Manipal Visit – Other updates

This is a sequel to my previous post on visit to Manipal for Manipal Bloggers’ meet and Manipal Media Students’ convention, MMSC ‘08

Some photos of the event are available on Flickr here.

Some random thoughts:

Mohan spoke about the idea of Blogathon (coined from Blog+Marathon), where all bloggers would blog about a specific issue on a given day. Do you like that idea? I couldn’t see much merits in it-yes, it may give thousands of different perspective on a given issue as thousand minds would key down their thoughts, but as a reader, will you have patience to read thousands of blog posts on same topic? One would get tired/bored before finishing 5^th post on same topic. I certainly don’t want to read same topic on all blogs. Will it succeed in creating some awareness (as all blogs try to draw your attention to a specific topic)- I don’t know. As a reader if I see same topic on all blogs that day I would probably close the browser and do something else-what is your idea on blogathon?

Another person (sorry I forgot the name) spoke on why people stop blogging- Anne Zeidi asked a simple question-what is the problem if someone stops blogging? I too don’t see anything wrong if people stop blogging. Do you? With 80 posts being published every second, let us not force people to blog.

Nobody talked on SEO, though it was part of agenda. If there was a requirement I could have talked on that.

Due to time shortage KenneyJacob volunteered to opt out of his talk on Campus Blogging. Nithya Dayal talked about piracy (she runs a music website muziboo.com) Talk on piracy resulted in statements like several singers gained star status as their songs reached millions through piracy and that companies like Microsoft unofficially encouraging piracy and more-great topic to debate upon. Siva spoke on Internet Society Chennai Chapter-I registered at their website but yet to explore the potential of this organization.

Unlike Webinnovation08 where sponsoring companies took good amount of stage time, presence of sponsors was hardly felt here, except some banners and brochures. On day 2 I asked for Times Of India (a sponsor) and I was given The Hindu. All participants were sent a campus18 registration mail-me yet to open that. In fact Mr. Kamat appreciated these students ability to get funding from so many companies-“Next time I want money for a event from sponsors I’ll call you guys” he said in an appreciative tone.

Met Priyam Malhotra who is building muftware.com a website which promises to list free alternative to every paid software in the world. He is a Microsoft beta tester and happily calls himself a geek. He showed me an interesting video on how Linux is better than vista…

The talk on "why new media is not new" by Lawrence Liang was interesting, though his slides were full of small sized text and difficult to follow. What he said was basic sense-what is new today will soon be old someday and those we call 'old' now were new once upon a time...but he gave several interesting examples in this context

The event continued till late evening but I had to leave to catch my train. Missed some action because of this.

ಮಣಿಪಾಲದಲ್ಲಿ ಕನ್ನಡ ಎಲ್ಲಿದೆ?

ನಾನು ಗಮನಿಸಿದ ಒ೦ದು ವಿಷಯವೇನೆ೦ದರೆ ಮಣಿಪಾಲ ಪರಭಾಷಿಗರಿ೦ದ ತು೦ಬಿ ಹೋಗಿದೆ...ನೀವು ವಿದ್ಯಾರ್ಥಿಗಳ೦ತೆ ಕ೦ಡು ಬ೦ದರೆ ಅ೦ಗಡಿಯವರು, ಆಟೋ ಡ್ರೈವರ್ ಪ್ರತಿಯೊಬ್ಬರೂ ನಿಮ್ಮನ್ನು ಹಿ೦ದಿಯಲ್ಲೇ ಮಾತನಾಡಿಸುತ್ತಾರೆ.
ಹಲವು ಸ್ಥಳೀಯರಿಗೆ ಈ ವಿದ್ಯಾ ಸ೦ಸ್ಥೆ ಮತ್ತದರ ವಿದ್ಯಾರ್ಥಿಗಳಿ೦ದ ಉದ್ಯೋಗ ದೊರೆತಿರುವುದು ನಿಜವಾದರೂ, ಇಲ್ಲಿಗೆ ಬ೦ದಿಳಿದ ಹೊರಭಾಷಿಗರು ಒ೦ದಕ್ಷರ ಕನ್ನಡ ಕಲಿಯುವ ಪ್ರಯತ್ನ ಮಾಡದಿರುವುದು ಖೇದಕರ.

Related: Endpoint Manipal| Karkala Photos | Bekal Fort, Kerala | Dual TVs in coastal karnataka buses | Speed Governors in Mangalore - Udupi -Kundarpura buses | LiveBlogging at WebInnovation 08