1. DJ Earworm – United States of Pop 2011

This is my favourite mashup for the songs of 2011. Some say his 2009 mashup was better, but personally I like this one is far better. The beats are great and as with all Earworm remixes, he actually tries (as much as possible) for the different peices of lyrics to somehow tie in together. Its strange though that some of the biggest hits of the year – Coldplay and Drake are not included in this, which I guess is probably because they were released late in the year and Earworm was probably in the middle of finishing the track.

2. Mashup-Germany – Top Of The Pops 2011

This is also a great one. This also doesn’t use Coldplay and Drake. I wonder how early these DJs start work on their end of year mashups!

3. Isosine – Wait a Minute

This was created by am amateur DJ and posted on r/mashups on reddit. I think it was a great effort, especially the slow part at the start. Usually end of year mashups focus on making it as dance-able as possible, but every now and then you appreciate the slow stuff as well.

The following two are not end of year mashups. However, they are my favourite two mashups yet!

4. Madeon – Pop Culture

This is an amazing mashup! It is an amazing dance song! I wonder how much practice, experimentation and thought went into such an effort.

5. The Killers vs Muse When You Were A Starlight (TEAM 9 REMIX)

This is my favourite mashup of all time, and the one that really got me into listening mashups in the first place. Part of it has to do with the Muse and the Killers being some of my favourite bands, and ‘Starlight’ and ‘When you were young’ some of my favourite songs. However just the way the remix is done, the subtle layering of beats and lyrics is just amazing and probably took a lot of effort. The result is a spectacular song, and I wish someday the Killers and Muse would appear on stage and perform this song live together. I would pay to see that!

Thumbnail credit – Meet The Chumbeques

He’s changed too. He has become much more used to life outside India, and some small things which Indians take for granted confuse him…even though he was one of the people taking things for granted just a few years ago. On the other hand, I’ve become somewhat more accommodating of people and our country than before. This is a strange direction we have both moved in, but I guess its for the best for both of us.

People think that revolutions happen because enough users are pissed off about certain stuff. Thats only partially true IMO. Thats just a small cause amongst a plethora. One of the biggest ingredients I think is the shared sense of purpose, hope of ‘maybe this time, its it!’, and an amplified sense of brotherhood and destiny. Here’s hoping the same purpose fills the rest of the year!

Thumbnail credit: YourLocalDave

The first thing which struck me the most, was that even though the women present at the conference I was speaking at were all dressed in full burqa, there was quite a lot more in percentage than in most tech conferences in India. Also contrary to their attire, they were not shy at all when asking questions or making their opinions heard in the crowd. I was really happy to see this, and I just WISH that I had this kind of participation of women in tech events in India, both in quantity, and the quality of the involvement in the discussions.

I spent as much (actually, probably more) time speaking Hindi there, than English! Indians are really everywhere over there, and if you happen to ride in a taxi, then you most probably can converse with the driver in Hindi. The hotel I stayed at for the first few days, was in Old Dubai, just opposite the museum. This place is so full of people from the subcontinent, that I for a few moments forgot that I’m in a different country. I  couldn’t see a single westerner (and just very few arabs) in that area. The rest were all from the subcontinent. In Dubai there is always something being built, and if you look at whose actually building them, you’ll once again find ‘desi’ faces.

This made me wonder of what is causing this massive influx of people, especially from the subcontinent, to go there and settle. It turns the reason is similar to the reason the US progressed decades earlier – the notion of the american dream.

The first person I really get to talk to about dubai was the doorsman of my hotel. He’s a tall sikh guy, with a proud beard and a prouder mustache and turban. The (often western) patrons of the hotel often click photos with him, just because of how impressive and unusual he looks. I got talking to him one evening, as he was having a particularly difficult time flagging down a taxi for me. He used to work for the Indian military and was part of the national boxing squad for a while. After that, he began working as a doorsman for  a five star hotel in Mumbai. Afterwords, he came to dubai and has been living and working there for the past 15 years. He said that he considered canada, but the process seemed a bit too slow for him, and he chose dubai instead. Since then, he is quite comforable and hasn’t thought of moving.

I talked to my own relatives, on why they are living in the dubai, and what they think of life as a middle class indian family there. They were quite enthusiastic about it, citing the high quality of living, low crime rate, proximity to india (its just a 3.5 hour flight from Delhi) , good salaries and above all, no taxes! They talked about how any of your dreams can come true here…and this is something which got repeated almost verbatim by a group of friends that I had met earlier in the week as week as well.

This is when it struck me. Its the Dubai dream. A counterpart to the american one. Poeple from all across  the world come here in search for a life that they probably just cant afford back home. Even if you’re earning just a decent salary (nothing special) you could somewhat regularly go into the best hotels in the world and dine and party there. Fast cars and fast times are more readily available here than most places on the planet. Designer shoes, clothes, watches and gadgets are so readily available here and so within reach that its like a dream come true for the average materialistic. This is the same kind of dreams created by another iconic city made out in the desert – Las Vegas. Comparing the two is an examination in contrasts and similarities.  Despite its contrasts, the one  thing which is most in common is their prominence out of dust to promise people the world. The emergence of Vegas was a quitessential test of the american dream, and dubai seems to be the same for the emiratee one.

You can see more parallels. Dubai has a massive appetite for consumption. Food here is given is massive portions, something usually associated with the states.  I went to a electronics fair where they were selling any electronic item you could think of, and it was so crowded that there was barely any room to move at times. I took my twenty minutes to find the exit to the area! So in those ways, dubai is pretty similar to the americans.

There is however, one thing which makes the american dream much more sustainable. Production. Dubai is all about selling and consuming. Not at all about producing. I was initially excited to find in the ‘internet city’ all the offices of the biggest tech companies in the world, but on further prodding found out that most of these are basically sales offices, and not much development work is being done there.

Till when can you sell? When will you have just no choice but to produce? And is dubai anticipating this day, and what steps are they taking towards it? What disadvantage, if any, would it pose to dubai when other great cities are not just sellers of goods and services, but also producers of them? I couldn’t find the answers to these questions in my short visit, but I sure am interested in them, and look forward to how the story of this city plays out.

So why is the title of this post ‘Yet another good note’? Its because of moments like these …

And this

And this

I guess seeing these images and videos makes re-assures me that there are people in this world with incredible will power and courage and also some genuinely good people trying their best to save them. Its a long way ahead, but I hope Haiti will rise above the rubble and emerge stronger in every way.

Picture credit and thumbnail attribution to the ‘The Big Picture‘ blog’s post titled ‘Faces from Haiti‘ from Boston.com

The Escapist

The Escapist is a story of five convicts who plot to escape jail. Pretty standard prison break movie, huh? Well not quite. The plot revolves around an old convicts desire to break prison to meet his dying daughter for the last time, and he recruits some other prison mates to help him escape together. There are twists and turn throughout the movie, and the ending is unbelievable. The film is fast paced, and will always keep you at the edge of your seat.

Taken

Taken is a simple story. I retired CIA operative, with a cold relationship with his daughter, suddenly finds himself with a situation in which his daughter is kidnapped in another continent. She’s taken and sold in the slave trade, but Liam Neeson has other plans, and begins some serious ass kicking, the likes of which are rarely seen on film. But what else could you expect? After all he trained Batman!

Bigger, Stronger, Faster

Bigger, Stronger, Faster is a documentary detailing the issue of anabolic steroid use which is prevelant in America. Roger Ebert said of this movie “This movie is remarkable in that it seems to be interested only in facts”. Its not only informative of the facts regarding anabolic steroids, but more importantly and interestingly, is a glimpse in to psychology of the ‘Win at all costs’ attitude in america, and grey areas of winning a competitionl and losing yourself.

Let the Right One In

Actually, the proper name of this film is “Låt den rätte komma in”. Its a swedish movie about a boy and his relationship with a vampire. The boy is constantly bullied, and the only good thing going in his life is a young girl in the neighbourhood, whom he later finds out is a vampire. I did not find it particularly scary, and I don’t think the directors intention is to make a horror film. It is more in the drama category rather than the horror genre, and is filled with great performances by both the boy and the girl.

Man on Wire

Man on Wire is a documentary, but made in way that it feels more like a hiest movie. Its about the extraordinary tale of a tightrope walker from france, who dreams of walking between the twin towers in New York. However, this is illegal, so they have to sneak into the towers in the night. Ultimately they become successfull in the ‘artistic crime of the century’, but at the cost of broken relationships and deportation from the USA. A fascinating tale of a man risking death in the excerise of his passion.

Spread the hope and cheer!

Thumbnail credit: Thomas Hawk

It also brings up the question: How much relevance do we give to each country in terms of news quantity? Just because China as a billion people doesn’t mean that an interesting news event in Mozambique shouldn’t be published instead. How do journalists gauge which news story is relevant and which isn’t?In the video we learn that the world (other than USA and Iraq) is covered literally only 1% of the time. Instead the media over there spends time covering Anna Nicole Smith’s death and Britney Spears. One of the factors that I overlooked was because it was simply cheaper to do it rather than spending on foreign bureaus.

Slimy paparazzi are easier and cheaper to find than honest and courageous journalists. Sadly, this is beginning to even happen in India. I would say that 90% of the news on Indian television is basically horse shit. These news channels are even hosting stand up comedy and quiz shows. Why? Because it is much cheaper to make a guy do stand up and film him for half an hour than do some serious investigative journalism.

There was a time when reporting could bring down presidents. Now they can’t even write their own stories.

Thumnail Attribution: Karlfrankowski

Everyone but actual developers. At least all the good developers that I’ve talked to who have even the smallest idea of what the world wide web is, think that a web without Yahoo at this stage would be a bad idea. And I agree.

People say that Yahoo has not innovated and Google has. Thats just the effects of Kool-aid. Anyone who has actual knowledge of the scientific community doing work on information retrieval, text/web mining and Human-Computer Interaction, knows that this community is actually pretty open (this video being one of the examples of scientists sharing their findings with others), and scientists regularly like to share their work amongst each other. And contrary to popular belief, Microsoft research as well as Yahoo Research are doing some pretty amazing things. See this, this, this and more if you don’t believe me.

This doesn’t mean that Google is not the best search engine out there currently, because it is. But the margin of their lead is not as big as it is made out to be by the press. Most people are just plain used to Google search, and have a Halo effect regarding it. This makes it extremely difficult to make an argument that any search engine is better than Google. It will be interesting how companies like Powerset will offset this Halo effect. Whatever their stragies will be, I know that it will involve a whole lot of PR and marketing. Simply being technically superior will not give you market share.

The Problem with the Yahoo and Microsoft Merger

Firstly, I don’t think that it is going to be a merger at all. It is an aquisition, plain and simple. I don’t know how many Yahoo employees, especially developers, will be comfortable with the idea of having Microsoft as their boss. Yahoo has been of late been staight up amazing when it comes to promoting open standards and educating everyone about best practices in web development. YUI, YDN and their stance on progressive enhancement has been widely respected. Whereas, Microsoft, especially when it comes to be web, has always been about closed and proprietary standards.

Also, it is a given that eventually (even though it will take a few years), Microsoft would like all Yahoo! properties to be in .net (or whatever new stuff they will come up in the future, like silverlight and stuff). In that case, all the awesome developers who are good in PHP, Perl and other open source technologies, will either have to learn Microsoft’s closed technologies, or just be laid off. If I were a Yahoo developer right now, I would be mighty concerned about the current situation.

It seems that right now, the Yahoo! board might be willing to put on a fight and continue the good fight. I really hope the executives at Yahoo listen to their engineers and developers and not to a bunch of greedy Yahoo shareholders who have no real attachment to the company and who just want to cash out.

Thumbnail Attribution: Yodel Anecdotal

Thumbnail Attribution: Trevor D.

I, along with many many others, am really excited for the new batman film thats about to come out….and thats a huge compliment  to the people in charge of its marketing campaign. Thats because the film isn’t supposed to be released for another six months! And already so much hype and excitement!

I’ve always been a Batman fan ever since I was a child. I could relate to him more. Maybe because everyone of us has a dark side we want to let out once a while. Maybe because he is not an alien/mutated/ghost, etc. but just a normal human being with truckloads of money and attitude!

I remember reading all the comics my brother used to buy (he was a huge fan himself) when I was seven or eight years old.  But I was a Batman fan even before that. I remember playing with a batman toy when I was five years old. At that time, the first Batman  movie was about to be released. I even remember going to the theater to see the movie with my family. Of course, at that time, I was five years old and I wouldn’t stop talking/screaming and everyone was staring at us hoping I would shut up!

Part of what makes it great for me to be Batman fan today is the fact that I’m a really big fan of Christian Bale (Empire of the Sun, American Psycho, 3:10 to Yuma), Christopher Nolan (Memento, Insomnia, The Prestige)and Heath Ledger (Monster’s Ball, The Patriot, Brokeback Mountain) as well.

Well, back to the viral marketing campaign…It is probably the best ever done for a movie. The heart of the campaign involves creating various sites connected to the story or Gotham City in general. The image of the joker has progressively been revealed in stages. Even now, not too much of the joker is to bee seen exept for a few photographs. However, Heath does look creepy and a psycho, from whatever we have seen so far.

Besides that they have been active on the major comic book conventions too. Once they had a treasure hunt done as well. They also released a trailer early on with nothing else other than a logo and dialogues. The new trailer featuring actual footage from the film was to be shown exclusively in the Will Smith movie ‘I am Legend’, but as expected, has leaked online. Now they have officially released the trailer. You can search for it on youtube if you  want, or just goto ATasteForTheTheatrical.com to see it.

They also sent a bunch of exclusive film merchandise to one of my favorite artists, John Mayer, who has an extensive online presence. They probably knew he was going to blog about it (who wouldn’t, if you suddenly got in your mail such stuff for free before everyone else!). That is just brilliant marketing. Plus the merchandise is  cool as well, especially the T-shirt. Below are some pics of what he got…

Lately, a LOT of sites have sprung up…the whole list till now is below…

• TheDarkKnightMovie.com (The Official Site)
• IBelieveInHarveyDent.com
• IBelieveInHarveyDentToo.com
• WhySoSerious.com
• Rent-A-Clown.com
• RorysDeathKiss.com
• TheGothamTimes.com
• TheHahaTimes.com
• WeAreTheAnswer.com
• GothamPolice.com
• GothamCityRail.com
• Gothamnationalbank.com
• Rememberinggina.org
• Gpdiad.com
• Gothamusd.net
• Gothamcab.com
• ACMESecuritysystems.com
• GVAFoundation.com
• ATasteForTheTheatrical.com (You can download the latest trailer for the Dark Knight there, you or can just go to this link

Also try going to http://www.whysoserious.com/personalityprofile and http://www.whysoserious.com/mausoleum/

Also check out batman-on-film.com for everything related to batman… Now some more photos…

I’m psyched!

Thumbail Attribution : Jeremy Farmer