Blogging Tip - Write Notes On Sundays

Did you ever have a concept called "Reading Day" when you were a kid? Did your parents or even your teachers ever ask you to keep aside one day out of the busy week to do reading practices? It is unarguably true that any self-respecting & successful blogger needs to follow a lot of other blogs, social media websites & other sources of information. I'm sure you take rest from the pressures of blogging for at least one day of the week. Why don't you reserve that one day for reading only? I'm not asking you to visit and comment on the blogs too. Your job should be just to keep a pen & paper at hand to take some notes as and when necessary.

I don't own a personal computer. I blog from my college. However, on Sundays, I just carry a pen & a piece of paper around and make it a point to read all the new posts that I've subscribed to, using the GPRS connection in my phone. All the while, I keep a lookout for a few essential ideas that keep me occupied for almost the whole of next week. This practice helps me learn various tips & tricks suggested by well known bloggers like Problogger, Madhur Kapoor & Blogging Tune. In the process, it also helps me to get new ideas for posts and advertising. For the taste, here's what I learnt last Sunday -

• I really need to structure the way I post, according to the days of the week. For example, video tutorials on Mondays, how-tos on Tuesdays, Advice columns on Saturdays etc.
• Got a lot of new ideas to write on, an example is this very post.
• It's high time I hire a pro graphics designer to personalize this blog.
• I need to make visiting cards for myself.
• Need to create a section in my blog for guest blogging.
• Shall need to organize the meta description of this blog.

Now, almost all the tips are indispensable in running a successful blog. Every Sunday, arrange for a whiteboard & get yourself a personal blog optimization tutor, free of charge.

So, I told you about my method of getting new ideas? What are yours?

The Ugly Mentality of the Indian Male...

A man is a man... he is the one who sustains the family.... why... because he earns a living.... just because he has an office to attend in the morning... does that make him the king of the world....??

Living in the 21st century and being a girl is the toughest thing that I have ever done. Trust me, its tougher being a girl in the world that we are living today. The man gets all the freedom... and the girl, none. If she drinks, she parties or hangs out with friends...she's labeled "bad". You think that this's all figments of my imagination??? Well... how about checking out the Hindustan Times' 6th January issue, where in a survey they found that the Indian male is a hypocrite and would never accept the women as his equal. The survey shows the ugly mentality that the male possesses today. Even though it's the new world... the Indian male would never shy away from making a lewd remark at a girl who is wearing so called provocative clothes... and as if that is not all... if eve teasing is done... and the man is questioned why.... then he simply answers that it was all her fault... why should she be wearing provocative clothes...or drinking or smoking....?? Isn't that against our ethics and morals....?? I say, isn't it against our same morals that a man also doesn't smoke or drink... then why is the man of the house allowed so....??

If only shall our counterparts ever accept the fact that they alone can't run the world...will they ever realise that a woman is as much part of this world and society as they are... and they have as much right to party.... to do what they want.... what truely is needed is sensitising the mentality of the Indian male...who just thinks that woman is nothing but a toy to be played with and thrown in a corner....!!!

I completely agree with what Annie Zaidi, at Blank Noise, Says--

I will not accept.....

I will not stop buying 'provocative' clothes. I will not be modest. I will not behave. I will not treat night as namehram I cannot be seen with. I will not change my stride to side-step the maps of our molestation. I will not call a Violation by another name. I will not make unwanted rules for myself. I will crush the beast where I see it. With a stare, with a slur, with a scream, with a camera.... I will take my rights as a citizen and nothing less.

Legal Rights of Photographers

The Bottom Line

Except in special circumstances (e.g., certain government facilities), there are no laws prohibiting the taking of photographs on public or private property. If you can be there, you can take pictures there: streets, malls, parking lots, office buildings. You do not need permission to do so, even on private property. Trespassing laws naturally apply. If a property owner demands you to leave, you must. But if a place is open to the public — a mall, office-building lobby, etc. — permission to enter is assumed (although it can be revoked). In terms of the law, trespass and photography are separate events; the former is illegal, but the latter is not. Only if the use of photographic equipment itself violates a person’s privacy (e.g., by using a long lens to look into someone’s private room) might it violate privacy law. Further, while people have a right of privacy, businesses do not except trade secrets.

Subject to specific limits, photographers can publish any photo they take, provided those photos do not violate the privacy of the subject. This includes photos taken while trespassing or otherwise being some place they shouldn’t be. Taking photos and publishing photos are two separate issues.

Risks

• Photographers run a limited number of risks from taking and publishing photos.


• If they publish photos taken while trespassing, any trespassing judgments against them could be increased if the judge(s) feel it was inappropriate to take those photos.


• They risk being charged with intrusion if they use technology — e.g., long lenses — to access places where the subjects have an expectation of privacy.


• Although it is not against the law, they risk losing invasion of privacy lawsuits if their photographs reveal private facts about people that are offensive and not newsworthy (e.g., showing a person purchasing anti-HIV drugs) when the people had a reasonable expectation of privacy. Jennifer Aniston’s suit against the photographer who published topless shots of her falls into this category.


• As with libel, they risk losing lawsuits if their photographs place people in a false light, e.g., mislabeling a photograph in a damaging way.


• They risk losing invasion of privacy lawsuits if their photographs inappropriately use specific person’s images for commercial purposes, e.g., stating that the mayor endorses a product by publishing a photo of him using it.

The details

Whether or not you can take or publish photographs is a matter of privacy laws. There are widely recognized to be four “prongs” of those laws — that is, four areas of which you can run afoul. Avoid them and you avoid civil and criminal penalties.

Prong 1 (while gathering): Unreasonable intrusion upon seclusion (e.g., trespass)
Prong 2 (if published): Unreasonable revelation of private facts (e.g., medical information)
Prong 3 (if published): Unreasonably placing another person in a false light before the public
Prong 4 (if published): Misappropriation of a person’s name or likeness.

So there are two separate questions with regard to publishing photos: 1) Are we allowed to take them? and 2) are we allowed to publish them?

While posting photographs for this page, I admit, there have been quite a few occasions when I'd just done an image search on Google and picked up a photo. So, what do you do with your blogs? How do you produce the pictures, if you at all do?

Recommended Articles In The Past Fortnight

So very sorry for not being able to write a single word for about a week. It's a misfortune that electricity is such a rare commodity in my college. Anyways, thanks to Google Reader and my mobile phone, I have been reading a lot of great articles and a lot of interesting tech news, lately. Thought I'd share a few of them with you too. At least, that'll keep you busy till I come back to the blogosphere. Thanks a lot for bearing with me.

1. Preview: NOKIA N81 Phone
2. Use These 5 SureFire Headline Formulae At Your Own Risk
3. Blogging To Get a Job
4. The Ultimate EMail Search
5. 9 Things You Can Learn About Blogging By Watching Me Sell My House - Problogger
6. NFS ProStreet - Rule The Street
7. The Right Width For Your Blog
8. EMail A Blogger That Linked To You To Say Thanks
9. 10 Ways to Hurt Your Blog’s Brand by Commenting on Other Blogs
10. The Best Website Taglines Around the Internet
11. Microsoft Sidewinder Mouse : A beauty
12. Case Study of a Teenage Millionaire: Ashley Qualls and WhateverLife.com
13. Find a Sponsor for Your Blog
14. If Your Blog Disappeared, Who Would Miss It?
15. Do You Use American English, British English or do you Swing like the Canadians?

Well, that is it, for now. Hope you have a good time and enjoy reading the above articles as much as I do. They are a combination of latest tech news, blogging tips and some more miscellaneous tips. As for me, I'll try to be back as soon as possible.

Good Ol' Orkut Has Changed

It was high time that Google had considered me too to be worthy enough for being bestowed with the latest look of Orkut. I have been hearing about the change in their popular social networking site Orkut's layout on The official Orkut blog , Google Blogoscoped and various other news sites for the last 4 days. Even here in my college, quite a few students have been blessed with the new design, but not me. Although Orkut's blog had said "We're rolling it out to groups of users at a time over the next week", it was getting tough for me to keep patience. Well, finally I too get to use the latest layout from today and I thought, why not check out every nook and cranny of the new layout and find out how much our good ol' Orkut has actually changed.

Changes in Orkut (that I could figure out):

• Added a few lovely round corners here and there.
• The tabbed links actually look and feel like tabs now.
• The special first character for your name is missing now.
• It looks like a complete package now. No more a social network under the development phase, if you know what I mean.
• They have now added breadcrumb-like navigation for communities.
• A very useful navigation bar added at the top (reminds me of free blogs on Blogspot, though).
• Options like "send message", "send teaser", "add to crush list" etc have been removed from the main profile page. Rather, they can now be view by pointing your mouse on the "more" link below the profile pic. This is for others' profile page, not your main homepage.
  Update: However, I feel the "Report Abuse" link should not have been hidden. It should rather be prominently visible to the users.
  
• The way "trusty", "cool" and "sexy" meters have been incorporated looks much better now.
• "Edit Profile" page looks much cooler.
• The fact that you can now crop your profile picture after uploading just rocks!
• Update: Thankfully they have done away with the line "You are connected to xxxx users via xxxx friends" from the main page. It was an useless piece of information, anyway.
• Update: You can now know about every change that your friends make, right on your homepage.
  

Changes in Orkut that would have been desired:

• Akin to the Orkut extension for FireFox, I would have preferred if I could have direct access to a profile's scrapbook, album or communities or send message to him/her just from a profile's picture or name.
• I wish instead of just "scrap tips", there would actually be a rich text editor for scraps and messages to be able to modify fonts, add pictures or insert smilies.
  Update: Or, how about keyboard shortcuts? Say, Ctrl+B for bold and Ctrl+I for italicized text.
  
• I would've preferred to be given an option to write in Indian languages.
• After you reply to someone's scraps using the "reply" button just below that profile's scrap, you can't refresh your scrapbook without sending the same scrap again to that profile. It's so irritating while trying to chat with a friend that I just end up scrapping on my friend's scrapbook itself, the old way.
• I hate the fact that you can send a message to either one person, a group or all friends at the same time. What if I want to send a message to my classmate, my girlfriend and my brother? How do I group them then? I would rather have the option of tagging people and then message them according to tags or I should be allowed to manually select profiles from my friends list, the way my email client allows me to select addresses from my address book.
• It's time for Orkut to shed the Beta tag.
• Update: Just as, in GMail, we get a notification and request to "update conversation" the moment we get an email concerning the same conversation that I am currently reading, I'd love it if I could get a similar notification asking me to "update scrapbook" the moment I get a scrap from a contact. That ways I don't have to keep a track on my GMail inbox or Google Talk to know whether someone has scrapped me.
  

My perception of the latest change:
On the whole, Orkut definitely looks much better than how it was before. Yet, as I've already pointed out, there are still more scopes for improvement. Allowing user post videos and html on scrapbook was a huge step Orkut had taken. Somehow, the very first time I looked at the new design, it suddenly reminded me of Windows Live Mail and Hi5.

Anyways, I guess we just got to change to survive. Darwin's theory always stands true, be it a living being or be it a website. I have pointed out as much changes and wanted features as I could. But that doesn't mean you aren't welcome to add to the list ;-).

Happy Orkutting!!

Why Do You Blog?

Blogs have been mushrooming on the internet at the rate of thousands a day, these days. Thanks to free blog services like Blogger, Wordpress, LiveJournal, Rediff Blogs and the likes, there are about 70 million blogs on the internet, today. There are blogs that tell you about health care, there are ones that teach you things like repairing a computer, learning JAVA and other computer languages, gardening and even having great sex with your partner. There are people who log their daily lives, converting their blogs into an online journal, of sorts. There are budding poets who love to make poems and showcase them to the world. There are businesses that thrive on the community they create, thanks to their blogs. What more? There are even blogs that teach you how to blog effectively. Blogs have become almost synonymous to social networks, these days. The relationships you garner with you readers is considered to be a blogger's greatest asset. Blogs are also created to earn moolah with advertising!

As for me, I had started this page as an insight towards my thoughts, as a log on my daily life. But now, I' write about what I love the most - gadgets, latest internet technology, websites and entrepreneurs. So, what's your story? Why do you blog?

Does You Email Provider Give You Automatic Email Forwarding?

Gone are the days when we used to actually buy stationary and stamps to write letters to our relatives, lovers or colleagues. Gone are the days when we had to wait for days or even weeks before our love, rejection or even queries of well being would reach the other side of the globe and another week or fortnight to get a reply back. Gone are the days when we'd go out in search of post boxes so that we could mail those hand written letters. The new age has arrived! In today's world, almost every single person worth his salt has an email address of his. And in the land of free web mail services, there are still a large chunk of us who use paid services for the need of better features, more space and ease of use. Talking of web mail space, there are email providers like Rediff, Indiatimes, Yahoo, Sify and the likes that even offer unlimited space to their free users.

So, which provider do you? Are you still a free user or do you pay your email provider for better services? Well, chances are that if you're a paid user, you're pretty satisfied with the services you get. But how about the ones who still avail of the services for free? Tell me, did you ever sign up for a certain email provider, only to find all stranded, stuck and frustrated 'coz despite other operators providing more space and better services, you can't shift 'coz all of your hundreds and thousands of contacts still have the current one that you've been using for the past few years?

A friend of mine, Ashwin George, has been using Hotmail for his mailing needs for a long time now. However, since the hotmail webmail has become too slow at recent times and that it isn't as feature rich as, say, GMail, he's desperate to shift but he can't, because of the very reason i just cited in the above paragraph. I was just advising him the other day that he could very well shift to GMail if he wants and get his emails on Hotmail automatically forwarded to the GMail account. But then, to our horror, we discovered Hotmail doesn't allow automatic forwarding of emails to another accounts. So now, he's all stuck and contemplating to become a paid user himself.

After I came across such a problem, I thought why not give a li'l check on the emails service providers that people often use on the net and figure out whether email forwarding is mostly
a premium service or is it just another of Hotmail's pathetic works. The web mail providers that I checked were Hotmail, Yahoo, GMail, AIM Mail, Rediffmail, Indiatimes, Sify and ZapakMail. Well, I realized that email forwarding is, afterall, basically a premium service 'coz it's being offered to free users only by GMail and Indiatimes, off all these 8 providers. This was kind of a revelation to me 'coa, being a regular GMail user myself, I'd always thought it's more of a basic feature provided by most :-P.

So, what email service provider do you use?

Mozilla FireFox Plugins : Recommendation #1

If you remember correctly, I'd already pointed out, in one of my previous posts, the advantages of using Mozilla Firefox as your preferred browser, over Internet Explorer. I've also posted 2 videos (Part 1 & Part 2) that'll show how to personalize your Firefox and use it to suit your needs. Well, the actual fun of using Firefox is the ability to customize it with the help of extensions. Extensions are nothing but little nuggets of programs that you need to install in the browser. These are often very powerful features that go a long way in making your online stay pleasurable. I myself have been using the browser for over 2 years now and have been following it's development pretty closely. There are so many extensions that I've come to love, in all this time. There are also a few that I just can't do without. So, I thought I'd share a few of them and tell you how to use them & why!

FasterFox: This is one extension that I just need to have, be it on my own personal comp or on a shared PC. Here's what the official explanation says :

Performance and network tweaks for Firefox.

Fasterfox allows you to tweak many network and rendering settings such as simultaneous connections, pipelining, cache, DNS cache, and initial paint delay.

Dynamic speed increases can be obtained with the unique prefetching mechanism, which recycles idle bandwidth by silently loading and caching all of the links on the page you are browsing.

A popup blocker for popups initiated by Flash plug-ins is also included.

After you install the plugin from this link, you can find it at the bottom of your status bar, just like in the picture below.

And yeah, you know what I find the coolest about this extension? It also shows the time it took to load a certain page! Can you see "8.470s" written right beside the FasterFox icon? That's it?

Well, there goes the first recommendation for you. As for the rest, they are in the pipeline. Oh by the way, just in case you don't wish to install the extension, you can even tweak your browser for the same effect. Here's the video on how to do that.

By the way, you can also check out Recommendation #2 : Google Browser Sync.


Other FireFox PlugIn Recommendations -

• #2 : Google Browser Sync
  
• #3 : AdBlock Plus
• #4 : StumbleUpon

Google's Privacy Concerns

I'm sure you must be aware of the loads of privacy concerns that Google has been churning out in various quarters and among the public in general. Well, here's a video uploaded on YouTube from Google itself, telling you what they actually do with those cookies that they store in your computer and whether and how they know who you are and what you do. Hope this video succeeds in putting some of your concerns to rest.

Bloggers' Union

It seems us bloggers are finally getting recognised. Blogging is finally coming of age. I'm sure you must have heard a lot about bloggers earning simply by posting on their or others' pages or by advertising extensively. What more? Bloggers are also proposing to form unions for themselves! Yes, you read that right. News all around the internet is abuzz with the discussion of whether bloggers should need to form an union or not. "In a world as diverse, vocal and unwieldy as the blogosphere, there's no consensus about what type of organization is needed and who should be included. Some argue for a free-standing association for activist bloggers while others suggest a guild open to any blogger -- from knitting fans to video gamers -- that could be created within established labor groups."

Well, to some extent, I'd say that, if not a full fledged union, today's bloggers do need some security. Today, there are people who blog for their companies, their products. There are bloggers who are as passionate about their blog pages as in the work they do for their companies. I myself have been up all night, innumerable times, just to frame up a great post or probably trying to give more exposure for my page. There are times when I'm online 7-8 hours, at a stretch, working on my blog. Well, here I just maintain a personal blog (although I'm planning to shift the realm towards tech blogging) but think about those who give up all of their days and nights just to dish out the latest happenings to their readers. It's true that blogging gets recognized these days. It's my blog that got my name printed in a newspaper for the first time ever (well, actually second time. I'd rather prefer to forget about the first occurence). Of course, I should never deny Sakshi's help,. It was precisely her post that earned me all the review.

Okay, I got deviated from the topic I know. Anyways, what do you say? Should there be a proposed Union for the bloggers or is it just another soon-to-die fad? Afterall, it's us bloggers who can make all the difference!

FavIcon For Blogs

Before you read this post, I'd suggest that you click a few more mouse buttons and make the effort of downloading and installing the latest version of Mozilla FireFox. As for the most obvious reasons, you can visit this link. The other reason being Internet Explorer is just not capable of showing favicons for the websites, unless it's version 7.

Why am I talking of favicons, suddenly? That is 'coz (you'll notice it only if you're using any browser other than IE 7-) I've finally managed to get rid of the boring Blogger favicon and got one of my own. And the best part is, it's animated! It looks so very personalized, now.

So, you interested to know how I managed that? Well, I've been scourgiing the net quite a bit for that and now that I've finally got the secret, here it is:

• You shall need a graphic file that you'd want to convert into an icon file and use it as the favicon for your site or blog page (preferably 16x16 pixels).
• Now you'd need a website that'll grab that file of yours and convert it into an icon file. Of course you can make it possible by using just Adobe Photoshop or Corel Draw, but it isn't possible for everyone to be rich enough to possess those applications. The websites that I can suggest you are FavIcon, Dynamic Drive & RW-Designer.
• Now comes the toughest part. You need to find one site that'll allow you to upload .ico files so that you can link to them, in your page. I guess you shall just need to google it out. The site that I myself used was Google Pages.
• After you've uploaded the icon file (don't name it "favicon.ico"), it's time to put two lines of code in your blog. For that, just shift to the portion where you can edit hardcore HTML for your page. Here's a li'l tutorial for those who use Blogger as their server.
  

On your Blogger dashboard, click on "Template"

And then, on "Edit HTML"

The resultant page will be something like the above. You can click on the image for an enlarged version, if you please. After you reach the hardcore HTML behind your page, the rest of the procedure is the same for all, Blogger or non-Blogger.

• Figure out for the tag <head>.
  
• Right below that, enter two lines of code :
  

  <link rel="shortcut icon" href="[URL]" />
  <link rel="icon" href="[URL]" />

Replace the part [URL] with the URL of the icon file that you'd hosted (third step above) and Voila! your favicon is ready. Just click on "Save" and reload your blog page.

Do let me know if this little tutorial works for you. Both rants and raves are welcome.

Configuring Google Reader

Life has changed a lot since I got this latest cell phone of mine. Now that I can access GPRS on the go, my thirst of reading news and latest updates from the technological world has been aptly quenched. The tool that has been helping me out the most is Google Reader. Okay, this is, most certainly, not a Google Reader sponsored post. It's just that, since it's been helping me a lot, I thought I'll let you all through a tutorial on this nifty gadget.

First & Foremost, even before you think of navigating to the Google Reader webpage, you need to know a little bit about RSS Feeds. If you're a regular blogger or at least stay online for a considerable long time, I'm sure you must have heard of the term. Now, the question is, what is a RSS Feed? Well, who can answer that better than Wikipedia? Well, I know, if you do happen to be a li'l technologically challenged, I'll write down a summary myself.

RSS actually stands for Really Simple Syndication. Now, what is Syndication, you might ask. According to eLOOK.org, the dictionary meaning of syndication means organizing into or administering as a syndicate. If you want a more comprehensive and to the context answer, you can refer to this post by Adam Kalsey. So, what do we do with these feeds and how can we procure them? Before that tell me something. Have you ever seen the following picture on the websites, while browsing?

If this pic looks familiar to you, then you do visit pages that offer RSS feeds. (Yeah, not every page offers RSS feeds.) It is these feeds that you need to supply to Feed Readers or Aggregators which, in return, procures the latest changes made in the so-called sites. Confused? Okay, let me put it this way. RSS Feeds are used by Feeds Aggregators so that they can deliver you the latest updates that are done in the websites that you visit more often. Say, for example, you happen to read news on a variety of web pages and also read loads of blogs. Now, these pages happen to change with new headlines and content every once in a while and it becomes very cumbersome to check each and every page for changes, frequently. This is where these feed aggregators come to your rescue. They automatically download the latest headlines of all the pages whose feeds you have provided and get them ready for you to view whenever you find the time. You can now skim through the topics and click on the interesting ones to read the rest of the article.

There are a lot of Feed aggregators available on the web. the ones I find worth mentioning are Google Reader, NewsGator, Bloglines, FeedDemon, Internet Explorer 7 & Mozilla Firefox. Here, in this post, I'll tell you how to setup Google Reader.

After you log into Google Reader using your Google Account ID (Gmail ID), you should be within the homepage. There, just keep a lookout on the blue colored bar to your left for the link "Add Subcription". Click on it and a little text box should appear. Refer to the picture below for details.

There, just paste in the Feed URL (RSS Feed) and you are ready to go. Just for you to start off, you can use the Feed URL of this blog. For the posts, it's http://feeds.feedburner.com/ShayonsLabyrinth and for the comments, it's http://feeds.feedburner.com/shayon/comments_labyrinth.

Now, as far as my blogs are concerned, you got the feeds served on the platter. How about the links to other blogs. Well, if it's a blog on Blogger, you are in for a comparatively easy time. Whenever you visit a blog page that's on Blogger (say, mine), just scroll absolutely down and you should be able to see a link saying "Subscribe to: Posts(Atom)". Can you spot it? It should be right below the area where all the posts on the homepage end. Well, just right click on "Posts (Atom)" and select "Copy link location" if you're using Mozilla Firefox or "Copy Shortcut" if you're using Internet Explorer. There are always equivalent commands in other browsers. Well, now that you've learnt how to siphon off a link from the web without actually clicking on it, just paste this link in the little text area on Google Reader, as shown above and you're off to a lovely start!

Now, how about blogs that are not on Blogger and other news sites? Always remember the keyword "Subscribe". If a certain website's offering feeds, they'd always have something or the other written on their page with "Subscribe" or look out for the RSS Feed icon I've shown above. Just right click on either of the text or the icon and the rest you know. For an example, I'll again use my blog page. Try scrolling down and keep a lookout for the phrases "Subscribe My Posts" and "Subscribe Comments" to the right sidebar. Could you find it? Consult the screenshot below, if not.


Well, now that you've learnt how to use Google Reader, try collecting feeds from other sites that you like to visit so often! Happy Reading!!

A Li'l Bit of Mumbai Darshan...

Okay, before you start checking out the pictures, let me warn you. The camera (in my phone) that I've used to snap the following pics is just another simple VGA camera and I realised it only now that although it gives me decent pics in the daylight, the pics are horrible when clicked at night. I guess I should've switched the night mode on, but I didn't realise that it'd be necessary. Hope i get similar quality of pics in the night time too, in future.

Well, I've been catching up with friends for the past 3 days and had been going to a few places too. It just so happened that I'd been to Vashi Railway station, yesterday, and it's supposed to be one of the best looking local railway station in Mumbai. And then I'd been to the legendary Marine Drive, today, and got wet in he rains. You won't realise how much fun it was, unless you experience it yourself! While being a part of all that, I did felt like clicking a few pics on occassions when I found the seeting pretty beautiful. Hope you like the journey.

That's Marine Drive for you, when it was raining cats & dogs!

And that's Marine Drive again, to my Left.

The old Taj, of Mumbai (Yeah, Mumbai has 2 Taj :-p)

Taj again, just in a different angle.

Gateway of India, from the place where we were standing.

A closer view of the same.

My companions of the day, Vijay & Pallavi, great buddies!

It's called Flora Fountain, a very famous landmark in Fort.

The rest of the pics are all of Vashi Railway Station. After actually checking out the pics on the comp, I was so upset. I wish Inew this was how the pics are gonna come. I'm sure I'd have gotten the night mode switched on, then. Could't do absolutely no justice to this beautiful station. Anyways, still put up a few, hoping you could find the essence of the station.

You Are What You Pretend To Be!!

DOES life always have to be about pitching? The latest self-help book, Life's A Pitch, written by advertising expert Roger Mavity and design guru Stephen Bayley, believes, you pitch all the time -- on your first job, first date and even with friends to make lasting impressions.

The book is based on the belief that our lives hinge on crucial moments when we must perform our best. Self-help guru, Robin Sharma feels that life's precious moments are about making that perfect pitch! It is strategising, creating a plan. He says, "Recently, when I was studying the symptoms of success, I realised the biggest challenge for successful people was how they pitched for themselves in troubled times. The big idea is -- setbacks are symptoms of success.

Challenges forge the greatness in you as they let you know what isn't working. They force you to be creative and hence pave the road to your NLG (Next Level of Greatness). So, the next time you face a setback, take a moment to celebrate."

The concept of 'presentation of self' as a way of understanding human behaviour goes back to the days of psychologist Erving Goffman. The idea that our lives are nothing more than how we come across, is alarming. It's about branding the individual. Self-help guru, Shiv Khera says, "I don't like the word pitching. Peddlers pitch, professionals present. Remember, you don't get a second chance to make first impressions. In this world, everyone's selling himself. Even on a date, the couple is telling each other, 'I'm worth having a relationship with'. But individuals shouldn't pretend too much."

Says industrialist Vijay Mallya, "Most powerful people in the business always pitch at every moment in life, that's why they're the most powerful brands." When individuals take their entire life as a pitch, every moment is about making them a bigger brand as their energies concentrate on it.

Says producer Anita Kaul Basu, "Since we want to be perfect at work and home, we have to pitch in our emotional lives and relationships too. So the question is: when do we get in touch with our real feelings? Do we lose the battle if we don't pitch?"

Author Stephan Bayley writes, "Pitching is about how we make first impressions. The way you sell yourself is crucial to your success. Psychologists know that first impressions are based on our spontaneous assessment of status, clothes, sex, age, size, posture, speech and facial expressions. We're locked in a game of continuous evaluation. Even the decision not to wear certain kinds of clothes betrays a set of prejudices. The person who says, 'I don't care what I wear, I just put on a T-shirt and jeans' is merely confirming how much he cares about creating a certain sort of wearily insouciant impression." So, be it clothing or talking, an individual is forever trying to pitch for himself.

The book quotes Beatrice Webb on how to build confidence for making the perfect pitch. "If ever I felt nervous when walking into a room full of people, I would tell myself 'You are the cleverest member of one of the cleverest families in the cleverest class in the cleverest nation in the world, why should you be frightened?''

Elaborating on it, actor Ayesha Dharker, adds, "While acting, we have to pitch with the right look and dialogue. Confidence does the trick. If you pitch with confidence, you win." Cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni states, "For a cricketer, making a pitch is about how you spin the ball, play with your bat and show aggression with your body language."

These days, social snobbery is also used as a weapon to make the perfect pitch. Every emotion is a weapon. We're in an age where we're designing our own personalities. Marcel Proust and Cary Grant had a lot in common, besides fastidious taste in clothes. Each knew that the most dangerous sort of plagiarism was self-plagiarism. Grant perfected a screen persona of dazzling suavity and effortless cool. Hauntingly, he once said, "Everybody wants to be Cary Grant. Even I want to be Cary Grant." But the authors of Life's a Pitch believe there are three kinds of people: the person we think we are, what other people think of us, and what we think other people think of us. But ultimately, we are what we pretend to be!

P.S. Just shamelessly copied this piece, written by Nona Walia, on the Times Life! section of Sunday Times, Calcutta edition, dated April 22, 2007. It's just that the very concept of pitching for yourself intrigued me a lot, so thought about sharing it with you too. So, do u too have anything to say on it?

Claim To Fame!!!

Wow! What do I call it? "30 seconds of fame" or "2 hours of pain in the ass"? Well, as already mentioned in Sakshi's post, this blogpage got mentioned (pretty abundantly, I'd say) in The Telegraph, Calcutta edition, on the January 30th, 2007 (thanks to Ms Suchi Arya). Oh man, I'd started this page just to vent out my frustrations in life and improve my writing skills, in general. Trust me, being in an engineering college, the scope to be creative in the literary department in just too limited. After getting into my present relationship, I had invited Sakshi tow rite here because I felt she had good enough ideas to think aloud and what more, her array array of topics actually supplemented mine. And well, I must admit, owing to limited internet connectivity in my college, it was getting too trying on me to keep this page updated as regularly as I'd like to.

I guess, that "master" move of mine paid off ;-) Combined with both Sakshi & my thoughts and the huge popularity on Blogger, we did happen to grab some attention. Yes, I was certainly pleasantly surprised when Suchi commented on one of my posts, informing about the article. It was a good piece that she'd finally produced. However, there's one li'l issue where I've been a bit unhappy about. I know, my page is called "Shayon's Labyrinth", but then again, I'd have appreciated if she had mentioned Sakshi's name as well. I personally feel she deserved that much, being the co-contributor of my blog, especially when Suchi had actually quoted one of Sakshi's innumerable posts, in the article.

Anyways, on my personal front, it's study time now. There'd been some issues in my relationships which I've finally managed to clear out, I hope. Got exams coming up, end of this month. And, oh yes, my second year anniversary of my relationship's coming up. Yes, I'd proposed to her on February 14, 2005! Cyber gaming still on the roll and furiously planning to reduce both my weight and waist! ;-)

Well, that is it, for now. Hope I get to write again, soon!


P.S: Any idea why I wrote "pain in the ass" in my very first line of the post? ;-)

Are You Ready For The Evolution?

Windows Vista has officially arrived, finally! But only for the corporate users. The company has announced the business availability of the Windows Vista operating system, the 2007 Microsoft Office system and Exchange Server 2007.

Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates had told shareholders on Tuesday that Windows Vista could be the company's biggest product launch since Windows 95 debuted more than a decade ago. Unlike the previous Windows launches, Vista's debut has been divided into two extravaganzas. While on November 30, Microsoft unveiled the corporate version of the new OS (along with Office 2007). The bigger rollout is scheduled for January 30 when Vista will be officially launched as a consumer product.

Microsoft has a big surprise up its sleeves for the consumers as Vista’s availability in five variants with aggressive pricing has no precedent in Microsoft’s product history. As Vista goes Corporate, here’s recapitulating all that is new with the operating system: interface, security, search, system requirements, and the various flavours.

Graphics
Desktop windows and icons are visually richer, an attempt by Microsoft to make computer use more intuitive and free-flowing. A desktop "sidebar" grabs data from the Internet to deliver customizable information at a glance.

Search
For those who find locating their things on a PC quite a task in Windows, here's help. Vista makes searching faster, more prominent and powerful, letting you hunt for desktop files and data in applications at once. A reactive ode to Google desktop search!

Security
Windows traditionally lets programmes running on the desktop access information stored all over the PC. Vista essentially seals off the core of the operating system, known as the kernel, theoretically reducing the damage a rogue programme can cause. It includes some basic anti-virus protections out of the box. It also lets corporate managers disable a PC's USB port, preventing workers from slipping data out on portable drives.

System resources

Vista can take advantage of portable flash drives to put frequently used applications in a sort of holding pattern there, making it much quicker to launch those programmes and putting less strain on the juice-sucking hard drive.

Interface
Office 2007 has done away with long-used menus in the Office programmes, regrouping them in a "ribbon" atop the screen that is designed to make it easier to find all the software's capabilities. Excel offers new ways of colour-coding data for at-a-glance presentations. E-mails and other items in Outlook can be tagged with an array of colours to better categorise and manage information.

Collaboration
Word makes it smoother to circulate documents to colleagues for review. Excel enables spreadsheets to be shared in a format that is interactive like the traditional Excel files but hides secret, often valuable formulas used to calculate data. Outlook adds new ways for incorporating scheduling and to-do lists in e-mail.

File format
Office documents will now be saved in the XML format, which will make it easier to search their contents and transfer them to other applications.

System requirements
To run Windows Vista Home Basic, the minimums are an 800 MHz or faster processor, 512 MB of memory, graphics hardware capable of SVGA (800 by 600) resolution, a 20GB hard disk with at least 15GB of free space, and a CD-ROM drive. For those who want Vista's Aero interface, they will require a graphics card that can handle DirectX 9 graphics APIs with Pixel Shader 2.0 3D texturing, has a Windows Vista display driver and at least 128 MB of graphics memory, and supports 32 bits per pixel. Users can also go for PC Pitstop's Vista readiness test, which will give them a brief comparison of their system's hardware to Vista's minimum and recommended system requirements. Microsoft's own Windows Vista upgrade advisor provides a thorough assessment. The programme scans the system and prepares a report analyzing its system's basic hardware compatibility (CPU, memory, and disk space), and details if the installed applications and drivers will work with Vista.

Flavours
Unlike Windows XP, which came in only two retail editions--Home and Professional, Windows Vista will come in five retail flavours. Microsoft has also released two OEM versions: Media Center Edition and Tablet PC Edition. For home users too, there's Home Basic and Home Premium.

We the people...

We the people of India, solemenly declare India....

Isn't this the very first page of the constitution... ?? The very first line of the preamble of our constitution on which the world's largest democracy rests.

India. Population surpassing a million. Politicians surpassing a few hundered but ruling the people who are numbering more than 10 times of what they are. 60 years of Indian independance and the people have been neglected to so much that the only day they are made to realise that they are the citizens of the largest democracy is on the day of elections.

Life, otherwise, is usual.... or It was usual. The people of India have finally realised that the preamble meant something.. it means that the largest democracy belongs to the people themselves.

2006 has been hailed as the year of the citizens not only here in India but also all over the world. The TIME magazine, put a mirror on the cover of the magazine giving the award of the person of the year to YOU... a common man, who has risen above the stature of an unknown entity. Every person has been hailed a link towards development of the world.

In India, the citizen movement started with the earnest, and for a nation who has idols in the film industry, found the movies leading the way. The likes of Rang de Basanti and Lage Raho Munna Bhai... forwarded the peace marches and revived the Gandhi culture. A nation which had been divided over issues came together to fight for justice for the likes of Jessica Lall, Pridarshini Mattoo. The Youth for equality, showed that no matter what, The gen X would stand up for their rights and stand united in that effort.

For a commom man in India, life is no bed of roses but, today he is ready to fight for the roses that dont come his way. India is finally waking up from a slumber that the Independance put her into.

Our country is finally coming of the age.. Hail the new India.. and hail the Indian.

Pravah '07

So, the ball finally starts rolling! The machinery behind our college's first ever technical festival, Pravah '07, has finally been oiled & all set to shift gear. People have started to brainstorm, planning out how to sell ideas to the top echelons of the most coveted companies. We even plan to organize seminars, so as to train the uninitiated how to talk, sell and bargain. Just chalked out the names of the expected events, last night. Damn, had been awake till 7:30 am & then again wake up at 9:45 am to get ready and attend classes. After this, I gotta prepare a powerpoint presentation which the sponsorship guys gotta carry to companies. Even need to arrange for a film festival. Phew! Quite a lot to work on, isn't it?

Oh, I almost forgot, Pravah '07 is slated to be held on 29th - 31st March, '07. As for the events, I shall be listing them down once I get the ppt presentations done. For now, I've got loads on my hands. And to top this all, there're my classes, Warcraft sessions and of course, gotta spend some quality time with my girlfriend as well!

We've been brainstorming about something for quite some time now. What after Pravah? I mean, the fest in itself is no big deal. However, do we just keep it at that? I had been wondering if we could print up something like a magazine, reporting the whole event, showcasing award winning projects and even a vote of thanks towards the organizers. People say, the cost's gonna soar then. Rather, people suggest that we conceptualize everything digitally & distribute as a pdf file. However, the majority of the crowd deems it unnecessary. What about you? What do you folks do when the tech fest in your college gets over?

So, as you can see, there are quite a few things that need to be thought upon. Ain't too sure how things are gonna materialize at the end, but I'll sure as hell try to give out my personal best. As for the rest, let's leave it all to the Devil!!

Last month Chronicled

So, finally the 'New' Year's arrived! I can even see Sakshi writing a post, ushering in the 'New' Year to this beloved blogpage of ours, as well. Well, kudos to you, gurl! Without you, this page would've remained stagnant for ages, thanks to my lazy ass!

Well, anyways, the point that I wanted to raise up was that what is so new about this 'new year'? True, folks do make 'resolution' but how many of them do you actually follow? I remember, after the college started, people continuously asking me about this year's resolutions. I got so pissed off at one time that I was forced to announce, "This year's resolution for me would be not to make any more 'new year resolutions' ever again!" ;-) I just can't figure out the very purpose of it all. Yes, I agree, for all you uninitiated out there, you'd at least go on a self evaluation trip once in a year. But then again, c'mon dude, what the heck? Since when have we started imposing things onto each other? Yes, for me, even this is imposition, never mind the intentions. I mean, if a dude wishes to live all his life in self-ignorance, who am I ask him to start re-evaluating his own affairs? And I thought I live in Democratic society!!

Okay, enough grumbling now! Actually, I shouldn't really have any grudges against 'new years'. This festive season, I've spent one of the worst as well as the best winter ever. Wondering how that happened? Well...it's just that I had to stay back in my college during the winters. Check out my 100th post for more on it. Anyways, after that 'bad patch', I happened to shake a leg at Tantra, one of the most happening discs (and I haven't been to many till date) in kolkata, with a few friends whom i met after more than 10 years! Then there was my cousin sister who opened a Pandora's box for me. After getting that wonderful & rare glimpse of the current teen life & trends, I realised it's gonna be a real tough time by the time I have kids of my own! Trust me, until now, I was too keen to have a few lovely kids of my own, someday....but after a few insightful plunges into the abyss, I guess I'd rather prefer to get an adult kid right away, if I ever do.

And after everything, there was this lovely trip to Digha, a sea beach in West Bengal, with my parents. Yes, just me & my parents! No extended family, no friends nor any siblings. Sounds boring? Well as for me, I certainly had a real good time. True, we did have one or two "discussion sessions", you know, the kind you'd expect between any dad & his 21 yr old son! Yet, it wasn't all that bad. And well, what I enjoyed the most was my way back to college, all alone. Actually, it was Monday the next day and I just had to attend the classes. So, ma n dad had left for Kolkata and I boarded another bus, on ym way back to Jamshedpur. I was absolutely clueless about the route, had 2.5K in my wallet, all in cash and tot op it all, I had been pining for a smoke all the way. After getting my supple ass all red in the bus for 4 consecutice fucking hours and 4 more on the train journey, standing all the way, by the time I entered my room, I was no better than an over used towel. Despite all the hardship, the thrill of treking the route back to home was what kept me ticking all the journey. I wish I could post the pics here, but the cam remains with Dad. Hope he mails them to me soon.

Now, an update on our college events. The socio-cultural festival, organised by NIT Jamshedpur, Utkarsh, is on its way. Students have already started to put their minds together for sponsorships. The dates fixed for the fest are 12th - 15th March, '07. Moreover, for the first time in the history of our college, we are planning for a tech fest that is yet to be named. The events for both the festivals are yet to be finalised. However, I thought I'd make a mention here about them so that, just in case you're interested in visiting or participating, you might let me know & I shall surely send out invitations on your way!

Well, that is it for today, i gotta rush for lunch now. Love you all.

Adios!!

What A Day...!!!

The Headlines in tomorrow's leading newspaper would be.... "All pretty Historic in Nature".

This day was quite eventful.. rather very eventful. For all the cricket buffs.. India registered its first victory, after months, in South Africa and it also turns out that India won a test match in South Africa for the fisrt time.

Dada a.k.a Suarav Ganguly, it seems, has come back in the Indian cricket team for the best. The one year break doing him good.. and finally resulting in India winning the test match against the South Africans.

Even as I type this, the hot topic that is being discussed on all Media channels is 'Justice for Jessica', the verdict of High court came out today and the main accused, Manu Sharma, has been convicted under section 302 of Indian Penal Court, and if not hanged.. then would be imprisoned for lifetime.

So what do you say... what a day... and if this is not enough.. then Lalu and Rabri have been aquitted of charges of excess wealth.

Oh yeah.. before I forget, I also learned that the generation Y is growing smarter.. that too faster than what we have growing up like.

Isnt that quite a muse for one day or what...!!!