Websites & Software I love and expectations from Google.

When I login to the internet, there are certain websites which I do check and there are certain software that I am logged in. These are the ones which make the integral part of my digital life. Websites are a few:- Gmail, Facebook, Google Reader, Twitter, Lifehacker & Orkut (yes I am back again on it).

Software..... well these keep changing but the browser is Chrome for quite a while because Firefox is too heavy for my PC & Safari 4 just arrived so maybe it might just be the default browser. Digsby is 1 app which is awesome but to be honest it needs to improve on the voice & video chat because the tokbox integration isn't working perfect yet. MSN & Yahoo messengers too but more MSN because of course most of my friends use it. Gizmo5 recently started playing up so now its not on.

Coming back to Gmail which is my communication hub because apart  from Myway and Yahoo email every other email drops in there & its pathetic that these 2 providers don't even provide the facility of email forwarding, leave aside POP3. Gtalk and AIM chat is in there too which helps and so do the widgets. Now Gmail is becoming the "default email" for people worldwide and the reasons are aplenty but I still expect many things from Google on 1st April. Just a quick list....

1. Gmail will complete 6 years. So maybe a 10 GB space quota there directly from the current 7300MB.
2. Grandcentral 2.0 finally. Its been ages anything happened here. (Glad its still on though)
3. New and amazing pranks as always.
4. Increase space in Picasa web albums. How about 25GB there just like Skydrive.
5. Or the long awaited GDrive finally.

Or maybe a takeover again of some interesting site. LOL. I really wish my wixi account stays forever unlimited and Google takes over Wixi. Crazy expectations here I know but with Google you can make such expectations. Who knows they might actually turn out to be true.

Just a random post,
H@rdeep.

SlumDog's Day.

8 Oscars out of 10 categories in which it was nominated for (Actually 9 because 2 nominations were for Best song). And most importantly, both for A.R. Rehman. Best Music Composer And Best original Song along with Gulzar saab.

Thats the Actual Awards won and categories nominated for.
1. Best Picture- Winner.
2. Best Director- Winner
3. Best Music (Song)- Winner - Jai Ho.
4. Best Music (Score)- Winner - A.R. Rehman.
5. Best Editor- Winner
6. Best Sound Mixing- Winner
7. Best Sound Editing- Nominated
8. Best Cinematography- Winner
9. Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay)- Winner
10. Best Music (Song) - Nominated- O Saya

I watched the history live. Waking up at 5.30 a.m was worth it. I got more than expected because I predicted A.R Rehman's win the day he was nominated. So no big surprise for me there but so many awards to Slumdog was fun. And then not to forget "Best Documentary" went to "Smile Pinki" which is made made in India too and made on an Indian girl. I was so damn excited & happy and my mom was like "Its Ok. What did you get?"

I had an answer for a change. LOL. I know it was easy. I got nothing. But then its just 1 side of the coin. The Other side is "I had an opportunity to be proud as an Indian". And believe me thats a huge thing for me. I like very few things about India and so I am generally not proud of being an Indian, but this day was like hell lot big. An Indian and a story based on India with Indian actors gets world recognition and top awards for excellence in cinema while the world watched it.

Just makes me realize 1 more time I need to make sure I don't die without being famous. The world should know I came, I lived and I died. If this does not happen, life is useless. Huge motivation. The day was fantastic. Hope we have more such days in our nation where we can celebrate the success of Indians and feel proud of them.

I promise I will give India at least 1 such day before I die.
Amen,

Ecstatic and overjoyed,
H@rdeep.

It was valentine's day today.

Oh yeah, it was Valentine's day today (Well actually its 1.25 a.m so it is 15th Feb already here in India) and it was a normal day for me. Yes a Saturday so loads of people were out and there was a huge traffic on the road, but it was also a day to call U.S. Yup weekends I call U.S for sure & this lady also had a date.

Wow, isn't that great? LOL & I thought she is kinda always available to talk to & hear me out and all. Guess life has to be in the fast lane now or else I am sure to be like Jim Carey in the 1st part of "Yes Man". All alone watching movies at home and stuff. :P

Everybody was busy today going out with friends and stuff. For me it was no different. It sure is a wonderful feeling being in love & having some1 to come back to, some1 to listen to you and stuff. Life is gonna be different from tomorrow at least because I am going to work after a long time (And I really mean a "LONG TIME"). What did I do today? Well, woke up late as usual and ended the day on internet watching this movie "Burn After Reading". What category was it nominated for in "Golden Globes" and why?

Funny at times and just 1 hour and 30 minutes. I love English movies for this. The time factor. And ending the day (well this is the time my day usually ends 1.50 a.m now) withthis blog post. Just to remind myself later on, I didn't have a date this year. :)

Not at all sad about being Single,
H@rdeep.

VOIP over the years through my eyes.

I still remember when I 1st came to know about the ability of calling cellphones and landlines through internet, it was probably called Net2phone . I just checked and was amazed that they are still there. Ever since that, I have seen & used innumerable other VOIP services (Yes I didn't even knew what is VOIP when I had heard of net2phone) & I have been amazed by many of them.

I will quickly go through some of the ones that I remember using.... Raketu, Jangl, Jajah, Jaxtr, Gtalk2Voip, Mediaringtalk, Phonegnome, FWD, Poketalk, Tuitalk, Jaduka, Nimbuzz, Globe7, Oovoo, Voxox & many more which I cant remember now of head. If you think I missed out the messengers, yeah I have used all of them. AIM, MSN messenger, Yahoo IM,  Google Talk and even Skype. Today the ones I cant imagine my life without are Grandcentral and Gizmo5 and the ones I love and use on and off are Mediaringtalk and Skype. Truphone & Fring are 2 things I am dying to try out and have not been able to because I don't have compatible phones. Oovoo is 1 thing I loved because of amazing voice clarity.

I have seen many great innovations in VOIP and also seen death of some great products. Jangl and more recently Ringbranch died and were amazing things. But nothing impressed me more than Gizmo5 and it keeps impressing me as I discover new ways of using it and how people around the world use it. Skype has been great too and has sustained itself over the years and now that its version 4 boasts of amazing audio and video quality, I guess I will be a regular user of it again. I also discovered recently that Skype allows something which no other VOIP software allows. Calling toll free numbers of various countries including Australia. The VOIP players have to do something thats unique and gives the users value as compared to the competitors in order to survive and sustain growth and most of them who today are popular do exactly that. All I can say is I am happy that I was introduced to VOIP by people & I use some of the most amazing products ever made available. I know I will certainly do something in this space, but I don't know what & when. Till then all I can say is "Wait & Watch" and keep making these amazing services and products people. I love them and I am sure there is a whole lot more interesting stuff brewing in there.

Always excited when it comes to VOIP,
H@rdeep.