Browsing: social media

There’s information overload on the Internet and many great stories are missed altogether! So every week I’ll do a roundup of the must-reads, the controversial stories, and the fun posts that I have found across the Net.

Check this one out! All your Facebook friends – are they really who they seem to be? With photos floating all over social media, how do you know who people really are? What would you think if you found your photo on diverse social media sites with a different name and a different life story?

We do live in a brave new world where social media has made interaction amazingly easy. In the old days only media behemoths had power, now every little blogger has a piece of the empire! Facebook, Twitter and Google + have made it possible for ordinary people to nurture revolutions and push for the popular choice.

And now Bollywood actor Abhay Deol has come up with a creative innovation- First Release Cinema on Facebook!

When is social media too much? When can we call it enough? When does social media become invasive and when do we start de-friending people? Are we just violating each other’s privacy or are we getting what we always secretly wanted – an insight into other people’s lives?
On the blog Sex and the Single Desi, Monica Marwah looks at the good, the bad and the ugly aspects of social media.
(Photo – Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com)

“When I was growing up, there was no Internet. We didn’t have access to people’s personal lives the way we do now. Things were happening back then but no one except immediate family and friends knew about it until some reporter got wind of it.

Now there are countless blogs, online magazines, social media, socialites and reality stars floating around. News flies around the world with the click of a button within two seconds. It is in your face and you can’t just ignore it.

However, I feel that there is a reason everyone is obsessed with celebrity culture and personal lives of celebrities: we are trying to find someone to relate to. Someone to look up to; Someone who is having experiences that parallel our experiences; Someone who can let us know that there is nothing wrong with us when bad things happen to us.” Guest Blog – Sex & the Single Desi
Photo: Christina Aguilera by Balt-art.

In our virtual worlds, there is a small, vibrant nation of 7 million people called Foursquare – it’s actually an app that can be uploaded on your mobile or your computer but is a buzzing hive of human activity. Everybody seems to live on Foursquare nowadays.

It is a location based social networking website created in 2009 by Naveen Selvadurai and Dennis Crowley to help people to check in through their mobile devices with their friends in different locations where the action is.

This innovative app which brings people and businesses together in a win-win situation was recognized as a Technology Pioneer for 2011 by the World Economic Forum.

“Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and Friendster have definitely made the world a smaller place but they’ve also made it more open for everyone to peek into our lives. Today we are defined by the number of friends we have on FB, by how many people follow us on Twitter, and how many people subscribe to our blog, rather than by the number of true friends that we can sit with and have a cup of chai.” GUEST BLOG

In a world where the computer is king, the Internet is all-powerful and Facebook and Twitter reign, social media is the newest and hottest turf to be conquered.

For each of these innovative entrepreneurs, who are in their 20’s and 30’s, the world to be conquered is virtual but the treasures to be won are very real – millions of dollars for successful start-ups, fame, fortune and fans globally.

Meet the creators of five start-ups everyone is buzzing about – Foursquare, Involver, MyCityWay, Occipital and Radium One. In our increasingly interconnected world where Mumbai and Manhattan are just a click away, you will soon be using their creations if you are not already…

I-Phone, I-Pad, I-Meditate?

It was bound to happen! The practice of meditation may be thousands of years old but it is perfectly suited to our very stressful modern times, when in order to go fast, you have to learn to slow down. And the buzz of the moment is that the power of social media is being harnessed by a group of high achieving young professionals to get the word out about the value of meditation, and the upcoming I Meditate NY event, one of the largest meditation gatherings ever to be held in the Big Apple.

Over 2700 New Yorkers, from all walks of life and all religions, will come together to listen to and meditate with the renowned spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar who heads the Art of Living Foundation, with music by Grammy nominated Chandrika Tandon and world music band Bhakti. This unique event will be held at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall on April 10, and leading up to it are free meditation classes at the Art of Living Center in Manhattan, a chance to get a first-hand taste of meditation.

Pop artist Anoop Desai has been on everybody’s radar ever since he became a finalist on the eighth season of “American Idol.” Now his first independently released EP ‘All is Fair’ has hit the airwaves. His new single is titled ‘My Name.’

Was growing up in North Carolina with a name like Anoop difficult?
“Kids made fun of it all the time, in the school bus, and I remember coming home from kindergarten and demanding that my mom change my name, because I wanted to be a Bill or something,” he recalls.

“I cringe at that now because I am lucky to have my name, lucky to have my culture. That’s what makes me unique and a lot of people don’t have that.”

Want to know where you can get WiFi connection in Manhattan? Confused by the labyrinth of subway connections? Or just hungry for a great meal? Now, thanks to a team of Indian IT professionals, you can have all that information at your finger tips on your iPhone – and it’s free.

NYC Way is the name of this neat application and it’s got Mayor Bloomberg’s seal of approval. It got an honorable mention for the App of the Year but also won the Public Choice Grand Prize and the Investors’ Choice Award in the NYC Big Apps competition