Twenty- five Seven

To WordPress or Blogger ?

March 26, 2014
or

I may be one of the millions in this world who are trying their hand at blogging. I may also be one of those millions who has crawled the web trying to find out which is better Blogger or WordPress?

Now that I’ve been blogging for ten years and more and still not winning the numbers, I’ve tried to analyse where I’ve gone wrong by asking these questions:
- Why do I blog?
- Who is my target audience?
- Will I still blog if no reads me?
Well, I blog because I like writing. This is one way of being published without going from magazine to magazine or publisher to publisher. Publishing, especially in print is taking a beating these days with most people preferring online books to hard copies. I know from personal experience because my own first attempt at publishing has met with a four year delay. My cookbook which is all ready (edited, proofed and even dummied) is still held up with Popular Prakashan. My Chief Guest for the book launch is already dead and I keep telling them that if they take long to publish the book, it may well be a posthumous publication! So the bottom line is I like blogging and it is a form of instant publication.

I started blogging as a way of keeping my family and friends informed of my daily doings. I thought it would obviate phone calls and letters….But unfortunately most of my friends and family are technophobic and have not really progressed between telephonics and letter writing. So now I have to keep in mind that my audience is the wider world who may not be personally interested in my personal life but would still read my blog if the style and content is well executed.

Lastly, will I still blog if nobody reads? I would be a complete liar if I said yes because I am narcissistic enough to want an audience. Why would I want to throw water in a plot of land which doesn’t yield flowers?

So, this brings me to the basic question – Which is the better platform – WordPress or Blogger?

Most bloggers who address this issue choose WordPress. I personally like to think this is extremely personal. It all depends on how comfortable you are with either platform. There are some features of WordPress which I think are great (more choice of templates, cleaner looking templates) while the obvious advantage of Blogger is that it is Google Based and has been around for longer.
Banking on Social Media with KotakJifi accounts

March 23, 2014
When I first heard about the Indiblogger event being held at Cafe Zoe this Sunday, I registered not knowing what to expect. This was my first ever Indiblogger event and I must say I was blown.

For someone who is a Golden Oldie, a homemaker who interacts more with her PC than her real life friends, whose virtual world doesn’t exist beyond a dormant FB account, this event came as a real shocker. I actually realised the power of social media and its ripple like impact.

When ICQ, Orkut and other such social sites sprouted in the virtual world, they were just chat rooms…or at least that what I thought they were. Since I had no use for such interaction, I didn’t really bother about social media till a school reunion made me sign up for FB. Even then, my use of FB was minimal and I preferred interacting through my blogs rather than individual walls, timelines etc etc. So I was quite unprepared for what I witnessed this afternoon at the Indiblogger Kotak Mahindra event held at Cafe Zoe . And this was part of a tri-city event being held simultaneously at Bangalore and Delhi!!

Not knowing what to expect with the traffic and parking situation, I took a cab down to Mathurdas Mills Compound at Lower Parel where I found myself one of the early birds at the venue. I met another blogger who I’d bumped into at a Blogadda Canola event and another young girl who wrote her own finance blog wealthymatters.com. Keerthika Singaravel was an amazing person who wowed me with her bubbly personality and her insights into personal finance.Following her came several other people who made me realise very soon that I would probably be the oldest blogger on the scene. However that didn’t prove to be a dampner.

Enter the Nerd

After Registration we were invited to hit the bar where alcohol was flowing….and not just cheap stuff but good Scotch . The eats that were passed around were lavish too and soon the crowd got into the mood. The first contest was to get the maximum number of people in a selfie ( is this the latest trend started off by Ellen Degeneres or was it there before????) and then there was a small interactive dance with three sporting members of the audience dancing in front of a crowd chorusing “Ich will”. This obviously got the adrenaline pumping strong enough for us to welcome our mystery celebrity chief guest Chetan Bhagat, who gamely accepted being introduced as a nerd. By this time I figured that this event had everything to do with Banking but I was completely bowled when he announced a new product aimed at the young – Jifi.

Twitter Banking or twits banking?

Now anyone who has tried to open a bank account knows the hassles involved. And for all those who have more time to tweet than go to the loo, this seems the perfect option – Online banking where even the account opening is done via Twitter/FB. Of course the KYC does happen but that is unavoidable.

And what was more amazing that you don’t need to have any money to open a bank account! Other added benefits included social rewards i.e. you get reward points for joining, reward points for referrals who even if don’t translate into customers earn you reward points which means it is a win-win situation.

And even as a penniless account holder, you are still accorded the respect given to a Rs. 5 crore customer and get to enjoy the same features as a Platinum Debit card with no charge.

And through MoneyWatch, you can track your multiple bank balances with ease……
No minimum balance, non interest bearing current account

Auto Term deposit creation once the average balance crosses Rs. 25,000/-

Tweet to bank – Account updates, cheque book request and many more account activities just a tweet away

Refer friends to Jifi and get rewarded

Loyalty Club – Social or Transaction get rewarded for both

Free Jifi Platinum Chip Debit Card for first year

Keep track of your expenses with a Kotak MoneyWatch platinum subscription for one year

Access to our Mobile Banking & Offers app, to bank on the go

Free NEFT through Net Banking

Obviously those who know the difference between # and @ , who are brand conscious consumers are not TWITS, therefore, this is banking through Twitter and not banking for Twits.

So where’s the catch?

This product is for the young and not just young at heart but customers who are fully conversant with social media, twitter and facebook. For golden oldies, technophobes and people like me who can’t understand the difference between # and @, can’t differentiate between DM and IM and who think LOL is Lots of Love, this product is not for you – Kotak has a range of traditional accounts for traditional people, even a home banking solution ( at a price of course) for those who can’t cross the road or are otherwise housebound and need help with banking.

The revelation

This was an innovative product launch – an online banking product for young people on the go, a product that recognises their need , their need for speed, their lack of time and understands their tech savviness. There may have been other product launches with such an insight into their target audience, but for me this was a first hand experience of the power of social media. Kudos to the marketing team who though of this innovative product launch strategy.

And kudos to Indiblogger for organising such a fantastic event – tricity. Truly fantastic. It was a great launch with great food and a great mood . So even if I don’t qualify for a KotakJifi Account, I may be able to gift one to my grandson when he gets his own Twitter handle.
Queen of Hearts

March 16, 2014

An unlikely Queen of Hearts

In yet another brilliant performance Kangana Ranaut has proved herself to be an actor to be reckoned with. When Rani Mehra, the typical middle class girl next door is pursued by Vijay (Rajkumar Rao), a lumpen looking engineering student who happens to see her at her father’s mithai shop, she is a bit wary of him but in the typical formula of the Hindi movie where the hero relentlessly pursues a girl despite her protests, they do eventually fall in love and decide to get married. The movie “Queen” thus begins with the trending Bollywood formula of the Big Fat Indian Wedding replete with marigold garlands, fat aunties and heaps of motichoor ladoos. But just the day before the wedding, the moment the Mehndi dries on her hand, there is a deviation in the recipe and Rani finds herself going on her honeymoon all by herself.

Struggling with the emotions of being jilted and trying to cope with an alien culture in an alien land ( Paris) Rani finds herself making an unlikely friend in Vijaylaxmi (product of an Indian father and mixed European mother) and who ironically calls herself Vijay. Vijaylaxmi played brilliantly by Lisa Hayden takes the young ingenue under her wing and within days, Rani is transformed into a new person. During a shopping trip she accidentally sends a photo of herself in a fashionable Parisian outfit to Vijay her ex while actually wanting the approval of Vijaylaxmi who was waiting outside the changing stall. The new Rani whom Vijay had dubbed “My Queen” piques his interest and he suddenly realises that his excuse for calling of the wedding was not only unpardonable but truly lame ( he muttered something about Rani not being able to cope in London where they were going to be staying after the wedding). After a riotous time in Paris, Rani continues with her ‘honeymoon’ to Amsterdam where she lands up sharing a room in a youth hostel. The three men she has to share with are not what she had bargained for but having nowhere else to go has to stay with them as room mates. The four of them become unlikely friends and a dare to cook at an Italian restaurant in Vollendaam makes Rani realise that she can do what she wants to do. So when Vijay lands up outside the hostel and demands to take Rani back with him, she flatly refuses and agrees to meet him the next day.

Vijay is stunned to see a confident, fashionable Rani walk into the roadside cafe and is even more shocked when she walks out on him citing a previous engagement of a Rock Concert. Eventually Rani returns to Delhi and just when you think the film was going back to formula of boy meets girl, fight and make up, she gives him back his ring and thanks him for helping her find herself!

Wow! That was one great movie with scenes that tug at your heart strings without being cheesy and moments which leave you laughing. All the actors put in great performances but Kangana Ranaut is truly the Queen of the show.

Verdict :

Must see movie.