sonu clones in indian idol
Goddammit!
The presence of Sonu Nigam as a judge in most competitions that search for a good singer, is becoming claustrophobic. In order to impress him, singers sing songs just like him and then those who don’t… somehow don’t make it to the next round.
Did any of you see how the Top three contestants in Sony television channel’s “Indian Idol” contest, are all having voices as if they are his clones?
indian theatres become costlier than anywhere else in the world
I would hear complaints from some in the film entertainment industry - that as compared to the international prices of a ticket to the cinema, we Indians pay very less. (this calculation was meant to include paying the stars, and the average price-rise of tickets over time…)
Considering the price of a ticket to the cinema theatre must have risen in proportion to the general levels of inflation, a friend did a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation and ended up with a figure rounded off to 460 rupees! This was two years ago, and I exclaimed “What the hell!” when he said this. Was I alone in that feeling back then?
Fast forward to Circa 2005. PVR Cinemas has been running since 3 months now, here in Bangalore. Located in The Forum Mall at Koramangala, it is the single biggest cash-sink for youngsters here… Middle-aged family members come here for the wide range of choice in goods that it offers, girls go to see what the hype is all about and to enjoy the music/karaoke and have a gala time, and ahem…. guys visit the place to check out the gals. 
In other words, a buzzing location milling all the time with people… and a multi-plex theatre with so-called “Gold Class” - supposedly star treatment for the audience. It wasn’t all that good though, plus with only 32 seats in the entire hall, it rather resembled a party at home, if a bit quieter. (other classes of theatres exist too with more seats in them).
So yeah, back to Gold Class, the tickets cost Rupees 500 and you are served the beverages/snacks that you order inside the auditorium; unlike other cinemas that actively dis-courage this practive. And I’ve gone to this place twice with my family and similarly with friends, already. Whither price-rise? Was I the one who talked something about it? errr…. *blush*
The Real You
Does anybody know who they really are? Yeah, one knows that he/she likes pastas, hate cabbage, like ghazals and dont like heavy metal. But how is he/she?
“What makes a person behave the way he behaves?” was a question I was asked in a B-School form, and that really triggered off a long line of thoughts. What is the answer? I dont know. Is it just your likes and dislikes that affect your behaviour? What about social taboos and stuff like that, and even ignoring all external aspects, what actually causes your likes and dislikes that in turn dictate how you behave? Is it the your surroundings that dictate your behavious? Or, is it just your past experiences and your experiences as learnt from others? The factors and the potential inter-relationships among them are countless. I will stop here or else this will become a mini-psychology theory.
February 21, 2005
Microsoft Update Service
I went to Microsoft’s Windows Update Service to check for any updated drivers for my computer components. The crap service offered me to install updates to the WINDOWS UPDATE SERVICE itself to enable me use the service to CHECK for WINDOWS UPDATES. After I did the updates to the Update Service, the idiotic service wanted me to restart my computer to continue further work on it!
Yeah right, here you go… Why don’t I just go and kill myself instead?
Ctrl-C & Ctrl-V
Yesterday, I went to a restaurant in FC Road (Pune) to have lunch. Most of the people there were wearing Jeans/TShirts/Jackets etc, except for 3 girls. They looked really beautful in normal Salwar Kameez. And, they were not Indian!!
I was just wondering, why Indians like to ape the west, and westerners like to copy Indians? Why? 
February 22, 2005
Net4India is totally Incompetent
More than a week that I went to their office and paid the money in advance in cash… and they still have not managed to get my partner’s account fixed up with all the existing domains. I wish I had the time and resources to sue these incompetent people to get some sanity back in my working life.
March 7, 2005
Internet Explorer 7
pffft…. another year, another challenge, another proposal.
That of Internet Explorer 7 to be released - which looks like a joke since its not going to have anything significantly changed since IE6. Moreover, its only for Windows XP users!
Microsoft seems to lose and gain just the right amount of things year-after-year to keep them going!
unpatched windows PC gets infected within 18 minutes on the net
YAY! Pop the corks off the celebration. Bring home the ‘naya kampooter’.
“Babloo ko bulaaaao……”
Nice scene ain’t it? 
The family just bought a new PC for the home, and their “clever” son in 7th standard managed to convince his parents to get an internet connection. Ahhh…. the joys….
SCREEECH !!! (gasp) What was that? What did that dialog say? What’s this about “we can see what you’re doing” and advertisements and pop-ups and pop-ins, and pop-unders and all? Some red-warning there?
huh? Welcome to spyware, worms and trojans push-downloaded from the Internet without the awareness of the victim. You need to keep your Windows OS updated with the latest hot-fixes all the time, and have the clunky tools of the trade - Antivirus, Firewall, Ad-Aware, and what not! Else within 18 minutes of jumping onto the Net, you get infected. Read the report here.
Viruses do not necessarily create visible symptoms for you to detect, and before you finally get to know, the infection has taken its toll upon your machine, almost invisibly! Sure, not everyone gets infected - but it pays to be safe. A stupendous phenomena lately seen round-abouts here is….
“I (sic) run Windows XP which I couldn’t upgrade to any service pack level (because of being a pirated copy) - and I have none of that anti-virus/firewall crap you tell me to install, but still see! See how my system still functions fine?
So says the person, blissfully unaware that:
1. He has no backup
2. Not even hell hath as many viruses as crawleth his hard-disk! (which he simply doesn’t even come to know of due to not having an antivirus) - And he spreads his mentality and files to others. Small wonder then, that we don’t seem to ever be able to see infections gone?
Like Arnold Schwarzzeneger, so viruses - “THEY’LL BE BACK!”
March 18, 2005
More hassles with Net4India
We had to buy a domain www.sat-india.net. We went to net4india and bought the domain using our cyber wallet. The backend processed the order successfully (or so we were told). The money was deducted from our account. Everything seemed to be just fine.
Even on the next day, the domain did not get activated. We checked and found it was still freely available in the market. We tried to book the domain again from net4india. It showed that the domain was still available! The same domain we had already booked and paid for 24hours earlier.
I went to my GoDaddy account and bought the domain easily and the site was activated in 45 minutes flat. The backend of net4india still shows that we have paid for the domain and it is under our control.
How sad can a mismanaged backend get? The company now says that we delayed in processing the order hence it was bought by a third party. And this happened after we had actually paid for the domain!
Excellent work Net4India. GoDaddy? Here I come…
April 7, 2005
do me a favour
“can you do me a favour?”
Its sooo saddening after hearing that phrase for the fourth time in the SAME day.
Was known people - not unknown either. damn, I’d surely do what they were asking, why do they need formality to this extent! Just asking right out would have been just as happy for me to do it….
