Emergent Noise

I guess its clear now, Google is definitely going to give Yahoo a run for its money. Google is already famous as a search engine, and the company is now making forays into all of Yahoo’s camping grounds. Its safe to say that in its current state, MSN is definitely not the portal of choice for most people around the world – Hotmail is dismal in its standards when compared to even the most unknown email services out there. And MSN messenger is just tolerable, used more out of habit and historic reasons then out of choice. Yahoo Messenger has left it far behind….Let me take this opportunity to tell all those who are still on Hotmail, if it works for you, fine, but its certainly not the best you could have and you dont know what you are missing.

But this post is about Google, and Google’s advent into email with Gmail has caused nothing short of a giant wave of change overs. Its plainly and simply better in quality. Its most obvious feature is that you are not reading web pages of an email service, as in Yahoo and MSN. Gmail is not made up of “web pages” its a “net application” as computer terminologies go. The interface is composed with Javascript and absolutely wonderful. The emails are sorted as “conversations” and helps you track your correspondence a thousand times better. I am not going to talk about the enormous 2 GB and increasing space hey allot, because I have seen other services that give out the same amount. Gmail of course, also provides secure POP3 access, which means you can use it without a browser , with a traditional email client. Its called backward compatibility. It means if were using Outlook Express all this time, you don’t have to give it up just to use Gmail. Beautifully executed.

And thats now all, in beta stage, is Google Groups, akin to Yahoo groups, but much more simpler to use then Yahoo Groups and doesn’t break as often. For old times on the internet, Google is more like the newsgroups (NNTP) on steroids, and sure enough it provides access to the well known Usenet and Alt.newsgroups. More backward compatibility . Plus, Google is certainly doing a better job at design and aesthetics than any of the others.

Of late , online communities have become quite popular, and most of us are part of some “growing network of friends” already. There’s Friendster, Ringo and Gazzag and what have you. Google Inc., is not to be left behind, and is the owner of one of the most popular ones : Orkut. Ring a bell ?

Then of course, there is Blogger, already the most popular blogging service. I am sure you will be aware of it, since this blog is hosted on Blogger. Clicking the “Blogger” on the bar at the top of the page will tell you more about it.

You share photos on Yahoo ? Google has Picasa all ready for deployment as a service.

If by any chance, you are a fan of Yahoo! news, fear not there’s Google News. The web page is again much nicer than anything else.

And finally, the standard desktop support application is available too, Google Desktop sits on your desktop and notifies you of new email and such, if you want to.

You know what the latest is ? Examining the code of Google Desktop has revealed the registration of a new handler, “googleim://” , and that can only mean one thing, an IM or Instant Messenger … Google already has a sort-of messaging client at its disposal called Hello, but there is talk that it has already acquired or is in the 0process of aqcuiring Mumbai based company , Geodesic Systems, that makes an instant messaging “net application” called Mundu IM . Mundu could very well makes its worldwide debut as Google Messenger.

Convinced that something is going on at Google that should have Yahoo and other portals worried ? Well, Yahoo sure is worried and have started to work and publicize their new by-invitation-only setup called Yahoo 360°

I see the beginnings of a portal war here. Whoever wins, though, the web is going be a much richer and vibrant and convenient place in the coming years…and I hope it’s as colourful as the Google Logo when it happens. I encourage readers to check out the links and observe the style of Google’s interfaces. Rarely have I seen aesthetic appeal and functionality so well integrated on a web page.

PS : I know, the IIT Junta, if they ever read this , is going to have a field day with this. My officially assigned nickname being “Google”. And no, I wasn’t paid by Google Inc. to write this , though I wish they would.

This time, I shall review on my own : John Grisham’s latest : The Broker

I just finished The Broker, and its fresh in my mind. And there’s a surprise in it, for all those people who have come associate Grisham’s name with gripping courtroom drama, and stories of brilliant lawyers, foolish lawyers, law firms and their larger-than-life successes and failures….

The Broker is not about the law. Its a spy novel about a pseudo-lawyer named Joel Backman, with a political and international relations backdrop . I am sorry for the poor categorization but thats exactly where the novel sits.

Its about a hard-core lobbying power broker (Joel Backman the lawyer) who is forced to seek sanctuary in prison due to a botched deal over control intelligence equipment , but gets pardoned at the last minute and is hidden away by his country’s intelligence agency to ‘protect’ him (as he is told). There are vested interests involved of course, and the unsuspecting but brilliant Mr. Backman figures out he is in danger.

Frankly, the book painfully creeps along in Mr.Backman’s “hiding” phase, because as Grisham admits in the authour’s note, he knows very little about spies and spy technology. His attempts to write about them are very amateurish. He does describe the hiding place : Bologna, in Italy, very well and it reads more like a tourist guidebook in some places than a novel.

The book ends with a thrilling maneuver by Mr.Backman that gets most of the snipers and spies off his back , but in between, it goes through endless fussing over his problems with learning the language of his hiding place (Italian). And more repeated discussions of the CIA and the FBI and a few more intelligence agencies from other countries thrown in: the Israeli Mossad and the Chinese MSS.

The only two characters of interest in the book are Joel Backman himself and Teddy Maynard – Director of the CIA…and only Joel Backman gets any kind of justice as far as character development is concerned.

All in all, the verdict is clear. Grisham should write law…or do a LOT of research before he attempts to write a novel like The Broker. It fails to excite the espionage fans, and simply disappoints the legal drama fans.

Read the book if you have nothing to do, or be patient with the story until the point Mr. Backman decides he must run.

I experienced something ou rarely do in Mumbai, a power cut. At 12.30 am and lasted upto 3.00 am. The temperature was soaring and I couldnt sleep, so I wasted time by taking a flashlight and my cellphone and fooling around. The result , a suprisingly blank-expressioned photograph. You can see the boredom on my face :

What I didnt realise then, but realise it now after looking at the photograph, is that something really huge bit me that night in the dark on my face. that pest control is waning already. Time to make a phone call and wage war on the bugs again. and the bite turned into a wierd boil. Very ugly and hurting a lot and its full of pus. I am sure you wanted to know that . But I decided to do something about it and was able to get the pus out…it oozed out slowly in response to the steam. And now, the boil is much better and hurts a lot less :

I hope whatever bit me hasnt left…cause I’d like to swat it with my own two hands. Not that I looked excessively handsome without a boil. But hey, at least my face was something I grew entirely by myself.

The inversion phase didnt last. Frankly, it looked rather ugly and Pooja didnt like it either. After spending some time on this, I have finally gotten the blog to look better and different. Its also more personalized and unique.

Besides that, I am finally settling into the vacation routine, though it is becoming clear that this will be a rather busy vacation. However, today, I found out something …I could use blogging to track my project progress. So that any references to the project are not present on this blog, which I shall reserve for my ramblings.

Accordingly, I set up the other blog here : “>http://glycosylation.blogspot.com

For anyone interested in whats going on with the project and contribute ideas etc, thats the place to go to . To all the biologists who may stumble by this, you may find the literature interesting (if not my work ).

Guess what I am doing, watching one of those soaps on Star TV. Sometimes its a novelty to wallow in the intellectual equivalent of grime.

Yep, its too painful to write a review on a book, so I am going to quote one already done :

‘Obituaries – Death at my Doorstep’ by Khushwant Singh

January 2005, Lotus Publishers–Books, Delhi
Reviewed by the-south-asian

Omar Khayaam’s dictum “The moving finger writes and having written moves on” is a very apt one for Khushwant Singh’s latest book [January 2005, Lotus Publishers–Books, Delhi] “Obituaries- Death at my Doorstep” . Singh’s moving finger/prolific pen never runs out of ink. Khushwant Singh explained in an interview; “Nobody has invented a condom for the pen.” The reason for his stories success, Singh answers “I know the art of communication. Basically, I don’t talk down to my readers.”

Now you better wait for me.

And thus ends the review. The book keeps you occupied and makes for a quick read. My favourite part was Khushwant Singh’s version of his own epitaph. It was apt.

Here lies one who spared neither man nor God
Waste not your tears on him, he was a sod
Writing nasty things he regarded as great fun
Thank God he is dead, the son of a gun.

Sure, a cynic might say its also a case of the dirty laundry of famous people washed in public. But we’re all admittedly or secretly, suckers for gossip !

For those who are sceintifically inclined and like interesting problems people tackle, I am gonna try my head at this…

N-Linked Glycosylation

Because it has very deep rooted and fundamental effects on a thousand things including, very very importantly to biology, this….

If you wanna know more, drop me a line.

Thats the idea…Inversion, and specifically to the dark. Look around, the blog changes colours to accomodate the current mood. This week has a sense of finality to it, its “End-Sem” time . I have my project for next year. M.Sc I is over. Phase 2. Reset. Objective redefined. Well, you get the picture.

In tune, I am starting with a new book by Khushwant Singh ” Death at my Doorstep “. The book itself is very inteeresting, to say the least. I’ve always like Khushwant Singh’s style of writing, since I read “Train to Pakistan”. Its very Indian, which is probably from his deep connections with Indian society and mindset from the days of the Raj, and into the 21st century….and its very un-Indian, in its frank and bold writing, and outspokenness, and skeptiscism, so uncharacteristic of that same Indian society.

More on this book later….

Yes, I know, as a country we are successful. But when you look at other countries that are just as successful in any field, do you feel there is something that Indians lack ? Something that allowed us to come this far since the independence, but it still too rare to give us the edge?

Why is it that there are activists like Medha Patkar interfering with any project that will obviously benefit more that it causes inconviniences to?
Here is an interesting story, which is at best an insightful true story about the Indian spirit that I am talking about, and at worst, untrue but a good read.

Right back in 1947, when India became independent, there were a few young Indian scientists, who were looking far beyond the then almost achieved goal of independence. One of them was Dr. Vikram Sarabhai who we today herald as the Father of the Indian Space Program. To those who do not know, only a handful of nations possess technology to provide access to space and it is to Dr. Sarabhai’s that we are one of those nations.

His greatest contribution was the establishment of the space program in its infancy. The first thing he required was a research facility. Of course making such a large facility involved a lot of space, and the most ideal location (in terms of equator-relative position, climate, logistics etc. ) had a problem, there was a village of about 40 houses in the middle of it.

Dr. Sarabhai , in a manner unknown to today’s government workers, personally went to the village to find out what could be done. But Indian villages being what they are, he could not find any forum to address the people of the village. He roamed the village unsucessful at communicating and finally a little frustrated. Finally he met the church pastor , who asked him to come on Sunday, where the Kerelite-Christian villagers would gather for mass.

Dr. Sarabhai, ignoring the fact that Sunday was in fact a non-working day did turn up at Sunday mass and waited until it was over. People stared at stranger, who came in a government car , dressed in a shirt and suspiciously English trousers.
The Doctor, in turn expected a long afternoon, full of argument and negotiation.
The pastor called him to the front after the mass and spoke “This man here is Dr. Sarabhai. He is a great scientist of our country and wants to make a facility so that our country may study and reach the stars. There is only a problem, he insists he must build this facility right here, on our village, and that means we must move away. Are you ready to give up your homes so that he may build his facility here ?”

Dr. Sarabhai was about to begin his speech to convince the villagers, fully expecting a commotion to begin at the mention of giving up their homes.

Instead , he heard the villagers’ unanimous decision. The church air resonated with one word : “Amen.”

This unquestioned support of the villagers and Dr. Sarabhai’s dedication has resulted in the “Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre”, ISRO’s single largest facility, near Trivandrum providing the technology base for launcher & propulsion development.

Is this willingness to progress and to support progressive paths missing in the India of the 21st century? People of the Narmada Bachao Aandolan genre, do you see what you are doing ?