Thursday, January 31, 2008

Copyright

People/Companies copyright their work, so that they can earn money by selling their work, and not allowing anyone to copy their work (probably, unless they pay some royalty). They have spent their time and effort, and in return they should get some thing, and Copyright is meant for that only.

Suppose, if a person/company has done some work, which is very valuable to the society, and they will not get even single paisa from that by selling or by any other way. In that case, if they release their work for free for others to use, then it would be very valuable to the society, and they get enough fame, and publicity for that. But, still many people/companies are not doing that. Probably, the main reason is greed, or jealousy. They don't want others to enjoy some good thing for free.

If a person/organization is working for society, and not for money, and their vision is completely different, then, still what is the reason for holding copyright? If by releasing that work for free, if it improves the society, why are they not releasing it?

For example, there are few religious organizations, and they have copyright for all the books/audio/video. Nobody is allowed to copy books for free. When I asked one senior person, he said, they need money to develop the organization. If they remove the copyright restriction, then they will not get money to develop the organization.

What is the purpose of that organization? It is to preach religious activities. Their vision is, everyone should understand their philosophy. For that, everyone needs to read these books. And, these books are copyrighted by them, and others are not allowed to copy. So, they are restricting the readers. Is it their vision? For these questions, they give all sorts of random things like, anyone can come here and listen to the preachings for free etc. I feel so irritated with them. They say that, they are here for the propagation of their religious philosophy, but, they don't allow others to do the same.

There are many people/organizations like this. Eventhough, they can fulfill their mission, by releasing their work for free, they are not doing it. Probably, the reason here is, Fame. They want all the fame for that work, and in the process, even if their mission is delayed, they don't have any problem. They don't want to give any credit to anyone else.

People/Companies/Organizations have full right to get as much money as possible from their work. Once, the money stops coming, and if they release it for free, then it would be very useful for the entire society.

After criticizing few organizations, it would be very bad on my part, if I don't name few organizations which are releasing it for free.

Chinnajeeyar Swamy graciously agreed to distribute all his preaching audio/video.

Gita Press sells books for pretty less price, that even if they put the books on public domain, nobody would dare to print for that much less price. Of course, releasing the books on public domain may help the people who read soft copies of the books. Of course, even if you take those books, and create soft copies and distribute it, I don't think they will complain.

Sun, and IBM are the two biggest software companies which open sourced their work. There are many other organizations like Apache, GNU, Mozilla, X.org, FreeDesktop.org, MySql, and many universities in US are helping in opensource software.

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

www.tnsatish.com

Finally, I registered tnsatish.com. My blog is moved to blog.tnsatish.com. However, there is no need to change bookmarks, or feeds, because tnsatish.blogspot.com redirects to blog.tnsatish.com.

For the last 10 days, I have been struggling on how to setup this blog on my domain by keeping my old blogs. It is a very simple process. I just need to change the CNAME for blog.tnsatish.com to ghs.google.com. In my blogger, I have to select custom domain and enter blog.tnsatish.com. That's it. My blog is live on blog.tnsatish.com.

It is not possible to use something like www.tnsatish.com/blog for custom domain. We have to use FTP publishing to post blogs. I could not find any simple way to copy all my previous posts to this. So, I changed my blog to blog.tnsatish.com.

The help and documentation of google is so bad that, it took me a long time to understand even these simple things.

Monday, January 21, 2008

Media

Actual:
Mr.X says, "Mr.Y told that Mr.Z is a drunkard".
Headline:
Mr.X says, "Mr.Z is a drunkard".


Actual:
Team A and Team B are playing a match. If team A wins, team C will goto next round. If team B wins, then team B will goto next round. Team C capatin told best of luck to team A captain and asked him to win the match. At the end of the match, Team A lost and press conference goes like this.
Journalist (J) : Are you feeling unhappy for losing the match?
Team A Captain (A) : Yeah. But, we played really good.
J: Team C Captain wished that you should win this match.
A: Yeah. Before the match, he gave his wishes to win this match.
J: Because of your loss, Team C is not going to the next round. Will you tell sorry to the team C Captain?
A: (thinking.. Why should I tell sorry, if I have not done anything wrong?) He should depend on his own capabilities to goto next round.

HeadLine:
Team A Captain Says "Team C captain should not depend on others to goto next round."


Actual:
A Journalist (J) is interviewing one Famous Personality (FP) about the Tata Nano.
J: With Tata Nano, Are you facing sleepless nights, because of pollution etc.?
FP: It is not just Nano. No.of cars is increasing everyday, and that is causing me sleepless nights.
J: Tata Nano is very cheap, and many people will buy it, and will it cause increase in the pollution?
FP: The economy level of the country is improved, so many people can afford to buy a car. So, no.of cars is increasing, and it is causing increase in pollution.
J: Because Nano is twice more expensive than a two wheeler, many people will switch from two wheelers to Nano. Will it cause increase in pollution?
FP: Of course, the pollution will increase.

Headline:
FP says, Nano will cause increase in the pollution.




Actual:
A Famous personality (FP) said, "Nizam was a good king. Except for the two years when rajakar riots happened, everything else was good. Rajakar riots was not done by Nizam, but by some other person, and Nizam was helpless in that".

News for 3-4 days:
Everybody started criticizing FP for saying Nizam was a good king. The only comment from all the people who criticized was, "FP might have forgotten about rajakar riots. He did not know what all happened during that time."

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Hinduism

I wanted to write a blog on hinduism for a long time. After reading the article by Nita on Hindusim, I got interest to write it immediately.

Hinduism is not a religion. It is actually called as Sanathana Dharma. Sanathana Dharma is a set of rules, culture, and about life beyond birth and death, etc. It does not contain the words Hindu, or Hinduism. Whoever were following Sanathana Dharma were called as Hindus by Arabs, because they were living on the other side of Sindhu river.

All the scriptures in Sanathana Dharma are compiled/written by Veda Vyasa (Except Ramayana, which was written by Valmiki). It contains, 4 Vedas, 18 Puranas, 18 sub-puranas, 108 Upanishads, 2 Ithihasas (Mahabharath, and Ramayana). This contains entire Sanathana dharma. There is no other scripture that belongs to this. However there are other books that we have to read to understand these scriptures (like Vyakarana, Jyothishya etc.). But, they do not belong to the scriptures of Sanathana Dharma. Nothing else belongs to Sanathana Dharma.

Sanathana Dharma is NOT a religion. It just says what you should do, and the punishments that you will get, if you don't do those things. There is nothing like one belongs to this or not. It is just that whether one follows that or not.

The question, "Whether Mr/Ms.X is accepted in Hinduism or not?" does not have any meaning. There is nothing like some one belongs to Hinduism or not. It is just that whether someone follows those rules or not. If any so-called brahmin does not accept this, I would like him/her to point out the correct scriptural reference from any of the above scriptures. The present caste-system is not supported by Sanathana Dharma, and that is another big topic.

Few centuries back, when muslim kings were demolishing all the temples, at that time, many leaders of Hindu religion established few principles to protect the temples, and culture. One of those principles was, not allowing non-hindus into the temple. It was required to protect the temples at that time. But, the present temple administrators, and priests are still following those rules established for a completely different reason.

Temples in Puri, Udupi, Guruvayur, and Srirangam do not allow non-hindus, or non-indians. If a rational person enters into Puri temple, they will never like to go there again, and will get very bad impression on Hinduism. The priests in those temple are destroying hinduism in all possible ways, and many people are thinking that, what they are doing is hinduism. And they are getting very bad impression on Hinduism. Many people do not know that, 90% of the priests in all the big temples are the actual destroyers of the Hinduism.

As Ankur pointed out in the comment to Nita's article, the only way to cleanse the puri temple is by demolishing the entire premises. I completely agree with Ankur. It is better not to have a temple which is spoiling, degrading, and giving bad publicity to Hinduism.

By the way, eventhough I am a hard-core spiritual person, I can hardly count how many times I went to a non-ISKCON temple in the last 5 years. I am fed up with the money-demands, useless rules, mis-interpretations of the scriptures and many other things in the temples.

I hope people will not take those big temples as the authority of Hinduism, and appreciate the philosophy of real Hinduism.

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Tata Nano

After Ratan Tata announced Tata Nano, many people gave many comments on that. These are the few comments.

we do not have enough infrastructure to support such things. Country should focus on road infrastructure first and then they should go ahead with such products. Ultimately everyone will suffer with the heavy traffic and pollution, and also I doubt on the quality of the car and who knows how much pollution will be there. At least this was not expected from TATAs.

How u get the road discipline? Imagine if all bikes changes to cars. Just imagine when you drive back home. India got huge population this wont work for us.

I wonder if Mr. Ratan Tata would be interested in travelling in Bangalore during the peak hours on weekdays for a distance of 20 Kilometers on congested and gridlocked roads during the summer time (or for any time, for that matter), and if so, how thrilled he would be by the experience. Thanks for contributing to the mess and making our cities even more polluted. I think mass rapid transit is the way to go. I do not share the enthusiasm at all.


The responses to the above comments.


Let's do the following to reduce consumption, congestion, crowding

  1. People below income level of 2 lacs per annum should not be allowed to possess a cell phone. (Reason: The lines are getting jammed)
  2. People below income level of 1 lac per annum should not be allowed to use electricity and running water (Reason: We would save more of the planet earth)
  3. Do away with Air Deccan and other low cost airlines. (Reason: Our airports are getting congested, be patriotic and use Indian Railways for travelling,).
  4. Only employees who understand the significance of urban congestion and are aware of their social responsibilities should be allowed to bring cars to office. (Reason: Why does everybody need a car, use a bicycle, it would keep you fit, my grandfather would scoff at the idea of youngsters driving cars, Huh!)
  5. Only cars priced above Rs 10 lacs allowed on roads, if you can’t afford it, travel in overcrowded buses.
  6. Only cellphones priced over Rs 10,000 allowed on phone networks- we’ll never have a network busy signal- who cares about people that can’t afford those phones- their talking must not be important.
  7. Only houses above Rs 50 lacs to be allowed to be constructed- the cheaper ones aren’t safe, spoil the skyline, are not attractive.


All those guys who said that driving a car adds pollution and own a car are hypocrites ( it doesn’t matter you are driving in India and US). Why don’t you use the public transport in US? Which is developed quite good. All our budding Environmentalist! Before telling others to not use a car. Please stop using a car, and use public transport.

Nano conforms Euro 4 standards, and in India Bharath 3 standards is enough.

It's the problem of infrastructure which the government is supposed to handle not the manufacturers," Bajaj Auto MP Rajiv Bajaj says.

"That's what drove me - a man on a two-wheeler with a child standing in front, his wife sitting behind, add to that the wet roads — a family in potential danger," Ratan Tata wrote on the company website.

This is a day that entire India looked forwarded to. Not just India. Entire auto world. There was a time, when India was known just for crazy cults and snake dancers. Few years back it changed where we could answer some phones and add two more digits for fixing Y2K. That was a time an Indian design was looked low upon and Indian made car was inferior. Wow! Looks we have come a long way when Newspapers in Japan, Germany, UK and the US were waiting anxiously for a truly Indian made car.

Nita writes that the profit margin TATA would be having on each car is wafer-thin after factoring the manufacturing cost, the retailer’s cut, etc. This genuinely seems to be a project in the interest of people to make their daily travel safer. Of course TATA does gain all the fame and limelight. But it deserves it. A big challenge accomplished and a real achievement!

One small comment that is good enough for all the cribs about the Tata nano is
If the public transportation would have been good, this car would not have come on the roads.

Monday, January 14, 2008

Transport System

If I have a gun, and if there is no punishment (in india) for killing anyone, then, I will definitely kill those who propose ridiculous decisions on transport system. I don't care punishment that I get in the other world, as long as I don't get any punishment here.

Transport system already has so many problems. To know few problems, you can read it on my blog and on enagar for the posts.

In Bangalore, they are proposing a ridiculous policy.

Bangalore’s traffic cops propose to implement a rule which will allow vehicles ending with odd and even registration numbers, respectively, to ply on alternate days. This means a vehicle owner takes out his/her vehicle on alternate days. The idea is to reduce vehicle volume on roads by at least 30 per cent. Government and public transport system vehicles could be exempted. Apart from providing a reprieve to road users, the new system could reduce pollution and promote extensive use of public transport.

If the transport system is good, nobody would spend so much unnecessarily on their vehicles. Because, the transport system is bad, people are using their own vehicles. Now, if they ban normal vehicles also, I don't know what will happen.

The people who take decisions on these never travel by public transport, and takes ridiculous decisions. If there is a rule that, all the MLAs, and MPs (no exceptions for ministers) have to travel by public transport only, then it will not take more than a day to improve it.

Friday, January 11, 2008

Changes in Tab Menu in VIM

I have changed the tab menu in VIM to display all the filenames in sorted order. If there are too many tabs in VIM, it would be very difficult to manage the tabs unless the filenames are in sorted order in the menu. I hope atleast now, the script would be useful to atleast one person other than me. :)

Monday, January 07, 2008

Bhajji - Transcript of the hearing

Procter : Did you call Symonds as Monkey?

Bhajji : No,I called a monkey as Symonds.

Procter : So you did

Bhajji : (Silence)

Procter : How dare, you insulted a monkey. You are banned for 3 matches.

Bhajji : :((

Ponting& Co : !!???

Ponting : hey, Symonds. What did he say?

Symonds : What ever, he is banned. You can bat well in the next game.

Ponting : No, Kumble is also there. Ask him whether he can ban him also.

Symonds : We’ll see in the next match, if he takes your wicket, then we'll complain.

Ponting : Then ok. Come.

New Rules in ICC

Some rules to be incorporated by ICC to give the other teams a perfect clarification:

(1) Ricky Ponting – (THE TRULY GENUINE CRICKETER OF THE CRICKET ERA AND WHOSE INTEGRITY SHOULD NOT BE DOUBTED) should be considered as the FOURTH UMPIRE. As per the new rules, FOURTH UMPIRE decision is final and will over ride any decisions taken by any other umpires. ON-FIELD umpires can seek the assistance of RICKY PONTING even if he is not on the field. This rule is to be made, so that every team should understand the importance of the FOURTH UMPIRE.

(2) While AUSTRALIAN TEAM is bowling, If the ball flies anywhere close to the AUSTRALIAN FIELDER (WITHIN 5 metre distance), the batsman is to be considered OUT irrelevant of whether the catch was taken cleanly or grassed. Any decision for further clarification should be seeked from the FOURTH UMPIRE. This is made to ensure that the cricket is played with SPORTIVE SPIRIT by all the teams.

(3) While BATTING, AUSTRALIAN players will wait for the ON-FIELD UMPIRE decisions only (even if the catch goes to the FIFTH SLIP as the ball might not have touched the bat). Each AUSTRALIAN batsman has to be out FOUR TIMES (minimum) before he can return to the pavilion. In case of THE CRICKETER WITH INTEGRITY, this can be higher.

(4) UMPIRES should consider a huge bonus if an AUSTRALIAN player scores a century. Any wrong decisions can be ignored as they will be paid huge bonus and will receive the backing of the AUSTRALIAN team and board.

(5) All AUSTRALIAN players are eligible to keep commenting about all players on the field and the OPPONENT TEAM should never comment as they will be spoiling the spirit of the AUSTRALIAN team. Any comments made in any other language are to be considered as RACIALISM only.

(6) MATCH REFREE decisions will be taken purely on the AUSTRALIAN TEAM advices only. Player views from the other teams decisions will not be considered for hearing. MATCH REFREES are to be given huge bonus if this rule is implemented.

(7) NO VISITING TEAM should plan to win in AUSTRALIA . This is to ensure that the sportive spirit of CRICKET is maintained.

(8) THE MOST IMPORTANT RULE: If any bowler gets RICKY PONTING - “THE UNDISPUTED CRICKETER WITH INTEGTIRY IN THE GAME OF CRICKET” more than twice in a series, he will be banned for the REST OF THE SERIES. This is to ensure that the best batsman/Captain will be played to break records and create history in the game of CRICKET.

These rules will clarify better to all the teams VISITING AUSTRALIA.