Archive for category Bhadaas
App Store cheats?
I like the iPhone App Store. I mean I really love all the different kinds of cool apps available 24×7 on my iPhone which I can install over edge or wi-fi anytime I want.
It takes real hard courage to go ahead and buy any app from the app store. Mainly because we (Indians) are so much used to free software that we take it for granted. The thought of buying software just brings LOL to our minds.
The app store changed all this. I saw people in India actually buying these apps! Forget everyone else, even I went ahead and bought a couple of .99$ and 1.99$ apps. Due to the sucky conversion rate to INR, they do cost us little more than they should. But still, I buy them.
After reading a lot of positive reviews, I gathered a lot of courage to buy the Moto Chaser game @ 5.99$. The game lived up to my expectations. You can read my review here .
But today after reading the news that the game’s price was reduced to .99$, I feel cheated. I mean lowering the app’s price for a few days might be a good marketing gimmick, but it fucks up the courage to buy new apps. I mean after seeing this, I am not gonna buy any app right away. I will probably wait for the developer’s birthday or any other stupid reason for the price to go down and then buy it.
Apple should do something about this, else people will stop buying the apps.
Movie Review: Welcome to Sajjanpur [Sucks]
I do not know why stereotype directors go out of their way and produce crappy movies which are completly out of their league. And I do not understand how great actors consent to such roles.
I was too excited to watch this movie partly because the music is really nice and because it’s a Shyam Benegal’s movie. However, it turned out to be complete torture. It had absolutely no storyline till the interval after which it was a little watchable.
For the first half, random characters were coming on screen and doing random stuff. To make matters worse, they threw in some songs which really weren’t necessary. Furthermore, no one probably watched the movie after the production was over, otherwise, they would have noticed that KK’s voice does not suit on the bhojpuri actor Ravi Kishan.
The fact that an excruciating street play about the Singur problem was deliberately inserted in the movie proves that directors take their movies as their playground and do not even think about viewers’ reaction.
Benegal wanted to make a comedy movie. Then why on earth did he try to insert public service messages in favor of eunuchs (like he hasn’t already) and against stupid superstitions (Marrying a girl with a dog to remove some kind of astrology issue)? They were really irritating and the message got out all wrong. Also, it was a movie for villagers and illitrate people with really good songs (thanks to Shantanu Moitra). Maybe he should have made a documentary.
Stay away from this movie.
WTF
I was installing Windows Vista SP1 today and got the following error:
Needless to say, even if I somehow get this installed, I will not be hoping for anything.
P.S: Looks like these guys do not want users to actually go to that link. Its neither selectable nor a hyperlink !
UPDATE: Turns out that link is actually useless. Just asks you to restart your system and/or run some stupid diagnostic tools to fix the problem. Seems like they do not know anything about this error.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Thanks to Bandan for the link from windowsreference.com. I was able to install Vista SP1. Not all the steps in that article might work. Here is what you need to do:
- Reinstall windows update agent
- Save it on your disk and run from a command prompt adding “/wuforce” at the end of the command.
- Install Vista SP. It should install this time. It will take approx 30 mins to install and will restart your computer multiple times.
Lost is Lost
I watched S04E04 of Lost today and was very disappointed. I was expecting that atleast they will reveal something in this episode. But instead, they are continuously adding to the list of suspenses related to the island and the people.
Apparently, team Lost is completly Lost and have no idea where to take the series. I would not be surprised if I find out that the writers are now writing more mysteries to buy some time to figure out the previous ones. There might be a lot of theories on several websites online, but they are probably planning to write their own.
I remember Seth McFlaren advising HBS students not to go about creating a TV series about a plane crashing on an unknown island if you do not know where to take it.
Apparently, he was right. The director has no idea where he is going. I am not saying that I will not watch it. Of course I will keep watching it. But I will not be surprised by any theories that might come up in it.
Lost has lost its zeal.
WTF
I saw an advertisement today in an India’s leading newspaper on the front page urging people to not talk on mobile phone while driving. For the record – in India, people usually drive as if they are drunk. Add mobile to it and you have many casualties.
Now, the advertisement shows a person driving a car and wearing a bluetooth headset. If you look closely, you will find that the person is sitting on the front left seat of the car and the car indeed is left hand drive!
Everything is fine except that we have right hand drive here in India! Unless the advertisement was meant for the select few who import vehicles from the US, it completly misses the target audience!
The advertisement was given by the Delhi government which is organising the 2010 Commonwealth games in India.
When will these idiots understand that keeping the right audience in mind is the first thing to do when creating an advertisement.
Seriously people. Grow up.
The death of the scrapbook :(
I have been receiving a lot of new year wishes in my scrapbook lately. Usually I like such wishes, however, most of my friends are using 3rd party scripts to send such wishes to every person in in their friends’ list. I do not think its a good idea.
Maybe I am being judgemental, but I think this defeats the purpose of the scrapbook. The whole idea of the scrapbook is to leave teasers or one liners for your friends while you are visiting their profiles. And maybe for people you do not know yet but want to know more. Its a great way to start a conversation with a total stranger on orkut.
With these 3rd party scripts (in which their own link supersedes the scrap), I am afraid that the charm of the orkut scrapbook is dead. I do not feel like checking my scrapbook when I see that I have a new scrap. Whats the use of wasting time when I will only end up deleting that scrap?
Google will have to definitly take some action for this. Else this will soon become another medium for spam and useless forwards.
WTF
Check out the broadband plans offered by Reliance in India:
Image source: http://www.reliancecommunications.co.in/Communications/rcom/broadband/broadband_con_postpaid.html
Hmm. 600 Mbps for INR 1799 pm? Sounds like a pretty good deal? It 75 MBPS at just 45$ a month? Hey, this is not justified to Americans. I mean they only got a maximum of 40 MBPS in some households that too extremely costly!
Mr. Ambani, are you in for another Monsoon hungama? This time in the broadband regime?
Thank god I changed my carrier. I am never gonna switch back to Reliance. If these guys cannot maintain a good website, what should we expect from them in terms of services & customer care?
Seriously people, wake up.
UPDATE: Seems like Reliance guys corrected the problem. Do not know how they found out, but hey, glad to be of help :).
Where are we going?
Sometimes I just wonder where are we all heading ?
Now I am obviously not thinking in philosophical terms and talking about tech here. When I turn around and look back at the year which has almost passed away, I see:
- A top notch software giant release a newer version of its operating system which is inferior to its own predecessor.
- Another software & hardware giant announce & release the invention of the year but soon become defensive about it and is now indulged in a cat & mouse game with a handful of god sent angels.
- A company ubiquitously called the synonym of the web releases an open source mobile platform which might make the mobile industry a little less “evil” but is certainly not a breakthrough (as expected from it).
- The Indian guy which gave a software giant the then invention for the web is challenging the same giant (now a copy-cat) with his another breakthrough invention.
These were the major news in the tech world which managed to stick in the feed xmls for the longest amount of time. I do not think that the motivation behind all the above was pure innovation. I see the 2 frogs in a well story going on here. Everyone is concerned about the competition so much that much of their resources are wasted in keeping pace with their competitors. Imagine what it would be like if all their resources went into pure innovation !
This reminds me of my first ever blog post :). Why do we compete ? Why can’t we just go our own way and do whatever we are supposed to and want to? This this this & this will tell you what I am talking about.
C’mon guys ! Its high time wake up ! Rise above the obvious stuff & make us feel proud that we were born in this time !
Stupid Outlook
Have you ever replied all to a mail in Outlook? It is so stupid! If your email address is there in the recepients list, it will add it in the To: field! Now even a class II student understands the meaning of reply all.
I have used many other mail programs like Thunderbird, Gmail etc. They all are intelligent enough to remove you from the list! Even the awesome mail app in my iPhone beats Mr. Outlook in this regard.
I am thinking that I so hate this company and its products. I have hated them so much that no matter what they do, I am gonna keep hating them.
Congratulations Ishmeet!
Ishmeet just became the first voice of India! Congratulations!
I feel that this was the right choice as he had a better voice than Harsha.
However, i do not like people from Punjab, Haryana & Himachal who say that its all because of votes from their states. If this was true, then it means that he did not deserve this title at all!
I really do not dig people from these states saying that they are better and more powerful than any other state in India. I agree that these are the richest and most literate states of India, but India is a land of diversities and every state has its own importance. If they think they are better than the other states, they are no worse than Tamil Nadu which thinks it should not be a part of India.
Ismeet was chosen because his voice was better between the 2 finalists.
If it was upto me, I would have gived this title to Toshi. And I suppose most avid music lovers would agree with me.