July 2004 Archives

Lets get to the Truth.

People of advertising agencies should be thanked for making things interesting sometimes.. There have been a lot of Ads that connect with our thoughts, or, get a laugh out of us.

Recently I visited this website of one of India's top rated Ad agency... Rediffusion | DYR

Its not their work or their name that caught me.. but their website content.

Website content writers for companies, are typical boredom-bringers... having read contents of various caompanies I can say that. If not for some interesting bloggers, I would not be interested in this thing myself.

Anyway.. what did i read.. Here it is.. I am sure u 2 like it.

-------------------------------------------------------------
"You may be reading this whilst thinking about appointing a new advertising agency (in which case we suggest hitting the links on your left right away). Or, you may be reading this because it's your coffee break, and you don't like solitaire. You may be reading this to understand why your bright young kid made advertising his career.

You may be reading this because you’re hoping to find a query button. You may be reading this because you're that bright young kid wanting to make a mark in advertising and marketing. You may be reading this, hoping somewhere in this ramble of words, you’ll find the name of a supplier you need.

You may be reading this because you’re the morality brigade checking for obscenity in advertising. Whatever your reason to read so far, we’d like to say, welcome to RDYR Lounge!

RDYR Lounge is just the place to keep pace with the Indian advertising industry."
--------------------------------------------------------------------
from Rediffusion (in context of displaying their work only)

Interesting? May be u like more of them like I did. Check them Rediffusion | DYR

Today I saw something very interesting, very good, very promising of India's future..

Its usual to see truck drivers making a shady backyard kindof... behind their vehicles parked in-line... on the sides of a busy road. When this other-side of the road is scorched by the hot sun in Chennai(India), this backyard rest place fills up with gossip.

Usually the truck drivers either have a gossip, a siesta, or, play an old game of squares by drawing lines on the mud and use small stones as coins. But today, I casually peeped into one such backyard on the road adjoining my office, and I found them (the truck drivers) playing chess.

Isn't it something very interesting, very good, very promising of India's future.. ;-)

It was nice to see Chess catching interests in these people..I thought its only cricket that fancies all kinds of Indians. Is Chess becoming interesting.. after Cricket .. in India?

This morning's newspapers carried a column about one gentleman Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web. He has been knighted by Queen Elizabeth II this Friday in London for his contributions to Technology.

He is a london-born scientist and the architect behind the Internet and internet technologies standards organization, the W3C.

The internet and "what it is?" need no introduction (at least to those of you who are already reading this weblog on the web). Since the time internet became feasible to be implemented, it has changed businesses worldwide, and is increasingly changing lives of people. All the credit, goes to this man, a non-celebrity, who never cashed in on his invention, and went on to set up the W3C (World wide web consortium), a non-profit industry standards-setting body.

He has sure done a lot to the people around the globe directly or indirectly changing the way we live.

Get a picture of him for your desktop wallpaper from my collection.

Read more about him here.

Maria sharapova is my recent inspiration. I admire the way this russian 17 year old made it to the wimbledon 2004 and eventually won it in straight sets against a hard opponent like serena williams... and very importantly yet she kept her mind in control when she spoke her age at the wimbledon saying "sorry to you (serena).. i didnt want to take this (wimbledon shield) from you, but i had to win today.. i myself didnt know"

I am sure if I stood near her, she would be atleast 1 feet above my head or so. A tall beautiful russian(actually siberian). And one sports magazine ad i saw today had her picture besides which was written.. "For those who thought siberia is cold..." ;-)

It was a display of sheer hardwork and focus on the goal(rather than the result) that this sportswoman showed at the wimbledon. Her walk to the podium to recieve the wimbledon shield was full of jumping, laughter, flying kisses and expressions. It sure showed how she tasted victory at that time.

Its wonderful that this woman showed up at the wimbledon beyond her own expectations. I dedicate this blog entry (well...thats something that i can do :o) to her. Thanks for inspiring me by your achievement.

India is much talked about these days because of its growth in software exports and because outsourcing software jobs to India is "popular".

Why is India good for software compared to other nations? Is it only because Indian labour is cheaper, and resource availability is higher?

Answer : Yes!
But I dont think it ends there. They are only part of the few reasons.

Indian software are of comparable quality adhering to software standards worldwide, and all large Indian software companies practise quality standards and work environment standards like ISO, CMM.

Understandably India is not a country which strives for the foreign market, theres much more to tap inside india. Because its a fact that majority of indian businesses(non-software) are not automated, and government institutions are not having technology facilities. That means much of India is still 10 to 15 years behind in technology.

So does that mean Indian software companies are basically targeting only foreign markets?

Not so. There are many instances in the country where indian software companies have been doing and are doing automation services for a variety of companies and some government institutions. An example of a growing in-country software consumer market is the banking sector in india.

Government institutions subsidise a lot of products and their services in the country, to allow for more people-friendly behaviour and for political reasons.

A lot of commercial products in India are also low-priced versions of actual quality of similar products sold in foreign countries, just to keep the India customer interested.

Yes, "Indians are used to low cost of living". And high quality products are not easily saleable in local markets. So, its only the foreign markets that can afford the cost of quality that some Indian software companies provide.

Considering the quality of software services provided, Indian companies target foreign markets to make the service feasible.

Today I had some time off my work at office. I was searching my mind for a topic to google for the day and learn about it(search engine at www.google.com). As it always happens, i found some interesting other than what i was looking for...and i took to reading on this, call it "Photographies of India" or something like that. 

I am no good buff favoring travel. Shifting geographical location, leaving everyone and everything around you, is still a strange thing for me to do. That explains why I would like to see photographs of India, while this is already the place where I live.

So, I found some real good shots of India by many creative photographers around the globe.. (or is my country real that good, and a'int i knew that?)

As anybody else, I also fascinate the TajMahal for it is the best monument I have ever been to, and more than seeing it on a picture visiting it in Agra will make you go speechless on its beauty.

Other than the Taj, I like all those pictures of villages and people living there. Living in a city away from meeting such people and being to such villages, my interests on collecting photographs which depict village life is not a weird thing.

I made a collection of webpages and some description of the image content of these pages. You should try visiting the links below for more photographs on India. They are interesting and will interest you to learn more about India.

As one photographer put it on his site "India is definitely the greatest show on earth. This very ancient land of contrasts, with its glorious past present everywhere, will change your way of thinking one way or the other and leaves a lasting impression on all visitors. High mountains, dense forests, huge deserts, tiny coral islands with beautiful beaches, magnificent temples, forts and palaces, the Taj Mahal, lots of holy cities and rivers, so many different peoples, languages and religions, an abundance of wildlife.... the list goes on and on. In fact , India has it all..... and a lot more besides. All you need to bring is a little patience and a healthy dose of humor",
http://www.frankossen.com/India.htm

Photograph Links on India:

http://www.stevenbaigel.com/photos/india.html
Nice photos with description

http://www.hanshendriksen.net/indiagallery.htm
Author of this India travel photo gallery with 32 India travel pictures is Hans Hendriksen, a Dutch travel photographer who prefers to record daily-life scenes.

eyescoffee.com
Has a collection of 27 pictures with references, and gives particular interest to the popular car of India in early days "The white ambassador".

http://www.robertleon.com/index_ie.html
Has a small 1.5mb flash slideshow of pictures

NOTE: All pictures may have copyrights, check their respective websites for details.

Apart from being the most sought after resource market for software corporations worldwide, India and its other industries are vying to show-up in world space.

How can I say that? ...Because I see it around me in India.

For instance, India was not a known manufacturer of automobiles or any product for that matter, which it used to export. Indians were only assembling or integrating imported goods.. (something that china has taken to - and made India costly in comparison to china).

Indian services industry was the only one where foreign investors willingly put their money. But these days, Indian companies are exporting more of goods that are wholly manufactured in India (or at least with raw materials alone imported). This is mainly due to two big companies in India which provided that break... that Indian products are also quality conscious. The companies were, Sundaram Fasteners, and Hyundai Motors.

While Sundaram Fasteners is a homegrown Indian company, Hyundai motors is a mix. Hyundai motors settled south of India and manufactured cars to target the Indian market. Many automobile giants considered the Hyundai setup in India as an experiment... and all eyes watched closely.

Hyundai successfully developed a car for the Indian market and it was a huge success. Hyundai gradually increased standards in manufacture, capacity and labour, and installed all quality standards in place. The experiment satisfied foreign investors about India’s capacity to enter foreign markets. Hyundai, now exports cars manufactured in India to Europe and America... for about an year already.

Though Hyundai's experiment was instrumental in lifting Indian industry's consciousness, it was Sundaram fasteners, which proved that Indian manufacture industry is quality capable.

Sundaram fasteners, one among TVS Sundaram group of companies, manufactured radiator caps and won a supply contract for General motors. They have been supplying General motors for more than 5 years now.. and won the 'Best of the Best supplier' award from General motors more than thrice. In this context I could hurriedly find an old webpage (1999)
"An interview with the chairman and MD of sundaram fasteners"

All these consciousness fortunately stayed, and Indian industries found (and finding) space in foreign countries to grow.

In the world of computers, different operatings systems pose different looks and usage interests.. They aptly call it "look-and-feel".

If you tried linux flavors like Redhat linux's Fedora, you have rather experienced "the difference".

I have been working on a Java project on a apple mac for sometime.. my office bought a cool new white emac for the same and everyday when i have to do something on it, it has been a pleasure... though i call it a portable TV-set ;-) rather than a computer. If you had one, you will agree more with me on this "TV-set" term...I bet :o).

Apple mac's not only have a different OS, but altogether a different hardware to use. If you
didnt know, you cant install a Mac operating system on any other hardware other than apple. Thats some marketing.. keeping your business with yourself., rather than allowing the world to produce hardware compatible for your software like Microsoft does. They do have the risk of being dumped by the market since its only dumping of one company's products.

Anyway as of now Apple exist. I would leave the argument of whether they are right in this, for another day.

With mac, a lot of things are different.. obvious enough for a regular windows user for years, u cant expect a mac os, or a linux to perform like microsoft's operating system... but if you see it on thier side, apple does what it does best. images, and graphics rendering.

You should view a photograph of yourself on a mac, and then on a windows or linux machine and os. You will find a great amount of clarity in the picture and sharpness in the colors. That explains why apple is happy with only hardware manufactured by them.

Hello world!

This is a test of my new blog. A 'Movable-Type' one, i have setup..
If u see it, it means it worked.