My Dream Phone!

I've never cared much about phones -- I always picked the one which had the least number of buttons, was the sturdiest, and was from Nokia (that's because of the guaranteed amazing battery backup and omnipresence of Nokia chargers)!

For a long time I had the Nokia 1100 -- the "Made In India" phone! And I absolutely loved its usability.

One button to access them all,
One button to find them,
One button to do all the stuff,
And in usability bind them :)

But then I had to shift over to Reliance to get a RIM-to-RIM free pack, and it went downhill from there. Not even a single phone was good enough. I picked the least of all evils -- the Nokia 2112. But I still wonder why would Nokia, the only company that had got its phone UI right, go back and screw it all up! Who the fuck needs the "receive call" and "disconnect call" buttons -- you know the stupid red and green buttons on all phones. From 3 clicks to send an SMS in the 1100, I now need 7 clicks through a cluttered and complicated menu to be able to send a single message!

So, I've never cared much about phones, until today -- the FIC Neo1973 has me all worked up! No MotoRazrs, MotoPEBL, Nokia SOME_RANDOM_NUMBER_HERE, Sony Ericsson's, and what have you have ever excited me as much as this phone does! An open Linux phone with GPRS. Apt-get style software updates. Open SDK. The power to tinker and write your own apps. The power to install hundreds of existing Linux apps. The power to change the UI if it sucks! Wow -- the possibilites are endless!

Can't wait to get my hands on one! Though I wonder how it would feel to dial a number using a touchscreen and not a keypad -- receiving/making calls while having food, washing hands, etc. is out of the window, I guess!

And I love the presentation that Sean Moss-Pultz (the creator of the phone) gave at the "Open Souce in Mobile" conference in Amsterdam. The power of simplicity!

That's what the phone looks like. A little on the unusal side, I must say -- but for all the phone narcissists out there -- it will make everyone take a second look at your latest "tool"!


The phone is called FIC Neo1973 but the software platform is called OpenMoko. The OpenMoko dialer.


The OpenMoko menu.

Privacy in India, Rediff, and seemingly interesting issues

From a Rediff Article -- it talks about how the Indian police and government treat the privacy of Indian citizens and how, as an Indian e-mail provider, Rediff has to deal with it.

"Government will cancel your licence if you don't comply with these police requests," he said finally. I was astounded. Here was I, hoping for a morally and hopefully legally defensible resolution to our dilemma and what we were getting was "practical" advice. "Our business does not depend on any government licences," I finally managed to blurt out.

Seeing the disappointed look on our faces, he leafed through his papers again. "You see, the law that governs this kind of case, the Indian Telegraph Act, 1885, was enacted with the shadow of the 1857 'mutiny' still over the Raj government, and is really an instrument to control such events rather than to govern the evolution of an industry. There is nothing you can do but comply if the request comes with the proper authorisation."

Which brings me to a couple of interesting questions:

• In case I'm under surveillance and the investigating agency has proper "search warrents" can it order me to decrypt my PGP (choose your favourite encryption mechanism here) data with my private key? What if I delete my private key or claim that I lost it? Compare it with a real world analogy -- if they ask me to unlock a physical safe, and I claim to have lost the key, they can break down the locks. What in the case of encrypted data?


• Is Rediff trying to "do a Google"? I remember reading a lot of blog posts on the Official Google Blog about their stand in the case where the US government wanted search query logs to track down "child porn".


• Is there a free webmail solution where all my mail is encrypted and the private key is with me alone? Decryption is done on the fly? I'm sure it can't be done without a browser plugin.

Innovation in Google Text Ads

Nice way to attract attention of the right kind of audience!

SpiceJet fighting cyber terror!

I hope their in-flight security is not as tight as their "web security" -- LOL!

New high or new low?

I guess I'm astronomically late in getting to know about the bandwagon, but I noticed an ad in the Gomantak Times (for those of you who don't know -- that's one of the leading English dailies in Goa -- OMG!). The ad was about the ill effects of smoking and how to lead a tobacco free life and pointed you to the URL www.LowTobacLife.com. And just below that it said "A website on gadgets & gizmos, haute couture, books, lifestyle products, etc." WTF?!

A friend at office told me that it was a new form of surrogate advertising by ITC. A little googling led me to the Global Tobacco Control website, which claims that it actually is a new cigarette brand which causes no harm!

I don't know which is true, but (a) it's a fucking intelligent way to go surrogate and (b) it's a mean kick below the belt!

Look up!

It is seldom that one smiles at Indian airports -- especially Delhi. Yesterday was one such rare instance. While waiting for my luggage (which was a very long wait, btw) I happened to notice a long banner hung up very high:

You'll always look up to the Delhi Airport
The ceilings is getting repaired!

And I couldn't help but look up at the ceiling and smile to myself :)

I've noticed quite a few lively banners and notices put up by GMR (the controversial company which outsed Reliance for the airport renovation bid). Really nice PR from a company that will mostly be viewed as a nuisance by passenger -- broken toilets, cramped up passages, closed pathways, etc.

Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna: Picture Review

Linus Does It Again!

Check out some of the one-liners this guy comes up with... from a recent CNN interview:

CNN: Now you are something of a rock star in tech circles...
Linus: I don't notice that in normal life. I don't actually go to that many conferences. I do that a couple of times a year. Normally I am not recognized, people don't throw their panties at me. I'm a perfectly normal person sitting in my den just doing my job.

:-)

Yeh Jeena Bhi Koi Jeena Hai Lallu...

That's exactly how I felt after my recent trip to Mumbai. It's not that it was my maiden trip to the city -- I've been there a number of times before. But I've been mostly confined within my hotel room in VT during the night, and within my client's office during the day.

It was only during this trip that I ventured away from what is called the "town side". I was putting up at Malad at a friend's place. And was visiting Andheri during office hours, shopping at InOrbit Mall and Bandra during whatever free time I had. And I've never seen so many people every-fucking-where. There was not even a single place where the people-to-floorspace ratio was relatively less. Every place was as crowded as the other.

It was a mad house. For two continuous days I had a headache because of the humid heat and the constant noise of traffic.

What's the use of earning a package of 7 lakhs plus, in a city like this when you end up spending 7,000 for a measly little room which you don't even feel like calling a home! It looks more like a prison cell with the iron grills jutting out of the holes in the walls people like to call "windows"!

What's the use of earning so much when every day of your life you have to leave home at six in the morning cuz it takes two hours to train-hop and reach your office? Covered in someone else's sweat!

What's the use of living like insects crawling, fighting, jostling for space every living moment of your life?

The Train to Hell

I was in Mumbai over the weekend. I had to board a bus from Bandra at 9:00 PM back to Goa. So I boarded a fast local from Church Gate to Bandra at about 8:00 PM. And that was the biggest mistake of my life!

I was smug about getting a seat at Church Gate and had a HUGE bag which was kept on one of the overhead racks. Bandra was about five or six stops away, so I was busy SMSing people left, right, and center.

The train stopped at Dadar.

"Bandra next station hai kya?"

"Haan. Aapko utarna hai kya?"

"Haan"

"To aap baithe kyun hue hain yahaan. Nikalna shuru kariye warna utar nahin paayenge"

I got up -- my bum was not even an inch away from the seat and poof -- someone else's butt was warming the wooden plank. I managed to pull my bag from the overhead rack... and that's all I managed to do. I was stuck! Literally stuck!

"Arre itna bada bag lekar kahaan chad gaye"

"Bhai sahab kahaan utarna hai aapko"

"Bhaiyya Bandra utarna hai"

"Arre toh dhakka maaro -- aise nahin utar paoge Bandra"

Shoving and heaving my way from out of the sitting area to the area right in front of the door I realized what I had just done. I had moved from an area with a packing fraction of 0.99 to an area with a packing fraction of 1.00!

Suddenly everyone in the compartment knew that there's an idiot with a huge bag on his head who was supposed to get off at Bandra and who still hasn't reached the door. Can you beat it -- I was just three feet away from the door!

"Bhai sahab -- so rahe the kya abhi tak, pehle utarna shuru karna chahiye tha na!"

Everyone around me was trying to inch me closer to the door. It's not like people were not trying -- but no one could fucking move! No one! It was a deadlock! Never in my life could I have imagined that so many people could squeeze into so little space.

I wasn't sure whether the sweat on my skin was mine or of the ten people I was in close contact with. I had to follow a seemingly dismembered elbow up to an arm up to a shoulder to a face to figure out who was hooked onto my arm with all his weight. The bugger was actually sleeping with all his weight hooked onto my arm -- bloody hooker!

Bandra came and went. More people got onto the train. Yes -- MORE PEOPLE!

Then finally, when Andheri came a BIG push from behind helped me traverse the last three feet to the door. I was out -- freedom at last!

I rushed back to Bandra on a fast local in the opposite direction, which was thankfully empty.

I just don't know what to make of my journey. Should I be amused about the state of affairs? Should I brush it off as "Life"? Should I be apathatic?

Why do people still come to Mumbai? Go back! No place -- house full!