My Search Trends 2009

After writing about the google search trends for the year 2009, I got this wired idea about finding out my own search trends for year 2009... I use only google for searching and I use less of address box and more of google search box in the google toolbar for mozilla firefox. And then I remembered that I had activated google web history few months ago... to my surprise google actully has a trends link in google web history. Its kinda scares me how much I use google... :( You can know a lot about me by looking at these search queries... Like what interests me, my work,. what time of the day I am most active etc.., What more.... here I go!!

Top queries

1. css layout
2. lorem ipsum
3. youtube
4. $ in INR
5. ===censored===
   
6. kalamandir
7. secunderabad
8. entrepreneurs blog
9. jquery image slider
10. time california

Top sites

1. www.answers.com
2. en.wikipedia.org
3. www.google.com
4. www.php.net
5. wordpress.org
6. www.w3schools.com
7. groups.google.com
8. www.youtube.com
9. ted.com
10. www.lipsum.com

Top clicks

1. Lorem Ipsum - All the facts - Lipsum generator
2. CSS Layout: A collection of 224 Grid and CSS Layouts
3. Welcome To National Board Of Examination
4. Go Daddy Coupons, Go Daddy Coupon Codes, Go Daddy Promotions, Go ...
5. Template Tags/wp list pages « WordPress Codex
6. http://translate.google.com/
7. Godaddy promo code and coupon list for 2009 - Page 1 of 45
8. Chief Minister YS Rajasekhar Reddy Helicopter Nallamala Forest ...
9. jQuery lightBox plugin
10. Downloading jQuery - jQuery JavaScript Library

India: 2009 Year-End Google Zeitgeist

After my last post on Year-End Zeitgeist, I started to analyze the google search trends in India and try to know whats on the minds of we Indian's...

Here, checkout some interesting stats...

Looks like the Indian youngsters are trying hard to find "how to kiss"... ;) It tops the charts on how to list... Coming to movie list "Love aaj Kal" topping the search quires is disappointing... come on India, lets move on to some realistic movies... stop living in the dream world... there were better movies. "Katrina Kaif" tops the popular celebrities... not bad. "Nokia 5800" tops the search for mobile devices... This mobile started with a price of INR 18k and now down to INR 11k... this shows how much Indians are getting ready for high end mobile devices... pretty good. Indian traveler has surely become net savy... "IRCTC" found third postion on fastest rising search quries... IRCTC has an excellent interface and you can book a train ticket in two easy steps with a credit card or net banking option... Impressed!! Coming to politics Rahul Ghandi seems to be generating lot of buzz with all his tours, some say he is PM in making. And last but not the least... budget 2009 takes the first poisiton in the fastest rising search quires...

Recession queries peaking - then declining - in India

Fastest rising

1. budget 2009
2. kambakth ishq
3. irctc
4. satyam share price
5. bhuvan
6. michael jackson
7. twitter
8. election results
9. windows 7
10. nokia 5800

Most popular celebrities

1. katrina kaif
2. michael jackson
3. salman khan
4. aishwarya rai
5. shahid kapoor
6. kareena kapoor
7. shahrukh khan
8. angelina jolie
9. megan fox
10. sachin tendulkar

Most popular movies

1. love aaj kal
2. harry potter
3. slumdog millionaire
4. kaminey
5. kambakht ishq
6. ghajini
7. hannah montana
8. dev d
9. wake up sid
10. dostana

Most popular

1. gmail
2. youtube
3. yahoomail
4. orkut
5. indian railways
6. yahoo
7. google
8. rediffmail
9. facebook
10. rediff

Most popular politician

1. rahul gandhi
2. indira gandhi
3. sachin pilot
4. sarah palin
5. p chidambaram
6. mayawati
7. barack obama
8. sonia gandhi
9. rajesh pilot
10. maneka gandhi

How to

1. how to kiss
2. how to hack
3. how to meditate
4. how to study
5. how to swim
6. how to draw
7. how to flirt
8. how to chat
9. how to concentrate
10. how to download

Year-End Zeitgeist

zeitgeist /tsīt'gīst'/ The zeitgeist of a particular place during a particular period in history is the attitudes and ideas that are generally common there at that time, especially the attitudes and ideas shown in literature, philosophy, and politics.

Year-End Zeitgeist is a collection of search trends over 2009 that offers a glimpse at the collective consciousness. Google has compiled Zeitgeist since 2001 — this year you can explore what was on the minds of citizens all over the globe, in dozens of languages.

Each year, Google examines the billions of queries that people around the world have typed into Google search to discover the zeitgeist—the spirit of the times. Take a moment, look back at the happenings of 2009—the people, events and memories that made this year unique.

India: http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/press/zeitgeist2009/regional.html#india

United States: http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/press/zeitgeist2009/

United Kingdom: http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/press/zeitgeist2009/regional.html#united-kingdom

Australia: http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/press/zeitgeist2009/regional.html#australia

Google Goggles

Google Goggles is a new visual search application for Android phones. Now you can search the web by taking a picture, instead of typing in words. Shoot a photo of a landmark, sign, logo, book cover or work of art to get matching search results for your image. For business information, just point your phone at a store, and Goggles will show you the name of the business, using the phone's GPS and compass.

http://www.google.com/mobile/goggles

Inserting inline images in gmail

This is for those who are wondering how to add a image into your email/gmail.

Here is how you can add images to your email without having to do any stunts...

Follow the below steps:

1. Open your email in any browser you are comfortable with
2. Login

The following four steps just need to be followed only for the first time...

3. Click on Settings link on the right top corner.
4. In the page which appears... find the "Labs" tab.
5. In the list of items listed Labs tab... search for "Inserting images" which is 6th form the bottom most. So, it is suggested to start checking from bottom.
6. Enable the option beside "Inserting Images", then go down the page and click "Save Changes".

That's it.

Now the mail will reload itself...

7. Click on Compose mail.
8. Try finding the insert image icon , it can be found under the subject box... in the list of icons... in between the smiley and link icon... (Check this link if you are still not able to locate the icon.. http://brokekid.net/2009/04/14/tips-tricks-for-google-apps-adding-images-to-gmail/ )

9. Click on it.. browse and upload the image from your computer or just give the web address... and click ADD IMAGE... This will insert the image into your mail.

Though the above looks like a huge procedure... it is pretty much straight forward... once you get familiarized with it... it will take a second to add a new image into your mail.

Top 10 Articles on sales from Q3

Here's a list of the Top 10 most read... most discussed... most controversial articles of the last 3 months. Use these tips to blow up your goals in 4th Quarter!

1) Killer Sales Questions! http://tinyurl.com/m739tr

2) 13 Ways to Make Your Boss Love You http://tinyurl.com/pbvrxv

3) 8 Tips for Overwhelming Your Negativity http://tinyurl.com/nqmqoc

4) Driving Unbeatable Sales Numbers! http://tinyurl.com/yexcd8w

5) Selling On Price http://tinyurl.com/yebrqkd

6) Why the Next 60 Days are Critical http://tinyurl.com/yekzvyr

7) 10 Leadership Principles for New Managers http://tinyurl.com/n5tt7s

8) It’s Nothing Personal, It’s Just Business http://tinyurl.com/nuongl

9) My Biggest Challenge with Cold Calling http://tinyurl.com/y8z74xa

10) 6 Ways to Improve LinkedIn Groups http://tinyurl.com/r7lwgn


Source: SalesBlogcast.com

Me the strange person

We are a strange people. We spend our lives doing things we detest, to make money to buy things we do not need, to impress people we do not like. We never want to be doing what we are doing. When we eat, we read; when we watch TV, we eat; when we drive, we listen to music; when we listen to music, we work around the house. When we want to be with friends, we go to the noisy restaurant; when we want to party, we spend the evening trying to converse. -- The Peter Pyramid by Dr Laurence J. Peter

The above quote has hit me really hard... Seriously, my life style is so damn mixed up.... I am seriously thinking of making few drastic changes... wish me luck.

Twittering your server status

We are very near to launch our new product and I had to write a simple script which will help us monitor few specific services on the production server (linux) without taking too much of processor or memory. This script sends a email when any of the services are down but today I saw that the mail server itself is down, though this script checks for the mail service... it cannot really send a email when the mail server is down... so there is no way for us to know the status of the server when the mail server is down...

I started exploring the possibilities to get a notification on any of the other communication platforms I use, SMS is the ultimate thing but for that you need a sms gateway etc.., The other communication platforms I use are skype, gtalk, twitter and these are accessible on my mobile too... I started researching on sending a ping to gtalk without having any IM client installed on the source server... after trying for an hour, I moved over to twitter considering twitter has an api.

So after searching for couple of mins I found an excellent one liner to send status message from command line to twitter...

Here is the code...

#!/bin/bash
curl -u username:password -d status="$1" http://twitter.com/statuses/update.xml

run this script with message in double quotes... and your twitter will get updated.

So, go ahead create a new twitter account for your server and start twittering your server status.

Honda - Even we screw!!

I am right now sitting in customer lounge of Honda Service Station, (Sainikpuri, RK Puram, Secunderabad AP, India), been here for almost an hour, in spite of calling them before I started to the service station. I had very clearly asked them if the bike is ready and specifically if the bike is washed. They said it will be ready in 10mins and I can come down to collect it. It takes good 30mins for me to reach the service station and to my surprise the bike is not washed. So, they made me wait for another 30mins to wash it and 15mins more to dry it. That’s 45mins gone…

So, I take the invoice generated to check what was done and for what I have been charged. They had charged me 12.5% of sales tax for few new parts and 10.3% of service tax. I wanted to see the cover of the original parts as mostly these parts come with MRP which means the sales tax is included – which I was not sure of… so, I did not stress much on that. All of this takes another 15mins.

I go to the cash counter to make a payment, I give them my debit card and was told that I will be charged 1.5% extra if it is a debit or credit card… So, I asked the cashier to provide me a bill mentioning the 1.5% extra charge, and again to my surprise she said she cannot give any bill for that 1.5%. I was pissed the very second she told me that and went to the manager to get this issue cleared. But neither could he do anything about it, I am writing this as the store manager is calling up the zonal sales manager.

This happens in most of the stores in my country but did not expect this from Honda. I did little bit of research and found that it is actually illegal for any store to charge extra fee for using a debit or credit card. I think that’s the reason Honda is not ready to give me a bill mentioning that 1.5%.

Finally, the sales manager is on phone and tells me that it is the bank which charges 1.5% for every transaction and they pass that charge over to the customer… I explained him that it is illegal to do that, again to my surprise he knows that it is illegal but tries explaining to me that if every customer uses the debit or credit card facility then they will have a 1.5% loss on their total profit. Anyways, I told him that I really don’t care about that and either I need a bill for that 1.5% or stop charging, not just for me but for everyone from now on.

Anyways, they did not charge me 1.5% but I am sure they will continue charging others who don’t ask about it.

All I want to say is… like all other companies Honda screws too.

First Ever Criminal Arrest For Domain Name Theft

Source: Slashdot

"Until recently, there hasn't been a case of a domain theft where the thief was caught and arrested. However, on July 30th, Daniel Goncalves was arrested at his home in Union, New Jersey and charged in a landmark case, the first criminal arrest for domain name theft in the United States. 'Cases of domain name theft have not typically involved a criminal prosecution because of the complexities, financial restraints and sheer time and energy involved. If a domain name is stolen, the victim of the crime in most cases would need experience with the technical and legal intricies associated with the domain name system. To move the case forward, they would also need a law enforcement professional who understands the case or is willing to take the time to learn. For example, the Angel's told us that in their case they called their local law enforcement in Florida who sent a uniformed officer in a squad car to their home. The first thing you can imagine the officer asked was, "What's a domain?".'"

Success is a continuous journey

Start with Passion

1. Passion
2. Work
3. Focus
4. Push
5. Ideas
6. Improve
7. Serve
8. Persist
----------
SUCCESS
----------

Bangalore, camel ride at your doorstep

Snap taken from p1i phone... in Bangalore!!

AdSense video units to be retired

Here is a mail I received from Google..

We're writing to let you know that we'll be retiring AdSense video units at the end of April. After reviewing this feature, we've found that it hasn't been performing as well as we had hoped, so we've decided to focus our efforts on other opportunities to help publishers monetize their sites.

We recommend that you begin removing the video unit code from your pages as soon as possible, to ensure that you can take advantage of the available ad space on your pages. At the end of April, any remaining Leaderboard or Skyscraper video units will begin directing users to YouTube.com, while other video unit sizes will automatically be changed to standard embedded YouTube players. These standard video players will display top YouTube videos, but you won't generate earnings from them once this change occurs.

If you'd still like to display free video content from YouTube, you can do so through YouTube.com directly: visit any specific video page for the embed code, or sign in to your YouTube account to create a playlist. For more information about embedding YouTube videos, please visit http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?answer=57788. Alternatively, if you have less than three ad units on your page, you may prefer to replace your video unit with a regular ad unit.

Although video units are being retired, other video offerings within AdSense aren't affected. Video ads may still appear on your pages and AdSense for video is still available for eligible publishers. If you'd like more information about the retiring of video units, please visit our Help Center at https://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/topic.py?topic=12182.

If General Motors had developed technology like microsoft

Here is another fake claim (collected on internet in 1999) doing rounds on internet... anyhow, its hilarious and fun to read...

Caution: If you have never used windows then this is not for you...

GENERAL MOTORS reply to BILL GATES

At a recent computer expo (COMDEX), Bill Gates reportedly compared the computer industry with the auto industry and stated, "If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25.00 cars that got 1,000 miles to the gallon."

In response to Bill's comments, General Motors issued a press release
Stating:
"If GM had developed technology like microsoft, we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics:

I love the 7th and 10th points...

1. For no reason whatsoever, your car would crash twice a day.

2. Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.

3. Occasionally your car would die on the freeway for no reason. You would have to pull to the side of the road, close all of the windows, shut off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. For some reason you would simply accept this.

4. Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.

5. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive - but would ! run on only five percent of the roads.

6. The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single "This Car Has Performed an Illegal Operation" warning light.

7. The airbag system would ask "Are you sure?" before deploying.

8. Occasionally, for no reason whatsoever, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna. (Read CTR-ALT-DEL)

9. Every time a new car was introduced car buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.

10. You'd have to press the "Start" button to turn the engine off.

Offside - A Film by Erez Tadmor & Guy Nattiv