Category: Digital

  • The Move to MySpace

    I had an older account on MySpace which was linked to my extinct Hotmail account. Gmail is just eons ahead of Hotmail and it didn’t make sense to keep the Hotmail account just for the sake of an old MySpace account, that I didn’t even use.

    I accessed my old MySpace account just to see what has changed after watching this tour of MySpace taken by Robert Scoble and was surprised to see that they had a beta Indian version for all its Indian users ergo still based in US and subject to their own laws and conditions.

    Thankfully, you can now delete the Hotmail account. Earlier, I believe it was to expire after a 45 day no-use gap, which didn’t make sense. Kudos to Microsft and the Hotmail team for that feature.

    I delted my old MySpace account and then deleted the linked Hotmail account. Opened a new Gmail based account on MySpace and signalled the end of my shift from Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail to Gmail.

    After my first few days digging around MySpace, I feel its a lot better than both Orkut and Facebook. There’s this sense of migration from one SNS to another but over the next year or so, I think I’ll put more of my heart into MySpace and Facebook than on anything else.

  • Google Books

    Google Books — This is a new Google feature that I found in the drop-down menu on the top of Gmail.

    I love the fact that everything that I might eternally want is under one Google Account – Docs and Spreadsheets, Gmail, Reader, GTalk and Orkut. These are the Google features I use most. I am getting around to using Google Calendar, Maps and even Picasa to complete the one id shift. I still dont like Blogger account though and prefer my WordPress account over it.

    I read a ton of books every month – both for school and for pleasure. I also listen to a lot of music – mostly over radio and from borrowed CDs from friends. These are two things that I don’t find on Google…yet. As of now, most of my book preferences etc are loaded on LibraryThing and I am beginning to enjoy the music on MySpace.

    LibraryThing has a really cool cataloging system and a really cool way to add books. What it partly fails is when you stumble on rare works by Indian authors but it has a manual add way of going around it. It also has a somewhat dumb interface. What also makes it dumb are its social networking features.

    What would make me switch from LibraryThing to Google Books? First, an equally cool tagging system. Second, a good search feature — knowing Google, it might work on this. Third, a really cool way to share this library with friends.

    I have just given Books the first look over and am looking into the details. More on this soon…

  • Hmm…2

    I have been unsubscribing from many blogs…still reading 128..after so many unsubscribing.  Have to work it down to 40-50.

  • New Stuff…

    I just signed up for emurse.com (some resume generator) and tumblr.com (a tumblog).

    Both are strange things for me here in India but I have decided to give both a try. While, I’m still thinking about what to put in my resume, I have a ton of stuff to put on my tumblog.

    For the uninitiated, if a blog is a journal/diary, a tumblog is a scrapbook where you post on tumblr.com (like wordpress.com). You can post videos, chat transcripts, cool websites, text, pics and I haven’t looked any further.

    Will give both a test-run.

  • Discovering hidden Google Stuff

    Found this and this via Google Operating System blog. I am reading through some of it.

  • I know you’ve seen this hundreds of times…but I just love this

    Yea, I’m on twitter too… http://twitter.com/pradx is where you can find me. And here’s the 404 message on Twitter.

  • Digital Library of India

    Some of the premier Indian institutions are working together along with IGNOU (that’s Indira Gandhi National Open University) to make their books available for free online. It’s an ongoing process and so you might find new resources tomorrow that you did not find today.

    The website is here.

  • How true is this?

    Found this over at ‘Creating Passionate Users‘. Do you do this? I do.

    The Myth of Keeping up. Image Credit: Creating Passionate Users

  • reading and doing

    Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog hosted as http://parallelspirals.blogspot.com/. I recovered the text from the WayBack Machine. This post appeared on Ocober 16, 2006 as per the timestamp. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.

    Everyone consumes the web differently. Web is a thing to be consumed differently. There are people who post regularly on the web and then there are people who read what has been written. They think and think. Say what wonderful work that all of them are doing and appreciate them for bringing forth a fact and then do nothing about it.

    At least, that’s how I worked. I read blogs like GlobalVoices [link]. I say that what they are doing is a great job and then go home and do nothing about the things that were reported there.

    Do you do anything after reading such posts which request you to use your power and freedom to make a difference?

    If yes, please do not reply on the comments. It’s very easy to talk about things that you do do. What is more difficult is owing up to the fact that you don’t do anything. And, to all those people who do do something, take a bow. And the people who write these things that cause other people to do, take a bow.

  • Is blogging genetic

    Note: I wrote this on my earlier blog hosted as http://parallelspirals.blogspot.com/. I recovered the text from the WayBack Machine. This post appeared on Ocober 14, 2006 as per the timestamp. I’m trying to collect here again all my old writings spread on various blogs.

    In the future, will today’s bloggers offspring also blog? What will they blog about? The same subject as their parents or something different. If both father and mother are bloggers, whose style will he take more??

    Nah, just joking. But, just think: how would ur children blog…what would blogging be like in that age – 30-40 years or even 10 years for all you older folks.

    What about SMSing and the choice of search engine or the choice of computer…or the choice of tech gadgets?? Trying to get your mind on a track that may or may not be thinking about. This can be developed into a whole new branch of philosophy called techno-philosophy where people study such abstract questions like “Why does Technology have the affect it does have?”…”Why does technology exist?”…”What would happen if there were no technology??”.

    Enjoy thinking.

    ===
    listening to:
    Angel – The Corrs
    At your side – The Corrs