Tamil Karutharangam on Internet and Computer usage at Pondy

There was a Tamil Karutharangam on Internet and Computer usage at Pondy on Saturday, the 23rd of Jan. This was organised by the Pondicherry Tamil Bloggers group.

Though it was so long a time ago, that a programme of this sort had happened around here, those were the lighter moments I happened to get with socialising with the great people, be it Tamil bloggers or the Senior most eminent people from the Tamil fraternity.

The decesion to make out this event was informed to every one of us by our friend RajaSukumaran of Pondy Tamil Bloggers just the preceeding week. This event happened at the Chamber of Commerce situated near the Bharathi Park at the heart of Pondicherry just a few streets away from the wonderful Pondy beach.

I am one of the speakers at this event and I preferred to speak on "Dark side of the Internet". This is my first ever talk and attempt to prepare for such a talk was going from Wednesday onwards. The three day preparations on this topic with myself searching frantically on the Internet was a knowledgeable experience in knowing about the tragedies happening on the internet.

This event was fixed in the evening, I left my office an hour earlier by 3.30 p.m. Arrived at the venue, "Chamber De Commerce" as it is originally called in the French. It had a good ambience of the French style. Being there well before the event, got me the chance to have a few lighter moments with RajaSukumaran and other people. A team work by every one of the people there was awesome in making out the hall be ready for the crowd to come and occupy.

After an hour, the venue was witnessing the participants for the event.

The meet started with Professor Na.Elango Sir giving off the welcome speech.

Rajasukumaran Sir, the coordinator of the Puducherry Bloggers group giving out his talk about the group.

That is Ko.Sukumaran Sir giving out an interesting talk on the steps involved right from starting a simple blog and he spoke specifically about Tamilmanam, Tamilveli and Thirati which are making their wonderful contribution to develop the language of Tamil on the internet.

The next session is mine. As you see in the pic above, you can read my body language. I was so much having a blank mind and really a fear is making its journey back and forth on my nerves from head to toe. I really felt the feeling of the Butterfly on my Stomach. As this was a first ever session for me to just speak in front of the audience, I was totally clueless on how would be the outcome of my talk would be.

Finally I made it. Had a good experience of giving such a talk.

The previous experience for me to do such a session was during the Villupuram Tamil Blog Camp where I explained on how to use the Google reader. It was an easy experience which needed just to give directions on how to use it with an online presentation. But, this event is totally different for me since I had to prepare and give out the talk to explain the audience on the topic. There is neither slide presentation with me for my audience to see nor any other projections to help me have an ease while my session is on. But, its a good and nice experience.

The freebies which made the travail to the participants while back to their home.

This was totally a different experience for me. My colleagues Raja Durai, Venkata Krishnan and Venkatesh made their visit to this event. Feedback of my talk from them was definitely a stepping stone for me.

The coverage of the event on the local cable TV got to reach to the people of Pondicherry. 

Totally a wonderful experience and an awesome evening to spend time with some of the good intelluctuals.


Pic Courtesy: Friends from the Tamil Bloggers' Group
You can have a nice read about this event at puduvaibloggers.blogspot & Pudhuvai.com

Photos of Villupuram Tamil Blog camp

A slide show of photos of the Villupuram Tamil Blog camp


Photo courtesy : Ko.Sugumuran

Villupuram Tamil Blog Camp - Photo tour

Its a nice time attending the Tamil Blog Camp event with the opportunity to network with bloggers from neighbouring towns like Pondy and Villupuram.

Left home by 5.20 a.m. and picked up by my colleague Kumaresan and then landing up at Moolakulam in Pondy for my colleague Shiva's house warming ceremony.

The previous day, there was an invitation from Ra.Sugumaran to join him at Pondy and then travel to Villupuram by car with other friends. Ofcourse when I left Shiva's function and called Sugumaran at 7.00 a.m. he was taking bath. He had gone to sleep only after 2.00 a.m. after the hectic work of completing the eleventh hour preparations for the event.

A change in plan...
I shall reach my Father-in-Law's house situated 10 kms before Villupuram and then catch Sugumaran while he crosses that place.
At 8.20 a.m. my mobile rings, Ra.Sugumuran calling...
We are nearing your place, where shall we catch you...

Where are you now?

We have crossed Madagadipet and travelling in a blue Indica car
Ok I shall stand 1 Km after Valavanur. I am wearing a white shirt...
By the time I approached the highway the Indica car sped past...
Oh !
Alas caught a tempo and reached Sugu's group waiting near the Koliyanur Road junction..
What a surprise, already the car is fully packed with 5 people + driver.
Sir, I shall come by bus.
No no, Come with us, we can adjust and go.
A good reception.
This is the first time I am meeting Ra.Sugumaran in person.
Although its very hard to get ourselves jam packed inside this Truly Indian Car, our friends were cool and receptive to this extra person intruding into their already packed car.
But in spite of the too short time and myself delaying their time a bit and making the people feeling more hardship inside the car, I could see the warm reception to this additional member inside the Tata Indica Car
Is this the Tamilian touch, I felt a feather in my cap on being a Tamilian.
A great feeling to get a good company of nice friends.

Then the car started and Sugumaran giving introduction of who's who. In the next 15 minutes we reached the venue.

Though Villupuram happens to be a District Headquarters the road leading from the main road to the Aringnar Anna Arts college is too worst and is full of pot holes. Is this the Indian roads, Why no body cares for such a condition which makes foreigners make fun of we Indians.

We reached the venue at around 9.00 a.m. and got surprised to see the internet connection working. Posted the first update of the event.

The technical staff of the computer lab of Aringnar Anna Arts college had already done the task the previous day to keep the PCs tuned up for the event. The college management was keen to see that everything is to the satisfaction for those attending the event.

Welcome to the camp.

Many persons at the event were new for me and I could not grasp many of their names.

This elderly person was giving out the forms and getting them back after being filled up by the attendees. The respect in his wordings were truly pleasing. A salute to you Sir.

The event has started and people are seen testing their just learned blogging concepts. I was doing a bit of live blogging of the event from that computer.

Almost all the PCs in the college are having Windows98 and many functions in the blogger website is not working. I wonder how the students of the college will succeed in updating their computer skills and make themselves fit to the needs of the emerging career secenario with this outdated operating system.
To be noted is - Microsoft has discontinued this operating system from mid 2006.

Ko.Sugumaran and Mu.Elangovan at the event.

Its surprising to see such a good number of girls were eager to learn the blogging stuff. Really interesting to know their urge to know about the blogging.

A satisfaction to me of having got an opportunity to teach a person on blogging.

The LCD projector which had done a promising work for the event. Although the image output is somewhat dull the projector worked non-stop making the event complete.


Hon. Minister of Higher Education Shri.Ponmudi giving out his talk.

To mark the occasion, a blog for Hon. Minister in his name was created.
URL - ponmudi2008.blogspot
There was a comment that though DMK's colour is Yellow the blog was designed with green colour - trademark of the party's rival - AIADMK

A photo session going on.

A session on insertion of photos and videos in a blog post is going on.

Myself giving out a session of google reader and igoogle.
Some of the participants felt that its really useful tool and thanked me of giving out this information.
Thanks for the encouragement.


Certificates getting ready.

A book in tamil titled "Important rivers, dams and water falls of Tamil Nadu" written by Mu.Nakkeeran was gifted to me as an appreciation for making out a session.
Actually I was left out in the list and it was Ra.Sugumaran who was particular in noting the mistake and ensuring that the gift was given out to me. A really good thing.

Mr.Raveendran, Deputy General Manager of BSNL, Cuddalore giving out his talk before presenting certificates to the participants. He is the only person other than me to come from Cuddalore. After the event I got lift in this Car to get dropped in Cuddalore. So much wonderful discussion with him that he had assured of helping out in conducting a tamil blog camp in Cuddalore.


A few more photos are there, I shall put a slide show in the next article.

Photo courtesy : Ko.Sugumuran

Tamil Blog Camp Update - 3.00 p.m.

Just finished lunch.

This camp has made many of the attendees hook on to the Computers around. Half of them are from the fairer sex, a good strength and so many people tied up with the event with interesting discussions in the native language coming out from the dedicated speakers.

The camp has made these people learn the first step of blogging and they are found sticking to the computers.

I shall be giving a talk on using the google reader the wonderful free tool from google. This tool enables one read the blogs and rest assured of not missing any single post from their favorite blogs.

Of course since so many people are on the internet the bandwith not supporting its taking longer times to proceed. I have to post the photos only after I go to home.

Tamil Blog Camp Update - 12.30 p.m.

Hon. Minister Shri.Ponmudi has arrived at the event and giving out speech on importance of Tamil.

The venue is now jam packed with around 150 people most of them standing and catching the moments of the tamil blog camp.

A blog with the name of Hon. Minister Shri.Ponmudi is being created.

Tamil Blog Camp Update - 11.30 a.m.

Hon Higher Education Minister Ponmudi is expected to grace the event.

The strength here is nearly 75 and a few bloggers from Chennai have arrived at the event.

A session on creating a simple blog using a blogger.com account is going on. Attendees were being taught on how to create a simple blog using a blogger.com account. For creating a blogspot address, a gmail id is required. So there were a number of people creating gmail accounts from the venue. Many of them getting sucked since the website does not allow to create an id. Then it was told that since many number of email ids were created from the same IP address, the website blocks creation of a number of accounts to prevent a possible spam.

But the fact that more number of email ids can't be created at the the same time from the same IP is a lesson.

Tamil Blog Camp Update

Reached the venue - Aringar Anna Arts College - Villupuram.
We a group of Six people including Ra.Sugumaran, Ko.Sugumaran and others arrived at the venue.
Break fast going on.
Internet Connection is already working - A Big Satisfaction
Arrangements such as Computers and stage requirements are going on in full swing.
Shall update about this intersting camp as quickly as possible.

STAY TUNED

Tamil bloggers camp

The tamil bloggers group at Villupuram is organising a one day event on blogging.

The event is taking place on Sunday - 11 May 2008 from 9.00 am onwards
Venue : Aringar Anna Govt. Arts College, Villupuram


An opportunity for me to rub shoulders with bloggers from around my neigbouring town.
Await for an article shortly...

Related Articles :
1.vizhuppuramvalaippathivar
2. puduvaibloggers

Photos & videos from Tamil Blog camp

The Tamil blog camp made the gathering a more interesting one with the presence of intellects of the tamil language. The participants got a visual treat of the world's second longest beach the Marina, before entering into the venue.

A warm welcome to the bloggers..

The events ... Vicky giving the intro of the event. The message is that the workshop is everybody's event and each one of the participants is an organiser. Participants made sure that they got their seat before the start of the event.

Although similar camps connected with the blogging and the like will usually witness young chaps and techies, this is a unusual one with an equal number of senior academicians making their presence to the event.
The food token with catchy words, was made sure by the organisers the it was received by each and every participant arriving at the reception.
The programme witnessed the exchange of highly useful information between the people. While the discussion on "how far the Government has implemented? " kicked off, the hall witnessed innovative sparks from persons such as Americai Narayanan (above) and the practicalities involved in implementing such policies.


The brain behind the ekalapai, the support software for tamil language.
The websites / blogs connected with the tamil language. The workshop @ the first floor is a quite interesting session on how to start blogging.
The audience were hooked up with the teacher.


Myself tasting the hot & tasty coffee.
Apart from the workshop there were PCs kept in a separate hall for the people to test their blogging skills.


One of the senior most participants taking down notes. Googling has it become a verb ?? ...


The high level of interaction was seen at the workshop. The eldest person to the workshop being interviewed by the CNN-IBN news channel.

A thought for the people on the wise way of selling their ideas.
The youngest participant to the workshop.
Myself with Mahen.
Ramki discussing on how social blogging can be done successfully. Muhammad Ismail, CEO of Digital Net Services gave a speech on how spyware becomes an unwelcome predators into the internet connected PCs. Some of the useful techniques to find out the spywares, keyloggers were video recorded by me at the workshop. The Youtube video podcast in Tamil is of 4':49" duration.





Poorna seen participating in an audition which included the various activities by the Tamil Bloggers of Chennai.



The organisers who had toiled to make this workshop a fruitful one.
The fruit had become more sweeter with the top headlines in The New Indian Express the next day flashing the moments of the Tamil Blog Camp.

Hats off to you organisers to make the event a roaring success and empowering participants.

Just a click of the evening seashore.