WhatsApp panic over sharing of account info with Facebook

Flood of messages, asking me to go to WhatsApp settings, accounts and uncheck the box that says I am sharing my WhatsApp account information (which means phone number) with Facebook.

Even without Facebook and WhatsApp, my (and possibly yours too) phone number is already with many random strangers, especially in call centres, if one goes by the unsolicited messages and phone calls we get.

Social networking sites and e-commerce sites already have tapped a lot of our personal information.

So, why panic and uncheck that box?

Is anything disastrous going to happen?

ESPN launches multi-sport India-specific website and mobile app

Sports websites are dime a dozen; and one of the popular ones is ESPNCricinfo. But it is only about cricket. Early today, ESPN launched an India-specific, multi-sport website and mobile application.

The website is branded SONY ESPN but the URL is http://www.espn.in/ and the app, available for now on Android and iOS, is called ESPN.

The ESPN mobile app existed before. What has changed today, with an update, is that it's got India-specific content too, besides the hitherto, predominantly American content.

It's like the ESPNCricinfo website, but it has got a much sleeker look, and has got a whole lot of content, drawn from the huge data repository of ESPN, which has only gotten much larger after its collaboration with Sony. So besides cricket, football, tennis, there are also NFL, NASCAR, shooting, chess, hockey, badminton, wrestling, kabaddi, etc.

Like all good websites and apps, this too can be personalized. Once signed in, we can choose our favourite  sports, leagues and teams. We can go to the favourites tab and follow scores, news, images, videos etc related to them. And like all the other good websites and apps, the selections sync across all the other devices -- mobile, tablet, laptop, desktop.

Besides all this, both the espn.in website and the app, will stream live sports events for which Sony has the broadcast rights. This is in association with Sony LIV. We can look forward to live video of the UEFA Euro 2016 on the espn.in website and also on the app, besides of course Sony ESPN TV channel.

ESPN International has 26 television networks and additional businesses like radio, print, internet, broadband, wireless, consumer products, and event management, in over 61 countries. Globally, it is headquartered in Bristol, and in India it is headquartered in Bengaluru, with offices in Mumbai and Delhi. ESPN is 80 percent owned by ABC, Inc., which is a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company. The rest is held by The Hearst Corporation.

• Presenting ESPN.in, the best of both worlds

More Railway stations get high-speed Wi-Fi connectivity

There are now 15 railways stations in India that have free high speed Wi-Fi connectivity. Interestingly most of them are not the big cities. There is no Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai, Kolkata, so far.

Other than Mumbai Central, where the service was inaugurated in January, none of them are very big metros.

After Mumbai Central, the stations which got the service are: Pune, Bhubaneshwar, Bhopal, Ranchi, Raipur, Vijayawada, Kacheguda, Ernakulum Jn, Vishakhapatnam. From yesterday, people passing through five more stations benefit: Ujjain, Jaipur, Patna, Guwahati and Allahabad.

Google keeps it word

It's interesting to note that Google is, not only focusing on mid-tier cities and towns, but also, more importantly, Google is keeping its word; unlike most pronouncements by the governments and politicians.

The internet major promised in December last year that it will in association with RailTel, the telecommunication wing of the Railways, set up free Wi-Fi in 100 railways stations by the end of the year.

This announcement followed an earlier one in September by Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the company's Mountain View headquarters, that the company plans to enable 400 railways stations with free Wi-Fi.

Google now plans to extend the project to cover key suburban Mumbai stations, like Dadar, Bandra Terminus, Churchgate, Thane, Kalyan, Panvel, Vashi, Kurla, Chattrapati Shivaji Terminus, Borivali and a few others.

DataWind sold more tablets than Samsung in India

DataWind quotes an IDC Report to say that it shipped more tablets in India during the fourth quarter of last year, than its competitors.

As many as 20.7% of the tablets sold in India during that period were by this Canada-based company that makes computer hardware, mainly for emerging markets. It had hit headlines in October 2011, when it manufactured Akash tablets for Government of India priced at just $60, under Rs 3,000 during that time.

According to the report, DataWind was followed by Samsung (15.8%), Micromax (15.5%), Lenovo (13.8%), and iBall (10%).

DataWind quotes another study to say that the company holds 58% market share in the sub-Rs 5,000 tablet segment (approximately $75).

An obviously ebullient Suneet Singh Tuli, president and CEO of DataWind, says the IDC report "demonstrates how our transition to local manufacturing and improvements in our sales channelshas allowed us to meet the phenomenal demand”.

Will you shop online if there are no discounts?

Most of us have shopped online - either on Flipkart or Amazon or Myntra or any other e-commerce site. But why do we shop online? Everyone says it's convenient. But my gut feeling is it's the price factor.

If we plan to buy something, most of us check the online price. The general impression is it's cheap online. Most of us fall for the discount (even if it'sn't very substantial), and click "buy".

Many people buy something online (even if they don't need to buy it) only because they have got a good deal. I know a few friends, who keep looking for them.

After giving lots of discounts, most of these sites, aren't making profits. They are just managing to stay afloat, aided by funds from venture capitalists, who are investing based on extrapolated growth curves.

The moot question is: if the online price is the same as offline, or not considerably less than offline, or if there were no more "daily deals", will people still shop online?

What is your take on this?

Li-Fi: Connect to the Internet using an LED bulb

Imagine an LED bulb doubling up as an access point for connecting to the internet and ordinary light being used as a medium to carry data.

A whole new world wherein a bulb would not only give us light but also help us access the web might not be too far way, if a new technology called Li-Fi (or Light-Fidelity) goes mainstream.

Prof Harald Haas of the University of Edinburgh, who coined the term Li-Fi in 2011, demonstrated the new technology to a packed auditorium at the Wipro’s Electronics City campus on Wednesday. He streamed a video from the internet on a laptop using light from an LED bulb to access the web.

Prof Haas said Li-Fi is a disruptive technology that could transform business models, create new opportunities, and is poised to be a $113 billion industry by 2022.

He said that the RF (radio frequency) spectrum will not be enough considering the rate of growth of wireless data communication. The visible light spectrum is much larger. The use of the light spectrum for Li-Fi overcomes the issues in traditional wireless communication, like the shortage of spectrum and network disruption because of interference.

In Li-Fi, anyone who has access to light can access the internet. The system also allows users to move from one light source to another without losing their network connection. What about connecting to the internet in the night? The stream of photos can be reduced to a minimal level that won’t produce visible light but enough to carry data.

Prof Haas said though Li-Fi was poised to compete with Wi-Fi, it is not meant to replace it. “We are not looking at an either-or situation.”

Though the inability of light rays to pass through walls and similar structures is seen as a major drawback of this technology, Prof Haas has a totally different view. He said it’s an advantage since restriction by walls provides more security to the network and eliminates the risk of the signal leakage to eavesdropping.

The Li-Flame, described as the world's first true Li-Fi system, was displayed at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in March last year. The third generation of products have now been developed and will be on display at the MWC later this month.

WHAT IS LI-FI

Light-Fidelity is a new technology that uses light waves, instead of radio frequency waves, as a medium to carry data. An improvised LED bulb functions as a router

HOW DOES LI-FI WORK

• An ordinary off-the-shelf LED bulb connected to an device, which in turn is connected to the internet.

• Internet data flows in via the device into the bulb, and is carried by light waves.
• At the other end, light waves carrying internet data falls on a receiver or a dongle which is connected to the computer.

BENEFITS OF Li-Fi

• Visible light spectrum is available in plenty, unlicensed and free to use.
• Double benefit of a bulb giving us light as well as internet access
• Low interference leads to very high data speed
• Li-Fi works under water as well
• Not harmful, unlike RF that can interfere with electronic circuitry
• Light won’t pass through walls, making eavesdropping nearly impossible
• LED illumination is already efficient and data transmission needs very little additional power.
• It can achieve about 1,000 times data density of Wi-Fi, since light can be contained in an area

PROGRESS CARD

• July 2011: Prof Harald Haas coins Li-Fi at TEDGlobal
• Jan 2012: PureLifi founded
• Sept 2013: Launch of first product Li-1st
• Dec 2014: Second product Li-Flame developed
• Nov 2015: Prof Haas demonstrates Li-Fi using solar cells at TEDGlobal
• Dec 2015: Latest product LiFi-X developed

(Originally published in The Hindu, February 19, 2016)

Online liberty and tolerance

Section 66A of the IT Act has been struck down. But does it mean that people can make objectionable comments and get away with it?

There are sections in IPC like 153, 153A, 504, 506 etc which have been invoked in the past, and will continue to be invoked in the future too.

What has been struck down is only a section that was introduced specifically mentioning electronic communication.

Since more communication today happens online rather than offline, undoubtedly we need clear idea of what is okay and what is not okay.

NEW AGE DILEMMA

I remember being told when I was a child how I should be careful while talking when elders are around. That's no longer the case now. The new generation particularly is very outspoken. However, not all their comments are objectionable.

Very often, what we see online is only an extension of what we see offline, probably a bit more as the virtual setting works as an incentive to open the minds out.

Free expression of thoughts, ideas, comments, suggestions, criticisms, alternative ways of approaching issues and problems should be seen as healthy rather than objectionable. They might look on the face of it cut-and-dried or irreverent or sometimes even outrageous. But as long as the intentions are good, it should be okay.

What should actually be seen as objectionable and clamped down strictly are incitement to violence, hatred, enmity among sections of people, statements that are coloured and discriminatory from the point of view of caste, religion, gender, language etc. made to show sections of people in poor light etc.

NEED FOR PRUDENCE

We may all have the freedom to speak out our minds. But we should also be mature enough to exercise discretion and ensure that we speak the right thing, at the right time, in the right place, in the right manner.

All of us do that in our daily lives. So many times we would have decided not to say something to someone at a particular time in a particular place, because we thought it was inappropriate. So exercise of such prudence and discretion is nothing new or unusual.

On the internet many of us tend to get carried away because we are physically way from the real world. In one way that is good, because some fresh, original thoughts flow out of our minds. At the other end, when we see such postings and comments, we need to understand that these are unfettered, true feelings of people. We need to acknowledge the genuineness behind the thoughts.

As we see more free expressions of thoughts, parallely we also need to develop greater amounts of tolerance. They are interlinked.

Sometimes I see people who actively support free speech are highly intolerant when other people exercise their right to free speech. That won't do.

Gmail at it again -- with Shelfie

It's tailor-made for Gmail to pull it off on April 1. That is the day when the service was launched as a beta release in 2004. So, when Gmail tells you that on their birthday, they have something new on offer, it's quite natural for anyone to be taken in, unless of course, you remember what Google had been up to the previous year or years.

Almost all Google services relish pulling a fast one on April 1. Cashing in on the current narcissistic craze, they poked fun at selfies. As millions of Gmail users around the world logged in, they were greeted with a pop-up announcement: the box that lets you select or change the background theme. At the end, they added: Create a Shelfie. The idea is simple, don't be so selfish: don't just keep looking at your own photo, share it with others, so that they too can look at you, forever. That's a shareable selfie or a Shelfie.

Gmail said it all in their blog post.

It didn't strike me at first, let me confess. In fact, only after I read the last line of the blog post, it occurred to me that it is April 1 and it's Google.

Freedom of choice -- to igonre

Controversies over tweets and Facebook posts are nothing new. It’s been there for over a decade, ever since the advent of web 2.0 that gave us tools to publish, broadcast and telecast whatever we wanted to tell the world. Earlier, controversies were around blog posts. There have been numerous cases of netizens losing jobs, being served legal notice for defamation, threatened, forced to take down posts etc.

Information -- an objective statement of fact or a biased personal view -- exists either in the private or public domain. When only known number of people are aware of what is said or discussed, then that is in the private domain. For example, letters, phone calls, emails, SMSs etc between two people or amongst a group of people. But, when communication happens amongst countless number of people, it is in the public domain. And that's where all the problems lie.

Earlier, defamation and libel cases were only related to what was published in books, magazines or newspapers or what was broadcast on radio or telecast on television. Most of the communication then was in the private domain. But today, arguably, we spend a lot of time talking to the world at large -- uploading status messages and comments, besides pictures and videos. Perhaps what is forgotten in the process is, there is a huge number of people -- most of them strangers, unlike in the private domain -- reading and listening to what is being said.

There is an old adage: "My freedom ends where your freedom begins". This makes eminent sense when two people communicate with each other, or in such private-domain interactions, where "I" and "you" are known entities. But does this adage hold good in today's changed communication paradigm?

Facebook has come to symbolize the new communication structure -- a lot of supposedly private and personal information and views are broadcast, knowingly or unknowingly, to the whole world in the public domain. The virtually unbridled freedom of expression that everyone has to express their views has forced us to adopt a new way to tackle the torrent of comments.

Facebook is also about a new freedom of choice -- where you choose to ignore. When friend requests from people  you aren't quite bothered about come, ignore. If for some reason, you are compelled to add them, then make list of people you want to follow, and ignore the rest. There is the 'hide' option, where you can choose not to see the types of posts you don't like. You can customize the news feed option: choose to ignore what you don't like.

Where is the compulsion to read and react to everything in the public domain? Ignore. Just as I may not make favourable comments always, why should I make unfavourable comments whenever I see something I don't like? Ignore.

Inundated with so much information in the public domain, the freedom of choice that I seem to exercise nowadays is to ignore. There may be limits to freedom to my expression; but thankfully, no one has curtailed my freedom to ignore. That's an absolute freedom I enjoy.

(Crossposted from Kaleidoscope)

Dive underwater to explore Great Barrier Reef

Google’s Streetview -- which gives a 360 degree panoramic view of landmarks and such prominent places -- isn’t available for India, though it is in many countries enabling us to virtually walk through cities and villages of the world; and also see, for example, Swiss Alps, Amazon River and London’s National Gallery.

Soon, we will have an oceanic variant, called Seaview. Thanks to technology, we will be able to dive underwater and get a breathtaking view of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. Google in collaboration with the Catlin Seaview Project will help us explore the Great Barrier Reef -- the world’s largest coral reef system located in Coral Sea off Queensland in the northeast of Australia.

Coral reefs -- the rainforests of the sea -- are underwater structures consisting mainly of calcium carbonate secreted by corals, a type of marine animals. They have many ecological benefits: serving as habitats to aquatic organisms, besides protecting small islands from being gobbled up sea. It’s estimated that 50% of coral reefs have been destroyed due to pollution and global warming.

Catlin Seaview Project is a scientific expedition aimed at carrying out the first comprehensive study to document and reveal the composition and health of coral reefs on the Great Barrier Reef across a depth of up to 100 metres. Ten Australian scientists from the University of Queensland and James Cook University are at work on the project. The pilot studies start next month, and the main expedition will be from September to December 2012 with some follow-up expeditions late in 2013.

During a recent Google Hangout -- a live audio-video link from underwater on the Great Barrier Reef -- Richard Vevers, founder of the Underwater Earth and Seaview Project, explained the objectives and challenges of the scientific expedition. Due to limitation of time, some of the questions from this correspondent were answered via email:

Excerpts:

How different is Seaview be from Streetview?The survey team will travel at approximately 3-4 km per hour on underwater scooters taking images continuously every few seconds which will then be stitched together. The length of the dives are limited to 1 to 1.5 hours due to battery life. There is only one visual team working on the Great Barrier Reef; however the plan is to roll the project out globally using multiple teams surveying locations all around the world. The roll-out model is similar to that of Streetview mapping.

What details will the mapping cover?
The expedition has 3 elements -- a shallow reef survey, a deep reef survey and a megafauna survey. The shallow reef survey will focus on creating a broad-scale visual baseline study of the reef using a scooter mounted 360 camera rig. The deep reef survey will be a detailed scientific study looking into the health and biodiversity of this little-known ecosystem. The megafauna survey will look into the movement of megafauna in relation to factors such as ocean surface temperature.  

How much surface will be covered by the survey?
The shallow reef survey will cover the largest area -- 20 locations along the 2,300 km reef with 4 x 4 km surveys carried out at each location on average. We hope to reveal about 300 km of the reef that people will then be able to explore. 

How do you overcome the challenges under water?The biggest obstacles are the natural weather and water conditions -- we ideally need good sunlight at least average visibility. Another limitation is driver fatigue and we are already investigating the possibility of using remote-operated vehicles in the not-too-distant future. 

What are the threats to the reefs and how will this project help save them?We have lost approximately 50% of coral reefs in the last few decades, mainly due to pollution, overfishing (using destructive practices) and global warming. The idea behind the Catlin Seaview Survey is to reveal the environment, life and science of the reef so that people become more aware of the state of our oceans and these potential threats.

Beyond the panoramic view, what will Seaview provide online?We are looking to analyse the 50,000 images from the survey using image recognition software so that the composition of each reef location can be analysed. We are also looking into adding layers of additional content on some of the images when displayed online that will allow viewers to discover exactly what all the different forms of marine life in the images are.  

When can we expect to see the Seaview on Google Maps and Google Earth?You will be able to see Seaview images through Panoramio in Google Maps and Google Earth from September when the first pilot information will become available online. The images will also be available through the expedition website, catlinseaviewsurvey.com so that people can have a full virtual dive experience online. More and more images will be uploaded over time as the surveys are completed and the data is processed.

(This article appeared in The Times of India, Bangalore, today)