Just returned from my talk at the Sri Siddhartha Institute of Technology in Tumkur, where the folks had their annual fest INTERFACE.
To get there, I had to get up at 6:00 am, and leave home just before 8:00 am. Took about 75 minutes to get there by car (my driver driving, not me!). Shubha decided to tag along – guess she hasn’t heard enough of my speeches yet to be completely bored 
IAC, managed to find the place without any problems and, after a massive breakfast with Principal Reddy and his team, and a quick (and highly impressive) tour of the institute, I found myself giving away awards and then proceeded to give my talk.
I had prepared slides during the drive to the college, but decided not to use them in the end, as I had been requested to also address the students on matters related to the IT industry and give them some advice, while at the same time showing them my vision of the Future of Computing.
So I spoke from the heart – experiences I have had, stuff I felt they should know. I used them (and my trusty PDA) to highlight the need to think outside the box, to go beyond the cut-and-dry world of their syllabus, and the need to learn to learn.
I showed them how “thinking outside the box” worked when designing software for PDAs, and how different that world is from the PCs they may be used to. I also talked about network computing, wireless networking and similar stuff.
Surprisingly (for a college function) I managed to retain my audience all the way to the end, and even managed to get a rant in about copy-protected CDs and antique ecommerce authentication systems. I spoke for 75 minutes, and Shubha says it went well.
After the talk had a gargantuan lunch (which totally rocked – YUM!), got to meet and chat with Minister for Higher Education Dr.G. Parameshwara (who was doing surprise checks at various CET examination centres), and was back in Bangalore by 3:30pm.
Everything went as per schedule, which was good.
I do hope the students of SSIT found my talk interesting enough to take it to heart – because as it is the case of so many technology areas today, the Future of Computing is really people like them, who will (in years to come) change the world (or what we leave them).
[Update: Some photos here]