thoughts

Its a controversy now!

Wikipedia is stopping its policy of allowing anyone to edit its web pages, enforcing this handicap only on the pages of some of the controversial topics and people. Its interesting to note the topics that are going to have this restriction imposed. While the ones like Islamophobia, Ku Klux Klan and Hamas may make some sense, its funny to note Sony, Sex and Mail-order brides listed there!

Wikipedia is not a place for expressing the opinions and the need of the hour for the site is to have a select group of voluntary editors who could verify the verity of the content posted.

Well, its true that its extremely difficult to maintain the value of the content with the anyone-can-edit policy, but it very important to note that this is the policy with which the Wikipedia has grown so much!

As I write this blog, I am watching a useless program in an Indian news television channel discussing about the “boo” Tendulkar received today from the Mumbai fans in the test match when he got out scoring a paltry single run.

Well, the last few years has turned the way media used to be in India. Today there are so many news channels, which one might be expected to say that its great for a democracy. But sadly, the news channels run out of topics and end up debating and talking too much on useless stuff, trying to beat the rivals. And the way Cricket is celebrated in India and the media hype about it. Oh, my goodness…

A few years ago, a cricket match would be “reported” and talked about for a few minutes in the news. But today, when there is a match, the channels start reporting about the probable list of players a couple of days before the actual match, the actual list of players before the day, the weather analysis the day before the match, pitch conditions and ticket sales, and the so-called experts and ex-cricketers at their best in throwing the suggestions - as though they are being listened by the captain or the coach. And on the day, right from the wee hours to late night dissecting the day as it happens. One channel even reported the number of balls a bowler bowled with ranges - like 11 yard to 12 yard, 12-13, upto 22.

This is sheer madness.

Why dont these channels, instead of making such stupid news and talking about these useless stuff, concentrate on getting some real news and real problems around the country? Is Cricket and some celebrity getting arrested only newsworthy? Sure, you have to compete with the channels around you and there are a lot of them to compete with. But ironically its all copy-paste stuff here. There is no individualism in any channel except for the background music or the anchors.

Of course, here and there, some good work gets done. Naveen Chawla controversy and the Members of Parliament getting bribed on camera are noteworthy… and newsworthy.

Lets hope the real smart people out there in the media business give some good news on this.

Is this the height of outsourcing? You might have even heard about the virtual personal assistant service these days which is a direct outcome of the outsourcing. If you haven’t, you are not updated. Checkout www.getfriday.com or other services.

Well, thats all old stuff now. The hot thing is outsourcing the early rounds of online games. Who will play those boring first rounds repeatedly to reach higer levels in games? So for these chinese people, play becomes work!

Man, there are so many ways to make money! So many interesting ways, that is!

If you are in networking field, you obiously must know about Vint Cerf - the father of Internet who developed the TCP/IP protocol suite with Bob Kahn (recollect Kahn’s algorithm?)

Google is lucky these days with a lot of great guys jumping in. The news now is that Vint Cerf has joined Google as Chief Internet Evangelist! Thats indeed a curious title for him