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How Well You Tweet? November 22, 2009

Posted by simarprit in Uncategorized.
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With the growing reach of Twitter, there is also an increasing desire to know how good I am when it comes to tweeting, at least with me it is. This desire has led me to explore many new websites being launched to cater to this segment of twitterverse. I can’t cover all, but here I briefly review three of them which I visit at least once in a month.

TW – Analyst – Looks like this is amongst the early movers. The site analyzes your tweets on the basis of writing and on the basis of frequency of your tweets. Simple, no-nonsense one page analysis approach is followed. The site is focused on sharing its judgement about your tweeting. For me it says – Your tweeting is already tip-top! No improvements needed – but check back here every so often to make sure your reputation is being maintained! But it was not always like this, there were suggestions and tips which lead me to incorporate them in my style of tweeting and bingo my report card starting improving.

Twitter Friends -  Based on the basic logic behind TW Analyst – Twitter Friends adds lots of bells and whistles to make you spend more time and gives you more reasons to come back. It allows you ego boosters like comparing you with followers or the ones you are following or just about with anyone else. It has interesting graphs which tell you how selfish, greedy or sharing you are when it comes to tweeting, of course they use more diplomatic words to make statements like that. Twitter Friends has also influenced my style of tweeting I realized that when it came to replying to others or doing RTs I was selfish, not anymore!

Klout – Klout is by professional in its outlook and development. It looks most focused towards founders making money by an early exit. Interesting UI, beautiful graphs and charts and a revisit value, Klout has it all. Klout doesn’t focus on tips and tricks of Tweeting it simply works on how good you are what is your overall clout when it comes to comparing it within your circle and the twitterverse in general. Klout is not yet a self-improvement tool on tweeting, it is what it says and encourages you to move towards the right extreme corner of the graph.

Most Popular Mapping Sites in the World November 19, 2009

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Here is the compilation of 10 most popular mapping sites in the world. I must state that I have considered only those sites which are in English and which are not a geography specific and cover whole world. Mapsofworld.com is of course owned by Compare Infobase Limited and I am proud of the fact that it has made to this list. Global traffic assessment has been don through various third party sites and press releases and blog coverage.

Rank Site Name
1 www.maps.google.com
2 www.mapquest.com
3 maps.yahoo.com
4 bing.com\maps
5 www.mapsofworld.com
6 www.geology.com
7 www.worldatlas.com
8 www.wikimapia.org
9 www. Multimap.com
10 www.maps.nationalgeographic.com

Christmas Rings a Bell November 12, 2009

Posted by simarprit in Christmas.
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As Thanksgiving Day comes closer, my mind starts looking at what all is happening this year on Christmas and Holidays. I thought my Christmas “fixation”(if I may say so) would end as Compare no longer owns one of the first Christmas Sites in the world Christmas Carnivals – I don’t see it happening. My interest and my involvement remains.

I revisited ChristmasCarnivals.com yesterday and I was thrilled to see the new getup of the site, it looks different and also the integration with Twitter part of it, @ChristmasC has become the largest Christmas Brand on Twitter, started much ahead of its time the Twitter account promises to offer goodies to one and all.

I would love to hear your ideas about what all we should do in Christmas Carnivals to make it  more useful to all age groups and all geographies (Yes, we still maintain Christmas Carnivals)

Map Doesn’t Change Map Page Does November 6, 2009

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Indian Map has gone through one significant change in last 11 years,  the state reorganization which was done in Novemeber 2000. If we keep that change aside nothing has changed as far as the Map of India is concerned, but at http://MapsofIndia.com the India Political Map page has been changing at least once every year. It changed once again yesterday, essentially to incorporate a new user interface (UI) and also to accommodate some broad level changes in integration with other content on the website.

Mapsofindia.com has been a site close to my heart since I named it against the trend prevailing at that point of time, Maps of India is amongst the first phrase as a domain name websites in the world. We are working on a significantly high number of changes on Mapsofindia.com.

The site is being geared to grow exponentially in coming days on both accounts knowledge and traffic. I would like your feedback on the new layout of India Political Map and I also look forward to your suggestions on what all you would like to see on Mapsofindia.com

Please visit the link and let us know your thoughts – http://www.mapsofindia.com/maps/india/india-political-map.htm

 

Twenty Most Useful Indian Sites November 5, 2009

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Total of 30 parameters and close to about 200 hours of my personal involvement has resulted in one list:

Here is “The Authoritative List of India’s Twenty Most Useful Websites”

The list with one parameter and Useful Ranking is being made public with this post. The complete study/report can be shared with anyone at a nominal cost of  $25,000.00.  Number of sites studied for this report are over 2000.

Your comments and specific questions would be welcome.

Important:

  1. Mapsofindia.com which made to this list is owned by Compare Infobase Limited
  2. IndiaMart.com & ClickIndia.com are founded/co-founded by Dinesh Agarwal, I know Dinesh
  3. MakeMyTrip.com founder is Deep Kalra who chairs NASSCOM SIG on Internet of which I am also a member
  4. I have considered only those websites which are Indian in origin and deed
  5. We had a tie between BigAdda and Ibibo – we included Ibibo
Website Google PR Google PR Rank Useful Rank
Rediff.com 7 3 1
IRCTC.co.in 8 1 2
Indiatimes.com 7 3 3
BSNL.in 8 1 4
Naukri.com 7 3 5
Cricinfo.com 7 3 6
BharatStudent.com 7 3 7
NDTV.com 7 3 8
MapsofIndia.com 7 3 9
IndiaMart.com 6 10 10
HDFCbank.com 6 10 11
BookMyShow.com 6 10 12
Magicbricks.com 6 10 13
Sulekha.com 5 15 14
ibibo.com 5 15 15
Shaadi.com 5 15 16
Clickindia.com 5 15 17
ICICIdirect.com 5 15 18
Makemytrip.com 5 15 19
Redbus.in 6 10 20

Do post a comment, it is important to us:

November – Top Indian Sites in the US November 3, 2009

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Here is the November update of the Top Indian Sites in the US. I am seriously considering moving this post to a site, let me hope – I am able to do it before my next month report becomes due.

Rank Top 50 Indian websites in US Quantcast Rank 11/2
1 mapsofworld.com 1,149
2 rediff.com 1,712
3 bollywoodsargam.com 1,975
4 indiatimes.com 3,002
5 sulekha.com 4,402
6 ibibo.com 4,956
7 bharatstudent.com 5,350
8 dgreetings.com 6,099
9 tradeindia.com 6,202
10 indiamart.com 6,556
11 mydearvalentine.com 6,581
12 sify.com 6,954
13 guruji.com 6,955
14 chakpak.com 8,035
15 hindustantimes.com 8,775
16 in.com 9,685
17 shaadi.com 10,127
18 cricinfo.com 10,281
19 hindu.com 11,526
20 mapsofindia.com 12,759
21 bharatmatrimony.com 13,160
22 webindia123.com 13,758
23 expressindia.com 13,784
24 clickindia.com 14,561
25 makemytrip.com 19,043
26 ndtv.com 19,561
27 bollywoodhungama.com 20,347
28 rajshri.com 22,713
29 tribuneindia.com 22,785
30 samachar.com 26,231
31 raaga.com 28,706
32 jeevansathi.com 37,616
33 timesjobs.com 37,874
34 indiainfo.com 41,456
35 carwale.com 42,265
36 beautytipshub.com 45,356
37 rediffmail.com 46,526
38 zapak.com 47,537
39 indiaedu.com 50,567
40 indya.com 54,549
41 icicibank.com 55,305
42 naukrihub.com 55,476
43 indiahousing.com 58,842
44 bseindia.com 59,974
45 ibnlive.com 60,887
46 magicbricks.com 65,739
47 indiaglitz.com 67,054
48 craftsinindia.com 71,579
49 naukri.com 74,577
50 liveindia.com 89,051

1984 Anti Sikh Pogrom (Riots) and Twitter November 1, 2009

Posted by simarprit in Sikhism.
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Twitter is a medium which shows everyone naked, instinctive statements taught a lesson to a host of thought leaders on eating crow. Shashi Tharoor, Barkha Dutt, Vikram Chandra, Pritish Nandy, Rajdeep Sardesai were all stopped in their tracks and requested/asked/ pushed to clarify their statements and use of words. Some like Pritish Nandy were extremely quick in clarifying their views and stating their position where as others like Barkha Dutt,  Rajdeep Sardesai and Shashi Tharoor took a circuitous route to reach the same place. Shashi Tharoor was quickly reminded of his “Cattle Class” misadventure on Twitter and decided to go absolutely silent on this question after making one simple clarifying statement.

The clarification seekers came from all geographies and belonged to all communities, however Sikhs from India, US, UK, Australia and Canada outnumbered everyone else due to obvious reasons. Sikh, Sikhs, Riots, 84 and 1984 remained critical words in all tweets. Rough estimate of number of tweets pertaining to 1984 Anti Sikh Pogrom puts the number close to 100,000. One could see instinctive collaborations happening simultaneously in putting across point and countering thought leaders, in some cases to a great  pounding effect.

A random check of  profile and age group of those who were actively countering or correcting the “thought leaders” talks a lot about the even spread of community across diverse verticals and 1984 atrocities hurting all age groups. An 80-year-old tweeted about re-living the partition mayhem and a 21-year-old talked about his being brought up listening to first hand stories from elders who faced it all and survived to talk about it.

On Twitter the Sikh community emerged as a Virtual Nation and grieved as one.

Tofu Sandwich Recipe November 1, 2009

Posted by simarprit in Food.
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A strange situation emerged early in the morning today, my daughter Avval wanted a “Never Had Before” breakfast, here is what she was served:

Tofu Sandwich:

  1. 4 Slices of brown bread
  2. 1 Small Capsicum
  3. 2 (1 cm Thick & 5 cm x 5cm) slices of Tofu
  4. A palm full of corns
  5. Few assorted herbs
  6. Tomato/ Onion Paste
  7. Mint Chutney
  8. Salt and Pepper to taste
  9. Olive Oil

Step by Step -

  1. Bread slices were put in toaster
  2. Corn & Straight Cut Capsicum was cleaned and put to boil
  3. Tofu slices were cooked in Olive oil and Herbs were added after Tofu slices became golden in color.  Flat pan frying with just a hint of olive oil as cooking medium
  4. Tomato/Onion  paste was lightly cooked with salt and pepper added
  5. Boiled Capsicum and Corns were mixed with Mint Chutney
  6. Cooked Tomato Onion paste was put on two slices
  7. Tofu slices were added (1 each)
  8. Corn & Capsicum mixed – with Mint Chutney were divided in two equal portions and put on top of tofu slices
  9. Sandwich was closed with the other two toasted bread slices, and bread corners were finely removed and the ready sandwiches were cross cut into two triangle sandwiches each
  10. Wow, wow , wow was celebrated

Stay Young, Drink Twitter Every Day October 27, 2009

Posted by simarprit in Internet, Twitter.
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When I woke up today morning I had a strange thought, do I eat Twitter or do I drink Twitter. I asked myself where this came from. The answer is plain and simple, Twitter has become something which I must consume everyday, my day has to begin with it and my day must end with it. It has become an addiction, which I am proud of.  So, the question remains, do I drink Twitter or do I eat Twitter.  I think in my case, I drink twitter everyday,  reason is plain and simple drinking is done more often than eating.  You can’t begin your day with eating something but you can always start it with drinking something.  You can’t go to bed after eating something it will make u feel heavy, but a drink just before sleep is perfect.

Having given an answer to myself to this strange thought, I asked myself who else is drinking Twitter around? There are many, the 1st and foremost name that came to my mind was of Gul Panag.  It looks like Twitter has become her favorite drink, specially the way she is going about the Wills Lifestyle India Fashion week tells you that she can drink as much of Twitter as is offered to her or she can lay her hands on.  On an average she is doing about 60-70 tweets a day either from the desktop or handheld and her every Tweet whether it is generic to specific to  the Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week or it is one-to-one tweet, you can see the adrenalin rush which she has in abundance reflecting in it.  Now, why am I observing it so closely, it is because a part of the action which she is doing involves one of the projects passionately incubated by me, Twitsanps.com.  Gul Panag has been using Twitsnaps since many months but the way she is driving the mileage out of the site is making me wonder on why we didn’t identify this dimension of TwitSnaps

Let me just allow random thoughts to flow and these thoughts are just throwing up zillion words, Social Media, Lifestyle, Fashion, Glamour, Connectivity, Networking, Integration, Bollywood, Miss India, Charisma, Fan Following and I can go on and on and on.  What Twitter has done is that it has brought forward a platform where you can create a potent mix of absolutely unrelated disconnected, disjointed entities floating around in the world.  No wonder the new name Twitterverse makes lot of sense to me.  There is a separate thought with which ITC would have gone and created Wills cigarettes, there would have been a surrogate advertising thought with which they would have created Wills Lifestyle as an apparel brand.  There would have been an altogether different thought with which Ministry of Textiles would have conceived India Fashion Week, now bring in a former Miss India who is now a Bollywood actress who has always had a dream of doing news coverage using Twitter to cover an event aided with a photosharing site which was conceived with a very different objective.

I am sure what Twitter is doing with me it is doing with Gul Panag and with many others.  It is just making us younger with every tweet we do.  The minute we Tweet, we allow unrestricted flow of thoughts to float around in the universe. We know if all these thoughts are connected together, it would truly reflect our persona which for people like me is the root cause of addiction. I have always felt that I have never been understood and I think many of us do that, but if you tweet and you tweet passionately and you tweet straight from your heart and your tweet carries the finest your gray cells have to offer, you know that you are home, you know that you can simply go and tell someone that if you want to understand me go and read my tweets.

Today when I was updating my Google profile in a section on write your brief biodata, I just wanted to write one word @simarp.  So do I go ahead and change my name, maybe I should. I love eating but I must drink and my drink is called Twitter.  Stay young, drink Twitter everyday.

Tata Nano Modifiction Agenda October 25, 2009

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As I eagerly await delivery of my Tata Nano which is still few months away, I have decided to make a to do list anyway and open it to friends and family for suggestion:

  1. It would be our first Business Idea prototype from Avval Business Ideas Pvt. Ltd.
  2. Our modified version of Nano would be named Seerat
  3. The roof would be the first thing to go off and would be replaced with toughened glass
  4. The back seats would move out and become flat platform
  5. Air Bags would come in
  6. The front seats would be moved out and replaced with power controlled seats with lumber support and would be  connected to an additional battery
  7. Rear wiper with spray would be added
  8. The rear view mirrors would get power control and indicator lights
  9. Front lights would get an internal row of LED circle – blue tint
  10. Rear/ Back light unit would be replaced with an LED panel
  11. Steering gets replaced with Audio controls
  12. A special U lights comes at the front and rear
  13. Tubeless tyres (If available in this size)
  14. Gets Alloys
  15. Gets a protective shield to cover the bottom
  16. Gets a four speaker music system
  17. Essentially a two seater, we would need to plan what we do with the rear doors, if possible we would close one and make the other remote controlled  lift up gate for shopping and such

I would love to implement more ideas, if they are practical. The idea is t make the car a small fun car for the family which does service in 5-7 KM radius for local errands, in 100% self drive mode