வணக்கம் தோழா / नमस्ते दोस्त / Hello Buddy!

लोकाः समस्ताः सुखिनो भवन्तु

Lokāḥ Samastāḥ Sukhino Bhavantu
may all beings everywhere be happy and free, may the thoughts, words, and actions of my own life contribute in some way to that happiness and to that freedom for all.

I am Balakumar Muthu, an International Award-winning Entrepreneur, TEDx fellow, and Technologist, who received the Top 50 Asia Innovation Award from SingTel in Singapore, Red Herring Asia Award, Java Master Award conducted by Sun Microsystems and BenQ Siemens Germany and Top 100 Startups Award at NASSCOM Product Conclave (NCP).

With over 17 years of experience and strong expertise in Software Consulting, UI/UX Web Design, and Development. I specialize in architecting, designing, and building web applications to address both technology and business challenges across various domains, such as Software as a Service (SaaS), E-commerce, Usability, Cloud Computing, Enterprise Apps in Ed Tech, Retail Tech, Prop Tech, Med Tech, Freight/Logistics Tech, and Food Tech. Additionally, I have experience with Social Networking Services (SNS) and Blogging platforms (CMS/Wiki).

Early contributed member of World Wide Web Consortium (W3.org), W3C HTML 5 Working Group and Internet Society (ISOC) India Chapter.

Passionate about Indian and Japanese culture and philosophy, I am a practitioner of Hatha Yoga and an avid travel and culture photographer, documenting my journeys at CasualWalker.com.

You can ping me @ balakumar.muthu@gmail.com for all things exciting and engaging!

Awards & Recognitions, I have received


Awarded the "SingTel, Singapore - Asia's Top 50 Innovation Award” (winner lists) and the Winner of "Red Herring Asia Award" (finalists) for Technology Innovation.

My Startup was selected as one of the "Top 100 Startups" to get showcased at NASSCOM Product Conclave (NCP), Asia's largest platform for Product and Startup Companies to connect with Software Product leaders.

Selected at Google India - Interview as one of the Top 5 Finalists out of 16,000 + people applied. Created Google Kids – a search engine for kids prototype for demonstrating during my Google India Interview.

First Prize Winner of "Java Master Award " contest, conducted by Sun Microsystems and BenQ Siemens Germany.

Received Sun Microsystems Duke's Choice Awards - 10 Year Celebration of Java Technology and Sun Microsystems appreciation for my contribution to the early versions of Java Platform.

TEDx Fellow and Mentor for NurtureTalent Startup Boot Camp at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras.

My Previous Startup LoveLogger, the world's first Collaborative Blogging & Private Network for Pairs, which received a great response from Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, and China. LoveLogger was awarded the “Asia's Top 50 Apps 2011 Award” (winner lists) from SingTel, Singapore. It was also featured in many popular magazines & portals from Japan, Korea, and China. This product was launched even before the current popular pair apps like Pairy, Between, Hey, Cupple.

Selected as the Official Honorary Reporter for the Korean Culture and Information Service of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

Early contributed member of World Wide Web Consortium (W3.org), W3C HTML 5 Working Group and Internet Society (ISOC) India Chapter.

My Expertise & specializations


I specializes in most aspects of Web business, including strategy, creative, design, development and it's growth. My strong expertise and experience includes Front-end development, UI/UX Design & Usability Expert, Branding, Content Management System (CMS), E-commerce, Software as a service (SaaS), Cloud Computing, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Singularity, Web Security, Firewall, User Onboarding, Typography, Developing Social Networking Platforms (SNS), Product Prototyping, SEO and Linux & Open Source Technologies.

My Personal Interests


I enjoy travel & photography, yoga, rock climbing, simple things — nature, reading. I love philosophy, art, culture, highly interested and passionate about the Indian, Korean & Japanese traditions, trying different flavors of tea, Wabi-sabi, Zen philosophy, making mistakes & learning from them, DIY hacks, and Western movies and Comics.

My Works featured at press / media


My works have been featured & covered by ZDNet Asia, Economic Times, British Council India, Times of India (TOI), Citizen Matters, Yahoo! Japan, MSN Japan, Infoseek, Japan.Internet.com, Livedoor.com, Google Blogoscoped, Netscape.com, Java.net, Webpronews, Planet Mozilla, Linux Toy, DeveloperIQ, Sina.com and many other popular Asian publishers. Java.net published my Java Duke Holiday Pictures from 1000's of submission.

Writings & My Contributions


Wikipedian contributed to more than 100's of Wikipedia pages in various topics in the Computer/Internet Technology category. Contributing writer of DeveloperIQ Magazine on the latest Web Technologies.

Curator of Casual Walker a Travel & Culture - Photography journal and guide, focuses on a wide range of visual stories - connecting travel, culture, places, events, art, reviews, technology & books. Casual Walker is ranked as the Top 75 Travel Blogs in India. view.

Co-organizer of Mozilla Firefox Party India, for the most early release of Firefox 2 and the IdeaCamp Pune. Regular to Tech meetups from BarCamp, BlogCamp, WikiCamp Unconferences to Sun TechDays, BEA Dev2Dev Days, Oracle Developer Forum, Google Developer Days and many other tech conferences. Attended Sessions with David Axmark, CoFounder & VP of MySQL and with Richard Stallman [RMS], GNU Founder Lectures.

Designer of DevCamp India Unconference Official event brand and WikiCamp conference India event brand, participated by Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales.

Being a big supporter of Linux - Ubuntu & Open source movement, organized the "Ubuntu Dapper Drake T-Shirts Contest" to create more awareness and interest for the early versions of Ubuntu Linux.

My blog is Listed as 'Favorite Blog lists at Sun Microsystems' Web Blog in 2005. Blogging since 2002 and listed as the 'Top 10 Tech blogger' by 'Blog Street India' and rated as the 'Top 50 Tech Blogger' by 'Blogs Top List' in 2005 – 2007. My blog posts have also been featured at Google Blogoscoped.com, Netscape.com, Java.net, Webpronews, Planet Mozilla, Linux Toy and few other popular blogs. Made my own blogging site at Yahoo! Geocities as geocities.com/i5bala (screenshots) in early 2002.

Published Usability report on Yahoo! Flickr, MSN Hotmail and Rediff.com.

My Travel & Culture Photography


Contact & Reach me


Want to work together, grabbing a coffee, or say hello? Good! personally, I have zero presence on Facebook or Twitter. You can ping and text me:

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Self - made man
the statue I greatly admire & the principle I strongly believe

“... left to his own devices, man will use his god-given talents to be creative, productive, & prosperous. Using free will, he will better his own situation and that of those around him, thereby influencing in a positive way his own destiny...”

W550 : Sony Ericsson’s New Mobile Walkman Phone

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Sony Ericsson announced a new addition to its Mobile Walkman family - the W550. This is an affordable phone for expressive fun seekers, offering great quality stereo music, a 1.3 megapixel camera, full Internet browsing and 3D gaming in one compact and stylish swivel phone design. It has a bright, 1.8 inch and 176x220 pixel TFT screen with 262K colors.

The new W550 phone is a Tri-band / GPRS phone supporting both J2ME MIDP 2.0 and Mobile Java 3D (Mascot Capsule v3 as well as JSR-184/M3G). Games can be played with the screen positioned horizontally and with buttons on the left and right of the screen being used for two-handed control. >>

Who was the BOSS ?

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Scientists at the Rocket launching station in Thumba, were in the habit of working for nearly 12 to 18 hours a day. There were about seventy such scientists working on a project. All the scientists were really frustrated due to the pressure of work and the demands of their boss but everyone was loyal to him and did not think of quitting the job.

One day, one scientist came to his boss and told him - Sir, I have promised to my children that I will take them to the exhibition going on in our township. So I want to leave the office at 5 30 pm.

His boss replied - O K, You are permitted to leave the office early today.

The Scientist started working. He continued his work after lunch. As usual he got involved to such an extent that he looked at his watch when he felt he was close to completion. The time was 8.30 p.m

Suddenly he remembered of the promise he had given to his children. He looked for his boss, but he was not there. Having told him in the morning itself, he closed everything and left for home.

Deep within himself, he was feeling guilty for having disappointed his children.

He reached home. Children were not there. His wife alone was sitting in the hall and reading magazines. The situation was explosive; any talk would boomerang on him.

His wife asked him - Would you like to have coffee or shall I straight away serve dinner if you are hungry.

The man replied - If you would like to have coffee, I too will have but what about Children???

Wife replied- you don't know - Your manager came at 5 15 P.M and has taken the children to the exhibition.

What had really happened was

The boss who granted him permission was observing him working seriously at 5.00 p.m. He thought to himself, this person will not leave the work, but if he has promised his children they should enjoy the visit to exhibition. So he took the lead in taking them to exhibition

The boss does not have to do it every time. But once it is done, loyalty is established.

That is why all the scientists at Thumba continued to work under their boss even though the stress was tremendous.

By the way, can you hazard a guess as to who the boss was?

He was A P J Abdul Kalam, the current President of India !!.


--

Thanks: Rajneesh Garg

Google Talk

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Google Talk is a simple and free way to talk with and send instant messages to your friends. Like Gmail, Google Talk uses Google's innovative technologies to help people communicate more effectively and efficiently. Think of it as Google's approach to communications.
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Google Talk is easy and intuitive to use. All you need to make free calls is an Internet connection, a microphone, and a speaker. After you download Google Talk, sign in with your Gmail username and password. Invite your friends to download Google Talk, and once they do, you'll be able to talk or IM with them instantly. >>

PC Magazine gives Four Stars for OpenOffice

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PC Magazine gives 4 "Stars" for OpenOffice, which says version 2.0 is surprisingly slick and highly compatible with Microsoft Office file formats. It even offers features not found in its expensive Microsoft counterpart. Quite interesting, but still it has to take more market space. >>

A Geek's Love Poem :)

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roses are #FF0000
violets are #0000FF
all my base
are belong to you!!

Google Dance 2005

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Watch the exciting Google Dance 2005. >>

and it’s video too>>

Firefox: Deer Park Alpha 2

Get Firefox!

Deer Park Alpha 2 is an alpha release of our next generation Firefox browser and it is being made available for testing purposes only for developers and the testing community. Current users of Mozilla Firefox 1.0.x should not download or use Deer Park Alpha 2. Deer Park Alpha 2 is not an official mozilla.org final release; it has been made available for testing purposes only, with no end-user support. >>

Google's Froogle Mobile

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Froogle Mobile allows to search the web for products from our mobile phone, to search for lower online prices when we away from your computer. Hope to see the Froogle mobile in India too, very soon. >>

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E-llusion!!

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Look at the image normally, your will feel the image is animating. Next concentrate on the image the animation stops. Seems to be good image for improving our concentration ;). source: wired.com

Popular Science's Future Body

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Popular Science, publishes an article about our human Body's in the Future. It states, brain chips that enable us to control machines with our thoughts. Kidneys and lungs built to order in the lab. Pills to make you smarter and more creative. An implant that gives you a tan and protects against skin cancer. Nanotechnology are already yielding products to help the sick and injured, including a Band-Aid-like heart patch and the C-leg prosthesis for amputees. Very interesting to read. >>

iPod Tux Stand

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Tux for iPod, an elegant stand for iPod. This lucite beastie comes in two models, Tilt and Upright, and accentuates our iPod like nothing else in the world, aside from a silk scarf and a beret. Cost around $35. >>

Java 100% in Fortune 500 Companies!! :)

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Java is in 100% of the Fortune 500 companies; still need any more reason to migrate to JAVA platform!!

Top 10 Technology CNET miss

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CNET, lists Top 10 Technology they misses. It includes the Apple's Newton, Napster and other interesting stuffs and that they thought have with them forever, but that unfortunately have gone the way of the dodo.. quite interesting. >>

iBeat for iPod

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iBeat, an iPod illuminating headphone with an steady light for our music, powered with 2 AAA batteries. It can be used along with other MP3 players also. IBeat available in green, white, pink, blue colors. Looks cO0l. >>

Java Job Opportunities Survey

Look at the Job Opportunities for Java developers Survey by JavaLobby. Looks STRONGER!! :)
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Happy Friendship Day :)!!

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May there always be work for your hands to do,
May your purse always hold a coin or two.
May the sun always shine on your windowpane,
May a rainbow be certain to follow each rain.
May the hand of a friend always be near you,
May God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you.

--
Balakumar Muthu

Apple's Mighty Mouse!!

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Apple's introuced Mighty Mouse, added more buttons to its mouse. More like touchpads. Instead of a scroll wheel, it has a scroll ball that allows us to scroll horizontally and vertically. It has a left and right click area, as well as force sensing buttons on the sides. The mouse is programmable under OS X Tiger and even plays nice with the PC.
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With Mighty Mouse’s Scroll Ball, we can scroll at a 45-degree angle even roll in 360-degree sweeps. Pan across a massive digital image in iPhoto or Adobe Photoshop.Take in a whole PDF in Preview. The Scroll Ball moves the content on our screen just as our eyes might move across a printed page. The Scroll Ball acts as an extra mouse button too, offering us one of a few clever clicking options. >>

Top 20 Innovative Companies : Google 8th place, Microsoft 3rd place ??!!

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Business Week Magazine lists the top 20 Innovative Companies in the World, Apple get's the top list :). But Google is given the 8th place :(, whereas Microsoft is listed in 3rd position. I don't know how they categorized this list, totally stupid!!. I can't really think of anything Microsoft has innovated recently much than Google. That’s totally UNACCEPTABLE and UNFAIR!!

RSS 2 PDF (Beta)

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To convert our RSS files to PDF format, "RSS 2 PDF" Online RSS (or Atom) Newsfeed to PDF Generator does the job neately, seems to be quite useful. Well done Tom Churm.:) >>

Nike's Hammer

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Nike's Hammer watch is tougher than a pitbull with a titanium codpiece. It can survive almost anything Mother Nature can hurl at it, barring a volcanic eruption - it'll withstand seriously heavy shocks and is water resistant up to 50m. The Nike Hammer hits UK shops in early September for £100.


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