world of Narnia. One of my favourite fantasy series ever. the child actor immediately makes an impression, wins everyone's hearts. The girl, 'Lucy,' is the sole saving grace in the entire movie, apart from some innocent, rib tickling jokes. but we are digressing here...what about the visual quality, audio quality, and the ambience of the auditorium in general? everything was well below par. the visual quality, most important part of the movie watching experience according to many, was extremely disappointing. it was nowhere near the quality of Prasads. the screen height was longer than that of Prasads but the width was shorter. but importantly, the quality of projection was very poor. Prasads beats everyone hands down in this respect. sound was pathetic, as if i was watching a jarred, very old documentary that bore the brunt of more than a thousand prior screenings. the seats, though, were plush and comfortable. 20 more points deducted, 5 each for the above 3 points mentioned(if you are not getting your math right, 5 points have been secretly deducted for the outrageously priced menu, but let's that be a secret - i am not supposed to advertise my poverty here).

when i was just starting to suspect whether i have deducted too many points from PVR because of my own high expectations, i quickly discovered that i had been walking and walking and walking, but the exit path never seemed to be coming to an end. at last it did, but not before draining me out completely. there should have been a sign telling that atleast 5 gallons of fruit juice needs to be consumed before embarking on this seemingly never ending journey. do i need say more, 5 points deducted.

did i miss mentioning the cute end of the movie? the children come back to their uncle's home through the same wardrobe(through which they had left for Narnia), and exclaim to the professor that he wouldn't believe what they had been through if they tell him. the professor throws an object to them and challenges them: "Try Me!" And the credits roll.
5 more points deducted. (why? c'mon, after the terrible experience i have had, i don't need only legitimate reasons to deduct points from PVR Cinemas)

btw, did i remark that its website sucks big time too?!! try creating a new user on it and you will know what i am speaking about. in future, i might still visit this theater to watch an occasional movie - but only as a last resort.

Rang De Basanti: Colourful and Different

2006-02-01T13:57:00.000+05:30

Rand De Basanti is supposed to be a revolutionary cinema and at the same time it tries to be entertaining too. it succeeds on both the accounts to a certain extent. the message of the film is simple: for india to awaken to the present day reality, a DHAMAKA in some form is needed today, just as a dhamaka was needed for the msg of bhagat singh & co to reach the british rulers of that age.

the film includes a lot of scenes recapturing the pre-indepence era and you are gonna love the art work and the cinematography in those parts. the rest of the film is very colourfully picturised. the music is its another asset, but only a few songs are retained at thier full lengths in the film. "tu bin bataye" is the most beautiful song, and the scene just before this song is the best scene of the film. the comedy in the film is passable.

the surprise package of the film is sidhart!! if you have watched him in some of the tamil/telugu films, then watch him in this one. he has got the most important role in the film and he did not fail to give the best performance. if not for sidhart's special performance in this film, i wouldn't have blogged about this movie. now i have made up my mind to watch his latest telugu flick, "Chukkallo Chandrudu."

15 Park Avenue: Another Jewel from Aparna Sen

2006-01-11T11:35:00.000+05:30

for the first time, one gets to see a true picture about everything that is related to schizophrenia - not many films, either indian or foriegn, were able to present a real picture about it until now. filmmakers seemed to be more interested in the mystery that is associated with it rather than the actual truth. but Aparna Sen comes up with a gem of a movie that is very educative, but at the same time there is a strong story in it, ably backed up by some solid performances. She chose to be intelligent by selecting an engaging story line(spanning more than 15 years) for a subject like this; as a result, the film moves at a fast pace. performances are top class - lead by an able Shabaana Azmi, who proves once again that she is one of the best in the business. no one else could have given such a high voltage performance with such sensitivity - playing the caring sister of a schizophrenic patient. watch her changing the gears from a professor to a sister, from a daughter to a women growing old without finding any time for herself. Konkana Sen was not too far behind for her early days in the acting field. if she was appreciated in Mr and Mrs Iyer, Amu and Page 3, this is yet another feather in her cap. she possibly had the toughest of the characters to play and her achievement is in the fact that she never made it look so. Waheeda Rehman did far better than what i expect from the yester year actresses. just watch the scene where mithi, played by konkana, is being sent away to the hospital(after she develops suicidal symptoms) by her own family members. kanwaljit singh, rahul bose, shefali chaya and the guy who played the doctor also played their parts well. good performances and a tight script make the film very entertaining.

the USP about the film in my opinion is the amount of research that was done to make it, and the sensitive manner in which the crucial scenes in the film were handled. the way mithi hallucinates about various things and associates them with whatever she sees on the tv(she believes her (imaginary) husband works for saddam and gets really upset when the news shows that saddam is captured by bush govt). when her sister doesn't believe in something that she has to tell her, she shots back: "How would you feel if i were to tell you that you are not a professor and you are just hallucinating it all??" mithi's doctor once asks shabana what does she see on a side-by table and she replies that she can see a flower vase on it. doctor tells her that he sees a table lamp there and asks her to look at it carefully. when shabana confirms that its definitely a flower vase, the doctor asks what would she see, if hundred people gather around the table and claim it to be a table lamp? would she still be seeing a flower vase over there? ofcourse yes. so whose reality is more real for her? what she sees or what the hundred other people has to say? its the same thing with the shizophrenic patients too - they believe in what they see and feel in their minds and that's as much reality to them as are sunrise and the sunset for the rest of us.

i highly recommend this movie to everyone(just see the number of positive reviews this movie has got), if not in the theatres, atleast make sure to watch it on a vcd/dvd when they get released.

Ramblings related to Google

2005-12-31T21:16:00.000+05:30

the year end google Zeitgeist is here. hurricane katrina and tsunami are right there on the top; tells a lot about how a majority of the people live their lives today - we are still moved by the big tragedies that are taking place around the world. the news channels revisited the tsunami affected areas to see how people have fought back their fates and carried themselves ahead. the reports by TV channel CNN-IBN looked like the best researched ones.

5 of the top 10 searches on Froogle are related to ipod. seems everyone has been buying only ipods these days. did i commit a mistake by going for the creative player? don't forget to checkout the other sections on that page(accessible through the tabs at the top of the page). Google Zeitgeist re-affirms the fun of putting the statistics to good use :)

Google's official blog also has this interesting post about the method developed by an Indian organisation called PlanetRead "which provides automatic reading practice to individuals who are excluded from the traditional educational system, or whose literacy needs are otherwise not being met." it started with a thought from Mr. Brij Kothari that "‘ if they just put Hindi subtitles on Bollywood songs in Hindi, India would become literate.’" indeed putting the hindi subtitles in all the bollywood songs would help provide immense reading practice to a vast majority of children, what with so much of popularity of hindi songs in our country. its an interesting concept which has got high chances of producing the results IMHO. Full Story.

two nice blog posts around the new year eve, follow:

both are insightful and fun to read.

My favourite Top-10 films of the year: 2005

2005-12-29T18:14:00.000+05:30

it is that time of the year again when you look back at the just passed year with mixed feelings, and to feel positive about it, start compiling top ten lists from every possible field :) let me put the list of my top 10 fovourite films that i got to watch in 2005.

1. Bose - The Forgotten Hero : i had only watched 'Making of Mahatma' from Shyam Benegal's stable until then, that too when i was very young. i could not watch his other film 'Zubeida' but when i made sure that i am not going to miss Bose, i got much more than what i had expected. i had expected a slow, lengthy but factual biography of Bose - with a bit of dramatisation thrown in here and there. although i had complete faith about Shyam Benegal not making it too loud or too filmy like umpteen Bhagat Singh movies. instead, what i got was an extremely interesting, very unbiased take on Bose's life with minimum of the fact-file stuff of his life. as a first thing, there was no unnecessary Gandhi bashing in this film, as is the norm for every film made on indian heroes other than the Mahatma himself. Shyam Benegal succeeded in portraying Bose's character and his life in true spirit, without unnecessarily trying to make a hero out of him in every scene - Sachin khandekar providing him able support. i believe Bose's life in itself was heroic, you don't need to dramatise it to make it any larger. since then, i have been hunting for 'Making of Mahatma' in every video shop here, without any success until now.

2. Black: what can be said about this movie! it was a completely new experience for me, i had not watched this kind of a movie ever before. it had big points in Amitabh Bachan at his best and the wonder act by the child actor. i was surprised to see some people actually calling it a very 'loud' movie. someone not liking a movie is absolutely understandable, but criticising this movie to be extremely unreal and characters going overboard? this from the same people who vouch for movies like DDLJ!! they don't understand about the different abstraction levels at which the movies can be made - black had its own level of abstraction and it stood upto it brilliantly all through, without any exceptions in between. people complaining it to be a copy of another film should understand that, simply copying a film scene-by-scene does not make a brilliant movie. these two, SBC and Black, are right there on top of my all time favourite movies.

3. Page 3: kudos to Madhur Bhandarkar for making a successful script out of a not so usual theme. it was interesting, entertaining, as well as insightful at the same time. the fact that it was also a commercially successful film, takes it to the third position im my list.

4. Iqbal: i liked this movie very much. i am of the opinion that some people tended to give it more credit than what was required. if you are extremely happy about this movie and exaggerate the reviews, that seems perfectly fine. but some people want to pretend that they care for different cinema and go overboard in praise of it when they think that they have got their victim - this time in the form of 'Iqbal.' false praise was the last thing that this film deserved. the same thing happened with 'Gangajal' which was the most confused film i ever got to watch(followed by 'Apharan' by the same film-maker). the difference is, Gangajal is an ordinary film and Iqbal is an extremely beautiful film. i had only heard about Nagesh Kukunoor until then, but after watching the film, i too became one of his ardent admirers. i won't be missing any of his films in the future, however small budgeted films they may be.

5. Swades: this was a film which would definitely disappoint more than it would satisfy you. that's because it was such a wonderful film, yet it could have been so much better. i don't mind the length of the movie. i don't mind if Shahrukh Khan doesn't wear designer clothes. i don't mind if the lead actress of the movie can't act. i don't mind if only 60% of the film is entertaining. but i still believe that Swades could have been much better. the message was unclear, and even then, it was not emphatically expressed(what was Mohan Bhargav in Ashutosh's mind - positive, ideal character worthy to be emulated? what did he meant by "there is a Mohan Bhargav in every one of us?"). Swades was well researched and Ashutosh Gowarkiar dared a few things with it(ridiculing the usual 'bharateeya parampara' philosophy that most indians take cover behind whenever its economy is challenged) which only he could have. it proved that Shahrukh can actually act, if given an oppurtunity.

6. Parineeta: how many times do we make a film based on an original fictional work (of indian origin)? Paheli was flawed, an ordinary attempt at best, and Devdas was utter crap. Parieeta scored because it was not too bad, rather than being too good. the music and the visuals were top class. literally anyone in place of Saif would have earned more points for it.

7. Aa Naluguru(telugu): the same description of 'Virudh' applies to this film too: it couldn't have been made in any other way. there were 20 members in the theatre, including me, when i went to watch this film. but later, it went on do much better . it had lots of positives, and once again it was a sort of dream project for the film-maker, so no compromises were made here too. Rajendra Prasad proved what a versatile actor he is - he was the sole reason why this movie makes into my top 10.

8. Premiste(telugu/tamil): this was a simple film made from the very bottom of the heart by the film director Balaji Sakthivel. i enjoyed watching it and wouldn't mind watching it again. i have already written about it here, so won't waste anymore words on it (than this!).

9. Virudh: this was an honest attempt proving a liability on the audience's patience. Mahesh Manjraker tried to be very honest, and though his intentions were good, even the execution, it was never a movie material in the first place. similar to 'Dev' this should not have been a full-length feature film at all. its a winner for me because Manjraker did what he wanted to with it, without any compromises. it is the decision of making this as a film that i do not quite agree with, but once the choice was made, it couldn't have been made in any other way. and he dared to make it that way.

10. Main aisa hi hoon: this is another flawed film that i liked very much. the story was good, not expected by me, as it ends on a positive note with a twist. Ajay Devagan did a fabulous job here, doing what he has been doing all these years - giving a controlled performance. i appreciate what Hrithik Roshan did in 'Koi Milgaya...' but any day i would prefer Ajay's portrayal of this character over that of Hrithik's in KMG. it takes extreme amount of talent, understanding as well as courage to give such a controlled performance of such a volatile character. not too many high points, but the movie on the whole was quite engaging.

the other movies which i was dying to watch but couldn't, as they never got released in the theatres at my place, are:

Matrubhoomi
Khamosh Paani
Hazaaron Khwahishien Aisi
Black Friday
Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Maara
Sehar - this was released in the theatres here, but i still missed it :(

but i got these films from the other sources and plan to watch them ASAP. i am sure atleast the top five would have made it to my top 10, if only i had managed to watch them this year :(

From the short films, i can choose the following three as my favourites:
Me, Meera by Subhakar
Girni by Umesh Kulkarni
The Loser by Sini

i have written about them here and here.

as is evident from the list, i have excluded the films in English and other languages and considered films in only Hindi or Telugu languages.

Pawar Job: strange to see this from a politician

2005-12-25T19:49:00.000+05:30

everything seems to be getting a bit clearer with the latest developments in the cricketing world. for the first time, Saurav Ganguly did the correct thing by directly pleading his case with BCCI head Mr. Sharad Pawar. he was also lucky that he found an able and willing taskmaster in the form of Mr. Pawar, who did the obvious thing that should have been done long back: talking to the senior players from the indian cricket team. since the very beginning, saurav's sacking-then-inclusion-then-sacking-again play was going on not based on the performance reasons alone. it was a sordid affair so far.
it all started with the unease between Greg Chappell and Saurav Ganguly. now to get to the truth, one needed to talk to the third parties, as any one of greg and saurav could have been lying. support staff, manager of the team etc could have been talked to in this regard, and then there were players themselves. if someone raises a point that the manager can take the side of whoever is more friendly to him, then i can understand the concern. but i am sure that the players don't have any reason to take the sides(atleast not the players like rahul, sachin and anil) and even in the rare case where they might, it doesn't matter. there is no reason for the person(coach or a player) whom the rest of the players back to be removed from the team for the reason of 'not gelling well with the team.' When mr. pawar met and talked to the senior players about all the accusations that were levelled against saurav which, until now, believed to be true what with the media coverage it succeeded to attract, and when finally he confirmed to the media and the pulic that there is no truth in those accusations, it only seemed that justice has been done to a player who had not been treated well by anyone in the recent past - whatever may have been his other shortcomings during the same period. the board(could have investigated the matter more earnestly when the uneasiness first arose), the selectors(could have avoided the politics in the selection process), the media, and perhaps even the senior players from the indian team itself, have all wronged saurav to some or the other extent. he should be a relieved person now, for atleast people who were genuinely interested in seeking the truth in the whole controversy that was created, should now see a pattern emerging out of it all- a pattern that suggests that some accusations levelled against saurav were after all baseless. for the rest its either like "we don't believe in anything that supports saurav even if vowed by the God himself" or like "we have always known that saurav can do no wrong, he is an unblemished person."

Shortcuts Mini Film Festival - Nov05 & Dec05

2005-12-25T13:46:00.000+05:30

five films were screened in the latest edition(december) of the ShortCuts Monthly Mini Festival. two of these five films were made by the same film-maker Ajita Suchitraveera: "Notes on her" and "The Solitary Sandpiper." Both the films had extremely good background score and 'The Solitary Sandpiper' was an extravaganza of rich visuals; every shot in the movie looked so beautiful and so captivating that you won't let even a single frame to miss out. it was a treat to watch.

if you can't quite understand the title ".tibbar" then you can try reading it in the reverse direction. that is how the entire film actually runs: in the reverse direction! which means it starts at the end, and ends in the beginning, explaining the rational behind the title. if you think its really an innovative way of shooting a film, then you are not too far off the mark - it has won more awards than you can count on your fingers. it depicts the cruelty with which the rabbits are treated in rabbit breeding farms(not intentionally according to the film maker), which is not too different from what we do here in our poultry farms.

"I couldn't be your son, mom" is a documentary by the famed pair of Budhadeb Dasgupta and Sohini Dasgupta. good documentary. Sachin Kundalkar, on the other hand, has chosen to do the exact oppsite by preferring to make a fictional film instead of the (offered) documentary project, with "The Bath." generally, not many people opt to travel some distance to sit out and watch 4-5 short films on very unusual subjects for close to three hours time. but those who do manage to come, suffer with a bit of superiority complex, with a feeling that they are some kind of 'uber geeks.' well, not all those who come...but some. like the few, who even after being told by Sachin that his film had got no real messages in it, were repeatedly asking questions like "what was the hidden message in so and so," or "what was fish swimming in the acquarium meant to convey to the audience?" or "was there any special meaning behind the conclusion of the film," etc. If you found the questions amusing, then just think about the plight of the film-maker who had already made it very clear that the film has just tried to show a (fictional) day from the life of the main character of the film, and nothing else.

ShortCuts Mini Festival - November Edition

why do i look so angry about it? because the same thing happened with Ajita, and the same thing happened last month with jyoti patil too. four films were screened in the last month's edition of ShortCuts. there was this interesting documentary on bootlegging where the film-maker Jyoti Patil had not just done a very good job with her research(in my opinion), but she also looked to have strived hard to understand the root cause of it all - and succeeded. but most of the distinguished audience in the hall did not just seemed to have failed to pick the real message of the documentary, but they also refused to care for the explanation that jyoti was trying to provide during the talk at the end of the screening. what jyoti was trying to tell was, the liquor that most of the poorest classes of the society produces is termed illegal even while the liquor is allowed to be produced by many other(higher class) sections of the same society - including the government. now, one of the viewers was suggesting that they should try to find an alternative way of earning their livelihood instead of the bootlegging, and was justifying the ban on the liquor production because of health hazards associated with it. whereas what jyoti was trying to say is, when others are allowed to produce the liquor, then why not these poor creatures too? why discrimination? and if it is posing a health hazard for the others, then the correct solution would be to apply the same quality control measures to it that are being applied to the rest of the liquor production. there is no logic in having one set of rules for the higher classes and another for the lower classes. the audiences kept nagging jyoti with questions like "they can sell 'papad' instead, as was shown in the film" etc. i really pitied jyoti at that time.

"The Loser" was a small and beautiful film showing the relationship of a mother and a son with utmost sensitivity. the film touched everyone's hearts, and had a nice concept that was deftly executed.

"In the morning" by Danielle Lurie is about honor killings and is based on a true story. its the truth of the gory practice that strikes you the most. its about the practice of killing someone with the intention of getting back the lost honor of a family. when the daughter of a family is brutally raped by a youngster, the job of 'honor killing' is assigned to the youngest son of that family, so that he can get away with the minimum punishment from the law. it is only at the very end of the film where one discovers that its the daughter who is actually killed in the name of 'honor killing' and not the youngster who had committed the offence in the first place. classic case of punishment being meted out to the victim. its still practiced in many countries all around the world.

the mini festival which was open to all until now, turns subscription based from the next month. details are here

'Premiste' is definitely worth a watch

2005-12-17T17:27:00.000+05:30

the makers of the film 'Kadhal/Premiste' claim it to be based on a true story...and i feel the best tribute to this true story is the realistic treatment given to the film. for once, the school-girl looks like a school-girl and a mechanic looks like a mechanic, the two being the lead protagonists of the film not helping their cause. one of the very first scenes of the film where all the students of the school gather in the school-ground at the end of the school session makes a huge impression right away. the images of a 'hero' or a 'heroine' are left far away when we get to see the two leading characters of this film and still they successfully carry the film on their shoulders with equal ease. but full credit to the director to make a whole hearted effort behind this seemingly simple enough, done-to-death plot of teenage love story(well, they look like teenagers in this film; for a change, 'teenagers = super duds in skimpy clothes' is not true). he never lets it divert from the utmost simplicity of the real life like sequences, still(because of?) it holds the interest of the audiences through out. the climax may dampen the spirits of some, but it was the harsh reality of the real story that prompted the director to make the film in the first place.

whenever i ridiculed everyone of shahrukh khan brand of films(DDLJ, Mohabbatein, KKHH, KKKG, KNPH etc), people used to tell me that i don't have a taste for the love stories. well this one is surely one of the better films and it can be categorised as a love story. it ought to be put in the proper context.

the best part of the film is the stay of the boy and the girl at chennai for a couple of days. most importantly, the feel of that phase of their lives was very accurately portrayed. one of the reviewers termed the film to be a bit disturbing in the second half, but i found no such problems with it. i don't know what was in the mind of the reviewer, and if it was the climax, then its justified to some extent. most of the second half otherwise is quite entertaining - the boy and the girl going through all the travails that are expected to come their way is well picturised. infact, the two fighting it out courageously and without too many complaints was the best thing to show from the director's point of view.

it would be difficult to rate the performances of the actors as everyone in the film just looked to be the characters and not actors portraying some character. Bharat is said to have done a de-glamourised role, which i couldn't really observe as i have not seen him before, and one reviewer was impressed by Sandhya's natural adolescent magnetism and here i can't completely disagree with him. The child actor Arun Kumar as the aide of Bharat is extremely likeable. in fact, my favourite scene from the film is when bharat leaves him forever. the film has couple of good songs and others are passable. Tamil film industry is really rich when it comes to some quality films and it matches and surpasses the quality of american films easily in my opinion. it just misses out on the (quantity + quality) factor. but who is complaining?
those who have not watched it yet, head straight to the theatre and give it a shot. after watching the film, you won't believe that it is produced by Shankar :)

Selectors are truly a bunch of jokers

2005-12-15T13:35:00.000+05:30

It seems that BCCI has got a lot of bonhomie for the well being of the indian media, as they never fail short of providing a new controversy for them to feed on every now and then. look from whatever angle, the entire handling of Saurav issue goes only to show the complete incompetence of the selection committee. they drop Zaheer Khan, who is performing way better than Ajit Agarkar, by replacing him with, who, Saurav Ganguly! we are not supposed to laugh at it. now that Saurav is dropped, where is Zaheer Khan? what is the logic behind replacing Zaheer Khan, the bowler, with Saurav Ganguly, the 'allrounder' and then replacing Saurav Ganguly, the middle order batsman, with Wasim Jaffer, the opening batsman, when we already have two opening batsmen in Gautam Gambhir and Virender Sehwag?
Kiran More says that Saurav was dropped because the selectors want to 'look ahead.' what changed their approach in a span of a week or two? why weren't they 'looking ahead' when selecting Saurav for the first two tests? unfortunately, atleast saurav's performance in the second Test didn't give them too many reasons to think differently. only politics did.

what the selectors should have done is:

Do not select Saurav Ganguly for the first Test. No controversies whatsoever.
Make it clear to Saurav that only a double century or something like that will allow him to retain his place in the team. Or just tell him that the second Test against the Sri Lanka is going to be his last, whatever his performance in it. He deserved a standing ovation in his last Test, especially after a decent performance in a low scoring match.
Pick him in the third test a final time and tell him that it would be his last Test.

none of these was done, and the selection committee has once again managed to come up with one of the worst ways to handle the issue by sacking Saurav from the Indian Test team in the way a kid is sacked from the school team. when you decide that there is no place for a senior player in the team, one who has done so much for the team, you execute it in a dignified manner. it was the same case with Anil Kumble(for ODIs), nothing has changed for Saurav Gagnuly. there are no two opinions on this occassion: Saurav deserved much better.

Do you miss the Internet?

2005-12-14T22:12:00.000+05:30

so what happens when you relocate to a different place? well, you lose your internet connection.

when one of my friends blogged about this humourous video clip, i laughed and laughed and laughed at it. what did i know that i would be one such victim in a few days time. when i moved to a different house this time, what i lost was more than just the familiar surroundings - The Internet. I got the WorldSpace radio the same day and the cable tv connection on the very next day. I could have lived forever without them. But Internet? i lived without it for more than a week and it reminded me of just that video clip again and again.

what else troubles me whenever i move to a different place? just one thing: books. while buying books, i or my brother never give a thought as to just how many books we are amassing in the process. we are reminded of it only in situations like this. now imagine, the whole belongings put together comes no where near the total collection of books that i possess. how can i manage to pack them and move them without expert help? i tried it last time and i tried it this time. i got into real problems especially this time, for they were a lot more this time around. i got all the cartons that i can get hold of from every grocery shop near me. they were not sufficient, so i got this brilliant idea of buying a few polythene carry bag packs, but the two supermarkets in my area ran out of them before fully accomodating for my books. i then took a cue from a known book distributor: started tying the books using, what do we call these rope like things made of plastic or cloth? the labourers too were cursing the book packs silently, which was understandable, as lifting 29'' TV was much simpler for them than lifting one carton full of books. how is paper heavier than metal? because the paper is packed more densely?

But i am back to Internet. And back to life.

Rahul's revenge with the Kolkata crowd - Rahul's way

2005-11-29T12:55:00.000+05:30

I love to watch Saurav play when he is in full flow. well, who doesn't? he hasn't been at his peak form in the past few months and eventually got sacked from the team by the indian selectors. many supporters of Saurav may feel disappointed about it but the decision cannot be called too unfair. at the same time, over-criticism of Saurav is also unfair; as he was the second highest run aggregator in the previous calendar year, he scored 80 against pakistan and two fighting 90s against England under extremely difficult conditions, faced Shane Bond with a lot of steel in the recent final against New Zealand, scored a century against Zimbabwe(which only Dravid and Laxman could do) etc. he may not deserve a place in the playing eleven but he was not as horribly bad as is now being made out of him by some. but still, feeling disappointed is one thing and taking out processions, burning effigies and booing the indian cricket team is going one step too far. we indians take cricket too seriously and forget that its just a game. nobody has died even if Saurav is excluded from the team unjustifiably. so the alleged show of displeasure by (part of) the kolkata crowd in the recent ODI was in bad taste. they reportedly booed the indian fielders on the boundary lines and did not spare even the indian coach Greg Chappel. more worse was the way the kolkata pitch was prepared by the curator: he clearly wanted to show the demons in the form of the pitch to the indian batsman as a revenge for the treatment meted out to their local hero - Saurav. this might have happened for the first time in the history of cricket, where one player has taken importance over the entire team and its victories. that was shameful for everyone. but the indian team was absolutely quite about it all. Rahul infact praised the kolkata crowd before the match and did not complain anything after it. but he had his own way of replying to them - the sober style. after the mumbai match was over, rahul removed his helmet, placed it on the ground, and clapped with both the hands as a gesture to thank the mumbai crowd for their excellent support throughout. that was more gentleman-like(in contrast to what Greg did earlie r and went on to deny it - how can someone respect a person like him??) and a fitting reply to the kolkata crowd's behaviour. Rahul is a thinking cricketer/person and I like him.

now that india has drawn the series by winnning the last one day match at mumbai, the media can start pouring unrestricted accolades over the champion of it all: Greg Chappell. whenever india did well in the past, nobody used to credit a big share of it to the then coach John Wright. things have changed since then, and Greg has got enough charisma and media adulation that more than 60% of the credit is always given to him. think what would have happened if india were to reach the world cup finals under him!! he might have been awarded the kingdomship of a part of our country, provided that was legal.

Changing face of the Indian Television

2005-11-23T12:11:00.000+05:30

The recent addition of new programmes on most of the tv channels was a pleasant surprise to me...and it goes on to prove that the humanity evolves in round circles. the best time for indian television has been the 1980s, when some high quality serials(Udaan, Buniyaad, Nukkad, Yeh jo hai zindagi etc) were created by those who were passionate about their work. they believed that quality serials automatically mean sufficient amount of viewership. the equation was completely reversed during the past 5-6 years when, lower the quality of the serial, higher the moolah it was supposed to generate. past few years have seen the kind of serials which were low in quality, low on morality, low in entertainment value and low in everything else, but abundant in stupidity. these were the serials which banked on the foolishness of the audience and successfully made a mockery of the intelligence of the entire Indian TV viewership for a long period. when the makers of such dumb serials were confronted at odd occassions by a saner mind, they shamelessly hid themselves behind the silly argument of 'we give what the audiences ask for.' exactly how they measured up what the audiences wanted is a mistery today, because just one year after the release of 'Star One' channel, which boasted of reasonably good quality serials in its schedule, every other channel is going through a complete transformation today.

'Star One' swept away with most of the awards from this years' Telly Awards. what were these channels talking about when they said that its the market forces that compel them to create such crap tv shows? Today, 'Sony' is making its earning mostly through the reality shows. 'Star Plus' is banking on KBC-II and at the same time trying to think new. 'Zee' has introduced some new serials as well with nice and fresh themes, like 'Mum, Tum aur Hum', 'Kaboom', etc. 'Star One' has finally forced the others to play the game fairly: to open their eyes to the reality and return the lost respectability of the intellect of the Indian viewership. today i switch on the television not just to watch cricket and news as earlier, but also for catching up with my favourite serials. me watching soaps on the television, that was unbelievable two years ago!! here are my favourite shows on the telly:

Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2005 - by far the best serial on TV today. i make the time to watch this one. ultimate pleasure to watch(or hear?) it.
Siddhant - the only other tv serial that makes me feel disappointed if i were to miss it. Anuradh Prasad weaved her magic once again.
The Great Indian Laughter Champions - Ehsaan Khureshi! the name itself evokes laughter!!
Kaun Banega Crorepati (Dweetiya?) - whose list can miss this one out?

But most importantly, other ones are not too bad. i don't have to jump to a different channel as soon as i accidentally get to a Sony or a Star Plus or a Zee channel. i can catch up a bit of "India Idol" and "Deal ya No Deal" on Sony, "Nach Baliye" on Star One, "Mum Tum aur Hum" on Star Plus and even "Rabba Ishq Na Hove" on Zee channel. Good times are here for the TV viewers. Finally. I hope it lasts atleast another 5 years before another (inevitable?) turn around.

Know yourself: A Simple Test

2005-11-23T11:21:00.000+05:30

i am no great believer of these kind of tests, but it is fun. Go here and answer some straight-forward questions(be honest and accurate) to get back some 'instrospectives' at the end of it, in terms of 'Big Five' personality model. For eg., i got this:

Extroversion	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	44%
Orderliness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	68%
Emotional Stability	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	82%
Accommodation	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	50%
Inquisitiveness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	70%

The Big Five is currently the most accepted personality model in the scientific community. The Big Five emerged from the work of multiple independent scientists/researchers starting in the 1950s who using different techniques obtained similar results. Those results were that there are five distinct personality traits/dimensions. Here are your results on each dimension:

Extroversion results were moderately low which suggests you are reclusive, quiet, unassertive, and private.

Orderliness results were moderately high which suggests you are, at times, overly organized, neat, structured and restrained at the expense too often of flexibility, variety, spontaneity, and fun.

Emotional Stability results were high which suggests you are very relaxed, calm, secure, and optimistic.

Accommodation results were medium which suggests you are moderately kind natured, trusting, and helpful while still maintaining your own interests.

Inquisitiveness results were high which suggests you are very intellectual, curious, imaginative but possibly not very practical.

'Harry Potter GOF' is a children's film no more

2005-11-22T19:46:00.000+05:30

i am not sure if its good or a bad news : 'Harry Potter' movies have taken the final step with 'Goblet of Fire' for not being a fun movie for children anymore. the makers of this edition of 'Harry Potter' might have believed that the market of adult viewers is greated than that of the children. but there was no necessity to kill the beautiful(and occasionally scary), imaginative world of 'Harry Potter.' they could have opted for some other subject. infact, the rating requires that under 13 year kids be accompanied by an adult! can you believe it!! and we were thinking the potter world is the sole property of the children.
i tend to give more points to those films which have a good background score, and 'Goblet of Fire' is one among them. The background score of this edition is some degrees better than the earlier ones(including COS). but alas, the film as a whole doesn't make any impression on the viewers. when you come out of the theatre, you just remember some well shot sequences and that's all. the best one was the harry's duel with the dragon during the first task of Tri-wizard tournament.
IMO, the highlights of the book have been the following, and i was particularly excited about watching them before going to the movie:

Quiditch World Cup!! do i need say more!

The three tasks of Tri-wizard tournament, especially the first one.

Rita Skeeter! (she was terribly under-utilised in the movie)

Yule Ball(needed sophistication and grandeur; the film lacked both. there is a discotheque-style dance in the end!)

Ralph Fienes

Fine, agreed that the last one was not part of the book, but i was really excited to see what magic Ralph Fienes, one of my favourite actors after 'The English Patient', could put into Lord Voldemort's character. boy, did he look funny! worst thing in the movie, inarguably, was the pathetic way in which the first ever rendezvous of voldemort with the audience was handled. he was supposed to look ugly, real ugly, and was supposed to create that sickening feeling among the audience that we witnessed in the book. that's what voldemort is all about. alas, he never looked like threatening, let alone scaring the hell out of the audience. he infact looked very healthy and handsome and Ralph has just read out the lines that were given to him, that too, in his usual boring tone(not in whispers i mean). but his transformation into human form near the climax (and that of Prof. Moody to Crouch Jr ) was well shot. other well shot scenes include the arrival of two other schools for participation of Triwizard tournament and the final task in the maze before the climax.

Now for the next biggest disappointment: Quiditch world cup. it looked grand...for a moment it commanded every bit of my attention...i was just collecting myself for a real treat here...the few seconds were shot with so much grandiose! but that was it. it hardly lasted a few seconds and it was all over by then. the actual competition between the two teams is not shown. that alone was sufficient to put me off. but more importantly, the spirit of the potter book was murdered again and again through out the rest of the movie. you don't feel for harry and ron when they have a fight with each other, the role of yule ball in the personal lives of harry, ron and hermione isn't handled well, the return of voldemort doesn't terrorise you, and the usual conversations between the hogwarts students, that generally evokes so much laughter, is completely sidelined. you won't find a single emotion in the whole movie; just the special effects. the magic of potter movies is sorely lacking in the latest edition. moreover, the movie looked like being shot with extremely low budget...the usual grandeur was missing, and one got to see very ordinary costumes and rusty locations. maybe it was a conscious decision to give it a very earthy and an ancient(medieval?) look.

like all Potter movies, you ought to watch it atleast once - if only for the riveting duel with the dragon(or harry shaking a leg with parvati patil, if you are an indian). but go with very low expectations, because you are not going to find the usual 'magic' associated with the potter books, and until now, to some extent, with potter movies.

NDTV's 'Big Fight' on Khusboo issue

2005-11-21T13:42:00.000+05:30

i find it ridiculously outrageous to find ONLY women being targeted by the people, who have so conveniently adopted 'moral policing' as their favourite pastime. NDTV 24x7 yesterday revisited the Khusboo controversy and to my delight, N.Ram(Editor of 'The Hindu') was also present. He attended the debate session in itself is a sign as to how much frustration this whole fiasco has generated in India. once again, just an expression of one's personal opinion about something has invited so much wrath from the others...just goes on to show the magnitude of intolerance among us. why should one bother so much about what someone's personal opinions about something are? what is so outrageous about a person being OK with pre-marital sex? even if it is assumed that she has crossed the line, is this the proper way to respond to it? condemning it in itself sounds very foolish(countering it is absolutely fine, everybody has got a right to present a counter-view), but what followed was completely ridiculous. more than 15 cases had been registered against her in the courts, various threats were sent and she was forced to tend an apology!! apology for what? prosecuting for what offence? now this was completely unaccebtable; you don't hijack the personal life of someone for such a silly reason. people who are doing all this should be ashamed of themselves. if you really seriously think that khusboo has committed a serious offence, then taking her to the courts should have been sufficient. why threaten her with her life, burn her effigies, take out processions against her and turn her life into hell overnight? even terrorists have relatively calm prosecutions.

isn't this all happening because all moral policing in our country is solely dedicated towards the women community and khusboo is a woman? why is the culture of our country so intricately woven only with the women community? where were the so called saviours of the culture when a school-going girl was raped by a constable on duty? but that should not affect the culture of ours because the offence was done by a male, which effectively turns it into a law-and-order problem rather than affecting the culture, and it was committed against a woman, which infact makes it cease to be even a serious law-and-order problem. where as every act of a woman is closely scrutinised with microscopes and all kinds of threats are used against those who fail to understand the rules set out for them by the 'society'. what is worse is that no political party is ready to defend her and assure her of safety(Left has just spoken in her support) and AFAIK no major organisation is supporting her(except the national women's organisation) in her present crisis.

N.Ram was right on the money when he concluded by saying that the only thing to come out of it all is the exposure of the 'intolerance' of a section of our society(he has also written a thought-provoking editorial on the same issue two days ago). as a pleasant surprise, it was a rare occasion when almost everyone finally accepted to atleast condemn the uncivilised behaviour against khusboo. except a middle-aged woman, that is; who believed that using the word 'culture' 10 times in a 15 word sentence would provide a lot of credibility to her argument(whoever said that the biggest enemy of a woman is another woman!!).

if what khusboo spoke should not have really been spoken, then the proper thing to do is to form a consensus on such matters and force the legislation to make a law barring people(or only 'women' as they would like to prefer) from airing such views. then we can collectively celebrate the ignominiousness of the entire civilisation of ours with out any discriminations.

Praising Rahul Dravid

2005-11-20T13:07:00.000+05:30

I have been a huge admirer of Rahul Dravid since very long now, so much so that i have always counted him as the best batsman in the Test cricket arena, giving Sachin the crown only for the one-day variety of the game. But the praises showered on Rahul Dravid these days is bordering on stupidity and i see yet another making of a scape goat ableit for the far future. As soon as Sehwag takes a wicket(1st ODI vs Sri Lanka) in his very first over, Ravi Shastri comments that Rahul is 'The Right Captain' for India because Saurav had always under-utilized the part-time bowlers. Maybe true. But what makes Mr. Shastri believe that Rahul is going to use them more in his tenure as the captain? it was just the first over of the very first non-regular bowler!! why can't he wait another 2-3 years and then make the comment when he might have sufficient basis to make it? he refuses to act smarter. and so does so many others. forget about the general Indian fans and the media. Indian coach Greg Chappell just declared that 'Dravid will become the best captain for India.' why speculate? what are Dravid's achievements as a captain in his short tenure so far when compared to Pataudi, Azharauddin, or Saurav to name just a few? he may indeed surpass them all in time to come, and being an admirer of Rahul Dravid as a player as well as a person, i can only wish that he indeed does so. who won't be happy for that? but why speculate now, when he is barely in his second series as a (permanent) captain? this is not smart stuff at all. over-praising or pampering may not be undesirable, but praising for wrong and absolutely ridiculous reasons definitely is.

Flock - New kid (web browser) on the block

2005-11-18T14:09:00.000+05:30

Flock is a FireFox based web browser with more emphasis on social networking . almost a month old, it is still in the developer preview stage, so use it only to test out its features and not as a sole web browser on your system(unless you are an adventurous type). it might crash once in a while and it has a bigger footprint on system's resources than firefox. but that is because of the following additional features:

Better management of Favourites - using Collections to store related web pages, Tags to label the favourite web pages and Favourites Star Button to quickly bookmark a web page(see next)

Direct integration with de.licio.us - removes the only limitation of de.licio.us - the time it used to take to bookmark something. you can still add tags to the bookmarks but with just a single click now. Just click the Star button near the adress bar or click the down arrow of the Star button and select "Star and Tag this page."

Good support for RSS feeds. Whenever you visit a webpage that contains RSS feed urls, you can switch to 'RSS View' that shows you the feeds available on that web page. Click 'Feeds' button that is displayed in the address bar to switch view.

Blog away from with in the browser - compose, drag-n-drop stuff and post to most popular blogging services, from the web browser itself. best thing i found is that you can manage multiple blog accounts in it. Use View->Top Bar->Blog Topbar. see the image.

Integrated support for flickr. If you are a flickr user, then you can share photos using a flickr account from within the Flock web browser using View->Top Bar->flickr photos.

Currently it doesn't import anything from existing web browsers(Firefox, IE on windows), but may support it in the future. still at a very nascent stage, might offer a good alternative to the existing web browsers in the future. to keep a tab on the development of Flock, go here.

Most of the rest of the things are similar to Firefox - you can download new themes and extensions if you don't like the default look etc. If you use de.licio.us, flickr and blogging a lot, then you must check out Flock(btw, there is a lot of hype going around regarding this web browser...claimed as the next 'big' revolution on the internet...don't give in to that...just see what conviniences it provides to you and whether you would buy them or not). Some links should help:
http://rss.weblogsinc.com/entry/1234000590064493/
http://www.techcrunch.com/2005/08/26/flock-social-browsing-is-cool/
http://www.flock.com/fiveways/togetstarted/13.php

Remote control Winamp from your mobile phone

2005-11-18T01:02:00.000+05:30

i had long wished to test out the application Bemused which allows one to control the Winamp media player remotely using one's mobile device(atleast series 60 and UIQ devices, see below). yesterday i did it. except the connection part, everything else is a breeze on windows. the server provided for gnu/linux OS, which controls the XMMS media player, did not compile on my system - will give it another try sometime.

here is how bemused can be used for Windows OS. first download the entire package from sourceforge.net for your preferred platform. the package contains a README file with detailed instructions about how to use it.

this is what i did to get it working on my Nokia 3660 mobile phone. i first installed the bemused.sis file on the mobile device using Nokia PC Suite. this is the bemused client that runs on the mobile device and sends requests to the PC. then i executed the BemusedServer.exe file on Windows OS(which is the bemused server and needs to be executed on the PC to recieve the instructions from the client running on the mobile phone). entered some basic info in the startup wizard, like the location of songs on my hard disk, location of the Winamp executable and the COM port to listen on for the incoming requests from the bemused client. after entering this information(COM port can be left blank for now, if it is not known), a new .ini file was created in the current directory with all the information stored in it.
in the main window, i first tried auto detection of the COM port(by clicking 'Find') but it failed. I knew COM4 is used to establish a connection between my 3660 and the PC Suite, so i tried that next. i got the error that the COM port is already in use. I then tried with the next COM port available - COM5. the server successfully bound to COM5 and started listening on it. now i needed to connect to COM5 from the bemused client on my mobile device.

from the mobile device, i launched the bemused client, which has the icon of a musical note, and selected Options->Refresh List. I got the error that "maximum bluetooth connections are already in use." after a lot of attempts using trial and error, i got it working this way. the mobile device for some reason was allowing only one bluetooth connection, and that was already in use with Nokia PC Suite. so i closed PC Suite, disconnected the mobile phone from COM4(using the bluetooth driver interface), tried to access the server from the mobile phone, and noted down the COM port on which it is sending the requests. my bluetooth driver interface flashed a message saying "connection request recieved on COM7." so i closed the bemused server, closed the bemused client on the mobile device, restarted the bemused server, bound it to COM7 this time, and finally, started the bemused client on 3660. the client got connected to the server, downloaded the playlist and was ready to be used as 'remote control' for the Winamp player. when i played some songs, the player was automatically started on my PC by the server and i could see all the albums and their songs on my 3660. the interface looks nice and is very easy to use( additional skins are available through author's website or - google). how to bind to a specific COM port depends on bluetooth adapter in use and instructions are present in the README file for WIDCOMM drivers. here are some pics to give you more idea.

Bemused started as a way to remotely control the Winamp media player, but today it is a general client-server framework to control many applications. you can see some examples on the author's website. It has also been ported to many mobile device architectures: google 'bemused' for your architecture to see if your mobile device is supported or not (yet). For gnu/linux users, this article might be helpful(note:most of the links on the page are broken).

Mini Anthikad-Chibber's take on "Me, Meera"

2005-11-14T14:26:00.000+05:30

Mini Anthikad-Chibber writes about the short film(59 mins) Me, Meera in the daily paper 'The Hindu.' I had earlier written that it is one of my favourite short films so far. Mini sees it as "random thoughts of a hyderabadi jotted down that has taken a celluloid shape." very true indeed. it never aspires to be extra-vagant, yet it leaves a strong impression on you by the time the film comes to an end. Mini writes about the journey taken by Meera, the main protagonist in the film, thus: "As she walks, landmarks appear and there is Meera's take on stuff that is intrinsically hyderabadi - from the Irani cafes to Best Book Center, pubs and Charminar to the hoardings, fairness cream ads to Babukhan Estates and the countless malls." She can remember quite a few things from the movie! She adds, "There is an amusing encounter with a poet at an Irani cafe and another with a Romeo at the MMTS station." The "amusing" encounter with the poet was the only thing that seemed a bit overstretched in time in my opinion but it ends thus:

Meera: paanch hi minute mein pyaar hogaya mujhse?
Poet: paanch minute mein nahin hua to woh pyar kaisa?

and at the MMTS:
Meera to the Romeo: If you want to ask a lady out, then ask. Don't stare.

regarding the pretty long 59 mins of time for a short movie, subhakar(director of the film) says "I just made the film without an eye on festivals. I look the film as a first scratch, like my portfolio." i like the honesty about his film making. The movie was said to be shot in over 100 locations, 10 youngsters helping him out and with a budget of Rs.85,000(~USD 2000). Any die-hard hyderabadi fan ought to see this movie - given any chance comes their way to watch it.

Update: Mr. Subhakar corrects me that "Mini" is 'she' and not 'he'. thanks to him :)

Funny Field Placement for Dhoni

2005-11-12T11:51:00.000+05:30

This is the field placement that is suggested by 'Sportstar' sports magazine of India for Mahendra Singh Dhoni. After the blistering 183* against sri lanka with 10 cracking sixes, the suggestion doesn't just look apt but also sensible - why waste the fielders inside the boundary line when he is able hit the ball out of the ground at his will? As Sportstar puts it, "The better thing for them[fielders] would be to relax on their lounge chairs outside the boundary and wave a white flag."

Launch of 'The National Portal of India'

2005-11-10T22:27:00.000+05:30

Thiru. Dayanidhi Maran, Hon'ble Minister of India, officially launched the national portal of India - india.gov.in at 3:00 pm today and dedicated it to the citizens of India.

It is needlessly heavy in the use of the images, but has got some good content in it and is way better than the other (indian) government related websites that i have seen. for example, navigation is extremely good and no part of the webiste (that i have come across) is broken. except for the home page, the other pages are light on the bandwidth. hope the website is maintained well and doesn't remain the same as it's created for all its life.

From the website : "This is the National Portal of the India, developed with an objective to enable a single window access to information and services being provided by the various Indian Government entities."

PCQuest talks to legal expert: Gaurav Sabnis vs IIPM

2005-11-10T19:40:00.000+05:30

PCQuest talked to Rodney D Ryder, who leads a full service law firm called Preconcept which specializes in technology and media laws, about the recent notices sent by IIPM to Gaurav Sabnis, an indian blogger. The entire interview is published in the November 2005 edition of PCQuest and is up for the grabs in the market.

Rodney expressed his surprise on more than one occassion regarding the kind of legal notice that was sent to Gaurav Sabnis, apart from shedding more light on the various options that are at the disposal of both IIPM as well as Gaurav Sabnis to take the matter forward legally.

Some excerpts from the interview:
Rodnet has to say this, "At the outset, one must confess sheer and utter bafflement at the notice. As a legal notice, it is unclear in making out the case against either the Blogger or his employer..." and regarding the 'arrest warrants' in the legal notice, he said, "...the legal notice is quite baffling!...It is essential that the grounds for a potential complaint or suit be made out. Libel, as it might be, would not lead to arrest"

regarding the claim 'we are also providing your details to various corporations within India and abroad', he said, "Another mystifying and bamboozling statement! Why should they do this?" he also added that "'notarized and legally ratified' through Google and blogspot[in the legal notice] makes no sense." When asked about the liability of a blogger, a forum or wiki in such matters, he clarified, "Merely pointing or linking would not invite liability, except contributory liability, which in this case is far fetched, but comments if not carefully worded could be construed as libel and invite legal action"

When i just thought that the entire media is just waiting for something to happen before commenting anything about the ongoing 'war' of principles, PCQuest has done a good job by trying to atleast get clear about some legal issues. To read the full interview, grab the November issue of PCQuest and turn to page 62. i wish PCQuest makes the interview publicly available to everyone on their website. Another technology magazine, Digit, has also published a news item regarding the same controversy.
[IIPM]

Inquisitor Search: an AJAX-style web application

2005-11-10T18:49:00.000+05:30

If you liked the suggestions from Google Suggest, then you must check this out: Inquisitor Instant Search. Try searching for ipod in both of them to see the difference. Inquisitor is defined as "an instant search technology that takes the waiting out of searching the web. It is an AJAX-style web application that retrieves web results and suggestions as-you-type."

If you are a Mac-Tiger user, then there is a plugin for the safari web browser. You need to contribute something to download it. As with Google Suggest, this is also a beta software as of now.

Why Gaurav Sabnis had to quit the job?

2005-11-08T15:15:00.000+05:30

its more than a month now, but the drama(Gaurav Sabnis vs IIPM) refuses to die down. better late than never and whoever thinks that grave injustice has been done to Gaurav Sabnis for no fault of his should put a word of support for him in his/her blog/website/whatever. here is my two cent's worth.

i had only one complaint all through this controversy: why did Gaurav Sabnis has to quit his job?

even if it may be argued that IIPM has every right to defend its reputation, or that claims made by Gaurav Sabnis are completely untrue, still influencing him to quit from his job crosses all the boundaries of decency. If Gaurav's claims are untrue, then its _only_ JAMMAG writer who needs to be taken to the court and tried, because Gaurav has only done the job of quoting them and did not offer any new or material facts. Even otherwise, how proper was the act of emotional black-mailing the IBM mgmt by the IIPM and of bullying Gaurav endlessly, which finally resulted in Gaurav quitting his job? why didn't IIPM follow the legal procedures respecting the law of the land and take proper action against JAMMAG and Gaurav Sabnis without resorting to goonda-ism through their students and threats? IIPM has lost every bit of respect in my eyes by acting like power hooligans who have no decency to follow the customs of the land. when educators from the so called premiere institutes of india display such examples of arm-twisting to meet their ends, what can we expect from the uneducated lot?
i am surprised at how this injustice done to Gaurav has largely gone unnoticed and unopposed by the mainstream media in India and the blogging community of non-indians around the world. Still, it has not gone completely unnoticed; today the ripples could be traced in a large section of the blogging community:
http://www.desipundit.com/2005/10/08/lies-damned-lies-and-fake-blogs
http://indiauncut.blogspot.com/2005/10/question-of-principles.html
http://sanityunstuck.blogspot.com/2005/10/gaurav-vs-iipm.html
http://www.ojr.org/ojr/stories/051026glaser/

if someone can respect an institution which sends a legal notice of this kind, then i have serious reservations regarding the mental stability of such a person.
[IIPM]

Opera Mini doesn't like Internet sharing

2005-11-08T13:37:00.000+05:30

Opera Mini, which was recently released in only a few countries, has another shortcoming: you can not use it on a mobile device that is sharing an internet connection with a PC. all Opera browsers work only with GPRS access points and not with the access points that are created using a shared bluetooth connection with the PC's.

though the world-wide release of the software is due before the end of this year, those who just can't wait getting their hands to it are getting the unofficial opera Mini jar files that are uploaded to the internet from the Nordic countries, so just do a google search for such files, and test them out, if you too can't wait for the official release. they may or may not work with your device.

or become a member of the Opera community(registration is free) and then you can download the software from anywhere in the world by logging in and going to http://mini.opera.com/my. remember, you need to do this from a mobile device which has internet access other than through a WAP gateway.

MINIX in its new avatar: MINIX 3

2005-11-08T13:14:00.000+05:30

remember the famous tussle between Andrew Tanenbaum and Linus Torvalds that was later archived on various websites going by its popularity? their respective operating systems became the central points of discussion during that exchange of emails. Andrew Tanenbaum has always been recluctant to add any new feature to his operating system, MINIX, which would add unnecessary complexity to it from the student's point of view. He wanted MINIX to be used for educational purposes only - so kept it small and tidy. If Tanenbaum had allowed for major changes in MINIX according to the requests of innumerable MINIX fans, it just might have been in the shoes of gnu/linux today. But Tanenbaum achieved his goal with MINIX - a generation of students have gained the knowledge of designing operating systems and implementing them by looking at the code of MINIX and doing slight modifications to it. Tanenbaum's Operating Systems - Design and Implementation book acted as documentation for MINIX for a long period now. But lately, Tanenbaum has different plans for his extremely popular operating system in its 3rd version: MINIX 3.

In Tanenbaum's own words, "MINIX 1 and 2 were intended as teaching tools; MINIX 3 adds the new goal of being usable as a serious system on resource-limited and embedded computers and for applications requiring high reliability." What more, it is available as a Live CD!! download the iso file, burn it on a cd-rom and boot into MINIX directly from the cd-rom - no installation to hard disk is needed. The best thing about the MINIX operating system is that its extremely well designed and it is the perfect example where academics meet the real world. Linux is a 'practical' OS, which means it works like a dream on a lot of architechtures with good stability and security; but the internal design of the kernel is not something to boast about - its less modular than it could have been. in the first version it was almost monolithic - and its moving towards more and more modular design since then. the design of MINIX has always been close to perfection and its also very stable and secure. But MINIX currently is only a kernel that supports only i386 architecture - lots of drivers and applications are yet to be created with support for multiple architectures. but don't compare it with gnu/linux, which is a complete operating system for desktops and servers etc. MINIX is supposed to be used on embedded systems, so it is better compared to linux kernel plus some additional programs.

the official minix mailing list comp.os.minix is buzzing with lots of activity - so that is the place to be at if you want more updated information. Download the Live CD from here. the website is here.

Opera Mini: Free Web Browser for mobile devices

2005-11-06T13:10:00.000+05:30

In one of my previous posts i have noted about lack of good, free web browsers for the mobile devices. Opera has come up with a new version of web browser that is specifically meant for the mobile devices which have difficulty in installing its 'Opera 8 for Mobile' web browser : Opera Mini. The installation of this browser can be done only through a mobile device(cannot be downloaded from the PCs) by browsing to http://mini.opera.com/ from the mobile device. It is absolutely free to use and runs on any mobile device that supports J2ME. Do note that the software is currently in its beta stage. More questions are answered here.

This would raise some eyebrows:
"Opera Mini will keep a record of your phone number, make, and model for use with maintaining your history, cache and cookies."

To understand it fully, we need to understand how Opera mini works. With this web browser, whenever a request is sent to some web site, the request is first recieved by an intermediary server. This intermedairy server then sends the request to the actual web site, gets the response, proecesses it such that it can be rendered properly on a small screen and then sends it to the mobile device. The obvious advantage is that navigating through the web pages will now be more convenient - the pages are specially customized to be rendered on the mobile devices. On the downside, response time may increase because of the overhead at the intermediary server. And ofcourse the privacy concern noted above; no idea how Opera plans to use the data collected from our mobile phones and archived at the intermediary server.

You may also be interested in Opera Accelerator which aims at increasing the browsing speeds (using an intermediary proxy server that does caching etc) on mobile devices and can be installed from the Opera browsers by going to www.opera.com/proxy for a 14-day trial .

New, improved Google Desktop (Search)

2005-11-04T16:44:00.000+05:30

The Google Desktop Search tool is in its new avatar as Google Desktop 2. See all the features. Download it from here(also contains a quick summary of its features).

If you are not satisfied with the available number of features then try the plugins from here. If none of the plugins meets your needs, then don't panic - perhaps others also are feeling the same kind of requirement and someone may come up with their own plugin that does the job. Yes, good news for the developers is that writing plugins for the Google Desktop is now possible with the Google Desktop SDK.

If you want to install it on a network, then the Enterprise edition may suit you better. It is completely free.

Log into multiple wireless networks

2005-11-04T15:51:00.000+05:30

If the need comes to be able to log into multiple wireless networks(places where multiple hotspots could be found), then use this still-under-development Virtual Wi-Fi software from who else but Microsoft:
http://research.microsoft.com/netres/projects/virtualwifi/software.htm
My primary interest in this software is that it is from Microsoft and it is Open Source!! In the past one year, there have been many open source programs from Microsoft or Microsoft employees, some of which are even hosted on SourceForge.net - world's biggest repository of Open Source software. See this for an example.

Clocky is a hide-n-seek alarm clock

2005-11-04T13:01:00.000+05:30

More Pics

Just today i came across this piece of information about an alarm clock that is designed by Gauri Nanda from MIT, U.S., who has become a minor celebrity after her work won the Ig Noble. Her creation Clocky is a shag covered alarm clock that runs away from you so you can't shut off the alarm and go back to sleep!! Hit its snooze button to shut it off and it waltzes away to find a hiding place - from which it continues to ring shrilly till you get out of bed. It is programmed to choose different hiding places each time the snooze button is pressed. According to the creator, she "wanted Clocky to be a troublesome pet that you love anyway."

Moon on your desktop

2005-11-03T21:40:00.000+05:30

If you ever wished to look at the only moon of this planet more closely, then help is on offer: World Wind.
And here is the news release.

The software lets you view lots of other things as well, but the data pertaining to Moon is the most interesting. We have already seen Google Maps and Google Earth for others.
You need .NET framework and DirectX installed on your system(gnu/linux version will be released only by january, 2006).

Windows Live is for real

2005-11-03T18:14:00.000+05:30

Just weeks after the reports that Google has shelved the project to create an online office suite application, Windows has announced the beta release of Windows Live that can be initially accessed for free at live.com. Also, Microsoft Office can now be accessed from just a web browser, without any installation or maintanence hassles.

If you got impressed with all the dragging/dropping and minimizing/closing of different boxes on live.com site, then don't worry: you can create a similar website with much ease by using ASP.NET 2.0. Just wait for the hosting providers to start supporting it and until then, just be ready for it by getting your hands dirty with some ASP.NET 2.0 code or read some articles on the topic here: Code Project and MSDN Magazine.

Desktop Blog tool for Gnu/Linux

2005-10-29T16:01:00.000+05:30

Here is an application which you can use in Gnu/Linux operating systems to post blogs to popular blog services like Blogspot, LiveJournal, WordPress etc:

Gnome-Blog

This could save you time logging in and traversing through lots of interfaces just for posting a small entry. On the other hand, if you want to post an elaborate message with images etc, i recommed the web interfaces over this.

There are others too: BlogGTK, but i like Gnome-Blog better. Debian users can install it using 'apt-get install gnome-blog' and start blogging by running 'gnome-blog-poster'.

(this post is from Gnome-Blog; above picture was added manually from the web interface; images can be dragged and dropped in Gnome-Blog.)

if you like, you can add it to your panel and keep jotting down text until you are finally ready to post it. Right-click on the gnome panel, select "Blog Entry Poster" and click OK. Enter the information requested and you are ready to post. I could not find a way in which multiple accounts can be used with this application.

Debian: My favourite OS

2005-10-29T11:11:00.000+05:30

Debian gnu/linux OS is by far my faviourite operating system. What do i like *most* in debian? Like everyone else, it has to be its package manager - apt. I just install the base system with the installation dvd and then mount the two Debian dvds that i have on a local web share directory and add this location to apt sources.list file. that's it. whatever package i want to install, its just one 'apt-get install' away! if a package is not present in the DVDs then Debian would isntall it from the internet from one of its mirrors. No dependency hassles.

The other positives are : stability and security. Security may not be a big concern for me on a desktop machine, but stability sure is. Debian stable versions are released roughly once per 3 years!! Only FreeBSD can compete with Debian in both stability and security. The tradeoff here is that you don't get the latest packages, those which are in their alpha and beta stages. if you want the latest versions of everything, you can use the 'test' version of Debian(which still is very robust) or go for Ubuntu or Gentoo(If you don't have a fast internet connection, then Gentoo or Ubuntu may not be the best choices - you may have to fall back on Mandriva or Suse).

Anything i miss in the OS? Debian is very reluctant to support nonfree software. you can still install such software but its not always straightforward. take the example of Sun's Java technology. simple 'apt-get install' won't work with Java and you have to manually download it from Sun's website(the .bin version, not the .rpm.bin version) and convert it to .deb package and then install it using dpkg. very un-debian way. same with software like flash player, real player etc.

Finally, what applications do i use most on Debian? the usual ones: Epiphany Browser(Firefox is not installed by default in Debian Sarge!), XChat IRC Client, Gaim IM, Mozilla Thunderbird, Beep Media Player, OpenOffice.org, Emacs, KDevelop.

More info:
http://www.debian.org
http://www.debian-administration.orgIRC Network - FreeNode, Channel - debian

End of Sourav Ganguly?

2005-10-28T20:52:00.000+05:30

that's it then. this may be the time Saurav Ganguly has to bid adeu to international cricket - one day version atleast. there is a small possibility of Saurav bouncing back in the days to come but i find it less likely. he playing the next test series itself is a bit unlikely. and it all came at the right time in my opinion. india had two emphatic victories back to back and it always looked difficult to make any major changes to this well knit unit. so no politics, no controversies. decision made purely on performance basis. for the first time BCCI did not do any thing silly and took a sensible decision. but we are not going to forget you Saurav, you will ever be remembered as a great cricketer for all our lives. thanks for entertaining us all through your wonderful career. and have a very great time in whatever you do in the future.

Live Cricket Scores on Mobile Phones

2005-10-25T15:24:00.000+05:30

Here is a nifty utility to track live cricket match scores on a J2ME enabled mobile device :

LiveCricketScore (License: GPL)

Its free, small in size, downloads minimum amount of data for every fetch of the latest score and it works on any J2ME enabled mobile phone. The application tracks only those matches that are played by India(ODIs and Tests). Source code is now available on the site or here.

Who is the second greatest test batsman of all time

2005-10-23T22:21:00.000+05:30

comparisions of great cricketers can never be done in a fair manner, but the analysis at the following blog by Rajendra Parikh is worth a read and it makes one thing very clear, that the analysis was done using only the statistics of the players:
Download it.
Read it online.
(Result? Bradman, the best player and Sachin Tendulkar, the second best)

'Shortcuts' mini film festival

2005-10-23T20:47:00.000+05:30

Its all happening here in Hyderabad. When people just started to feel elated that one is finally getting to watch some interesting cinema(2005 has been really eventful with Black, Page 3, Iqbal, Hazaaron Khwahishen Aise, Parineeta and a lot of others), more joy is in store for film buffs in the form of some of the best short films and documentaries. All this was made possible by a bunch of passionate film lovers from the organisation called 'Short Cuts' which organises a monthly film festival of short films, many of which have won national and international film awards. Every month they also showcase the local talent by screening atleast one film made by a Hyderabadi film-maker. Do have a look at their web site for more information about what films they have screened so far.

Let me point out my favourites from the last two film festivals that i got to attend. “Me, Meera” by Subhakar was the best out of all. It was also the longest at 53 mins. It impressed me at various levels 1) it covered all the famous places from Hyderabad including best irani hotels, book sellers and pirated hollywood vcd shops, 2) it had a good dose of quotes. one was attributed to churchill "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.", which other sources attribute to Ralph Waldo Emerson. And another killer ad: "Smoking cures Cancer" 3) It has lots of humour, which was never loud 4) It touched a chord or two philosophically too, which is unlikely with someone who has a very distinct take on philosophy regarding everything. It also got a stylish treatment to the whole film, and you gotta love the art work in the starting titles!! if only i had a copy of it on my disk - i would have shown it to everyone who came my way.

The other film i liked is "Girni" by Umesh Kulkarni. It was born from an idea - to enter into the mind of the child and see from his eyes the imapact of noise (that of a 'girni', flour mill) and the best compliment one could give it is that the execution has been perfect. You feel right inside the innocent mind of the child right through the film and that itself is a huge achievement. The film won "Best Film", "Best Director" and "Best Cinematography" national awards (short film category) is no surprise to me at all.

More film talk after the next film festival - sometime around 15th of november.

WorldSpace Radio: Mixed Feelings

2005-10-23T16:22:00.000+05:30

Radio is Back!
I first came across the WorldSpace Radio in Prasads Multiplex Theatre and felt very happy to atlast see 'cd quality radio' at the disposal of the hyderabadis. The initial cost of Rs.5,500 and rather high Rs.1200 per month prompted me to take some time before deciding to go with it. After sometime, I revisited the shop at Prasads with the intention of giving it a go for atleast one year, but another surprise was waiting for me: one year subscription would now cost Rs.1800. That's equal to my cable tv rent. I was assured that the fee would not be increased again for around another 5 years and that was some consolation for me. But i decided to wait for the festival season and see if they come up with some nice offers: they came with one and that sealed the deal for me. The BPL Diva Reciever(Radio Device) + 3 month subscription to around 35 channels for less that Rs.2000. I decided to buy the reciever, try it for 3 months and then decide whether its for me or not and then either renew the subscription or not based upon the experience. I went to the shop that very day and bought the package.

I was warned that because of the festival season, they got lots of orders and hence they can do the installation only after 10 days. I was also told that the manual installation is not that hard. The manager then went on to say that it would take 3-4 days for the installation and one week at max. He suggested me not to try the installation manually. So much for their own confusion. I was asked to register the device with customer support office, get the password and unlock the signal(all but 5 free-to-air channels are encrypted). That dampened my spirits because i can't listen to the radio(yes, i decided to install it manually) until the next day as it was already beyond 8:00pm, the closing time for their customer support office. Called the customer support next day, gave them the details, got the password, entered it and started trying to recieve the signals.

I was told that the antenna should have clear Line-of-Sight to the sky, and trees, glasses etc are not a problem. What manual says is, curtains, glasses, plastic etc are no problem but walls and trees are. So much for the knowledge of the sales people. I got in a fix now: i have my house covered with either trees or other houses. Still tried to direct the patch antenna that comes with the device towards a small patch of sky partially visible under the sky and voila! got the signal after the annoying 'TDM GONE'(means no antenna/signal) for all morning. But it kept diconnecting and only some(Carrier 80) channels were coming. I tried it again in the evening and the signal was slightly better but only channels from Carrier 80 were coming - none of the channels from Carrier 75 were coming. Tried the next day and the 'TDM GONE' signal was all i saw for the whole day. Got a call from customer support saying that the installtion would be done on monday or tuesday - that's only 4 days from the buying date! so gave up on trying it myself and started waiting for the technician. Contacted the customer support again on thursday to be promptly told that it will take more than 10 days because of 'festive season' and started to give all kind of statistics as to the number of orders and available personnel to handle them - wonder what statistics they used when they last called me. I decided to go with external Yagi antenna and extension cable for an additional cost of Rs.1000.

Spent another thousand bucks and bought the antenna and cable and installed the antenna on the roof. That was it. Got a very good signal strength(4 bars compared to 1 flickering bar earlier) and the music play was uninterrupted. The quality was better than what i had expected. And i was able to recieve all the channels: from both the Carrier 75 and Carrier 80. Finally, was able to tune in to Jhankaar and Farishta - channels for hindi film music.

In the end, i am pleased with the quality of the music and the kind of music that is played and as a bonus it also has some news channels like NDTV(English and Hindi) and CNN (BBC needs Gold Subscription - Rs.250 per month). Those who like English music would like it more as no radio in india plays that kind of music for 24 hrs a day; and there are like 10+ channels covering various genres(jazz, pop, country, blues, rock n roll etc).

Unlike FM, there are no advertisements(except NDTV). Anyhow the FM in Hyderabad is not something to talk and rave about. But the management and customer support leaves much to be desired. It works like any Indian government organisation - different departments are not well co-ordinated with each other and you don't get proper responses to your queries. The website is decent(http://worldspaceasia.com/) but the forums are empty with just 9 members. There was another forum(http://worldspace.in/web/forums) which had good traffic with lots of users but that has been closed or moved. There is also a group at Yahoo! Groups: http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/worldspace-radio/ which has good activity.

So in summary, those who like only hindi film music may not like to pay such a hefty subscription fee for just 2 channels, especially if you can listen to sth like Mumbai FM. I listen to only hindi film music but i still got the subscription because i love music very much. Those who like english music channels or classical music(hindustani, carnatic, devotional etc) can buy the package with their eyes closed, especially during the offer period.

Critics of Saurav Ganguly

2005-09-24T12:10:00.000+05:30

There are critics and then there are critics.
This is one of those few times when the entire media - newspapers, web news portals, tv channels etc - is up against the indian cricket team captain: Sourav Ganguly. This is such a time when Saurav can not do a single thing right; even if he scores a century or wins test matches, he gets back only one thing: criticism. Let's see how many times Saurav was criticised and how many times they were fair/reasonable.

1. Saurav Ganguly is out-of-form.
(i) he is not batting well
Fair enough. Everyone would agree to this and if selectors remove him from the team I would neither be surprised nor be sad. But my respect for him would not diminish - all players retire one day.
(ii) he is not captaining well
Debatable but if some one raises this point then it cannot be termed too unfair.

2. Saurav Ganguly should be criticised for scoring such a slow century against some 'pedestrian bowling attack and belter of a pitch.'
But no body except Laxman scored a century in that match against the same 'pedestrian bowling attack and belter of a pitch!' The indians got all out for 360 in the second test and it might have gone the same way had he not be part of two century partnerships and take the total to 550+. Rahul Dravid played all his life at that pace when in best of forms and he is called a true test player! And Sunil Gavaskar rebuked a similar comment from an ameteur zimbabwean commentator saying that Saurav is not playing for survival as he is not edging anything; he is meddling everything from the middle of the bat. He chose to play a slow, cautious and keen innings and not that he was unable to score at a faster pace. (Rahul Dravid played a similar innings in the second test match, which sort of mocked at every one who earlier criticised Saurav Ganguly)

3. Saurav won against a weak team
True. No credits to him or the team for winning the series abroad after 18 years. But a series win eluded india against a similar team when it earlier toured zimbabwe so, if we don't want to praise them, atleast lets not blame them for the 2-0 series win.

4. Saurav Ganguly is going to extremes to stick to his captaincy
Not true according to me but not too unfair on part of the critics if they think in that line. My reasoning is that we have seen very few cricketing persons in the world who might have opted to voluntarily pull-out from the team when they ran through a bad form. Moreover Saurav said in all honesty that he would not mind if he has to play under someone else.

5. Saurav Ganguly is an embarrassment
This was the headline of an article on Rediff.com and I have not read a more ordinary piece of journalism than this for some time now. The reaction speaks a whole lot - more than 80% of the comments rebuke the article in very strong terms - by both die-hard Saurav fans and his hardcore critics. Personally, it was a blot on the reputation of Rediff.com; I don't even want to comment on that.

4. Saurav Ganguly is arrogant, indisciplined and/or rude
It may be true but my question will be to ask when did this transformation take place? He became like this in the recent past or was he like this all the time? If he was like this for all the time then why raise this issue now? Why no body complained about it when india was tasting success?

5. Saurav Ganguly has crossed the line by going to public about Greg Chappell issue
He can be fairly criticised for caring less for the established norm about what can be and what cannot be talked about in the media. At the same time, an apology is also expected from him on this issue (which I think he indeed sent to Greg Chapell).

What I do wonder here is, where as it is fair to criticise Saurav to talk about internal matters in public, is the media fair enough in not saying a word about Greg Chappell who actually seem to have committed a bigger blunder? Who gave a coach the authority to ask/suggest/influence an acting captain selected by formal procedures by Board-elected Selection committee? Who would have been responsible if Saurav had stepped down, someone else named the captain and India would have gone on to fair very badly in the test(s)? If a coach can make such suggestions mid-series, what is the role of the systematic procedure of selection of the team and the captain by the selection committee? If the coach finds 4-5 undeserving candidatesin a given team, can he ask for other players from outside of 15-player team?

6. Saurav defied the oppurtunity to deserving Mohammed Kaif to play the tests
Selection committee has taken the decision to name Saurav the captain so how can *he* chose not to play? Shouldn't the blame go to the selection committee instead of Saurav? Wouldn't Saurav be blamed if he opts out of the team to make room for Kaif? And even if agreed to the fact that Kaif deserved a place in the top-11, the fight could have been between Yuvraj and kaif, Laxman and Kaif or Sehwag and Kaif because Kaif was in a form better that all these players(apart from Saurav). So all of these players should be blamed or, more correctly, Selection Committee should be blamed.

Either play Saurav or don't play him. Let Selection Committee take a decision. Until then, lets be fair in the criticism and lets not indulge in any person-bashing, or settle personal grudges or get reduced to some pedestrian journalism.

Questioning Greg Chappell

2005-09-24T01:29:00.000+05:30

When asked about who gave the authority to Greg Chappell to suggest Saurav Ganguly to pull-out from the playing 11 for the first test match against Zimbabwe, some of the critics gave such tame justifications:

I. "Greg Chappell is a professional, so he did not shy away from giving his advice 'for the betterment of the team.'" Does that mean that the intentions of selection committe was to harm the team interest?

II. "First the exact context has to be understood in which Greg made that suggestion'." Why no one tried to understand the 'proper context' in which Saurav made that public statement? Why is he openly blamed at the first oppurtunity for the smallest of mistakes and Greg is protected for what ever he does by trying to find a 'proper context' for his behaviour?

III. "Greg gave that suggestion when he was asked to give 'elder brotherly' advice by Saurav himself." If this is true then all the blame rests with Saurav and a clean chit must be given to Greg Chappell.

IV. "Greg is always right - he is tough, aggressive, wise and professional." When Saurav was packing the bag to leave, it was Rahul Dravid who suggested that it would not be wise to take such a decision in the middle of the series. I don't know why some people consider Greg to be the wisest of all while he is no match to the wisdoms of the likes of Rahul Dravid and Sunil Gavaskar.

The recent truce seems to have swallowed all the differences between Saurav and Greg which seems to have made the job of BCCI review committee on this issue all the more easy. The Selection committee might in all probability drop Saurav in the next series, which would be the more accepted way of removing a captain, and should put an end to all the controversies. But the apprehension remains that Greg may repeat similar acts in future if not asked to explain himself properly by the BCCI (and media).

Nokia 3660, Bluetooth and Internet

2005-09-22T10:58:00.000+05:30

Got fed up with the IrDA communication between my mobile(Nokia 3660) and the PC, so decided to go for an USB Bluetooth Adapter/Dongle. Searched through various online shops and found some really cheap ones for around $8. The last time i checked, price was around Rs.1000 in the local market, so this was a very good price. Encouraged, called a computer shop and checked for the latest local price and whoa! its for Rs. 450 now. Hurried to the shop and got 'advik' bluetooth adapter which came with the Bluesoliel driver.

A new computer device sometimes means a lot of problems and this was that time. I tried and tried and tried but in vain. I searched through articles on the internet, read through nokia and the driver docs, uninstalled and re-installed the software(Bluetooth driver and Nokia PC Suite)...but with little luck. Finally installed the latest versions of both Bluetooth driver and PC Suite, followed the directions from readme file of PC Suite and everything fell in place! Filled with joy, I copied all the images from my phone to the PC, transferred some files to my phone and installed the NetFront Web Browser. It was all a breeze from the PC Suite.

Now was the time for a test: how to share my PC's internet connection with my phone through the bluetooth connection. There were some threads at allaboutsymbian and other sites to help me out and it was a rather simple procedure. Browsed google with NetFront on my phone and felt satisfied. 8hrs of work with some positive results in the end :) NetFront and Opera both cost money after the trial period, so now the hunting starts for an open source HTML browser for series 60 devices.
(NOTE: Nokia is currently working on an open-source browser for its devices )

Under-Estimated Sourav Ganguly

2005-09-16T13:28:00.000+05:30

Mr. Saurav Ganguly, I am impressed.
I have always liked Saurav Ganguly as a cricketer but yesterday's talk of his with Sunil Gavaskar and Harsha Bhogle took me by complete surprise. The kind of maturity as well as honesty he showed in answering all the (trciky) questions posed to him was unexpected from a cricketing person, much less from Sourav, who is known for arrogant and, sometimes, rude behaviour. Atleast in recent times, he was looking very weak and vulnerable as if going through a frustrating period. But he was gracious enough to accept all the criticism of the past 6 months and looked every bit in peace with himself. One would believe him when he said that captaincy is not at all an issue for him and he wouldn't mind one little bit if he were not to captain the next test match. Atleast i believed.

He even joked that he was hoping that it was not the end of his career, when presented with a plaque commemorating his 48th test cap as the captain of the indian test squad, highest by an indian. It was saddening to hear that since the time his captaincy was questioned, all is not going well in the dressing room and that is affecting the team's performance. But it was heartening to see Saurav prompting everyone to keep their differences with themselves and show some maturity to hold the game of cricket above anything else. He supported every young indian cricketer when they first came to the international scene and when some of those same players are not supporting him in his crisis, atleast he is not complaining. He may not captain the team in the next series but he atleast should be bid adeu with some respect as none of the past captains can compete with his success as a captain, and i doubt how many to come in the future can hold their own in front of him.

Whatever may be his achievements in winning matches as a cricketer or as a captain, his contributions in building the team and a team spirit and a terrific atmosphere in the dressing room will make me remember him as one of the best ever cricketer in indian cricketing history.

Hunt for an mp3 player: Zen or iPod?

2005-09-15T13:40:00.000+05:30

The easy job was done when I planned to buy an mp3 player for myself; then started the hard job of choosing which mp3 player to go with. Quickly zeroed-in on these 4 players:

Creative Zen Micro 5GB (USD 190, offer: USD 165)
Apple iPod mini 4GB (USD 200, offer:USD 170)
Creative Zen Touch 20GB(USD 205)
Apple iPod 20GB (USD 230)

I could not find any offers currently for iPod 20Gb or the Zen Touch.
All the reviews I read on the web(amazon, cnet, mp3.com, tomshardware. anandtech etc) either said that the players from Creative have superior audio quality or said that the difference is not very much. Creative players definitely have the price advantage. But iPod wins in a crucial department:'style' statement. Its cool to possess an iPod these days and not so for any other player. The problem for me is I am buying from US but I don't live in US; so I prefer a player with user-replaceable battery. Only Zen Micro has this feature. But iPod mini looks so cute in its green, pink colours.
what to do? I still have a few days left to make the decision and most probably I will go with the Creative Zen Micro player.