“YOU” — Times Person of the year

The wait is finally over. I am Person of the year and so are you.

Since the deal of Youtube, user generated content is the new buzzword in Internet industry. So it didn’t come as a suprise when Wikia announced OpenServing, which I guess is nothing but based on Youtube’s business model i.e. maintain user content’s and wait for some big daddy (Google in case of Youtube) to step in with a big cheque.

Whatever it is, Wikipedia, Flikr or Myspace, at the end it is YOU who is gaining and are being welcomed to the world of freebies. Internet has become a tool for bringing together the small contributions of millions of people and making them matter. So whether it is movie reviews, online videos, encyclopedia, Operating System, blogs, YOU, the end users, are everywhere and big daddys are noticing.

I am proud to be part of collective mass known as YOU and I am proud to be Person of the year. This line from Time article says it all

“For seizing the reins of the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game, TIME’s Person of the Year for 2006 is you.”

Congratulations and welcome to Web2.0, welcome to 2007.

Rename all photos in Windows-XP

How to rename all of your photos in Windows-XP
Lately I clicked lot of photos from my Canon PowerShot S2 IS digital camera. Once I downloaded all the photos, the next big task was to rename these photos so that it makes more sense than names like DSCxxxxx.JPG. I did some research and found that there is an easy way to rename all the pics in one shot.

1. First open the folder where you have downloaded pics and select View -> Thumbnails.
2. Select all pictures you want to rename using CTRL key OR simply use CTRL+A shortcut to select everything.
3. Right-click the first photo, and select Rename from the drop-down menu.
4. Give a descriptive name to first picture say NewHampshire.JPG
5. Now click outside the photo in white space of windows explorer.
5. Voila, XP will rename all other pics as NewHampshire(1).JPG, NewHampshire(2).JPG, …. and so on.
6. Sit back and smile on your smartness.

Dalits – Travel but peacefully

Come 6th November and there is panic in Mumbai. Reason – Hide, the Dalits are coming.

Every year on 6th December, thousands of dalits descend on Chaityabhoomi near Shivaji
Park – to pay homage to Dr B R Ambedkar on his death anniversary. Now I had my share of calling myself a Mumbaikar as I lived there for 5 years. As my parents live in
Nagpur, I used to travel a lot between Nagpur-Mumbai. Couple of times, I had done this route around 6th December and believe me it is not a journey you would like to take. I am a cautioned traveller who makes travel plans much in advance. So here I was, I had reservation in second AC from Nagpur to Mumbai. The date of travel was 5th December 2002 or 2003.

To start with, I had to scream on top of my lungs to get into my compartment. There was not a single police officer in site to handle the huge rush of Chaityabhoomi pilgrimage. With a travel bag in one hand and a suitcase in another, I Jumped over people and finally got to my seat. Much to my expectations, I found five people sitting on my hard-earned-money-worth birth. And what a site it was. In a compartment made to accommodate 70-80 people there were at least 300-400 people in it. Since it was a AC compartment, there was no free air flow. The heat was unbearable in the compartment. It suddenly was like-Bihar scenario. After much altercation with the family, during which I got lot of fiery glances from youths sitting on top berth, they vacated a small area for me to sit. And that was it. I traveled 18 hours sitting in that crappy area, smelling all the stench possible and cursing myself for choosing such an auspicious date to travel. I have my own opinions against reservation, in general, and Mandal Commission, in particular. I certainly oppose what happened in Kherlanji. I will not dwell into it in this post.

I have nothing personally against congregation going to Shivaji Park to pay their respect, but it should not be done at expense of other travelers.

No wonder that Mumbaites panic in first week of December.