Google announces the launch of Google Groups to Google Apps Premier and Education Edition users.
Google Groups is a good addition to Google Apps. It will help companies build web scale applications and provide several collaboration platforms to be integrated into the applications. I will be eagerly looking at integration points (API) for Google Groups. This will allow easy creation of communities inside enterprises and educational institutions. More on this topic later.
From The Limitations of Jugaad by Radhika Chaada
Think of the R&D labs in India for Microsoft, Adobe, GE, or any other Western company. They are considered among the best within their parent companies – but only for solving pre-determined problems. The problems themselves are conceptualised and defined in the West.
When I spoke to Anand Chhatpar, CEO, BrainReactions, this is what he had to say. “The people in Bangalore used the same Dell Inspiron computers, the same broadband Internet connections, the same Microsoft Windows platform PCs, the same programming languages and databases used in Silicon Valley, but the people in the US were making multi-billion dollar Google, while the people in India were still testing office applications and doing grunt-work for American companies. Why? One of the investors, one of the scientists and a large number of employees in Google are Indians, the technology is the same, so why was Google not developed in India? In fact, almost 40 per cent of Silicon Valley start-ups have been formed by Indian entrepreneurs. Why then were the entrepreneurs in India still doing work on contract in the service sector and not innovating products for the world?” And he added that while globally, India was being heralded as a software powerhouse, he did not have a single programme on his computer that was made by an Indian company.
Fair enough. I used to ask myself the same questions. After spending most of the past two years in India, I see a lot of hope. Here is why:
- I visit several engineering and management institutes to give talks on Technology Trends, Entrepreneurship and I find a lot of students eager to start and looking for guidance.
- Indian government is doing a lot with Innovation Fund. They give grants and are hard at work in setting up Incubation Centers. One of my recent talks involved Incubation 2.0.
- Informal startup communities are gaining traction. These include Chennai Open Coffee Club with over 1500 participants and similar coffee clubs in Bangalore, Pune and other places.
- The silos of professional societies like TiE local chapters, Nasscome Emerge Community and the informal startup communities are slowly inter-connecting.
- We are still a long way from producing a Google or Microsoft. But the product culture seems to be improving - an encouraging sign.
- A band of us evangelize product innovation, point to social media as a lowering the entry barrier into global entrepreneurship and working to provide as much support as we can.
- Zoho is a beacon. I hope to see more companies following their lead.
You have received a 787 Dreamliner Virtual Postcard from Dorai Thodla, celebrating the historic first flight of this game changing airplane. You can access your postcard here:
Experience the 787 Dreamliner’s Historic First Flight here:
If the link for the postcard did not work, copy the following url and paste it into your browser. – newairplane.com/dreamlinerfirstflight/postcard/postcard.html?id=c30269180c60c3f6
If the link to the 787 Dreamliner’s Historic First Flight web page did not work, copy the following url and paste it into your browser. – 787firstflight.newairplane.com
Meta:
Thanks to Sriram for the link on Facebook
Computer Science Education Week, December 6-12, 2009, recognizes that computing:
- Touches everyone’s daily lives and plays a critical role in society
- Drives innovation and economic growth
- Provides rewarding job opportunities
- Prepares students with the knowledge and skills they need for the 21st century
You can follow the event and find more resources at @csedweek
If there is one thing you and I can do to help, it would be to entertain, inform and educate using technology.A vision of computing and the future of interaction:
It is that time of the year. I hope to see a lot of interesting lists that talk about the best and worst of 2009. But we may have a few added bonus this year. We will also get the best of the decade (as Ask.com has already done). Here is a sample.
Can't believe that Twitter which started in 2006 beat every one else to become the number one app for the decade.
From this amazing list from Ask.com
Top Technology Questions:
- How do I make a website?
- What does URL stand for?
- How do I find my IP address?
- What is an RSS feed?
- How many megabytes are in a gigabyte?
- How do I delete my cookies?
- What is JavaScript?
- What does FTP stand for?
- What is a 3G network?
- What is a PDF file?
After reading a paper on Psychology of Curiosity (a pointer from Dan Heath), I was curious to find out whether there was test for curiosity. I found this test and read the opening paragraph.
Being intellectually curious is all about asking questions, not about having answers. It’s about believing in the pursuit of knowledge as a value in and of itself.
It was so appealing, I had to take the test (I am sucker for tests, anyway) and found this insight.
True knowledge lies in knowing that you know nothing at all
Are you curious about your curiosity level? Then try this Intellectual Curiosity Test. I would love to get your observations as comments.
One of the Top 50 Innovations of 2009 recognized by Times Magazine.
The full list of innovations are here.
