News

Moving back to India

After about 2+ years of staying in Denver, I will be moving to India the coming weekend.

I have about three weeks of vacation, split across mine and my wife's hometown. I hope that would be enough of a time to recharge myself and start work again on things I love to do. :)

I look forward to getting back to India.

KMaheshBhat.com migrated to Drupal 7 multi-site setup!

It took me quite a bit of time but finally I migrated all the content of KMaheshBhat.com from the Drupal 6.x single site install to a Drupal 7.x multi-site setup. That means, WiseTome.com, Splat.WiseTome.com and KMaheshBhat.com now runs from same code base.

ಚೀನಾ ಮತ್ತು ಗೂಗಲ್

ಚೀನಾದಲ್ಲಿ ನಡೆಸುವ ತನ್ನ ವ್ಯವಹಾರದ ಬಗ್ಗೆ ಕಳೆದ ವಾರ ಗೂಗಲ್ ತನ್ನ ಬ್ಲಾಗ್ ನಲ್ಲಿ ಒಂದು ಪ್ರಕಟಣೆ ನೀಡಿತು. ಗೂಗಲ್ ಹಾಗು ಹಲವು ಸಂಸ್ಥೆಗಳ ಮೇಲೆ ಚೀನಾದಿಂದ ಉದ್ಚವಿಸಿದ ಸೈಬರ್ ದಾಳಿ ಮಾಡಲಾಗಿದ್ದು, ಇದು ಚೀನಾದ ಮಾನವ ಹಕ್ಕು ಹೋರಾಟಗಾರರ ಬಗ್ಗೆ ತಿಳಿದುಕೊಳ್ಳುವ ಪ್ರಯತ್ನವೆಂದು ಅದು ವಾದಿಸಿದೆ. ಈ ಕಾರಣದಿಂದ ಅದು ತನ್ನ ಚೀನಾದಲ್ಲಿ ನಡೆಸುವ ವ್ಯವಹಾರ (Google.cn) ಹಾಗು ಸೇವೆಗಳನ್ನು ನಿಲ್ಲಿಸು ಸಂಭವ ಇದೆಯೆಂದು ಹೇಳುತ್ತದೆ.

ಗೂಗಲ್ ತನ್ನ ಚೀನಾ ವ್ಯವಹಾರ ೨೦೦೬ರಲ್ಲಿ ಶುರು ಮಾಡಿತ್ತು. ಅಂದಿನಿಂದ ಇಂದಿನವರೆಗೆ ಅಲ್ಲಿ ವ್ಯವಹಾರ ನಡೆಸಲು, ಅದು ಚೀನಾದ ಕಾನೂನಿನ ಪ್ರಕಾರ ತನ್ನ ಸರ್ಚ್ ಇಂಜಿನ್ ಅನ್ನು ಸೆನ್ಸಾರ್ ಮಾದುತಿತು. ಇದರಿಂದಾಗಿ ಗೂಗಲ್ ಅನ್ನು ಹಲವರು ಟೀಕಿಸುತ್ತಿದ್ದರು. ಈವಾಗ ಗೂಗಲ್ ಚೀನಾದಿಂದ ಇನ್ನು ಹೊರಗೆ ಬರಲ್ಲಿಲ. ಚೀನಾ ಸರಕಾರದೊಂದಿಗೆ ಮಾತುಕಥೆ ನಡೆಸುತ್ತಿದೆ. ಈ ಮಾತುಕತೆಯ ಪರಿಣಾಮ ಇನ್ನು ಒಂದು-ಎರಡು ವಾರದಲ್ಲಿ ತಿಳಿಯಬಹುದು.

Indian Citizens Save - Indian Government Borrows

Back in 2004, Martin Feldstein said in Budget Deficits and National Depth [PDF]:

... the budget deficit of the central government is about six percent of GDP and this rises to about 10 percent of GDP if the deficits of subnational governments are included. The combined government debt is now close to 75 percent of GDP.

More recently on Reuters (emphasis, mine):

By March 2010 its debt liabilities would have climbed to 35 trillion rupees, a 12 per cent jump in a single year.

D. H. Pai Panandiker says in article Indian government - the compulsive borrower.

Economic Times give confusing tips on investment

I have to put a disclaimer before I state anything. My knowledge on stocks and investments could not be called anything but rudimentary. Any investments I did in equity market, I did it based on advice given by my father.

That said, I have started to look at the market recently. And from my understanding, the basics of investment is something along the following lines. When you can take risk, which is usually at earlier part of your life, your investment portfolio should be more in equity and less in debt market. Equity market has a higher risk, but does give you a higher returns. Debt market on the other hand, is less in risk and in returns. The basic premise behind this is that, at a younger age you have time to recover from any losses the risk of investing in equity, than the time you have at later part of your life.

But there cannot be a preset ratio or correlation of the ratio to your age. There are other factors that you need to take into account. There might be some responsibilities, or some loans that you need to repay. The market conditions too need to be taken into account. There is no point investing into equity when you cannot get a return, just because you are young.

That brings me to hunting and searching (googling, or should I say binging?) for current news, tips, and articles on investment strategies. Since I did take advice from my father, and that has acutally helped me build assets, I thought I would do what he did. As a kid, I remember him reading through several newspapers and related magazine, one among them being Economic Times.

I do not buy newspapers. I am not sure how that will effect the newspaper industry in India. I turned to the online version. And that led me to these two articles.

These are two articles published on the same day, by the same news outlet. One says the debt market is strong, while the other advices to invest in equity market.

What am I, a newbie investor, to make of this?

ಭಾರತದ ಅರ್ಥವ್ಯವಸ್ಥೆಯ ಮೇಲೆ ಟಾಟಾ ನ್ಯಾನೋ ಪರಿಣಾಮ?

ನನ್ನ ಗೆಳೆಯ ದೀಪಕ್ ರೆಡಿಫ್ ನ ಅಂಕಣ ಕುರಿತು ಬರೆದಿದ್ದಾನೆ - ಟಾಟಾ ನ್ಯಾನೋ ಬಿಡುಗಡೆಯಿಂದಾಗುವ ಪರಿಣಾಮಗಳ ಬಗ್ಗೆ.

ಆ ಅಂಕಣ ಹೇಳುವಂತೆ, ಟಾಟಾ ನ್ಯಾನೋ ಕಾರ್ ಅನ್ನು ಒಂದು ಲಕ್ಷ ರುಪಾಯಿ ಮೌಲ್ಯದಲ್ಲಿ ಮಾರುಕಟ್ಟೆಗೆ ತರುತ್ತಿದೆ.

ಇದರಿಂದಾಗಿ ಭಾರತದಲ್ಲಿ ಮುಂಚೆಗಿಂತ ಬಹಳ ಜನರಿಗೆ ಕಾರೆಂಬುದು ಕೈಗೆಟಕುವ ಸಾಮಾನಾಗುತ್ತದೆ. ದೀಪಕ್ ಹೇಳಿದಂತೆ ಭಾರತದ ಹೆಚ್ಚಿನ ಪಟ್ಟಣಗಳ ರಸ್ತೆ ಸಂಚಾರದ ಮೇಲೆ ಪರಿಣಾಮವಾಗಲಿದೆ. ಆದರೆ, ನನ್ನ ಕುತೂಹಲ ನ್ಯಾನೋ ಆರ್ಥಿಕ ವ್ಯವಸ್ತೆಯ ಮೇಲೆ ಏನು ಪರಿಣಾಮ ಮಾಡುತ್ತದೆಯೆಂದು.

Can Tata Nano effect Indian Economy?

My friend Deepak came across an article in Rediff and talks about the effect of release of Tata Nano.

The article mentions that Tata is putting Nano to market at the price tag of Rs 1 lakh.

Due to this, car becomes an affordable commodity to a lot more people in India than it were before. As Deepak said, it would have a lot of impact to the already congested traffic situation in most of the cities. My interest though is what effect Nano would do on the economy?

The credit crunch in US has affected India. Reason could possibly be the involvement of India in IT industry. A change in one market of a country would spread to the other markets of that country.

Since more people are able to buy a car, there is possibility of new markets opening up. Even those who are not able to do a full down payment, owing to the fact that the amount is much lesser than before, they will try to buy the car acquiring a loan. This is one of the direct impacts I can think of. This seems like a good time for investors.

Nano may be a small variable, but it would be interesting to see to what extent the wheel turns the other way due to a chain-reaction.

ಭಾರತದಲ್ಲಿ ಪತ್ರಿಕೋದ್ಯಮ

ಒಂದು ವಾರ ಮೊದಲು ವಯಕ್ತಿಕ ಕೈ-ಯಂತ್ರ ತಂತ್ರಜ್ಞಾನದ ಬಗ್ಗೆ ಬರೆದಾಗ, ರಾಘವೇಂದ್ರನ ಪ್ರತಿಕ್ರಿಯೆಯ ಬಗ್ಗೆ ಚರ್ಚಿಸುತ್ತಿರಬೇಕಾದರೆ, ಜಗತ್ತು ಹಾಗು ಅಮೆರಿಕದಲ್ಲಿನ ಪತ್ರಿಕೋದ್ಯಮದ ಬಗ್ಗೆ ಗಮನ ಹೋಯಿತು.

“In 2009 and 2010, all the two-newspaper markets will become one-newspaper markets, and you will start to see one-newspaper markets become no-newspaper markets,” said Mike Simonton, a senior director at Fitch Ratings, who analyzes the industry. ಮುಂದೆ ಓದಿ.

೨೦೧೦ ರೊಳಗೆ, ಎರಡು ಪತ್ರಿಕೆಗಳಿರುವ ಮಾರುಕಟ್ಟೆಯಲ್ಲಿ ಒಂದು ಪತ್ರಿಕೆ, ಒಂದು ಪತ್ರಿಕೆಯಿರುವ ಮಾರುಕಟ್ಟೆಯಲ್ಲಿ ಪತ್ರಿಕೆಯಿಲ್ಲದ ಪರಿಸ್ತಿಥಿ ಬರುವುದೆಂದು ಮೈಕ್ ಸೈಮನ್ಟನ್, ಫಿಚ್ ರೇಟಿಂಗ್ ನ ಹಿರಿಯ ಅಧಿಕಾರಿ ಹೇಳುತ್ತಾರೆ.

ನಾನು ಅಮೆರಿಕದಲ್ಲಿ ಇದ್ದ ಈ ಎರಡು ವರ್ಷದಲ್ಲಿ ಇದೇನೂ ಆಶ್ಚರ್ಯಕರ ಸಂಗತಿಯಂತೆ ತೋರುವುದಿಲ್ಲ. ಇಲ್ಲಿನ ಇಂಟರ್-ನೆಟ್ ನ ಪ್ರಭಾವದಿಂದಾಗಿ ಎಲ್ಲರೂ ದುಡ್ಡು ಕೊಡದೆ ಸುದ್ದಿ ಹಾಗು ಮಾಹಿತಿ ಪಡೆಯುವುದನ್ನು ರೂಢಿ ಮಾಡಿಕೊಂಡಿದ್ದಾರೆ. ಹಳೆ ಕಾಲದಿಂದ ಪತ್ರಿಕೋದ್ಯಮ ನಡೆಸುತ್ತಾ ಬಂದವರುದ್ದು ಇದಕ್ಕೆ ಹೊಂದಿಕೊಳ್ಳುವುದು ಹೇಗೆಂದು ತೋಚದೆ ಪರದಾಡುವ ಪರಿಸ್ತಿಥಿ. ಆದರೆ ಇಂಟರ್-ನೆಟ್ ಉಪಯೋಗಿಸಿ ಜಾಹೀರಾತು ಆಧರಿತ ಸುಧಿ ಅಥವ ಮಾಹಿತಿ ವಿತರಣೆ ಮಾಡಲು ತಿಳಿದವರು ಈ ಸಾಪ್ರದಾಯಕ ಪತ್ರಿಕೋದ್ಯಮಕ್ಕೆ ಪೈಪೋಟಿ ನೀಡುತ್ತಿದ್ದಾರೆ. ಜನ ಸಾಮಾನ್ಯರು ಬ್ಲಾಗ್ ನಂತಃ ಮಾಧ್ಯಮಗಳನ್ನು ಉಪಯೋಗಿಸುತ್ತಿದ್ದಾರೆ. ಸಾಪ್ರದಾಯಕ ಪತ್ರಿಕೋದ್ಯಮದಂತೆ ದೊಡ್ಡದಾಗಿಯಲ್ಲದಿದ್ದರೂ, ತಕ್ಕಮಟ್ಟಿಗೆ ಸಂಪಾದಿಸುತ್ತಿದ್ದಾರೆ. ಇದರಿಂದಾಗಿ ಪತ್ರಿಕೆಗಳಲ್ಲಿ ಜಾಹೀರಾತು ಖರೀಧಿ ಕಮ್ಮಿ.

ಭಾರತದ ಪರಿಸ್ತಿಥಿ ಹೀಗಿಲ್ಲ.

“I do not see ads generating revenues enough to substantiate a firm. Internet penetration is low in India. Also, more brands need to take up this mode of advertising,” said Rajesh Srivathsa. ಮುಂದೆ ಓದಿ.

ರಾಜೇಶ್ ಶ್ರೀವಥ್ಸ ಹೇಳುವಂತೆ, ಭಾರತದಲ್ಲಿ ಇಂಟರ್-ನೆಟ್ ನ ಪ್ರಭಾವ ಬಹಳ ಕಮ್ಮಿ ಇರುವ ಕಾರಣ, ಜಾಹೀರಾತುಗಳಿಂದ ಒಂದು ಸಂಸ್ಥೆ ನಡೆಸುವಷ್ಟು ಹಣ ಬರುವುದಿಲ್ಲ. ಜಾಹೀರಾತು ಖ್ರರೀಧಿಸುವವರು ಈ ವಿಧಾನವನ್ನು ಇನ್ನೂ ತೆಗೆದುಕೊಂಡಿಲ್ಲ.

ಹೀಗಿರುವಾಗ ಭಾರತದಲ್ಲಿ ಪತ್ರಿಕೋದ್ಯಮ ಇನ್ನೂ ಹಲವು ವರ್ಷ ಜೀವಿತವಿರುವಂತೆ ತೋರುತ್ತದೆ.

Newspaper Industry in India

About a week back, on responding to a comment by Raghavendra on my post on Personal Digital Gadgets, I started to look at the state of newspaper industry in US and world.

“In 2009 and 2010, all the two-newspaper markets will become one-newspaper markets, and you will start to see one-newspaper markets become no-newspaper markets,” said Mike Simonton, a senior director at Fitch Ratings, who analyzes the industry. Read more.

I have been in US for two years, and this does not seem surprising. Due to Internet, the people in US seem to have gotten used to getting news and information for free. The traditional newspaper industry, unable to come up with a way to deal with this, seems to be in soup. But those who distribute news and information supported by advertisement are giving competition to traditional newspaper industry. Laymen are using mediums like blogs. Even though they are not as big as the traditional industry, they seem to be doing ok. The effect of this is that advertisers are buying less from newspaper industry.

This does not seem to be the case in India.

“I do not see ads generating revenues enough to substantiate a firm. Internet penetration is low in India. Also, more brands need to take up this mode of advertising,” said Rajesh Srivathsa. Read more.

Seeing as it is, it seems like the newspaper industry will be staying alive in India for some more years.

Twitter Block - Drupal Module

This is related to the Twitter status you see on my homepage.

Update: There will be no support for Twitter Block module. Please use Twitter module instead. Read the reasoning here.

Styled Twitter Block

I was browsing around, when I came across Aaron's on adding Twitter to a Drupal site. Since I am in the process of redesigning my site, I was a little more aware of the closure variable and hence I commented so on his post. He nudged me on his respone through Twitter.

Thus, I created the Twitter Block module. It is quite minor and straight forward at this moment and advanced modules have already been coded. (See the modules download page over at Drupal.org).

Download module: Twitter Block

I am yet to put the license files, but it is provided under GPL. The installation is simple - just copy to your modules or sites/all/modules folder. You should get the Twitter Block menu in the admin/settings once you enable it. It lets you configure:

  • Twitter User Account
  • Twitter Block Title
  • Disable/Enable Follow Me link
  • Text of the Follow Me link

As far as the comment goes, I was able to add the Javascript references to the $closure variable. For a background, you can see from Twitter page, that putting the Javascript references near the footer increases the page load times.

Hot tip! To ensure loading of your page even in the case of twitter.com non-loading, move the two lines that start with <script type="text/javascript"... to the bottom of your page (just above </body>).

While coding this module, I took a wrong turn with the drupal_add_js() function, and after some trial and error, use the hook_footer() to get these Javascripts into the $closure variable properly.

Once you install and configure this module, you can sytle it by lathcing on to the block-twitterblock class. You can see the result of my current theming on the Twitter Block.

Credit goes to DryIcon via SmashingMagazine for providing the Twitter icon.

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