INDIBLOGGER STUDENT INITIATIVE

As a blogger I was always looking for an opportunity to inculcate the blogging culture into the Student community. I wanted to change the notion that people had on blogging in a negative way. This was itching my mind for a really long time and Indibloggers gave me the platform to establish myself as a good blogger. It was a collaborative community initiative by us to spread the blogging culture to the college students.

Home Ground:

KCG College, probably most famous for the climax scene of Sivaji, Dhool etc. was the place chosen by us to kick start this program. I had approached the college long time back about this event after getting consent from IndiBlogger and more than us it was the Students who displayed better enthusiasm levels and second my intention to host this event at the college. The more the students turn up the better will be this event and will turn out to be like a festival in INDIA. Blogging is indeed a festival that can be celebrated and Chennai being the Blogging capital needed something special. So Indiblogger Student initiative will indeed turn out to be a festival in Chennai soon.

From scratch to scholar:

As a layman, I might not know what a blog is and what a blog can do for me? This was the first question taken up by the team and we spread the word of mouth about What a blog is? The next question that tickles my mind is Why should I Blog? That was answered by the talk given by me for 10 minutes where I spoke about How to gain recognition and make the world know that you exist. I also spoke how to make a lot of people come and read your blog and some Blogging Ethics. This gave the community a complete knowledge on why a person should blog.

In order to come to limelight your talents need to be shown to the outside world. The World Wide Web is the best option for the outside world which when realizes that you exist will worship you for your work. Visit to colleges is a sequel and all those who are interested in hosting the same event at your college please get in touch with us. This is something that you are doing as a benefit to the community and probably your initiative might bring you to limelight.

Photographs taken during the Bloggers Meet:

That is me, giving a talk on How to make your blog famous?

Launch of IndiStudent Badge:

The IndiStudent Badge was launched during the meet that can be used in your blog and mark yourself as a Student Blogger. We did demonstrate about how to create a blog, How to use Badges in a blog etc. It was an event to remember and once again, I am thankful to Indiblogger for making the Student community realize their dream.

Sriram :)

The best brains when not tamed and molded in the right fashion results in the product called terrorist. God only knows what joy these people get out of killing others. If a scientist wanted to come to lime lights he ends up spending tiring nights at his lab to innovate something. But these people want to come to limelight by killing innocent hearts.

INDIA, is a land of culture. It had armies in its monasteries when other country people were trying to decipher their civilization. When this is the case, INDIA has become a play ground for the terrorists. The training ground for them are the cities in INDIA and the innocent public are the affected lot. We call ourselves intelligent but do we actually think about the same for the second time? 

What is the government doing for the public? It does not even have the intelligence team that can smell such disastrous happenings before the mishap happens. There is no swat team that relies on its own brain. It is still a dog that is trusted and not a human. The government in India is just fit for giving condolence meetings and the state government is fit for announcing fake promises and politics = marketing is the latest trend.

My father will be getting an additional salary of Rs. 1000 per month if he works in Jammu & Kashmir. But not many are ready to go there because they fear life. This is the state of the country which has so much potential human resources. It is our duty to safe guard this nation. Laws need to be reframed and punishments needs to be brutal and cruel against the terrorists who do the same to innocent public.

Sriram :-)

When I was a kid, my parents used to ask me, what is my ambition in life? I used to tell them that I want to become a scientist. But that was a time when I did not realize that seriousness of science. But it was like a dream come true when I saw the researchers from various parts of the world come down to Chennai for the Microsoft Research Symposium TechVista.

October 1^st 2008, Chennai:

The Chennai Convention Centre at Nandambakkam near Airport was all set to witness the event. 1500 was the expected audience who were brought to the hall by charted tour buses. MSR indeed took care of each and everyone who showed interest in attending the program. It was a day that answered thousands of questions in the minds of young people who were hesitant to pursue research as a career. It was a day when the field of Computer Science was celebrated like a festival.

Dr. P.Anandan from MSR, started the show by speaking in Tamil and telling the audience that he is a person from Chennai and it was great for him to have TechVista hosted in Chennai. Chennai is indeed privileged to have such great researchers who have given their life for the betterment of life of others to come down and talk to the novice Academic crowd. Dr. Anandan gave a brief introduction to the program and gave us an insight of TechVista that have happened in the past. This is the first time this event is happening in Chennai and it witnessed a huge turn over. It was launched by the Director of IITM.

During the inaugural function, Mr. Adithya Sankar demonstrated the power of Photosynth, a Research product that was developed by Live Labs. In this process, the MSR wanted to have a native touch and demonstrated the technology with the Srivilliputur, Sri Andal Temple. The technology was an eye opener for most of the audience and was indeed the right way to kick start the day.

Session 1: The Session 1 consisted of lectures by Prof. John Hopcroft, Richard Szeliski and Prof. Shafi Goldwasser.

Talk by Prof. John Hopcroft:

It was indeed a pleasure to listen to his talk. Datas are present all around us be it in the web, satellite information etc. But how to tame these data was the glimpse given to the audience by his inspirational talk. He did throw light on a lot of youngsters who were craving to pursue research. It was a seed for me to take up my higher studies to sharpen my knowledge. He gave a real time example of how a bird’s location is tracked in the world and its applications in the field of Weather forecasting, hurricane direction prediction etc.

Talk by Dr. Richard Szeliski:

Dr. Richard’s presentation was speaking about the field of Computer vision and it was indeed a pleasure to listen to him. He made all our blind folded thoughts reach a clarity by speaking about how the technology of photosynth came to shape and how it works internally. This was indeed a beautiful presentation and it became the darling of all masses as it podcasted some of the un seen content which were soothing to the eyes too.

Talk by Prof. Shafi Goldwasser:

Security is not just a need today but has become a science by itself. How to improve security by the method of obfuscation was discussed in this mind blowing session which people can understand provided they have domain knowledge of what security and Cryptography actually is. This was a sizzling talk for those who aspire to be an expert in information security. Her talk gave us an insight of what all should not be done when considering security as an issue. Obfuscation means making things complex but resulting in the same output without changing the functionality of the code.

      Dr. P. Anandan, MSR India                                    Prof. John Hopcroft

              Dr. Richard Szeliski                             Prof. Shafi Goldwasser

Session 2: The Session was a series of talk given by Richard Rashid, Prof. Shree K Nayar and Vijay Chandru.

Talk by Rick Rashid:

Rick’s talk was showcasing the various research products from Microsoft Research labs across the world. The masterpiece was World wide telescope that allows us to have the entire view of the galaxy like the view from the telescope. His talk also included a research product Boku – Simplified programming for Kids in which they can create their own games without having much of computer knowledge. This was really attractive too. He also spoke about the live traffic suggestion system that is a brilliant product by itself.

Talk by Prof. Shree K Nayar:

What you see is different from What you like to see? This was clearly explained to us by the inspirational talk by Prof. Shree Nayar. A lot of us understood the fact that Camera isn’t just a device that captures still photographs but the one that can be taken as a challenge and re engineered to make experience reach better shape. The Wide angle camera that was used for the video conferencing in which 4 people can do the conf with one camera was really attractive. Design of 4π camera that is considered as a challenge was also explained in this speech. This was an eye opener for a lot of the audience.

Talk by Vijay Chandru:

Strand’s life sciences is a company that deals with the field of Computational biology. Vijay Chandru Sir delivered a brilliant Session that would have inculcated a feeling in the mind of the listeners that Computers were invented to facilitate the biological problems that we are facing today. Its applications in the field of Medicine, Surgery and cure of Cancer, HIV were all discussed in this talk.

            Richard Rashid                                           Prof. Shree K Nayar

                  Vijay Chandru

TECHVISTA 2008, is a day to remember and is a day that is meaningful in the life of those who are interested in celebrating Computer Science. It was a god’s gift for me to be present there.