Pronto Networks, the company behind AirSpot has come up with this idea of building up a pool of users in a city who would want to share a part of their bandwidth (which they might not use otherwise, all day long), to their friends and neighborhood. What’s good? The users who take this initiative get a 50 % share of the revenue AirSpot makes!

Technically, the ProntoPoint router, that runs the AirSpot service, has a dual SSID – one personal and the other public. I am sure you got it by now!

All you need is a existing internet connection (broadband), and a AirSpot router to get started! The mantra is – social internet sharing across AirSpots, Make money by sharing your internet bandwidth, a revolutionary concept to try out!

Just as they say – Do more with your internet.

I am yet to try out their service and would love to do the same. You can also check out an interesting contest they’ve floated and who knows, you may win a AirSpot router to try out! Check them out on facebook and twitter, they do share some great tweets, across the week with various interesting hashtags!

I would love to see some feedbacks, if you get a chance to try the service.

Google has also come up with a lot of “April fool” initiatives. Google romance being one of them :p

[ad#gmail1]

Now, something which came up as a surprise was the Gmail themes. They existed in the Gmail accounts, but today they’re made available for the Google hosted domains as well. We knew it was coming but I didn’t expect it today!

Here is what I saw when I logged on to my Google hosted email -

I went on to select my favorite theme, that is “Desk” and the new inbox is something more lively!

You may go ahead and choose your favorite theme from a list of several themes.

[ad#gmail2]

Gmail rocks!

Yeah, I do not wish to be the first person to break the news! I know Google has better people to do this :p

But the fact which I would like to pin here is,

Its important to understand that Google isn’t getting into a browser war. It’s not the browser market but the operating systems market that it’s after. It’s aiming to strike at the heart of Microsoft – Windows. Google is aiming to eventually move the operating system online making an important move in cloud computing. It did that with the Office suite a few years and that has definitely made a dent in Microsoft’s strategy so much so that they are pulling their socks up and getting mighty serious about Software-as-a-Service model.

Thanks Kiruba for putting things just as they appeared in my thoughts!

Ever thought of being part of the next big business idea? If yes, this is for you!

Event Info

Host: Proto.in

Type: Meetings – Business Meeting

Network:Global

Time and Place

Date: Saturday, September 6, 2008

Time: 10:00am – 5:00pm

Location: Amity – Noida

City/Town: Delhi, India

A Startup is probably the best place to be at for a fresher or for a professional who is looking for a career boost or to experience rapid growth. But the issue is that most people are not aware as to where to find these startups, neither are these startups able to be part of campus recruitment processes because of their small size.

The Basic Questions:

What is a Startup? A Startup is a company which is in its early stage of growth. It is most probably the founder of the company with a small team of five to ten people (or maybe less) working hard at a fabulous problem and to grow. There are two ways a startup could go: a) Really really big, or b) Go nowhere. The option is that you learn a lot from being part of a small group of people since you learn everything related to running a company and everything that goes on, which is an experience you will never get working for a corporate, and also if the startup grows big, you make a lot of money along with the founders.

What does it mean to work for a Startup? It would mean:

1. A committed job which would be an amazing place for passionate people
2. Slightly long hours of work
3. A very tightly knit team which is dedicated, passionate and probably the smartest set of people you will meet.
4. Slightly lower salaries
5. High Payback options on success

Who all can be part of this Startup Lunch? If you believe you do possess the skills to contribute to a Startup, you are more than welcome to put-in your name. Some of the verticals you might be coming from are:
* Programmers
* Marketers
* Visual Communication
* Animators
* Etc.

How Does this work?

The principle is roughly the same as the SpeedDating concept. The startup founders are seated on one side and the candidates get to say hello and have a quick conversation to talk about what the background of the founder is, why he started the company and what sort of person he is looking for, while asking questions to the candidate about the reason to join a startup and what his/her passions are and ten minutes later the same process continues with the next founder. Within an hour, you would have met/spoken to most of the startups, and by the end of the day would know whom to get in touch with for your first/next job.

So, what’s Cooking? Delhi Startup Lunch 3 is!
The Delhi Startup Lunch 3 is ready to be served on 6th September 2008.
We invite new & young businesses (Startups) and Candidates from Delhi + NCR region to participate.

More details about the event and the online registration process is available on the wiki page. If you decide to be a part of the event, you contact me or either of these guys to get any information you wish to have.

Abhishek (abhishekb@zoomtra.com)
Avinash (avinash@routeguru.com)
Vishal (vishalg76@gmail.com)
Praval (catchme@praval.com)

Praval is a web evangelist and marketer with Uswaretech.com, a Django web application development shop.

This was awesome! A good find by Brajeshwar.

The second day of the event has just begun at the Dogra Hall, IIT Delhi. This time with a rock solid Wi-Fi connection available for us! Things have just started up at this startup event with a cool video and music!

Yesterday was a beautiful day here! We saw some awesome talks by people like Kiran Karnik, Mahesh Murthy and Bhavin Turakhia. There was no Inter access available here on Day-1, so I couldn’t keep up to live blogging this event for long. My last post talks about Day-1 at Proto.

For today, It’s 0945 hrs and the founder of Proto.in, My Vijay Anand is addressing us elaborating his ideas and the concept behind this community and its flavor.

Today, there is an array of showcases by various startups. The first category of startups is IT companies.

The first one Soliton has just talked about themselves/ They are into manufacturing high resolution cameras.

The second showcase is by Picporta. This involves a cool tool which lets you search pictures as easily as we search texts over the Internet. The concept involves a high degree of Artificial Intelligence. This is an innovative tool by an Indian startup. The presentation ends with a beautiful demo showcasing the product.

The next one is "The Hiring Tool", a b2b marketplace which has over a 100 clients signed up for them. The tool has a intuitive interface for the consultants and recruiters, helping them to easily manage the job seekers and their details on the fly.

1025 hrs and we’re now getting a chance to see  a presentation which show-casts more than 60 companies(startups) which have come up to proto.

The next category of the companies coming up is Web based start ups.

The first one is Lifeblog, a Bangalore based startup which has come up with a personal online diary enabling you to add images in various timelines.  Nothing innovative or new. For me, it was more of a new interface for already existing web apps.

1040 hrs: The next web based startup is TIRIYO which eyes on 3 major goals: Hiring management, Application sourcing and & match. It is a Chennai based startup providing companies a tool to manage their resources. I guess we are not here to see job sites. I was looking up to some entrepreneurs!

1048 hrs and we have Muziboo showcasing themselves! Its an online music collaboration websites. Prateek Dayal is the founder of this company along with his wife. Muziboo believes in creating an ecosystem for music lovers.

1055 hrs Hariharan and Ashutosh from Lords of odds are here to evangelize the selling of predictions online! Sounds strange but interesting. It’s all about prediction, says Hariharan. Betting seems interesting to him :p They’re planning to get mobile which shall involve predictions via sms. I somehow do not foresee a long future for this website!

1100 hrs and it’s now a question & answer session for the IT and Web based startups.

A Microsoft guys shoots a question on PicPorta asking them if they’ve  patented their technology or is it a proprietary. PicPorta says they’re looking forward to get it patented in future as they’ll be using this concept for a wider work area in future.

It’s 1110 hrs and time for refreshments and networking. The next session resumes at 1145 hrs. Seeya then!

1155 hrs: With the advent of the next session we have the next set of companies eyeing on e-commerce services.

The first one is this category is  Lootstreat. The guys talk about bargaining online and they mange the supply chain on thier own.

The next one is ApnaBill who deals with bill payments. Currently they just have just mobile rechages. I find them similar to other services in the market like oxygen, easybills, etc.

Storez is the next startup which deals with online buying of consumer products, say – cookies! They have a cool interface to look for a product and then find the best merchant for the same offering you the cheapest price. Storez has around 55 merchants as of now and they’re rolling in around 100 merchants in all by the end of August.

That marks the end of e-commerce category.

The Wi-Fi is taking a heavy toil on me getting connected and disconnected time to time. I shall now continue to tweet about &proto4 at my twitter page than waiting for the connectivity to resume time and again. It gets to be pathetic when you posts do not get updated in real time. Follow me on twitter to catch up with more action.

Ciao!

It’s 0915 hrs and things are on schedule! The proto.in has just kicked off! Day one of the start up event and everything here is just perfect, except the wi-fi though! I’m blogging live from within the audi at IIT, Delhi – the venue for this event. Due to failure of the Wi-fi over here, I am on a GPRS network to help you keep updated with the proceedings here.

Mr. Kiran Karnik, former president NASSCOM has just appeared for the keynote.

Mr. Karnik emphasizes on not just look over outsourcing. One should try and look beyond the existing opportunities and work over the unleashed avenues.

The talk is now followed by A Q&A session:

• Why doesn’t the govt. support startups?

Ans: Govt. procurement processes have been bothering us since long. But things may improve over a span of time. Traditional thoughts are   definitely a barrier.

• What should one do after starting a startup? move with the market or decide himself.
  Ans: End of the day, you need to move with the market as it’s not just about a hobby. You need to market yourself or get a good marketer for you!

We’re now moving on to a series of talks by various startup entrepreneurs who have done substantially well with their work/business.

Bharat martimonial – Murugavel Janakiram on Building services for India – The art of Pricing.

Murugavel is having masters in computer sc. with a flair in programming. Inspired by match.com in US, he started a company with a cash flow of 10$ per month with a pricing of INR 300 for onetime, or as he says, “until you get married”! Today the pricing is more than INR 1000 for 3 months of subscription. Monetarising the web traffic was a major concern for him and still happens to be one of the key hurdles for people getting with Internet based startups. In his words, “think big but speak small.”

Derecti.com – Bhavin Turakhia on At the helm of a fast growing business.

Bhavin is one the most talented young entrepreneurs India I’ve ever come across. He’s the CEO of directi.com in his late twenties with focus on crisp business strategies. He describes business as a game, which needs just two prime concerns:

1) Get the right players.

2) Get your team think and work effectively and in a way better than your competitions.

Talking about the 2nd point, Bhavin says you need to concentrate on getting your team play their roles and not you controlling them. Secondly, you need to diversify your approach into various segments or modules. Thirdly, you need to keep a scoreboard for your game – business, for that matter. This involves measuring everything and anything that’s related to your growth or failure in a game. This creates that motivation to achieve better heights. Bhavin says ” Celebrate your victories!” Just as you do not intend to delay your work schedules, do not postpone celebrations alike. An organization should align everyone’s interest. Success of an  organization is proportional to the success of its individuals.

Morpheus Partners – Sameer Guglani

Targeting users is an important step towards success. Building a product for investors is a lame thing. Instead, building  a product, getting a lot of users for the same and then looking onto investors leads to better business results. In his words,  Sameer says, “getting 10 users for your product should be your first concern.”

Next we have is Mahesh Murthy throwing a talk on general advertising strategies for startups.

He is one of the best marketer and advertiser who’s known to market anything from vacuum cleaners to insurance. He introduces himself an engineering drop-out who thereafter slipped into marketing. He has traveled across the world for this very reason. Mahesh has held a key position in revamping channel V in India. Thereafter, he has worked for a lot of clients before starting his startup named seedfunds.

He talked about how to market your product. He starts with – “If you do not have a product which you do not think is an innovative attempt, drop the idea of advertising it.”  He recommends building a product which is impressive enough. Think of Google, Yahoo, Amazon, etc. which do not advertise themselves. Rather they do not need to. They indirectly advertise themselves indirectly with the kind of services/product they offer for the users.

Price is another factor which would probably affect your product. He insists on building a premium product at a premium cost. You can only challenge your competition if you can dare to keep the price ahead of it, of course for a premium product. The volume of production may be less, but the cost shall definitely be high to help you stand out. Mahesh emphasizes of creating trend rather than following one. For him, business research forecasts is crap as no one knows what’s coming up tomorrow.

My cellphone is magically getting switched off! And the Wi-fi is still not up! I’m sorry Vijay, I can’t carry on more for today

Proto.in come together once in every six months, bringing together entrepreneurs – current and aspiring, investors, bloggers, veterans, technologists, mentors, media professionals, hackers, students, and even folks from the government bodies like NASSCOM, TiE, etc. to build a cohesive and sensible business ecosystem in India.

Proto.in is here in Delhi this july!

The Upcoming edition is finalized for the dates – July 18th and 19th, 2008 in Delhi and tentatively planned at the Indian Institute of Technology – Delhi.

Do check out the website to know more. I thank Mayank to have introduced it to me through his blog. He is holding a small contest to give away free passes for the event! Visit here incase you think you’re lucky!

Businesses, educational institutions, governmental agencies and other organizations around the world are converting their computer operating systems from Microsoft Windows to Linux at an increasing pace. They are likewise converting their application programs from commercial software to free software (also referred to as open source software). There are at least 25 reasons for this situation, including:

(1) Because it is licensed under a free software license, Linux (as well as other free software) is available at no cost. It can be downloaded from the Internet for free, and it can be purchased in disk or box form at trivial cost. One copy can be used on as many computers as desired with no restrictions. This is in sharp contrast to Microsoft Windows, which can easily cost US$100 or more per computer.

(2) Because it is free software, Linux is also free in the sense that anybody is permitted to modify it, including its source code, in any way desired. If modified versions are not redistributed (i.e., given away or sold outside of an organization), they can be kept secret. This is also in sharp contrast to Microsoft Windows, for which modification of the software is generally not permitted. Source code is the original version of a program as it is written by a programmer using a programming language and before being converted by a compiler into a form such that its instructions can be understood directly by a computer’s CPU (central processing unit); it is generally necessary to have the source code in order to be able to make changes to a program. This ability to freely experiment with and modify the source code, and to do so without disclosing the modifications to outsiders, has been a very important consideration for a number of large organizations.

(3) High quality support for Linux is available for free on the Internet, including in newsgroups and other forums. Some people claim that this support is at least as good as that provided for proprietary (i.e., commercial) operating systems for a fee. Linux support can also be purchased on a commercial basis if desired. Among the types of support that can be required for operating systems are help with customization, assistance in installing new programs, patches to cope with new security threats and patches to fix newly discovered bugs (i.e., defects). Fortunately, the need for the last two types is relatively infrequent for Linux.

(4) There is little possibility that support for Linux will be discontinued at some future date due to planned obsolescence or for any other reason. This is because the source code will always be available to anyone who wants it, including individuals who provide support for free over the Internet and businesses which provide it for a fee. In contrast, with Microsoft Windows and other proprietary software for which the source code is usually kept secret, obtaining support becomes difficult (from both a technical and a legal point of view) if the developer decides to withdraw it (for example in order to try to force users to pay for upgrades to newer versions).

(5) There is little or no fear of major obsolescence, planned or otherwise, with Linux. This is because the UNIX architecture on which it is based has been exhaustively tested and refined for more than 35 years and has proven to be extremely efficient, robust and secure. Improvements continue at a rapid pace, but new versions remain basically compatible with the underlying UNIX architecture.

(6) There are no forced upgrades for Linux users. This because older versions continue to be supported (e.g., with the development of new security patches and device drivers) and because newer versions, if desired, are available for free (as is all free software) and are typically highly compatible with older versions. The developers of proprietary software, however, have strong financial incentives to engage in planned obsolescence, namely, in order to induce users of earlier versions to spend money to buy or lease new versions.

(7) Should a user decide to upgrade to a newer version of Linux, there are no licensing fees or other software costs if the user selects a free distribution (i.e., version). Moreover, the training, program modification/conversion, hardware acquisition and other costs associated with upgrading to a new version are also relatively low due to the compatibility with earlier versions.

(8) Linux has no onerous requirements for keeping track of licenses. In a company with hundreds or thousands of computers, a number of full time personnel can be required just to make sure that all of the computers in use are in compliance with the complex licensing terms of the EULAs (end user license agreements) for Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Office and other proprietary software. And for Linux users there is no fear of surprise audits by the BSA (Business Software Alliance), with possible severe penalties for minor license violations.

(9) Linux features superior security, including a very low rate of infection by viruses, trojans, worms, spyware and other malware. This is because UNIX and all of its descendants (including Linux) been designed from the ground up with security in mind, rather than having attempts at security tacked on as an afterthought. For example, users do not routinely use the system as the root (i.e., administrative) user, thereby protecting key system files even in the event of a break-in by a malicious intruder. Also, a robust firewall is included in major distributions and it is enabled by default. Another important factor is the free availability of the source code, which allows thousands of people around the globe to search for security vulnerabilities in it.

(10) Linux is highly resistant to system crashes and rarely needs rebooting (i.e., restarting). This can be very important for large organizations for which even a few minutes of down time can result in a substantial cost. The reason is that Linux has been designed from the ground up to be an extremely stable and robust operating system, incorporating all that has been learned about attaining these goals from the more than 35 years of history of Unix-like operating systems.

(11) Although the number and variety of application programs for Linux are not yet as large as those available for the Microsoft Windows operating systems, an extensive selection already exists and it is continuing to increase rapidly as more and more developers start creating programs for Linux. Most Linux applications are also free software (including nearly all of the most popular ones), and many have features and performance equal or superior to those of comparable applications for use with Microsoft Windows. In fact, users often find that all the applications that they want are freely available on the Internet and that it is no longer necessary to purchase any commercial software.

(12) There is a choice of numerous distributions (several hundred) of Linux, each with its own unique set of characteristics but all basically compatible with each other. This allows users to select the versions which best meet their specific requirements. It also means that if one provider of Linux were to go out of business, there would still be many others from which to choose. Moreover, it fosters a healthy competition among them, thereby contributing to the continuous improvements in Linux’s quality and performance. If the choice seems overwhelming, it is usually difficult to make a mistake by selecting one of the most popular distributions, such as Red Hat or SuSE.

(13) Linux features a high degree of flexibility of configuration, and a great deal of customization can be accomplished very easily and without having to modify the source code. For example, it is a simple matter to configure Linux during installation so that it will be optimized for use as a workstation, desktop computer, notebook computer, web server, database server or a router. Likewise, the appearance and behavior of the desktop, including icons and menus, can be configured in an almost infinite number of ways, according to user tastes or requirements. They can even be made to resemble Microsoft Windows. Should this not be enough, the ability to freely access, revise and recompile the source code allows virtually unlimited flexibility of configuration.

(14) Linux and other free software uses open format file formats. These are formats for word processing, spreadsheet and other file types that conform to industry-wide standards and which can be used by any developer of software to create compatible programs, in contrast to the closed formats commonly used by some proprietary software. This eliminates the problem of lock-in to proprietary standards, with the consequent difficulty and expense of switching to other software in the future. It allows the user to have complete control of its data, particularly in the event that at some future date the developer who originally created the software goes out of business or stops supporting its earlier software.

(15) Linux is generally faster for a given set of hardware specifications. This is due to greater optimization of the source code, including far less code bloat.

(16) Linux features a high degree of compatibility with other operating systems. For example, it can read, write, copy, erase and otherwise manipulate data that resides on Microsoft Windows partitions on the same hard disk drive (HDD), act as a Windows server for a network containing Windows clients, format disks for use with Windows, and even run Windows programs directly if necessary. In contrast, the Microsoft Windows operating systems cannot access HDD partitions that contain other operating systems, cannot format disks for other operating systems, etc.

(17) Very high ethical standards are maintained for Linux and other free software, in large part due to the very openness of their development process and the free availability of the source code. Linux has never been convicted in a Federal court of violation of U.S. antitrust laws or other crimes, nor has it had to pay penalties for the unauthorized copying of technology developed by other companies. Antitrust refers to government policy to regulate or break up monopolies in order to promote free competition and attain the benefits that such competition can provide to the economy and to society as a whole.

(18) Linux reduces the need to upgrade or replace hardware when upgrading to newer versions. This is because its code is very efficient and compact, thus allowing it to work effectively on older computers that are not suitable for the newest versions of Microsoft Windows.

(19) Linux is capable of operating on a wide variety of platforms (i.e., processor and system types), rather than just being limited to Intel-compatible processors and computers. It scales well and is well suited for use on a diverse array of equipment ranging from supercomputers to industrial robots to electronic medical equipment to cell phones (and can even run on a wristwatch).

(20) Linux is a superior choice for use in academic institutions for a number of reasons. Among them is the fact that there are no secrets (in sharp contrast to proprietary software), thereby providing students the opportunity to study how computers really work rather than to just learn how to use them. Many educators are convinced that it is far more important for students to study computer science fundamentals than to practice specific applications (such as Microsoft Word or Microsoft PowerPoint). One reason is that computer science fundamentals will still be valid many years from now, whereas the specific application programs, especially the proprietary ones that do not conform to industry-wide standards, are constantly changing and those currently in use will likely become obsolete in a few years.

(21) For governmental agencies, Linux and other free software allows for transparency of data because it stores the data in formats consistent with industry-wide standards. This is in contrast to the proprietary, closed formats characteristic of commercial software. Such transparency is important for maintaining an effective democracy. Keeping non-secret data in standards-compliant formats allows anyone to access it without having to purchase expensive proprietary software. Also, storing secret data in standards-compliant formats is widely regarding as being more secure than keeping it in proprietary formats.

(22) With Linux and other free software there is little reason to fear the existence of backdoors, in large part because all of the source code is available for inspection. A backdoor is a secret method for obtaining remote access to a computer. There is a (not unjustified) concern by many foreign governments and corporations that back doors have been covertly inserted into proprietary software that could allow the software developer and agencies of other governments to snoop into their most confidential data.

(23) Using and advocating Linux helps foster a healthy diversity and increased competition throughout the software industry. Such competition can promote technological advance, improve performance and lower costs for open source software and proprietary software alike. Both economic theory and hundreds of years of real-world experience clearly show that monopolies have little incentive to innovate, tend to produce shoddy products, charge inflated prices and tend to corrupt the political system.

(24) Linux and other free software have not only caught up with, or some cases surpassed, their proprietary counterparts, but they are also developing at a faster pace. This trend will accelerate as demand for such software continues to grow and more and more individuals and organizations become actively involved it its development.

(25) Linux and other free software provide the opportunity for users to contribute to the advance of software technology because the source code is freely available to study, improve, extend and redistribute. This has been fairly common, and the most notable corporate example has been IBM. In addition to giving back to the software community and being a virtue in itself, such contributions can have great public relations value.

(26) There are actually more than 25 reasons that organizations around the world are converting to Linux and other free software. A twenty-sixth reason is that with Linux, in contrast to the Microsoft Windows operating systems, there is no need to defragment HDDs. Fragmentation, which is the spreading of data into non-contiguous locations on a hard disk drive, can reduce the efficiency of data storage and slow down computer operation. Defragmentation is not difficult, but it can be an annoyance to have to do it periodically, and it is unnecessary with a well designed operating system.

This beautiful article is available in detail, here. ]]> http://www.praval.com/why-linux-25-more-reasons/feed/ 3 http://www.praval.com/twitter-is-no-more-just-what-are-you-doing/ http://www.praval.com/twitter-is-no-more-just-what-are-you-doing/#comments Thu, 22 May 2008 06:54:52 +0000 Praval http://www.praval.com/blog/happenings/twitter-is-no-more-a-status-display-client/ Twitter started off with “What are you doing?” display concept. It has now grown to be much more than what it was eventually built for! People now chat over it asking questions within their network, either directly or with a group of people. I thought gtalk and other IMs would replace general way of communication, that’s probably the email which started off with hotmail.com by Sabeer bhatia, several years ago.

People now find it easy to use @username to communicate, effectively. Strange!
To know more about twitter and how can you use it to its potential, visit twitter.