Why Social Media?

1^st of all many who will be reading this post will be on any one of the Social Media platforms. Interestingly all of them reading this will someway or the other be routed to this post via one of the Social Media Platforms.

Agree or not we are all Social beings and we are proving right in a different way, Not socializing in Public but via the Web. Turn on the radio, TV or for that matter any advertising media, end of the clip/poster there will be something like “Follow us on Twitter” “Like our page on Facebook” and so on. Did you guys ever wonder what is so great about social media?? I am not taking any complicated stories here, but what level of reach “Why this Kolaveri” has attained is all because of Social Media.

Today, all Global Companies ranging from Consumer products to IT products & services to Manufacturing companies to the Recruitment Companies, they all do invest on the Social Media. Even the Healthcare fraternity no longer ignores the Social Media.

People obtain information, education, news and other data from electronic media and print media. Social media are distinct from industrial or traditional media, such as newspapers, television, and film. They are relatively inexpensive and accessible to enable anyone (even private individuals) to publish or access information, compared to industrial media, which generally require significant resources to publish information. Apart from Email, Instant Messaging which have been extensively used, a few of the other examples of Social media are the Twitter, Facebook, etc. Social media is a waste of time if you don’t utilize it in the right sense, Playing games or just chatting over these sites will just waste your time but what you have to make sure is it is make use of it by gaining information, proper contacts in all walks of life, Getting your news/post to maximum number of people etc.

A recent report indicate that Indian’s are now spending more time on social media sites. Social Media in India is growing at close to 100 % and is likely to touch 45 million users by the end of 2012. As subscribers are now coming out with cheaper internet packages this figure is slated to grow much further.

The flip-side of all the virtues of Social Media is that there seems to be no universal guideline on usage of the social media. Though we have increasingly more social network users the question that stands out is how familiar they are with these social networks and what precaution have they taken to safeguard themselves against any information leak or against their vulnerability. Off-late, it is been felt in various forums that we need legalized checks to rein in the opinions being expressed, intrusions of privacy all of which may hurt people and their sentiments. Companies like Twitter & Facebook is taking steps to combat this and its ultimately in the hands of the user who uses it properly and not click on things which are in the 'SPAM' category and get trapped.

My suggestion is just this, No matter what people say you are going to need this in the years to come if you want to be successful. Think about it and you will know what i'm trying to convey here as i do not represent any company and its just the person in me that is requesting you.

The post cannot end just like this, I need to give away my Social Media reach as well right?

Follow me (Twitter) : @iMishaal

Blog : The very blog you are reading this post, If you are that illiterate, here it is (www.mishaalhk.blogspot.com :P )

LinkedIn : http://in.linkedin.com/in/mishaalhk

Youtube : http://www.youtube.com/user/Mishaalhk

What Provoked 'THE HINDU"

Nope, this is not about the Religion 'HINDU" i am talking about in the title but the News Paper "THE HINDU". I know there wont be anyone here who wouldnt have seen the new "Go ahead of the Times" campaign of the Chennai based newspaper "The Hindu".

It all started with Times of India coming into the Chennai market where the market leader was "The Hindu". People view this battle with so much of Interest as they are considered to be the market Leaders in the Indian context point of view. Like the very famous Blackberry & Apple fight which happened over a couple of years back (Ad link below for reference)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNj2XPhPrx4

The very moment i saw this Hindu Advertisement it reminded me of the video above. Strange as you call it, TOI did not do it targeting only The Hindu but for some reason the latter took it pretty seriously. I would personally want to read Hindu as against the Entertainment friendly TOI as they hardly have any news in their papers and only Advertisements in their main paper. If you have a close look you would find that atleast 40% of the Newspaper is advertisements, and would you want to spend money for a paper that shows advertisements or read some sensible news? I am sure if a survey is done atleast 70% + people would opt for The Hindu as against the Times of India.

I agree people are moving to TOI loosing their senses to think and wanting to know about what the Entertainment industry is upto and all that, and Hindu would have sensed that they are loosing a lot of people that way and hence the new Ad just to make oneself understand the importance of newspapers. From my small study i did i find that people who have subscribed to the TOI are using it as a secondary newspaper as Hindu remains their primary one. And for a yearly subscription of just below Rs 300 (I guess) people would anyways go for it being a silly amount and that is how they are just a secondary paper. No offence to the TOI fans here but this was just my personal opinion and there is this one right called the "Freedom of Speech" (Refer Jan 27th 1950 Edition of The Hindu :P)

Year 2011 - A Tribute

Well this wouldnt be a long post as like my earlier one's but i would call it more of an Ice Breaker as i havent posted anything here for ages. My reasons for not having posted anything here for a while are many but being 'LAZY' tops the list and then the 'NO TIME' reason tops the list.

All in all a great year it was from passing out of B-School and getting into Maersk, the worlds largest Container operating company in the world. Meanwhile that one phase where i was in the Job-Hunting position was quite a pain and i must tell you its one time that you cant do anything freely and have this thing of getting a call any moment (For Interviews). I was left stranded in this city with friends inviting me to join them for trips and i had to reject it all because of my calls for interviews mostly being on weekends.

We lost lots of Talent Personalities in the area of Cinema, Music, Politics and even well known "Terrorists" as well. We saw many CEO's being replaced and it was indeed a great business year for most of the Companies. Indians point of view we witnessed something which was hard to witness with that of the Rupee falling at its all time low at Rs 54 a Dollar.

Securing the Gold Medal in Finance at my B-School was an honor and i was to be honest surprised at getting that medal but i hope this one achievement can take me places in future. There were no International Trips last year and i'd make it up this year for sure.

Steve Jobs : A Tribute

6:30AM, Friend of mine sents a message stating the shocking news of the death of one of the greatest innovators of all time. At just the age of 56, Steve Jobs had almost 1/3^rd of the world knowing him making him one of the most renowned personalities in recent times. There were rumors in the past of him passing away and I regreted this news as well. Turned on the TV to find out if the news was true. A legend in his own way, Innovation and Easy going in life was his key USP’s.

From “Steve Jobs is an American Entrepreneur…” to “Steve Jobs was an American Entrepreneur…” in Wikipedia was the next thing I checked out to find out if the news was true. Giving away his CEO post to Tim Cook in August I guess he already knew that his time was coming to an end. Exactly a day before his death the latest iPhone which is the iPhone 4S was launched {Probably the S stands for Steve – iPhone 4 Steve} . I have always had these 2 videos of Steve, one the very famous Stanford Graduation Ceremony speech in 2005 and the All things Digital Conference one on one talk with Bill Gates which was very hilarious at the same time very informative.

Steve had his own share of Bad Phase in his life and this was during 1984 when there was an Industry wide sales slump and following an internal power struggle and an announcement of significant layoffs because of the disappointing sales at that time, Jobs was relieved of his duties and he himself claimed that he got fired from Apple. After a while Jobs started all over again and came back to Apple Inc. He realized he’s been living in one of the most creative period of his life and that Innovation was the key if he wanted the company to grow. From iMacs to iPads he had a big hand in its development.

Not many know that Steve Jobs as CEO was earning just $1 as his salary, Others were all shares and in 2010 Forbes estimated his net wealth at $8.3 Billion. Jobs always stressed on the importance of team work and his model for business believe it or not were ‘The Beatles” as they kept each others negative tendencies in check; and they balanced each other. The totel of the band was greater than the sum of the parts. His importance in todays world can be witnessed by the kinds of Tribute he’s been receiving from all walks of life from Obama to Bill Gates.

Apple Inc Paid Tribute their all time Hero Steve Jobs by having his Photo in the home page of http://www.apple.com/. And said “Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.”

Steve’s all time Rival and a great friend Bill Gates tweeted, “I’m truly saddened to learn of Steve Job’s death. The world rarely sees someone who had the profound impact Steve has had, the effects of which will be felt for many generations to come, For those of us lucky enough to get to work with him, it’s been an insanely great honor. I will miss Steve immensely”

Google’s CEO Larry Page said, : He was a great man with incredible achievements and amazing brilliance. Google also posted a subtle tribute below its main search bar which said “Steve Jobs, 1955-2011”

President of the US where Apple Inc was born, Barack Obama said: "There may be no greater tribute to Steve’s success than fact that much of world learned of his passing on a device he invented."

Twitter Tips & How to decode Twitter Psychos?

As an avid Twitter user i have come across lots of different people in this platform over the last 2 years. Now before getting into how you decode the Twitter Psychos let me give you a few Twitter Etiquette which you need to follow for a peaceful 'twittering' career. They are as follows;

-> No ASL Business in Twitter, People who really want this and is obsessed with this can go to this one site called www.orkut.com (:P)

-> Since its a 140 character business, Everything needs to be short with a Hash tag (#) to highlight the topic.

-> If its a late reply that you are making to a tweet, do it with a '#' referencing to what you are replying to, He/She may not recollect what that reply was for. Twitter has brought in a feature wherein you can know what that reply was for but this happens only in the Web and a few application, many do not have this feature.

-> Dont Follow people un-necessarily. If only a few people follow you and you follow a thousand people or more, many would assume you are a spammer. An in Twitter spammers are considered SATANS. :P

-> Humour is accepted but not tweets like "Just felt the Earthquake, it was damn fun" , Atleast a person reading the tweet has commen sense and knows that you were scared to death and just trying to show off giving a humour quotient to it.

-> Also, you dont you occasionally need to use the rest room? Please dont take your phone in there. There have been quite a lot in my timeline who has an update for everything from the 1st ball of a cricket match till the end of a match or if Shakti Kapoor or whoever makes an entry or an exit in Big Boss 5 or Big boss 25. You are literally getting some of your followers bored with one single topic and dangers/chances of you being blocked/unfollowd is very likely

-> Twitter is becoming a very common platform and chances are likely that your Boss/Manager/Parents/Relatives are tracking your tweets. You dont want an additional sheet of your tweets (Tweets containing offensive words against your Office/Workplace/Manager) along with your appraisal form My recommendation is to keep your account PRIVATE and enjoy cribbing, but make sure the people who request to follow you are not the people who are trying to hide from.

-> Stay within your limits, something what you can learn from the basic thing in twitter, the 140 character limit. That being said do not have more than 2 tweets with "...Contd" , It just doesnt go with the essence of twitter.

-> Whenever you send a DM (Direct Message) make sure you inform the recipient as well but mentioning him/her. Most twitter users are not used to checking their messages and its only the Mention tab that they look into (Unless they are using an external app like Tweet-Deck)

Now that you have known the Do's and Dont's (Well, according to me and my knowledge) lets see how do you deal with a few different people in Twitter, A friend of mine @Kofykat (Twitter Handle) wrote this post on her latest post titled "Twitter behaviour Decoded" where after reading thought i would write something on how to handle these people.

-> The Spammer : Just leave them alone, Dont ever reply to their tweets and block them as soon as you identify they are of this species.

-> The Orkutiyan : Basically this class of people are just kids or wannabe's who have recently got into facebook and have been wanting to increase their standard in their part of the world and join the Twitter world, Dont even think of following these class of people. Let them mention and RT and follow you, Just leave them un-noticed.

-> The Inspirationals : These quote centric people are just loosers and are just a mere Cut & Copy via Google so this are not Mahatma Gandhi's or a Martin Luther King, so these people dont make any sense either.

-> The RT-ers : People who increase their twitter count by counting on others, basically just RT-ing is their forte. Just mere loosers who have no thought of their own and depend on others, Request them now and then for stop RT-ing on a frequent basis and if that doesnt work out, BLOCK/UNFOLLOW them.

-> The Expert :These are ideally the class of people you would want to follow but then their extreme expert opinions can get you crazy, things like iPhone or Android kind of topics, being a layman you would be wondering what language is this he/she is speaking, There is no wrong following them very informative so i wouldnt quite club them into the Psycho category.

-> The Stars : Pure Bakhwas, First and foremost advise would not be following them. Basically there are wanting for more fans in order to make their promotions of movies and other endorsements easier and we are falling trap to it. I understand and know that Ra One is going to release via TV and i dont want @iamsrk to keep tweeting about it day and night.

-> The Foul language Tweeter : A complete NO NO for me, i wouldnt want to follow someone who is just tweeting all non sense and fill my time line with obscene tweets, people might think using those language makes them sound cool and all that but DUDE, that era has ended.

I dont know if there has offended anyone here or not but these were just my views and done in discussion with @Kofykat ( Blog : http://mychocolethandbag.wordpress.com/2011/10/04/twitter-behaviour-decoded/ )

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The Indian Grand Prix is Here!!

Buddh International Circuit, It may not be very familiar to many but in the near future it will be the talk of the town, not that it isnt at present as its just familiar with just the Motor sport enthusiasts. This circuit will host the 1st International Grand Prix on Indian soil, YES, you heard that right. India may not have the best drivers in the world indeed will host the most dangerous sport. Roaring at 307 km/hr it will indeed be a sight to watch for all the people who would have wanted to ride their machines at their machines provided the COPs a.k.a Mamu allows us to in the Indian Roads. This is indeed a stepping stone for all motor sport enthusiasts and youngsters looking to take this sport as their career in future.

28th October will stage the Practice session which will be followed by the Qualifying on the 29th and 'D' day which is the Race day on the 30th. I just cant wait to see the Green Signal at the starting Grid. All this excitement will only stick to me watching the race at home as from what i read from a few news articles, Its going to be very costly affair. Hotels are priced at almost INR 30,000 a night which is costlier for a person residing in Chennai, taking into considering the flight tickets to Delhi.. Singapore Grand Prix including the tickets would have cost me much lesser. So i have just scrapped the idea of watching the Grand Prix for this sole reason. And i am not that crazy a fan for Formula 1 as i have already experienced this great sport at the Bahrain Grand Prix in 2004. But for a first timer, I would highly recommend to experience the roar of the Formula 1 engines which is terribly loud.

The Circuit will be 5.14 kms long and the race will be a 60 lap one which the drivers will be covering 308.4 kilometers which will be covered in an approximate time of 90 minutes. The circuit is spread in an area of 875 acres and will have a seating capacity of 150,000 people much more than what Eden Garden (For those people who dont know its the Cricket Stadium in Kolkata) and the Salt Lake Stadium (Once the 2nd biggest football stadium in the world, also in Kolkata) can accommodate.

A Proud moment for all Indians having this motor sports here in India. With the presence of this new sport here in India, there are many things India has to look at considering the worldwide viewer ship of this extreme sport. Its time the world see India as the super power and have all the attention of the world. As per a recent study its not just the Hotel and the Tourism industry which will get a boost but also the Country's profile also gets a lift. In-spite of not getting a direct funding for the Grand Prix from the Govt, the Private players have played a great part in getting things together. Credits should be given to Force India Team Principal and Baron Vijay Mallya who played a great role in getting this sport in the sub continent.

Please look at the link below to have a virtual tour of the circuit which will host the Inaugural Indian Grand Prix

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfNbMBuN0Uo

VROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!

E7 C/o Nokia :P

First of all, My reason for absence here in my BLOG - Hectic work schedule (I so wish i could have a Blogging hour during my office hours)

First look at it and you are reminded of the N8 and people tend to ask you if that is a N8 you are holding, I got this question very frequently. The E7 design language mimics its N8 sibling, and consists of a flattened aluminium cylinder that features a 4-inch glass capacitive touch screen on one side. E7 has its own class and I’m sure anti-Nokia folks wouldn’t agree to this statement of mine. Its not the Phone that they are against but the OS in the form of Symbian. I agree that its high time that Nokia move into a better OS as an when they are upgrading their models. But one thing to be kept in mind is the fact that Symbian has all the necessary applications under them and why do you want to go into another OS and make things complicated? OK, Android is good for gamers and for ultra fast applications. Nokia does not want its Business class phones to have games on it nor does it want high speed applications. E7 like a mentioned is a Business class phone and a replacement for the very famous E90 Communicator users. Talking about the E90, I know few people who still have that phone in spite of using it for years that is because of its class. I have never been a touch phone person and have had problems in the past using the only touch phones, E7 came as a sense of relief as its got the qwerty as well which is so awesome to use. E90 and other communicators were really huge in size and that was the need of the hour then, times have changed and people no longer need such large devices. Users now want something more compact but at the same time with a full qwerty keyboard to type their messages on and a large screen for reading their mails and browsing the internet. I haven't used the Internet with my connection as yet but did try it through the Wi-fi which was so convenient to use.

The camera is not upto the mark (Rating 6/10), N95 8GB which I’ve been using for years has a better camera in spite of it being a 5 mega pixel, there is no close up mode for camera (Would you believe it) which is a flaw. Carl Zeiss lens would have been a better option than the one used in E7. Being a smart phone with 8 mega pixel camera I expected it to be really good. Camera overall has been disappointing especially during the evening, flash is really bad and you cannot depend on this machine for pics during the night. From what I’ve analysed it’s the glass window protecting the 8 megapixel camera and dual led flash on the other side which is the reason for the poor camera clarity. The speaker is very loud and clear but is positioned such that it becomes muffled slightly as soon as the phone is placed face-up on any flat surface.

After spending several weeks with the Nokia E7, there is absolutely no doubt that its one of the good phones in recent times, nokia has introduced and you cannot quite tell that it’s the greatest communicator of all time but comes close and offers a balanced set of features of any Symbian device to date.

In short this is what I would like Nokia to have if there is a E7-Version 2 which are -> Higher density display, an autofocus camera and a current generation processor and YEAH, a tasty serving of Windows Phone :P