Good Luck Gates

There are some gifted people and there are some talented people in this world. But some are both gifted and talented. They think and implement things in a unique way. They dream high and achieve high. They forsee things that common people cannot even think of. They not only create oppurtunities but also make the best out of every oppurtunity coming their way. And in the process, they change history forever.

In the late 1970s one guy from Harward University dreamed BIG and saw something magical which others around him could not even imagine. He started a company of his own and it brought revolution in the way people work and communicate across the world. It changed the world forever. However, it was not an easy path and it did not happen overnight. There were many road blocks on his way. He was blamed for monopolizing the markets. His company faced many legal issues on various Anti trust laws across the world. Inspite of all the troubles and tough times, its products reached to the consumers across the world and made him the richest person on this planet continously for almost 15 years. You might have guessed it by now. We are talking about Microsoft and it's founder Bill Gates.

Microsoft - One name each and every person associated with a computer identifies. Its products constitute Windows Operating System, the Office Software, the Internet browser, the media Player that plays your music and videos and almost everything. You name anything in Software - Microsoft has it. Today 90% of the computer users in the world use one or the other products of Microsoft. Microsoft succeeded in reaching every corner of the world ranging from large corporate offices to a small desktop in a common man's home.

Microsoft is not only popular among its users, It's also popular among its enemies and competitors. There are many controversies and allegations surrounding Bill Gates and his company. After all, he is the richest person and it's the most popular company in the world. Keeping aside all the controversies and allegations, one should admit that Microsoft played an important role in the development of personal computers and it succeeded in taking the technology and its benefits to common man.

Bill Gates pledged his major percentage of his wealth to his charity organization Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. As of 2006, the foundation has an endowment of approximately US$34.6 billion. The foundation donates money to various HIV/AIDS researchers. The foundation also fights against poverty across the world and helps in improving global health standards.  

The success story of Microsoft and Bill Gates may be one among the many success stories of Silicon Valley. But, the enormous success Bill Gates and Microsoft has achieved is beyond anyone's thought or imagination. On June 28th 2008, Bill Gates officially steps down from Microsoft. He plans to devote his time to charity work. He will remain as Microsoft's chairman and work on special technology projects but his main focus will be on finding new vaccines and financing projects in the developing world.

Let's wish that the man who made PC popular among the house holds continues his legacy and reach greater heights in his new role.

http://specials.rediff.com/money/2008/jun/27slide1.htm

Good Luck Gates...

-Venks

Freedom

Few days after starting my own blog, I came across the news that blogger arrests hit record high. A number of bloggers across the world are arrested for exposing human right abuses or criticising governments.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7456357.stm

I don't know what caused these arrests. It might be because of false accusations made on the governments or it might be because of exposing the hard bitter truth. I don't want to comment on that. But, this brings out an interesting argument about 'Freedom of Speech' or 'Freedom of Expression'. What are the boundaries for Freedom? Or What are the limitations for Freedom? You may argue that if there are any boundaries or limitations, then it would not be called "Freedom". It's one of those age old arguments to which History failed to deliver an answer. And the quest for the answer still continues.

I want to borrow a quote from one of my favorite characters - Dumbeldore in Harry Potter series. "The truth.." Dumeldore says. "It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution." I think the same applies here to freedom. Freedom as we all know is a beautiful thing. But, what we all need to realize is Freedom is also a terrible thing and most often people tend to neglect or forget about the terrible part. History has always showed us that Freedom comes with a price. The sacrifices of many leaders made India free from the shackles of the British rule. The brutal bloodshed gave rise to French Revolution and the perils of world war to free the world from dictators like Hitler is well known to everyone. It all proves one thing again and again - Freedom comes with a heavy price.

Peter Parker in Spiderman says 'With Great Power, comes great responsibilites'. Freedom is like a great power. It comes with a price and should be dealt with great caution and responsibility. Unfortunately the people who paid the price for Freedom never gets to enjoy it and the people who enjoys the freedom do not know the price of it. They take it for granted. The death of Princess Diana raised the questions on Freedom of Journalism. The Global Warming raised the questions on Freedom of exploitation of nature. The Iraq war raised the questions on Freedom of Power.

There is an old saying - 'If you can do it, it does not mean you should do it'. Please remember that not everything that is possible is a good idea. Freedom should be used to bring happiness and to provide equality of justice to one and all. It should be used to raise your voice against the unalawful and unethical exploitations and fight for the greater good of humanity. It should be used to share the responsibilities of making the world a better place for tomorrow.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom,

My Father, let my country awake.

- Rabindranath Tagore

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It's time for the weekend. It's time for the Freedom from work and worries. Njoy...

-Venks

FW:

Opened my Bag.. Found it empty.

Reached my pocket.. Got few coins.
Searched my heart.. I found you.
Then I realized how rich I am..

Becoz I have a great friend like you.

Few days back I got the above 'You are my best friend' kind of message in a mail. "No.. Not another one" I thought. Seriously.. I am getting tired of these kind of mails. I hardly know the person who sent me this. I doubt whether I ever met him in my life or not. And it's just not me, there are some fifty to sixty people in the 'TO' list. To make things worse, the subject line has 'FW:' in it. He got it from someone and just forwarded it to a bunch of people and I am one unfortunate soul among them.

The next day I received another 'Good for nothing' message with the same 'FW:' thing in the subject and some 100 people in the TO list. This time it said that I should forward this message to some 100 people in the next five seconds to get some good fortunes. Otherwise it will bring bad luck and terrible things happen to me. It even quoted some examples. Whoa.. "Who is this guy?" I thought. Why is he trying to scare me? I searched my Inbox and I found many such mails from this guy. Though the crap is sent with different combination of words and other flashy stuff, they have one thing in common - 'FW:' in the subject line.

One of these mails says that Orkut has run out of names. All the accounts will be charged $10 per month going forward or the accounts will be deleted. The only way to keep your accounts active without paying money is to send this message to everyone in your friend's list. Sometimes you get the same kind of messages for Yahoo and MSN. Though the company name changes, the motto is same. I still wonder how people believe this stuff and the original creator of this message might be laughing out loud at the ignorance (I prefer stupidity though) of the people who fell for this.

One of the other messages among the lot is the sharing of the fortune by Bill Gates or AOL or some high profile company. It goes like this - Microsoft and AOL are now the largest Internet company and in an effort make sure that Internet explorer remains the most widely used program, Microsoft and AOL are running an e-mail beta test. When you forward this e-mail to friends, Microsoft can and will track it. For every person that you forward this e-mail to, Microsoft will pay you some money. This is one of those chain mails which takes advantage of the fact that people will do anything for money. I think Bill Gates is too busy worrying about his 'Not so Successful' Operating System VISTA than sharing his fortune among the people who forward junk mails.

For people who don't fall for money, they have developed one more trick. The message says that someone is ill or someone is going to die in a few days (Usually a little girl or boy for more sympathy) and they don't have money for the medical expenses. The only way to save them is by forwarding this message as Google/Yahoo/(some software company) have agreed to pay some amount of money for each mail forwarded. Someone please educate these people.. Neither google nor any of the so called corporate giants can never track a mail going across the internet through different servers. It's just not possible.

The above chain mails which I mentioned are just a tip of the iceberg. There are many variations and many new ways coming up daily just to spread spam and junk across the net. As if they were not enough, you have these unknown friends claiming that you are the best thing that happened in their life.

As I write this blog, here comes another mail from my so called 'unknown best friend' explaining me how to survive from the attack of the aliens. God save poor souls like me...

-Venks

Here I Start...

There are some things in this world which cannot be expressed in words. For everything else, create a blog. This is the first thing that got into my mind when I started seriously thinking of creating a blog of my own. The next BIG thing.. What should I write in my blog? About myself? No way.. This is not going to be my autobiography or something. If I want to write autobiography, I would rather write a book, publish it and make some money. I am sure that my journey so far has enough interesting twists and turns that can fetch me some money if put on a book. May be in future... but not now.

The first post in a blog is always time consuming. I have to make sure the font, the layout and all the flashy stuff is right and appealing to the readers. After a lot of 'doing that' and 'doing this', finally I decided to go ahead with this layout. I don't know how appealing it is but after a while I thought it would be good if I focus on the content rather than the layout. So, if you like the layout, shoot a mail to me. I appreciate it. If you don't like it, go to hell. I give a damn about your opinion. After all it's my blog.

So, Why did I start a blog? Initially I thought having one's own blog is pretty cool. But, that's not why I started a blog. Do I have a lot of free time? No. Believe me... I have hell a lot of things on my plate right now. I don't even have time to enjoy my Guitar (Yes I have a guitar and I have an interesting story on that. But not now... Later.) Do I want to make comments and abuse others like what Aamir Khan is doing? That's not my style. I have my own ways of dealing with others if they mess up with me. Let's not get there. I started writing blog because I like writing. I am passionate about it. I like to express things. I like to put whatever I feel in my heart on to a paper. It gives me lot of relief. You may call it as my stress buster. You may also call it "TSI - Transfer of Stress through Internet" or whatever it is.

What do you get by reading my posts? It's a different blog with all mass masala elements. It's a family and youth entertainer with faction and mafia backdrop. It has sentiment, comedy, action, romance and all other ingredients that appeal to both Class and Mass audience. And please help yourself with the hidden social message in it.

So.. Here I am with my first blog. Now I can put this link in my orkut and all other social networks and chase people to read it.

Catch you later...
Venks
(This is my Pen name :))