Witty Sparks

Google Voice.. another giant step in communication?

krstiger — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 12:24:36 +0000

Google plans to launch Google Voice, an application to simplify communication in the coming days. This service would be initially available for GrandCentral users, a company which Google acquired and then would be slowly opened up for others. This application is a move towards strengthening its presence in the communication sphere. With Google Wave also waiting in the wings, the two applications would seek to increase Google’s foothold on the communication and collaborative space respectively.

Google Voice is an innovative offering whereby a number would be provided where a user could be contacted. This number could be linked the user’s office, home or cell phone depending on the user’s preference. Also calls could be directed to users Google VoiceMail. These being the basics of this application, there are several additional features which Google is looking to provide.

Google with Voice would be looking to expand its reach among the Small and Medium Businesses (with small headcount) who run their businesses on Google Apps and other free applications. Google voice brings to fore another highlight which is an acquisition spree of Google. All efforts could be said to be directed to expand their footprint in the communication and collaobrative space which till now exist as two separate spheres.

A glimpse of the same can be had at the following link http://www.google.com/googlevoice/about.html# where the features are explained with videos.

Some related videos to Google voice are:

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Branding strategy in Rural Communication

Michael Jackson-King of Pop passes away

krstiger — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 12:17:53 +0000

The world of pop music and entertainment bereaved the loss of one of its most famous stars Michael Jackson aka ‘Wacko Jacko’. The star died at the age of 50 and the sad part about his death was that he was planning to make a comeback to the world of music and entertainment. Alas fate had something different in store for him! A look at the events in his life indicates that it is nothing less than dramatic! A dramatic rise to fame at an early age of 11 and then a uneventful fall to disgrace! Jackson however stood as a pillar when it came to providing hits in music and entertainment. His best selling records are Thriller, Bad, Dangerous among the others.

He may have become a bad boy after getting slapped with a couple of molestation cases and later getting acquitted but no one can take away from him the fact that he was a genius and a superb entertainer! He entertained his fans and audiences around the world with his moves, popular among them being Moonwalk and Robot.

When he was alive he was scorned by people for his lunatic acts and behaviour and all that he was as an entertainer and a genius artist was forgotten and went into the background. But after his death now the past may have been kept aside and a silent prayer could be said for a man who showed the world the smooth moves of Moonwalk !

King of Pop

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Dangerous

The famous Moonwalk

Some of his best dance moves

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Video of Confederations Cup Semi Final- Brazil Vs South Africa 2009

krstiger — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 04:31:41 +0000

Brazil defeated South Africa with a lone goal from Daniel Alves to enter the finals of the Confederations Cup. The match was decided by this lone goal by the Brazilian towards the dying moments of the game to steer them to victory. The match was 0-0 for the majority of the time and Brazil had to play hard to find opportunities to score. Both teams played well but it was the final moments that decided the outcome of the game.

The match was lackadaisical through the two halves and the flurry of action happened towards the end when the Brazilian team showed promise to score!A direct free kick from Alves did the job for the 2005 Confederations Cup champions as there was celebrations in the Brazilian camp following the goal.

Brazil face United States in the finals of the Confederations Cup.

Watch videos of the semi finals between Brazil and South Africa

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Watch videos of Twenty20 World Cup Final 2009

krstiger — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 04:57:06 +0000

Pakistan beat Sri Lanka in the finals of the Twenty20 world cup and won the trophy that they missed last year by a whisker! For Pakistan, it was a relatively easy game to win after their bowler blew apart the top order of the batting. Sri Lanka won the toss and lost four quick wickets and at one point in time were reduced to 70 for the loss of 6 wickets. It required the captain Sangakkara to rescue the ship. His knock gave the team a total to defend.

But Afridi’s half century ensured the team coasted to clinch the finals easily. It proved to be an anti-climax for the fans around the world, as the contest turned out to be one sided.

Watch the videos of the finals

Watch Afridi’s Kiss..

Watch Afridi’s knock..

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Bing..a different search engine?

krstiger — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 11:05:04 +0000

Microsoft’s search engine Bing( Beta) gained 12.5% market share in the second week of June in U.S. This is a heartening news for Microsoft and for the the search engine industry as the monopoly of Google would be challenged. These may be early days to make any predictions as to how Bing would fare against the likes of Google and Yahoo as it has been recently launched. However, the fact that Bing has found favour among search engine users. With it colourful images that form the background of the page, Bing has added one more feature which is a small pop up kind of thing that appears beside the search result ( giving a summary of that page).

There is more to followon Bing and Google, so watch out this space for more updates!

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India crashes out of Twenty20 World Cup 2009..whom to blame?

krstiger — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 14:10:37 +0000

India crashed out of the Twenty20 World cup and with its exit sank the hopes of millions of cricket fans who hoped for a repeat of the earlier World Cup performance. It lost all its Super 8 matches, to England, West Indies and South Africa. The losses against England and South Africa said it all, that this was a side which didn’t look life defending their Champions Crown!

Despite the same team composition, the side failed to chase the total of 150 odd runs against the English side. And the same happened yesterday against South Africa, this time the target being 130! This shows the lack of consistency in the side, with the gelling factor missing altogether. The batsmen too failed with only Yuvraj and Rohit Sharma showing some resolve.

But as one looks at the side, the impression one gets from the side is one tht is physically present but mentally absent from the field! Perhaps, IPL was a major success for BCCI and players but the price paid for the success was Twenty20 World Cup and Indian team’s lacklustre performance bore testimony to the same!

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Australia crashes of Twenty20 World cup 2009

krstiger — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 01:27:30 +0000

Australia have been knocked out of the Twenty20 World Cup in the round robin stages, a fact many Aussie fans would find difficult to digest! A side which was considered an invincible juggernaut some time back was made to eat humble pie by the West Indians as they took their opponents to the cleaners with some typical Calypso hitting!

But the Calypso kings had other plans in store for their Aussie ‘mates’! Led by their captain Chris Gayle, they came down heavily on their counterparts with some lusty hitting that surprised many in the crowd. Even Brett Lee was not spared and was taken apart by some brutal hitting from Gayle who was unstoppable.

This match was followed by their loss to the Lankans who emerged victorious after some classy spells from their spinners Mendis and Muralidaran. Batting first, the Aussies never got the momentum to put up a big score. They lost some early wickets at the top of the order eventually managed. Thanks to some lusty blows by Mitchell Johnson and David Hussey at the end, the side posted a score of some respectability! The Lankans chased without any difficulty and the loss meant Goodbye Australia!!

For once the Aussies appeared vulnerable and they sure did miss the services of Symonds, Gilchrist and McGrath. Wish if the likes of Gilly and Warne could return to bolster a vulnerable Aussie squad!

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Indian thump Bangladesh in Twenty20 World Cup 2009

krstiger — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 04:52:25 +0000

India comprehensively defeated Bangladesh and laid to rest the ghosts of the previous World Cup encounter at Port of Spain when the latter brought about their exit from the World Cup in 2007. Batting first the Indian team put up a good total of 180 runs at the loss of five wickets. The openers started the innings in a steady manner with Gambhir and Rohit. Rohit Sharma in his short innings that he played displayed streaks of brilliance with his first drive that raced to the boundary. He hit three boundaries and two sixes in his knock of 36. He looked at ease, with ample of time to play his shots although there were bouts of haste and impulsiveness which surfaced from time to time in his innings. It was one of those that brought his downfall when trying too had to scuttle a ball to the boundary he was bowled by Hasan. Dhoni and Gambhir played safe with singles but it appeared that Indians were beginning to lose the plot as the run rate had begin to drop and the Indians were just 70 odd runs in the 10th over. Although a sense of urgency set in, it required the services of ‘Blaster’ Yuvraj Singh’s clinical powerful clean hitting to steer the Indian ship to a respectable total. Yuvraj plundered the Bangladesh bowler as boundaries and sixes rained in the otherwise pale and insipid innings. He hit four mighty sixes targetting the midwicket fence and three boundaries to help India reach a respectable total.

The Bangaldeshi batsmen showed some intent with an aggressive display of strokes by the Siddique at the start as he scored 41 runs from 22 balls with three sixes. However, the other batsmen failed to rise to the ocassion and the team eventually capitulated to some willy Indian bowling performance from the lkes of Pragyan Ojha who spun a web around the batsmen. He grabbed 4 wickets for a paltry 21 runs and won the coveted Man of the Match award. Apart from Siddique, it was a rather lacklustre performance from the ‘Tigers’ who were expected to repeat the Port of Spain performance. But as goes the saying ‘Lightening does not strike twice’, the same was displayed by the Indians who won the match with ease.

However, the services of Sehwag was missed at the top of the order and fans around the world would be praying he recovers soon to give the side the boost with his drives, cuts and pulls!

Check out more Twenty20 World Cup Videos

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Holland stun England in Twenty20 World cup opener 2009

krstiger — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 02:55:12 +0000

Holland pulled off a surprise by defeating hosts England in the first fixture of the Twenty20 World Cup 2009 at Lords. Winning the toss, the Dutch chose to field. The English team got off to a decent start due to some mediocre bowling performance from the Dutch bowlers.
Ravi Bopara came up with some powerful drives and boundaries and the side reached hundred without losing a wicket. However, they could not maintain the momentum and once Bopara and Wright, the two openers, departed a a sort of vacuum was created. The English side dearly missed Kevin Pietersen and the same reflected in their side’s batting performance which lacked powerful hitters who could clear the fence with regularity and ease.

The openers did the bulk of the scoring for the English side and the side managed 162 on the board for the loss of five wickets in the stipulated twenty overs. The Dutch chased the total set by England and were helped in the process by some shoddy fielding by the English players that saw run out chances go begging and sloppy overall fielding. The Dutch batsmen showed fighting spirit and the match went down to the last ball which went for overthrows and led the side to victory. For the Dutch, it was Grooth who did the bulk of the scoring with six hits to the fence and a big six! This loss would have sent a cold chill down the English side’s spine. The loss would be a wake up call for the side which despite having heavyweights like Collingwood, Owais Shah and Anderson failed to impress its fans!

Check out the Twenty20 World Cup Videos in our VideoBuzz section

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Google Wave – new wave in communication?

krstiger — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 02:48:49 +0000

Google recently announced its plans on a product which would cater to communication and collaborative tool called Google Wave. Coming from the Google ‘House’ the tool appears to have an imprint of simplicity and novelty!
Yet to be released, it would have features which would combine aspects pertaining to communication such as online chatting with colleagues and friends while working on documents simultaneously. The tool suggests that the entire thing would be happening real time which implies that whatever correction or editing to the text would be done, would be reflected in real time. Sounds good so far. Also the individuals using the tool would be make changes or write in the document wherever they wish ( sounds a little borrowed from Microsoft’s OneNote)!

Users can add people during a conversation at any point. And to avoid any kind of confusion that prevails regarding the thread of the conversation, the tool provides a playback option which would recapitulate the conversation with the concerned individuals, now that is new!! So, looks like a combination of orkut, picasa and communication knit together in real time.

Watch the demo video below to know more about Google Wave.

Apart from the these feature, the tool has two more aspects – for developers it provides them the option to contribute to the wave by building robot extensions (or in plain terms write programs) which would improve the tool. It gives the option to embed waves into your own site (using Javascript) which would in turn make the wave more collaborative. The tool is in open source which would mean free for use. So, something on the lines of say a twitter (which the company has already worked upon) could be plugged on your page. This feature may be on similar lines to facebook where you can have your set of features like games etc on your page.

Google ‘Wave’ as the name of the tool sums it up that there are several of them, and all can be put together to make a larger wave. This tool would extend Google’s efforts in collaboration and communication space as it has already come up with Google Apps that has messaging and collaboration for offices. So, this tool would be for the end user/individual space and would help Google get into this territory also. Google has now tools which cater to the different spheres and userbase. Google analytics, Trends, Site Search and Website Optimizer cater to websites. Google Apps, Enterprise Search Solution Checkout and Local Business Center would be for enterprises while Google Wave & other offerings from Google labs would be for individuals.