Venky's Musings

On a sabbatical

2006-10-28T20:47:00.000-05:00

For a short period of time. Blogburnout, I don't know. Last few evenings, I did not log-on to my machine either. I found it to be very relaxing. I am adding to my collection of books. I have bought over twenty new titles, in the last couple of weeks; enough reading material for the next six months or so.

Till I return, cheers!

Next YouTubes???

2006-10-22T19:19:00.000-05:00

The recent issue of Time has a story, about the YouTube and it also profiles a few web2.0 companies that have the potential to be the next YouTube (???)

The companies profiled were the Farecast.com (direct competitor of Kayak.com, my favourite),Yelp.com, Doostang.com, 37Signals.com (another favourite of mine), 30boxes.com and Pandora.com.

Of all these companies, I am very excited about 37signals. The team and the products they have developed are truly amazing. Almost, all of the products were developed on RoR. Which company would acquire 37signals.

I will be there

2006-10-17T21:47:00.000-05:00

Do plan to attend the PodCamp (Pittsburgh). More details can be found here

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Any plans for the Second Life

2006-10-16T22:17:00.000-05:00

The Second Life is getting populated. More and more corporations are setting up shop in the SL, the print world are setting up SL bureau / news desk. Heck, there is even a law suit, seeking damages for SL land usurping.

I am not bitten yet, though I have been in-and-out of it, last few months. For more info about the SL, check out the, wikipedia

What is your experience , so far in the SL?

Technorati:Second Life

Anoushka Shankar in Pittsburgh

2006-10-11T23:00:00.000-05:00

Anoushka Shankar is performing on :
Venue: Byham Theater
Wednesday, October 25, 2006, 7:30 PM

GooTube

2006-10-09T22:16:00.000-05:00

I am glad, this is finally over. Last few months, we are hearing stories about the possible suitors for YouTube. I am glad, it is Google and nobody else. Why am I excited about google? YouTube exemplified the "disorganized, lets enjoy it and everything else will fall in place" culture of Google.

This is an all-stock deal. If the GOOG goes north, YouTube shareholders will be more richer.

What is interesting in the deal, is the possible involvement of Sequoia Capital in making this deal happen. Sequoia is an investor in YouTube, have led two rounds of financing and own thirty-percent of the company. They were also an early investor in Google. Talk about "warm-introductions", and this is a classic example.

I am glad, Google is maintaining the YouTube brand. YouTube literally created a cottage industry; there are now, over two hundred fifty video uploading sites. They created a culture, encouraging people to share videos, encouraging corporations to announce their new product/service lines as short films. A great success story, the founders should be proud of.

At 1.6bil$, overvalued? possibly; an example of an inflated Web2.0 bubble? Seems like it.
Do the founders deserve those $$$, in my world, YES, absolutely. I wish them all good luck and hopefully they will invest part of it in venture philanthropy.

Other than the YouTube founders, the other winner is, the car dealers; The looser?
Om Malik. It will be interesting to see, Om loose those 40 pounds. A trim Om, is a sight to behold.

Technorati:Google YouTube GooTube Om Malik Gigaom

Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and an unforgettable sunday

2006-10-08T21:42:00.000-05:00

(Pic Courtesy: Sri Bala)

Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra invited the Pittsburgh Bloggers to attend the symphony concert of Dmitri Shostakovich, the great russian composer, who lived during the reign of Stalin.

Jonathan Mayes (from PSO) was our host for the evening. He gave us a quick tour of the backstage, the rooms where the muscians practise, the private rooms of the conducutors and most importantly the library.

It was a rare glimpse at the library, place where the notes are prepared and archived. The contemporary notes are borrowed from other symphony orchestra. To get the notes in shape, they use an electric eraser, to remove those notes / marks, people make.

The concert itself was unforgettable. My favourite was the Symphony no.5 in d minor, opus 47. Shostakovich made the fifth symphony as a vehicle for his artistic rehabilitation during the Stalin era. The very eloquent Largo, was heart wrenching and satirical. During the crescendo, I could feel my eyes go moist. Compare the Largo, to the Allegro non troppo and you will find yourself exhuberant and see yourself muttering "Our business is rejoicing, our business is rejoicing". The piece made me ecstatic.

The conductor Vassily Sinaisky was at his best. His body language was all "Oh, What a joy, it is", and he did a great job in bringing out the very best from the orchestra. This was Vassily's debut performance with the PSO.

After the concert, the entire concert hall gave a standing ovation, that possibly lasted about 15-20 minutes. It was a tremendous performance and they deserved every bit of the standing ovation

A big thank you to Jonathan (PSO) and Mike, Cindy from the Pittsburgh Bloggers, for making this happen. What a sunday, it was. Totally unforgettable.

Do check out Sri's blog, for more pics and the post about the symphony. Good stuff.

Technorati:Symphony Pittsburgh Dmitri Shostakovich
Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

On a break

2006-10-01T13:16:00.000-05:00

... for a week. See ya all next week.

An incredibly busy week

2006-09-29T22:46:00.000-05:00

Why? An elevation ... and a change; yipeeeee

The Rise of the Amateur

2006-09-25T22:53:00.000-05:00

I first heard the term Crowdsourcing, in a Businessweek story, few weeks back. Crowdsourcing is a term coinded by the "Wired" magazine writer Jeff Howe and editor Mark Robinson.

In essence, crowdsourcing is a "user-centered" innovation, where companies rely on amateurs or un-paid professionals to solve problems. The project is managed and owned by the company, that also sells the work and the results.

In his blog, Jeff Howe defines "Crowdsourcing" as

Simply defined, crowdsourcing represents the act of a company or institution taking a function once performed by employees and outsourcing it to an undefined (and generally large) network of people in the form of an open call. This can take the form of peer-production (when the job is performed collaboratively), but is also often undertaken by sole individuals. The crucial prerequisite is the use of the open call format and the large network of potential laborers.

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Grameen Phone Network

2006-09-24T11:40:00.000-05:00

I had the opportunity to attend a programme where Iqbal Quadir (Founder-Grameen Phone Network) was a speaker.
Iqbal is an early pioneer of "micro financing" and his venture Grameen Phone Network is a classic example of social venture in poverty eradication.

Listening to Iqbal speak was inspirational. The passion he put forth, to empower the masses, to avoid avoid harassment by the local politicans, to avoid concentration of power with a certain few were highly motivational.
I sat there listening to his speech with a flood emotions overpowering me.

He recounted the early days, when he had difficulty, convincing the telephone networks to come to his home country, Bangladesh and set up phone networks.Today, Grammen is a billion dollar venture, and highly profitable.

Guess, what his next venture is? To set up micro powerplants using bio-fuel, to provide electricity to the entire country, Bangladesh.

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Sequoia Capital (India) raises $400 m

2006-09-22T22:26:00.000-05:00

Sequoia Capital which acquired WestBridge Capital Partners early this year have raised 400mil USD, for their new fund.

the new fund will broaden the firm's historical focus on early to mid-stage companies to include investments in expansion and growth stage businesses.

It will be exciting to see, what their new investments might be. WBCP have a long history of investing/nurturing successful early stage companies.

Technorati:Sequoia VC Venture Capital India

I luv Pomegranate

2006-09-18T21:14:00.000-05:00

Few months back, I I had blogged about the morning breakfast and how I wanted to get away from slimfast, bread and cereals.

One of my regular readers, responded suggesting, I try eat apples for breakfast. It seemed a novel idea at first, but have been experimenting for the past couple of months and I am beginning to enjoy it. They make me feel healthy and energetic all through the morning.

I am also cutting down on coffee and have replaced it with pomegranate juice.Some days, I have a full glass, else I have a half-glass and fill it with organic milk. It tastes good too.

The net result, I have lost weight (close to 10 pounds) in the last 4-6 weeks. I feel very healthy.

Technorati:Pomegranate Apples Food Breakfast

Vital Friends, we all need at work and in life

2006-09-17T12:57:00.000-05:00

I was at B&N last night, I came across this book as a staff recommendation. A very interesting book, the author does not say anything new, things that you and I do not know about. But, what makes this book interesting is the way the book has been structured and written. Things , we assume as normal or take for granted, Tom Rath does a good job in highligting those as a "power network"; a network that might be vital for that job elevation your are yearning for.
We all know how good friends, relationships at work makes your worklife more fun filled and interesting.

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A link to bookmark

2006-09-16T22:45:00.000-05:00

"The Welch Way", the weekly coloumn of Jack and Suzy Welch in the Businessweek is available as a podcast.

Do not miss it. You might listen to something, that you can assimilate.

Technorati:Businessweek Podcast Jack Welch

A tiny URL?

2006-09-16T22:34:00.000-05:00

I was on-call with the tech support team last night as a follow-up to a tech issue I am having with my laptop. (It is less than six months old. grrrr....).

The tech support asked me to download a utility , when I enquired if I am on the correct page (the URL was humangous), he directed me to the TinyURL and asked me enter the "tiny url" that was generated, which directed me to the download site. (I was on the correct page, yipeeee)

From their homepage:

Are you sick of posting URLs in emails only to have it break when sent causing the recipient to have to cut and paste it back together? Then you've come to the right place. By entering in a URL in the text field below, we will create a tiny URL that will not break in email postings and never expires.

Browse through it. You might find it very useful. It allows you to drag-and-drop" to your links bar, they have supplied code, so you can link to them / have a URL input box.

I liked, what I saw.

Technorati:TinyURL

A "Long Tail" practical application

2006-09-16T22:09:00.000-05:00

Hittail , is a practical application of the "Long Tail". What does it do?

Hittail, suggests how to attract traffice to your blog, by suggesting "head lines" that will attract traffic to your blog.

HitTail reveals in real-time the least utilized, most promising keywords hidden in the Long Tail of your natural search results. We present these terms to you as suggestions that when acted on will boost the natural search results of your site. It's that simple.

Of course, HitTail is built with sophisticated algorithms and patent-pending technology that took our Chief HitTailer a while to develop.

You can read about Hittail and the techniques used,here.

Give it a try!

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Watchout... I mean "Lookout"

2006-09-16T21:56:00.000-05:00

Read about Lookout, in a few magazines and decided to give it a try. Been playing with it, last couple of days and my reaction so far is very positive and a "thumbs up".

Lookout is an add-in that allows you to search your old e-mails. The big difference between this add-in and the outlook search utility is the Lookout's ability to search your attached dox including the pdf's. You can search, using the booleans which I found to be very effective.

Give it a try, it even beats the google destop search in a few instances.

Technorati:Microsoft Lookout

Can babies run?

2006-09-10T12:25:00.000-05:00

My nephew is attending the pre-school. On friday, his school had a sports meet. There was a running race, for my nephews age group. All the babies were assembled and the teacher gave the details about the race. After listening to the teacher, my nephew walked over to her and said

Teacher, babies should not run. They will fall down, if they run.

Sweet!!

The teacher was surprised and explained to him, that babies can run in the sport meet.

Currently reading ..

2006-09-10T12:06:00.000-05:00

NASDAQ masterfully chronicles one of the most important eras in global financial history. You will discover a drama like no other and realize what most people don't know or don't understand about the Nasdaq

Technorati:Books

Blog Camp in India

2006-09-10T11:41:00.000-05:00

The blog unconference being held in Chennai, India (sep 9th/sep10th) has been fun. It is unfortunate, I could not be present , but have been following the sessions through blogs and the flickr feed.

Last night, I spoke to Kribs, the main organizer of the event. He seemed very excited about the turnout and the speakers who have signed up. At that time, he was looking forward to the live video conference with Rob Scoble.
One of the attendees,has commented,thanking Rob for the great presentation (as usual!).

Gigaom has a detailed post about the first day.

Zoho one of the sponsors, have more details about the camp with upto hour updates

You can read more about the unconference at their blog and follow them on the flickr feed

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Very true, indeed

2006-09-09T11:28:00.000-05:00

In America, its just about shareholder value and profits. In Europe, values,culture and tradition are important. Its different. -- Laxmi Mittal in Fortune

Fortune did an interview with Mittal shortly after he won the battle to acquire Arcelor. In any M&A, the difficult part is in integration. We are not talking about the F&A's or the managements working together. We are talking about the work culture, how things gets done, the HR policies, the self-esteem of the people, more specifically people at the lower end of the totem pole. If you can get over this cultural difference, the rest is a smooth sail.

Many of the business schools forget this portion, when they teach the M&A's.

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Who Says Elephants Can't Dance -- Book Review

2006-09-09T10:51:00.000-05:00

Lou Gerstner's tenure at IBM was path breaking both for IBM and the industry. IBM was close to being buried in the past, while new techies like Microsoft, SUN were redefining the industry. As is always the case, the analysts were calling for breakup of the IBM for better vision and go-to market strategies.

In this book, Lou shares with his readers how he handled the "Big Blue" and turned around the company. Remember Lou had prior experience with the computer industry and he cannot differentiate the computer chip from the other. Many of the employees were skeptical if this man can really deliver, what is to expected. IBM employees are known to be honest and very frank. Lou shares with us, some of the welcome e-mails he recd on the first few days:

Welcome and don't worry about not knowing very much about microchips, just as long as you don't get them mixed up with chocolate chips

Lou is very honest in describing his own talent, the limitations he has to encounter and the issues at hand. His decision not to break up IBM was brilliant strategy. His other decision to concentrate on the services sector (similar to what Jack Welch did at GE) , where the margins are fat was another brilliant strategy. His strategy, to have his HR head work with him closely to redefine the compensation packet, measuring performances and creating opportunities for the top performers was very profound. (Jack did a similar thing at GE and today P&G is following a similar strategy).

A brilliant book, do not miss it. There is a lot to assimilate from this book

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Wiki -- The Wired Story

2006-09-08T22:50:00.000-05:00

Wired has a great story about wiki's. A very well researched story, it does immense justice to the wiki world, pointing out the benefits and the potential pitfalls.

Did you know the first wiki was started in 1995? ahem.

I have been playing with wiki for over a year now and have one, for myself. The potentials are immense and it is truly a collaborative tool. If you can control vandalism, it is a true symbol of online collaboration.

What are your experiences?

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"Musically Yours" Toilet Roll

2006-09-04T12:13:00.000-05:00

This is not a photoshop image. The product is called "iCarta". You can read more details here

Will the Murphy's Law hold true, here. I would assume,so.

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