city02

i would tend to disagree on the following points: 1. RIM / BB has NOT tried to 'bend anything with money power' and its wrong to imply otherwise [they have not had any more cases against them related to bribery / corruption than the Tatas which is a high enough standard for our country] 2. I've never been employed in any capacity by RIM or its subsidiaries - I'm just pointing out disinformation which tends to hog most of the attention 3. Secure encryption implies not having ANY form of backdoor access with another key else its easily subject to manupilation 4. Anyone insisting on any 'key' in BB's possession does not understand how public key encryption works since the only keys are in the possession of the users and not RIM 5. 'lives of Indians is as precious as life of Americans, Europeans, Chinese and Israelis' is true but irrelevant and hence a strawman since no one has claimed to the contrary 6. to date security agencies have not been able to provide ONE example of a terrorist escaping justice due to BB usage ALONE if they escape its due to the loopholes in the current system / infrastructure / response time etc. If they are convicted, its due to other primary evidence - no terrorist has yet been convicted SOLELY on the basis ot BB interceptions / msgs 7. its easy for the govt to demand 'real time interception' but this facility has not been provided ANYWHERE else in the world [not due to privacy reasons but technical constraints] 8. it shows an utter abdication of responsibility by security agencies purely on presumptive grounds of what MAY happen in the future as opposed to fixing the hundreds of internal problems that prevent them from doing their jobs more effectively TODAY including but not limited to: - budgets, manpower, resources - coordination / info sharing among relevant branches of govt [which even the US is still struggling with today] - leakages of sensitive data - preservation of evidence to prevent contamination - securing our borders - actively pursuing each lead to track down terror cells - basic anti-terror tactics development that is followed abroad - and dozens more that we as laypeople know nothing about but the people working at the agencies face daily here's my analogy: our country is like the titanic slowly sinking in a sea of terrorism while security agencies are busy re-arranging the deck chairs [i.e., BB / RIM] and focusing on minor faults instead of the bigger issues that urgently need to be addressed like life boats and flotation devices

my problem with airtel postpaid is having to login each month to pay the dues i want to switch to auto pay using my card but don't want to personally appear at their store and wait in a line is there any operator that allows online autopay registration? i can switch to them in mumbai instead

agreed with shashank below, rcom can keep saying there will be no price wars but that will hardly make it so once the early adopters have been exhausted the ONLY way the operators will increase subscribers will be by reducing rates however this may take over a year to happen as the network gets rolled out to different cities

i tried to google this and got a huge amount of useless links has anyone tried enabling gmail push email on nokia E series with airtel? any instructions would be helpful my wife thinks my degree in computer science is useless if i can't figure such a basic feature on her new phone! thanks in advance...

perfect device for me - i had to buy a 2nd USB data stick since my wife did not like waiting for me to finish using the net depending on the pricing by gsm operators it could reduce the extra rs. 650/month i'm paying to rcom for 1 gb i think all usb should have wi-fi ability for shared connections from next year onwards

i also have been using matrix for almost 5 years now but only for the US where they provide handsets also for other countries like singapore, HK, Bali, etc we just get a pre-paid when we reach the hotel HK prepaid is the fastest - no docs at all, just pay and use!

Does anyone happen to know the normal charges for vetting a rental agreement of standard size? about half a dozen pages ...

all that conspicuous consumption has generated thousands of jobs also so its not all bad. instead of disconnecting his power, the govt should simply charge @ commercial or 5-star hotel rates and double their monthly bills...

this is much better: i think maybe the industry benchmark in what to avoid in customer experience! but if it makes anyone feel a little better even employees get the brunt of their incompetence. i was told of cases where paper or email bills were not delivered to DAKC addresses and the MDN barred for non-payment! maybe the newsletter should be called 'out of touch'...

yet another lawsuit waiting to happen! a vast majority of subscribers will not understand 'user generated' content they will assume it means they can upload ANY song they like however, either they have to be the creators of that music or the copyright owners any music downloaded off the net does not make the user its owner unless there is a signed document saying otherwise now the music industry lawyers can start making more money!

why only focus on the 'OR turtles'? there are critically endangered species going extinct on a daily basis: The turtles do not even feature in the top 10 list as of 2010 q1: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/04/100409162708.htm Even the good old tiger is more endangered according to the WWF: http://www.wwf.org.uk/news_feed.cfm?3618/Ten-to-watch-in-2010

BOTH are responsible but primarily the ASKER or initiator should be more accountable. I'll admit if I was offered rs. 5 L to settle dues of 25 L, I would take the offer [assuming I even had the 5 L to begin with]. But if it was rs. 5 to settle rs. 25 of fines then i would rather pay the fine. So 5 L for Tata is equivalent to rs 5 for me I suppose. It would have been a harder choice if the stakes were higher: say rs. 5 Cr to settle 25 Cr of penalty ... needless to say I think we have a good idea of how reliance would choose!

as long its costs half as much as blackberry, individual users will try it out but corporate users will stick to their company provided / reimbursed services i think that almost 3/4th of BB users are corporate in india at least

according to the IMF, India is ranked # 142 while sri lanka is # 121 world bank has us @ # 123 & S.L. @ 109 CIA world factbook puts India = 147 ; SL = 127 but in all 3 bangladesh is below us at least: # 158, # 146, # 165 respectively its nothing to be proud of but we are not so badly off either! this year I expect us to cross $100/month = $1,200 annually which is a small step in the right direction if you consider 'middle class' as those whose incomes are high enough to pay income tax [e.g., over rs. 10 - 11k monthly] the GREAT indian middle class is hardly 5% of the population or 5 crore all this talk of a billion consumers is quite misleading if you have no income, you can't really consume or buy much

in a rational world, the big companies would keep adding features to keep pace with their competitors but a recent case in point is the 'shared wi-fi' for broadband that tata has offered to connect multiple laptops to a single usb dongle this makes a lot of sense for 'SOHO' type users [small office / home office] but its unlikely rcom will launch a similar feature anytime soon maybe they think very few customers will opt for it but waiting for your competitors to succeed before copying them is a sure fire way to lose market share

I feel that since ADA is already trying to sell off the tower business [this year] and even the rest of RCOM [last year] He maybe open to MDA buying it back [next year] It will allow ADA to focus on financial services & entertainment verticals with which he seems more comfortable But he may choose to retain DTH [bigtv] for his upcoming TV channels which would feed the content via his platform However I don't think an outright merger is practical since there is a large disconnect between senior management Its tough for the generals to work together after 5 years of cold war despite the brothers kissing and making up in public Never underestimate the egos of the Presidents in the organisations! It would not be the 1st time that despite approval from their chairman certain initiatives failed to be implemented properly...

since my trackwheel started malfunctioning for the 2nd time [the 1st time it was under warranty and i got a free handset replacement] i have been given the following 2 options by blackberry: rs. 3 k for a 8703e OR rs 6,900 for a curve i don't know which model of curve so lets assume the cheapest / oldest one i have googled some online prices which are around rs. 13 k which implies a trade in value of rs. 6 k for my 1 year old handset that's about 55% of what was paid for it has anyone else heard about this 'deal'? i'm leaning towards the curve since there will be no more trackwheel and a camera but is the additional rs. 3.9 k worth it? what about my sms stored on the handset?

good point i will reconfirm but i strongly suspect its used / refurbished with blackberry its safest to assume the worst deal... so should i go for a used curve at this price?

why is electricity bill not acceptable? i'm having the same problem with getting my license since i don't have a ration card either. how does one get a ration card and does it have any photo on it?

I was looking to buy a 10x optical digicam as an upgrade for my wife for diwali. However I noticed that video digicams go upto 50-60x optical - is it OK to take still photos with videocams?

it would be nice if dvd players could record onto SD cards - it would be cheaper than going for DTH recorders which are restricted in terms of monthly fees and big intrusive logos even a usb 'out' would help since an external HDD could be plugged in for those who want to record TV shows

That's not correct. In the US all calls within the same area code [3 digit prefix] are considered local and the rest are long distance which is identical to our STD. There are some notable exceptions like NYC, Atlanta, etc that have multiple area codes in the same local area since they ran out of numbers in the 1st code and had to expand. Probably the top dozen most populous metros have multiple area codes in the local calling area since their mobile and landlines have the same numbering format so you can't tell just by looking at a number if its from a mobile or not unlike here. For these metros you will have to dial the entire 10 digit number for all local calls but to call another city or state you have to prefix '1' for long distance while international requires a '00' prefix for decades now. The rest of the cities with a single area code only require the last 7 digits to call any local number. The entire country is only consider 'local' for specific tariff plans and is a promotional tool not a standard.

this is probably the only case apart from healthcare costs that places like the US or China are worse off than India. Not only do they pay for roaming but also about $0.10 - 0.20 / min for incoming which is upto Rs. 10/min for simple incoming calls [airtime usage]. Some plans offer unlimited incoming on nights or weekends but you have to spend about $25-50/month as a minimum to get the benefit. We are truly world class in telecom rates as opposed to other areas that we THINK we are up to the mark... However, in a free market the regulator should not be imposing tariffs on any operators but transparency and customer empowerment should be the focus instead. Else it becomes like the bad old days of license raj and more corruption as vested interests try to direct govt policies. Ideally free roaming incoming should be introduced as a good first step.

shameful but totally expected just goes to remind us that no matter how much we want to join world bodies like the UN SC, we do not deserve it not only are we a 3rd world country with 3/4th of the population in poverty but also 3rd class in terms of infrastructure we have world class corruption, pollution and population and little else there should be a ban on bidding for international sporting events until the entire sports ministry is scrapped and all the politicians & adminstrators replaced with proper audits of the spending

unless you have a severe budget issue, avoid semi-auto and go for fully auto this difference does not even exist abroad as ALL washing machines are fully auto you will NEVER see any ad for 'fully automatic' or even 'automatic' wash. mach. - its just assumed it would be like debating the pros & cons of b/w TV vs colour TVs! the real issue for you is cheaper top loader or more expensive front loader this depends on your usage - the more often your clothes are washed, the better off you will be with a front loader i've had a videocon top loader for 5 years with minimal problems now we have an IFB front loader for 3 years with no issues even if you go for a top loader, try to get the hot water option else your whites will start looking duller / grimy after 1-2 years of washing that was the main reason we switched from our top loader - now we have bright whites even after 3 years due to heated water also its useful to have a display showing time remaining since it can take upto an hour for regular wash and 90 min for heavy loads auto resume is very important if you have load shedding so it can continue instead of being reset if the lights go out i feel that front loaders are a bit louder than top during the 'spin cycle' and ours sounds like a small jet engine so location / placement is important also if you have a small flat