So nice it is, innovative and informative. Merger of Space Craft with Windows Live team blog is sure to be more utility oriented for the people, more so for the bloggers.

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The Space Craft is moving!

I'm both excited and a bit nostalgic to be writing this blog entry letting our users know that The Space Craft (the official Spaces Team blog), is merging with the Windows Live team blog.

In some ways, this is a formalization of changes that started years ago as the team that built MSN Spaces expanded and partnered with other teams to help build Windows Live web services including Home, Profile, Photos, Events, Groups, and of course Spaces. ;)

For Spaces fans, here’s a quick history of our service:

• MSN Spaces launched in fall/winter 2004-2005 with support for blogs, photos, and lists. It was also integrated with MSN Messenger so that when a friend posted new content, a green star ("gleam") would show next to that person's name.
• In January 2006, support was added for searching Spaces, people, and blogs with the help of the (then MSN) Search team. (I joined the Spaces team in March of 2006.)
• In summer 2006, we added friend lists, and a host of other modules, redesigned the Spaces home page, and re-branded as Windows Live Spaces. In some ways, this was the launch of Windows Live 1.0.
• A bit over a year later in fall 2007, we launched Windows Live Events and a revised Spaces home page that included What’s New with your network and big improvements in our photo sharing experience. This broad release might be deemed Windows Live 2.0.
• As we embarked on planning for “Windows Live 3.0,” we expanded our team’s mission to include not just Spaces but also the friend/network experience, profiles, “What’s new,” permissions, groups, and Windows Live Writer.
• Most recently, starting with web release in December 2008 we shipped a bunch of new services, including:
  •  Windows Live Groups
  • Network invitations and friend suggestions
  • Web activities
  • New privacy and permissions controls

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the Windows Live team blog, it is a fantastic resource for everything that is happening on Windows Live and is available at: http://WindowsLiveWire.spaces.live.com/. There is also an RSS feed and you can use Windows Live Alerts to subscribe via email, IM, or SMS.

• Twitter - You can also “follow” WindowsLive on Twitter at http://twitter.com/WindowsLive or TXT “follow WindowsLive” to 40404 in the USA, 21212 in Canada, or +44 7624 801423 in other locales.
• Facebook - You can become a fan of Windows Live Messenger and also add the Windows Live Messenger Facebook application.

Whether you view the blog on the web, follow Windows Live on Twitter, or any combination, I hope you’ll take a minute to connect with the Windows Live team. In addition, many of our team members including Chris, Eric, Joe, Michelle, and me will be continuing to blog about our work on Spaces and the rest of the Windows Live web services on Windows Live team blog. See you there. ;)

Thanks much—
- Rob Dolin
Program Manager, Windows Live team

It's quite in vogue these days to use some quotation or the other while delivering a speech. An excellent orator like Atal Bihari Bajpai, ex Prime Minister of India, always used to get a thumping applause for it. Manmohan Singh, the present Prime Minister of India, tried to follow him, if not fully atleast partly. He did so even when he was the Finance Minister and made it a note to add famous lines of the revolutionary the great Ram Prasad Bismil on most dry a subject like budget. The lines so quoted were 'Sar faroshi ki tamanna ab hamarey dil mein hai'.There is a thinking that quotes add strength to a speech and naturally why the speakers, particularly politicians, should miss that opportunity which they can't help using relevantly or even otherwise. But the practice may lead the speaker into trouble these days like it happened with Samajwadi leader Amar Singh who picked up a portion from a song sung by Mohd. Rafi in a film with the quote '...patthar ke sanam...' supporting his criticism against Mayawati, U.P. Chief Minister, ridiculing her over enthusiasm for necessary/ unnecessary construction of buildings, parks and monuments. The small quote was not taken lightly and she has threatened an FIR against him.

Romance and sex has all along been most dominant a factor since ages, nay since day one after life started on the earth planet. Chanakya, the great sage and diplomat who was the chief advisor to king Chandragupt Maurya, held a view that women have eight times more anxiety for sex compared to men and this view fully holds good in the case of birds and animals, even creatures. One thing that differs in this context is as to who is a fore runner in the matters of initiatives for the purpose. There it is the male that stands first both in the case of humans and animals. If a man feels proud in offering several temptations like valour, money and wealth to the opposite sex, animals do the same thing and it is the meat that acts as a major incentive in their case as they have nothing like money or wealth to offer. A tiger, besides exhibiting his valour and strength in so many ways to a tigress, no sooner he kills his prey he offers it to her and she easily succumbs to temptation offering her sex to him readily. So does a dog. Blue bulls are known to be vegetarians in strict terms but they drag their female partners to green pastures offering them the leaves of grass, crop and the plants. They are known for keeping three partners at a time. It is a mystery only as to why initiative part is more dominantly played only by males and not that much by females.

I would have driven a rock roller on the chest of Varun Gandhi if I was the Home Minister of India is what Laloo Yadav said in one of his election meetings in Bihar. Funny and absurd too. Vomitting venom like this is not that very uncommon for politicians of this country but there should be some restraint atleast. Criticism is one thing and expressing hatred to appease a few is another. If Varun Gandhi has done really any thing wrong there are laws of the country to take care of it, it is a different matter that the rulers may interpret the law to suit their own whims implementing them accordingly but after all it is there in whatever recognizable shape and style. The constitution of the country amply grants the right to freedom of speech and it is for the talkers to use it in a dignified manner or misuse it in an unbridled order. Many a leaders take it for granted as a licence to apply it in a manner that befits their convenience and fancy. They can talk in a silliest possible manner slinging absurd most remarks against any body or they are even the ones who always feel free to pronounce fatwas to kill any one. People are there who take notice of it with concern but their rights are confined to voting alone beyond which they just can't go. In totality it is only sad for the country. Now that there are two FIRs lodged against Laloo on this count, let the law take its own course in real terms.

I will not ride Tata's Nano as it has come out of people's blood, said Mamta Banerjee in Kolkata. Difficult to know as to whose blood she is talking about. The known blood that was lost is that of people who starved and died after Nano plant in Singrur was not allowed to function by Mamta's men. Many a people committed suicide after sale of their land did not materialise as a result of plant having been withdrawn from there compelled as Tata was for this by political goons. Possibly politicians have no limit to their irrelevant stutters and in a fury of their political whims they forget what to talk and what not. How come the same very Nano was heartily welcome in Gujarat where not only the Chief Minister of the State, Narendra Modi received the proposal whole heartedly but equally the farmers, traders and others bountifully rejoiced the event. If at all there was any blood squeezing involved, how they could have accepted the plant in their State so cheerfully. Or how the people of Pant Nagar (Uttaranchal) could have recognized it as a matter of pride for them.The fact remains that Tata Nano plant generated a large scale avenue for employment, more so for the local people for whom it proved to be a boon. Better it is for the politicians to receive the things in a correct perspective instead of probing the loop holes for the purpose of unnecessary mud slinging.

'Child is the father of man', said Wordsworth and a child in every one is alive the whole life of a person howsoever old he/ she grows. Facultatively it is always prudent to get reminded that the child in me is capable of directing my mind in different positive ways. Even genetically it counts and biologically too. Many in old age suffer from the notion that regeneration in the body system stops at the level of advancing age. It is not that correct. May be the regeneration level is not that very effective at a later stage of life but that it stops completely is not true. It holds good in physical terms, more so mentally. Necessary will coupled with perseverance makes it possible that we are able to secure reproductive element considerably rejuvenating our total body system. Rejuvenation is most powerful a Vedic principle since ages and it holds good equally in modern age. Psychologically, if I am engrossed with a problem causing mounting pressure and tension, I am to think of a child in me asking for a solution and the chances are for a positive reply -my mind will be directed to take up the task in a manner a child in me could have taken it up during the early phase of my life, free of malice, prejudice and chastefully innocently. In most of the cases people are unable to overcome a tension for the reason that their faculties get deeply preoccupied with prejudices on an issue and this blocks the process of sorting out a situation dispassionately. A child is more capable of looking at things in a natural manner without any fixed mind and there lies the key to circumvent a situation.

My Diary:3/4/09

She addressed number of emails to me of which I replied a few. She showed a sublime sort of love not only recognizable but highly adorable. This was a contact covering two most distant parts on the globe with several thousands kilometers between the two destinations, South Africa and India. She wanted my photographs which I failed to transmit. The love of most chaste an order was amply manifest in whatever she communicated. I wrote to her that my age is in the wrong side and that I have nothing much interesting left in my life. Her photographs that she sent to me spoke volumes of her enchanting beauty with a healthful getup posture. Knowing as she did about me that I have been a bank executive, she wanted me to assist her in certain financial matters by the way. There again I was idiotically unresponsive for otherwise normally no validly acceptable a ground except that I couldn't suppress a 'touch me not' image of mine. Only so stupid. Sounds absurd and silly. I have no pertinent an explanation to my own self against hurting her sentiments and remotely some where in my heart there is an excruciating pain tumultuously piercing me minute to minute. Reason or no reason, a feeling of guilt terribly haunts me.

As a blogger I have been writing for Smorty and the experience of working with them was certainly a pleasant one as I always found it smooth and irritation free but there was a break and during a long intervening gap I did miss the opportunities to interact with them. Returning to this very site of mine (one of my two sites I used earlier writing posts for them) which Smorty were good enough to still keep active and alive despite no activity on my part for a long time, I feel like sticking to the task in a rejuvenated order. Hopefully I may get the same support and patronage I received earlier from Smorty.Thanks to them. This post of mine is on a personal note away from the ones otherwise directed commercially which opportunities are ofcourse extendable to me only as the sole prerogative of Smorty.

There are no subjects which are not talked about nor are there individual areas which are not covered as news, story, fiction or other modes of expression but it is the woman that has been given utmost coverage. Long back I read 'Worst women of twentieth century' by Bernard O'donnel containing horrifying stories relating to women. If what he wrote is taken in the spirit it is narrated it looks like it is the women who are most corrupt with a level of criminality. Does it mean that it is the women only who commit sins and menfolk are innocent people behaving as angels. Why angels even as they too are a lot committing numerous crimes. Committing a crime, behaving callously or leading a most corrupt mode of life can not be supposed to be any sort of a solitary area for women, it applies to all human beings, men or women. Those who isolate women for this purpose are themselves obsessed with something highly negative. Divine gestures or satanic conceits both are to be read only in a composite context of all human beings.

 It is an inbuilt anxiety in human mind to feel conscious of where he/ she is situationally placed and with what surroundings. It matters a little apparantly but counts much from psychology point of view. When mapped, different places emerge as dots indicating what they are. Nothing practically, nothing so materially tangible, nothing of any interest to the viewers, the readers but, denotive as they are of a person's belongingness, they are a most significant factor in providing much needed a confidence to the person concerned that there is some spot on earth which he/ she can call her own and that so much counts from one's own entity angle.

Like just a gush of air it touches you and you are floored in howsoever best a form you might been till that time. It's not that it happens just like that, it is infact the offshoot of something that has been hovering in your mind for quite sometime consciously or otherwise as a chain of various ingredients from different thoughts occurring one after the other. Really very difficult to get out of it. There could be many an advisors to help you in your efforts to overcome the problem but it hardly works result wise. No dearth of counselling like 'be calm', 'don't get perturbed', 'behave yourself' coming forth in abundance but what about an outcome? Practically nothing. If you happen tobe a strong willed person, may be you are able to fight it out with but this too will have a limit beyond which it can't go and hangover continues for quite some time. It is actually like a fit attacking its victim and retreating only when its time is over. Tortuously torturing are the moments of despondency but since it occurs when it has to, the only course open to the victims is to take it with courage and patience.

Viewers all over the world owe congratulations to the couple Abhishek/Aishwarya Bachhan on their completing one year of a happy married life. Togetherness is undoubdedly best of the gifts on the occasion and it was there. Aishwarya Rai Bachhan's expression that she got the best family to join as one in its household as the wife of Abhishek Bachhan is quite in the fitness of things and none can have a doubt that Amitabh Bachhan's is a family adorably admirable. Normally it is seen that in the movie world the family life of individual stars does suffer some setback or the other but his is the one that remained an exception. The trio -Amitabh, Aishwarya, Abhishek joined by Jaya Bachhan make an ideal family in the country. The speculations and the apprehensions expressed by many when Abhishek married Aishwarya that the couple may undergo problems at the family level in days to follow are in a way laid to rest and one tangibly finds all going on so well. Congratulations to the couple, greetings to the family. 

Ash, Abhi gift each other 'togetherness' Bollywood News | Aishwarya Rai | Abhishek Bachchan | Amitabh Bachchan

Actions followed by reactions forming a chain culminating into multiplicity of events are a source in themselves to radically change the society. This is no utopian a thought, this is how social order changes one followed by the other. You do some job that requires takers with an advice from somebody that more the takers more the business. You write good and the readers who recognize you as such are not big in number as they need more tasty a material to read. You switch over your focus to say films and your readers increase in number but still not big enough from returns angle. You are a puritan and not at all inclined to write on sex sticking as you do to your convictions. The result ? You are a flop and whatever viewers you had earlier they too are reduced to barest minimum. You lose the very source which could provide you some resource or the other to keep your job going on. It is all gone and you are virtually jobless. Constrained, you start reconciling to writing on gay literature with sex as the central theme. You get a flush of response with a large number of viewers and readers going through what you write. OK, you get work, your business starts running well but the negative element that overpowers you is that a staunch convictionist in you stops surviving. Writers, add bloggers to them now, are known for their role as conscience keepers of the society which is otherwise supposed to develop based on the inspirations they so draw from writings of different authors, poets, novelists, story tellers and playwrites. Anomalies of reactions affect all of them. What happens in the process is that the very message which was supposed to be given to the people is diverted to the one that they themselves longed where sex is on the top. I saw a film with Ashok Kumar and Nalini Jaywant in the lead roles where the hero at one point of time gives a small touch to the toe line of heroines legs. The picture was marked for 'Adults'. I ofcourse failed to notice what was wrong in it. Wrong or no wrong, the picture was a hit marked as it was for adults. Actions and reactions with their chain continuing for decades, what has now emerged is a total nakedness. Possibly there is hardly any stage left except direct sex visible on the screen. It is virtually so utopian to think of a situation when there is someone emerging on the surface who can overpoweringly correct this sort of recycling to an order constructively positive.

Judgement given by the Supreme Cout of India restraining the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh from making further additions with reference to Ambedkar Park in Lucknow is by all means a welcome judgement in the sense that it checks the measures through which public money was being wasted. The Hon'ble Court, however, permitted repairs to continue which too is laudable in the sense that the existing structures of monumental significance should not get damaged with the passage of time. This part ofcourse holds good only if the authorities concerned don't go for manipulations. What actually is going on in the Ambedkar Park is actually not a repair, it is practically an overall replacement. The very boundary wall which was otherwise built only a short time ago and was elegantly constructed in quite an ornamental order had no case for any repairs and you ask any commoner in the city, the prompt reply is that it was not needed at all, rather it is a sheer misuse of funds. The monitors of such projects are not supposed to forget that state of Uttar Pradesh is not that rich to afford such wastages. On his mission to propagate cultural heritage of India abroad, it was Vibekanand who heralded a message to the people there that there is no cause for constructing unnecessary buildings, even mosques, temples and churches, when it is a world suffering from hunger and penury. This was the message that held good when it was uttered, equally holds good now and may hold good always in days to come. The present day managers of affairs can use such golden utterances of the great men of the country without resorting to unnecessary wastages.

Man was in search of employment always. Some could get it some could not. The rulers were the providers of the opportunities to the people who needed it which role is now played by the governments directly and through public undertakings. There is much of difference between how it was done in the past and how it is done now. Earlier the rulers did it as a matter of consideration for the needy whereas now it is done all on a political basis or say with votes orientation in mind. Asifuddaula was one of the great Nawabs of Lucknow (State of Oudh). A famine took place and the food shortage was at its extreme. Since nothing was produced, the people were left with no resource to buy the food items as in whatever form it could be available it was so costly. The Nawab announced distribution of food from the royal store free of cost. The public was reluctant to receive it for the reason that they considered it against their self respect to accept free supply of food without any work. Realising it, the Nawab ordered the construction of Bhul Bhulaiya to accommodate their sentiments. In the process a great building of world fame status came into being besides helping the people particularly the poor. There was no prejudice or any sort of hidden agenda in the name of the help so extended. It was just a heart felt compassion to overcome the difficulties of the hungry. Currently what prevails is just in contrast to that and either there is no help at all coming forth or if at all it is there it is directed towards a vote catching device.

It is Shahrukh Khan or Aamir Khan or even Amitabh Bachhan, how is it that every now and then there is some controversy or the other on their rank. Earlier what continued for a long time was the controversy on whether it could be Shahrukh Khan to be rated as number one or it should be Amitabh Bachhan. Now the new version of the controversy is who between Shahrukh Khan and Aamir Khan is better in their field of activity, the films. Comparing one artist against the other is normally a general tendency on the part of the viewers and there is nothing bad in it as it gives necessary boost up to the element of competition but the practice at times assumes illogical proportions when the entire exercise is stretched too far. It becomes much worse when it is for commercial reasons. Art of any discipline does deserve an appreciation and recognition which encourages the artists, the performers. When it was a debate at public level earlier on comparing the two -Amitabh Bachhan and Shahrukh, Shahrukh was at times found reacting somewhat assertively. This time it is not the case. Shahrukh, possibly gaining experience of the past, is quite submissively humble in his reactions. His remark that whatever is said by Aamir Khan is correct shows his magnanimity on the issue. Amitabh Bachhan has a Himalayan height to his credit, Shahrukh has acquired the title of 'Badshah' from the public and Aamir Khan is a great jewel of film industry. All of them taken together, it has given the country laurels and recognition all over the world. Awarding them a rank in normal manner is just so natural but the very grace of the issue is diminished the moement it is unpleasantly dragged to mud slinging as seen very often when the viewers clash on the point amongst themselves. Artists are great and they continue tobe as such in the eyes of the public. This should not be necessary to rub the point beyond logical proportions.

Physically powerful and mentally strong are the people to be and remain in lime light which feature may not necessarily mean that they are not weak. There are weak moments for all. A tough posture that one wears is nothing more than an exterior phenomenon. The very truth lies in the fact that it is a particular situation that renders varying looks changing from look to look. Mythologically Lord Hanuman in the masterpiece Ramcharitra Manas was all powerful bestowed with divine capacities capable of doing any wonders. He too had his weak moments when he had to express his inability to fight for Lord Ram while under attack by Lav and Kush launching their campaign called as Ashwamedh Yagna. The very situation leading to sons fighting their father had practically demoralised Lord Hanuman and he was under a total incapacitation with no courage left in him to join the fight. History also is full of such instances. Once Hitler's lieutenant, Mussolini was a terror for enenmies and it was said that he had no bones in his body structure but just steel only. When captured with sharp shooters calling on him to kill him, he was awefully shivering. He even offered temptations to the killers if spared. His offers ignored, he was killed on the spot. Getting killed in the process of fighting is altogether a different matter but here the very stout posture of his with a usual commanding gesture was missing. He had to succumb to attack on him like a weak person. This only shows that howsoever strong a person is apparantly, he is too weak too depending on the moments lived. Not the man but it is the situation that counts which makes him strong, which makes him weak.

Sensex falling down miserably with the last leg of 875 points on Tuesday the 22nd January, it was virtually a tearful day for many who invested with the hope to get better returns but what they got instead was some thing just otherwise, a setback. Share market is utterly typical in the sense that hardly any one can take notice of what is in store the next moment for the investers. There are experts and great pundits who claim to forecast the happenings in the share market but this sort of behaviour on their part is nothing more than a professional gimmic. True, dealing in shares is not, or say is not supposed to be, just gambling or speculating. Never ever having any interest in sharemarketing in the past for the reason that I was repeated given a note of caution in my childhood by my mother that satta is not a good thing that good boys never indulge in such activities. I did not then know what it all actually meant but the note of caution my mother gave me was all along ringing into my ears and when share dealing became very popular afterwards, this too I took as part of a gamble thus keeping myself dragged away from this both temperament wise and taste wise. One thing which clearly comes to my mind is that if at all share trading is adopted as a tool for earning some extra money, why this can not be conducted in a manner where there are not much of risks involved. I get the answer from the people who are well experienced in the field and the opinion they gave was that it is possible to go with comparatively a risk free trading but it fails to work with the persons who suffer from a lust for money doubling and tripling within a limited frame of time. I could understand it and realised that what happened on 22nd January this year gave a shattering jolt to mainly this class of people which they could have otherwise avoided by behaving in a normal order without so much of greed.

This post was written by me immediatelely after 22nd January happening and is being published now.

So exhilerating a news that Kashmir Singh who was languishing all these years in a Pakistan jail for a period ranging 35 years with the sword of Damocles hanging on his head all the time is being freed and one can well realise how exciting would it be when he joins back his family to lead a normal life. Joy knows no bounds for his family members mainly his wife Paramjit Kaur, one can easily realise. It is certainly something that is sure to strengthen the relations between the two countries -India and Pakistan. A very good sign of peace getting a boost. People in India owe lot many thanks to Pakistan for such a gesture of goodwill so extended by them. People in both India and Pakistan are after all did exist as one in the region a little above half a century back and nothing may look more natural than the two joining back with a cordial and kinship oriented atmosphere. Kashmir Singh may pinchingly miss his mother who died around two months back when he reaches his home back. How sweet a moment this should have been both for the mother and the son if she was alive today.

Indian on death row in Pak to walk free tomorrow-Pakistan-World-The Times of India

It happens at times that very small things appeal you so much that you find yourself lost into a valley of thoughts inspiring and refreshing. Opting to travel by train instead of air from Delhi to Chandigarh, I had my choice window seat in executive class of Shatabdi Express. It was chilly cold early in the morning of winter (December) but quite pleasant. Train stopping at Chandigarh, I had virtuallly to remind myself that I had reached the destination as if I was totally unmindful of the time that passed. It was so pleasant at the railway station - a dawn followed by sunrise with a blush coupled with a continuing chorus by the chirping birds and doves coming out of their nests in the shelves on the ceilings of the railway platform. Sereneness of the atmosphere was sumptuously visible and relishing. I felt like talking to chirping birds like Wordsworth did when he wrote '.....Sing. sing ye birds thou sweeter song'.

This is an extract from 'MyDiary'