Vettaikaran movie stills - Vijay and Anushka

iPhone 3.0 release time

Apple users are awaiting anxiously for the best kept secret of the new millennium, Apple’s iPhone 3.0 release time. Apple’s Vice President, Scott Forstall, made the announcement that the new iPhone 3.0 OS would be released sometime today, June 17, 2009. Users are waiting with iPhones connected to their pcs to be first in line for the software download.

Though the release time hasn’t been officially announced, many believe it will be between 12:00 and 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time.  Why the reason for the secrecy, you ask?  More than likely, it is to prevent their servers from crashing or overloading when the release is made public.  Yeah, like iPhone users haven’t heard of Twitter!

Dark Side of so called “Mahatma Gandhi”

Ibid, and culled from The Gandhi Nobody Knows by Richard Grenier:

Gandhi the part-time pacifist:

Although Gandhi became famous for his pacifism, his beliefs here evolved considerably over the years. In fact, until the British massacred hundreds of peaceful Indians at Amritsar, Gandhi was such a faithful British subject that he served in the imperial army.

In the Boer War, Gandhi led the Natal Indian Ambulance Corps and, in one of those weird coincidences, was one of the three future world leaders at the Battle of Spioenkop, along with Winston Churchill and Louis Botha. For his good work, Gandhi eventually won the War Medal and was promoted to sergeant major.

Gandhi also volunteered to serve in World War I, one of the few Indian activists to support England unconditionally. A bad case of pleurisy prevented him from serving, and in fact forced him to leave England and return to India.

From Richard Shenkman’s Legends, Lies, and Myths of World History:

Gandhi, for starters, had some very strange beliefs. When he was older, he preached that a couple should have sex only three of four times in their lives - although he engaged in a lot of sex when he was younger. He liked to sleep in the nude with naked young women to test his vow of chastity - apparently, sleeping nude with his wife wasn’t much of a test. History doesn’t record what she thought of this.

Speaking of his wife, she died when he refused to allow her to get life saving shot of penicillin after she contracted pneumonia. He was, you see, opposed to modern medicine. But not fanatically opposed, since after her death he allowed himself to be treated with quinine for his malaria and allowed his appendix to be removed by surgeons. Nice guy, huh?

Gandhi and World War II:

Gandhi never quite seemed to realize that the non-violence he urged against the British would have failed horribly if applied to the Nazis. He urged the British to surrender, and suggested that the Czechs and even the Jews would have been better off committing heroic mass suicide.

Even as late as June 1946, when the extent of the Holocaust had emerged, Gandhi told biographer Louis Fisher: “The Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher’s knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs.”

As the Japanese advanced into Burma (now called Myanmar), there was a real possibility of an Axis invasion of India. Gandhi thought it was best to let the Japanese take as much of India as they wanted, and that the best way to resist would be to “make them feel unwanted.”

(In fact, the Axis was helping a buddy of Gandhi’s to raise an army of Indians that would have seized the country from the Brits, but that’s another story.)

Gandhi, family man:

He described his wife as looking like a “meek cow.”

He refused to allow his sons to get a formal education, and also tried to force his oddball sexual ideas on them. He so disapproved of the wife of his eldest son that the Mahatma disowned him. This son broke from the family and became an alcoholic. In rebellion against everything his father stood for, Harilal Gandhi even announced at one point that he had converted to Islam.

The Mahatma also had trouble with his second son, Manilal, who had an affair with a married woman. Dad made the matter a public scandal and pushed the woman involved to shave her head. Manilal was also briefly exiled from the family for lending money to fellow black sheep Harilal.

There’s a lot more, like the fact that he wasn’t always the pacifist that he has been made out to be and his odd fascination for bowel movements - I’ll spare you the details of that last one.

Madalsa Sharma in Vettaikaran

Anushka has won the race to Vettaikaran, and will be the heroine opposite Illayathalapathy Vijay. And now, when it was time for the second lead lady to be finalized, once again a non-Kollywooder has landed the plum role. It’s none other than the ravishing Madalasa. Rumours say she has a super sizzling number with Vijay in the movie, something you guys out there are bound to enjoy. This could very well mean the entry of a new actress into Tamil cinema.

Madalasa is the latest Mumbai import to Tamil cinema; she already has landed a glam role in K.T. Kunjumon’s Kadhalukku Maranamillai with Meera Nandan in the lead.

Sania Mirza to tie the knot

It’s another love-all start for Sania Mirza. The Indian tennis star, who has been plagued by injuries over the last two years, looks to be on the cusp of a new doubles partnership. However, this time, it is off the court.

A family source told HT on Thursday that Sania is set to get engaged to long-time friend Sohrab Mirza on July 10 in her hometown, Hyderabad. It is learnt that invitations have already been sent out.

“The boy is not related to them,” the source said after being asked about the common surname. “She knows him from her school days.” The groom-to-be is a businessman from Hyderabad.

Sania burst on to the scene at the 2005 Australian Open as a teenager and has literally grown up under the public eye. Being the biggest pin-up girl in Indian sports, she has been linked to men, right from the tennis court to tinsel town—most notably actor Shahid Kapoor.

While she has had to keep her eye on the ball despite multiple off-court controversies, the 23-year-old has also slipped in the women’s rankings owing to injuries and growing competition.

Sania, however, made a comeback earlier this year when he became the first Indian woman to win a Grand Slam. She teamed up with India’s Mahesh Bhupathi to win the Australian Open mixed doubles crown.

Currently playing at the French Open, Sania may soon join the brigade of young tennis players looking to settle down early in life.

Salman Khan’s Dus Ka Dum is back

Salman Khan’s Dus Ka Dum is back again; the previous season was quite popular among the masses and this is the reason why the makers of the Dus Ka Dum have now decided to bring him back again a host.

We spoke to our source,

“There were rumors about Salman Khan being replaced and the production house coming up with another game show hosted by Anil Kapoor but now the channel has a contract with Salman for the second as well as the third season, so to continue the fame of Salman’s popularity they have now decided to start the second season.”

Further our source told us that, “The main reason for the second season is rise of TRP which was quite visible during the game show.

The response for the entire season was great and this made the channel to decide to come out with a new season.

During the first season he had a huge female fan following across all age groups and it really worked for him and for the show also and so we are hoping that it will do wonders.

This season too, we hope to bring in more celebrities and friends of Salman. The format of DKD will remain the same.”

The new season of DKD is expected to air after Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa 3 concludes. The source says, “Jhalak started four weeks ago and is expected to finish by the end of May. We will start DKD’s new season in June.

We have already spoken to Salman and he has agreed to give us dates in June, though specific dates have not been decided on as yet.”

Last year, DKD was aired for two and a half months, allowing audiences to see the different shades of Salman on the show and contestants were also common middle class people and right from old people to young people had a gala time with Salman.

The question most frequently asked by all the contestants to the superstar was whether he planned to marry soon. Let’s hope that this year our Sallu mia has an answer for them.

Vodafone Zoozoo campaign attracts over 70,000 fans on Facebook

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The official fan page of Vodafone Zoozoo campaign on Facebook has so far attracted over 70,000 fans. Neo@Ogilvy, the digital arm of O&M, which is managing the Zoozoo Facebook brand page, claims that the official fan page on the social networking site has received 2.6 million page views till date, since its launch on April 20, 2009.

Besides, video clips of the Vodafone Zoozoos TVCs (television commercials), the Facebook page is also offering its users downloadable Zoozoo screensavers, wallpapers and sound clips of Zoozoo ads. A video showing the making of Zoozoo ads has also been uploaded. To build and sustain engagement on the Zoozoos Facebook brand page, Vodafone uploads its TVC on daily basis, even before they are aired on TV.

Already 20 TVCs have been uploaded on Facebook. Vodafone will be releasing a total of 30 Zoozoos ads during the IPL season on TV channels. “We release the Zoozoos TVCs exclusively on Facebook.com, even before airing it on TV channels and Facebook members are the first ones to watch the Zoozoos ads daily,” Prasanth Mohanachandran, executive director, digital services, OgilvyOne Worldwide, has said.

Vettaikaran Movie Release

Starring ; Vijay, Anushka Shetty
Music : Vijay Antony
Production : M.Balasubramanian, B.Gurunath Meiyappan
Distribution : AVM
Release : 17 October 2009

After completing villu, directed by Prabhu Deva, vijay starts his next movie ” VETTAIKARAN” directed by Babu Sivan an assoicate director of Dharani. Vettaikaran is the movie name of MGR’s Hit Movie and it will be a typical vijay movie with all mass commercial enterntainment.Will Vettaikaran will be hit?? Who cares??? We will support our Ilaya Thalapathy even if its goes wrong.

‘The Fake IPL Player’ caught?

Caught! ‘The Fake IPL Player’ has finally edged a delivery to the slips and has been marked out. Sources say that the anonymous blogger has been identified and will be named soon. Fingers point towards a non-KKR player, but obviously a guy who is a part of the ongoing IPL. No more information is available on the truant blogger. With the chances of the name being revealed soon, the end of the blog fiasco seems a distant possibility.
The blog looks to provide the inside scoop on the KKR’s .And in the words of the anonymous blogger, it says,” I will be bringing to you the “aankhon dekha haal”, right from inside the dressing room, meeting room and players’ bedrooms ;-).”

The blog is seen as yet another headache for team co-owner Shah Rukh Khan and the managers of his team. With the multiple-captaincy issue and the clash of egos between Brendon McCullum and Sourav Ganguly doing no good for the Kolkata Knight Riders, this controversial blog has only added to the team’s cup of woes.

The blog has no qualms in calling SRK a megalomaniac and has named him Badshah D*&#o. Ganguly has been aptly coined as Lordie, the guy who is in constant altercation with the Badshah and the Coachie (John Buchanan). The Phoren Babas point to the foreign support staff that the KKR’s have in their camp.

The Fake IPL hits out at not only the KKR players but it also calls names to other top shot international cricketers. For instance, a former Aussie opener is quite audaciously called the Pedophile priest, while West Indian captain Chris Gayle is referred to as the Calypso King.

The posts on the blog are filled with jibes against all and sundry. The articles aspire to be sensational at every comma, semi-colon and full-stop. In fact the popularity of the site is swelling by the day.

Did Microsoft Really Copy Apple?

It has always been a running joke that Microsoft’s Windows systems look surprisingly like Apple’s OSX systems, with features like desktop search in the taskbar, and the look of Vista.

There are two schools of thought here – on the one side, Microsoft copies all (or most) of their ideas from Apple, and claims them as their own executing the copies as originals. On the other side, Microsoft doesn’t take their ideas from Apple – period – and the similarities are purely coincidental.

I’d like to take you through a new concept – The Usability Funnel. This is a concept covering the evolution of operating systems and their interaction with humans.

The history of Microsoft and Apple is long, and entwined, with the two companies famously butting heads for years. (If you DO know the history here, skip the next couple of paragraphs)

In 1988, Apple Computer inc. (now Apple inc.) licenced Graphic User Interface elements to Microsoft for Windows 1.0, but when Microsoft made changes in Windows 2.0 making the interface more mac-like, Apple filed suit, claiming that the licence terms had been violated. There have been many occasions since then, where Microsoft and Apple have crossed swords, leading to Apple being incredibly protective of its intellectual property, and an air of resentment between the two companies, and some some childish bickering.

But, as I said in the title, did – or does – Microsoft copy Apple’s ideas? On the surface, it would appear that this is a no-brainer – given the similarities between XP and Tiger, and of course Vista and Leopard.

Stop for a moment here – try and forget about Windows, Vista, Linux, and other operating systems. Imagine an operating system entirely your own, with your own look, and all of the features that you want in an OS. Go ahead, I’ll wait.

Now, I bet that your dream OS has buttons, boxes, icons, and other metaphors like the desktop. It may even have a bar at the top or bottom.

Either way, my point is that Windows, Linux, and Mac all share these characteristics, because all the time, all three are moving toward a better, more intuitive user interface that better understands, and molds around the user. In a standard 2 dimensional environment, is there any other way to do this?

I think it’s a viable theory that the interface of computers has been shaped by not just research and focus groups, but by sales and the reaction from the users themselves. Is the explanation that this is really the best way for humans to interact with machines?

Let’s look at this another way. Think of this as what I like to call the “Usability Funnel”, in which there is one point of perfect interaction between machine and human, and all of these GUI-enabled operating systems are heading toward this point. In this scenario, Microsoft isn’t copying Apple, but moving towards the same goal.

Above: My depiction of the “Usability Funnel”

Overall, I think this is a provable theory that could really work. I may continue with this idea in the future, and I’d really appreciate your input on this. Developer, user, or observer? Comment here or email me, tell me what you think of this concept.

[Update]

In response to the comments on this article, I agree, that in the beginning – Microsoft did become a mirror for Apple products, and yes, Bill has admitted that he likes the Mac OS numerous times.

However, I stand by my diagram regardless. The reason that it is a funnel shape is to signify the point of optimum interface with humans. Please also note that the graph does not represent time on either axis, just usability and user integration.

And yes, Aero and Aqua do share some clear similarities, but at the same time I don’t think that this has a significant effect on the user’s interaction with the machine, it’s still a 2D interface with windows, buttons, boxes, and so on.

Is there any other way to express these metaphors besides icons, windows, bars, buttons, and the like?