needlessly messianic articles written by ankur banerjee on anything that catches his fancy, which is quite a lot indeed - stuff like tech, quizzing, h2g2 - and cups of filthy liquid almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea
The ‘Hutch dog’, in the commercials for the Indian cellular operator Hutch, was supposed to be phased out. Seems like he’s back! Saw this new ad while watching Ocean’s Twelve (dunno how many times I’ve seen it) yesterday. ‘Chika’, was the name of the original pug, but I think he’s been replaced recently, by well, a new mutt. I think Vodafone must have faced a lot of alienation of ideology among its subscriber base after the sudden name switch, which they did overnight.
The Hutch pug commercials earlier weren’t that great - in the sense that the dog really was there just for the cuteness factor. The new Vodafone commercial actually seems nice though, because using the dog to get the message across is being used quite effectively. Watch the Vodafone India ‘Helpful Dog’ ad below.
Off topic, but I’ve noticed that the cell info display for the Vodafone network STILL gives the operator as Hutch! I found this out when I was trying to roam on another network my home network Delhi itself, the day I came back from the NTU exam. Airtel, or for that matter, everyone’s network seemed to have conked out around the airport that day because of the sheer number of people in that area. So I was trying to search for any working networking, and saw that Vodafone (obviously) is still listed as ‘Hutch’. THAT is something they need to sort out quick, rather than million dollar advertisement campaigns.
I’ve been thinking of starting a few websites off late, you know, now that almost all my exams are getting over (and the chances of getting through any place good, other than NTU, slim). Haven’t started work as yet, but yes, I do plan to as soon as my ‘fundraisers’ bring out their pot of leprechaun gold. For now, just hang on to your pyjamas and wait for updates on WHAT those sites would be about.
One thing which I’ve been doing a lot of these days is looking for some cheap and reliable web hosting to get started with. That’s because my current hosting plan - which I use for this blog - doesn’t allow me to host multiple websites on the same account. And apart from the new projects which I want to start, we also need a reliable host for the Code Warriors’ website, which has been having problems with its MySQL databases for some time.
It’s this searching-out-hosts thingy which is a pretty tough to task. Frankly, there’s so many choices around on the Web - hundreds, maybe thousands - of web hosts. It gets difficult to compare their features and their prices. One such nice place to do a search is Web Hosting Pal. Pretty uncomplicated website, not overloaded with information. That would be quite a bundle of relief to newer websmasters; with a nice beginner’s guide to walk them through an explanation of the various features which they might want and / or have to pay for. This is important, because many times I’ve seen people get swayed into paying for features they don’t really need. On Web Hosting Pal, you can compare features and read in-depth details / reviews about the different hosts - say, comparing between which ones support ASP / PHP, the databases offered, etc.
Anyway, stay tuned for more updates on any new sites I’ll be starting. Brought to you by Web Hosting Pal.
Oh well, AIEEE 2008 was held today - and I don’t think I’m very happy about this one either. Sad eh? Anyway, my exam centre was Summerfields School, which, since the last time I went, has gone into even more disrepair. And not a SINGLE person I know at that centre (and that’s something, because I know quite a people from mine and other schools). I hadn’t slept all night, and pretty much dozed off between the paper.
You can download AIEEE 2008 Analysis and Solutions by clicking here. It’s a ZIP archive containing PDF files of the solutions for physics, maths, and chemistry sections plus an overall analysis. Approximately 3.6 MB in size, so on some slower connections it might take a bit of time to download. The solutions are by Career Launcher.
The funny thing was that for the second year in a row, there were some mistakes in the paper. Again. Hell, there was one question on speed of sound in helium which I was sure I had nailed, but there was no option for it! Then I see in the solutions that the answer actually wasn’t there. Spent quite some time on this one with caffeine-fueled passion to get a *physics* question I *knew* right. Oh well…
I’d posted these AIEEE past year question archives way back - last year, in fact - but as the time for AIEEE draws closer, I thought it’s time I pointed these ones out again. Some people, like Apoorv, were asking for it to. So to download the old papers, click on the links given below to download:
I hope these past year question banks, especially that of AIEEE, will be helpful for the upcoming exams. Note that last two question archives may take a slightly longer time to download on really slow connections - obviously, because they have more papers.
Saw this new ad while watching Ocean’s Twelve (dunno how many times I’ve seen it) yesterday. ‘Chika’, was the name of the original pug, but I think he’s been replaced recently, by well, a new mutt. I think Vodafone must have faced a lot of alienation of ideology among its subscriber base after the sudden name switch, which they did overnight.