The last time he was in Singapore he charged S$10 for his autograph from everyone. Ironically though he didn't charge anything for taking a photograph with him. You know which option I opted for:)
yup even I don't understand how their business model works. I wonder how much they're paying the cell phone carriers for accessing this information? Anyone care to explain please?
I'm an Indian student living in Europe now and the first few months I should say I was alarmed at the kind of benefits and the kind of social security Europeans get to enjoy! On the other hand, I know people in India, working at IBM, Bangalore, who slog well into the wee hours of the morning every single day, including Sundays, 365 days a year and earn a fraction of their European counterparts (ok I agree this is not that unfair to Indians partly because of currency valuations). That a kindof sounds like they deserve to get their pay for their work. But, if you're going to talk about 3 week long paid vacations (as they do in Europe), why do you think IBM would not resort to move jobs away to a more economical place?
This whole problem would go away if you just had to give at least an area code as a prefix to dialing 911. Then the call could be routed to a local-state dispatcher. *Now that sounds feasible*.
dude, aren't you contradicting the whole point of having the 911 emergency system which is to make it as easy as possible for people to remember one emergency number which they could call wherever and whenever??
How do you think anybody would remember the area code of every single location where they happen to be present and using a VoIP phone there?
this actually makes me wonder how is America ever going to sentence someone from India who uses his American VoIP phone line (which btw has a valid American phone no.) to make a prank 911 call?
In this case, theres not much which can be done. At the max, the phone line might be withdrawn from the customer!
Even though I've posted this a lot of times b4 whenever you Americans get pissed off because of outsourcing, I'm taking the time to type it again.
Knowing Hindi is not a lot helpful. India is not China. Most Indians speak good English. Ofcourse, its good to know Hindi esp. if you intend to travel and explore India. But, within a city like Bangalore, knowing how to speak English, is more than enough.
Moreover a lot of people in South India do not speak Hindi. They've their own languages. So, do not expect any replies for your broken Hindi in South India. Hope that helps!
"My conclusion after working with them for a year and being overseas for a month of that: If it's trivial detail work that doesn't require any creativity or insight into the underlying design. If the task can be specified up front and is entirely based on widespread standards, the Indian team is perfect and will do a good job."
Great observation! It is true to some extent...and FYI I'm an Indian infact Bangalorean. I agree with you that not all workers in the Indian IT industry are smart enough. But, the fact is, they've enough knowledge to do whatever routine tasks which they're asked to do! In a sense, its a trade-off. The better talent you need, more you should pay! I guess you agree with that...and it applies in India as well!
And btw, if you want to see the Indian geeks in Bangalore, then go to Google India Research Center or something. Not an outsourcing or a BPO firm which does not need that kind of technical expertise!
But, in general I do agree with your observation. I should say its partly due to the Indian education system whose inherent ability to dampen any kind of innovative thinking in the minds of the students is well-known. But, you should also agree that not every American IT guy is a geek - I've met several really dumb American IT guys while travelling abroad!
I think people have not spent considerable amount of time and effort into explaining and educating users about how to use sudo for their necessities and not just su or even worse - login as root, totally discarding the normal user account, to solve their problems.
I spent the first 4 months of my linux life (after I switched from Windows one fine day) without realising that there was something called sudo and running as root all the time inorder to avoid all problems. This I think is partly due to the fact that when using a distro, the very existence of something called sudo is hidden. They should make a GUI component or something, through which a normal user can login as root and configure the sudo options that he needs once and for all.
A GUI interface like this, can make configuring and using sudo more attractive to desktop users and they'll probably not jump to root to satisfy their needs next time!
I still remember that day when I was configuring the/etc/sudoers in vim. A normal user wouldn't want to do this in vim!
Atleast with other laptops, you get a WinXP Installation CD. With my IBM Thinkpad R40, which came installed with WinXP, does not even have an installation CD. WinXP installation files are in the hidden hard disk partition!!
How do I get a refund?
I agree with you totally! I've been noticing this for quite a while; whether for the good or bad, ever since I started spending my time online (too much time infact after enrolling in a CS degree in the univ.), my contact or my ability to connect with people around me has been worsening.
I would say this is partly due to the fact that my immediate neighbours in the physical world do not somehow share similar viewpoints (not even close) and sometimes even worse - we do not even share a knowledge pool from which any sort of intellectual discussion could start! So, automatically this would make anyone to look out for alternatives - and the internet with all those blogs, forums, mailing lists, usenet, etc provides a nice and easy alternative to connect with like-minded people.
As you say, we all long for connections and we all long for recognition; just this time, we're finding a solution, not in the physical world but instead the virtual world!
Slashdot Mirror
The last time he was in Singapore he charged S$10 for his autograph from everyone. Ironically though he didn't charge anything for taking a photograph with him. You know which option I opted for :)
yup even I don't understand how their business model works. I wonder how much they're paying the cell phone carriers for accessing this information? Anyone care to explain please?
You can watch the interview of the IBM guy at ZDNet: http://zdnet.com.com/1606-2-5942611.html
I'm an Indian student living in Europe now and the first few months I should say I was alarmed at the kind of benefits and the kind of social security Europeans get to enjoy! On the other hand, I know people in India, working at IBM, Bangalore, who slog well into the wee hours of the morning every single day, including Sundays, 365 days a year and earn a fraction of their European counterparts (ok I agree this is not that unfair to Indians partly because of currency valuations). That a kindof sounds like they deserve to get their pay for their work. But, if you're going to talk about 3 week long paid vacations (as they do in Europe), why do you think IBM would not resort to move jobs away to a more economical place?
haha those videos were funny!
This whole problem would go away if you just had to give at least an area code as a prefix to dialing 911. Then the call could be routed to a local-state dispatcher. *Now that sounds feasible*.
dude, aren't you contradicting the whole point of having the 911 emergency system which is to make it as easy as possible for people to remember one emergency number which they could call wherever and whenever??
How do you think anybody would remember the area code of every single location where they happen to be present and using a VoIP phone there?
this actually makes me wonder how is America ever going to sentence someone from India who uses his American VoIP phone line (which btw has a valid American phone no.) to make a prank 911 call?
In this case, theres not much which can be done. At the max, the phone line might be withdrawn from the customer!
Even though I've posted this a lot of times b4 whenever you Americans get pissed off because of outsourcing, I'm taking the time to type it again. Knowing Hindi is not a lot helpful. India is not China. Most Indians speak good English. Ofcourse, its good to know Hindi esp. if you intend to travel and explore India. But, within a city like Bangalore, knowing how to speak English, is more than enough. Moreover a lot of people in South India do not speak Hindi. They've their own languages. So, do not expect any replies for your broken Hindi in South India. Hope that helps!
"My conclusion after working with them for a year and being overseas for a month of that: If it's trivial detail work that doesn't require any creativity or insight into the underlying design. If the task can be specified up front and is entirely based on widespread standards, the Indian team is perfect and will do a good job."
Great observation! It is true to some extent...and FYI I'm an Indian infact Bangalorean. I agree with you that not all workers in the Indian IT industry are smart enough. But, the fact is, they've enough knowledge to do whatever routine tasks which they're asked to do! In a sense, its a trade-off. The better talent you need, more you should pay! I guess you agree with that...and it applies in India as well!
And btw, if you want to see the Indian geeks in Bangalore, then go to Google India Research Center or something. Not an outsourcing or a BPO firm which does not need that kind of technical expertise!
But, in general I do agree with your observation. I should say its partly due to the Indian education system whose inherent ability to dampen any kind of innovative thinking in the minds of the students is well-known. But, you should also agree that not every American IT guy is a geek - I've met several really dumb American IT guys while travelling abroad!
I think people have not spent considerable amount of time and effort into explaining and educating users about how to use sudo for their necessities and not just su or even worse - login as root, totally discarding the normal user account, to solve their problems. I spent the first 4 months of my linux life (after I switched from Windows one fine day) without realising that there was something called sudo and running as root all the time inorder to avoid all problems. This I think is partly due to the fact that when using a distro, the very existence of something called sudo is hidden. They should make a GUI component or something, through which a normal user can login as root and configure the sudo options that he needs once and for all. A GUI interface like this, can make configuring and using sudo more attractive to desktop users and they'll probably not jump to root to satisfy their needs next time! I still remember that day when I was configuring the /etc/sudoers in vim. A normal user wouldn't want to do this in vim!
Atleast with other laptops, you get a WinXP Installation CD. With my IBM Thinkpad R40, which came installed with WinXP, does not even have an installation CD. WinXP installation files are in the hidden hard disk partition!! How do I get a refund?
I agree with you totally! I've been noticing this for quite a while; whether for the good or bad, ever since I started spending my time online (too much time infact after enrolling in a CS degree in the univ.), my contact or my ability to connect with people around me has been worsening. I would say this is partly due to the fact that my immediate neighbours in the physical world do not somehow share similar viewpoints (not even close) and sometimes even worse - we do not even share a knowledge pool from which any sort of intellectual discussion could start! So, automatically this would make anyone to look out for alternatives - and the internet with all those blogs, forums, mailing lists, usenet, etc provides a nice and easy alternative to connect with like-minded people. As you say, we all long for connections and we all long for recognition; just this time, we're finding a solution, not in the physical world but instead the virtual world!