BarCamp Bangalore

Sorry for the break in the Discussion about the buying habit of Big 5 of Internet world . there was a lot of action in personal life (change of job to be more precise ) so can't blog much  .

 

Now the latest news is that After success of BarCamp Delhi this time India's silicon valley Bangalore is going to host BarCamp . its scheduled for  Saturday, April 22, 2006  (9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.)

 

you can check the details at the wiki URL for the wiki is

http://barcamp.org/BarCampBangalore
 

 

response was too great we run out of space . due to constraints we got to close the registrations  after 100 participant and 30 sessions .

 

will keep you guys posted about it .

 

What Does Big Boys Wants to Buy? Part –1

 

Every aspiring entrepreneur wants to come up with the next killer application. But the question is what is a killer app actually? How do you validate that your application is a killer app? A common rule of thumb is if any of the Big Guys (Read Google, Yahoo, MSN, Amazon, Ebay etc) wants to buy you than your application can be a killer application?

Success for a startup approximately equals getting bought. You need some kind of exit strategy, because you can't get the smartest people to work for you without giving them options likely to be worth something. Which means you either have to get bought or go public, and the number of startups that go public is very small.

If success probably means getting bought, should you make that a conscious goal? The old answer was no: you were supposed to pretend that you wanted to create a giant, public company, and act surprised when someone made you an offer. Really, you want to buy us? Well, I suppose we'd consider it, for the right price.

Paul Graham In "Ideas For Start Up"

With this thought in my mind I begin to explore what the big guys of Web 2.0 would like to buy? This proves to be a Holy Grail. Especially when we have the example of EBAY buying Skype with out any possible synergy between their lines of business.

So I thought lets compile the data and do some crunching to predict who may wants to buy what. J . I begin by analyzing what ultra cool Google might be interested in buying? What's there in Google shopping list? I will analyze the buying pattern of all the three big boys in subsequent posting.

Lets start with Google 

I found a complete list of acquisitions made by Google at wikipedia . Even in Pre IPO phase Google was always scouting for good start up. But post IPO its acquisitions are more widely know and good news is currently Google is on a Shopping Spree .at first glance they all look like madness and without any master plan. But on a deep analysis you can find some strange pattern.

Surprisingly most of the acquisitions made by Google are in the category of "Shadow Applications " very few of them are in the front end? Only a very Few of the companies were bought in order to enter the new business (Read: Picassa, Pyra Labs, KeyHole Outride etc).

Most of them were just applications which can strengthen the existing product offering which are not in leadership position in their respective markets.  Something likes a steroid for a dull application in Google Basket.  Like Deja which was bought to re launch Google Groups. "Applied Semantics " which was bought to develop contextual advertising like Ad Sense and Ad Word. They paid 102 Millions for net semantics. Later on they acquired sprinx to enhance these contextual Ad services.

Zip Dash was bought to provide a revenue stream on the top of Google Maps.

Reqwireless was acquired to avail Gmail on wireless devices .

dMarc Broadcasting was acquired to extend advertising onto audio channels.

Writely was acquired to provide online web based word processor

Baidu was acquired to get a geographical reach in a niche market.

Cut a deal with AOL to get a lot of user base, which stick to Default.

 

There are many more. But I guess this list is enough for the purpose of discussion

So? Does that Looks like a totally random selection with out any coherent logic? It looked like this to me initially. I thought money has got in to the head of folks at Google. Predicting what Google will buy is not easy.  Can I do it? 

Honestly I can't but I can find some common characteristics, which are present in all these firms and try to extrapolate from the data. We can only point in the general direction of the next buy of Google.

With all these data I set down to do crunching and finding a pattern, super imposing one model after another.  (Actually I had dinner with one Investment Banker last night so I am still under the hangover J).

Sadly I still can't shout Eureka! So I share my finding with you and trust "wisdom Of Crowd " to help me.  So you go thru the details I have given here and come up with your own predictions.

I will post my analysis some time soon during the day or tomorrow.  Now it's Time to Go Back to work J.

stay tuned

 

Saad's Photo Stream

During bar camp i had a chat with Saad . i don't know much about him other than the fact that he is a NID Grduate and a ace Photographer . he can do wonders with camera . check out his Flickr photo stream here  
if some body is intrested in my flickr photstream he can find it here

 

How was Holi For you Guys ?? Last few days have been exceptionally hectic a lot of good and sad things happened but now its past . will resume regular posting soon .

 
Prashant

 

Problems With Advertisement As A Revenue Model

Sometime back (Last Saturday to be more specific) I gave a talk at BarCamp Delhi about “Web 2.0 & Power of Default “. I discussed how customer accepts what is offered to them and live with sub optimal solutions. I explained how this tendency of default is spilling over to Internet applications also.

Audience response was good (Well, They were listening ). Some folks asked questions pertaining to the default factor & its implications. But strangely most of the Questions come out from the slide where I mentioned, “Web 2.0 Requires a Revenue stream other than Advertisement “.

Well honestly I haven’t prepared much about that point . Much of the answers I gave were more of the gut reactions & reflexes that were not backed by “coherent “ logic.

So here I will attempt to bring some coherence in my arguments about why I am not comfortable with the idea of having Advertisement as the [only] source of revenue.

What Are Advertisements? : A Tool to Grab Your Attention

Ever heard of the term “Attention Economy”? No? Ask any veteran of Advertisement world. This is a pillar of Advertisement (Now onward “Advr.”) world.

Attention Economy is the whole cartel of Advr. Folks trying to get your eyeball, you’re mindsapce, your attention and getting paid for it. They put up an Advr. , You look at it; if it is good you talk about it to your friends and somewhere down the line this convert/translate in to you or your friends purchasing the stuff. It’s a chain reaction for which you are the starting point .So it all depends how good was the Advr in getting your attention.

In narrow sense of word the parameter for measuring the efficiency /Quality/Effective ness of an Advr is, it’s ability of distracting us from what we are currently doing and make us pay attention to the product it is pitching.

This makes Advr. Unsuitable for some type of applications. It’s ok to look at an Advr while you are relaxed, or not doing something, which require a focus attention of yours. In short if your intended application or website offer a service which can be accessed in a “Sit–Back & Relaxed “ mode (say photo sharing, social networking, chatting and even Blogging J) than perhaps having a few Advr link on the side bar is not a bad idea.

But the moment you want to do something that require you to “Sit-Up & Stay Focused “ than most of the folks don’t like the idea of having an intrusion of Advr. That partly explains the reason why out of so many companies in Web2.0 space ,only 37signals.com is not having a Adv supported business model .Because the nature of application require them to do so. and 37signals is having a substantial user base that actually pay for the service.

There is one more and very interesting aspect of this story,

During the debate at BarCamp someone from the audience said

“ I won’t mind having a few Ad-Sense hyperlink in the side bar if that can enable the service provider to give me the service for free. Its perfectly fine with me.”

What that gentleman was trying to say was that he would put up with the annoyance of having Ad Sense link, as long as application is free. He will simply ignore them. He will not click on them .its fine with him

Yes Sir! It is absolutely fine with you. And you are not alone, World is full of people like you. But if I am a small time service provider, it is not fine with me. If you come to my site and don’t contribute to revenue even after a long time of steady usage of my service than I will be in trouble.

If you look at the ratio of “Page View “ and “Advr Click” for Big Portals, you will see the truth. God save you if you are a small time operator for a niche segments.

Problem is compounded with the rise of “contextual, Text based, Advr service” like Google’s Ad -Sense, which pay you only for clicks. Now than you can’t even get the benefits of “Eye Ball Time” of those “Banner-Ads” On Which a user might never click but which can generate /convert in to a sale in offline world.

Say an Advr of Pepsi or “All Clear Clinic” .

So if you want to make a “Sit Up “ type of application what are we left with?

a) Simply make some thing people will pay for. J
b) Keep a basic version for free but not “Advr Free” so that user can try it
c) Give a lot of feature in Paid & “Advr Free” Version.
d) Let both Free & Paid Community interact with each other.
e) Keep your subscription fee very low.
f) You can even think of starting a sort of referral scheme which award you a certain point on every joining and after amassing a certain numbers of point you are automatically upgraded to a Free “Paid Version”.

OR Else

You can keep giving every thing for free and hope that one Fine Day Google, Yahoo, EBAY & MSN will try to out bid each other to acquire you. Good Luck.


Problem With Portals:

You can argue that Companies (Read : Portals ) are making Money this way. Isn’t it? Doesn’t it validate the model?

Yes it does. But only partially, only for some players, some very big player .Big players are hard to replicate. There can only be so many Yahoo and MSN. While making plans for your businessbig portal are not good data points.

“Investors looked at Yahoo's earnings and said to themselves, here is proof that Internet companies can make money. So they invested in new startups that promised to be the next Yahoo. And as soon as these startups got the money, what did they do with it? Buy Millions of dollars worth of Advertisings on Yahoo to promote their brand. Result: a capital investment in a startup this quarter shows up as Yahoo earnings next quarter-- stimulating another round of investments in startups.”

Paul Graham in “What Bubble Got Right?”



Now be honest to your self and calculate how much chance does your company have to be next yahoo before you burn all your cash? If you think it has a fair amount of chance to do so, than you might as well take yahoo as a data point.

Problem with portal model is that aiming to be a horizontal portal like Yahoo, MSN is like competing with Boeing & Airbus in bidding for a 100 Year Lease of all aircraft of Lufthansa. There is very little room.

There is a time for every type of technology & every type of venture. If you are there at that time you can click. Not after it, Nor before it. Portal was the model of Web 1.0 world now have a good number of portal.

Similarly Blogging might be the hottest Application today, but it is not a brainchild of Payra Labs alone. Long before Web 2.0 and all this hype, a company called PointCast came up with the idea. It was way ahead of its time.

So think about it what type of application you have? Can you replicate the Portal phenomena? & Can you make Portals of World Buy you? And can you do all of these before you run out of cash. And deiced.

Endnotes:

I have not suggested any solution to the revenue problem here. I have tried to provide a framework for discussion. I am looking for an answer myself because as an aspiring entrepreneur this is the first question VCs will ask me.

This makes me wonder why this Advr mindset is still prevailing and why people still see it as the only source of revenue on net. After all 1999 is not that far in memory lane?

I think part of the reason lies in the history of Advr & Internet it self.

From the inception of the concept of Advr. It has been very hard to measure “Return On Investment “(ROI) from the capital expense on Advr. (I.e.: Can you tell how many people drink Pepsi because they saw an Advr of Pepsi in Playboy or Times or WSJ?) .

Internet is the only medium where this problem is solved to a certain extent. This is what Advr World has learned from Internet.

What has Internet learned from Advr World?

Well if you can get enough folks to Advertise on your publication you can sell your newspaper on a cost that is absurdly lower than the expense & still you can make a lot of money.

But ironically while most of the newspaper charge you some thing? Geeks have taken this to next level and they are giving their newspaper for free.

Looking forward to you comments!!

The Itch, The Denial & The Muse

What are our desires? What on earth does they stand for? Why some of them snowball in to passion or obsession and other dies very next day? Is there logic behind this seemingly random process?

Sometime back I wrote a Blog post about loosing the desires of child hood as we grow up? In that post I provided a cursory view of the problem. Why we hold back our self from doing what we want to do .Be it Starting a Venture or Going to North Pole or Asking the girl out for coffee? Why some time we can do it and sometime we can't?

Ever since that posting I was thinking about it .I used to think that the solution lies inside us. It's a fight within me. It's all about overcoming my fears, insecurities and uncertainties and there is no external dependency. Starting a Venture require a mental require to cross a mental gap which is up to me to do. Outside factors can't help much, at least not in any Positive manner. I need to be a lone warrior in this quest.

I was wrong. I realize it while I was sitting at BarCamp Delhi.

There are external factor. Three of them. Survival and snowballing of any desire depend on these three factors. Can we control them? Yes. I think so. You have done it in past albeit unknowingly.

These three triangulating forces are

a) The Itch b) The Denial c) The Muse

The Itch:

Itch is the desire /wish/ dream it self. Every desire start as an itch. Small but not ignorable. It holds our attention and occupies our mind. We have to do something about it. It offers us an opportunity to do something, something original, something new. It is more like mythical siren's lure.

We go through this daily .we find many temptations inviting us to explore & trying to start that itch. We notice a new café on our way to work and feel like checking out the stuff there. We see "Rang De Basanti " and time feel like fighting out the whole god damn system (although its momentarily) .We read that in Dec 2005 alone 40 Million mobile phones were sold in India and we think can I make some thing that these user will pay for? .We stop at HP Gas Filling station and wonder whether sania is looking at me? J

Some of our Itches are just long standing needs vying for attention. A sort of incremental desire. In tune with the current rhythm of life. You always wanted to check that café but can't squeeze enough time for it. But some time our itch constitute of something, which doesn't fit in out rational scheme of things. We are afraid to explore them. A sort of disruptive desire out of harmony with your current life. This type of itch is hard to kill and we feed them.

How to know which type of desire you are having right now? Well that's very simple just think what is stopping you to explore that option? Is it constraint of time, money, geography or energy level?

Or you are afraid of the idea, does this idea contradict your past, your surroundings, if implemented successfully will you be looked upon as most unlikely person to pull it? You don't doubt the potential of idea but doubt your own capability to do justice to it. Are you afraid of being laughed at if you fail in the pursuit? Can you sleep now?

If it is any of this case than there is a fair chances that this is an idea, which is a disruptive idea. Legend is when Sabeer Bhatia and jack smith came up with the idea of Hotmail. Than both of them were not able to sleep that night. They were afraid. In retrospect it looks funny. Why would they be afraid?

Because the moment you come across something big ,you are pulled in to two opposite directions by the forces of Denial and Muse. It's like a black magic and for sometime nothing makes sense. Still you can't escape because these forces are playing inside you.

The Denial:

"In a way, it's harder to see problems than their solutions.Most people prefer to remain in denial about problems.It's obvious why: problems are irritating. They're problems!Imagine if people in 1700 saw their lives the way we'd see them.It would have been unbearable. This denial is such a powerful force that,Even when presented with possible solutions, people often prefer to believe they wouldn't work."

Paul Graham In "Ideas For Startup"

" If anything can go wrong, it will definitely go wrong " :Murphy's Law

The moment you come up with a world changing, paradigm shifting, curve jumping, and rain making idea. The force of denial begins to show you every reason why this will not work. It seeds you with worry, apprehensions and doubts. You worry about loosing peer acceptance, you worry about home loan EMI, you worry about kids & if you are an American you worry about Health insurance also

We are conditioned that way. I admit you need to do some amount of forward thinking but too much of it kills any zeal you have for moving ahead. What denial actually do is, it make us incapable of trusting our guts. You look ahead when what you need to do is to squint in future. You can't see or predict future by looking ahead. Horizon is the limit. You need to squint and denial makes you incapable to do that. It hibernate your brain with cold logic.

Itch is about warm imagination. Denial is about cold logic.

The Muse

I can call for souls from the heaven & ghost from hell, So can you.

That is not important, what is important is, Will they come?

William Shakespeare In Hamlet

Everybody has their own private Mount Everest they were put on this earth to climb. You may never reach the summit; for that you will be forgiven. But if you don't make at least one serious attempt to get above the snow line, years later you will find yourself lying on your deathbed, and all you will feel is emptiness.

Hugh Mac load in "How To Be More Creative"

Third factor that do the trick is the force of Muse. The out of the world inspiration. Some sort of goal, some conquest beyond the stated purpose of the endeavor. It could be anything proving your self, making money, revenge, world domination, nirvana, moksha, to be one with the universe or any such thing.

Painter draw portraits of long lost girlfriends, composer create symphony for lost love. Emperor erects Taj Mahal. They were not just painting, composing or building a monument. They were serving a higher purpose.

Near to home NRN created infy not for just creating software and make profit . perhaps his muse was to show that you can create a world class ,profit making commercial enterprise in India by ethos of wealth sharing and respect for individual . he has given a human touch to capitalism "

E Sreedharan did Metro to prove that A Govt Project can be done with highest quality and execution standards . it is not just a mean of transport . it stand for the hidden potential of all those great potential of great minds locked in the govt. machinery . its a muse for them .

I have seen that for much of the time people take seemingly irrational maneuvers because there is muse factor. They are inspired. The whole cartel of seminar and networking meeting industry is catering to those folks who seek company of like-minded, enterprising folks.

It is a type of positive self-feedback. Remember we used to put up all those posters and banner in our rooms during college. We were looking for muse. Strange we don't do it now.

So if you want to wrestle and overthrow the forces of denial then feed the forces of muse. A muse inspires every great idea. None of the great idea, invention, and accomplishment was approved by the peer group. Create your own muse.

Read, meet, discuss, analyze, deduct, conclude and make a jump .

May the force be with you.

Notes From The BarCamp

i had a Great Day @ BarCampDelhi . I attended  some great presentation and brainstorming  session on everything which is web 2.0 . there was talks about     " Ruby On Rails" ,Ajax ,Structured Blogging, Adword , Bootstrapping a Software start up , Testing  web application  ,Mobile Web Application , Knowledge Management .  i did a session on "Web 2.0 & Power Of Default "  looking at the Queries i received i can safely say that  the  presentation went ok . 

 

Right now i am sitting in perhaps the 13 th  or 15 presentation of the day and surprisingly  i am not tired .  Truly speaking i am just listeinign to the talks which is being delivered by the  speakers here . i think it will take me another week or two to properly digest the learning i had today .

 

 

As i sit here i realize that there are enough people here who wants to share . they want to share the knowledge ,experience,stories and compare notes . the free flowing format of the  conference is a great enabler . atmosphere is conducive to idea . More than anything  this BarCamp Today has cemented my desire to launch my venture someday .   i found a lot of aspiring , established and "one time " entrepreneurs and Some VCs and some Technical reporters  for old media :-)

 

People always tell me that entrepreneurship is a lonely journey . you are on your own till you be some body and than there is always  lonely at the TOP
Events like BarCamp allows a Peer Meeting  of Entrepreneurs . look forward to next BarCamp

 

 

will post the snaps and other details  of BarCamp  soon !!

 

 till then take care

 

Long Live Entrepreneurship

 

--
Prashant

 

Blogging Live From BarCamp Delhi

right now i am sitting @ Adobe  Systems ,Noida attending the first ever barcamp in asia . start is good so far . it is the kind of  get to gather  i was looking for .

right now Mannik is giving a presentation on "Ruby On Rails " . there will be a lot of session on various  hot web technologies . seems like it will be a great day for learning .

will keep you guys posted

--
Prashant Singh

www.knowprashant.blogspot.com
 

BarCamp in Delhi .

Good News!!!  BarCamp is coming to Asia and Delhi is going to host it . it will be on March 4 ,2006 at   Adobe  Dev Centre in  Noida  .

 

you can get more details at

 

http://barcamp.org/BarCampDelhi

 

 

I am All Excited about attending  BarCamp ,Delhi  . its a different kind of technology  conference .where a lot of budding, established and aspiring entrepreneur , geeks and evangelist meet to discuss their  views on technology trends and other stuff .

hope to see you guys there.

 

 

Nice Pics

i was browsing through Digg and i stumbeled on a fabulous article about being creative by hugh Macload . this was one of the best peace of writing i had seen after ayn rand . guy writes from heart . soon i was on his web site. it was cool . He draw cartoons on the back of Business Card .

his drawings are reall good stuff probabaly better than Dilbert . here is some of the pics .
(c) Acknowledged .

have a Great week end !!!

Internet & "Fall Of WaterFall "

CAVEAT : I have never developed a single workable software on my own .

(Last program I had written was of "Doubly  Connected  Circular Link list"  I think it was compiled properly but it showed some run time error .so I  copied the code from my friend's program and changed the message in Printf  )  .

I have practically little Zero experience to comment on the things which I am going to write about .  views expressed here are based on my observation as a ring side view of software development at my day  job as a salesman in a software firm  and whatever little I read on Internet . there is good chance that it might be just plain big talks .

Good that you are still reading .. thanks .

FALL OF WATERFALL

 

When I was in college Mr. Pressman told us that best way to develop a software to develop in a waterfall methodology .

Req. Analysis ->  Specification Freeze  -->Design --> Development/Coding & Integration-> Testingà User Handover /Installation . (documentation is common in all these phases) .

Through out the short life of software industry ,from mainframe era to desktop era, waterfall methodology  of software  development was de-facto standard .Names have changed  but essence was same . developer /analyst and evangelist followed this as fundamental  postulate ,lemma #1  of good development practice. The whole cartel of CMM, ISO and other QA standards evolved around it .

In Waterfall  school of thought the main stress is on maintaining a proper development hygiene & Following the strict process . but lately with the arrival of Internet and the rise of web based application development ,waterfall   methodology has failed miserably and some folks claim that this is not the best way to develop web based application . Internet is a new medium and it require a new set of principal .  does it ? or it is just a hype ? lets see

 

PUSH(S)  IN THE FALL :

a)       Rapid Prototyping : ->  Waterfall way of software development  is based on the assumption that you can study the requirement deeply first and than freeze the specs. from there on you only have to implement . But this, I believe is a fundamentally wrong way to approach the problem of software design . To study the requirement it is not enough to,  "study " it  on a one time basis  and try to design a solution . you will surely miss something .  To come up with a good design you need to live the problem  for some time .

You can argue that there are domain expert who have "Lived" the problem for  long time . but the problem is that  in "waterfall " the interaction with these domain expert is very structured through manuals and other documentation.The very process block the flow of  ideas and counter productive in the pursuit of understanding the domain .

So lets admit that in a typical IT project the knowledge transfer  from domain expert to designer is crappy, formal and very basic , it can't bring AHA moment to end user .  problem is more severe  because once the specs is finalized they can't be changed till the next version . so you can't make (basic )correction  en-route . much of this constraint is due to the fact that software is distributed across a wide user base and upgrading them every six month is not feasible .

But in web based application this problem is not there . so they can afford to what is called "Rapid Prototyping " . loop of "Feed back -> Correction-> Feed back " make us easier to reach the ideal prototype soon . Real power of Internet here is that it work as an instant distribution channel . so a true collaboration is possible only on a web based application . this is one of the reason "Water fall "  is out of fashion  when it comes to web based application development . it is not aligned along the grains  of  Internet . it doesn't exploit Internet's capability as a collaboration and distribution  platform .

 

b)       Failure Mode Analysis : Waterfall preaches that success is about following the best practice only. But experience tell us that as much as it is about following best practices, it is by equal means depends on  avoiding  individual case of failure also . every text book of computer programming preaches that we should first design flow chart and do a dry run on notebook and than punch in the code . honestly how many time you have done it . we write a program first  than optimize it to avoid individual case of tripping. I call it Failure Mode Analysis (FMA)  and this is most efficient(not correct or ideal )  way of developing the software  .  a development based on this method is only possible for a web base application  .

When it comes to FMA ,Waterfall expects a lot out of Testing  team but I have noticed  the testing function with in the constraints of design . you can't rectify  a design level mistake through a post implementation testing .So we mostly glorify design level goof up as implementation constraint .

 
c)       Development Democracy :  Waterfall treat software development a very sacred,ritualistic endeavor where End User is passively involve . Most of the times expectations are not clearly defined and understanding about requirement is hazy . most of the time working hypothesis is "If End user accept  the final application ,good if he doesn't accept "Very Good " he should wait and pay for new version" .Web based applications are "For The User ,By The User & Of  The User " . they bring in the sense of shared owner ship and community between developer and end user . which works wonders in faster adaptation of software .

       

           Conclusion :   based on the arguments I have presented above  I conclude that water fall way of developing software is not suitable   for web application development .For any software to be a good software it should revolve around user . I will end with a little of f –the –track story  .

Have you ever read   "War & Peace "  (A Great Software )? It was written by Leo Tolstoy who was soldier  in Russian army and seen the WAR for twenty years on first hand basis.  he knew the price people pay for WAR . then  he lived in peace for another 20 years to see the price people pay for peace and than he set down to write a book ( living the problem) . it took  him some years to write the book and he always incorporated his day to day observation in plot . his Epilogue shows that book's plot was not frozen it was up-to- date and relevant (Rapid Prototyping ) . At that time only a handful of peasants &  common man in Russia can read and still the book is not only about army , politics or govt its about people ( Democracy ) . perhaps that's the reason  we still  read "War & Peace " & forget other regular  book after one month of reading it .  It seems Mr. Tolstoy understood it long before our software guys

P.S  Thanks for reading  . I welcome & Value  you comments

Mother of All Demos

We all take few things for granted . like Air,water ,sun and Computer mouse . but mouse was not their and we (most of us )
never  care to explore the origin of mouse and innovator who developed the first prototype of mouse ."First Mouse " how was it  ?

 

 

now you can see that here

 

http://sloan.stanford.edu/mousesite/1968Demo.html 

 

a great description of first demo of mouse based  human computer interaction paradigm  .

 

P.S. : I haven't received much(ZERO)  submission to the Quiz i have posted . what happened you guys too busy .
 
 

Two Stories & a Little Quiz

Recently  i had a very interesting discussion with a friend of mine who is a Software Engg -turned -investment banker with Goldman . we were discussing  how difficult it is to see a business proposition in a technical breakthrough .To illustrate his point  he told me a story rather two stories  and ask me two Questions . it was fun and surprisingly i answered both of them correctly .
you guys wanna try it . here it is


Ever considered your self as a VC who face  new business idea .you think you can identify next hot application .  then lets test it here are three cases of a techie pitching you his plan to bring next Big thing  on Internet .

Which one you will bet your money on ??

Case #1

" Let's assume there is a graph with more than million nodes in it . all the nodes contains some value in them . value can be duplicate  also . i will write an application to traverse that graph to find out nodes whose value match or satisfy the given criteria and display it . if there are more than one entry  or node who matches the given criteria  i will arrange (sort ) them in the decreasing order of their In degree . i think this programme if it can be written in a fault tolerant ,secure ,scalable and web enabled manner  it will fetch me millions "

Case # 2

" i want to put a java database on Internet where anybody can create an account and gain a limited view base access to read,write retrieve his her information . user can export the view or records in a form where people having an account on other such databases will be able to import it and  read it . it will give a great tool to share information . and i think this programme if it can be written in a fault tolerant ,secure ,scalable and web enabled manner  it will fetch me millions "


so answer me . have you heard of any company who work on this plan .  you can leave your  comments /answer here as comments  .  i prefer them  here  instead of you sending me as email.

looking forward to  your reply

prashant 

Let’s Go Honeymoon…..!!.

Marriage Is A Public Admission of a Private Desire :_G.B.Shaw

Aamir Khan finally got married to Kiran Rao and they went to Panchgani for honey moon.

Britney Spears got married to some Drummer (Lucky Bastard ) and went to some virgin island for  honeymoon .

One of My Friend who is going to get married in Feb 2006 has planned elaborately about his honeymoon  .down to the timetable  of activity which they will do each day .He showed  me his time table for honeymoon(surprisingly ! According to  their time table they have nothing interesting to do during Nights . They plan to sleep ( Go To Bed )at 10:00 PM  . I don't trust him on that )

 

Why people make such a big deal about their honeymoon ? Some time I feel that couples are actually looking forward to honeymoon and Marriage is just the passport for it . I have never seen People planning or participating in the preparation/Affair  of their marriage . I have never seen people planning their life or changing their habits to accommodate the new comer .

I know of an incident where one of my acquaintance doesn't had a separate wardrobe for his fiance  till the day she became his wife and came home to him . they were engaged to each other for six month and the rascal had made Train & Hotel reservations  03 months in advance (for honeymoon Of course ) .

As more and more people around me  are getting married  I am observing this tendency more and more . Why ? is  it just a random  observation or there is a law governing it .

As always Lets See ……..

I see my female friends (Not Girl Friends)  being so upbeat about their marriage . they prepare a little Too hard  for it . In the pursuit of  impressing their would be Hubby / In Laws they do all kind of  stupid things. Right from Knitting Sweater to Making hand made cards . From sending an hanky with " P "stitched on it with  silk To reading Economic Times just because the "would be" do it ( I doubt if both of them  understand one bit of it ) .

God Save those girls . I have nothing to offer them .

 While people are so enthusiastic toward there partner before and during honeymoon than why does  an alarming number of marriages are on "Rocks" & a lot of  folks are disillusioned by the whole system of marriage . To most of them its not Good or Bad . Its just that its Boring .

I think some of it is due to the way we handle the honeymoon period . We are excited about our partners because we have something new to discover their . something unexpected ,something refreshing  & something different from us and our surroundings .

I believe each of us has got something in them which is unexpected ,refreshing, different . Problem is that we have only so much of  it . one can learn only few interesting things .Specially when he is in a 9 –To-5 job .  Tell me when was the last time you learned a new skill which is not related to your carrier ? probably in college .

Now let's say you know 10 such things which can make you look like  hero/romantic /adorable puppy  /cute -idiot .Problem is that people  are a bit too eager to show all of them in the first 15 days of married life and they  want to spend rest of their life remembering those 15 days .That's what make it boring .

Have you ever noticed people remember the trip to Disneyland but don't remember each ride specifically but same people remember explicitly the  Gondola ride of Venice (In Italy) in details .why ? Because in Disneyland there is too much of it and in too little time .whether in gondola you go easy, at a more "life like" pace .

Honeymoon is also like a trip to Disneyland .

People tends to believe that a long honeymoon is must for overall stability of relationship and understanding of your partner . but I seriously feel the overall value add of honeymoon  in terms of marriage is almost zero or in some cases  negative .

Ask somebody who is married for 5+ years that when was the last time  you did some thing romantic for your wife ( excluding sex)  like singing a song ,writing a letter or even went to see her unannounced  at her office  and they will tell you " I made bed tea this morning " (Grrhhhhhhhh How Romantic!!)

Someone said that best way to keep your marriage fresh is to be a different person on each weekend . that is a bit too tough but we can be a different person on  every anniversary .So folks Take it easy while you are on honeymoon . you will need all that energy and enthusiasm for rest of your life .

PS: I haven't touched on an important aspect of honeymoon here as I know my Blog is being watched by some females also. But I guess I have very little to offer in that aspect .

Bug Me Not

How many times you have to create a user account in a site just to read a article or download a report . i have done it about 100-200 times and i have a separate email account for this thing i leave this id to avoid getting all those spam and upgrade offers

but now i came across

 

www.bugmenot.com

 

try it guyz it will give you bogus/farzii but working loging ids of most of the sites . now i can check my astro forecast without bothering to create an account at indiatimes

Yipee !!

prashant
 

01 Jan 2006 : A Photo Essay

Come on ! Quick on this one . What you were doing on Jan 01,2006 ? or for that matter what you were doing on Jan 01,2005 .

As far as i can remember almost every time in past 9 -10 years i started my new year with a Hang over from new year eve parties .So this time i decided to try something else .

This year i was out of Delhi . i was with my parents in "Bari Sadari" a small village near UDAIPUR where my dad is currently posted .There was no party on 31st of Dec and I slept early at around 11 '0'clock in night .

Surprisingly i woke up early at around 6'o' clock in morning (trust me guys ). Day start with a very very good omen i recieved an SMS from a dear friend of mine after a long time . Then I went for hiking with my brother . Then we went to ChittorGarh for seeing the famous fort of chittrorgarh .It was a great day . all of us had a good time .

My brother Vikrant had just bought a brand new Sony Cyber shot 3 Mega Pixel Digital camera so we use it fully to capture the moments . The professional photographer in me was awaken and i took some Real <--You judge yourself--> photographs .

So here is the photos we capture on that day a Photo Essay on Jan 01 2006. with running commentary from Prashant singh

This is me while going for hike in the morning . do you remember anything by looking at this snap . i was trying to pull a pose like the one Bill Gates had on the cove of his book "The Road Ahead "

My brother Vikrant on the way to an old Temple in a Cave up the Hill . T was trying to act like a Pro in Photgraphy . How good am i ?

Vikrant @ Cave Temple

Buddha in Denim

" Come Fall in Love"

Inside Chottorgarh Fort

this was how i spent my day . it was fun .long overdew fun . let me know if you like the snaps .

Cheers !!!

Software Horror Stories

Bug , Feature Crap ,System Failure, OS Crash , Programming Error . these words may invoke emotion of annoyance,frustration,humor or anger but Have you ever heard of a horror story  related to software.
somebody has complied all the great software blunders which cost human life .

find them at the following link


http://www.cs.tau.ac.il/~nachumd/verify/horror.html

Now I hope programmer of world will code with proper attention .

Welcome 2006

Welcome 2006

This picture of mine is taken on first of Jan 2006 by my brother Vikrant . i had a great day . i hiked, did camel riding and went to see fort of Chittorgarh Great day folks . i will share the complete album soon . meanwhile I wish all of you a

Very Very Happy New Year

Looking Back At 2005

First of All I would like to thank all of you for your response to my previous post . it was really encouraging to see that my blog is being checked regularly by so many people . I recvd at least 20 emails from friends and friend's friends who checked the last posting and liked it . Thanks a Ton ! Keep Coming back .

Now  as  the year end is approaching I think its time for some serious bookkeeping . During this time of year  Most celebrity blogger posts their  prediction for the upcoming year . I will save that for my next post for  now let me recollect what all happened in 2005

To begin with 2005 was an eventful year for me . both on professional as well as personal fronts . so I decide to list them here . some of the news are global & you might have read them in news paper and some are very personal and nobody know about them . all are equally important for me .So here we go ..

• 2005 started with me loosing a chance to sell SkillPoint at Texas Instrument's Bangalore operations . It was a real set back as that deal could have given  us a solid reference base in bangalore corporate market .But I think I pretty well make up for that . now we have Big companies like  Idea Cellular ,Xansa  and couple of other US Based Staffing firms as our  client .

• After much of delay I launched my blog . only to discover that world is too busy to read my crap . but slowly and steadily people begin to visit it regularly . having the blog URL in my Gmail signature helped .

• Much awaited Google IPO and a spur of activity in Internet market . Euphoria like Dotcom Days .

• Nishant was blessed with a baby girl and I am still not able to visit him and see the baby . Sorry Nishant !

• Some people from my College Gang  decided to take the "Red Pill" (they joined Microsoft ) and moved out from Delhi. So I am left with very few folks of mine in Delhi . This year it was  little more lonelier here.

• This year I took my first Flight .It was SpiceJet Flight from Delhi to Pune . Being in Air did excited me but over all experience of Air Travel was very disappointing .I prefer traveling by Indian Railway :AC Second Class  . It has more leg room .

• I lost my Grandfather this year . my first encounter with the death of a family member  . living it once was bad enough so I will not even mention it here in details  .

• We got our first client in Hyderabad , Chennai ,Pune and USA .I meet with K P Pandyarajan of MaFoi . A really dynamic person .

 

• My brother Vikrant Became a Sr.Software Engg at Quark and visited USA . as per his word "America Bahut Achee Jagah Hai , Wahan Log aate Jaate aapko Greet Karte hain" (USA is a cool place . people (read Girls )  greet you Good morning even if you don't know them) .

• Discovered Paul Graham  and his writing on net  . the guy is a genius .

• One of my college time buddy who used to look like a good partner in my crusade of living as a  confirmed bachelor  was floored . He is happily engaged and a bit too busy to call .

 

• Visited SHIMLA  a  really very very beautiful place .

 

• Somebody in  Microsoft  did a great job of  integrating linux with windows  so much so that his "Mahual" conquered  Himalya and River rafted in Ganga . Congratus !

 

• Great ideas like meebo.com, riya.com,del.ico.us  came and Ajax suddenly became  hot technology on net

 

• Mating season started  EBAY  bought Skype (no body knows why  ?)  , Yahoo baught del.ico.us ,Google bids for riya  .

 

• Somebody very close to me reminded that being in a better College/Job/Company require to shed excess baggage of past . that special person taught me that I am still very very disposable . Thanks ,Lesson learned .

• Rohan ,Vivek  got Engaged .

• I learned how to cook chapatti it was easier than I expected.

I Can't remember  anything else of much significance .wait for my Predictions for Year 2006 .

Wishing all of you  a very Happy New Year

From (Astronaut, Scientist ,Entrepreneur, Lover )

To

( Driver,Manager,Husband )

Lost In Transition

When I was a Kid ,my dad used to live in Middle East due to job . every time before coming back to India, daddy used to ask us (by postal mail ) about what he should bring for us . almost invariably I used to ask for Rocket or Airplane . Every body in my neighborhood knew I wanted to become an astronaut. I really believed that someday I will step on moon. I will be first Indian to step on moon . ( I still have the chance to do that J )

Somewhere while growing up I lost my dream of becoming a astronaut . I don't really know the reason . I never cared to explore them . By the time I was in my teens I wanted to be a Scientist but after enrolling as a student of Science with Non Medical I focused on becoming a Engg. And then fornext two years of my life I eat, slept, breathed and smelled P.E.T / JEE .

During my college days I wanted to start a company and my folks were sick of hearing my plans, but currently I am trying hard to become a manager in my current assignment .

During college I was attracted toward a girl & wanted to be her lover ( FYI : she rejected me and I am thankful to her , because she could have done something more cruel , which someone else did to me recently ,& I am thank full to her also . but more on that later. ) and now my parents want me to be a husband of someone of their choice and I don't know how long I can withstand the pressure .

This is my story and I believe this can be the story of any other boy in our times . each of us sometime in there life want to be an Astronaut, Scientist ,Entrepreneur and Lover but more often than not we are reduced to Driver, Manager & Husband . Why ? from being a boy to being a Man what do we loose in transition ? is it inevitable ? do we have a choice ? Is this the cost of Growing up ? Lets see .

I think that one fundamental difference between the ambitions of our childhood and goals of
adulthood is of conformity . As we grow up we tend to become more and more conformist . I tell you this is a very cozy feeling when you know that you are one with the people around you . you are acceptable , you belong . we tend to believe that its safe to fail conventionally than to succeed unconventionally .

Of course we never admit it to our self and try to glorify our current position and I am not trying to prove that there is no effort or glory involved in the last three roles . all I am trying to find out is why we shed our goals and never realize it until its too late to do anything about it . All of us are working hard , all of us are busy and intelligent . so how on earth we can miss the point . why we scale down our ambition .

Local Maxim

One reason we never realize what we are doing is that often we are trapped in what I call a "Local Maxim". a short term win on the cost of a long term victory .I still remember how my friends used to feel down and out when they were not able to make it in Campus Placement in College . It looked like the end of world . Funny thing is even some girlfriends switched loyalties during this time .( well that was not shock to anybody it was expected in my college )

Another case in point is of my friend who was working in a company where his project was to write software to mine data from unstructured source of information like text file . just when his project was in most interesting phase he got an offer from another company and they were offering a huge jump in salary . he asked me for advice . he was in love with his current assignment but still he was making a lot less then his classmate or friend in US who is working on $/Hr basis in a valley based firm . I advised him to stay but under the pressure of family and wife he switched his job . He knew he will not going to enjoy the work but still he did it .He don't talk about his job now. he opted for a local maxim .

We all do it sometime or other . all of us are busy ,all of us are achieving something or other but our effort ,our victory our energy is not aligned with our long term goal . we keep penny so close to our eye that we can't see the dollar behind it .

One way to avoid the trap of local maxim is to have friends outside of work, industry, demographics and beyond your financial profile . As a sales person I have meet many top notch professionals who make a packet of money every month & budding entrepreneurs on shoestring budget (some time on serial credit cards) . Based of my experience I can tell you both teach you a great deal . its better than having friends who are only programmer in some IT firm. It gives you perspective and vision to look beyond local maxim.

Who wrote the Script of My Role

" You know someone said that world is a stage ,and we all must play our part ,

fate has been playing in love, with you as my sweetheart ,

Act One was when we meet I loved you at your first glance,

You read your line so cleverly and never missed a clue , Than come act two .

You got changed and acted strange and why I never know .

Honey you lied when you said you love me and I have no doubt on that

But I rather go on hearing your lies than go on living without you ,

Now the stage is bare and I am standing here with the emptiness all around

And if you are not coming back to me that they can bring the curtain down "

Elvis Presley In "Are You Lonesome Tonight"

Legend is that king Elvis was in love with a girl who was equally in love with him . but he was a Truck Driver @ that time .And no self respecting uptown family in USA like the idea of their daughter getting married to a truck driver . Girl finally ditched Elvis Presley to marry some one normal . later king wrote this song for the same girl who never cared to say a proper good bye to him before partying ways .Nobody really know who she was . and everybody knows such girls.

Now lets for a moment think like that girl . In Her shoes she might be taking the best most thoughtful and calculated move of her life .When she loved him she was a girl and all she cared was that boy should be good looking, caring and madly in love with her . but now she is a women soon she will get married and as a consequence will have kids. Now think of it will you like to raise your child in a house of truck diver . so the poor girl acted wise, she thought like a wife /mother /homemaker and married someone else . girl in her lost her voice . she grew up .

As we all grow up at some point our friends ,family ,society give us the script of the role we have to play . they define what you are supposed to do as a father , son, wife , husband and everything else . we tends to believe these script as a fundamental premise.

Every person is unique so should be the script of his life . But we forget to ask a basic question what we are supposed to do as a person ? we should have a purpose of life beyond playing these pre scripted roles . but sadly this is rarely the case .Most of us never try to explore our role and write its script . sounds like a Matrix .

Now think for a moment about another girl . Her name is Gauri Khan , wife of SRK . think of her decision of marrying SRK .An average looking guy, a struggling actor with no steady source of income and on top of all these he was from a different religion . she must have faced an hell lot of resistance from her family . every body must have tried to push those scripts about "Good Husband Material" down her head . but she opted otherwise . Why ? what is the difference between approach of Gauri & approach of the girl who ditched Elvis . Honestly only Ms. Gauri can answer that . I will not even attempt to guess .

We have many example of people who opted to write their own script . Sania Mirza , N.Kartekeyan, Sabeer Bhatia , Narayan Murthy ,Dhirubhai Ambani list is end less.

DNA of Enterprenuer (If Any)

An Astronaut moves in general direction there is no path for him to follow and a Driver drive on roads with the help of maps . an entrepreneur tries to create new market where- as Manager only optimize the returns on existing market . Lover symbolize adventure and Husband smell security .

As we grow up we tend to be afraid of taking unknown road , we don't venture in unexplored territory. We trade adventure for security . we trade surprises & excitement for predictability .we tend to believe that our sense of worth is function of our job, possessions, salary etc. we don't see it as something intrinsic to us . at that juncture , we loose our chance . that feeling of intrinsic self worth is the thing we loose in transition .

That is the only thing which makes the difference between living for work and working for a living . lets hope more of us are in First category . lets write our own scripts and lets live a firsthand life .

Feed Reader In Gmail

Google is  now offering web based RSS /ATOM  feed integrator  bundelled with Gmail .  I can see a though time ahead for companies like newsgator.com . sometime back there was a rumor that Microsoft  is going to offer desktop based feed reader with Vistas and currently a crack team of Microsoft is sniffing web for possible targets . newsgator was surely one hot prospects .

i am wondering was it true . i am using web based newsgator for past sometime  i expected that any company looking to gain a footstep  in this sector will acquire it but they missed newsgator . perhaps they developed something inhouse .

what does it means for aspiring  Entrepreneurs  ? is era of your start up being acquired is over ?
i don't think so Google is in talk with riya ?

for companies like google  only thing that matter is the technology and  how good it integrate with there system . they will not go wacko  like MS did in buying  hotmail . No irrational exuberance this time .

watch out meebo.com  your time start now