Investing during inflation!

Winners and Losers During Periods of Rising Inflation

High Avg. % Change and Freq. of Market Outperformance			Low Avg. % Change and Freq. of Market Outperformance
Aluminum			Airlines
Containers (Metal & Glass)			Auto Parts & Equipment
Foods			Automobiles
Gold & Precious Metals Mining			Computers (Hardware)
Metals Mining			Consumer Finance
Natural Gas			Electric Companies
Oil & Gas (Drilling & Equipment)			Household Furnishings & Appliances
Oil (Domestic Integrated)			Retail (Department Stores)
Oil (International Integrated)			Truckers
Tobacco			Trucks & Parts

Source: Standard & Poor's

Read whole story here

The $915 Billion Bomb in Consumers' Wallets

"This past summer's subprime meltdown involved about $900 billion in now-suspect securitized debt, reckless lending, and consumers who buckled under the weight of loans they couldn't afford. Now another link in the consumer debt chain - credit cards - is starting to show signs of strain. And the fear that the $915 billion in U.S. credit card debt (an uncannily similar figure) may blow up has major financial institutions like Citigroup, American Express, and Bank of America strapping on their Kevlar vests."

Read the whole story

Spiritual solution to Vidarbha farmer suicides

This is a very interesting story about how spirituality has impacted Vidarbha farmer suicides. Hopefully, it can get replicated in Andhra too.

"Over the past few years, the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra has been making headlines for the wrong reasons -- first due to the growing number of farmer suicides and then owing to an outbreak of life-threatening chikungunya."

"This is just the beginning. I am glad our efforts are bearing fruit. Suicide rates have dipped in 507 villages across the six districts. However, there are thousands of villages where this good work has to be taken. You should take it ahead. Pass on the word."

Read the full article here

Broadcom Chip Clears Way for 3G iPhone

"He (Steve Jobs) may not have to wait that long. In what could be a preview of the next-generation iPhone, chipmaker Broadcom (BRCM) announced yesterday that it had begun shipping an integrated device it’s calling a “3G Phone On a Chip.” The chipset’s features read like an iPhone hold-out’s wishlist."

Read the whole story here

Learn about the Technical details of the chip

Also read: Why Apple doesn't need 3G

Right To Information (RTI) Act -- a contemporary Indian revolution

"Vijaya Dashmi, October 12, 2005 will go down in Indian history as the day which gave citizens the empowerment to realise Swaraj. This was brought about by the implementation of Act 22 of the the Right To Information Act.

This was a not a new right conferred on citizens, but was an essential part of our Fundamental Rights about which we were ignorant. The Right to Information Act is only a codification of a fundamental right of citizens, to implement and enforce it."

Read this inspiring article about a revolutionary act

Where are you missing information? Are you going to ask for it now?

Here's how to file RTI for US residents

President's rule imposed in Karnataka

After all the hungama of the last few days about power transfer in Karnataka, its time for President's rule in Karnataka! Though, it seems like Governor Rameshwar Thakur has taken a decision which is best given the bitter rivalry among the 3 parties -- Congress, BJP and JD-S, what's really unfortunate is the lack of stable political machinery in one of India's fastest growing states. The ability of creating messes by His Highness H.D.Deve Gowda is at show again.

This is also going to be an interesting situation for the management of Karnataka state by the President Prathibha Patil who has been a die-hard loyalist of Indira Gandhi and her proteges. Is is going to be all impartial?

Coalition governments are an accepted norm these days. However, with so much of fragmentation, is it time for some alternative?

Lastly, what is the impact on the booming economing of Karnataka?

Here is some interesting reading

Centre approves President rule in Karnataka
Everything about the Karnataka crisis
Who is Pratibha Patil?
Who is Rameshwar Thakur?

God goes online

"YouTube has produced its share of celebrities: Lonelygirl15, the lip-syncing Chinese teenagers known as the Back Dormitory Boys, and Tyson, the skateboarding bulldog, to name a few.

But no single video by any of these user-generated superstars has ever attracted as many viewings as a clip of a little girl wearing a "Princess" T-shirt, reciting the Bible's Psalm 23. That video has been viewed more than 3.7 million times--not on Google's YouTube but on Godtube.com, the site's upstart competitor."

Read the whole story

Watch the story faster in this slideshow

Hair accuses ICC of being racist

Darrell Hair, the controversial Aussie umpire seems to have opened a can of worms about the twisted ways of the International Cricket Council (ICC). In his hearing at London, apart from accusing the ICC of racism, he's gone on to say about how poor the ICC administration is in handling its issues and standing up against member countries!

Though, Hair was always famous for his arrogance, this hearing casts a new light on ICC's style of administration. Will this cause a shift in the way things work in the future?

Read the whole story from today's hearing

Also, here is the timeline of Hair's hearing

Help Suresh!

Suresh an F1 visa Student at Eastern Illinois University is in Masters Program for Computer Science. He was supposed to graduate in December, 2007. On August 14th, Suresh was driving to his school after coming from India the previous day. He was supposed to stop in Nashville for the night and again drive to Illinois the next day. But before reaching Nashville fate played with his future. He met with a serious accident and is currently in ERLANGER HOSPITAL, Chattanooga TN, fighting for his life.

For further details and to contribute, please visit this website

MIT researchers demonstrate 'WiTricity'

Imagine a world where you can transmit power from one place to another without any cables. A great example would be something like you could charge your cell phone or your laptop while continuing to use them sitting in your garden without having to connect them to power source using wires which would otherwise corner you to a place inside your home close to a power source.

Read this article about the revolutionary technology

Right to Emergency Care - Supreme Court Ruling.

Date Of Judgment: 23/02/2007.

Case No.: Appeal (civil) 919 of 2007.

The Supreme Court has ruled that all injured persons especially in
the case of road traffic accidents, assaults, etc., when brought to
a hospital / medical centre, have to be offered first aid,
stabilized and shifted to a higher centre / government centre if
required.

It is only after this that the hospital can demand payment or
complete police formalities.

In case you are a bystander and wish to help someone in an
accident, please go ahead and do so.

Your responsibility ends as soon as you leave the person at the
hospital. The hospital bears the responsibility of informing the
police, first aid, etc.

Please do inform your family and friends about these basic rights so
that we all know what to expect and what to do in the hour of need.

Please forward this message to everyone and save a life.

Solar power makes tiny village beam

"In Gudda, a village with very little, residents are literally beaming. Just two years ago, villagers had never seen light after dark, unless it came from the moon. Then, solar light arrived and changed everything."

Read the whole story here

NJ teen unlocks iPhone

"A 17-year-old hacker has broken the lock that ties Apple's iPhone to AT&T's wireless network, freeing the most hyped cell phone ever for use on the networks of other carriers, including overseas ones."

Read the whole story here

For detailed unlock instructions, read his blog here

Fed Chairman Well-Armed to Combat Liquidity Crisis

" During the recent stock market turmoil, investors around the world have been looking to one man above all others. Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, America's central banker, has more power than any other single person to affect how this financial turmoil plays out. It's fair to say that Bernanke has been preparing for this moment for at least 24 years."

Read the whole story here

Google’s Danger-ous phone strategy

" All the talk about Google (GOOG) courting the cell phone market seems to have folks a bit confused about what the search giant really wants to accomplish. Is Google trying to become a handset maker? Does it want to be a wireless carrier?"

Read the whole story here

NRI doc donates $20 mn to Kerala village

"He was born into the “untouchable” caste in India, so poor that he didn’t wear his first pair of shoes until he went to medical school.

Then he came to America, where he made millions as a Buffalo neurosurgeon and lived a lavish life, once owning a Rolls-Royce, five Mercedes-Benzes and an airplane.

But he felt empty, almost soulless. So he donated his personal fortune — some $20 million — to establish a neurosurgery hospital, a health clinic and a spa resort in his native Indian village, Chemmanakary."

Read the whole story

Also, check out this link

Apple's evolution over these years

Check out this really cool poster of Apple over the years

"Gandhi-giri" goes global and high tech!

"After two weeks of protests by high-skilled immigrants over a broken promise to expedite the processing of green cards, the White House has approached immigration advocacy groups to work out a compromise. While the talks are ongoing and could still break down, the government is likely to reverse a July 2 decision to refuse more permanent residency applications, and will likely begin accepting them in the next few days. "I think they are determined to fix the situation," says Charles Kuck, president-elect of the American Immigration Lawyers Assn."

Read the whole story

iPhone Mystery at Duke University: The Case of the Flooded Routers

"A handful of Apple's (AAPL) iPhones have managed to knock out large sections of the campus Wi-Fi network at Duke University, and network officials there still don't know why."

Read the whole story and get puzzled!

What's beyond web2.0?

"Think of how we access all the information of the Internet. We do it at a desk where wires keep us attached to a specific location. Laptops help us branch out a bit, but even then we are tied to a wireless connection. Go too far and you no longer have access to information."

Read the whole story

Nigerian scams: Be on the alert

"I was looking at my e-mail inbox with sleepy eyes one morning when I was jolted into attention by a message from my younger brother with the subject noted as 'Emergency'.

With trembling hands I clicked on the message to read that he had gone to Nigeria for a conference and had lost his passport, tickets and money. He was in deep distress and would like me to send him some money urgently through a Nigerian friend. He had signed with his old designation in Bangkok rather than his new one at his present post."

Read the whole story here

Please help Bay Area Family

A Bay area Indian family needs your urgent help after a devastating turn of events in their lives - the 32-year old father had a ruptured brain aneurysm and went into coma. He is having a wife and a five month old baby girl at his residence in Sunnyvale, CA.

Any help in any small amount - financial, logistics, information forwarding, Prayers - will help as we respond as a humanity. Details are at available at these links :

Details and medical aspects :
http://poddars.wiki.zoho.com/StoryMedical.html
Ways to Help (you can add ideas here) :
http://poddars.wiki.zoho.com/Santanu.html
How to help with Financial contributions :
http://poddars.wiki.zoho.com/Fund.html
Pass the info so others can join your help:
http://poddars.wiki.zoho.com/HelpSantanuFlier.html

---------------------------------------------------

Santanu Poddar, age 32 living in Sunnyvale is a graduate from Jalpaiguri Engg College and postgraduate from IIT Kharagpur in Mechanical Engineering. He is an employee at Hewlett Packard, Sunnyvale, California.

He had a cerebral attack around 15 days back and is now on life support and had numerous brain strokes. His brain has suffered irreversible damages and he is in coma. The doctors at Stanford Medical have given up all hopes after 10 days of monitoring. He has recently been shifted at Critical Care Unit at ElCamino Hospital in Mountain View.

He is having a wife and a five month old baby girl at his residence in Sunnyvale. His wife, Debarpita Poddar, doesn't work and is faced with lot of financial issues to take care apart from this tragedy.

It would be great help if we all could help her with some financial assistance.

Please contribute generously for Santanu and his family, in ways suggested at
http://poddars.wiki.zoho.com/Fund.html

Apple's next phone

Read about apple's next iPod nano like phone

Seva Cafe ... a unique restaurant based on service

Take a look at this very nice video of the seva cafe based in Ahmedabad which is based on the gift of giving.

If you are in the Berkeley area, visit their sister location -- "The Karma Kitchen"

Super-moms of suicide country

" In Vidarbha, where an average one cotton farmer ends his life every six hours, Mangalabai and Kamalabai are mothers who singularly stand out. After the death of their husbands, they learnt every thing and are raising their family with unnoticed resilience"

Read the whole story here

Bringing disabled kids back to school

"Shakeera Begum from Mangammana Palya in Bangalore is a housewife. Her husband works as a daily wage labourer but spends all his money on alcohol. Shakira struggles to make the ends meet. The problem is further complicated by the fact that her three children Imran, Ayesha and Shiekh Salman are hearing impaired. She had a tough time getting them admitted into school."

" All this changed when government-funded and NGO-run Integrated Resource Teacher (IRT), Manjulamma came into the picture. Manjulamma was specially trained to handle children with special needs. She spent time with the students with disabilities and helped them learn concepts that they were unable to cope in the regular classes."

Read the whole story here

Super cool video

Gosh! What an amazing series of concepts ... check out this awesome video called "Shift Happens"

(source: http://www.karmatube.org/videos.php?id=73)

Review: Shrek 3

"Eddie Murphy and Antonio Banderas are back in their cartoon avatar, albeit voices in Shrek The Third, offering plenty of fun to both kids and adults. Anyone who has gone through the process of becoming a father will identify with the lovable ogre as fatherhood claims another victim in this third installment of the popular animated adventure."

Read the whole review

Alert! Wireless Identity Thieves on the prowl

"According to an article in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required), the seeds of the nation's largest identity theft operation involving customers of TJX Companies (owners of TJ Maxx, Marshalls, and other discount stores) began in the parking lot outside a Marshalls discount clothing store in St. Paul, Minnesota. Criminal hackers, using a directional antenna, sat in their car and eavesdropped on wireless communications within the store. Over an unspecified period of time, the thieves were able to capture everything from the use of wireless handheld price-checking devices to wireless cash register transactions. But it was the wireless network for the store's main computers that ultimately allowed the criminal hackers into TJX. Once inside that network they were able to download millions of credit card numbers, some which have shown up on carder networks in eight different countries."

Read the whole story

Dream roadtrip?

"The 434 km National Highway 1D, which connects Srinagar with Leh and is the only road that connects Ladakh with the Kashmir valley, was reopened on May 1.

Ladakh, comprising Leh and Kargil districts, remains cut off from rest of the country for nearly six months as the Srinagar-Leh highway is closed from November to May every year due to heavy snowfall at Zojila Pass and adjacent areas.

The only other road to Ladakh, the Leh-Manali highway, too remains buried under snow through most of the year.

The Zojila Pass, which is at an altitude of 3,505 metres above sea level, is the gateway from lush Kashmir to the cold desert region of Ladakh, which, geographically, is part of the Tibetan plateau.

Besides the Zojila, two other mountain passes on the Srinagar-Leh highway are the Namikala (3,719 m) and the Fotula (4,094 m)."

Read the whole story and watch the picture

India is now a $1 Trillion Economy -- yoohoo!

"

India is now a trillion-dollar economy.

According to a Credit Suisse report, Indian GDP at the current price level of the rupee (Rs 40.76 per $) stands at $1trillion. The strengthening rupee has now made India the 12^th country to achieve this milestone.

With the Rupee appreciating to below 41 against the US dollar on Wednesday, it was the first day for the economy to be a trillion-dollar economy.

The report said that India's stock market capitalisation too stands at $944 billion, just shy of the $1-trillion mark. However, if one stretches the definition of what constitutes an Indian stock, plus does a rounding, the Indian stock market is also about a trillion dollars as of Wednesday."

Read the whole story

The old woman who gave her town a swimming pool

An inspiring video of how Maisie raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in her own simple and inspiring way.

Super cool bluetooth headset

Jawbone is one of the best bluetooth headsets around currently ... its noice cancellation feature is the best ...

read more here

Also watch this amazing demo

Are you getting ripped at the gas pump?

An interesting video about how gas pump owners are making billions of dollars from ordinary consumers!

New science of sharing

From charityfocus

New Science of Sharing

Charles Terry sends in a great Business Week article on the New Science of Sharing:

"As large-scale scientific collaborations become the norm, scientists will rely increasingly on distributed methods of collecting data, verifying discoveries, and testing hypotheses not only to speed things up but to improve the veracity of scientific knowledge itself."

"Leading scientific observers already expect more change in the next 50 years of science than in the last 400 years of inquiry combined. As the pace of science quickens, there will be less value in stashing new scientific ideas, methods, and results in subscription-only journals and databases, and more value in wide-open collaborative-knowledge platforms that are refreshed with each new discovery."

"As mass collaboration takes root in the scientific community, companies have an opportunity to rethink how they do science, and even how they compete. One area in which new open scientific collaborations can pay dividends is in the early detection of disruptive innovations that could threaten a company's product roadmap—or, even better, generate entirely new products and services."

Kirchoff's law in action

An awesome forward that I got ...

Kirchoff's Current Law
At every node, the sum of all currents entering a node must equal zero.

Kirchoff's Voltage Law (KVL)
The voltage law says that the sum of voltages around every closed loop in the circuit must equal zero.

Exercise :
Please apply Kirchoff's Current and Voltage laws to the following figures. And submit the assignments by today evening. J
Figure 1:

Figure 2:

Apple Keeps Humming

"Apple's (AAPL - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr - Rating) deal to put the EMI music catalog on its iTunes store without antipiracy software is a master stroke that should cement Apple's dominance -- and could lead the change in how most consumers get their music.

The Digital Rights Management-free tracks from EMI will be priced higher -- at $1.29 a song -- than their protected counterparts, but will come at a higher quality. "

Read the whole story

Jayasuriya salutes one of his best hundreds

"The left-hander, who said he wanted to finish the World Cup "on a very good note" before deciding on his future, still appears to have the same drive and passion for his game now as he always has."

Probably this is one of the key distinctions between the 37-yr old Jayasuriya and 33-yr old Sachin Tendulkar

Read the whole story

Got gadgets 'coz we got storage!

" I recently switched cell phone carriers and bought a new Palm (PALM) Treo 700p to replace my old Treo 600. One of the nice things about the 700p is the improved camera and video recording features, so I decided to run over to Best Buy (BBY) and grab a memory card. I knew prices had dropped, but even I wasn't prepared for how much:

A 2-gigabyte SanDisk (SNDK) SD card was $30."

Read the whole story here

Apple TV is here!

"You have to read -- or listen -- between the lines of the WJS review, but the thing doesn't quite seem ready for prime time. The main limitations are neatly summed up today by Charles Jade at Ars Technica, riffing on an analyst's report that suggested that Apple TV would be the death of TiVo, NetFlix, DVD players and all the rest. Jade points out that ... "

Read the whole story and watch a 'positive' review video ... the reviewers are really funny! ;-)

LOL! Abhishek v/s SRK in NY

Can't believe their "rivalry" is being taken to such heights ... look here

Interesting Yahoo mail beta bug

"Namesake" is brilliant

"When a book is made into a film, especially one that is penned by a Pulitzer-Prize winning author, there's more scope for potential disaster. Will the characters, locations, plots and sub-plots pan out as effectively on celluloid as they do in the reader's imagination? Mira Nair's The Namesake, adapted from Jhumpa Lahiri's book by the same name (she won the Pullitzer Prize in 2000 for Interpreter of Maladies), does not disappoint. In fact, it surpasses one's expectations."

Read more at Namesake is brilliant

Apple TV Due This Week

"Apple's (AAPL) long awaited TV set-top box, originally scheduled to ship in February and delayed in a rare Apple PR snafoo to the ides of March, will be showing up in those FedEx trucks any day now. I know a lot of people who can't wait. But a piece in CNET.com this morning has done a pretty good job of assessing what kind of market impact Apple TV will and won't have. "Don't expect Apple TV to be an overnight success," warns CNET staff writer Tom Krazit. "It's unlikely that Apple TV will disrupt the entrenched players in the living room."

Read more at Apple TV due this week

Teenager investing advise ... useful for adults too?

"

In our 2002 book The Motley Fool Investment Guide for Teens: 8 Steps to Having More Money Than Your Parents Ever Dreamed Of, we announced a contest to award a five-year, $1,000 annual grant for the "most eloquent and effective advice on personal finance, investing, or business offered by a teen." Now that the fifth year has ended, it's time to announce the contest results for 2006. Congratulations to our winner, Kenny Lee!

The winning entry
We were impressed by many of the entries, but the judges deemed Kenny's the best. Kenny hails from Monrovia, Calif. Below you can read much of his winning entry, which condenses many important financial lessons into a small package. I've added a few notes in brackets. Share it with any teens you know. Many of us ex-teens could learn a few things from Kenny, too."

Read more at :News Flash: Fool Pays Teen $1,000!

Mac Laptops: Grabbing Market Share

From http://blogs.business2.com/apple/2007/03/mac_laptops_gra.html

March 09, 2007

Mac Laptops: Grabbing Market Share

Lots of interesting detail buried in W.R. Hambrecht analyst Matther Kather's report initiating coverage of Apple (AAPL) with a widely reported "buy" and a target price of $110. But what caught my eye was how well Apple laptops are doing, not just relative to Mac desktop sales (which are sort of anemic), but relative to the rest of the laptop market as well.

Drawing on Apple's filings, Kather reports that its notebook sales in the U.S. grew 49.3% over the past year and that the company now has a 7.1% share of the notebook market in the U.S., up 2% from last year. (Worldwide notebook market share is a less impressive 3.9% and growth there is essentially flat.)

This is important as laptops increasingly replace desktops as the machine of choice, especially among higher-income mobile workers. iPods are still Apple's biggest source of revenue, representing nearly half of its 1st quarter revenue. But laptops are No. 2, with more than 20% of revenue in that quarter.

Hambrecht anticipates Apple notebooks sales growing another 29% in 2007. (link to pdf of full report here)

Is google building its own wireless device?

From http://blogs.business2.com/apple/2007/03/is_google_makin.html

Is Google Making Its Own Mobile Device?

That's the speculation at Macworld UK this morning based on a Google (GOOG) job posting for an analog engineer/designer whose qualifications include programming, circuit modeling, power supply design and "ham radio license a plus."

"To improve accessibility," the posting says, "Google is experimenting with a few wireless communications systems including some completely novel concepts. We are building a small team of top-notch Logic Designers and Analog Designers aimed at nothing less than making the entire world's information accessible from anywhere for free. Are you in?" (link)

Macworld quotes Phil Taylor, senior analyst with Strategy Analytics. "In the wake of Apple and some other big-name brands moving into the handset business, why not Google?" said Taylor. (full text here)

The trick for Google and its new analog engineer would be to make something that stands out in a crowded market where the bar has just been raised dauntingly high by Apple's (AAPL) iPhone.

Palm (PALM), meanwhile, has hired Paul Mercer, a top Silicon Valley designer, to work on its own answer to the iPhone, according to John Markoff in today's NY Times (link, sub required). Mercer was the lead designer of Version 7 of the Macintosh finder and helped Samsung design the Z5, one of South Korea's best selling MP3 players.