It began as a subterfuge, in the early 1950’s, with the objective of “beating the system” to get labeled wine ahead of its regulated release date. In the 50+ years since, it has been successfully monetized, with a sales growth of nearly 8000% (80M+ bottles). Thanks to extremely clever mass marketing (talk about demand generation) primarily by Georges Duboeuf that has made the annual release of this wine primeur (read, early wine), a frivolous event in itself, an impressive money-making venture. Yes, I am referring to Beaujolais Nouveau ..
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.. a journey has begun to rediscover for the self the South of India
.. carnatic, Indian Classical Music-related communications from dhanyasy.org
.. ponder on the productions of some of the [A-Z]ollywoods from around the world
.. to engage in and be at the receiving end of some mind-numbingly worthless banter
.. media blog posts from trips made on the roads (more or) less traveled
Makes me wonder if this video is an early documentary for the technology-enabled journey of humans to look inward, deeper and deeper, and realize that all ephemeral, identity-based expressions (atman) will eventually mature and converge into the realization – aham brahmAsmi – of a single, universal conscience (brahman) that is as within each one of us, as much as it is everywhere outside.
Watch the “Did you know?” video (v4.0, 2009) from XPLANE and The Economist:
There is a reference in this video to a quote by futurist, Raymond Kurzweil:
What used to fit in a building now fits in your pocket,
What fits in your pocket now will fit inside a blood cell in 25 years
What then can fit within a blood cell can in turn be hardcoded into your DNA, only to be later worked in to the sub-atomic void at which point there is no differentiator in identity. There might be spiritual paths to explore into these depths and realize the connected oneness. Many such journeys of self-realization and enlightenment documented in mythology, religious scriptures, and by new age gurus. Such divining is however not for everyone, at least not in a single life time, as sincere as the endeavor might be.
Perhaps, it is for this everyone the long winded path through technology (here, media convergence) where we eventually realize this connected oneness. When that happens we won’t need transportation vehicles and communication tools to connect. Pursuit of material objects will be irrelevant. For what we sought, wanted to be, and where we wanted to go we would have found them all within. The big nothing!
Everything else is pure illusion, sarvam mAyam.
Image source: aejmc.org
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On October 2nd 2009, two brave photography (and coffee) addicts set out to hike to North Dome in Yosemite for a sunset/moonlit view of the Half Dome. On our way we stopped at Starbucks in Oakdale, CA for some bean juice and was challenged in a taste test between Pike’s Place and the VIA (what?). We won and left with a few packets of Starbucks Via in our pockets. This is what happened next…
A personalized trailer of PROTOTYPE (game) after I opened my Facebook kimono to them. A glimpse of what is possible already in content marketing w. social context; it is going to become not only more specific and sophisticated but also go up a notch… in immersiveness .. and soon you wouldn’t even be bothered to open your kimono for any foreplay .. such customization of content will become seamless & all pervasive!
Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. Here is a sample of of the word cloud I generated for www.inderstadt.net on Wordle.net.
Today (02Sep09) is the Onam day in Kerala, India. To those that go “Oh, now what?”, it is to Malayalis (people of Kerala) what ThanksGiving is to North America .. including the big TG Dinner (sadya, in Kerala). The harvest festival of this state that cuts across socio-religious boundaries in its celebrations and thanksgiving. Happy Onam or Onam Ashamsakal in Malayalam!
Some tips to maximize the social web- and SEO-friendliness of your newly created career blog on self-hosted WordPress (wordpress.org). Using the example of www.amalbala.com
Lessons that are as applicable to practicing Web Presence Management (WPM) as they are to life! Learned from a hike to the White Mountain Peak .. the point of any journey is not to arrive!
This summer, bHive Software – Bala, David, and Shyam – summits White Mountain Peak @ ~14,252 feet. Some photos and video from this hike in INYO National Forest.
A small tip on how to access your target HD quality video on YouTube with a direct URL. Add fmt=18 to the share URL to access the HD video in a 640×360 resolution. Add fmt=22 to the share URL to access the HD video in a 850×500 resolution.
Came across this FREE online service – CatchYouTube – that converts any YouTube video into your choice of A/V media formats, ranging from simple .MP3 audio to specific video formats such as .MP4 and .FLV. …
“O Mind, be firm ..” - A poem in Tamil by Subramanya Bharathiar. Verses that are Ideal, Immortal, and Inspirational. With this, I wish everyone the very best for this new year (2009). Listen to …
Here is a quick tip on how to get thumbnail images for your desired YouTube video.
YouTube automatically generates up to 3 thumbnail images that are 130 x 97 pixels in dimension and in JPEG format. …
Powers of 10 is a short film dealing with the relative sizes of things in the universe .. and the effect of adding another zero. Made by the office of Charles and Ray Eames for IBM. Personally, this (video) makes me WONDER at the profundity of the seeming “nothingness” that is at the macroscopic and the microscopic ends of our existential spectrum and (yet) that which encompasses within, all the things that are seemingly “something”, “nothing”, and “everything”.
This blog is primarily written by Bala Gopalan -- Hi-Tech Entrepreneur (bHive Software) and Social Media Practitioner, who is passionate about Travel Photography, Movies & Music, World History, chit.ambaram, Mechanical Timepieces, and Web Presence Management. Note: postings on this site are thoughts and opinions of Bala (and, his spouse Dhanya Subramanian) and do not necessarily represent the position of either of their employers. You can connect with Bala through the following channels:
