Vatsil's Planet

YouTube - japanese subway station

2009-11-28T13:53:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8FQsg12hoY

Fame, Faith and failure

2009-10-09T16:36:00.001+05:30

from ouchmytoe.com
Ref : http://ouchmytoe.com/archives/2009/10/04/fame-faith-and-failure/

Two years back, when I went to Madurai, the city where I grew up, I bumped into a friend whom I used to play cricket with when I was in school & college.

Mani, the all-rounder I was scared to ball to…and frightened to face is today a bus conductor and works for Rs 6300. Here is what happened.

"Aren't you Rajan?"

That's how he knew me…Rajan. Jammy, the fancier name caught on later. There was no way, I was going to recognize him…he had become a man. A man hardened by fate, deeds & hard luck. A face, I wouldn't recognize.

"Heyyyy…..hmmm….hmmm…how are you?" I just couldn't place him. But being the good guy out of the two, he was more forthright.

"Looks like you didn't recognize me. Remember me? Mani? The fast bowler?"

"Ohh shucks! Mani…it is you?"

"How have you been, Rajan. You are working with Indian Express aren't you?" I could see that Mani wanted to hug me….but I didn't. He was oily and smelled of bidis. I could see his khaki shirt was wet with sweat and salt formation where the sweat had dried, stood out like Google Maps. Though, I did think that his eyes were moist.

I didn't tell Mani that I was with Indian Express ten years back, and had changed seven jobs since then. He kept on asking questions.

"Are you married?"
"Where is the girl from?"
"Is she pretty? Huh? Huh?
"Love marriage or arranged marriage?"
"Have any kids?"
"Boy or a girl?"
"Started going to school?"

He was genuine. I was the faker of the two. I answered in mono syllables. I didn't ask him about his family, friends, job…nothing.

After getting bored of my mono syllables, he started looking at me up and down.

"You must be a rich man now. Aren't you?"

"Well, not really. I don't run my own business…I still wait for my monthly salary on the first of every month."

Back in my town, asking somebody for their salary is an accepted norm. There is nothing to hide, especially if you are friends. And what I was dreading happened.

"That's ok. I recently got a hike after completing two years and my salary now is Rs 6300. How much is yours?"

I could have been honest with him. But something inside didn't allow me. I didn't tell him that I was with Yahoo – one of the top Internet companies – and to make it worse, I cut down my package and said: "Well, my salary is double that."

"I told you, didn't I? You are rich. For me to get Rs 15,000 every month, I will have to work for another ten years."

Mani was immediately on another subject. He told me that he met most of our cricketing friends at least once a week – they all boarded his bus and bought tickets from him. He also told me that some of our cricketing friends were richer now and HAD their own bikes.

"So, what do you do when you meet our cricket friends?" I asked Mani.

"Well, remember Rajesh…that sloppy fielder? He called me home last weekend…and introduced me to his parents as the best fast bowler he has ever faced."

"Wow…thats nice."

"Yeah. And remember, Suresh…that left hand bastman? He met me one day in the bus and we got talking. Now, I teach his young cousin brother the fine art of bowling….and Suresh pays me Rs 200 every month. I didn't accept it at first….but you know Suresh…he always has it his way."

"Wow…thats nice too."

The people Mani was referring to had been an integral part of my life twelve years back and now I didn't even know them…leave alone caring. Some shop keepers, some LIC agents, some sales executives….Mani, sure was famous among them.

"We talk about you…you know. I keep telling my wife that you are with a newspaper and we won't have any trouble in finding a good school for our children, when we can afford to take them out of the Government School."

"Hmm…." I didn't commit anything to him and changed the subject. "So, how long will you be working as a conductor?"

"I have it clearly charted out. Two more years as a conductor. By then the small property that I have will be worth at least 2 lakhs…I will buy a second hand, white Ambassador car and become a Tourist Taxi driver."

"Good money there?"

"Yeah. And once I understand the Taxi business, I will appoint a driver to drive my Ambassador as a Tourist Taxi…and I will get a good Gujarati family and drive their family car."

At this point, he smiled…and added: "Double income, you see."

Mani threw his beedi down on the ground and ordered the shop keeper for a Halls candy. Then he turned towards me and asked: "One for you?"

He wouldn't let me pay for my cigarette too. After finishing with the shop keeper, he said he wanted to visit my home and see Rekha and Rhea and have a word with them.

I don't know why…I lied to him that they weren't home. He was very disappointed. I had just turned down the guy, I once wanted to impress. Back then, he was my hero…and I wanted him to be my best friend….so that he would take me in his team when the cricket teams were divided every day at 4.30 p.m., so that he would ask me to open the innings if I were in his team. How time changes.

I saw him returning the Halls candy and getting his fifty paisa back.

"Why what happened?" I asked.

"I didn't want to be smelling of beedi, while meeting my sister-in-law…that's your wife. Now, I don't need it."

Not for a moment did Mani suspect that I could be lying.

"So, what is your mobile number. I will give you missed calls…I can't spend money in calling STD….you understand that….don't you? You will have to call me back."

After taking down my number, he gave me a missed call and asked me to save his number. I didn't.

After parting ways and promising to be in touch in future, I started walking back home.

For Mani it was a monumental meeting with a friend from the happiest times of his life, and for me it was another update on Twitter, Orkut & Facebook: "Just met an old friend…"

Funny, meeting Mani didn't even give me the excitement that I get when I see '1 Friend Request' message on Facebook or ibibo. Requests from people, I don't know. From people I don't share any memory with.

Two days later, when I was back in Gurgaon I realized….Mani had all going for him. He might only be drawing Rs 7300 but he definitely has been a more successful person than I have been.

Class stays, they say…once an all rounder, always an all rounder. Maybe, that's why when we had met….I was scared to face him.

Since this incident two years back, I have made seven trips to Madurai and during my stay there…. every day at the same time I go to that shop for a smoke. I always hope to see Mani, so that I invite him home and introduce to Rekha & Rhea as the best bowler I have faced and the best batsman I have bowled to. But, I haven't yet been given a second chance.

Maybe, the second hand, white Ambassador is keeping him busy.

Calvin and Hobbes for October 08, 2009

2009-10-08T16:45:00.001+05:30

from Calvin and Hobbes (Unofficial)
Ref : http://www.ucomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2009/10/08/

YouTube - Vomit Comet

2009-09-23T20:20:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrjosOjvlOc

YouTube - Oh, The Temptation

2009-09-23T09:04:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7LN96jEXHc

The Case against Heaven

2009-09-19T14:02:00.001+05:30

from RedCarrotJalabee , written by RCB
Ref : http://www.redcarrotjalabee.com/2009/09/case-against-heaven.html

(Obviously other people might have said this better, but hey, its my blog.)

Consider the following propositions or axioms common to all the Abrahamic faiths:

1) Heaven exists.

2) God gave mankind free will.

Heaven is the ultimate reward for all virtuous conduct. Its an etenally blissful afterlife, free of all the evils and sufferings on earth.

Free will is the reason for evil. Free will is also the the offered explanation for good. Greed, selfishness, good, evil all spring from free will, as natural consequences of.

Now lets consider these two propositions as valid simultaneoulsly. I draw the following two possible sets of conclusions:

a) Heaven is blissful.

b) Heaven is the epitome of goodness.

c) For goodness to be meaningful, free will must exist.

d) If there is free will, then evil exists as a consequence.

e) Ergo, there must be evil in heaven.

f) Ergo, there must be suffering in heaven as a consequence of evil.

g) Evil on earth is temporary, all things in heaven are eternal.

h) Ergo, there must be a lot of evil and lot of suffering in heaven.

Else

a) There is no free will in heaven.

b) Without free will, there is no notion of good.

c) Without the notion of goodness, there is no notion of bliss.

d) Heaven is not blissful.

Ergo sum, one of the following may be true:

a) There is free will AND (a lot of) suffering in heaven.

Else

b) There is neither free will NOR bliss in heaven.

Outsource This!

2009-09-06T15:42:00.000+05:30

from RedCarrotJalabee , written by RCB
Ref : http://www.redcarrotjalabee.com/2009/09/outsource-this.html

I'm sure you must have heard the usual Freidmanite drivel about why markets should be unregulated, and outsourcing is the surest road to better productivity in a flat market... so on and so forth. However, outsourcing doesn't work primarily because a labour camp sweatshop in China can produce an iPod quicker, faster and cheaper than American production lines. It is because of the fact that Steve Jobs, sitting in his Manhattan perch, can call up the Chinese contractor and say, without having to worry about putting on a straight face, that he wants another 100,000 pieces by the end of the week.

Now, hold on. I am not talking about the things that people like Noam Chomsky, Naomi Klein and Arundhati Roy write about. Sure, the contractor probably has to slave work a few hundred Chinese peasants to death. I need to emphasize that I, on the other hand, am referring to, the straight face, or the lack of any necessity for it, in orders from another continent.

Think about it. If your manager wanted you to stay back the whole weekend (without any extra pay) and labour to finish some report out in time for the client meeting on Monday, he'd go about it with circumspection. He'd probably dangle some reward of a distant raise in front of you. Or drop hints about some recommendation to a vacancy that might come up as a result of your immediate superior Suryakantvenkataramanulu's (why should it always be Bob, Jim or Joe?) resignation. He might also, if we were anything like me, resort to pointing out gaffes that you let slip in your report all week long, so that by the end of it, you are so crushed and pliable, eager to regain his confidence, that you offer to stay back and finish the aforementioned report.

This is where outsourcing comes in. If you had a back office with some hapless young assistants, you don't need to worry about all that effort. You just call them. Tell them crisply that you want the report by Monday. Then you hang up. Problem solved.

Ofcourse, clever entrepreneurs have already realised all this. For eg. take for instance, this site which already does things like break up with your GF/BF for you. Again, note, what's being done away with is not the inefficiency in doing something... its the Thespian effort needed to say that terrible thing right, the need to put on your poker face... and all that sort of thing. The oldest outsourced activity in fact is another case in point - assassinations. Heck, if you wanted to kill your own king, you'd need a tie up with Assasins Inc. in your neighbouring country.

In fact, if the Greeks had discovered outsourcing back then, we'd have had no need for terms like 'Herculean task'. Poor Hercules. If only he had known that we Indians were around even then, and kicked ass at math and spreadsheets, even back then; he wouldn't have had to bother with all his... well, tasks. He'd have simply sent a parchment through his half brother Apollo (whom we worshiped back then, still do) that read:

Aryabhat,

We are in need of a positional arithmetic system based on the decimal system that we can use instead of the clunky system we have now to show the Egyptian delegation visiting our home office. Also, as a secondary objective, we may want you to explore the possibility of incorporating some method to indicate null or void quantities. If you could mash that up with your number system, which we'd like by Monday, that'd be great.

Also, Archimedes is calling in sick next week. So I need you to stand in for him next week, on the 'Move Mount Olympus' project. Apparently, he was talking about something about being able to move earth itself. Please look at the project mail archive and figure out what he meant.

Regards,
Hercules
(Half) God
Olympus Corp

Google Docs: A love letter

2009-08-31T20:58:00.000+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7y7NafWXeM

AWESOME !! Privatize the Fire Department

2009-08-30T19:54:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bb8qG76L9jE

Calvin and Hobbes for August 29, 2009

2009-08-29T16:25:00.001+05:30

from Calvin and Hobbes (Unofficial)
Ref : http://www.ucomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2009/08/29/

Monkey and Magic

2009-08-27T23:15:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IM-KQxgtOao

Psychic

2009-08-26T12:12:00.001+05:30

from xkcd.com
Ref : http://xkcd.com/628/

டைம் பாஸ் சாட்டில்

2009-08-24T12:58:00.002+05:30

from pkp.blogspot.com
Ref : http://pkp.blogspot.com/2009/08/blog-post_20.html

அவன் பெயரும் கோபால் தான். ஆனால் இன்னொரு கோபால். சரியாகச் சொன்னால் கோபாலிகா-வாம். முப்பது வயது. இந்திய ஐஐடியில் என்னவெல்லாமோ மிகப் பெரிய டிகிரி படிப்புகளெல்லாம் படித்து முடித்து விட்டு பிழைப்புத் தேடி அமெரிக்கா வந்தவன். இணையத்தில் சாட் செய்வதென்றால் அவனுக்கு கொள்ளைப் பிரியம். அதிலும் முகமறியாத அனானிகளிடம் சாட் செய்வது என்றால் இன்னும் இஷ்டம். அப்படித்தான் அந்த பதிமூன்று வயது அமெரிக்க பெண்ணும் அவனுக்கு அறிமுகம் ஆனாள். நிறைய சாட்டியிருக்கின்றார்கள். ஆனாலும் நேருக்கு நேர் பார்த்ததில்லை. அரசியல் முதல் அந்தரங்கங்கள் வரை அநேகம் பேசியிருக்கின்றார்கள். படங்களும் பரிமாறப்பட்டன. எத்தனை நாட்கள் தான் பேசிக் கொண்டிருப்பதாம். நேரில் சந்திக்கலாமே என முடிவெடுத்தார்கள். அதீத எதிர்பார்ப்புகளோடு இந்த கோபாலும் ஏற்கனவே சொல்லப்பட்டிருந்த மீட்டிங் பிளேசுக்கு போனால் அங்கே இவனை வரவேற்றது ஒரு under cover agent from Chid Predator Unit. அவன் கையும் களவுமாக பிடிபட்டதாகவும் அவனை ஜாமீனில் எடுக்கவே $15000 ஆகுமென சொல்லுகின்றார்கள். எல்லாம் நிரூபிக்கப்பட்டால் இது பெரும் குற்றமாக (First degree felony) கருதப்பட்டு 20 ஆண்டு சிறைத் தண்டனையும் $25000 அபாராதமும் கிடைக்குமாம். பொழுதுபோகாமல் இணையத்தில் விளையாடி அந்த விளையாட்டு இப்போது இவனுக்கு வினையாகியிருக்கின்றது.

மைனர்களிடம் சீண்டுவது இங்கு பெருங்குற்றம். பள்ளிப் பேருந்துகளை நடுச்சாலையில் நிறுத்தும் போது அதில் மின்னும் சிவப்பு ஒளியைக்கண்டு மொத்த சாலைகளும் ஸ்தம்பித்து நின்று சிறார்களுக்கு சாலையைக் கடக்க வழிவிடும். சிறுவர்களை அடித்தாலோ அல்லது திட்டி அது அழுதாலோ Child Abuse என யார் வேண்டுமானாலும் 911 அழைக்கலாம். எல்லாம் டீனேஜ் முடியும் வரை தான். பள்ளி முடிந்து கல்லூரி போனதும் பொத்தி பொத்தி வளர்த்ததெல்லாம் பூ...ம். கோபாலுக்கு இதுவெல்லாம் தெரியாதிருந்ததா? அல்லது தெரிந்திருந்தும் இது ஒரு வெர்சுவல் உலகம் தானே எப்போது வேண்டுமானாலும் Undo செய்துகொள்ளலாம் என நினைத்திருந்தானா? அல்லது அமெரிக்காவில் இதெல்லாம் சகஜமென ஆழம் தெரியாமல் காலையிட்டு பார்த்தானா தெரியவில்லை. இணையத்தின் இன்றைய மெகா பரிமாணம் நம் ஊரில் வருமுன்னேயே இது குறித்துச் சொன்ன "காதலர் தினம்" கூடவா இவன் பார்த்ததில்லை?

இனி சாலையில் போவோறெல்லாரும் இவனுக்கு தேவர்களாகவும் தேவதைகளாகவும் தெரிவார்கள் .இவன் மட்டும் தனக்கு படுபாவியாகத் தெரிவான். http://locator.thevision2020.com ல் Sex Offenders அல்லது Child Predators வரிசையில் இவன் பெயரையும் போட்டாலும் போட்டு விடுவார்கள். உருப்படியாய் எதாவது செய்கின்ற நேரத்தில் சும்மா வம்புக்கு சாட் செய்து வாழ்க்கையை தொலைத்துக் கொண்டான். பாவம் அந்த கோபால்.

Tech Support Cheat Sheet

2009-08-24T11:41:00.001+05:30

from xkcd.com
Ref : http://xkcd.com/627/

Year's Best Optical Illusion: Scientific American Gallery

2009-08-23T22:29:00.001+05:30

from www.scientificamerican.com
Ref : http://www.scientificamerican.com/gallery_directory.cfm?photo_id=B5B09611-E7F2-99DF-37B57709D6F8FB20

FREDERICK A A KINGDOM, ALI YOONESSI AND ELENA GHEORGHIU, McGill Vision Research, Dept. Ophthalmology, McGill University

No, you have not had one grappa too many. These images of the Leaning Tower are actually identical, but the tower on the right looks more lopsided because the human visual system treats the two images as one scene. Our brains have learned that two tall objects in our view will usually rise at the same angle but converge toward the top—think of standing at the base of neighboring skyscrapers. Because these towers are parallel, they do not converge, so the visual system thinks they must be rising at different angles, as demonstrated by this year's winner of the Best Visual Illusion of the Year Contest, sponsored by the Neural Correlate Society.

Bi-cycle stunts by 2 girls

2009-08-19T21:46:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b36Yi-Pb1wM

2008 Latest Edition - Did You Know 3.0 - From Meeting in Rome this Year

2009-08-15T15:45:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpEnFwiqdx8&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Efacebook%2Ecom%2Fhome%2Ephp%3F&feature=player_embedded

Calvin and Hobbes for August 14, 2009

2009-08-15T13:22:00.001+05:30

from Calvin and Hobbes (Unofficial)
Ref : http://www.ucomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2009/08/14/

Robot running

2009-08-13T22:44:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sv35ItWLBBk

Duty Calls

2009-08-13T19:16:00.001+05:30

via xkcd.com

Working for Google

2009-08-13T19:06:00.001+05:30

via xkcd.com

Calvinball

2009-08-13T19:03:00.001+05:30

Other kids' games are all such a bore!
They've gotta have rules and they gotta keep score!
Calvinball is better by far!
It's never the same! It's always bizarre!
You don't need a team or a referee!
You know that it's great, 'cause it's named after me!

—The Calvinball theme song^[50]

Calvinball is a game played by Calvin and Hobbes as a rebellion against organized team sports; according to Hobbes, "No sport is less organized than Calvinball!"^[51] The game was introduced in a three-week story in 1990, where Calvin is bullied into signing up to play baseball, cursed when he proves a poor player and insulted when he quits.^[51] Calvin and Hobbes usually play by themselves, although Rosalyn plays once in return for Calvin doing his homework, and does very well for herself after eventually realizing that the rules are made up on the spot.^[52] Most games that Calvin and Hobbes play eventually turn into Calvinball.^[53]

The only consistent rule is that Calvinball may never be played with the same rules twice.^[54] Scoring is also arbitrary, with Hobbes reporting scores of "Q to 12" and "oogy to boogy."^[55] The only recognizable sports Calvinball is similar to are the ones that it emulates (i.e., a cross between croquet, polo, badminton, and volleyball.) Equipment includes a volleyball (the eponymous "Calvinball"), a soccer ball, a croquet set, a badminton set, assorted flags, bags, signs, and a hobby horse. Other things are included as needed, such as a bucket of ice-cold water, a water balloon, and various songs and poetry.^[56] Players also wear masks that resemble blindfolds with holes for the eyes.^[52] When asked how to play, Watterson states, "It's pretty simple: you make up the rules as you go."^[57] Calvinball is a nomic (self-modifying game), a contest of wits and creativity rather than stamina or athletic skill, where Hobbes (and on one occasion, Calvin's baby-sitter, Rosalyn) usually outwits Calvin, who takes it in stride, in contrast to his bad sportsmanship when he loses other games.

via en.wikipedia.org

How to do almost anything with Posterous

2009-08-13T18:50:00.001+05:30

Online sharing and blogging service Posterous has been getting a lot of attention recently. The development team is adding features regularly and it’s fast becoming the best way to share content with all your different social services while also keeping it all in one place too. The best bit is you can do it all via email.

With so many ways to use Posterous it can be difficult to keep track of them all. Here we’ll take you through everything you need to know about it and suggest a range of ways you can use it to make your online life easier.

The basics

Creating an account

Setting up your own Posterous blog is simple. There are no forms to fill in; you simply send an email to post@posterous.com. Whatever you put in this email becomes the first post for your new blog.

Once the email’s sent, a Posterous blog is set up for you and you’ll get an email straight back inviting you to create an account. This is completely optional; if you don’t create an account anything you send to Posterous from your email address will still be posted to your blog without you ever having to visit the admin panel.

There are advantages to creating an account though – if you want to choose a custom URL and site name you’ll have to go for it. What’s more, most of the features listed below are only available if you have an account. It’s free, so you’ve nothing to lose.

Preparing your posts

There are four ways to post content to Posterous. There’s a blog-style WYSIWYG editor on the site and you can send messages via SMS from your mobile phone, but the two most powerful ways are via email and via the Posterous Bookmarklet.

Via Email: When posting via email, the Subject line is the post’s title and any text or attached files also become part of the post, either embedded or as a download. The way Posterous handles media is seriously impressive. Images will display in the post, for example, while MP3s and videos are playable directly in the page. Even other files, such as PDFs and Word documents, are viewable directly from your blog. It will embed Google Maps as well – just paste the URL into your post.

Posterous accepts any formatting you’ve added to your email. Bold text is bold, links work perfectly and everything looks just as you intended. If you want more control, logging into your account gives you access to a traditional blog text editor with all the tools you’d expect at your fingertips.

You can add tags to posts by adding them to the Subject line in the format ((tag: The Next Web, guide, Posterous)).

Via the Bookmarklet: Alternatively, there’s the Posterous Bookmarklet. This sits in your browser’s bookmarks bar and allows you to select any text, video, music or photos you like from any web page and post it instantly.

Making Posterous work for you

Here are a few ideas for getting the most out of Posterous.

Use it as a blog

If you don’t need the plugins and customisation options of a mature blogging platform like Wordpress, Posterous can easily act as your blog. Being able to easily publish posts with rich media via email from anywhere makes it simple to run a blog without worrying about the admin side of blogging. You can even run it as a multi-author blog by allowing other people’s email addresses to be able to post to your account

If you want to move your existing blog to Posterous, that’s easy too. There’s a simple import option to get all your existing posts ported over. If you already have a domain name, that can be set to point at your Posterous account.

Use it to update your existing blog

If you can’t bring yourself to give up your existing blog, that’s okay. You can use Posterous to easily email posts in to your other blogs. All major blogging platforms are supported.

Use it to post anything almost anywhere

Beyond its easy blogging features, Posterous’ big selling point is that it can share anything via email to a wide range of services. Setting up the services you want to post to is a simple case of entering appropriate details on the Autopost page. Then, by simply sending a photo (for example) to post@posterous.com, or selecting it from a webpage via the Bookmarklet, it could be sent to Facebook, Flickr, Picasa and FriendFeed simultaneously, as well as to your Posterous blog. Any tags you added to your post would be picked up by services like Flickr too.

With Autopost to Twitter enabled, it’s easy to use Posterous as an alternative to Twitpic. Many desktop Twitter clients, including Tweetie and Seesmic Desktop, support posting images via Posterous with the added benefit of them going wherever else you’re set up to autopost to.

Of course, sometimes you might only want to post something to one service instead of many. An video might be worth tweeting about but you might not want it on your Youtube account. To handle this, the Bookmarklet has the option to exclude services, while you can specify services you wish to post to via email using different email addresses.

To only post to Twitter, you’d use twitter@posterous.com, for example. To send to a number, but not all, of your services you can use the format twitter+youtube+vimeo@posterous.com to just send to those services. If you have a number of similar accounts, but only want to post to one, that’s covered too. If you have three different blogs but only want to post a picture of a swan to the one called ‘Birdwatching’, you could do that by emailing #birdwatching@posterous.com

To send the picture to only the Birdwatching blog and your Flickr account, you’d use flickr+#birdwatching@posterous.com

Use it to work as a group in private

By setting your Posterous blog as Private and allowing colleagues to post to it, you can use it as a private working environment. Co-workers can use it to email in ideas, images, audio and video for their colleagues to access anywhere and work with. With email subscriptions available, each post can be received by every member of the group without them ever having to log in.

Use it as a podcasting platform

Podcasts can often be difficult to set up. Finding the right host for your audio and uploading each podcast can take a lot of valuable time. With Posterous it’s possible to subscribe to any users’ RSS feed within Apple iTunes. Any audio files you post are then made available as downloadable podcasts.

It can’t get much easier than recording your podcast and sending it as an email attachment. It’s almost certainly the easiest way there is to dip your toe in the world of publishing audio online. The URL you need to subscribe to in iTunes is itpc://YOURUSERNAME.posterous.com/rss

Use it as a ‘Web Scrapbook’

The Bookmarklet makes it really easy to keep a record of things you like from around the web in one place. For example, graphic designers could keep examples of others’ work on their blog (either publicly or privately) as inspiration for the future. Researchers could keep useful articles all in one place. The ability to crosspost these clippings to your Delicious bookmarks adds even more value to this idea.

Keep track of who’s visiting your Posterous blog

Google Analytics is fully supported by Posterous. Just set up a Google Analytics account then head to your account’s set up page to get started.

Conclusion

Posterous is a flexible tool that is developing fast. Customisations via themes and premium features for those willing to pay are among the improvements planned for the future.

F-15 landing with one wing

2009-08-12T20:53:00.001+05:30

from www.youtube.com
Ref : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_EXtBEaBbs

Florida man blames cat for downloading child pornography

2009-08-11T21:12:00.001+05:30

from www.guardian.co.uk
Ref : http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/deadlineusa/2009/aug/07/cat-download-child-pornography

Don't let your eyes deceive you. This sweet-looking fellow could be capable of downloading pornography. Stew Milne/AP

Dogs have been blamed for eating homework - now a Florida man says his cat downloaded child pornography.

Police are charging Keith Griffin of Jensen Beach, Florida with 10 counts of possession of child pornography after finding more than 1,000 images on his personal computer.

Griffin told police he had been downloading music, and that his cat jumped on the keyboard when he left the room. He said "strange things" appeared on the computer when he returned.

He is being held in Martin county jail on $250,000 bond. No word on any charges against the cat.

• This article was amended on Monday 10 August 2009. The headline was changed.