It is with considerable pride that I can announce that we have just released

If you are in the USA and have an iPhone, feel free to try it out – it’s free (for now).

Notch up another product release, after Mundu Radio, Mundu IM v4 and now Mundu IM for the iPhone. Plus the C|Net Webware 100 Award for Mundu Radio.

It’s been a good year.

[UPDATE:] We have a hit on our hands! Check out some of the reviews on C|Net, IphoneAtlas and TechCrunch. And this is only after day 1!

I am on the lookout for an individual or company that is experienced in creating effective *product* related websites.

Note that I am not looking for backend developers. What I am looking for are people who understand product focus (and of course site usability), and who have experience in working with non-webdesigner clients – this includes being able to understand and interpret a client’s needs without the client having to be a product web designer. If you are the type of designer who starts a discussion with “tell me EXACTLY what you want”, then you are probably not the kind of person I am looking for – if I could tell you EXACTLY what I am looking for, then I wouldn’t need your services, would I?

If you are such person or company who matches up to my requirement, please contact me with a list of sample product websites (with URLs) that you have designed. Your own website URL would be great as well.

If you remember, back in May I had asked all of you to go vote for Mundu Radio. Well, this is kinda late news, but hey – Mundu Radio won! The competition was awesome, and to be placed among winners such as Google and Yahoo is mind-boggling!

When we created Mundu Radio last year, I didn’t quite realise just how ready the market was for something like this, but clearly it was. We have had so many downloads and so many users, it’s scaring me! Not that they aren’t happy with the product, but because the expectations are so high when it comes to the next version.

We have been busy as beavers defining the new product, identifying additional platforms, etc. And now we need people to work with me on this product (and related ones, which I can’t talk about yet).

So if you are keen to work on mobile applications, as addressed by this article of mine, and if you have some experience in C/C++/J2ME development on Linux, Symbian, PalmOS, Windows Mobile and MacOSX, and if you want to work in an environment that is open and colourful as this (our new, HUGE office on Outer Ring Road in Bangalore, that FINALLY serves fantastic, freshly ground and roasted coffee!!), then you should consider contacting me. You can also write to me at my firstname.lastname, a user in the domain of geodesic.com (damn these spammers that make me go through contortions like this!)

Update: You can also contact me through LinkedIN if you are a member there.

If you want to know more about the company, don’t hesitate to check it out, especially the results – we are doing great!

We are looking for people who consider software development to be a creative and expressive art form, not just a job. We are working on technologies that people will be using in the (near) future, and that needs not just development skills but an active imagination.

In fact, read this article, download the current application and in your application, tell us how you would make this a better application, or what other mobile applications you think the future could see.

I look forward to working with you!

Of all the Live Earth performances yesterday, this must have been the most surreal one:

Madonna, in what can only be termed a 1940s style of dress, with an expensive Les Paul guitar round her neck, rocking the planet.

One could say this was a stunt (and it was), but I bow to the Queen of Reinvention – that was an unbelievable performance! Even seeing this in a crappy Youtube display doesn’t take away the the unbelievable energy and magnetism that this woman (who is older than me!) exudes! I have seen much younger rockers appear like stone statues on stage compared to her.

Update: Youtube pulled the above video with this message:

If you still want to see this video, just google for it.

Try this:

Take a plastic bag (the one you got on your recent shopping trip will do).

Cover your nose and mouth with the opening of the bag, making sure that no air escapes from the sides.

Start breathing normally.

Keep doing it.

Feel the air in the bag (and that you are now breathing) getting warmer? Feel the uncomfortable feeling as the oxygen in the bag gets depleted, and the CO₂ level starts increasing? Feel the lightheadedness and the headache that slowly comes on?

That is what we, collectively, are doing to our planet.

It isn’t enough to point a finger at the (mis)developed nations like the USA, UK and parts of Europe, saying that they are the ones to blame. They may be the biggest perpetrators, but we here in Asia have an equally big role to play, by encouraging the west to continue what they are doing to pollute the planet.

At FOSS.IN, we decided to do away with plastic bags last year, and gave people eco-friendly cotton bags. Over the months since FOSS.IN/2006, we have received countless calls from people asking where they could get such bags, including from some megacorps like ABB. And we have heard of other events following our example.

Over the year, I have progressively replaced incandescent bulbs at home with energy efficient fluorescent ones. Not only did they last much longer and were much brighter than the earlier ones, but my savings on my electricity bill paid for the investment in 3 months.

I know there are many ways more ways to undo some of the damage we have caused to our planet in the past 100 years, and while you may not think that your own contribution will amount to much, I can assure you that it will.

Remember the hot and oppressive summers we have been going through these past few years? When you wondered what had happened to the pleasant climate we used to enjoy just a few years ago?

Remember that plastic bag you were breathing into?

Awareness, and pro-activeness are no longer an option – they are a necessity.

This is no longer about our children and the planet they will inherit.

This is about you and me.

SOS – Answer the Call

Apple has FINALLY released guidelines for designing webapps for the iPhone!

Go here.

Reads like a straight-forward how-to for mobile web applications – effectively what I have been “preaching” in my mobile computing talks.

Today, the iPhone gets released. And while everyone is going overboard about the features, the glitz, the hype, etc., I see something else that most people seem to be missing:

The iPhone is finally going to force people to write *real* mobile web-applications. Designed for a mobile interface, without sacrificing visual appeal, functionality or “whoa!”.

I have been waiting for this for a long time – ever since I use a my PDA for the first time to access the Internet, and sadly found that web designers couldn’t care less about mobile users. While I have had a mobile version of my diary for a long time (and yeah, I know it sucks ostrich eggs visually), I have not seen many people take the trouble of doing this kind of stuff.

While all these new fancy iPhone apps that are popping up all over the place are targeted at the iPhone, they will in effect be usable on any real mobile device. For example, almost all of them work just fine on my PalmOS PDA’s browser.

I think this is great.

Innovation isn’t about creating something new.

Innovation is about creating something that makes people sit up and say “Whoa! I want that!”

Woke up earlier than usual today, and lay in bed reading mail and my feeds on BlogLines on my PDA.

A long-time blog I have been following is that of the guy who got me into keeping an online diary in first place (I refuse to call it a blog) – Wil Wheaton – blogger extraordinaire, great writer and fantastic human being over all. And oh yes, Ensign Wesley Crusher from Star Trek: The Next Generation.

When Wil says something is worth reading, I usually take his advice, especially since his reading tastes (and software tastes – he is a Linux user) closely resemble my own.

This morning, he pointed us at a story by Cory Doctorow called When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth.

He claimed to have read it through in one go, which is a tall claim these days – no one writes that well anymore.

I was wrong.

I read the story through in one go, beginning to end, no stops. Before I even had my first coffee of the day.

This is truly a story written for people of today. Every sysadmin is going to love it.

Go read it.

Now.

I am in the market for a new motherboard for the RadioVeRVe studio machine, and was doing some research on CPU performance and reviews.

And I ran into this. (Read the whole thing, right to the end).

As Shreyas just put it: “The Internet is truly magical”.