The Extent of the so-called “Social Networking” sites
Posted by Harish.S at Friday, May 21, 2010Facebook, Twitter, Orkut, MySpace are some of the sites which are pretty famous among youngsters now. The concept of Social networking was born in 1990’s to keep in touch with friends and family but it has evolved a lot. As of now, they are used as a source of advertisement ad money making venture by luring in people to use their features. It has changes the face of the internet ad Facebook has become one of the most popular sites in the internet. This advent of extensive social networking bought a lot of problems along with it.
• People become friends without knowing each others.
• People waste lots of time on non-productive activities such as games, quiz, and so on.
• Privacy problems.
• Addiction to social networking.
• Cut-off from the physical world.
There has been many problems and crimes reported because of Social networks. Kids are being blackmailed, bad company, money fraudulent cases, stress and strain and various other problems. To quote some:
1. A girl form Bangalore has been blackmailed by two of her Facebook friends for money and she has been stealing it from her mom regularly to give those guys. One day she was caught red handed and a police complaint was lodged on the two guys who were just of age 16 and 18.
2. A Mumbai girl sits in Facebook for almost 5 hours a day and had some 1500 friends in Facebook. She was under an emotional breakdown because her Facebook boy friend broke up with her and attempted for suicide.
I can just keep on giving even my personal experiences of waiting time in Facebook during exam, my friend wasting his whole time in his home playing a game in FB rather than spending time with friends and parents. The development of technology should be utilized for a productive work rather than this kind of time wasting entities. But I also don’t tell that Social Networking concept is a goner. Everything has its own limits and we should use it in a correct manner. Last but not the least, to end this with a quote I choose a Tamil saying which says “ALAVUKKU MEERINAAL AMURTHAMUM NANJU” (i.e.) Honey also turns into poison beyond a certain limit.
Post your comments.
Has Justice Been Served?
Posted by Harish at Sunday, May 16, 2010Today I read an article in the Hindu. It was by a carnatic singer from Chennai. He expressed his views about the death sentence given to the lone captured terrorist from the Mumbai attacks, Ajmal Kasab. This is one of the most discussed and debated topics in India for quite some time now. But after reading it, I realized that I had my own views to share about the death sentence and I could find no better medium.
Open for comments.
What are we?
Posted by Harish at Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Do Indians suffer from inferiority complex?
Posted by Harish at Saturday, April 3, 2010Daksh 2010 was a big hit !
Posted by Harish.S at Tuesday, February 23, 2010Daksh 2010, Sastra university's technical festival was a great hit. There were nearly 1400 registrations from 150 different colleges. Over 50 events were held in the span of three days from Feb 19-21. All the teams worked so hard to make Daksh a grand success. All the arrangements were good and everything went as planned. The highlight of Daksh was the infotainment stalls which were keeping people happy by organizing fun events. The college was full of people in all the three days. There was a great sense of enthusiasm in every Sastraite. Guest lectures were conducted in which eminent personalities like Mr.Gurumurthy , Dr.Swapan Das Gupta shared their thoughts.What makes Daksh more special is the laser show which took place in the ground on 21st night. It was a technical marvel to look at. Lights dancing to the tunes and vivid patterns stole the show. The happy lot will be TEAM DAKSH as all their hard work has paid-off :).
The APPLE frenzy
Posted by Harish.S at Saturday, February 13, 2010Apple inc. has made it again. It invented new technologies like mouse wheel , iPod, iPhone and now the iPad. Though it never seemed a bigger prospect when compared to its previous products, it has created a revolution in the market again. It just didn't create a market share for itself , but also boosted the number of iPhone software developers by nearly 200%. The number of iPhone related projects have been increased to 1600 from 600 in just one month. Apple has repeatedly proved its worth by making a firm entry into the market with every product they release. One more achievement for Apple : Nearly one billion songs have been downloaded from iTunes. That is a big number. iTunes and iPod still continue to dominate music industry by all means. And for iPod users, you have a chance of winning a $10,000 Apple voucher. All you have to do is just download a song from iTunes before the song count reaches 1 billion or go to Apple site and register fr the draw. So lets wait until Apple unveils its next product.
Yahoo! presents CloudCamp & First India Hadoop Summit in Bangalore [23 days left]
Posted by adithya at Friday, February 5, 2010 WhereBangalore
OrganizerYahoo!
Key Dates
Event is on: February 28, 2010
About CloudCamp:
CloudCamp is an unconference where early adopters of Cloud Computing technologies exchange ideas. With the rapid change occurring in the industry, we need a place where we can meet to share our experiences, challenges and solutions. At CloudCamp, you are encouraged to share your thoughts in several open discussions, as we strive for the advancement of Cloud Computing. End users, IT professionals and vendors are all encouraged to participate.
Register for CloudCamp Bangalore & Hadoop Summit, Feb 28, 2010
About India Hadoop Summit:
Yahoo! India R&D presents first India Hadoop Summit, a dedicated track at CloudCamp, will bring together leaders from Hadoop developer and user communities. In this event you will find participants from Yahoo! India Hadoop team, Industry leaders and top universities.
Speakers will cover a rich variety of topics including the current state of Hadoop development and deployment, PIG, Data Mining, performance optimization of Hadoop Cluster, testing in Hadoop, real-world case study and, Hadoop in Academia Research.
At India Hadoop Summit, you will be encouraged to share your ideas, thoughts and experience in several open discussions. Please use the tag "indiahadoopsummit2010" in your tweets, posts, and photos.
Location:
Will be announced soon.
For details regarding schedule please visit above site.
Website : http://tinyurl.com/yj9mk28
Email address: blr.clug@gmail.com
THE HUMAN MIND
Posted by Harish.S at Tuesday, February 2, 2010The "HUMAN MIND" is one of its kind. There is no such thing as complex as it. Great psychologists have wondered how the mind reacts to various situations and it still remains a mystery to all. It eludes all possible theories by acting in a new way everytime they try to find a pattern. We all have tried to ask ourselves certain questions about our own actions for which we ourselves dont know the apt answer. Why do we react wierdly at times? Why are we not aware of ourselves when we are not in control of our mind? Why do we develop certains tastes whic halways differ from others? Why are people different even though they have same organ called the 'brain'. What is responsible for all these? We never know the answer to all these questions. How ever sophisticated a technology becomes it is still no match to a human brain. One such instance of this : Massechusetts Institute of technology developed a super computer named "DEEP BLUE" which was considered to be 99% efficient in playing the game of chess. But that lost to Garry Kasporov in a game of chess and garry lost to Indian chess veteran vishwanathan Anand.
"DEEP BLUE WAS NOT BLUE ENOUGH".
Thus life goes even without understanding the basic thing of a human being: THE MIND. Let us wait till some one unravells that mystery.
Awaiting your comments.
DAKSH 2010, NIRMAAN - Purificador de agua
Posted by adithya atGreetings!
Daksh, the technical extravaganza brought to you by SASTRA University is back with a bang!!!
Daksh aims at providing a podium for students from all over the world to compete and also to whet their technical skills. It is a package deal of workshops, guest lectures, entertainment shows and numerous events spread over all branches of engineering and management, which is bound to leave you enthralled. We invite you to make the best of this deal, to experience engineering and to Come, Learn, Get Dakshified!!!
This year around, the Nirmaan cluster of Daksh is up with newer and more exciting prospects. Construction, has been merged with fun, knowledge and experience to bring you
"PURIFICADOR DE AGUA", an event related to the making of a working model of a Water Treatment Plant. It is out here to test your basic construction skills along with your creativity and ability to work with different materials.But that is not all!!! It tests your Marketing skills as well. Wondering how??? Check out the following link for all your answers.
http://www.daksh.sastra.edu/
So all those out there who think you can work this out, and be on the trail for the cash prize of Rs.25000, register now!!!!!
Send your queries to nirmaan@daksh.sastra.edu
For further details visit www.daksh.sastra.edu
contact : 9840700236
Come. Learn. Get Dakshified!
See you soon,
Team DAKSH.
The plight of 'Mahatma Gandhi' in South Africa
Posted by Harish.S at Thursday, January 28, 2010When I was thinking about what to post today, I read the previous post about Nehru. Suddenly these incidents came to my mind and I feel every Indian needs to know this.
- We all know Gandhi is a barrister. AndGandhi went to South Africa in 1890 to lend hands in solving a case on trading. Barristers were respectful and influential persons in those times. But in SA Indians faced severe racial discrimination. Gandhi during his early face of life faced severe difficulties than those he faced in India during 1930's. In SA Gandhi was harasses in every way possible because of his strict life style and strong mind. Gandhi was not even given a single room in any hotel when he reached SA for the first time because he was a colored person. 'BLACK' people are not allowed to use any service used by the so called 'WHITES'. This situation prevailed in SA for many years together.
- Another instant of hardship for Gandhi happened when he was going from Johannesburg to Natal where he was thrown out of the train for travelling in first class. Whites are only allowed to travel in fiirst class in SA. Gandhi being a barrister insisted on first class ticket and refused to get out of the train. So he was forcefully removed by the guards and he travelled in a tram to the place. Another time when he was traveeling in first class in same route, he got the same treatment but another white person stopped the guard saying that he has a tiket and has all rights to travel in first class and he has no problem in travelling with Gandhi.
- Gandhi faced severe oppositon in getting approval to practice law in SA for the only reason of him being a black. He had to undergo a rigorous process to get approval which nearly took him two months his one year work schedule.
Nehru-The philanderer
Posted by Viswanathan Karthik at Wednesday, January 27, 2010DISCLAIMER: This post has been written with the sheer motto of passing on information (and improving one's writing skills) and does not harm or disfigure any political figure.
Lady Mountbatten->Nehru->Kashmir issue
After an hour of googling found out that Nehru was a very good philanderer, and Lady Mountbatten was not his first extra marital relations; he had a son to some other lady who is in an orphanage!!
The above photo shows the plight of Mountbatten when Nehru was coquetting Lady Mountbatten. So friends and readers please think, the next time you fall for someone see to that you don't take the wrong decisions.
Awaiting your comments....
Twittermania!!!!!
Posted by Harish.S atTwitter has become a buzz word in the present world. Internet was being used only for transfer of information in late 90's. But now a days the number of users have multiplied and internet has become a space of booming business. More people started using social networking sites to keep in touch with their kith and kins. Then came a site for updating status messages only. First I thought that what's the use of a site only for that purpose. But it has turned out to be one of the most upcoming site of the year 2009 and Twitter identity has become an important part of the technical world. Every celebrity is now in twitter and there are loads of dumb people who are always ready to follow what the stars do. This has become an amazing way of publicity for everyone. Twitter has proven useful for many communities: vendors to advertise their portfolio, celebrities to increase their publicity. The most interesting fact is that twitter has helped to generate huge funds for the relief of earthquake victims in Haiti. Also, it has paved way to jobs where a person needs to twitter to promote,market and support a product and the person is paid on the basis of number of tweets made. This has proven the use of technology and science for useful purposes and has shown the power of internet. Twitter has made a firm stand in the internet and everyone is in "Twittermania"
The Right Path
Posted by Harish atAn Interesting Comparison
Posted by Harish at Tuesday, January 26, 2010Awaiting comments!
It Happened to Me Once
Posted by Harish at Saturday, January 23, 2010Technika 10 - Ethical Hacking Workshop, Birla Institute of Technology Mesra,Patna Campus
Posted by adithya at Friday, January 22, 2010
Overview of the Workshop What necessitates the computer security is that, people think it to be 'Cool' to be able to 'Hack', but its 'Cooler' to be able to secure systems. To make you 'cooler', here Kyrion Digital Securities come with an exciting plus informative workshop. The workshop will feature talks by some distinguished experts on security and even the practical demonstrations. The focus of the workshop is to learn how to protect us from the menace of hacking. During the workshop, the primary aim would be to introduce you to the current popular attacks and explain the techniques to counter them. Don't worry it would not be a "scriptkiddie" material. The other focus of the workshop is to enable you to build up future systems. It includes making you aware of the current shortcomings which give rise to bad security systems. As it is quite a vast topic to talk about, we will be giving an overview of what constitutes 'ideal secure system'. This course would equip students to counter the potential attacks. Also, the aim would be impart technical know-how of how to make the Internet transactions safe and secure. This would be a founding stone for India to emerge as a Super Power in times to come.
For any query, please feel free to contact:
Kyrion Coordinator
Name: Tajinder Kalsi
Phone: +91-95559-44466
Email: tajinder.kalsi@kyrion.in
One More Problem Due to Overweight!
Posted by Harish atCensoring the WEB
Posted by Harish.S atAnother post regarding the censorship issues relating to the web. I have posted the problems faced by Google in china previously. Internet was introduced to enable free flow of information throughout the world and it has succeeded in doing so. But there are some countries which are prohibiting people from the right of freedom to browse by "censoring the web" .The list of top ten countries where stringent censorship exits are :
10. Pakistan
Pakistan started censoring the web in 2000, when the main target was anti-Islamic content. Over the time, it seems, they liked the possibility to control the Internet traffic, and have been increasing the scope of their censorship system ever since.9. Burma
Burma, officially the Union of Myanmar, is a country characterized by severe human rights problems, so it would be hard to expect an open and reliable Internet adoption. It is estimated that less than 1% of its population has access to the web, and this happens via a handful of cybercafes, and always under tight surveillance.8. Yemen
The Yemen government is very hostile to the freedom of the media in general, and the Internet is no exception. Political and social issues are always under their radar, although the digital infrastructure for the censorship here is not as advanced as in some of the other countries on our list.7. North Korea
North Korea has managed to accomplish a really tough task given our time: they kept the Internet outside of the country borders! For a country that has no independent media at all, however, it makes sense.6. Syria
The Syrian government admits that it automatically blocks websites with pornographic content and with politically sensitive information. In reality the situation is much worse, and many journalists from around the world consider Syria to be one of the most repressive countries as far as the Internet is concerned.5. Cuba
The Reporters Without Borders organization considers Cuba “one of the world’s 10 most repressive countries” when it comes to online content.The local access to the Internet is so controlled, and the punishment to dissent so severe, that they managed to create a state of self-censorship, where people don’t even try to access prohibited material out of fear.
4. United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates is one of the most connected countries in the Middle East. Despite that fact, the country tries to control heavily the flow of information on the web. Virtually any website containing ideas or information that goes against the political, moral or religious values of the country is blocked.3. Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia introduced the Internet on its country many years after other Arab countries, exactly because they didn’t know how they would be able to control the content. Today they have a complex censorship system in place, and they even have laws criminalizing the access to websites that violate Saudi laws or Islamic values.2. Iran
The censorship of the web in Iran started several years ago, and today they are one of the most efficient countries on this respect. The target? All non-Islamic websites, making Iran probably the country with the most extensive web censorship in the world.1. China
If you think that The Great Wall of China was already an incredible thing, you should take a look at what critics from around the world call “The Great Firewall of China.” China has undoubtedly the most sophisticated censorship system in the world. In the past they have been able to block all sorts of unfriendly websites, and even to silence movements like the pro-Tibet protest as if they never existed.End of Scrabulous
Posted by Harish.S atWe all use facebook. It is one of the most popular social networking sites in the world. The unique aspect of Facebook is its application database. An application called scrabulous was among the most used application. But because of legal problems and privacy breach, facebook decided to remove it from the site and filed a case on January. The application was created by two Indians. Though it can be presently used in India, proceedings are going on to remove it and all the odds are stacked against SCRABULOUS.
Google - 'Hai Baaton Mein Dum?' Contest [10 days left]
Posted by adithya at Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Contest ends on: January 31, 2010
Winners shall be announced on: February 28, 2010
Open to residents of India above 13 years of age.
Yahoo! Hack U 2010i
Posted by adithya at
Hack Day at IISc Bangalore begins on: January 21, 2010
Hack Day at IIIT-Hyderabad begins on: January 22, 2010
Browsers : Internet's eye piece
Posted by Harish.S atInternet has become so common such that not even a single day passes without using some sort of its services like mails, chatting, blogging, social networking, etc. But have you ever thought about the tool you use to surf the internet - "THE BROWSER". Do you know how it works or what it is based on? How much secure a browser is? Is the browser you are using is better than others? What all you can do with it? We never care for such things as long as we are able to surf the internet using the old crap installed in most of the operating systems.
A browser is rated by WEB STANDARDS PROJECT using the Acid3 test. The acid test basically that tests how well a browser follows certain elements from web standards, especially relating to the Document Object Model and JavaScript It actually tests how a browser runs CSS, DOM objects, Web2.0 modules and gives a score for 100 based on the performance. These are the scores of Acid3 test of some of the popular browsers:
1.) Google Chrome 4.0.295.0 - 100/100
2.) Safari 4 - 100/100
3.) Opera 10 - 100/100
4.) Mozilla Firefox 3.5.2 - 93/100
5.) Internet explorer 9 - 32/100
Source: Wikipedia
From the above pictures we get that Chrome, Safari and Opera have 100/100 but it is not that all are of same standard. It just implies that all the browsers have passes all tests in Acid3. Chrome out lasts every other browser in terms of speed and captures the 'Numero uno' spot. Also I would like to add a detailed performance report on popular browsers where Google Chrome is the clear winner.
Along with performance there are lot of other factors which influences people to use various browsers such as add-ons, themes, plug-ins, etc. The race is on and every competitor is trying to become better over the other. In the end we the end user is benefited by these as our browsing experience increase day by day :) . Enjoy surfing the internet.