But writing is what I do best.

I’ve always been good at it. I remember when kids used to hate English as a subject. I was able to easily go through anything thrown at me.

And I always scored good in English.

Why?

Because I love reading stories, and expressing myself.

I wrote a few poems in 6th and 7th grade and attempted to write a novel in 9th(though my lack of discipline meant I wrote only 20 or so pages).

Right now, I’m in a tight situation!

What I Wanted

Since 8th grade, my plan was this:

1. Complete school.
2. Take a break.
3. Start a business.
4. Never attend college.

But something different happened.

What Happened

1. Started a blog and a WordPress Setup business.
2. Completed school.
3. Entered college.

I’d never have done this. But I am the only kid of my parents and I have to do what they say. Not to say that I hate college entirely. I am in a course that I like.

I have always loved computers and I am doing B.Tech. in IT. The problem, however, is that I am being taught lot of strange things. And boring at that. As a programmer, I love software. I find Operating Systems and Databases easy to grasp but talk about Microprocessor Architecture and I am zero at it.

So, I have to complete college. (And I am doing pretty good at it, I am top scorer of class)

But, I am not happy!

I want freedom. And knowing that I might have to do a job, work under someone, because my dad thinks that is “Secure” kills me! I do not want to do that.

However, I also have to score well in exams. I can’t disappoint my parents.

Right now, I have two options:

1. Concentrate fully on studies. Study well and do a job.
2. Make use of 2 month holidays I’m getting and finally start something that helps me prove to my parents that this is a sustainable way.

My “Something”

I need a plan, right?

I have one.

I’ll do two things:

1. Restart blogging at Blogging With Success. I’ve been passionate about blogging and would love to blog again on the topic. With better writing skills, I’ll be able to get more audience.
2. Promote the hell out of WordPress Blog Experts. Mainly by guest posting. Guest posting, however, is something I’m terrible at. I just can’t land them. Many times, I sent articles which never got published! I need better skills for that too.

And that’s where Damn Fine Words comes in. I am writing this post in hopes of winning a place in the course. $1599 is a big amount for a student. And I can’t even dream of spending that much.

I do not have 2-3 things, Damn Fine Words will help me to achieve the biggest goal I have:

Start my own company and achieve freedom(from a possible 9 to 5 job!)

I do not want to get trapped in a normal job like most of other people. Money is not my top priority(I was going to say “I do not want money”, but that would be a white lie!), I just want to be free and writing is the way I can do that.

Writing better will help me get more audience and clients.

That’s why I need to get into Damn Fine Words.

No, then take 10 minutes and watch it now:

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Now, the question is:

If 12 years of spoon hitting can kill a person, why can’t continuous practice make you successful?

You’ll never.

Because the upper part is important and that is what most of us see but we forget:

The underground part is important.

Cut a branch and it will grow up again but cut roots and tree is dead.

Never forget what is the root cause of anything.

I did this mistake when I killed Blogging With Success to focus on WordPress Blog Experts. What I forgot was that WordPress Blog Experts got most of the traffic from Blogging With Success.

Do repeat this mistake.

Repeat the mistakes that others have made.

Why would you do that when you can learn from mistakes others did and learn from that?

Because you never know about a situation completely.

There are so many things affecting a situation that it is unique in itself. You can learn a bit from it but unless you repeat it, you’ll not learn completely!

So go, repeat the mistakes.

They are built to irritate the user.

I recently tried Elegant Themes Covertible Theme[not an affiliate link].

It has great drag and drop landing page functionality and the feature works awesomely! But there’s a little problem.

You can only have one damn page on your website after using this theme!

Yes, you can build one landing page and after that, every page of your blog/website will display only that landing page.

I have no idea what was going on in developer’s mind when doing this but this is really stupid. I’d have gone for this theme instead of Premise Plugin but, common sense!

At least I can have multiple landing pages(though not as good looking) and have a fully functional blog too.

Image Credit: pakec via flickr

Good and Evil are something strange. Being a little evil is not bad at all.

But can you be more or less evil? I do not think so.

Seth Godin has put it the best way in his post Over Your Head:

Once the water is deep enough that you must swim to stay afloat, does it really matter how deep the pool is?

It’s simple, once you are evil, it does not matter how evil you are. Thing is, you are!

Image Credit: pakec.

Confused?

Ever saw an engineer’s product? In most cases, the focus is on function.

It may look bad but it will work. And in most of the cases it will work well.

Compare that to an artist’s work. It will be beautiful. It will look good. Work? It ,ay or may not.

Why am I talking about this all of a sudden?

Well, the point came from me switching to Safari from Chrome.

I was just comparing the philosophy and working style of Apple and Google.

Apple: Design That Just Works

“Design is not how it looks, it is how it works” – Steve Jobs

With Apple, everything is designed to work. You take an Apple product in hand and it works well. Anyone can use an iPad. Even 6 year eneducated boys can!

Apple charges more but the products look great, and work really well.

And when they do not, Apple is not afraid to replace them. (Ask me, I am going to get a new iPhone as a replacement in 2-3 days!)

It’s no surprise that designers are more powerful at Apple. Unlike normal tech companies, where products start in Engineering Department, Apple starts with designers.

This results in great design.

Apple is not the first to introduce new things, but when they do, they do it really well.

Apple spent most of its time as a computer company.

Why?

Because they were doing that one thing well.

They did not branch out to other fields just to earn more profits.

“Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me… Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful… that’s what matters to me.” – Steve Jobs

That is the viewpoint that I love. Why do something that you are not good at?

Anyway, back to Apple, they entered phone market in 2007 with lot of things up their sleeves and turned everything upside down.

2010, they did it again with iPad.

Apple was not first company to make a phone or a tablet but when they made one, they made a great one.

This pursuit of excellence is that I love. That’s why I love Apple.

Google: Constantly Evolving

Google is at completely opposite end. They are not afraid to bring new and unfinished things to market.

They move at fast speed picking up what seems to be future and profitable. Everything that is not that useful is left behind.

Fast and simple. And I like this too!

Just look at their products. They are not completely finished at any time. New features are added and removed regularly. Take recent redesign of black bar. They removed it first in favor of a hovering menu.

When users complained, the black bar was back!

Google evolves constantly. But what I do not like is that they are completely focused on Engineering side. Google’s designs used to be plain and simple until they hired someone from Apple.

When it comes to Android, I just hate it.

Why?

First, it is copied. Second, it is not copied well!

It is confusing! I recently tried using an Andoird phone. My first 15 minutes were really bad. There were many UI inconsistencies.

Back button in one app takes you to last page. On another app, it goes to menu. On yet another one, it goes to home screen!

Compare that to iOS, where Home buton takes you only to one place: Home Screen.

I don’t hate Google but I do not like them either. Search, it’s great! So is GMail and Reader, but recent pushes like Android, Google+ are too bad.

Samsung: Jack Of All Trades

If Google lies on completely oppsoite end of Apple, Samsung are two steps more opposite to Apple.

Samsung wants to do everything in every market. They will make phones, TVs, washing machines, kitched appliances and what not. While they do well in most of the things, they are not on the top in most of the markets.

They can be second or third. For them, it is presence that matters. Presence, and some small profits!

And that’s where my hate from them comes from. They don’t do things well.

Yes, they make good things. But they make them for sake of making something.

There’s no design, there’s no love for the product, there’s no excellence.

That’s why I love Apple. They are artists, they love creating!

I'm Using Safari From Now!

I just switched to Safari.

There goes Chrome. Yes, Chrome is fast, good looking and what not. But the biggest problem with Chrome is that it is from Google.

Not that I hate Google, I love them. I love their Search, GMail and almost every product sans Android.

The thing that prompted me to switch was a small quirk with Chrome.

When I go full screen in Chrome, there’s no address bar and tab bar. Not a big issue, so I will live with that.

The real problem was this: Someone at Google decided to make the “Press Escape To Leave Fullscreen” message appear whenever mouse moves near upper edge of screen.

All well and good.

While surfing, it does not create any problems at all.

But….

When I am writing a new post in fullscreen, it was a big problem!

I was just unable to focus on Upload Media and linking options on WordPress editing bar because that useless notice would show up and steal focus. So, I had to either leave full screen or focus on the upper side of icon to be able to click it.

After getting fed up of this, I just switched to Safari.

Safari shows the address bar, tab bar and menus only when I hit the uppermost line of pixels.

Yes, I miss a few things like Mouse Gestures and Auto Pause on YouTube, but I’ll leave with these quirks as long as my primary task(writing) isn’t interrupted by the browser.

Also, with the stupid changes that Google makes, I’ve started disliking Chrome. They just removed “+” sign from the new tab button.

It looks plain and stupid now.

That is a common problem with Engineers. But let’s discuss that some other day!

Meanwhile, give Safari a try. Who knows, you may like it!

Do you agree?

Well, you are wrong then. Windows has some 75-80% market share. (Source: Wikipedia)

So, it must be a frequent target because it is used so widely.

Wait, shift to mobile space now. iOS has about 30-40% market(Again, Wikipedia). Still, it has not been attacked with malwares. Worst news you hear about iOS is some bug. Why? Don’t hackers exist for iOS?

The answer is simple. iOS is built to be secure. Windows was never designed from ground up to be secure. Not saying that Windows is inferior or bad, but I was tired of OS wars and this lame arguments.