Mob Mentality

The term “mob mentality” is used to refer to unique behavioral characteristics which emerge when people are in large groups. 

The first time I came across this in text is in 10th standard when i read the play excerpt of Julius Cesar by Shakespeare. Caesar is killed by Brutus and et al, they are now conspiring to convince the Romans that Caesar was indeed the bad guy and had to be killed. At this point Antony enters.Seeing the body of Ceasar is shocked and now wants a chance to speak at the funeral of Caesar. Brutus accepts the humble request(BIG mistake Big guy) though Cassius puts in his concerns. After all Antony was going to speak after Brutus finishing his speech. Brutus was confident in swaying the people in his favor;he does it - with ease.

The scene starts with Brutus convincing the citizens about why Caesar must not live. Citizens agree completely with Brutus and they even praise him. But then comes Antony starts off with the epic lines -Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; Then spins the web of words which not only make the citizens against Brutus but they also start to praise Caesar for his greatness.
In a span of 30 min the minds of the citizens waver about the ideologies of Brutus and Antony. My ma'am then said Antony played with the "Mob Mentality" of the Romans thus etching Caesar as a great figure in their minds and defeating Brutus and co.
You can read the play here.

Nowadays too I see such "Mob Mentality" still. The main platforms where I notice an impact is Twitter and the electronic media. Twitter has this nice feature called 'Trending Topics' which shows the most tweeted words by the users. Most of the time it will be very useful ones - #goldenglobes ,#oscars, Sachin Tendulkar, etc... But sometimes Twitter is taken over by some small topic which is very irrelevant and most users don't care about it. Then why does it trend? Because there are too many people asking why it is trending ? I know it sounds stupid and people who are involved as dumb but it happens quite often these days. Though Trending Topics itself fuels the users to act like a 'Mob'. Just because it is on the trending topic more users tweet about it.  I had this day when Maple Syrup was trending and I was clueless why would so many users think about something like that simultaneously. Just because some 16 year old ( viz Bieber) wants to have Maple syrup for breakfast it doesn't mean everyone should re-tweet it to show their support (come on everyone isn't eating maple syrup for breakfast!! ).
Such blind following also happens in India too often. There are some people who support organizations/ideologies because some-other person is also following it. (I am not talking about my friend Rohit ). Today Chandrababu naidu says "No Telangana" you shout a "Jai" for him day after he says "Jai for Telangana" again you shout a "Jai" for him. Isn't it time for us to stand for what we believe rather than rally behind so-called politicians.
The media (usually the television) also does this. I observe that for some cases the media gives a lot of (unwanted)attention. I really can't say whether it is intentional or not. We give too much importance to the TV channel reports too. When they have an expose about something then everyone point the finger at the accused and make him almost a criminal. No facts verified,no experts consulted, none. I can say about the Talwars in "Arushi" case. Even without the CBI filing the report "sources" told every news channel that the father was closest to become the criminal until they closed the case. Actually the Arushi's father was even the first to be arrested. At that time every on-looker was pretty convinced he was the killer but later he was released on lack of evidence.

This kind of judgement on our part is very wrong. We  must wait on the facts, weigh the balance and then make a stand. It isn't very nice of you to make the fastest allegation on your opponent but making the right statement counts.

Capitalism II - The game

About a year and a half ago I was in search of strategy- both RTS and turn based games. This was mainly due to my liking of games like Rise of Nations and Civilization IV. But I had enough military action through these games. I was now searching for a more peaceful (I mean no bullets and blood) but more enthralling game. I didn't really care about the graphics that the game presented because I had already played games like Age of Empires ,Wolfenstein ,Doom -Though these games lacked the visual edge, they had the content to make us play these games time and again. Some Google searches and I am introduced this new game - Capitalism II. The first comments on this looked like "The second part way better than the first one". I never plan to play the first part but it was comforting that this was a second installment of the game so I did expect  it to be fun. Moreover this game belonged to a different genre- business. Never really played a business game other than Monopoly. So I grabbed this game.
When I installed the game I told myself this does not have rich visuals. This also brought smiles to my face because my system could run this game without any problems. The introduction video also showed some promise , it was going to be totally about business. The game puts you as the Head of a company. You take all the decisions. You have to build the shops to sell, factories to manufacture and research centers to discover new products. You also get to deal with financial activities of the company like stock options and loans with banks. There is both single-player as well as multi-player. Single-player mode has the campaign mode in which you are given some specific scenarios to complete. You can also start a game with your own scenario. You are engaged in the company activities completely. The best part is the variations you can implement and experience. You can build from a car to a camera, rare sheep and sell leather or sell a silicon chip or the entire computer system itself.

I liked the games idea. I started playing ,but as usual,very early I was totally involved in winning the game (be better than your competitor in the market). Initially it was so difficult for me to really stay up to the computer AI but I learnt the trade pretty quickly. I usually manufacture and sell the items which have more profit margin and try to make more money out of the apartments. I also like to control the manufacture to the root hence will have factories to build from the scratch rather than depend upon the Seaport and other suppliers.

If you want to play a game which is of strategy genre with a difference then this game is worth a try.

We are 11!

I am in no way referring to my age , I was just quoting the tagline of this year's EA Sports FIFA installment- FIFA 11.This is not a review of this wonderful game but my experience with it. I have been playing EA Sports FIFA from 2004 edition , but only on PC. This year i decided to buy it for Playstation. At the time I bought this game I knew only little what you could with this game. There was career mode where you can play as manager or a player or both and you could play online with other gamers. These two reasons were enough to make me spend INR 2500 on this game. But nowadays i don't really play both the modes mentioned much. Well what I discovered was that there is a cool additions to the different modes - Play as a single player in a 11v11 match online. I created my Pro (my player - Jayadeep aka JD aka Chica :D ) and i was off to play as a midfielder. Thanks to BSNL internet connection I dont have such a nice online experience.

So back in November I started the game and I wanted to finish of my first season with Manchester United. But there was some update to the game ; updated it (took 20min :/ - bad internet bandwidth). I thought it was a usual squad update but found a new option called - Ultimate Team(FUT). Of course I clicked it it askedfor few details about "My Club". I had no clue I would be playing FUT more than the career mode.
Well FUT mode is more like building a club by acquiring better players for your club. You get coins after you finish each match. There is a Store from where you can buy packs containing players and others extras. There is also a trading system to sell /buy players and extras. I have been playing this mode from November but in bits because I had academic work and exams to deal with and I have managed to build a club with decent players. In the beginning I was a little new to this so made some bad decisions but mow I am pretty sure of what I am doing . So Check out my FUT team here (before the link expires).

I am actually trying to build a FUT with the following players- Forwards-Wayne Rooney,David Villa,  Midfielders-Messi, Xavi,Iniesta,  ,Defenders-Evra,Puyol,Pique, Sergio Ramos. Goal Keeper-Casillas

The team is thought not based on my favorite players but based on need for high team chemistry. My style of play requires lot of team chemistry. As you see this more like a Spanish/Barcelona Team :D . I do have a EPL based team but I cant seem to find the players with high ratings.

I like playing down the wings, defensive and counter attack is my best weapon. With the new Phyisical play by defenders I really feel hard to score from the centre. I play best with 4-4-2 formation but dont shy away from a better default formation. My favourite team is Manchester United with Berbatov and Rooney to score from the deadly crosses from Nani and Valencia. I also like the Barcelona FC because their formation(4-3-3) is so set for crossing but with only one guy waiting in the box.

By the way , If you wonder why the tagline is "We Are 11" - it is not because it is FIFA 2011 :D  - Now you can play as the Goal Keeper watching the computer playing as you teammates :).

Toys!!

Well who doesnt like toys ? My latest liked toy is the push back toy car from Mcdonalds :D .Yup! i got it along with the Happy Meal. The exterior of the car is very bad ;looks like a overly used toy car. The colour is not attractive and the car never gives a feel of Batman but it did come as "Batman Toy" :o .
As you can see from the description above i was not so excited to fix the parts of the car. But come on it was a toy and moreover i was bored studying for my exams. So I put the car together pulled it back , released, the car moved......*wow what happened * ..... .After the car came to a halt i just couldn't stop myself from 'playing' with the toy for some more time!
Wanna see this toy car in action ? watch the video below !

Goodnight puny human!

If you are into English TV sitcoms like myself then you would have surely come across the geeky "The Big Bang Theory". For the starters, it is a sitcoms based on the lives of 4 friends-Leonard ,Sheldon ,Howard ,Raj  and their hot and sexy neighbor Penny. It is a all out comedy series with lot of science facts. The basic plot is all are nerds except Penny, who hasn't attened even college and works as a waitress in The CheeseCake Factory. Leonard, an experimental physicist, wants a girlfriend like a normal human being but can't find one because of his 'geekness'. Sheldon, holds a PhD, is the ultra nerd who thinks he is the most intelligent human being alive (once he wonders whether is an alien among the lesser-intel humans :P ).Sheldon has some rules and when he makes a rule it means all of mankind must follow it whether it be regarding a couch or a time machine. Next, Howard,an aerospace engineer is a big flirt who tries to woo every girl whom he sees and everytime Howard is desparate to find a girl. Lastly Raj, he is Indian :) and a particle astrophysicist  who becomes dumb in front of girls in absence of alcohol !!

Comedy ensues when Sheldon starts to use the technical bumbo-jumbo in the everyday life. With Penny clueless about science, video games, comics and computers and rest always interested in these "Fun" things ,the scenes bring smiles to your face.

• Things I like in the series(not in order)Sheldons Epic phrase -"Thats my place!!".
• Howard's pick up lines.
• Leonard trying to woo Penny by trying to rough her Ex.
• Sheldon's Dream about Sheldonopolis (while doing yoga with Raj).
• The history episode where it all began .
• How dumb Penny looks when having a conversation with Sheldon and Leonard.
• Conversation between Howard and his mother.
• Bazinga pranks :D
• Soft Kitty Hard kitty
  and many more. 

My favourite character is Sheldon mainly for his "reasonable" actions and decisions. The way he speaks is so different from any character seen on TV. By the way Jim Parsons playing as Sheldon won the Emmy 2010 in the 'Lead Actor' Category. You can watch the video here. 

I love this sitcom a lot. This is the one sitcom which makes me laugh more than FRIENDS. The first thing i do when a episode goes on air is to watch the episode online at CBS or get it through my friends :D.
Watch this series if you want to laugh your guts out :).
Oh,do u want to know more about the title of the blog post? Then watch the video here.

Google Chrome and Microsoft Bing!!!!

Lets get our history right!!

Microsoft is the company which develops operating systems for personal computers from 1981. However in the 1990's something awesome happened to PC's , that was Internet!! It was so awesome that every customer started buying PC's just to use internet. Microsoft was more than happy to sell more of their products-mainly Windows and Office-on these PCs.

However as the number of Internet users increased the content on the internet also increased. Now everyone needed a tool to find what they wanted more quickly and accurately. Here comes the "Do-No-Evil" Google. Basically, google is a web search engine which searches the internet for what you queried. As the content grew, Google 'crawled' the web more and found results more quickly and Google too grew with time.

There were a lot of search engines before Google but none of them were better in searching millions (now billions) of web pages within seconds accurately to find what you want. One such 'other' search engine was 'MSN search' by Microsoft. But sadly it was very bad. Also some users went with other options like Yahoo , AOL etc... and all of these had one thing in common , that was, Google was better than them :P .

So, come 2005 Microsoft realized that they need a search engine which can compete with Google, hence they start developing a new search engine called 'Live Search' which eventually is re-released as 'Bing' in 2009. Now to the point why do Microsoft need Bing? Cant they tell everyone to use Google. Now there is a problem with that.

Now consider this scenario - One day Google gets very angry at Microsoft for some reason and decides to do something Evil. They decide to not allow people to search from Windows platform!! I know this is really evil of Google. But say if they allow Mac and Linux users to search but not Windows. Yes, Google will be losing a lot of market-share to its competitors but at the same time Microsoft will be losing its already slipping PC market-share.This is so unacceptable for Microsoft. So Microsoft put their own search engine product Microsoft Bing!

Though Bing was introduced with so much expectations it didn't deliver as expected . In short it was not a 'Google-Killer'. But it was not that bad either. Bing found a lot of fans (bing accounts 10% of searches). But this was more than what Microsoft signed on for. They wanted an alternative for Google and they got it. But as we say it wasn't a Google-Killer. The market-share of Bing is the lost market-share of other search-engines like Yahoo!.

Google too isn't an all happy enterprise! It has its fears. It also fears of Microsoft becoming Evil . Google as a search-engine company has built itself a huge Kingdom on the Internet. Now that can be pretty dangerous. Just imagine the plight of Google when ,say, the internet is down for a month (i said imagine, remember). Or, say users cant access Google's site because Internet Explorer crashes(something familiar huh? :P ) whenever the address bar reads anything Google . Now when we look at the statistics we see IE holds a large but decreasing market-share of nearly 70% browser market. If this ever happens then 70% of the world wont be using Google anymore which means 70% less money Google makes. Of course this is most horrible for Google. So what they do is develop their own web browser- Google Chrome!

Chrome was released with very simple interface, no cluttering, no crashes, faster searches and open-source. Chrome was an hit among browsers. Google stuck to their basic formula - do everything a little faster and simpler. Chrome starting gaining browser market-share steadily eating away the pie of IE.

Microsoft brought Bing against Google and it failed.But Microsoft understood that the Internet-search market cannot be underestimated once again. Hence it has partnered Yahoo! in order to fight the Giant G.

However Google Chrome is used by Google to emphasize the fact of openness and the use of better technologies on web like HTML 5.

Are YOU ready to Move?

For a long time video game consoles have been a important form of entertainment. The first home video game console was released as early as 1972 named Magnavox . From 1972 till date there has been constant improvement in this field pushing the recently released consoles to the Seventh Generation!!. The first of these consoles was XBOX 360 ,released in 2005. A year later Sony rivaled the XBox 360 with their Playstation 3. These two consoles actually was direct challenge to the game developers to publish games with better graphics, game-play and games with longer game time.

Amidst the release of these two HD-consoles there was the release of a console whose approach to games was very different. Nintendo entered back into the video game console market with the introduction of WII .Wii was very different from PS3 and XBox360. Wii uses a controller which looks like TV remote and the gamer uses the remote, to control the character, which is sensed using IR sensing Sensor Bar. This changed the thought of "how to game'' and simultaneosy brought in a lot of new customers into the gaming. Now gaming was no more just-for-recreation. It became way of exercising, doing your daily Yoga and many more. You didnt need a ThreadMill to show you how many calories you lost. All you wanted a Wii.

At first Sony and Microsoft snubbed aside Wii since Wii didn't play games as-they-knew-it. But sales of Wii surprised everyone. And Wii currently holds the record for the Most Consoles sold in a single month in the US.

Motion sensing gaming has picked up so much frenzy that both Microsoft and Sony have released their own alternatives to Wii -XBox Kinect and Playstation Move. The PS Move is just like a Wiimote, comes as a addon to the existing PS3 console. Move has a glowing Orb which is sensed by the PS Eye camera .Sony already has a long list of HD games supporting this new addon. This is real direct competition for the Wii , actually the Wii is on the back foot now. Bad online experience and not so many 'games' on the Wii have given a little edge to Playstation Move which already has a well established PS Network and a long list of HD games to be 'Moved'

On the other hand Microsoft have gone a step ahead. They have removed the Controller itself :) .Your "Body" is the new controller. There is a console , a Display (HD is good :) ) and there is you!!. How do they do this? They use a sensing device similar to the Sensing Bar of Wii. The sensing device basically maps different but many body-points to recreate the 3D image of the gamer to pinpoint the exact position of the player. So as you move body the character on the screen moves. Sounds fascinating doesn't it ? With the popular XBox Live ,Kinect also has social advantages. You can video chat with another Xbox Live subscriber or your friends using MSN video chat. The camera on sensing device is pretty cool as it changes its position(to a limit) as the user moves in front of it. Kinect too has a 19 games already compatible with it.

Now, we have 3 consoles fighting for supremacy. Nintendo already know the motion sensing gaming well while Sony and Microsoft are yet to completely dive into moption gaming. But everyone agrees that Motion is going to be the battle field for the next year or so.

So Are you ready to Move ?