Customizing Google News

I am a great fan of Google. Google comes up with great products. However, in some instances they seem to be refusing adding simple features that people really need.

I use Google News to read news from different sources. Google news is a decent news aggregator. However there is one feature that readers across the world are craving for. The feature is to exclude news from a specific news sources in search results. If you google something like "google news exclude source", you'll find this issue being discussed in hundreds of forums. There is even a place where you can recommend this feature to google. I am sure hundreds of thousands of people would have recommended this feature. And it's a feature easy to implement. I don't know what's keeping Google from implementing it.

There are roundabout ways to achieve it. Someone suggested making changes to some Windows OS hidden files to block content from specific websites. Other simpler suggestions are like creating custom section with search string containing '-, for e.g. '-indiatimes.com'. I am trying that out. Let me see how effective it is. But it is really annoying that Google doesn't provide a easy way of doing it. For instance, why doesn't it allow customizing standard sections to filter out news from bogus sources, such as Times of India. Seeing news from from Times of India on my Google News page makes me sick.

Google Chrome, Google Buzz & Google Desktop

I have installed Google Chrome on my laptop. After getting used to Chrome, I find IE extremely awkward to work with.

Google, however, seem to have made a faux pas, the way they rolled out Buzz. There are several privacy issues that gmail users are facing due to not knowing enough about the features of Buzz and default settings decided by Google for Buzz.

Some years back Google had launched Google Desktop - a tool that allowed users to search the contents of their PCs, the way they search content on internet. Google desktop died because of privacy issues with it. (I had installed Google Desktop on my laptop, but uninstalled it when I realized that it searched and displayed contents of password protected file to anybody having access to my laptop).

Asia-Pacific Dance Show

Yesterday we attended Asia Pacific Cultural Center's new year celebration. There were going to a music and dance show. In the morning I said to Poornima, "I won't enjoy it. But I will come with you since you'll like it. You can also meet all your friends". Poornima was supposed to participating in a couple of dance sequences, but had to opt out. After extracting a promise from Poornima not to mind if I stole a few catnaps while the show was in progress, we set. I even took the liberty of sitting in the passenger's seat instead of driver's, and playing music of my choice (as if to compensate for the "sacrifice" I was making!) This year APCC had chosen to portray Indian culture. First half of the day was dedicated to Indian music and dance, and second half was kept aside for other countries.

When we reached there Indian instrumental music was being played. I love the sound of santoor. Needless to say, I loved the performance. Dance performances were scheduled after the music. Dance performances were divided into three parts. First they had classical dances - Bharatnatyam, Oddissi, Katthak, etc. That was followed by folk dances from different parts of India. And finally contemporary Bollywood dance.

Curiously, I loved the classical dances, especially the Oddissi performace was amazing. So was the jugalbandi between Katthak and Bharatnatyam. The folk dances where not bad either (I missed Bengali folk dance, but got to see Kashmiri, Rajasthani, Marathi, Tamil and Panjabi). It was good to hear Dhagaalaa laagalee kaLa (however the dance on that could have been better). In the Bollywood section, jugalbandi between Bollywood dance and Bharatnatyam was interesting.

After Indian dances, performances from other Asia-Pacific countries were presented. The first was Tearama te Fare O Tamatoa from Tahiti. Tahitian music was amazing - it was like war drums beating at a very fast pace. As far as Tahitian dance is concerned, I reserve my comments on it (search youtube for "Tahiti dance coconut bra" and you'll get a sample of what it was like!) The Chinese troupe presented a beautiful dance by Chinese farm girls reaping harvest. Some of the Japanese dances were also entertaining. We were among the last Indians to leave, although we didn't wait till the end of the show.

Overall it was a very good entertaining day (even for me). I think the best dance of the day was the jugalbandi between Katthak and Bharatnatyam, which brought out the subtle similarities and differences between the two dances very distinctly and beautifully.

An appeal to stay calm

The most ridiculous reaction to (probably the first) bomb blast in Pune was from Pune's Congress MP Suresh Kalamadi, who "appealed to the people of Pune to be calm". India's problem is not that people become agitated by terrorism. Our problem is that ordinary citizens care less about terrorism. "It is neighbour's daughter, who died in the terrorist attack, not mine. Thank God! Now, let me get back to what I was doing" - that's the kind of attitude most Indians show towards terrorism. They are too busy on their jobs and their shopping that they neither have any time nor do they care for anything else.

We don't need people to remain calm. We need people to raise in rage against those people who are condoning and abetting terrorism. We must stop electing (and re-electing) politicians and political parties who overlook or tacitly support terrorism. Newspapers (such as Times of India) who create sympathy for terrorists and terrorism-sponsoring Pakistan should be burned. And we need to slap the so-called celebrities who have more sympathy for Pakistanis than for Indian victims of terrorism.

Impressive Super Bowl Ads

Interesting Google SuperBowl ad.

And here's one from Coca Cola

Second "reading" of Silas Marner

Last week I listened to book on CD Silas Marnar while driving to office. It was a good adaptation of George Elliot's literary masterpiece. I had read the book just after I had quit my first job and before my B-school started. It's a very poignant tale of an old blind weaver who is transformed by his love for an orphaned child, whom he takes in his care and brings her up. Good old Sesha had given it to me to read.

As I heard the story I was constantly reminded of Seshagiri. It's more than a decade, I have met or spoken with him. Recently I heard that he is in Hyderabad. I hope he is doing well, and I wish that I see him sometime. Of course, if we meet we won't play chess. He was always a better play than I (I vaguely remember he bet me in the final game of MBT chess championship, or was it a draw?). Given I am so out of touch (with chess) that our game would be totally one sided.