January 23, 2008
- Open-source products are great. But know the limitations before you use it.
Apart from doing software / web development on Open-source platform, Indus Net Technologies also customize and implement open-source products for clients on demand. Some popular (and free) open-source products are SugarCRM, Drupal, osCommerce for CRM, content management and e-commerce respectively.
IMHO, these are some limitations that I have observed. It is important to know them before [...]
January 13, 2008
- SEZs are not good for Small & Medium sized IT Enterprises
With the uncertainty over the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) scheme after the union budget, a mad rush towards Special Economic Zones (SEZs) is very much expected. I have been studying about SEZ or last three weeks and two things are very clear -
The SEZ Act is under constant change. So whatever is stated there [...]
September 29, 2007
- Effectiveness of online candidate search databases offered by job sites
IMHO, online candidate search is a great service. I currently use two such websites and shell out almost $5000 per annum for the same. I always do a solid cost / benefit analysis and I have found that I am saving almost $15-$20K on my recruitment cost alone.
We manage to find decent candidates. However there [...]
September 24, 2007
- The Hari Sadu advertisement – Instilling the right culture?
Everyone who watches television in India must have come across the "Hari Sadu" advertisement aired by Naukri.com. This ad became very popular for its creativity and also won the award from the Advertising Club Kolkata. Here is the full story board followed by the video of the ad.
There has been a lot of controversy around the advertisement [...]
September 20, 2007
- Goldrush – Pixels, words, and now individual pages
It all started with pixels. Alex Tew started selling pixels with milliondollarhomepage.com to earn some quick money. Public relation clicked and he became a success story with a wild frenzy among people to own a "piece of history". The "me too" crowd followed and we saw thousands of similar sites selling priceless pixels and few [...]
September 19, 2007
- Which “Google Apps” program do you use the most?
I recently read Ed Kohler’s comment where he has ranked the importance of various "Google Apps" programs in the following order:
1. Docs
2. Presentation
3. Spreadsheet
However, I beg to differ.
In my personal experience I have found spreadsheet to be most used online collaborative tool of the entire office suite.
An online spreadsheet can be used in hundreds [...]
September 10, 2007
- Is “joining bonus” a right tradition?
I have noticed that several companies offer joining bonus to a prospective employee to join early (or shall I say "immediately").
I was wondering if this is a right tradition? Is this ethical?
I see it this way –
A guy is working in Company A and he has a notice period of 30 days. if he [...]
August 20, 2007
- Reliance & Naukri steps into social networking marketplace
Reliance’s BigAdda, Rediff’s iShare and Naurki’s Brijj.com are the latest dotcoms to hit the Indian social networking marketplace. It may trigger the next dotcom explosion with many more mindless dotcoms in line with these me-too networking sites by public listed biggies of India. Soon, we will forget why the first dotcom boom wave came down crashing [...]
August 14, 2007
- West Bengal – Poised to take a leap in IT & ITeS?
Department of Information Technology, Government of West Bengal (www.itwb.org) is doing a remarkable work in supporting and nurturing IT industry in the state of West Bengal. Their investor-friendly approach and innovative action-oriented leadership has changed West Bengal over last five years. I am fortunate to be doing business in this state in such exciting times!
They have put up [...]
August 3, 2007
- HCL – Poor tagline, Poor advertising
Hindustan Computers Limited (HCL) is one of the top-five IT companies in India.
Recently I saw their latest media campaign which says: HCL – a $4 billion company.
I have never seen such a poor tagline before. In fact it was amusing and I could not stop laughing when I saw it on an outdoor display. The first [...]
July 6, 2007
- I joined Kiva.org
Today, I was browsing through and stumbled across a website called Kiva.org
Kiva.org allows individuals to make $25 loans to low-income entrepreneurs in the developing world (microfinance). By doing so, individuals like you provide affordable working capital for the poor (money to buy a sewing machine, livestock, etc.), empowering them to earn their way out of [...]
June 16, 2007
- Check out Voki
Hi,
I recently stumbled upon Voki (www.voki.com) which seems like a nice widget. It comes from Sitepal (www.sitepal.com). Actually I have used Sitepal in past. Unfortunately it didnt work great for me (nothing wrong with their product, but it was just a bit irritating for our customers). However I can see good potential for a concept [...]
March 14, 2007
- Hostorix launches fail-safe linux based reseller hosting
I recently visited Hostorix.com. This is a new hosting company from an Internet marketing veteran – Armand Morin.
I was impressed how Armand has identified a pain that most webmasters feel – Downtime! Aren’t we all worried about our website going down? I fail to understand how large hosting companies like Lunarpages, 1&1, Hostgator, GoDaddy etc. overlooked this [...]
January 18, 2007
- Wait a little before you buy your Apple iPhone
iPhone is the hottest desirable gizmo at this point of time. As per AppleInsider (http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=2415), Apple is going to make 47% – 49% margin on each iPhone sold.
So, if you are not in a big hurry, waiting for a few months might save you some bucks. With so much of margins available, Apple will [...] - Amazing – Human-like Emotional Figures made from Fruits & Vegetables
Art knows no barrier. I came across this fantastic gallery from Saxton Freymann.
Gallery URL – http://www.rit.edu/~ksh8863/saxtonfreymann.html
Saxton Freymann creates this human-like figures out of fruits and vegetables. He creates emotions from the natural wrinkles of the fruits. It is worth a look.
January 17, 2007
- Case study – Increasing perceived value of a service offering
I am staying at the executive housing of ISB – Hyderabad today. It is managed by Sarovar Park Plaza (http://www.sarovarparkplaza.com/). The room is great and the service is impeccable.
But what caught my fancy is a small plaque on the work desk (photograph included).
It reads – “FORGOT SOMETHING? If you have forgotten any essential toiletry [...]
January 16, 2007
- A fiction with shades of fact – “The Fourth Estate – Jeffrey Archer”
Recently, I finished reading "The Fourth Estate" by Jeffrey Archer.
It was a nice read – a bit long though. At some places it becomes boring.
The overall storyline is interesting. What is more interesting is its simmilarity to real life media tycoons Rupert Murdoch and Maxwell. There are too many simmilarities to ignore and [...]
January 2, 2007
- A view of the regional provident fund office at Kolkata
My relationship with the Provident Fund Office dates back to 2004, when I went ahead to get my company and employees registered under the Employee Provident Fund Scheme in order to get them the much desired social security.
But what I saw there, shattered my faith in the department. Rampant corruption, mismanaged departments, pathetic work [...]
December 20, 2006
- Knowledge capsules – Fast start kits
In this age of information overload, it is nice to see some “read it – implement it” kind of quick start guides at http://www.faststartkits.com/
These guides are easy-to-read and are only 2-3 pages long. Most of them do not need you to have any background knowledge of the subject it covers as they are targeted towards [...]
December 2, 2006
- When Gmail makes life difficult
I am a big fan of Gmail because of its speed and simplicity. However Gmail makes life hell lot of difficult in some cases -
1. The Threading Bug
While threading, Gmail creates threads based on the “Subject” of the email. It should be “Subject” & “Sender/Reciepient”. It is very cumbersome to sort out and read mails [...]
