Byte on the Go

Who the hell is James Altucher?

2012-05-25T09:10:00.001+05:30

I'm not a fan of Facebook but I do check my business page a few times. Just one of these days, I read a very catchy title "How to be the luckiest guy on the planet in four easy steps." Now who doesn't want to be lucky and I clicked the link to read what this guy with the big spectacles has to say. I had difficulty in pronouncing his name but who cares. I read this post, and then another, and another, and another. That day I would have spent almost 4-5 hours just reading posts by James Altucher. Every time I thought of returning to work, something inside me kept telling me that this is way more important that anything else, evening more than building your own product.

Since that day I religiously read everything that he has to say, and have gained confidence, faith, focus and even more. Success seems possible, and being an entrepreneur doesn't sound sound like a nightmare (it's still very difficult).

So, thank you James for being my mentor (you know you are mentoring lots of people).

Visit James Altucher's Blog

P.S. I added "the hell" in the blog title thinking about how James might have titled such a post.

Google Correlate - Find Patterns Relating to Real World

2011-09-03T10:24:00.000+05:30

New tool from Google. Simply craw an interesting curve, then click 'Correlate!' to find query terms whose popularity over time matches the shape you drew.

How to fund your new web startup

2008-04-11T14:20:00.000+05:30

An interesting post from WebWorkerDaily about how to fund your new web startup.

http://webworkerdaily.com/2008/04/09/funding-your-web-work-dream/

Twiddla.com - Team Collaboration Online

2008-03-12T16:04:00.000+05:30

Twiddla is free web-based meeting place that makes it simple for geographically dispersed people to collaborate on projects.

Mark up websites, graphics, and photos, or start brainstorming on a blank canvas. Browse the web with your friends or make that conference call more productive than ever. No plug-ins, downloads, or firewall voodoo - it's all here, ready to go when you are. Browser-agnostic, user-friendly, mom-approved. It also allows one-click audio chats too.

So if you are looking for a tool that allows you to communicate and collaborate in real-time with a team that is located all around the world, check out Twiddla.

Web application development made easy

2008-02-27T11:15:00.000+05:30

Web-based application development is generally not considered to be a task undertaken by non-programmers. But that thinking is about to change with the launch of a new set of tools that make it easy to develop web applications.

"Rollbase is an on-demand application development and delivery platform for businesses to rapidly find, create, customize and share web-based applications using point & click, drag & drop tools within a standard web browser. Rollbase brings the power of rapid application development to business users, IT professionals, and web developers who may not have the time, resources, or expertise to create on-demand applications using traditional software development methods. Rollbase is a state of the art Platform as a Service (PaaS), Cloud Computing Platform, enabling businesses to focus on application innovation rather than the software and hardware infrastructure behind it. In conjunction with the Rollbase Platform, the Rollbase Application Directory is an on-demand application ecosystem where users can browse, test drive, and install business applications built and published by experienced Rollbase users and partners with a single click. Rollbase requires only a browser and an Internet connection."

Voting is now open for the 2008 Webware 100!

2008-02-27T11:03:00.000+05:30

Webware has opened up the user voting on the 2008 Webware 100. This is their yearly awards program where Webware users vote for their favorite Web 2.0 apps.

Go vote now

Control + C - A web service on Cut and Paste

2008-02-16T21:32:00.001+05:30

ControlC is an interesting and useful service which helps you save time by organizing and storing the data that you cut and paste for use.

Once you have signed in and installed the software, every time you hit CTRL+C, the data is stored on ControlC website in your account and also on your local clipboard. The advantage is that you will not have to worry about copying sand searching for the same data over and again and it can be directly accessed from their website. You can keep these links as public or private. If made public, e can be viewed by your friends also.

All content uploaded from your clipboard is encrypted to protect your data completely. You can optionally, however, unencrypt and permanently store the data in your account, and share it with the world.

I think I am going to find it pretty useful why researching for my posts. As I can keep copying interesting information while researching on a topic and the go through all the information at once and make my posts richer.

Conducting Online Meetings/web conferencing - Absolutely Free

2008-02-16T21:12:00.000+05:30

My first exposure to online meeting/web conferencing was through Webex and GotoMeeting. However, these are paid services.

However, the cost of these services in no more a concern as there are a plenty of free web conferencing services that are now available which are either absolutely free of cost or they cost very little. Here is a list of free web conferencing services.

List of free services

1. Yugma
2. Vyew
3. Zoho Meeting
4. DimDim
5. WebHuddle

List of a few paid services

1. Webex
2. MixMeeting
3. GotoMeeting
4. Microsoft Office Live Meeting
5. Adobe Connect

Web Services Revenues: From where is the money coming?

2008-01-31T19:25:00.000+05:30

Through this post, I am trying to clarify my own understanding of how most of the free web services actually make money and from where this money actually comes from. For this post, web services mean services such as email, social networking websites, online bookmarking services, blogs, knoweldge portals, applications like Expensr, among others. We will look at
revenues coming to them directly from these services and not as an offshoot, for example, as a consultancy project for the guy who runs the show.

So, where does the revenue come from? Advertisement...

I think advertisement is the single largest source of revenue for all these services. If they don't place advertisements on their websites, they will die within no time.

Now who are the real advertisers. A real advertiser is one who has a real, consumable product or service - music labels, automobiles, furniture stores, property, movies, books...thelist is very big.
The web services (as we mentioned above) are also advertisers. They will place ads to promote their website. Surely their advertisement will add value to the advertiser, but the total value added to the system would be nill as they act as both producers and consumers of ad revenue. By their advertising, there is no incremental revenue for the entire websphere.

This makes me think that the entire websphere is feeding on the promotional/advertising budget of the real product/service companies.

I would really appreciate any feedback on these thoughts in order to consolidate my understanding of how this entire system is working.

MOLI - Separate you social and professional life

2008-01-31T19:10:00.000+05:30

MOLI is a new service launched by a US-owned company. This again is a networking platform but with a different view. MOLI feels that on the internet on needs to keep it's social and professional life separate. And this is what it aims to do. Here you can create multiple profiles that can individually be shared with different groups. It offers multiple benefits to the users.

Multiple Profiles - Create different profiles for the different parts of your life: friends, business or anything else you choose.

Privacy - Use privacy permissions to decide who gets to see and interact with the different sides of you. Profiles can be public, private or hidden.

Share - Upload photos, videos, music, or text and share it with everyone on MOLI or just the people you choose.Customize your profiles with custom backgrounds, drag and drop functionality and useful tools like interactive event calendars, RSS feeds, blogs, message boards, video chat and much more.

Original Content - Get access to fresh trend setting content, created daily for moli.com - articles, audio, videos and more...

This idea of creating multiple profiles and privacy permissions is what sets them apart from other social networking sites like FaceBook. MOLI also recently got a funding of about 30m dollars.

However, the point of concern seems to be that most of the people who are active on the internet are maintaining their profiles with various websites like FaceBook, MySpace, Hi5, LinkedIn, etc. Now why would they add one more to their list if most of their requirements are being met with the existing networks. What would rather happen is that FaceBook and MySpace will also work on these features to allow people to maintain multiple profiles and provide advanced privacy settings.

Choosing a browser for a better web experience

2008-01-30T20:04:00.001+05:30

All my life I have used Internet Explorer for browsing the internet. There was practically no good competitors whom you can depend on for a better experience. We all moved with IE from version to version. But looking at the scenario now, IE is not alone there are atleast three challengers as far as I am concerned.

Till the last month I had IE and Firefox installed on my machine and I used to alternate between the two (mostly using IE while using Firefox whenever I read about how good it is).

Recently, however, after installing IE 7, I realized that I made a big mistake as everything started falling apart and my system became much slower. Then I uninstalled it and reverted to IE6. Last week, I noticed that I am unable to post on Blogger as there was some Javascript error (from both IE6 and Firefox). I thought of installing Safari and trying using it. Bingo! It worked perfectly fine. I just got a bit more interested in browsers and also installed Opera and it works fine here also.

Now, I am trying to work mainly through Safari and Opera and am trying not to use IE at all.

This blog provides a good comparison and background of the 5 popular browsers around.

Surely, there is a better web experience after IE and Firefox.

What's the value of blogs like The Learned Man

2008-01-30T19:49:00.000+05:30

I've been spending some time on going through a few blogs that have some name and are also popular in their circle.

In the past few days I really enjoyed reading ReadWriteWeb blog , TechCrunch, ProBlogger, the blog about making money online.

I also used to visit the blog The Learned Man because I heard about it from some. The blog claims to have about 700+ members and caters to the niche e-learning industry in India.

I subscribed to all the 4 blogs in my NetVibes home page and have been following the stories. To my surprise, the learned man blog did not see any change or new post in the past one month. It was last updated on December 24, 2007 with information which was already there in everyone's mail boxes. Before that it carries a post on 13th November and one on 25th October. The post on November 13 is just a reproduction of information from www.livemint.com

This is making me think about what value does such a blog adds. It might have worked very well for the blogger himself as a brand tool but adds little value to the readers. I think a blog should not only report news from other channels but also provides it's own content, analysis and info that will help people in their industry.

Let's us see where my blog is headed.

After a close analysis, I have kind of carved a niche for my own blog and it has to do with:

how web can help people improve their live by making use of various web technologies, and
how web can be used as an effective medium to fulfill all learning related needs.

All my recent posts have been focusing on these two areas. For example the story on Qtrax is a great breakthrough in terms of how people access music, and the story on password managers about how people store their important information.

Teaching Sells: Great program and nice people

2008-01-29T19:59:00.000+05:30

Recently my wife and I subscribed to the online program Teaching Sells launched by the the famous Copyblogger and his associates. The program was about how to builds and sustain successful membership website and offer great learning content through Internet. I was very excited about the program as I am from the field of e-learning. I had a decent experience on the website and the information provided was great. The courses run on moodle platform. I had paid a fees of $97 for the 3-month membership.

Their membership runs on a subscription basis. So, after my initial 3-moths are over, I will be charged again for the next quarter. Hardly did I know anything about it, and one fine morning I received a message from my credit card company that i have been charged $97 for this membership. Initially I was in shock as I never thought it was possible. At the same time, I had no intentions of renewing my membership with them as I wasn't able to use it effectively. We talked to them over email and they instantly refunded the entire money. I was glad and understood that I was dealing with the right people.

In this age on Internet and online payment, one finds it difficult to trust on people you have never seen and probably never going to see also. But this proved to be an absolutely genuine group. I'm glad I went through this experience.

Getting paid for Online Surveys

2008-01-28T21:00:00.000+05:30

I really got paid! In the past few months I had heard a lot about online surveys that paid. I was actually not convinced at all but wanted to give it a try. So, I joined up GlobalTestMarket Survey site. Instantly they started sending surveys. For each survey you earned a few points (50 to 100 points). They said they'll pay once I have 1000 points. Soon, by attending about 15 surveys I had 1000 points. Two weeks from then, I today received my check for Rs. 1800, thats about Rs. 120 per survey (approximately 15-20 minutes spent on each survey).

I am not sure of any other survey websites but I will definitely recommend this one to all.

Qtrax: Free and Legal Music Downloads now available

2008-01-28T10:01:00.000+05:30

Qtrax launched it's free and legal music download application today. Qtrax is a 100% free peer-2-peer service wheere users can download music from a collection of more than 5 million songs, absolutely free of cost. The service is absolutely legal unlike other P2P networks. Qtrax is working directly with the four major record companies - EMI, SonyBMG, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group - to make this service working.

The best thing is that the music is piracy-proff as it runs on their proprietary player and cannot be ported to your CD player or iPod.

In their own words:
Qtrax works directly with record labels and publishers, licensing their content for distribution online. When you download and play music, the support of advertisers allows Qtrax to compensate artists for their work.

Download the player from here: http://www.qtrax.com/download.php

Online Password Management

2008-01-23T20:39:00.000+05:30

In today's time, almost all internet savvy people have accounts with so many websites that it becomes very difficult to remember the login and password information of all of them. Obvioisly, it's not a very good idea to use the same login/password information for all the accounts.

Some people rely on browser settings to remember the details, but it still can get you smashing your head on the computer table.

Keeping this inevitable need in mind, new web applications have emerged that take care of this need - storing your private information. Two of these services are Clipperz and PassPack.

Both these services are web applications and work on server technology. They just don't help you save your passwords but also any kind of secret information.

It can get you thinking about how you can rely upon them...how safe will your information be in their hands. They have an answer to this question. Clipperz says that user data is encrypted by the browser before being uploaded. In other words, Clipperz doesn't hold your personal data in its original form. It is encrypted first, using a "passphrase" that is known only to the user. The case is similar for PassPack also.

These kind of applications are also called zero-knowledge applications, as they don't store any information in plain format but encrypt everything before it is stored.

So, does it serve your needs? Open an account with them and see it yourself...

List of 'How to Do' websites

2008-01-23T20:34:00.000+05:30

Web is no more just about reading news and chatting. It is fast becoming a learning platform where you can learn about almost anything, in any format be it text, audio, or video. This post from Read/Write Web provides a great list of Sites That Teach You How To Do Stuff. DO have a look.

Link to post

Researching for Blogging

2008-01-23T16:34:00.000+05:30

Recently, I've started taking blogging seriously. I really belive that it makes a huge difference to me in terms of how I think and how I capture new information. After having all the blogging elements rightly placed, my next task was to organise how I research for new information. Using RSS feeds is the ubiquitous was for collecting information today. Apart from that the most intersting and effective tool I am using is NetVibes (www.netvibes.com). NetVibes provides you your own personalized home page where you can organise the information you like in your own way. You can add the feeds that you like and hundreds of other modules of interest.
The best thing about NetVibes is its sleek design and seamless integration with various types of information.

Now, every morning, my first task is to open my personalized page and scan through all the information to get a feeling for all the happenings and then decide where to focus for my own writing.

The blogs that inspired me the most in terms of kind of user base they have and the quality of content they generate are TechCrunch, Read/WRite Web, and ProBlogger.

I ahve also hear a lot about Yahoo Pipes but haven't explored it yet. I am'sure its a great tool for any such research.

Squidoo and HubPages - Consolidating Knowledge

2008-01-23T15:43:00.000+05:30

Do you have authoritative knowledge on a particular topic. Or do you have enough knowledge on something to recommend it to others. Then Online knowldge portals can be a wonderful thing for you instead of posting all your knowledge in your blog. Squidoo (http://www.squidoo/) and Hubpages (http://www.hubpages/) are two such services available. On Squidoo (or hub pages) you can publish authoritative articles on any subject or knowledge area.

Squidoo is a website designed to make it easy for anyone, for free, to set up a single page on a topic he or she knows or cares a lot about. Advertising revenue is shared with these content creators, and some of it is given to charity.

Squido runs advertisement and other money generating programs on each page (they call it alens). Squidoo splits its revenue with its "co-op" of lensmasters. 5% goes straight to charity, first. Then 50% goes to the lensmasters. 45% goes to Squidoo.

I have already started my own lenses on 5 topics dear to me (all the lenses are still WIP). Check the out here. http://www.squidoo.com/lensmasters/msahajwani

Apparently, Google is also launching it's own service similar to Squidoo. They have named it Knol (probably derived from Knowledge) but the launch date is not yet known.

Expensr – Your online finance manager

2008-01-23T09:29:00.000+05:30

Do you find it difficult to track your finances, or control your expenses. expensr (http://www.expensr.com/) is the right tool for you.

expensr is a free online personal finance application. Expensr tracks your income and expenses and makes a slick pie graph that answers the question "Where did all my money go?"

It combines the utility of software like Quicken/Money with the social power of Web 2.0. Using it’s social software features it shows you how you're doing compared to your peers. This means users are able to see aggregated data of a particular tag and anonymously compare spending against others. For example, you can compare rent with other people in your city. Or how much people are spending on entertainment in Bangalore?

Elearning! Magazine’s “Best of 2007”

2008-01-22T09:06:00.000+05:30

Elearning! Magazine magazine announced it's Best of Elearning Awards 2007. The winnders in 11 categories are:

BEST LMS
Winner: Learn.com LearnCenter
Finalists: Saba Learning Suite, SumTotal Total LMS 7.1

BEST ON-DEMAND LMS
Winner: GeoLearning Maestro 5.0
Finalists: GeoLearning GeoExpress, Moodle

BEST IT CONTENT
Co-Winners: Element K Online IT Certification Training, Learn.com IT Course Library, SkillSoft Skill Choice IT

BEST LEADERSHIP
Co-Winners: Ninth House Situational Leadership II, Harvard Business School of Publishing The Essential Leader, Ken Blanchard High Performing Organizations, AMA Leadership Development Blended Learning

BEST SOFT SKILLS
Co-Winners: Learn.com Managing to Excel, Ninth House Retaining Talent, AMA Business Skills Blended

COMPLIANCE TRAINING
Winner: Corpedia Compliance E-learning
Finalists: Syntrio Sexual Harassment Training, Red Hawk Ethics Training Series

BEST VIRTUAL CLASSROOM
Winner: WebEx Training Center
Finalists: iLinc LearnLinc, Saba Centra Live

BEST WEB SEMINAR
Winner: iLinc Meeting Linc
Finalists: WebEx Meeting Center, Saba Centra Suite, Citrix GoToMeeting

BEST PRESENTATION TOOL
Co-Winners: Articulate Presenter & WebSoft CourseLab
Finalists: Sonic Foundry Media Site

BEST AUTHORING TOOL
Winner: Articulate Presenter
Finalists: Trivantis Lectora, Adobe Captivate

BEST SIMULATION TOOL
Winner: Adobe Captivate
Finalists: TechSmith Camtasia Studio, Harbinger Raptivity

Read the full story.

New Product from Harbinger - FlockPod

2008-01-22T08:55:00.000+05:30

Harbinger has experienced tremendous growth with it's product 'Raptivity' in the last 2 years.

Harbinger today announced the commercial launch of FlockPod (http://www.flockpod.com/); the latest addition to its range of innovative software products. FlockPod is the world’s first social interaction pod - a small place on any Web page where people get together and interact on-the-spot, while staying on the page.

The central idea of FlockPod is to provide a space on any web page for various users to collaborate and interact right on-the-spot, to share ideas, opinions, experiences, anecdotes or sometimes even to question, reason or debate.

Organizations can use FlockPod in a multitude of ways: They can invite debate and feedback on electronic documents, conduct spots polls and surveys of their employees and customers, allow knowledge workers to support each other, create mini-knowledge-bases, foster informal learning, collaborate on Web research, create online user communities, and so on.

Consumers can use FlockPod too: They can form groups of friends that flock together, collaborate on shopping decisions, exchange views on Web pages of common interest, plan group events, bookmark and share favorite links, or even comment on shared photos.
These are just a few of the many applications FlockPod can be used for.

Riding the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) wave, Harbinger provides FlockPod as a subscription service. Organizations can set up and manage their own subscriptions which will enable their employees, partners and customers to interact in unique ways using FlockPod. However, users can set up their own FlockPods for free if they expect to have limited members in the group.

The Dynamic Web

2008-01-21T20:01:00.000+05:30

This blog has been renamed to The Dynamic Web. I was finding the earler name too restrictive to reflect all my thoughts and interests. My posts will revolve not just around e-learning but will be more open to web technologies, business and learning. I will explore how web as a whole is becoming more of a business platform and plays the most important role in how we behave, communicate and learn. No doubt, this is where our future lies. A deep understanding of how it works and the emerging technologies is imperative.

Virtual terrorists

2007-09-06T11:54:00.000+05:30

This is an interesting story about how Second Life can become a wonderful training ground for real terrorists. Practice with any fear!

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22161037-28737,00.html

Terrorist training...

2007-09-06T11:08:00.000+05:30

Today morning, I had a casual discussion, and a good laugh, with my colleague about the possible internal training requirements in a terrorist organization, like Al-Qaeda.

As we here in the news, these organization are so advanced, in terms of technology and brain power, that you can't deny the sophisticated internal training systems they may have. So, how will they actually be conducing there training, considering that they all are so widespread. They are equipped with laptops, mobile phones, other wireless devices and have people who are knowledgeable in technology as well as the subject like leadership, using ammunition, money laundering, etc. Who knows they must be running their own servers as well. Given all this, it makes a strong case for them to be able to rely upon as an alternative for training, in case there are difficulties in sending trainees to their training centre.

SO, will there be any e-learning companies who might want to take up a project or two for them :) If so, what kind of negotiations will they be having: more costs because of risks involved, physical protection?

Do send in your comments about what you think about it!

Note: This is just a casual thought and does not reflect the writers intention to do any work for a terrorist group.

Follow this link if you want to know more about the client, Al-Qaeda