Ravi's Rants

The folks who buy a new product when it first comes out, are commonly known as the early adopters. These people – who are not the same as the “beta testers” – actually spend money to buy the product. They risk the annoyances, technical and usability issues of First-Generation products in exchange for the “Wow”…

If you drink coffee at Starbucks, you’ll surely appreciate this: 54 cents Refills For Starbucks Coffee .

If you’ve ever wondered about the power of influence that videos – even free ones – can have in selling commercial products, look no further. Recently, I was on the receiving end of this power, as I shelled out about $3,200 to buy a Yamaha Motif Keyboard – thanks(!) to two powerful videos on YouTube.…

I recently asked a very close non-blogger, never-blogged-before friend to start his own blog on my new multi-blog site, YehHaiIndia.com (driven by WordPress Mu – very cool software). His immediate response was: The problem with blogging is you need ideas and thoughts you want to write. And you are assuming I have thoughts that are…

“Bacn” – pronounced as “Bacon” – is spam (kind of), but not really the lewd, disgusting, “killing my inbox” type. From Jargon Watch at Wired.com: It’s not really spam. You want to read it (and probably would), you just don’t have the time. Thanks to the folks at PodCamp Pittsburgh, there’s a new web-term you…

Camtasia is giving away a slightly older version of their famous screen-capture software, Snag-it, that lets you go beyond the “Prnt Scrn” button. Here’s where you can download it. A Print-Screen Tip If you press the “Alt” + “Prt Scrn” buttons together, you will capture only the front-most (active) window – which means you no…

This has been around for a while now, but its coming out of beta (a.k.a Google Labs) means that Google is serious enough to support this going forward. Here’s how it works: Dial 1-800-GOOG-411 (800-4664-411) Say where you’re calling from – City, State or Zip Say what you’re looking for (Pizza delivery, from the video…

My “Video Unit” link wasn’t available yesterday when the announcement was first made. Was able to see it today. “Linked” my Adsense account with my YouTube account. Got the confirmation from Google in a few minutes (they do warn that it could take up to 12 hours). Created my “player”, got the code. The ads…

Going by the PageRank (PR 6), you can guess how many sites are linking to this post on JoelOnSoftware. The content is that powerful. Here’s the summary: 1. Fix everything two ways 2. Suggest blowing out the dust 3. Make customers into fans 4. Take the blame 5. Memorize awkward phrases 6. Practice puppetry 7.…

In this era of the open web, it is hard to monetize information that you can easily get elsewhere. Want to read about what’s going on with the presence of Iranian dictator Ahmedinajad in NY City? Just Google-News it up (yes, that’s different from Googling it up), and you’ll get all the latest relevant news…

In my book “No Business Like E-Business“, I write about the Google Supplemental Index (GSI – Ravi’s acronym). Basically, this is like the “alternate” Google database, where sites that are “on the way in” or “on the way out” show up. If yours is a new site, it may show up in the GSI before…

“Our invalid clicks rate – the activity rate – has remained in the range of less than 10% of all clicks every quarter since we launched AdWords in 2002. At Google’s current revenue rate, every percentage point of invalid clicks we throw out represents over $100 million/year in potential revenue foregone.”, says Google’s Inside Adwords…

I found this amazing site yesterday through one of the feeds on LinkOverLoad.com. Awesome video coming right up… Animoto basically turns your pictures into a fantastic MTV-style video, with some great soundtracks available on their site for free, or you can use your own audio – with your pictures almost flashing in rhythm to the…

“The _____ swept down from the hills like a dark and hungry wind. The first thing anyone would notice would be the _____, its long white hair flew wildly in the breeze generated by the two swinging katanas that had been enchanted to draw blood from anything, even lamp posts and cheese. Raised in a…

The iPhone launched at $599 (8GB) and $499 (4GB). About two months later, Apple deprecates the latter, and slashes $200 off the former. The early adopters get mad. Should Apple care? They didn’t have to. But they did (Steve Jobs letter). Great strategy (in-store credit). Great PR. Gotta love Apple.

The whole idea of podcasting is not to be just able to publish your audio files online, but to make your audio posts “subscribable” – i.e., your listeners should be able to set up their podcasting software (like iTunes) to subscribe to your feed, in which case the software (in this example, iTunes) will automatically…

We all knew this day would come, but I had been more curious about the type of video ads that would show up: would they be pre-roll (first show the ads, then the actual video)? Would they be post-roll (after the video) or some kind of pop-up (probably not, knowing their Adsense policy about pop-ups)?…

James Bond Jason Bourne Jack Bauer   Think it’s a coincidence that these three super crime-fighting-machines share the same initials? I think not. Bourne was bourne as America’s answer to the ultimate killing machine and British super spy who is the only one (other than God) who can save the Queen: James Bond. Last night,…

Watch this hair-raising video that shows a herd of buffaloes trying to fight a pride of lions, trying to snatch a baby calf away from the jaws of 5 lions and 2 crocodiles! Will the baby calf survive? Make sure you have nerves of steel before you watch it. I hope this fight inspires you…

Creating an e-business… Learning a new skill… Being the best at what you do… Building something worth building… Creating something worth creating… Saying something worth saying… Doing something worth doing… All of these take plenty of time – and effort. It is very easy to just look at the end-result of other people’s successes, ogle…

The sad thing is that along with the “Citizen Marketers” come the “Citizen Abusers”. Any form of user(citizen)-powered marketing will always eventually be subject to abuse, and then the distinct line between a legitimate “volunteer” citizen and a “paid” citizen suddenly becomes very thin. Point in case: Digg.com, BzzAgent.com or a PayPerPost.com. As time goes…

Maybe quite a lot, and mostly not a lot. “Huh?”, you say? If you look at this “top bloggers” list, you may end up buying into the fantasy that blogging will make you big bucks. Not every blog will make that kind of money. Actually, it would even be fair say, that less than a…

You know what is Blog-And-Ping. Blog-And-Bookmark is quite similar. You first blog about something (hopefully) interesting, then once your blog’s ping service has done its work on the back-end pinging all of the various web sites and your post is live, then you go to work as follows. Use a one-to-many social bookmarking tool like…

I save about 1/2 hour every week on grocery shopping thanks to this list. That’s 26 hours a year. Assuming I would have done this for at least 40 years of my life by the time I’m dead, that means 1040 hours saved (26 * 40). 1040 Hours = 43.33 Days Yes, I get (at…

Check out this pretty cool list of Google’s acquisitions, from Deja to YouTube to Doubleclick to Feedburner. If you notice the trend, they’ve pretty much tried to stick to their core competency and have bought companies with products that complement their core niche of search and analysis.

“Steve Jobs said: “We’re here to put a dent in the universe. Otherwise why else even be here?” Did you know that you have big things to accomplish in life? And did you know that those big things are getting rather dusty while you pour yourself another cup of coffee, and decide to mull things…

Google came to prominence with a “Hate Images, Love Text” campaign. Slowly but steadily, they ventured into “banner” advertising, then “video” advertising, then affiliate programs, and now they have purchased one of the biggest “traditional” online advertisement networks, DoubleClick. Their huge dependence on their “advertising” model is both exciting and scary at the same time.

I mean, when it comes to searching and finding a real snake in the real world. Online though, I’m still betting on Google 🙂

I was getting about 500+ spam-comments a day. I’m now down to about 20. Based on my personal experience with spam, I have created a list of “bad words”, which, when used as a blacklist, will make most of your spam go away. If you’re using WordPress, copy the list below and paste it into…

Backdrop and Shower curtain from Wal-Mart: $18 Tripod from Sears: $30 Expensive, Wireless Headphone (with “compander circuitry”) that sounds like crap: $100 Cheap-looking, Wired Headphone that just works: $20 Pink-shade Table Lamp: $10 100W bulb (that you need to keep switching off between takes because the lamp-shade says it can handle only 40W): $2 CyberLink…

If you’ve used a computer long enough, you probably have tens of little icons in your system tray (next to your system clock), that are an indication of all the apps that are currently running. Many of them may be programs that automatically add themselves to the startup process, or may simply be applications that…

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act, but a habit.” – Aristotle What could you possibly excel at, simply by doing it consistently, repeatedly, and persistently?   “I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence, I can reach for perfection is God’s business.” – Michael J. Fox

From the Wikipedia: BitTorrent is a peer-to-peer (P2P) file distribution protocol. The protocol was originally designed and created by programmer Bram Cohen, and is now maintained by BitTorrent, Inc. BitTorrent is a method of distributing large amounts of data widely without the original distributor incurring the whole of the corresponding costs of hardware, hosting and…

So is this the start of yet another monopoly? Why hasn’t anyone else gotten into this? It’s not like there are major infrastructure setup pains involved – just buy a darn satellite and start broadcasting – it’s not like it’s hard to do for someone with a lot of cash and people – something that…

Found this article about Sergey Brin – it covers everything from Sergey’s casual attire at work, to his electric massage chair, to his Russian-Jewish upbringing. Even if you don’t like Google or Sergey, you simply cannot pass up on reading about the founders of one of the largest corporations in the world. Some highlights from…

As a follow-up to my original lusty iPhone rant, I decided to scour the web for a closer look at the iPhone. The hype is dying. Real people have used it, some have heard about real people using it, but everyone definitely has something to say about it. So go on and see if you…

What would happen if Microsoft were to design the iPod packaging? Really witty, self-deprecating video, apparently made by ….. Microsoft employees! – Ravi Jayagopal

The machine is us… Digital Text is no longer just linking information… HyperText is no longer just linking information… The Web is no longer just linking information… The Web is linking people….

Check out the oldest domains ever registered. Ranking   Date Domain Name 1.   15-Mar-1985 SYMBOLICS.COM 7.   09-Jan-1986 XEROX.COM 9.   03-Mar-1986 HP.COM 11   19-Mar-1986 IBM.COM 11   19-Mar-1986 SUN.COM 13   25-Mar-1986 INTEL.COM 20   05-Aug-1986 BELL-ATL.COM 20   05-Aug-1986 GE.COM 42   17-Nov-1986 ADOBE.COM 42   17-Nov-1986 AMD.COM 42   11-Dec-1986…

Check out Steve Ballmer’s modest office. What is it with corporate executives playing golf within the office? Are you somehow cool for being unprofessional and playing a game while someone’s trying to talk business with you? I just don’t get it. Let me know if you do. – Ravi Jayagopal / LinkOverLoad.com

Everytime I come across a cool Firefox plug-in, I want to install it and use it right away. This is even more true when I want to perform a task (like, say, grab the color code of a cool looking color from a web site), then search if a Firefox plugin exists to do that,…

Google’s Blogsearch and Technorati are great sites for focused reading about a particular subject. Doing a Google search is entirely different from doing a search on blog search. Google’s Blogsearch and Technorati will both bring you back all posts on blogs and niche sites that have been tagged with, or contain, the keyword that you…

And you also thought that the crazy hand-waving, screen-manipulation stuff Tom Cruise did in Minority Report was just computer-generated special effects. Just wait till you check out (below) Jeff Han outdoing Tom Cruise with the multi-touch displays. The cool thing about Apple is not that they put one of these displays in the iPhone –…

GrimThing has this interesting post that makes a practical comparison of Gimp and Photoshop. Summary: For businesses: Photoshop rules! For home use: Don’t pirate Photoshop, and use Gimp instead, which can do all the basic stuff you need to do anyway. Personally, I’ve used both Gimp and Photoshop, but primarily use Fireworks just because I’ve…

Imagine blogging for a whole year, ending up with a very popular blog that has 23,457 subscribers, ranked #45 out of all blogs in the world, and earning (brace yourself) a whopping $3,350 for the entire year! Now stop imagining – this stuff is real. I noted in an earlier post, that in spite of…

The iPhone is out. No, not that stupid Cisco thingy. I’m talking about “the” iPhone. Yeah, baby – the one from Apple! But why am I feeling like this about the iPhone? I’m not an Apple fanboi. I’ve never owned an Apple product – nope, not even the iPod. Well, 6 months ago, I did…

2006 was the absolute best year of my professional- as well as my online- career for many reasons; the main reason also being the most measurable one: Money earned. But there were many factors that contributed to my success, and here are a few key learnings from 2006 – stuff that you should know, in…

Last updated on December 4, 2007 Click here to read Part I of How “Blog-and-Ping” Can Boost Your PageRank. How “Blog-and-Ping” Can Boost Your PageRank – Part II The Ping List – Making Google Your Little “Bee-yaach” Here’s a list of URL’s that I have in this very WordPress-driven blog (log in as admin and…

“Blog and Ping” is a term that refers to a technique where you make a post on your blog, and using your blog software’s in-built feature, you then send out a “ping” to various blog directories, notifying them that you have added a new post to your blog. A “ping” is a way of notifying…

Something’s going on with Google Video. Every visit to my various WordPress blogs was freezing up my browser (both Firefox and IE), and the last visible message on the frozen browser window’s status bar on all blogs was “loading from video.google.com…”. I removed all Google video embeds in my various blogs, and all of them…

FTP stands for “File Transfer Protocol”. It is what you use to “transfer” (or upload) files from your computer to your web site – and vice-versa. To make it easy for you to learn how to use FTP software, I have created a video tutorial, available at this link. It is about 2+ MB in…

If you know what a “blog” is, you probably already know what a “RSS Feed” is. One of the best (not to forget, cheapest and fastest) ways to get free content for your web site, is to display a third-party RSS Feed. Every time the feed’s content changes, content on your web site automatically changes,…

“Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention to arrive safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming: Wow!! What a ride!”. That’s what a running-mate told Dean Karnazes, who once entered a 199-mile relay race all by…

… if you are relying on the (potential) swarm of Digg visitors to click on your Adsense ads. Personally, I think the spike in traffic you will get by getting a home-page link on Digg won’t be worth anything at all, unless you are selling something that Digg users want. Now, I don’t know what…

What is a viral web site? I believe it is a site where everyone who visits it, wants every one else they know to visit it too – and they want to be the first to tell the people they know. Way back in 1999, the ‘net was ablaze with a mania called “Mahir”. An…

Does more traffic to your web site (or store) mean more sales? Not necessarily. According to this CNN report, a company “which sells used machinery for making tubes to clients worldwide, has seen its site utube.com knocked off line by millions of online searchers looking for video site (YouTube.com)”. Traffic alone is no good. What…

No one saw this coming. Almost no one. It doesn’t seem so surprising when you think about the fact that Google has never been good at building a huge community (other than for search). And they didn’t get invited to the “Social Networking” party. So they figured, if you can’t get an invite, then throw…

A News.com article quotes Mike McGuire, research vice president at Gartner, as saying: “Apple is genetically incapable of doing anything that smacks of me-too …”. Wow! Isn’t that the kind of branding you want for yourself and your company? If Apple reeks of “Me only”, then there’s another company that is the anti-thesis of Apple,…

What’s the first word that comes to your mind when you hear the name… (my opinions below): Rodman: Weird Jordan: Greatest Britney: Stupid Beyonce: Beautiful Paris: Slut KFed: Loser Bill Gates: Rich Warren Buffet: Savior Osama: Moth**f****r Gandhi: Peace Tiger Woods: Classy Tom Cruise: Nutjob Mel Gibson: Anti-semite? Mother Teresa: Compassionate You: …… What is…

Or… “How to Become an Expert on Anything” I had a room-mate in college (Shyama). The guy was an absolute genius. Over time, I found that he would spend a lot of time trying to figure things out himself. He never asked anyone for help. On the other hand, I found that almost all of…

Many years ago, during yet another boring conference with a long list of uninspired speakers, one man brought the entire crowd back to life with this opening statement. He said: “I feel like Elizabeth Taylor’s 8th Husband…. I know what to do, but I don’t know how to make it interesting”. For the rest of…

No, this is not about “inches” in the context of “size”. Ron Jeffries in his article on Automated Testing (yeah, a very “exciting” topic for the average person) writes: “The transition from good enough to excellent occurs at the high end of the range of capability in every endeavor. The fastest runner is fractions of…

[Update on 09/19/2009: See the video that I just found on YouTube at the end…] Original Post from 07/08/2006… Everytime you are ready to give up, every time you think: I am too tired right now… I am too sleepy right now… I am too hungry right now… I am not feeling too well… I…

You’ve probably heard of Guy Kawasaki. I first heard about him in the context of something to do with Apple (the company). The next thing I knew, I was furiously reading his blog and soaking up every interview he gave. In one of his interviews, he talks about “Guy’s Golden Touch“, which in essence is:…

And where do you end? Most small web-site owners fail because they try to do everything themselves. Just because the web offers plenty of free resources for learning new technologies, doesn’t mean you should go out and learn all of them and try to build it all yourself. When you want a phone, you don’t…

Greek Industrialist Aristotle Onassis once said, “The secret to success is to know something that nobody else knows”. Well, it doesn’t have to exactly be something that no one knows. It could very well be something that… not many people know… many people know, but don’t care about… many people care about, but are doing…

Remember Daredevil? He is the blind, avenging lawyer who fights the bad guys in the court of law during the day, and bashes them up on the streets at night. I am kinda like that. More like Clark Kent, actually – I slog away quietly at my day job during the day. It’s like being…

Not sure if you have skills that will actually make you money? I was watching this show the other day, on the History channel with my 7-yr old daughter, where they showed one of the first Titanic expeditions ever – right from planning to execution. It was simply mind-blowing. They had brought in this expert…

He’s the man who is believed to have invented the word “Viral Marketing idea virus”, among many other powerful marketing concepts like “sneezers”, “worldview purple cow” and “Permission Marketing”. The author of six bestsellers, including Permission Marketing, an Amazon Top 100 bestseller for a year and a Fortune Best Business Book. His newest book, All…

Oh, how I love the Sound of Silence. No, not the movie. I’m talking literally – like when things are quiet (except when my kids are around, of course 🙂 ) Ever wonder why people get great ideas when they are in the shower? That’s because it’s (kind of) quiet in the shower. It’s just…

“Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” – Anonymous But the dream started with an idea that was planted in their minds by a toy given to them by their father. In the words of the boys, “Late in the autumn of 1878, our father came into the house one evening with…

Or “25 signs that you probably don’t have a life”. Passion & Commitment – these are absolute necessities – you should want to succeed so badly, that you can almost taste it! So how passionate are you? How committed are you to what you do? Take this crazy-but-fun survey to find out: 25. You work…

Forget creating “niche” web sites, “niche marketing”, “vertical portals” and “mini sites”. Have you found YOUR niche yet? Everyone is born with a gift. Everyone is blessed with a unique talent, a special skill. The difference between winners and losers, is that the winners find their niche early in life – they know which game…

Yeah, that’s how it feels when you love what you do. No, scratch that – not just “love” what you do, but are absolutely crazy about what you do. That’s how it feels when you work for yourself, instead of slogging away your whole life for someone else. That’s how it feels when you feel…

He never took a single psychology course as an undergraduate at Queens College. Initially rejected because he did not have enough background in psychology, he was accepted after he took six psychology courses at three different schools in New York. The American Psychological Association (APA) put Milgram’s membership application on hold when questions were raised…

Imagine this: You own a restaurant. You spend lots of time, money, brains and effort building up a brand and increasing sales and repeat sales. They like your food and service so much that they go out and tell all of their friends and family. Now the world comes knocking on your door, and wants…

“He was called the Bayonne Bleeder for the punishment he took during his fights”, writes Tom Denelson of Inside Boxing. “Chuck Wepner must have felt that the heavyweight championship was his as he saw Muhammad Ali go down as a result of a right hand to the chest. It was not to be as Ali…

If you are reading this post, you are among the lucky few in this world. We are lucky because we are aware. We want to do something. We want to be something. We are lucky because we are surrounded by people who are content working for others all their lives, without ever giving a single…

“Survival of the fittest” was Charles Darwin’s theory. Boy, am I glad the theory works, on many levels. I was telling a friend – let’s call him Mr. “X” – about Robert Allen, the real estate mogul, who not only made and continues to make millions in real estate, but has trained and mentored average…

Many years go, when we were in high school, a friend of mine (let’s call him “RT”), during a sickening conversation about road accidents, in a sadistic manner joked that he wished he could someday witness one and see bones getting crushed and blood spilt everywhere – something like in a gory horror movie. He…

I was flying from New York to Michigan, and the flight was running on time. Then arrived a family of a mother, 3 kids and the grandmother. One was an infant, one a toddler and the third a slightly older girl. Unfortunately, this family had seats all over the plane – one seat all the…

Have you ever met, or even heard of a child who’s afraid of flying? I know I haven’t. Children have the most fun on a flight, especially during takeoff and landing, as they soak in every bit of the plane, the clouds, the miniature automobiles and buildings, the vast ocean, the awesome view – just…

Try giving a child the following choices: (a) Go out and play now and do your homework later. -OR- (b) Do your homework now, and go for a movie later. I’ll bet 8-out-of-10 will pick choice (a), because even though they are truly getting a better deal out of (b). they realize that “later” may…

After nearly 6 years, I decided to go back home to India for a 3-week vacation. I had been hearing that things had changed a lot in those years. How naive of me to think that they had changed for the better! Upon arriving in Mumbai International airport 3 hours late from Newark, NJ due…

Months ago, I went to Citibank, and closed my long standing account. Over the course of years, I had kept “substantial” amounts of money in my account. And I had eventually decided that I wasn’t going to get paid a 0.95% interest for my money, when ING was paying 3.x% for the same. And I…

My wife hates taking unfamiliar routes when driving. If she is not fully confident of the route, she simply will not drive. Fortunately, her “thing” stops with driving. Unfortunately, most people “live” this way – they go through their entire life without ever once taking the road less travelled. They continue to do only the…

I’ve never thought much about Clint Eastwood, the actor. Yes, I loved him in “The good, the bad and the ugly”. Maybe “Dirty Harry” too. But that was it – at least for the longest time. Then some time ago, I saw “Mystic River” (only because I am a big fan of Sean Penn). I…

When I read about Amazon’s all you can eat, free 2-day shipping plan, the first thing was I added up all charges I’d paid towards shipping in the past year (and I bought about 30-40 items – books, toys, etc). 2004 total in shipping fees: $0.00 Compare that to the $79 I would pay for…

Amazingly, this happens just one day after I posted this. Google fires blogger: Actual post that got him fired / Story Queen of Sky gets fired: Pictures / Story Microsoft fires intern over pictures of Mac G5’s – Pictures / Story So, what’s the moral of the story? A> Don’t post pictures taken at work…

One definition of “Blogging” is “publishing at the speed of thought”. Ok, maybe that works for a personal blog where you are writing about your vasectomy. Maybe you get the idea about what to blog in an instant; maybe you log in to your blog and start writing the next instant; but you don’t have…

Link: Three types of Brands – Part I “Product Brands” are hard to leverage even in a new industry. Heck, they are hard to leverage even within the same niche. Apple, the computer company, sells more iPods than Sony, which invented the Walkman, can sell its MP3 player. How many of us would care for…

No, I’m not talking about the mean T-Wolves, who are making their star player’s family starve. On November 12, 2004, ICANN passed a policy, which basically means this: Domain name transfers will no longer require email-based approval by the domain name’s regsistrant. So, I could basically ask for your domain name to be transferred over…

When you don’t care who is at the helm of a company, you don’t care who its board of directors are, you don’t care who works there, but you care about their product, you’ve got a “Product Brand”. Think Coke, Marlboro (nope, quit smoking 5 years ago), BMW, Starbucks. When you are willing to buy…

Like Robert Kiyosaki’s two dads , I have more than one Guru Drona. My second guru has no hair, and flaunts his shiny pate – even on the covers of his books. He has created a brand out of being bald. Ok, he’s not really bald. Clean-shaven, shall we say? Lives in the same county…