Maruti Suzuki A-Star is launched in India
Maruti Suzuki’s latest offering A-Star is out today in India. I am very excited about this car. The official site of the car at www.marutisuzukiastar.com is terribly slow. May be everybody is rushing to the site to know more about this gorgeous looking car! (BTW the site is developed in .Net with heavy dosage of Flash by BCWebwise) What makes A-Star extra special is that it is fully designed in India - first for Suzuki of Japan.
I have made up my mind as to which car I am going to get when I upgrade from my M800 in about a year! 
I got hold of a video of the A-Star.
The car has been launched in three versions - Lxi, Vxi and Zxi. Ex showroom prices in Delhi are Rs. 3,46,775 for Lxi, Rs. 3,74,000 for Vxi and Rs. 4,11,775 for Zxi. All the variants have stuff like body coloured bumpers, Air Conditioner and Power Steering which usually comes only in the higher versions in other cars of the class. Vxi and Zxi come with additional features like power windows, built in speakers etc and Zxi has air bags too.
Video of moon’s surface taken by Chandrayaan
Here’s one of the first videos of the moon’s surface taken by the terrain mapping camera of Chandrayaan - India’s first unmanned mission to moon.
Bubble Breaker - 870 points in a single shot!
I was playing Bubble Breaker on my mobile and hit the jackpot! Got 870 points in a single shot! This is a big deal in this game and highest by far for me. Then I saw videos of a few people getting 1000+ score in a single hit but I am happy with this for now.
The aim of this game is to match similar bubbles together in order to burst them from the board. The more bubbles you burst at once, the more points you receive. This game is also known as Bubblet or Jawbreaker.
EMICalc.net - Equated Monthly Installment Calculator
I have launched EMICalc.net, another calculator site after AgeCalc.net (An age calculator). As the name suggest this site has a calculator to calculate your equated monthly installment for a mortgage or loan. There are tons of EMI Calculators out there but this one is bit different in the sense that it also tells you the total interest you will be paying on the principal and the effective flat rate of interest over the tenure of the loan. And it also generates the repayment amortization chart.
I am going to add functionality so you can know the rate of interest from the EMI amount, tenure and principal. So if you aren’t sure what is the rate of interest you are paying on one of your loans, or want to confirm the EMI amount the loan agent has given you against the promised rate of interest then you can know it from EMICalc.net.
Check out EMICalc.net.
Donate to Wikipedia
It looks like Wikipedia’s annual fun raising is going on. I have donated whatever little I could contribute. In my opinion Wikipedia is a great service. I pay money to buy newspapers and subscribe to magazines. I use Wikipedia in the similar fashion - to gain information on various topics so the donation is well worth it.
If you want to help Wikipedia click on the button below to donate.
Sub prime crisis - an explanation in simple words
I came across this presentation about how the sub prime crisis was created. It shows how borrowers, mortgage agents, banks, investment banks, rating agencies and governments f**** up!
Very interesting. An explanation in very simple terms that everybody can understand.
View in full screen to read the text clearly.
I got a car
I got myself a car as a Diwali gift! My first one! A Maruti 800. It’s used but new for me anyway!
I bought the car through carwale.com - India’s no. 1 car portal. The seller had posted a premium ad (so I could view his contact details). I called him, arranged to see the car, I liekd it and closed the deal the next day! I am still practising my driving though.
V.I.P. underware baniyan ringtone
V. I. P. Underware baniyaan!
I had heard of this line from a song a long time back. One day I Googled a bit and found the source. A song from a 1977 movie Kitaab. Lyrics written by the great Gulzar. Wonderful song.
I made an MP3 ringtone by cutting and joining a few pieces from the song using Audacity. You can download the ringtone from here.
The funny part is that the boy shouting V.I.P. underware baniyaaaan at the end of every stanza looks so much like richest Indian Mr. Mukesh Ambani! BTW Mr. Ambani (born 1957) was 20 at the time of release of this movie (1977). Here are the pics for comparison -
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We on ma credit card!
It is not Photoshopped. This is an actual credit card that I have from ICICI bank. ICICI bank had come up with this offer where offered an add on credit card to existing card holders where you can chose any background for the credit card. 100% customized card - and you can see which picture I selected to be on my credit card!
Cool, isn’t it?
iPhone in India, is it for you?
Indian bloggers can’t have enough of the iPhone! Every blog that I’ve been reading regularly is talking about it and crying fowl over its pricing. iPhone is priced at 31K and 36K for 8Gb and 16Gb versions respectively. Apparently iPhone costs the most in India. People have been asking who’s going to buy it?
iPhone is an aspirational product. It is really an iPod with phone capabilities - a music player that can make and receive calls and has a web browser. Technically speaking it suffers with same kind of drawbacks as earlier versions of Windows Mobile. By pricing it at a premium Apple is making sure that it remains a lifestyle product. May be Apple doesn’t want your average Indian IT professional buying it. An average IT/tech guy might go for a Nokia N series,Sony Ericsson P series, HTC or BlackBerry after comparing the features with iPhone. iPhone is not just a phone, its an experience. Apple products have always been about an experience and iPhone is no different. Users of lifestyle products are willing to a paying a premium for that experience, brand and that little exclusivity. What’s special in having a phone that everyone has? Unlike Microsoft, Apple doesn’t want to rule every desktop/pocket. It’s all about experience.
In the US and elsewhere things are a little different though. There carriers are subsidizing the iPhone because they have a large market of consumers of lifestyle products who don’t mind signing long term contracts for expensive data plans. In India very few people will be ready to do that. The fact that 85% of the subscribers are prepaid subscribers and lack of 3G networks only makes the matters worse. iPhone in India is no more than a music player with phone and we already have market flooded with such phones so Apple has decided to launch the product in premium segment targeting the top of the pyramid. Bottom of the pyramid is already overcrowded. I guess the reason why Apple decided to launch iPhone in India was to tap the gray market demand. Apple knows people are paying 25K+ for unlocked iPhones in the gray market, so why don’t sell an official premium and pocket those customers. Personally I’d rather buy an official (under warranty) phone at 31K instead of buying an unofficial(cracked-unlocked) phone for 25K. Apple could not have sold it for less than the gray market price. Apple is importing the phones in India legally and they have to pay applicable taxes and duties.
It’s clear that Apple isn’t in the game for market share, they are here for the mind share!
