bisht blogs

It's time for a new Typo theme

Wed, 07 May 2008 02:23:00 -0400

I actually never thought that I would be getting bored with my theme so early in it’s lifetime. Ahh, yeah, it’s time for a new theme.

And on “the reason behind the change” .. simple .. I have been doing some RoR coding lately, and now recently moved back to UI, and as always the kick to make beautiful things made me change my mind on my current theme.

And on “the reason why I’m blogging about it” .. simple again .. I haven’t blogged for some time now. Plus, just wanted to know whosoever will read this post, that I (along with a friend of mine) will be launching our cute little app sometime next week or so; why am I saying all this .. I just felt like .. and don’t forget to say “good luck” :)

Orkut makes developer apps online for users

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 02:38:00 -0400

Yeah, you heard it. Finally, orkut has launched a few selected apps for the general public. It’s been said that the apps are currently available to a few selected users only (maybe developers only, or GOD knows who are the chosen ones), and Orkut needs to first test the stability of the OpenSocial API on their container.

Earlier, Orkut had stated that they plan to roll out the applications in phases, so that they may be able to test and figure out their API, and other issues. Right now there are only a few handpicked apps (and some of them are really addictive I tell you !!), and when the next slot of apps will be available for users is not known as of now.

It’s actually good to be developer, you get all the inside scoop beforehand, and get to use the apps before anyone else on the sandbox :)

Do check out some apps, and let them know your feedback, and if possible me also. The app that we are developing will get you rolling when it comes out in the next slot.

Happy social apping till then :)

Wordpress for a facebook alternative

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 17:52:00 -0400

I was over at Rashmi Sinha’s (of the slideshare.net fame) weblog and there is a very interesting article that she has written about the possibility of wordpress becoming a social networking platform, and comparable to Facebook.

It’s a must read really. Go checkout the blog entry, and also do some more reading at further links in the article itself. It’s worth spending time lurking on the internet.

Seed funding and mentoring come free

Sun, 16 Mar 2008 16:33:00 -0400

I happened to reach Sita’s blog over at Binary Day, and fortunately (or unfortunately) to this article about Seed Funding over there.

It’s such a pity that there aren’t enough VCs or firms that are ready to fund ideas, judging only by the ideas, the people and the motivation. Why the need of business plans ?? I really can’t write a BP, nor can I face the disappointment on my partner’s face (as well as mine) after getting rejected for not really having a good business plan. Did I get rejected because I had no business plan, or I could not write one efficiently ?? The latter is a more appropriate reason.

I had written about it in my earlier post as well that Web-2.0 has not reached India as yet. You can read that post here (about the talent crunch that startups talk about in India right now).

Till the time web-3.0 comes in, and India just about catches up with web-2.0 till then, I guess the best places for Seed Funding or mentoring (or for that fact anything related to a young startup) remain the GenPortal (www.genportal.org) and NEN (nenonline.org).

The Entrepreneur's Quote

Sun, 16 Mar 2008 06:51:00 -0400

This one’s good…really good I say. Try and think of the major driving force behind entrepreneurship – as to why you want to be an entrepreneur. Is it the money, fame, freedom, or anything else. What comes to my mind is what I can relate to with this quote.

“There is only one way to live life, and that’s my way”

Web-2.0 - where is the money??

Sat, 15 Mar 2008 16:17:00 -0400

Web 2.0 is not just a version of the web anymore. It has become a platform for quick-money-on-the-go. Have an idea, will earn millions.

The amount of money in a web-2.0 venture can be made out by these quick facts – Facebook is worth $15 billion, Feedburner a $100 million, Youtube a cool $1.65 billion, and so on with a lot of other web-2.0 startups(all information from the Richer Scales “Another bubble” video).

Let’s just try to get behind the scenes and see where the money is. I haven’t been lucky enough like some of these people, so I’m just curious to know as to where is the money. Or is there any money in reality.

In essence, in the consumer internet space, there are notably 3 parties to anything. First, the publisher of the content, second, the advertiser for that content, and third, the community driving that content. On more occasions than not, one always finds himself in the third category – the community driving the content. The chain of flow of money is as easy to figure out as this:

The publisher, publishes content. The advertiser buys ad space surrounding (not in literal terms) that content. Publisher gets the money. Advertiser gets the leads/ clicks / new users/ etc. (in other words, he gets what he wanted). The end. But, the people who actually generated that content, do not even exist in the whole process. They sit comfortably sleeping around somewhere.

The fact that YouTube now shares the profits that it generates from the content, with the contents’ originators, is not simply Google’s morals or values. Probably, there was a lot of happening over this issue when people (the content creators) came to know the amount of profits YouTube was making from their content, and finally after a long battle Google decide to share the profits with their users (I’m not exactly sure of the details, so if anybody could update me with the actual proceedings, would be great). Something similar to what we(content creators) get at TechDispenser. Fine. Perfect you say. End of story.

But, however, there are a number of cases, when such sharing of revenue becomes a lot of problem. For example, techcrunch. Now, in my view, TechCrunch is a little better than ReadWriteWeb, just because it has a very active community with a lot of comments and interaction amongst the community as well as Michael Arrington. So, does it not make sense to actually, have the community (which may or may not be the actual content producers, but definitely they enhance the content) be given some share of the earnings ??

For a simple scenario, we have systems where comments are rated by the community / readers / other commentators, on the comments’ usefulness/ importance/ relevance et all. So, maybe on similar lines, we can create a system (which can be easily integrated into any blogging engine) which makes use of some sort of rating algorithm (I bet this has to be complex) such that at the end of the month, the system tells us as to who all people have been the most active on the community. And no, this should not be as simple a rating system as 9rules uses, but much more complex with a lot more ifs and buts, since we have to deal with money. So, at the end of the month, the deserving people, who have actually done the most useful work, get their rewards.

Or alternatively, maybe along every comment that a reader writes, we can have a small button that says “Payme a penny”. Yes, and then if I really like the comment what the person made, I simply click onto it and give him a penny from my account (some online system like PayPal). Obviously, this requires setting up of an online system, much larger than PayPal, with a lot more smoother / easier transfer of money from one place to another, and a host of other features. but, as I said, this is just an idea. And maybe if this does not seem feasible right now, in the future it might be prevalent everywhere. Who knows !!

And lastly, I have limited my talk on blogging, and commenting only throughout this post (as I feel bloggers are the one who desperately need money, with so many of “money by blogging” sites coming up a dime-a-dozen), but this is actually a topic that has to be addressed at every level in the web-2.0, till the people get the answer to the question “Where is the money in web-2.0 ??”

Bloggers' choice : creativity in ads : text links or reviews

Sat, 15 Mar 2008 13:54:00 -0400

In the AD-age, when online advertising is growing by leaps and bounds, the search for the perfect ad network is still a delusion. In a recent survey by McKinsey Quarterly about online marketing (requires free registration to read), a large number of companies (major part of which are Fortune 500 companies) do plan to invest even heavily (if not doing already) in online advertisements. And not surprisingly, companies are in the search of new and unexplored methodologies / ways for online advertisements. The bottom line is, companies are ready to shell out money, but on newer medias

Undoubtedly, the report also carries a lot of stress on blogs, and how companies are looking at consumer generated content for marketing and advertisement. Cashing on these opportunities, are 2 of the major players who are doing exceptionally well in the text link ads business (apart from paid writing ads), notably Text-link-ads.com and Linkworth.com

Going by the bloggers’ choice, it seems that it is a much better option to use text-link based advertisement media rather than sponsored blogging, since quality advertisers with brand names and lot of investment in ads, prefer link-ads over sponsored blogging. And on the question of why – simply a lot of technical and functional reasons, and the impact on their business. No doubt, companies prefer to have a sponsored group on facebook, spending more than $30000 per quarter for the same, rather than have Mark Zuckerberg write a blog entry for them (which I doubt will be any less than $30000 !! :p ).

There might be some in the crowd who would still prefer reviews, going by the fact that there are some blogs which make more than even $1000 for one small little piece of writing that goes on their blog (a.k.a review article), but then again, they are the exceptional ones. When we talk about blogging, we mean everybody – the general lot, cause that’s the target for companies who are willing to spend millions of dollars on text link ads or some other forms of creative buys. What the average blogger needs is to have a simple method of monetizing his blog, and what the companies need is a creative way of advertisement.

In the next few articles, we will go deeper into the web and the advertising world, and try and find out the next big upcoming ideas on creativity.

Yahoo adds facebook - goes completely customizable

Fri, 14 Mar 2008 15:50:00 -0400

Facebook with Yahoo. Sounds good ??!!. Or doesn’t ??!! Yahoo has recently come up with the “My Yahoo beta” (although it has been some time since the beta was released), there are quite some interesting features now available.

Simple things first, the whole page has been completely thrown open for customization. Not just the layout or the colors, but more than that there are widgets that you can add and play around with. Even with the colors and layouts, there are more choices available now than before. Personally, after trying out “citrus”, “blue” and “black” colors, I went a step ahead and into the “Passion” category, where I immediately found out “Football” customization. eeee . Yeah, there must be tons of football lovers using Yahoo for sure. Here’s a cool little screen-shot of “My Yahoo – Football” :)

You can add on to all these small little customizations here :

Going ahead, what was more interesting, was the modules that you can simply add to your page. I tried adding a few “Editor’s picks” – like “Salon.com”, “beauty blog”, et all !!. But the real piece of cake is “Facebook Integration”. It has become so monotonous now with everything happening around Facebook only, and I am trying to figure from a developer’s point of view as to why only facebook. Earlier, I actually wrote about the social web browser “Flock” too going for simple Facebook integration, and also about why Facebook is preferred over OpenSocial.

Anyways, here’s how easy it is to integrate Facebook on my yahoo page, and then just simply sit back and relax, and watch the facebook activities on your customized yahoo homepage only.

There’s a whole lot of activity going around at Yahoo these days, maybe after what happened earlier this year, with Microsoft trying to buy out Yahoo. Keep watching yahoo for further updates. I’m damn sure these guys will come up with something much cooler now.

Trying out flock on my win machine

Tue, 11 Mar 2008 12:11:00 -0400

Oh yo people, it’s spring time again, and the weather is super-fun. It’s awkward, but I feel the same way on the web too. The colors are vivid, the energy is high, and when you’re on flock, everything is kewl.

After a very long time, I made the toughest decision to give Flock a try (my desktop, which runs windows XP is actually in no mood to take any further load, given the fact that it already makes a noise similar to the one that a jet plane makes during take-off, whenever I run photoshop), and somehow it has gone down pretty fine till now

If you are a Firefox user, or have been one earlier, then you will find a stark similarity between Flock and Firefox (apart from the “F” word that they share in common). I came to a conclusion from viewing the first webpage, that they share the same default styles or something. The point is that if you test your design for firefox, it is assumed to be tested for Flock as well. Happy !

Certain good things about Flock are definitely the Feeds Sidebar and the People Sidebar. Actually I have just tried out these two, else I think the Webmail Sidebar and others must also be equivalently good.
The People Sidebar simply lets you log onto any of the services like Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, et all, and then just follow your friends from the comfort of your sidebar. All the updates and everything else, are simply shown in the sidebar itself. Okay, the facebook app-a-holics will probably miss the fun of playing around with strange looking applications, but if you are not one of them, then the sidebar is one piece of joy. Here’s a screen shot of my facebook people sidebar.

Also, the other thing that I was talking about was the Feeds Sidebar. What I did was grabbed my own feeds at bishtblogs and then tried playing around with the functionalities that Flock provides. Simply put, you can view the feeds as Headlines, Excerpts, Full or even in one single-column or two-columns. Simple things you say. What’s great in that you say. I say why didn’t anybody do that earlier, the simple things that could have been earlier. It’s actually the same thing that Google follows – Beauty in simplicity – you just have to make simplicity stand out. Anyways, here’s my feeds page with a two column full article feed.

Hope you all enjoy Flock as much as I am. Anyone else writing about Flock, then do let me also know on that

Poll : Google search or Digg

Tue, 11 Mar 2008 08:13:00 -0400

The search engine war has not yet started. Probably it will never start, cause probably Google will never loose to anybody in the near future.

But just try and think, as to how many times have you tried to search for a better/relevant story/article on Digg rather than Google. Isn’t this strange that unconsciously, we are moving towards the Digg results rather than the Google search results. Alternatively, to say that when Mahalo started the “humar-powered-search-engine-space”, then they had a brilliant idea. But maybe the implementation was not that good. The users could not really absorb their concept.

But, on the other hand, consciously or unconsciously, Digg has entered the “human-powered-search-engine-space” and nobody is taking note of it. We are all pretty happy to use it to get the results, and move on.

I’m actually just feeling sorry for Mahalo people. Their implementation went all awry. Maybe next time someone will think of a better method to implement the idea. But, really, can something better be done in the “human-powered-search-engine-space”, better than how Digg has done it ?? Consciously or unconsciously ??!!

Poll : OpenSocial v/s Facebook

Mon, 10 Mar 2008 10:22:00 -0400

It was just for fun that I started to develop a facebook application, and slowly getting used to the Ruby wrapper for the facebook API. But then, suddenly, a few days earlier, a friend of mine told me to try out OpenSocial. To be honest, before that day I had never given an iota of thought to try out OpenSocial, and was happily developing my app for Facebook.

Try and think of it. Have we really forgotten OpenSocial ?? Has Facebook really changed the face of web ?? Why aren’t enough developers building apps for MySpace or Orkut ?? Why only Facebook ?? Or why not facebook and opensocial both ??

A plethora of questions come in my mind when I start thinking about OpenSocial v/s Facebook. Can someone please help me on this.

Joyent loves facebook apps developers

Mon, 10 Mar 2008 09:22:00 -0400

If you are a facebook developer and you are having a hard time getting the right host for your app (one who understands scalability), then the obvious choice is Joyent’s accelerator hosting for developers. It’s no wonder that almost a third of facebook applications are hosted with Joyent’s accelerator program.

But, but, but, this is not just the end. Things get even better now !! Joyent, Facebook and Dell, recently partnered to give developers like me (have a lot of ideas, but not the bucks!!) a free accelerator package for one whole year. Now, that is simply put as A.W.E.S.O.M.E !!

You might not get all the features of a Joyent’s accelerator hosting, but certainly more than enough for something free. Quoting Joyent on this, the only limitations are:
Special Notes: The Free Joyent Accelerator™ cannot be used with BIG-IP load-balancing. Mail pre-configured for outbound SMTP only, limited to 500 recipients per hour. There are no limits on the number of facebook users your application may host. * We reserve the right to deal with abuse.

So, if you have been planning to write that great little application for a long time now, but were afraid to handle the initial expenses, this is just the right opportunity for you. (It is one helluva good one for me surely !)

For a complete low-down on what is included and all the smaller details, check out the Joyent-Facebook-Developer page. Have fun developing the next killer app on facebook !!

Megadeth in Bangalore, India. Take the Rock bus this time around

Fri, 07 Mar 2008 10:58:00 -0500

Yeah people, you got it right!! Another of those great times in India. And this time it’s big. Really Big. And unfortunately, I ain’t attending it this time around. I just wish I could have had attended it this time around. Huh :(

For a little bit of details, this time it’s not just another rock concert. It’s a “Road 2 Rock” people !!, and it just can’t get bigger. Rockers unite, huddle up in a bus, rock all day and night, all along the journey from Pune to Bangalore. Awesome I say. Really great !!

And who all are performing you say. I say it features Megadeth, Machine Head, Pentagram, JunkYard Groove, and a whole lot of other Indian Rock bands (our own guys next door, you see)

More details can be found on the official Megadeth homepage , which finally leads you to the Road 2 Rock page. So go check the Road 2 Rock homepage directly itself

Rest Laterrs !

The state of entrepreneurship (web 2.0) in India - part 1 (the talent crunch)

Mon, 25 Feb 2008 15:00:00 -0500

Everybody is talking about the entrepreneurship revolution going around in India these days, something which started in the silicon valley some years back. And no, India has not really come into the mainstream of the web 2.0 scene. Try asking a few people (probably bloggers, tech bloggers especially) and see what the answer is. No, I’m not here to write something about someone or try and prove something in this post, it’s just an observation, and not even classified as right or wrong, or good or bad. In this series of articles, I try and go deeper into the state of entrepreneurship (strictly the web 2.0 space) in India, the problems faced by the budding entrepreneurs, and the small consumer internet space in India which seems to be overflowing with all sorts of startups right now with no space left literally

For the past six days, I have been lurking around the land of opportunities (the same term used for the U.S, some years ago by the Indian janta), and no I was not really looking or a fat-paying job (though I wouldn’t mind the same). I was in search for a startup that was doing some quality work in the web 2.0 area (I use the 2.0 term so often and with ease, although deeper down it is not that staright-forward), and needed a guy to do things the right way (or probably their way). And I was not disappointed, as you can see there is a derth of young startups in Bangalore these days. Half of them although have a very doubtfull future, and the other half are somehow working things out. Not enough money, incubation problems, talent crunch. Just some (and the most important) of the problems faced by these startups. The fact being that I too am bitten by the entrepreneurship bug, although i really do not intend to dive down into the sea right now, makes me ponder and do a research into these problems.

Talent Crunch

Is that really a problem ?? When I read blogs, personal blogs, of the so-called technopreneurs, and I read something like “Brain-drain in India”, I am obviously surprised by thhe manner in which people write these things. On one of such blogs, I found out that the guy himself was in states for a decade or so, and then he returned to India to launch his own startup. And surprsingly he was very disheartened by the fact that brain-drain still happens in India. Somehow, this does not seem to be justified to me.

We all understand how important the quality of talent is for a startup. We know the difference between the “bright” and “right” talent. But in essence, these are all relative terms, and more than that these are terms that are used to showcase the startup culture. But in the very rare of cases, will you actually find such a thing happening. Yes, let’s face it, in India people do not want to take the risk of hiring a smart guy over a geek as of now. Yes, the culture of smarter people over geeks has not yet arrived in India. Just for an example, a friend of mine from college, joined a big It firm in India (one of those giants you know), cause he was not geek enough to get a job in a startup that he wanted. Now the guy is starting-up his own venture, after been reminded again and again of the same fact that he was not a geek at each interview. And just for the records, his business plan was selected at the ISB startup showcase recently. Not bad I guess, not bad at all for a “non-geek” after all. So, the moral of the story is, geeky is good, but smarter is better; and follow what you preach. So, either all these startups stop talking about Mr.Right and Mr.Bright, or simply do what they preach.

Talk about talent crunch and we hear about the Mr.Right been so epensive. It’s a simple world. The best brands come expensive. So why does a startup crib about talent crunch. Why do startups have to go about reasoning out as to how the IT industry (startups) needs people to work their asses-off with low-payoffs, take all the damn risks, live life on the edge. Why can’t startups really start paying people good money. Essentially, my observation about successfull startups is that the venture was funded by 3-4 guys, owned by them in partnership and then yes they worked their asses-off to get the thing up and running (building the gears and putting the car in the 1st gear). And after that, they went for the kill, hiring people, expanding, and the rest. This phenomenon seems to be just perfect. It’s strange that now people come up with ideas, don’t want partners, need low-paying-skilled workers, give them a fraction-of-the-fraction-of-the-profits later, lure them into all the good things (stock options) and all other stories like that. And then startups complain that they don’t find the right talent. I guess, it’s high-time for startups to understand that good things in life are not for free. Ready to shell out – will get proportionally better results later.

Off to bangalore for some time now

Tue, 19 Feb 2008 10:56:00 -0500

Aye yo people. I’m happy. I’m gay. I just uploaded my new typo theme and now bishtblogs is running smoothly on rails. I happened to notice some changes with the rails or with my host, something that has led to my weblog running pretty damn fast. I always wondered whether any rails app runs smoothly on a shared hosting environment, but this time it seems (with rails 2.0) that it can. I have still not really gone into the stats (my logs et all), but for the naked eye, it seems that everything is up and running fine.

I still have not integrated my photoblog module with Typo, and I guess I won’t be able to do so for the coming week or two, since I’m off to bangalore tomorrow to meet some people. For the moment the area right under the left navigation that says “from the photoblog” is filled with two static photos (me and a friend of mine), which obviously will be made away once the photoblog module is integrated.

From the usability point of view as well, the top navigation, with all the links like “design”, “blog”, “love” and “the basement” are ajaxed, although when you try and open them, you do not get any status message as to what is happening behind the scenes. Pretty lame I say. But..but..things will be working in a jiffy asap when I get time again in a couple of weeks

Till then, please do drop by your feedback on anything and everything bad or good in here. Just mail me at sanjay AT bishtblogs DOT net. And I will do the rest

Great day..cheers!