zigzackly's omnium-gatherum *
Like you haven't had enough of us already..
Blogger profile,
older photographs,
Flickr album,
Picassa album,
Facebook profile,
Ryze page,
Orkut page,
LinkedIn page,
published articles.
Guest bloggers:
Hurree and Annie
Reactions, suggestions, any kind of feedback is always welcome.
CollaBlogs infested:
Jugalbandi;
Caferati's blog;
blogolepsy;
indi³;
We, the Media;
Son of CSF.
Now and then, when Hurree needs a holiday, i pinch-hit at Kitabkhana.
And of course, the wonderful World Wide Help group blogs, which include:
The South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami Blog and TsunamiHelp Wiki |
MumbaiHelp |
Cloudburst Mumbai |
KatrinaHelp Blog and Wiki |
RitaHelp |
South Asia Quake Help |
Site feed: Atom or Feedburner.
We endorse, approve of, and throughly adore:
The Babu
Annie
Megha
Calvin and Hobbes
Frazz
The funniest page on the web
Luciferous Logolepsy
Wired
Google News
Books at the Guardian
Wikipedia
Hobson-Jobson
A.Word.A.Day
List of Bests
Word Spy
Literary Encyclopedia
Other Thieves of our Time
[!] = updated in the last 24 hours
Blogroll me?
Recent Posts
Swab your cheek - help save Nalini
Environment-friendly spam
You and I
For Anonymous
Imagine
Why you should send your visiting card to a PR spa...
Do they know it's Christmas?
The problem is us
Godawful Poetry Fortnight - writing cue - day 13
Godawful Poetry Fortnight - writing cue - day 12
D Mervin Ffingir writes, and having writ, moves on:
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Meant to link to this ages ago, but kept forgetting. Annie's post last week did what she does so often and so well: put into words something that had been lurking at the tip of our brain for a bit, something that we knew we found odd about the whole Delhi Bloggers and Bombay Times thing.
Blogging is a virtual activity. Blogosphere is VIRTUAL.Precisely.
It is comprised of people who sit in front of computer screens, hitting keys for the pleasure of it, or for a cause, or even for self-promotion of a certain kind. These people will read what other people like themselves are writing. These people will scream, rant, rave, stand up for each other, laugh when they receive legal notices, make fun of those who deserve it....
but these people may choose not to crawl out of the woodwork to say hello.
Took another look-see at the Wicket to Wicket debate on the state of Indian cricket, and find that Harsha Bhogle, Sambit Bal, Ashok Malik, Devangshu Datta and Mukul Kesavan have, between them, as of this moment, attracted 327 comments. Look to your laurels, oh bloggers!
I
Now, thanks to the folk at Wicket to Wicket, one of Cricinfo's blogs, you, gentle reader, can read my good friend Devangshu Datta on a blog, even if it's just this once, and on cricket. Heeeere's DD, guesting on Wicket to Wicket, on How to win the 2007 World Cup.
[Via Amit]
Our Favourite Duck is our favourite duck because he keeps doing things that we wish we had thought of, and does them so well that even if you ripped it off, it would be a pale shadow of the original.
Deeps and shallowsThis isn't a stream of conscious rhyme, by the way. Paddle over, and scroll down the right column to see it in all its clickable glory.
Who or why or which or what
(Le)high and mighty deep in thought
Nudes and news, candy and cars
Fish in ear,language no bar
Here's some stuff, lovely and random
Bounce around, win worldwide fandom
Spend on books, gain endless pleasure
Would-Bes take note, this one's a treasure
Weird world, views and SF musing
Manic man magnet, most amusing
Green town, tin men, munchkins, elves
Claws all out, she prowls the shelves
Plath and Patil avatar
Mithun-loving superstar
Castle captured, future bright
In the lab in darkest night
Intrepid IWE Ocean sailor
Uncut, cutting super-tailor
London's funniest guy's guy
Let us go then, you and I
Burbling, erudite barbarian
Not Lucien, but dream librarian
The one in which Annie gives it
A writer's life and how she lives it
Up to tricks around the house
Immunodeficient mouse
Genre banners all unfurled
Finest writer in the world
Wisecracking to Shaggy's beat
Venomous yet strangely sweet
Ultra-comic comic lair
Fear this feline if you dare
Shady lines, unbroken back
Brown is clearly the new black
You might meet Marco Polo here
Flowing, cool, refreshing, clear
Intra-city introspection
Demand-supply intersection
Teenager-tantalizing temptress
Ever-changing future empress
Skywalking feet are often wet
On lofty paths great minds are set
Magicians say the strangest things
Half eagle, half beastly king
I do not want the peace which passeth understanding, I want the understanding which bringeth peace.
~ Helen Keller.
Exhibit 1
Exhibit 2
Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred three score and six.
It's true! That Varma boy is the...
Er, we just noticed there's a problem with our Flickr album. All the shots of us have this kinda streak slicing across the neck...
We told you about this a little while ago, but here's a reminder:
The South-East Asia Earthquake And Tsunami blog has nominations in the categories Best Journalistic Blog - English, and Best Weblog at the 2005 BOBs.
Click here to go vote.
And view current status here.
Voting closes 20th November.
That's the name of a new blog, a collaboration between River of Delhi and river's blue elephants, David Israel of Washington and kirwani and David McKelvie of Glasgow and When I am a veteran with only one eye ..., and it will feature poetry and illustration for children.
Go see. It looks marvellous, and we're looking forward to more.
They're doing it in Bangalore, Madras, Delhi, Calcutta.
How about a blog for Urbs Primus in Indus?
You know, blogger meets, general news and gossip, that kinda thing.
Gateway of India
I will not start any new collablogs.
I will not start any new collablogs.
I will not start any new collablogs.
I will not, will not, will not even join new collablogs.
No, really, I can do it. I won't be weak. I won't get into any more collablogs. Won't, Won't. Won't. So there.
No more collablogs. Promise. really. Cross my heart and hope too lose my password file.
(See, I'm not copy-pasting. Each line typed out. Penance.)
There's way too many showing up in my profile already. What will people say? And that doesn't even include the ones I do anonymously.
No more collablogs. No more.
I will resist. No more collablogs.
No, no, no. No more collablogs.
I won't collablog.
You can't make me collablog.
I am stronger than you think. No more collablogs.
I will not collablog.
This is going too far. No more collablogs.
Have you no life, man? Rein it in. No more collablogs. Resist!
Just this one time, maybe? Won't do it again.
See?
The Jabberwock's big blog story in Business Standard is out. Nice stuff. Patrix, Uma, Amit, Samit and this blog make an appearance.
Here's some stats from the piece
# As of October 2005, Technorati is tracking 19.6 million weblogs internationally
# The total number of weblogs tracked doubles every five months or so, and the blogosphere is now over 30 times as big as it was three years ago
# About 70,000 new weblogs are created every day — that’s about one every second
# Between 700,000 and 1.3 million posts are made each day — or 9.2 posts per second
The Content Rules look.
Posts area centred, all else in the shadows, unfussy black and white, with standard blue links (and all done - the ignomy! - with a table, because I mucked up the CSS and hadn't the patience to put it together again).
Verdict? (: And that means you lurkers with the RSS readers too, please. :)
We're going to burn in hell for finding something to smile about in this terrible situation, but this is the best damn use of advertising we've seen in a long while.
CNet says "Google believes it can help OpenOffice--perhaps working to pare down the software's memory requirements or its mammoth 80MB download size"
From Gaping Void.
The short version:
So you want to be more creative, in art, in business, whatever. Here are some tips that have worked for me over the years:
1. Ignore everybody.
2. The idea doesn't have to be big. It just has to change the world.
3. Put the hours in.
4. If your biz plan depends on you suddenly being "discovered" by some big shot, your plan will probably fail.
5. You are responsible for your own experience.
6. Everyone is born creative; everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten.
7. Keep your day job.
8. Companies that squelch creativity can no longer compete with companies that champion creativity.
9. Everybody has their own private Mount Everest they were put on this earth to climb.
10. The more talented somebody is, the less they need the props.
11. Don't try to stand out from the crowd; avoid crowds altogether.
12. If you accept the pain, it cannot hurt you.
13. Never compare your inside with somebody else's outside.
14. Dying young is overrated.
15. The most important thing a creative person can learn professionally is where to draw the red line that separates what you are willing to do, and what you are not.
16. The world is changing.
17. Merit can be bought. Passion can't.
18. Avoid the Watercooler Gang.
19. Sing in your own voice.
20. The choice of media is irrelevant.
21. Selling out is harder than it looks.
22. Nobody cares. Do it for yourself.
23. Worrying about "Commercial vs. Artistic" is a complete waste of time.
24. Don’t worry about finding inspiration. It comes eventually.
25. You have to find your own schtick.
26. Write from the heart.
27. The best way to get approval is not to need it.
28. Power is never given. Power is taken.
29. Whatever choice you make, The Devil gets his due eventually.
30. The hardest part of being creative is getting used to it.
The abbreviated version is here, the full-length version is here, and you can get the free PDF here.
The Herald Sun reports that a "millionaire mobile phone salesman "Crazy" John Ilhan has unveiled his radical design for a $40 million tower in the shape of a phone. The distinctive 120m highrise in City Rd, Southbank, would house his multi-million-dollar communications empire and 166 luxury apartments."Hm. Guess that's one building where you'll get good signal in the lifts.
[Via Textually.]
Note: [*] = The site linked to requires registration.
Zig's on Twitter
Follow, all ye who must know more.Words
We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually produce a masterpiece. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true.
~ Eyler Coates
to be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best night and day to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight and never stop fighting
~ e e cummings
In three words i can sum up everything I've learned about life.
It goes on.
~ Robert Frost
Ring the bells that still can ring,
Forget your perfect offering,
There is a crack in everything;
That's how the light gets in.
~ Leonard Cohen
May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.
~ Edward Abbey, naturalist and author (1927-1989)
I fell in love – that is the only expression I can think of – at once, and am still at the mercy of words, though sometimes now, knowing a little of their behavior very well, I think I can influence them slightly and have even learned to beat them now and then, which they appear to enjoy.
~ Dylan Thomas, Welsh poet, short-story writer, and playwright, "Poetic Manifesto" in the Texas Quarterly, Winter 1961
A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.
~Thomas Mann, novelist, Nobel laureate (1875-1955)
The world in general doesn't know what to make of originality; it is startled out of its comfortable habits of thought, and its first reaction is one of anger.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, writer (1874-1965)
In times of profound change, the learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.
~ Al Rogers
Assumptions are the termites of relationships.
~ Henry Winkler, actor (1945- )
Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds.
~ George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans), novelist (1819-1880)
Either you think - or else others have to think for you and take power from you, pervert and discipline your natural tastes, civilize and sterilize you.
~ F. Scott Fitzgerald
There is no remedy so easy as books, which if they do not give cheerfulness, at least restore quiet to the most troubled mind.
~ Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, author (1689-1762)
Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching.
~ Satchel Paige
Fake it till you make it.
~ (Heard on West Wing)
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