notes

This November 7th Twitter announced it’s doubling the character limit from 140 to 280. It wasn’t that long when 140 characters seemed like a barrier as I typed my first notes in 2007. And as time flew, I accepted the challenge of emitting my views with limited use of words albeit using more tweets. In the process, I also became deft at using English terms. It was fun but that wasn’t the only thing I liked about the restraint of Twitter’s ABCs. Comprehending the emotions of my counterparts was also painless, whether a friend’s happy event, an unfortunate tragedy, or an outrage on some political news. I cannot ignore the diverse forms of outraging on Twitter with humour or insulting language and mindless obscenity. At times for good reasons, sometimes frivolous but mostly done for a harmless banter presumably. Regardless of the personal motives let’s applaud Twitter for doubling the characters. It’s a welcome change even if it increases the length of our tweets at least our views & interests would be communicated instantaneously and not in multiple pieces. Here’s to more tweeting with 280 then!

I took to Facebook soon after its launch in 2006. Back then, the enthusiasm was palpable in experimenting with a new online medium which redefined the concept of connecting with friends and family online. Though as I ventured into my future this opinion about Facebook changed and I started viewing it as a ‘Snob’s Lair’ where each person despite the struggles seemed content, for reasons best known to them. This plausible fakeness was instrumental in my detachment from this platform, I turned myself into an infrequent visitor.

My perception regarding the social networking site notwithstanding, I decided to challenge my intellectual status quo and see for myself how Facebook would treat me after my longish absence. I’d gathered the courage to shun my apparent misgivings about Facebook and picked up my phone. I tapped the first few posts on my timeline with a ‘Like’, a happy smile, and even congratulated an old friend who’d been promoted at her work in a lengthy comment. Ecstatically a few minutes later I received all the goodwill through some likes, smileys, and comments! My experiment proved successful. I cannot assure if I’ll be embracing Facebook full-time like before, but it’s then that I realized something that Mark Zuckerberg had been saying all along about “connecting people”. It’s about participating in other people’s happiness and sorrow and acknowledging the upheaval in their personal lives. Even if the interaction seems virtual on social networking the emotions exchanged are genuine and worth its weight in gold!

Notes On Apple’s New ‘Mothership’ Campus

This is an insightful cover article on Apple’s new headquarters by Steven Levy (@stevenlevy) from the WIRED magazine. The campus was Steve Jobs’ dream and his finest design creation which has transformed into a futuristic architectural marvel today (and fondly identified as the ‘Ring’). Some quick notes from the write-up below.

  • The new campus was built according to Steve Jobs’ vision, he idealized California and based many of his ideas on his favorite features of the Bay Area in his youth. Jobs wanted to create a new campus ‘where the border between nature and building would be blurred’.
  • Steve Jobs dedicated a large amount of his last two years of life in the design of the building, where he would swoop down on the details he demanded and the meetings would often last 5-6 hours!

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