The year comes to an end...

So the year of the headache finally comes to an end. Shouting parlimentarians, dud new launches of over-hyped products, and returning slowdown speculations. The year, that witnessed Charlie 'Harper' Sheen getting kicked out of the 'decade old' running series two and a half men, and dozens of more stuff.

Lets hope that the new year brings in some good news for the 'geeks' , waiting for some groundbreaking products


a very happy new year to you all

Reliance Thugs Again

Among the pleothra of allegation, Reliance has been one network that doesn't give much statments in its defence. After being involved in 2G spectrum allocation scandal, and bad customer services, its now found of cheating its customers. I personally saw Reliance not confirming to what has been stated.

Whenever one uses Facebook mobile site, the site clearly states that using Facebook App from their phones would not charge any data on the Reliance network. On reading this, one of my good friends who is on the Reliance network, asked me to install the Facebook app on his Samsung phone. He had the first version of the Facebook app, and when i tried it out, the app was charging it. So i decided to download and clean install the latest version. But still it was charging for data. When i had started, his phone's balance was Rs42.60 , and by the time i was finished trying the new Facebook app, his balance was Rs13. 29bucks were lost, and that was just because Reliance was cheating by charging people for what should have been a free service.

We called up the complaint desk at 198. It took us half an hour to connect to that number, and when it connected, the voice was cracking due to bad quality of service(QoS) inspite of the fact that Reliance spends a fortune on getting movie stars root for its 'flawless' network(had they spend it on strengthening their infrastructure, they would have got more subscribers). At the first call attempt, the complaint desk doesn't believe that it has been constituted for handling complains, it states that it has been constituted for activation/deactivation of services. On the second attempt, the guy told us that the charges were valid as this service was not free. He then started contact the Reliance GSM nodal and appelete officers, whose numbers "were not reachable". Imagine grieverence redressal officers "not reachable" on a weekday. Lame professionalism.

But then, my friend tells me that Reliance has been a notorious network. Earlier, he was charged Rs30 couple of months back for a caller ring back tone which he never requested. Then it took him 3 days to get the caller tune deactivated. And he had to waste over Rs48 to shut down the service(reliance charges Rs6/min to call the IVR from where the service is deactivated).

Then i think to myself, earlier this year, Reliance ADA shares were penalised and blocked for trading by Securities and Exchange Board of India(SEBI) for carrying out insider trading that had inflated the group's share prices. What can one expect from such a network.

Well, i have to admit. Vodafone Essar has given me great service, and greater complaint support. No wonder i'm happy with it.

VLC brings in Santa

VLC Player has been known well in the software industry for being so stand alone and external codec free. Also its UI works brilliantly in Window 7. But here is something that i just noticed.

Its been quite sometime since i've updated my VLC player. I've been using my 3 year old VLC player, but this is the first time i've seen this thing. A christmas hat. VLC has really picked up the right things from Google. When i first saw this icon, i was quite surprised. Then i realised that it was the 20th, and the countdown to Christmas had begun. Its good to see companies like VLC take a step ahead to give its users a goodwill gesture for the holiday season.

Posts on hold

Hey guys





I would be busy for a couple of weeks now, so wouldn't be posting. But i have some new stuff waiting to be published.

signing off

PH

Sharad Pawar Slap Episode - a wakeup call

The recent episode of the slap that Sharad Pawar had to face as an effect of the public ire due to 'price rise' happens to be one of the most serious things that has hit the political class lately. It does come like a shock call to most of the political class. It does represent how much the public has resentment against UPA's policy of forcing its injust decisions on the nation. The silent yet supporting and non-aggressive behavior that guards at the function was attending clearly shows that even the people associated with securing these 'thieves' support the attackers. UPA has been forcing its decisions for its own benefit ever since it first came in power.

Just to give out some examples, earlier, the UPA had been trying to avoid the Joint Parliamentary Committee for an enquiry against then telecom minister A. Raja(who'se chargesheeted as of now). Same is the situation for the highly mass-supported India against Corruption led Janlokpal bill, and the retaliation of the masses against lifting any sort of investment restrictions on FDI. In times of recession, opening up FDI would just put more oil to the fuming prices of essential commodities. Within UPA's rule, prices for essential goods have jumped up 300-400 times, and in some goods upto 1600times. petrol was given the excuse, but everybody understands that 200% hke in petrol cannot cause a hike of 400% in foodgrain prices. Evidently people in the government are involved in artificially inflating prices.

And the way that the prime minister has been supporting all this is pretty pretty shameful. Mr Mohan Singh happens to be one of the biggest failures of the 21st century for India. From administrating, to economics - he's failed at everything.

And then, when a commoner hits out at a corrupt politician, all the political parties unitedly condemn this incident. And they forget this condemning when the students were lathicharged by police while protesting against 49% reservation in education and government jobs , or farmers protest injustice by the system to them in front of Rahul and other 'dum,toothless yet highly supported by dorks' leaders.

Its high time while policical parties should realise that they should stop this 'Loot-tantra' else they would have the same fate as of Saddam Hussain, Hosni Mubarak, Col. Gaddafi or the Russian Czar. Now what they do is in their hands. Getting assaulted by the mob, or developing the nation with public-accepted strategies is completely in their hands.

Another loyalty rogram - Payback

Future group introduced another loyalty program for its customers called "Payback". This new program allows customers at future group's trademark 'bazaar' stores(such as big bazaar, food bazaar, future bazaar) and other future group stores, such as pantaloons, hometown, along with a few other chains(such as fernsnpetals, icici bank credit cards, hpcl, univercell, LetsBuy) to avail points on purchase, and redeem them. And here's the business model. The signup form clearly states that the information would be used for telemarketing. Most of the people dont care about that, but i do, being privacy conscious. The companies have to do this in order t recover the cost of the cards, and make a subsequent profit out of it. I filled in incorrect information. Nobody loses anything and everybody gains something.

One thing, that occured to me was that chains such as Pantaloons have their own loyalty program. Till now, they have been giving discounts to the ir existing customers on their own loyalty card. With this new card, it might be possible that Pantaloons would be giving some benefits only to the Pantaloons 'green card' loyalty program members. Then how come one customer use two or three loyalty cards for the same purchase, it is something i'm still not able to understand.

LetsBuy - great deals, great value for money, not so great delivery speed

I recently got a pen drive ordered from Letsbuy.com (courtesy one of my friend). He had ordered a 6Gb pen drive from LetsBuy considering that it gave a great deal. Letsbuy gives this 6Gb Zipmem pen drive(yes, to my amaze too, a 6Gb pen drive exists) for Rs 270 including shipping which is actually a brilliant deal(or in one of my classmates's words - a loot). This order was done on the 7th of November.

But i didn't receive the product for 10days. Getting irritated, i called up the LetsBuy helpline at +91-124-4901234. For two days, the Letsbuy automated call attending system kept on disconnecting calls after making me wait for 3 minutes in the false hope of talking to a customer care executive. I had also mailed them, but till yet i have not yet received a response or an acknowledgement. After two days i.e on 18th November, when i was finally able to talk to them, on hearing the issue, they registered a complaint. Later i received a call on 21st from +91-124-6737562 regarding the same. The executive told me that the product will be shipped immediately. Later on the 23rd, i received a mail confirming that they had shipped the product from Blue Dart shipping, enclosing the shipping docket which could be checked on Blue Dart's site. And funny thing, at the footer of the mail, they had written the following

"We believe in offering genuine products with manufacturer's warranty at the best price and FASTEST DELIVERY"

Seems like a Joke. I may be wrong, but that's what i found. The product was prepaid,so processing shouldn't have taken much time. Anyways, i received the product on the 24th. They charged me immediately, and took 15days just to ship the product(in spite of the 4-7 day delivery claim on the website). And they were shipping from Delhi only, so shipping shouldn't have been an issue. And it took just two days for Bluedart to deliver the product. Had there been any delay beyond LetsBuy's control, they should have intimated me. Had i not called up and complained, i might have still been waiting for the product.

I had already been sceptica about purchasing things online, and this just strengthened my belief that the consumer has the lower hand in e-commerce, and cheating is quite possible(along with the regular phishing and confidential detail privacy issues). I had never heard of anyone's experience,but the news of internet forgery over the years has made me a bit overcautious. Fortunately(for me), i wasn't paying, as my friend had gifted me this drive(what a great pal, thanks dude). Otherwise, i would have surely gone haywire, considering i'm quite sceptic about my money. Would i think of buying anything from the internet in future - not likely with that kind of experience. But the deals at sites like Letsbuy are over the internet are just over the top, just like this one(4Gig HP v220 @ wholesale market costs INR290 + traveling, and here's 6Gig Zipmem @INR270). LetsBuy's deals would surely be hard to ignore.

What will i do, i cannot say. Something's are better left upon time.

What do you think, to buy, or not to buy from the internet? Feel free to pour in your comments

Rediffmail NG on MTNL 3G

Rediff had a pavilion this year at the India International Trade Fair 2011. A funny thing was that, they had set up a stall just next to the exit. Finding Rediff there, i just went and checked out what was going on. And here's the funny thing they were promoting - rediffmail NG for MTNL .

MTNL - already known for bad quality of service(QoS), has been a partner with rediffmail for providing pushmail services. Rediffmail, which i find one of the slowest mail providers, tied up with one of the worst quality networks out there. If rediff had provided this service on all other operators, it would have been a hit. But on MTNL, it seems like a distant dream.

Product Review - Tzinga Tropical Fruit

I recently came across this new flavour of Tzinga - Tropical Trip. In my previous review of the Lemon mint flavour, i had mixed reviews. When i saw this new flavour out there in the freezer, i decided to give it a try.

Tropical Trip, as the name hints, contains a mixed Tropical Fruit flavour consisting of Pear, Pineapple, Mandarin, Apple, Passionfruit and lemon. Here i must mention, all the flavours are well mixed, and so it takes time to identify the different components. Plus we have the regular caffeine, taurine, and sugar.

I bought it chilled, and the flavour was pleasant. It is nothing like the regular Red Bull'ish flavoured drinks, but it tastes good. A little on the fruity flavoured side, the drink seems pleasant to drink, and i would recommend it to the ones who're trying an energy drink for the first time, or to those who hate the typical strong flavour of Red Bull.

As for the packaging thing, personally speaking, i do dislike the plastic packaging. A tetrapack would have been better, but then, companies do things which are sometime confusing. Maybe its because Tetrapack increases costs, or the brand owners wanted to give their product a completely different identity for a product that comes in competition with the very dominating Red Bull.

Anyways, the drink did have mild effect on me. I was quite sleepy at the time when i had the drink. For the next two hours, i didn't feel sleepy, and neither too energetic(which Red Bull makes). I probably find Tzinga better than Red Bull. Reason being that it doesn't give an extreme kick.

And another notable thing. Its written very clearly that "not recomended for people who want to go early to bed" - a warning Red Bull should have written. When i first had Red Bull, it took me three days to get my regular sleeping routine back.

My review for Tzinga Tropical Fruit - 4 out of 5. Not an extreme kick, great flavour, great price just makes me find it the prefered choice.

What do you think? Do you share the same opinion, or think differently, feel free to pour in.

What times

Hey everyone
Sorry for not posting in ages. Have been terribly occupied with work lately. Job interviews, projects to name a few. I has a few drafts for for the blog, but got lost when my pen drive stopped working.

I shall be back to posting more tech stuff.

Signing off till then

Adobe stops Flash production

Adobe systems, in a recent chain of events, has decided to put an end to the hugely used Flash player. Adobe will not be developing its flash player for web browsers furthermore. This decision was taken at a recent meeting of the company. This move is taken as a long term well thought strategic move from Adobe systems Flash player was developed by Macromedia Inc which took it to its peak. But later Macromedia Inc was sold off to Adobe. Flash player has been well recieved by developers and web users for enriching the web experience, and adding a sense of creativity and ease to it.

This is being taken by the industry analysts as a move by Adobe to wipe out all the traces of Macromedia in its operations, and strengthen its brand identity. Some are even sceptical over the fact that this might reduce the business for Adobe, hence destabilising in the long run.

Google shuts down support for Gmail on Blackberry

In the recent turn of events, the search engine giant Microsoft turned off its support for users accessing their Gmail service from their Blackberry handsets. After this, Blackberry users will be able to check their Gmail only using the web interface, or the Gmail app downloadable from the gmail mobile website. This is considered as a move which Google has taken to aggressively market its enormously popular Gmail against Google's mobile OS Android competitior RIM which has given noteworthy competition to Google's Android with its new Blackberry 7 OS.


My personal view - love the move as a hardcore Google fan, dislike it for the Blackberry users, since multiple apps means no more single view multiple mailbox.

XP to 7 - a giant leap

Thats windows 7





Thats windows XP



Finally, i upgraded my old Windows XP to Windows 7. Yes, being a tech savvy person, i should have done that ages back. Its Windows 8 that's making waves lately, and now i'm using Windows 7. Sounds funny,though true. My old mates would never believe this.

Well,coming back, 7 is completely a glossy seeming Windows. The feel that 7 gives is very close to XP's. The gadgets are good. Though i'm still adjusting to 7, it feels good to use. And by the way, HD looks best in 7, probably because DVD was the 'hi-tech' thing at the time of development of XP.

All these years, the only reason for me rooting for XP is that XP is easy to insta`ll, and is a complete no-nonsense OS. Old compilers such as Turbo C run smoothly on it. 7 on the other hand, works efficiently and smooth. Its not that its more efficient than XP, but relatively faster.

XP is an operating system which can be used with 1Gb hard disk space, but 7 on the other hand needs atleast 7Gigfor the same. All the additional space required is for the upgraded features. It would not be wrong to say that 7's kernel is a copy of XP's pathbreakign kernel, which still is fun to explore. Very recently, i had a virus infection in which a file called "regsvr.exe" used to load at startup. I deleted the file, and all its associate files, and made a zero command program in C, and renamed it to the earlier's. Now XP runs flawlessly.

Also, XP has a very robust crash protection mechanism. Once i had a file in my Documents and Settings profile corrupted. I copied a file from another system, and replaced the old file with it. Post then, i was able to save my data. The profile was still usable, it would only take time to load the profile, and that becamne the reason i reinstalled XP.

And the best part. XP needs hardly 30 minutes to get installed and running on any multi-core system, whereas 7 needs atleast an hour to copy files, and another hour to get installed. Comparatively speaking, XP has way more advantages over 7.

XP has been one of the finest of the Windows Microsoft has ever released in the last decade(or even in history), and will still remain unless the software giant comes up with something big. Back in 2001. when XP got launched, it had outbeaten all OS's available then in the market, and flagged Microsoft as the undisputed king of softwares. Its XP that hindered Red Hat Linux's development. GNU had to rebrand RHL to Fedora to make it usable. Even OS X developers had to work too hard to save their existing customer bases, and Apple had to launch BootCamp to prevent Mac users to dump their Mac's and shift to regular PC's. And that is one big reason why most of the computers out there still work on XP and nothing else.

And for the fact, i installed 7 on a partition other than of XP's. So i have the freedom of using my 'old pal' XP sideways with this relatively new kid 7

What do you think about this? Do you agree that XP is way superior, or 7 outsmarts it. Feel free to pour in. Comments are welcomed

Jobs goes, iPhone 4S woes

In the recent chain of events, Apple unveiled its new iPhone 4S. The phone was labelled as dud, considering that it only had a mere few enhancements. Thats a different thing that people don't realise that 4G is not yet standardised, so Apple cannot come up with a product claiming its 4G ready(ignorant people). But one thing was sure - the Steve Jobs magic was not there.

And the very next day, Steve Jobs dies from cancer at the age of 56. This came as a big blow for Apple, as for them, its was Jobs who was weaving magic all around. Whether it was iPod, iPhone or iPad, all the products were released by Steve himself. The only product that was released in is absence - the iPhone 4S, was immediately termed dud by the journalists. Not only Steve Jovs was the face of Apple and Pixar, but was also associated with the innovation, quality,and product dellivery that Apple was reputed for.

But one thing is for sure. The death of Steve Jobs for a second must surely have shaken Bill Gates,whom Jobs was the closest competitor to. Suddenly the demise of the founder, and the subsequently media criticism of products must have made Gates worried, who was already on fire ever since Windows Vista was released.

Seems like tough times are coming. Already new innovations seem dim, and the old innovators leaving the planet, dark days are knocking the door. One thing is for sure - we will miss the innovation Jobs was famous for.

Rest In Peace Steve Jobs, you shall be eternally missed

Movie Review - Batman Begins

In my ongoing movie marathon,i watched the 2005 DC thriller Batman Begins. Directed by my favorite Christopher Nolan, i couldn't resist watching this movie. So after watching the movie, here's the review. Being a Christopher Nolan movie, the duration is long(just like in most of the Nolan movies), but the length is well justified considering how much in depth Nolan explains the character and his ways.

The Plot:

The movie starts with a dream. Young Bruce Wayne(played by Christian Bale) is in a greenhouse with Rachael Dawne(katie Holmes). While hiding from her, he falls into a well which was closed. Rachael goes to home and calls for help. Inside the well, because of the noise Bruce made while falling, enormous number of bats start flying outside, and he gets scared. And here ends the dream.

Bruce wakes up to find that he's in a jail. Just before his breakfast, he gets into a fight with a bunch of hustlers, and is locked in a cell. There, he meets Ducard(played by Liam Neelson) who proposes him to come visit him in the mountains if he wishes to pursue his desire to fight the evil. He represents a group called the League of Shadows. Bruce does so. He faces extreme difficulties in reaching the top, and when he does, he is greeted by Ducard. He starts his training immediately. The story goes back into the flashback as Bruce tells Ducard his story.

Bruce's young again. Post the falling into the well incident, Bruce and his parents go to an Opera. Bruce feels uncomfortable, and asks his parents to leave. While leaving, they come across a street gangster who kills both his parents. This affects young Bruce a lot. He considers himself responsible for his parent's death.

Bruce comes back to his home. He attends the trial of his parents's killers, but just when he thinks the killer's about to fall prey to him, he is killed. When he tries to reason the killers of his parent's killers, he is beaten up and thrown out of the building. He is told that being at the top of a multi-million enterprise, he will never know how the dark world operates. He takes this statement to his ego, and goes to an exotic land where he lives like a commoner, and observes the world of illegal doings.

While meeting an underworld trader, he gets caught in a police raid and lands up in a jail. And thats where the story had started.


The story comes back to the present where Bruce is in the mountains.Back again in the mountains, Bruce starts rigourous training. This training continues for sometime. He is taught by Ducard, under the supervision of a martial arts guru Ra's Al Ghul. After the completion of his training, the league of shadows asks him to kill a man who committed crime. They also disclose that their next target is Gotham city which they will wipe out compeletely. Bruce doesn't do so, and escapes. And in the process, kills everyone, but saves Ducard.

Bruce then returns to Gotham city, and joins his company Wayne Enterpises. He comes in contact with the old people he had left. He joins the R&D division of his company where he meets Lucius Fox(played by my fav. Morgan Freeman), who once was a director at the time when Bruce's father used to run the company. He introduces Bruce to various defence products that the company had developed, but not put on production. Sending Bruce to the R&D division was just a way for the board to keep Bruce away from the company's proceedings.

Then starts Bruce's pursuit of creating a new identity. He starts working on his Batsuit. And uses it to counter the criminals.

But meanwhile, a microwave vapouriser used to convert water to vapour for industrial purposes gets stolen. Later it turns out that Dr Jonathan Crane, a doctor who has been getting criminals transfered to sanitorium has been supporting Ra's Al Ghul in his evil plan to wipe out the city, by mixing his poisonous mixture in the water supply of the city, and vapourising it. Bruce later finds out that Ducard is actually Ra's Al Ghul. Ra's Al Ghul comes to Bruce's birthday party, and exposes his intentions, and burns down his house. Ra's Al intends to blow up the central water pumping station with the microwave vapouriser using a train to reach there,which would cause hallucination among the citizens, and hence cause people to kill each other out of fear(hence the city will destroy itself). Bruce manages to escape with the help of his loyal butler of his family Alfred(played by Michael Caine).

Batman then goes out to save the city. He gives Sargent Jim Gordon(played by Gary Oldman),the very officer who handled his parent's murder case when he was a child, the access to his car, and asks him to blast away some metro pillars, so that the train that carries crashes. Gordon does his work, and manages to rip off the track. Meanwhile , Batman goes into the train,holds up a fight with Ra's and when he finds that Gordon had completed his work, leaves. The train crashes, and Ra's dies.

Meanwhile, Rachael finds out about the real identity of Batman. Bruce decides that he would rebuild the burnt Wayne mansion brick by brick. In the last scene, Gordon calls Batman, and briefs him about a new criminal called "The Joker". The end

Final Take:
Christopher Nolan is one nightmare for all directors trying to compete with him. His direction has been marvellous to watch, whether it is Inception, and Batman Begins shows such a brilliant director he is. His screenplay is great.

Christian Bale, and the rest of the cast also has done a brilliant job in the movie. Michael Caine, in the role of Alfred has done some outstanding role.

My rating 4.6 out of 5

Movie Review - Delhi Belly

In my ongoing movie marathon, i caught up with the controversial Aamir Khan production Imran Khan starrer Delhi Belly. Heard of it a lot, i decided to watch the movie.

The Plot:
Tashi(played by Imran Khan) is a journalist who lives in a stinky apartment with his two friends Arup(played by Vir Das) and Nitin(played by Kunal Roy Kapoor). Nitin works as a photographer with Tashi, and Arup works as an animation artist in a company. Tashi has a girlfriend cum fiance Soniya(played by Shehnaz Treasury) whom he intends to marry.

Vladimir - A diamond smuggler Vladimir, comes to India. His associate in illegally exporting diamonds who happens to be an airhostess is busy somewhere,and asks her friend Soniya to take a packet from Vladimir and deliver it to the mentioned address. Soniya being a airhostess herself, doesn'tgo through extensive baggage check.

Menaka(played by Pooja Jagannathan), a special correspondant is a collegue of Tashi, who likes him. They meet during a star's interview. She keeps on hitting him every time she meets him.

On the other hand, Tashi is gifted a car by Soniya's parents.

Soniya gives Vladimir's packet to Tashi for delivering, but Tashi asks Nitin to do so. Nitin gets sick(hence Delhi Belly). Because of this, he is unable to do so, and asks Arun to do so, along with giving a sample for medical examination at the pathological laboratory. Arun mixes up between the two packets, and delivers the sample to the address, and the smuggled packet to the path lab.

Meanwhile, Menaka calls Tashi to a party where he gets into a fight with her husband Rajeev who is extremely drunk. They escape the party, but Rajeev follows them. He damages Rajeev's car a lot. Menaka and Tashi reach a hotel where they are able to escape Rajeev. Tashi drops Menaka to her place, and goes straight to Soniya's place.

The next morning, everyone goes their regular ways. But Cowboy(played by Vijay Raaz) reaches Vladimir's hotel asking for the package. The package contains diamonds worth millions. There they find out the blunder in packet delivery. Cowboy goes to Tashi's house with his men, and hold them. Nitin by chance brings the package from the lab, and when he returns to his place, finds all of them waiting. They find out that the package contains diamonds. Cowboy decides to kill them, but the ceiling for the flat collapes. Cowboy and his men go unconscious, and Tashi and his friends escape.

They sell the diamonds to a trader. But later, Cowboy calls them and they find out that he has Soniya, and he'll kill her if they don't bring the diamonds back. So they go back to the trader who asks them double the price the gave them for the jewels. He throws them out of the place. Tashi includes Menaka in the group and forcefully exchanges the diamonds with him, and escape. Nearby police pursues them. While escaping, Menaka and Tashi go cosy.

Tashi and the group reaches Cowboy's stated place, and are ready to make the exchange. But Cowboy starts pointing the gun at them. Just in the nick of time, the trailing police comes and starts firing, and Cowboy and his men counterfire. Tashi, his friends, Soniya, and Vladimir(who was also in the room) duck , and save their lives. Everyone else in the room is either killed, or left unconscious. They escape. The package containing diamonds falls from the window of the room, and onto Tashi's landlord.

Soniya finds out about Tashi and Menaka go cosying. She goes mad over him for so. Tashi calls off his marriage. Menaka returns to bid final goodbye, but when she's about to leave, Tashi realises his affection for her, and kisses her. The end

Final Take:
The movie funny and stupid. The story isn'tpowerful,but yet manages to make one laugh. Mature people will not like the movie, and so will the female audience, as the movie extremely vulgar. Vulgar abuses are used in the movie in every scene.

Ram Sampath's music is a bit catchy at first look, but slowly one tends to get irritated of them. The old songs used in the movie are good.

The direction is good, one cannot find any contradicting facts in the movie. Usually in such mindless comedies, direction is usually poor. Aamer Khan makes sure the movie has a good end product.

Frankly speaking, Delhi Belly seems like an Indianised version of The Hangover, infact quite is. Its just the Hangover story modified to Indian situations.

My rating for the movie 3 out of 5. Too much abuse, no strong story, and just mayhem in the movie doesn't make me want to give anything more than 1.5, but the humor is just mindblowing.

Movie Revew - Mr Bean's Holiday

Another one of the movies that i caught up recently was the 2007 release Rowan Atkinson starrer Mr Bean's Holiday. Being under Mr Bean's label, the movie had my expectations up high.

The Plot:
Mr Bean who resides in London, goes to a Raffle in the month of June. Its raining profusely. He's late, and on reaching there, finds out that he's won a holiday to the south of France along with a handycam. And in the next scene, he's on the train to Paris, playing with his new camera. He's destined to Cannes. In Paris, he has a mixup of cabs, and reaches Vous Etes Ici instead of the railway station at Gare De Lyon. He starts walking and reahces there,but misses the first train to Paris, so has lunch at a local restaurant. After having his lunch, he goes to the platform , and starts doing some shooting with his camera. There, he asks a gentleman bound for the same train as him to record for him. In the process, the guy recording for him misses the train, and his son is left alone inside the train. The boy gets upset on finding this. Bean tries hard to cheer him up, but the boy remains angry. At a local station, the boy takes revenge by making Bean miss the train.

On the next train, the boy's father comes, but the train doesn't stop. The man had displayed his phone number, but the last two digits go missing. Bean tries to call the number, but doesn't help. He boards the next train, but he realises that he's left his passport and wallet on the station's telephone booth. He's kicked out of the train the next station.

There starts a long struggle for Bean to reach Cannes, and loses the boy. He reaches a road in the countryside, where he's given a lift by a girl, who also has to go Cannes. They stop at a restaurant where he meets the boy again. They again continue for Cannes. The girl stops at a place on the outskirts of Cannes to get her car refuelled where she comes to know about Bean and the boy. It turns out that the boy's father is a jury of the Cannes Film Festival. And by chance, he is judging the same movie the girl had acted in.

They reach Cannes,and crash at the venue of premiere. The film is a complete bore. The girl finds out that her scene has been cut, and is heartbroken. Looking at this, Bean plays the video he had recorded of her in the journey, and by chance it makes perfect sense with the narration. The jury member recognises Bean, and when he comes to get him, meets is son who was itting on the back side of the projection screen. Bean reaches the beach. The girl becomes a star. The director of the bore film becomes a master director. At the End, the movie becomes a musical.

Final take:
Te movie is okay, but not as good as it could be. Personally, i found Johnny English a dozen times more funny than Mr Bean's Holiday. As i had indicated earlier, the movie didn't quite live up to the expectation of the extremely popular Mr Bean .

Rowan Atkinson has done really good acting. So did everyone else in whatever little part they had. There wasn't much acting involved, as there was not much story.

I'd give the movie 2.5 out of 5

Movie Review - Johnny English

Another one of the movies which i had a peek at recently was the 2003 Rowan Atkinson starrer Johnny English. Mr Atkinson, being a funny man, is hard to resist. The movie is a spoof on the Bond series.

The Plot:
Johnny English(played by Rowan Atkinson) is a British secret agent of the MI7. He works at the office, and is nothing more than a paper pusher. Once, during the funeral of the topmost agent, where the incharge for security was Johnny English, an explosion occurs, and all the agent die.

But meanwhile, the security of the queen's jewels becomes an issue. The secret service suspects a multi-millionare jail operator Pascal Sauvage - a frenchman , to be behind this. Johnny is posted at the place of exhibit to protect the jewels, but the thieves somehow manage to steal the jewels and escape.

While investigating for the theft, English and his associate reach Pascal's hideout where his men have the Queen jewels. Because of a blunder, the thieves escape with the jewels in a hearse. English and his asscociate Bough chase him, but lose him in the way and track the wrong hearse. When they realise their blunder, they somehow manage to get out of the situation.

Later it comes out that the MI7 was correct, and Pascal is the mastermind behind the theft. He intends to control Britain.

Meanwhile, the MI7 chief discontinues English from the case when English suggests that he suspects Pascal to be the mastermind of the theft. English decides to inspect the office of Sauvage. When they do, they find out about Sauvage's plans to crown himself as the King of England. They meet Special agent Lorna Campbell(played by Natalie Imburglia) of the Interpol who also is tracking Sauvage's activities, but unfortunately they get caught. The MI7 chief discontinues him from the case. This breaks English's confidence.

Pascal's men break into the Buckingham palace, forcefully make the Queen sign a will to crown Sauvage the king, and hide her. Meanwhile, the case gets reassigned to Lorna, and she seeks English's assistance in catching Sauvage. They reach the outskirts of Pascal's secret hideout palace and break in the night before Pascal would be sworn in as the King. There they find out that pascal intends to convert the whole of England into one large jail, but in the process, get caught.

They manage to escape when Bough comes behind tracking them. They escape, and break into the ceremony. There, in a string of events, English tries to expose him, but Sauvage orders him to be thrown away.. Sauvage gets irritated of all the drama, and utters ill things to the British. English escapes the guards, and just before the crown gets placed on sauvage's head, English pushes him and to everyone's surprise, English gets crowned. English immediately understanding the changed situations, orders to arrest Sauvage. People roar in praise of English's order.

The Queen gets restored of her powers. She awards English with a knighthood. English goes on a vacation with Loren, where he makes a blunder which leaves Loren in a pool. The End

Final Take:
The movie is very funny. Rowan Atkinson plays his part wonderfully. Natalie Imburglia suits the role well. Others play their part well.

I watch the movie twice, because it was so funny. Because it mocks the British monarchy and the church,it has been rated much lower than what it deserves. This movie is more funny than most of the Mr Bean movies, which are low on dialogues.

My rating for Johnny English : 4 out of 5.

Movie Review - The King's Speech

I had the opportunity to watch a movie - the oscar nominated The Kings speech.. Having heard a lot about it, i decide to watch it. Now, here' sthe review

The Plot:
The story sets in 1925. King George Vth's younger son - Albert Fredrick, the Duke of York(played by Colin Firth) has a stammering issue. He stammers too much every time he needs to talk. This stammering problem becomes a cause for embarrasment for him at the closing ceremony of the Empire Exhibition at the Wembley stadium - an exhibition staged by the various British colonies from all over the world. He excessive stammering makes the speech a headache for all the listeners out there.That is when he decides to take medical treatment for the illness.

He tries many medicinal procedures to reduce the stammering problem including some really silly ones, like cigerette smoking. But none of them show any results. He eventually gives up hope.

His wife Elizabeth(played by Helena Carter), on suggestion of the president of society for speech therapies, secretly visits Lionel Logue(played by Geoffrey Rush) who resides in Harley Street and discusses the issue.. The doctor agrees to treat his problem, but with the condition that the duke would have to follow his rules. But initially the king finds the techniques of Lionel offensive.

Later one evening, while being extremely tensed over a christmas speech that his father had asked him to deliver, he decided to hear a recording from the last session at Lionel. And he found that Lionel's experiement was extremely successful. He decides to continue the treatment, and finds himself in a better state.

After the first world war, King George Vth demises. After his death, Albert's older brother David becomes the King. Albert does everything to make David the king, as he is scared of the public speaking responsibilities that a king has. As a ruler, David does not discharge his duties as a king, and wastes his time in the service of his love interest Wallis Simpson. She is a twice divorced woman who knows how to control men. David decides to marry her. But that would be deemed illegal, as the King is the head of the church.

It is decided that Albert would be the king, and would be called King George VIth. On 12th of December 1936, Albert is sworn in as the King, but his first briefing as a king to his men is a disaster for him. His stammering makes it too embarrasing for him.This stammering breaks his soul. He consults Lionel again.

Before getting officially sworn in at the Westminster Abbey, Albert discovers that Lionel did not have any formal credentials, and gets hurt. But Lionel in time, controls the situation, and makes him assured. They practice the speech's in the Abbey. And Albery becomes King George VIth without any embarrasment.

Later, World War II between England and Germany. The king had to deliver a speech on behalf of the nation. And this speech would be a historic one. Just as George gets his speech, he calls in for Lionel. Lionel comes and assists him. His futuristic vision helps George to be at ease while giving the speech. The speech was a success. After the speech, everyone applauds the king for the well delivery. George acknowledges him as a friend, and thanks hi for all the suppor he had contributed to the monarch.

Later in 1944, Lionel was awarded with the commander in chief rank for his services to the monarch. The movie ends.

Final Take:

The movie is good. It shows how the most powerful person on the planet is so terrorised by a small fear, and his struggle to overcome it.

Colin Firth has done a splendid job. He played the role of a stammering royalty with brilliance. Geoffrey Rush and Helena Carter have also done a splendid job.

Ther direction has been outstanding, the director Tom Hooper has done a magnificent job,and rightly gets the credit for it.

My rating for the movie - 4 out of 5

Buy Blog Reviews - Does it Work

I recently came across a site called Buy Blog Reviews. Well, here's another one of the sites that allow affiliates to earn using sponsored posts. Does it work, i don't know.



Well, if any of you have an idea of whether this works, do comment here.

My New Casio G1W MTP 1300D 1AVDF

I just bought a new watch. On browsing through a huge collection of watches from various brands like Titan, Timex, Fast Track, Swatch and the likes, i finally purchased one from Casio. With the trust on the brand Casio, it seemed to be the best deal at the store.

















Here are the features of the watch

Case / bezel material: Stainless steel
Stainless Steel Band
One-touch 3-fold Buckle
50-meter water resistance
Mineral Glass
Regular timekeeping
Analog: 3 hands (hour, minute, second),
3 dials (day, day of the week, 24-hour)

Accuracy: 20 seconds per month

Approx. battery life: 2 years on SR621SW
Size of case/total weight: 45 X 41.9 X 8.7 mm/114 g


Finishing of the watch is good. The feeling that aluminium gives is one of its kind. The watch is quite light compared to other models.

The watch has three sub dials - one showing day, one showing date, and the third showing the time in hrs.

The numbers scribed on the dial, as on the side of the rim are very clear and easily readable. Only in case of low lights, the watch is not

The watch also comes in variant in which the background is white instead of black, but i'd not recommend it for young guys out there.

I bought it at Rs2995 from Arun Watch Shop, Yusuf Sarai, New Delhi (which happens to be one of the biggest watch dealers in Delhi). I did find it on watchkart.com, but then again i'm not so sure of less heard online companies trading.

My rating for the watch - 4.8/5 . Have money - go buy it !

Adsense (Sigh)

I had recently applied for the Google's Adsense program. Considering it to be a good one,i applied for it.Today, i got this mail. Unfortunately, Google thinks i haven't got sufficient content.


Issues:

- Insufficient content

---------------------

Further detail:


Insufficient content: To be considered for AdSense, your site must contain
enough text content for our specialists to review and for our crawlers to
identify relevant ads to show on your pages. We recommend including more
complete sentences and paragraphs on your site. We require websites to be
fully launched and functioning, allowing users to navigate throughout your
site with a menu, sitemap, or appropriate links. Once the majority of your
site is complete and functional, we'll be happy to reconsider your
application.


Google. If four years of blogging on the world doesn't give you enough content for your crawlers which run through my page everyday, nothing will !!

Quick Review -First Impression - Sansung Galaxy S2

Recently, i went to a Tata Croma store in Noida, where i came across the Samsung Galaxy S2. Being disconnected lately with the technology news (primarily because i was growing short on time because of the hectic schedule). Coming back to S2, the phone was a bigger version of the Samsung Galaxy S, with an improved display, and a better camera, not mentioning the improved battery life.






The phone was quite slim compared to its width. A real light phone, it was very quick in launching apps. Must say, i found it similar to the Galaxy S, but this one's a better.

Will post a full review for Sansung Galaxy S2 in the coming days

Viral Fever - What a way to start a new Year

Its 1st September today. People might know it as Padma Lakshmi's birthday, Life Insurance Corporation of India's foundation day, or IndianOil Day,
. But for me, its called "Birthday".

This year, the birthday, like every year was full of unpredictable surprises. One of the unpleasant ones this year was Viral fever. For a couple of days, i had been feeling weak, and had difficulty in sleeping. Infact , wasn't sleeping 6 hours a day.yesterday, i just tried using a thermometer, and it gave a shock- Viral Fever. And that too on the eve to my new year.

So i finally entered the new year with fever, paracetamol pills, hot water gargles , and a call from my ex. While the latter was soothing, the former ones were something i never expected to do.

Happy Birthday to me !!

Blogger's Rights - a must read for every blogger

Many a times we come across the news for people getting jailed for their bitter yet true remarks. Passing of resolution against Om Puri's speech at the RamLila Maidan is one of such events.

And on the internet, we do tend to use our freedom of speech , and we do sometimes go over the edge in expressing ourselves.

I found a link which mentions all the rights that we bloggers have, our freedom of speech, to things that go in for our defence in difficult situations.

https://www.eff.org/issues/bloggers

The link has references to all your requirements, and points that you should know. Run by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, i found the link to be highly useful.

Hope you guys find it as useful as i did. Suggestions are welcomed

Product Review - Tzinga

I recently tried a new energy drink which i had heard of. The drink's named Tzinga, an is promoted by a Gurgaon based firm.

I purchased a pack of Tzinga. It was a 200ml pouch, hence cutting the traditional can cost. But the price was too shockingly low - INR 20. I can buy 4 of these, and still have a polo. This is probably the cheapest drink out there in the Indian market.

The pouch is more like those cheap one drink pouches available in the market.






The drink comes in Lemon Mint flavour, and claims to have ginseng and guarana added along with Taurine. And all this for 20 bucks. I decided to buy it.

I opened the pack(which is sealed like a juice tetrapack), and tasted it. First thought - Mint dominates every other flavour. Slowly lemon comes into the picture when the tongue becomes used to it. But first reaction is.... too wierd for someone whose just migrated from Red Bull or the similar class. The taste of caffeine is missing, and the flavour of mint is spoiling the drink.

I somehow managed to gulp the whole drink. Will i put my money on buying this product - maybe not. Reason : Out of the league flavour, which is totally imbalanced. Mint might make alcoholics go in for it, but as a regular stand-alone energy drink, the mint's just too much.

If the flavour have had less of mint and more of lemon, the flavour would have been better. Maybe because i'm drinking an energy drink after ages, i'm feeling the exhuberant variation in the flavour.

My rating - 3.5/5

Another visit at the Easy Day - more surprises await

Yesterday, i did visit the easy day store at the Botanical Garden Metro Station again. I was on my way to the Great India Place(walkable distance from there), and it was pretty humid and hot. So decided to pick up some juice or drink.



I bought a Minute Maid pulpy orange drink. The product costs 20 bucks normally, but surprisingly the staff charged me INR 16.50 . On furthur enquiring, i came to know that Easy Day does offer discounts at every product.

I literally was surprised to see that most of the stock had been sold, and fresh stock had been ordered. The store manager told me that the demand for the products had been more than what anyone had expected.

Good to see competition ruling the Indian chains

The Shame minister of India - Mohan Singh

Mohan Singh happens to be the most dull prime minister in the history of India. I wonder what was INC thinking before selecting such a man for the post.


Yesterday, when Rahul Gandhi read his speech from a piece of paper in the parliament, the whole union cabinet came in praise of Rahul for uttering his speech like a child's nursery poem in the annual playschool function in front of his sister Priyanka who was the chief guest.

It really surprises me. The government is acting like an incubator for Rahul Gandhi's political career, and not as the administrator of the nation.

And the shameless smile of the PM in the Lok Sabha, who under the cloud of the tag of an "administrative failure" still thinks praising Rahul will boost his career. His appointed ministers - Raja,Kalmadi, Soren all in jail,with the appointed impeached CJI being his choice- all adding to his failures. Anna Ji was fasting for 12 days for a strong Lokpal bill while all he can think is boost Rahul's career at that time?

Sounds bad for the nation, really disheartening state of affairs .

App Review - Adobe Muze(Code Name)

I just came across Adobe Muse while surfing around the web. Abobe Muze is a new software for creating beautiful web pages without having any knowledge of the web programming. It includes support for scripts. The software is in its initial development stages. Initially released for Mac's, the product is now available for the Windows platform.

Installing it wasn't difficult, as it installs directly from the Adobe site. You need Adobe Air to make it work.

Here are two screenshots from the development phase




I made a very simple site, and in 5 minutes. Yes, it did take me around ten minutes to understand what the software environment was, but then got comfortable with it. The environment is slightly different than of Microsoft Frontpage or Yahoo Sitebuilder, but still user friendly. Being Adobe, the software gives a feeling of a flash player in motion. Nevertheless, it makes quite gud pages. Novice and professional web designers will love this program. And this is after the fact that Muse is just a codename, and the product is still in its initial stages.

The demo site i developed is online. Check the photo gallery tab for the software's beauty. You can check it by clicking Here . You can go directly at the photogallery at http://prattzz.freewebspace.com/the-photo-gallery.html

As you could have seen in the site, scripting is embedded in the program. So in case of building a customised site, the program gives quite a lot of options. Also, the gallery does support facebook'ish photo browsing, something that appealed me a lot.

My personal rating for Adobe Muse : 4.5 out of 5

Adobe Muse is available at http://muse.adobe.com/

India gets a new cheap super-charged SUV with Force One

Yesterday, Force motors launched their new SUV - Force One. The new SUV is already making waves , as it is offered at a surprisingly low price of INR 10,65,000 , which seems to be quite cheap. And to add to it, the SUV comes with a Mercedes-Benz validation of the whole car, adding to it reliability and perfomance.

To add more, Amitabh Bachchan was made the brand ambassador for the SUV.

Source

Difference between the Govt "Jokepal" Lokepal and Anna's Lokepal

Today, on the Delhi Metro while on my way back to home , an India Against Corruption volunteer was distributed pamphlets clearly specifying the difference between the government formed Lokepal better known as Jokepal, and Anna Hazare led IAC's Lokepal. The pamphlet stated all the crucial points in Lehmann's language, so easy that anyone can read and understand. All of you should have a look at it. The pamphlet being in Hindi, was read by all in the train, and triggered discussion about the movement.






This pamphlet can also be read in English at http://www.indiaagainstcorruption.org/docs/english_pamphlet.pdf and http://www.box.net/shared/l5okarpc3l3btzk6ore8

And after that, if the government doesn't decide to formulate Anna ji's Lokepal, then its a shame that we have selected such pathetic people to run the nation.