Kishor Krishnamoorthi’s WebsiteKishor a.k.a Mjuboy’s Blog

Second year in University is a lot busier than I expected it to be. More reading for lectures and more preparation for classes, not to mention the fact that I’m involved in the committee of 3 different societies, and also have 2 jobs. All of this has resulted in relatively little free time but its also nice to have something to do. Occasionally, I do take a break, even when I have things to do but without the small breaks, it would be too much to handle.

I also received the final version of my $2,000 logo recently. For those who have been out of the loop, I won a custom made logo worth $2,000 from David Airey with this blog post. I shall be posting this logo soon and also eventually use it to watermark my photographs. I am very pleased with the logo and it was a pleasure to work with David Airey. I would personally recommend him for any design work you may wish to get done.

Things have been going quite well though. I went Gliding last week, it was good to have that sense of flight after such a long time. I was a bit rusty with the controls, as expected, but some practice should get me back into form. The Photographic Society has been good as well. We had classes on the technical basics of photography last week, which I taught and will have the next ones today evening.

I’ve also been hanging around with the Model UN crowd quite a bit. We had a baking session yesterday evening for a bake sale which will take place today. The session was good enough, with meeting new people and catching up with old friends, as usual.

I’ve also been taking much fewer photographs this term, mainly due to lack of time. If I did start another 365 Day Project, it would be filled with lots of average quality pictures but a 52 Weeks Project does seem possible. Speaking of the 365 Day Project, I noticed yesterday that the final photograph of the project has exceeded 1,000 views of Flickr, I was quite happy to know this and it does encourage me to take more photos.

Paradise Biryani is something that I’m missing a bit too much this term. And its not only the Biryani but Indian food in general. However, I did find a really good Indian restaurant close to our house but its just not the same as food in India. But it is possibly the best Indian restaurant I’ve been to in England, and with reasonable prices too. If you are ever around Colchester or Wivenhoe, make sure you go there. Its called ‘Bengal Spice‘ and is on the Wivenhoe High Street.

And if you’ve been following my Flickr uploads, you would’ve noticed a photo of a dismantled iBook. An old iBook of a friend which slowly stopped working was given to me and I thought it would look nice on my wall. If you havent seen it yet, take a look below.

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For my 18th Birthday, I shall be giving away 6 free photography wallpapers which were taken by me in the wonderful city of London. I hope you like them!

London Underground

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Lloyds Building

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London Eye

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St.Pauls Cathedral

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The Streets of London

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Millennium Bridge

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You can see more of my photography work at my Flickr Photostream.

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Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve had meetings for the various clubs and societies at University and I was duly elected President of the Gliding Club, President of the Photography Society and Vice President of the Politics Society for the next academic year. I’m quite thrilled by these posts which I have undertaken and I shall do my best to ensure that I help all the societies equally.

I successfully spent the International Shutdown Day without using the computer all the day. I had to take photos of sports for most of the day so it was bit easier to refrain from using the computer since I had something to keep myself occupied with. I did feel the urge to use it in the night after I’d finished all my work but I managed to keep myself under control. And I hadn’t really missed many happenings on the internet as I saw on the next day.

Thanks to a friend, I finally got the chance to play the most coveted game of the year, Grand Theft Auto IV. I played the game on a Xbox 360 but I didn’t really care which I console I played it on as long as I got to play it. My first impressions of the game was the highly improved graphics from the previous games and the physics. Enough cant be said about the new physics engine which is very realistic and gives a whole new feel to the game. We also played the Multiplayer for sometime which was great, we had a bit of a lag but otherwise had a new and exciting experience. I tried to do a mission and I almost completed it when I got killed at the very end. I just cant get used to the dual joystick use in consoles since I prefer PC gaming. Regardless, if you’re going to get only one game this year, make sure it is GTA IV. You can watch a very good 10 minute video review of the game here.

I’ve made some changes to my wishlist, I’ve now amended it to include items that I actually want as opposed to things that would simply be nice to own. Take a look at the updated Wishlist here.

After many months of thinking, I bought myself a Flickr PRO Account yesterday. It offers unlimited upload of photos along with several other incredible features at a very reasonable price of approximately $2 a month. I shall be embedding the Flickr Gallery into the site soon. You can take a look at my Flickr Stream here.

We’ve got exams from next Monday and honestly, I have hardly studied anything. I really hope I get things done soon.

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I went Gliding yesterday after more than a month. I’d forgotten how much fun it is to glide and had some very enjoyable flights yesterday. The weather has improved which made the whole experience more pleasurable and we had a great day out at the airfield.

GTA IV comes out in less than 2 days. I wasnt really anticipating the release of the game that much since I’m not as interested in games as I was 2 years ago when San Andreas came out. However, I did want to try out the game just once to see how it is and if there is enough improvement as has been publicised. And yesterday, I read IGN’s review of the game and they gave it a perfect score of 10 and called it ‘One of the best games ever’. I also watched the gameplay videos which are totally awesome. And some of my friends over at GTAGaming got invited for all expenses paid trip to New York by Rockstar Games to have a sneak preview of GTA IV, you can read about their exciting experience here. These events have reinstated my interest in the game and I look forward to release. You can see a countdown to the release of the game here.

I got a PC Sync Extension cable for my cameras flash so that I can fire both of my flash simultaneously indoors, I have taken some exciting photos with some new techniques and you can view some of these on my Flickr Stream and my 365 Day Project. I can also use my flash outdoors now, using the cable and I’ve been experimenting to get unique shots which can be seen in the links above.

I had an Economics Test a couple of days which went fairly well. My exams start on May 12th and ending on May 30th. I also got the result of my Politics Essay and I was quite happy with it as was my teacher.

In order to make my domain more ‘UK-friendly’, I have now redirected my previous derelict website and domain name – Cozmonite.com, to this site so that now anyone who visits that domain can click a link to visit this site which is my primary website.

And I have some big plans about the photo gallery which I shall try and implement soon so that it will be easier to view photos here.

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Its been exactly two years since I posted my first ‘Hello World‘ on this blog. Two years. Its been so long but it feels like it was just yesterday. I can honestly that my blog has progressed a lot in the past couple of years and has indirectly affected my life to quite an extent.

My first anniversary was less exciting when compared to this one, maybe because my life was more or less the same that time.

And in the past year, my internet addiction has decreased by a lot, which is a good thing. Earlier, I used to have the urge to sit in front of the PC and do nothing useful. I used to waste a lot of precious time, simply refreshing and going to random websites. But in the course of the past year, I’ve learnt that that the internet is nothing spectacular. I’d rather sit and ponder in real life, instead of spending time of the internet. I’ve also learnt that internet is just an useful means of fulfilling your needs, but not an end in itself.

If someone had tried explain the above, to me before, I would’ve looked at them with disgust saying that they don’t understand the importance of the internet. But infact, I would’ve been the ignorant one, not understanding the importance of life. Even today, I have several friends who are in the situation I was a year ago. I sincerely hope that the truth dawns upon them too. You cannot explain someone about it, but the person has to go through the experience personally to realize it.

You should note that I’m not abusing the internet in any way. Its been highly useful for me in several aspects of life, made me meet new people and taught me many important things and it will continue to do so, until it dies.  It is an important resource of information, yes. I’m not opposing that, but simply that one should minimize the time spent on the internet unless it is essential. I’m sure a lot of people who read this post are going to deem it as utter bullshit, but in the course of time, they will (hopefully) come face to face with reality.

Life has certainly changed over the past 2 years, and this blog has been a witness to all that gradual change. It will continue to be a virtual record of my life and the experiences that I will have. I would like to thank my family and all my friends for having influenced my life in someway or the other and made this blog more interesting to read. Thanks.

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Today, I’ll be writing my first website review for the SwitchPlanet.com which is a very useful site where people can trade their old DVDs, CDs and books with each other for free.

Registration is quite a simple process and you need not give all your details for becoming a member. And also for the sake of convenience, registration is not mandatory for viewing the listings. You can view the listings at your own leisure and register only when you spot something that you like. After logging in, you will be taken your own page where you can view your Account history, friends, switchbucs (I’ll come to this later) and many such details.

Currently, there are 4 categories of items, namely DVDs, CDs, Video Games, Books but they promise to include more soon. You can create your own catalogue of your current items by using the handy search available. You can select a category and search for items which you own. Once you find the relevant item, you’ll be able to add it to your catalogue by selecting ‘Have It’. Once you do that, you’ll be able to mention how much Switchbucks (Read the next para for more information on this) it’s worth, whether you would like to make it available for trading or not, and what’s included in the box. You can also click the ‘Have It’ link on any item you view to add it to your catalogue.

Now, coming to the currency of the SwitchPlanet – SwitchBucs. The whole point of introducing SwitchBucs is so that you and a person need not have an item that each other wants. For example, if you have a DVD of ‘Seinfeld’ and you want a DVD of ‘Heroes’, you will have have to find a person with a DVD of Heroes who also wants a DVD of Seinfeld and is willing to trade it. This type of coincidence is very rare and therefore, the usage the SwitchBucs. With SwitchBucs, you can sell your Seinfeld DVD to a person in exchange for a specified amount of SwitchBucs. You can later use the SwitchBucs that you’ve earned to trade for something you want. Incase you do not have enough Switchbucs to trade for an item, you can buy Switchbucs for dollars, the exchange rate being 1 USD for 1 Switchbuc. Personally, I think this is a very innovative idea which makes the whole process of trading easy and simple.

You can also maintain a ‘Wishlist’ and when the items in your wishlist are available, you will automatically be notified about it via email. You can view a organised catalogue of all the products available, the most wanted products and similar lists. The profile of the members are also available and you can add members as your friends and expand your network. Various groups and forums are also available to help out new users and to meet like minded people.

When someone requests an item you own, you have the option of either declining or accepting the request. On accepting a request, you will have to mail the item within 5 days. You will have to pay for the shipping by yourself but this is also an advantage when you are requesting an item the sender will have to pay for the shipping. Once the receiver confirms that he has received the item you have shipped, you will be credited with the necessary amount of Switchbucs.

Both the sender and receiver are protected by the aptly named ‘Switch Guarantee’ which ensures your safety. You will be credited with the amount of Switchbucs if the item is reported lost in mail, damaged, etc. This is made to ensure that everybody is a winner and I feel that this is a good move by SwitchPlanet.

The best part of the whole process is that it is completely free, except for the postage charges. The donations made by the users of the website is once again donated to charity organisations. Overall, I think it’s an excellent way to reuse and recycle old items and their mission statement denotes this -
“Use more…waste less.”

You can register for the website here and view thier list of items here.

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