Mean Machines are passe now.

TOYOTA PRIUS

I really can't say whether it is Just in Time manufacturing or sheer brilliance that gets Toyota another hit : PRIUS .
Prius is a hybrid built from scratch unlike most other cars which have hybrids as evolved models.
NYT reports that Toyota has already recorded a sale of more than 400,000 in such a short span of time.
It is such a phenomenon that its brand value is metaphoric with the yellow, blue , white "Live Strong" rubber wrist bands.
Currently the PRIUS is priced at approximately $22k and is poised to give a mileage of approximately 50 gallons per litre.

THE iPOD OF CARS

The FIAT Cinquecento is coming back!
The Cinquecento was the Elvis of its times and if it FIAT has its way, the new version of this three-door car to be launched at its 50th birthday will be the ipod of cars (are you there Mr Ghosn? And yes Mr. Jobs, you can certainly stick the feather)
Cinquecento (earlier , the FIAT 500) was akin to MUL's 800 in terms of bringing about a market transition from two-wheelers to affordable 4-wheelers. If rumours have it, its going to be priced at approximately $ 13.5k
Well if its gotta be the ipod of cars the it needs to be presented atleast like a Yashraj flick and Fiat knows how to do this well and beyond.In addition to the exterior design of the Cinquicento ,they've come up with this uber cool portal that boasts not only of a chic and sexy look but is also loaded heavily with stuff that'll get the ooohs and aahs out of the first time clicker.
So heres me signing off quoting the website punch-header : "500 wants you"
(I want her too, 500 times :P)

copyrights reserved by Pseudonormicks and boy luvarien.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed are solely the author's and are subjective.They are not intended to influence,offend or hurt anybody living or dead.The articles may have a tendency to be satirical and or sarcastic.

DIE HARD 4.0 LIVE FREE

RATING : **

Every once in a while comes a Hollywood flick with almost pure (read: animation-free) action sequences to give the fussy critics a 'reality check', but Die Hard 4.0 goes a step ahead ; it revolves around the growing importance of digitizing the analog globe with minimalistic digital action sequences.

A stereotypical loner (like Raghavan from Main Hoon Na), who is also a code wizard ,gets thrown out of the US defense Systems department because he hacks his self designed computer network using just a laptop to prove that it is vulnerable. So whats the big deal? Well, this network governs the entire Nation and yet the government is not ready to fund this guy to build a better system.

So now Mr. Code wizard gets his ego up his head and lives with the motto of destroying the network (read: hacking in and controlling)

He starts off with the transport routes jamming all the routes surrounding the White House. Then comes the communication networks and radio frequencies. He gains access to all TV channels and displays his version of the news: The White House being blown apart-- more panic. Now he moves on to electricity and has his eyes on the gas pipelines. The world's superpower is declared to be under attack.
But wait, this movie is not all about the bad guys wining and winning till the end. John Mclean (Bruce Willis) bumps into this code kid who happens to be a competitor to these virtual terrorists .

The white hat hacker somehow manages to beat the system by configuring his PDA to establish a network via the satellite (thats until the terrorists cut that path and locate him).Now begins the action.

A typical boom-bang-thud-i stand up again movie DH4 lives up to the Die Hard series. Although the movie is technically sound, there are a few goof ups that make it look artificial ; like the scene where the fighter/bomber aircraft flies as low as the flyover to bombard the trailer, or the car-killed-the-chopper chopper scene. Had this been a Bollywood flick, critics would have blown its revenues apart, but thankfully it ain't. Finally it is not a bad watch if you are lazing at your electricity-ridden place with the city flooded and off cource a generator-run multiplex at a stone's throw.

copyrights reserved by Pseudonormicks and boy luvarien.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed are solely the author's and are subjective.They are not intended to influence,offend or hurt anybody living or dead.The articles may have a tendency to be satirical and or sarcastic.

CAMPUS PLACEMENTS and the SOFTIES

The sixth semester ends and there starts the official drive for on campus placements for the engineers : a part of the promising future of our country.
Talk about placements and the first thing that comes to your mind is the Top Five Software conglomerates : TCS, WIPRO, INFOSYS etc. often nicked as 'bulk recruiters'
I'd been for one of their Pre placement talks (PPT), but before going in for that lets talk about Pre PPT scenario.

These Software giants are perceived differently by different people:

a) If you are from an IIT, then you'll give the "huh?- I-dint-get-you reaction when asked about placements in these companies.
b) If you are from an NIT, then you'll get the question, but promptly reply that its not prestigious for you to get in there (you know better)
c)If you are from any other local engineering college, then this is mostly going to be your first job (and probably your final one,on campus) taken from job-security point of view.
d) If you are a parent, then its a prestige issue that your lad works in here (you certainly have the following facts & figures:turnover,employee base,business verticals,presence in different countries et all.

Coming back to the PPT, since I'm from a non-IIT/NIT institute, this company was confident of getting a wholesale deal struck here (offcourse with bulk discounts and other perks). When you know you have the market then you tend to loosen up a bit and so was this one , a bit unorganised in their presentation skills.
A confident bloke tried to challege them and asked the golden question' why do you recruit such masses?' He got back:" Well, we have an ever expanding business and we are always in need of freshers" -Thanks to the ever increasing attrition rate and headhunters.THis explains the reason why he made two contradictory statements:
a)"You all have the freedom of choosing your career paths: be it a domain or a vertical of your choice"
b) you'll be able to chose your domain/vertical after establishing considerable (4-5years) time in the organisation."
I say he was a smart guy: he knew the folks were dozing untill he reached the 'compensation' slide.
I liked their attention seeking technique of starting off with an audio visual ad campaign and winding up with a 'this-is -the kewlest-place-to-be' movie ; for which almost 75% of the junta fell in.
But I did not, as i constantly told myself: "You are here just for the PPT. Not to get placed!"

But the truth is that sooner or later, I'll be placed within one of it's competitors and you might just hear my mom say 'Mera beta ABCDeeeee mein job kartaa hai'

Dear mom. And dear me.


copyrights reserved by Pseudonormicks and boy luvarien.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed are solely the author's and are subjective.They are not intended to influence,offend or hurt anybody living or dead.The articles may have a tendency to be satirical and or sarcastic.

PSYCHE: Teleseries Reviewed

VERDICT: ***
Mondays: 10:00 pm Saturday :4:30 pm (Star World)

Shawn Spencer (James Roday ) is very much like an average bloke in his twenties with a charismatic persona except from the fact that he possesses an innate ability of observing and successfully retaining the minutest detail in the surroundings. But for his father, Henry (Corbin Bernsen) , this feat is the result of the training imparted, than his genes .Thanks to his razor sharp senses, he is able to pin point the culprits from the corner of an over a news bulletin while his blonde girlfriend is over him.
Spencer kept on tipping the cops while he went hop-skip and jump through the 36 jobs he took after high school until this day when the cops suspect him of being an accomplice terming his tip as an inside information. The witty Shawn however tries to convince the cops that he is psychic and bags a kidnapping case from the still skeptical chief of police. He gets his childhood buddy Gus (Dulé Hill) who reluctantly joins him on the case and then in guarding the 'psychic' secret. Spencer solves the case in a weird (dramatic) style : asking impertinent questions, hitting on the victims sister and yes, cant miss the psychic pretence. All of this drives Gus crazy getting him the fits and the viewers the drama sufficient enough to draw the un-types in for a mystery series. Later on Spencer goes on to open his Investigation agency 'PSYCHE' forging Gus' signatures to make him a partner and thereby dragging the poor chap into what could be an adventurous ride for their careers.
The series is Star World's attempt to relinquish the many detective concepts being aired by giving it a fresh perspective through the 'comic-drama' genre. Although Spencer's antics might just remind some of you of one Detective Omkar Nath (I'm not suggesting things), yet this typical American kid and his chicken hearted partner have something for you to be glued to the IB for an hour and a half.


copyrights reserved by Pseudonormicks and boy luvarien.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed are solely the authors's and are subjective.They are not intended to influence,offend or hurt anybody living or dead.The articles may have a tendency to be satrical and or sarcastic.

ROBO-KAAND

Whiling away my precious PL(prep leave) morning over the myriad newspapers I have subscribed to, I came across a little piece :a pseudonorm that said ”South Korea plans Code of Ethics for Robots” : The scarcely populated country which comprises of old people (unlike ours which is heavily populated with a good proportion of young blood) would have new citizens 10 years down the line. These robots would also be guarding the delicate border separating the nation with North Korea.

Recently Prof Warwick (the first man to have a chip implanted in his body) had come down to India giving a series of lectures on the importance of implanting these chips .Prof. Warwick predicts that the world will be full of robots in the next 25-50 years and so to survive , one definitely requires these chips that could keep man still superior over his creation.

So, the next-gen cool kids won’t be the one’s who’ve got pierced at odd places, but the one’s who’ll have implants at maybe even places. To add to it, they might even carry tags saying “Powered by XYZ Corp.” This seems to be an excellent brand building tool complimenting the much sought after evolution of mankind. Especially when R&D work is being done on building intelligent robots who can take their own decisions, there’s a lot more to see for the current young guns and off course their kids (that’s if they reproduce humans instead of bots)

If you haven’t sensed the sarcasm above, let me brief you about the preventive measures proposed to the much dreaded future (only witnessed in Sci-Fis): Coming back to the South Korea article, they’ve set up a team of esteemed scientists, lawyers and doctors to come up with a set of rules that would prevent android (human look alike robot) abuse and define the relationship between man and these machines. They might even consider Issac Asimov’s (sci-fi author,”I,robot”) laws laid 60 years back:
a) Robots may not injure humans or allow harm to come to them
b) Should obey orders given by humans (not overriding the above law)
c) Must protect their own existence (not overriding the above 2 laws)

It is difficult to understand how exactly these laws might be inherited if these robots are to guard a country’s border, however, I give the benefit of doubt and wait for them to come up with their set of laws.
Laws made would possibly differ among nations and might lead to the setting up of an international federation of Robotic rights and proliferation (I’d prefer a kewler name though) and the then superpower would decide the fate of this creation that may have just evolved out of the human fetish for owning slaves.

I feel I’m virtually on my way to build my first work of fiction and eventually perform a fast Fourier transform of the nightmarius-producto-hormones in side your cerebrum (or is it cerebellum?) , so preventing any further deflection on my guilt-o-meter ,I take your leave ; but do ponder.

Pseudonormicks copyright 2007
The views and opinions expressed are solely the authors's and are subjective.