Wordcamp Mumbai #WCMumbai 2014

Annkur Wordcamp Mumbai

After missing the first Wordcamp India (Delhi) in 2009, last year I got an opportunity to attend the my first Wordcamp at Pune. I got introduced to a whole new set of like minded junta (yet the ones who would blow me away with their talent, creativity & lightheartedness). I also travelled to Baroda to participate at Wordcamp earlier this year and when WC finally arrived to hometown Mumbai, I couldn’t wait to see how the participants mix here would be.

From what I saw, this was one of the only events in Mumbai with more developers than non techies (success or failure?). Wordcamp by its nature attracts a lot of community folks from across the country and that is something I really love. People traveling from Kolkata, Lucknow, all parts of Gujarat and Maharashtra for an event = wow. The Mumbai organizers surely did great by keeping the ticket pricing at Rs 300 (or pay whatever you like over 300) – cheers to Gounder, Kane and the team!  Read More

The Day I Took An Auto Driver To Police Station

Auto Drivers In Mumbai

A few weeks back, on a fine Sunday afternoon I was seen tweeting about help required around Goregaon / Malad (Mumbai) to take a fraudulent Auto-rickshaw driver to a nearby Police Station. I had promised to share more details on my blog and here we go!

Yesterday Mumbai saw a flash strike by auto rickshaw drivers which apparently wasn’t called by their union. Newspapers are reporting hundreds of rigged auto meters lying at workshops as auto-walas panic to get them ‘un-tampered’ given the recent RTO drive against them. As my friend Sandeep RTs above … Only in India you can dare to go on a strike, justifying an act of cheating.

What happened that Sunday was a simple story. I took an auto from Andheri highway to Goregaon Oberoi Mall. The auto driver wasn’t in uniform and while that was least of my concern, as we reached the destination (Oberoi Mall, Goregaon) I realised he was trying to overcharge me. The meter reading was 4.80 and the auto-driver asked me for Rs 64.

I happened to knew the formula for calculating the auto-fare after the recent change in tariffs (Thanks M4Mum/Raxit). So when the auto rickshaw driver asked mr for Rs 64, I got a little suspicious and casually hit the calculator on my mobile. For the ones who want to note, the formula is x13 –2 (multiply the meter reading by 13 and subract 2 from the total.)

The calculation in my case came to 60.4 and not 64. A small difference. I confronted the auto wala and he showed me a fare card. It was certainly a fake one, for fares above Rs 80 his tariff card showed amounts higher by Rs 10 or more. I told him that he is cheating & he suggested me to forget the 4 rupee difference as a loan and asked me to go. Yes, WTF.

I took the fare card and told him to take me towards the mall on the opposite side, where there were quite a few police vans given it was near about independence day. The auto-wala realized that I am not going to relent and Read More

Startup Weekend: Cambridge To Hyderabad, The Experience

Startup Weekend Cambridge

Back in March (2011) I disappeared for a month to UK and while I spent a month there, there are only two significant things I did. The First being a visit to Stone Henge (picture below) and the other being ‘Startup Weekend Cambridge.’

Startup Weekend is this 54 hours madness that brings together business folks, developers, designers and jack of all trades like me to build a startup over a weekend. Ones with an idea pitch it, voting follows and teams are formed organically. These teams have to come back with a product / prototype / demo / whatever by Sunday evening and present to the judging panel. In march, Startup Weekend, which has as of today done over 100 cities and 250 action packed weekends, came to India.

My friend Pankaj Jain was (he still is) passionately spearheading the India leg of SW and I decided to jump in and help organize Delhi and Bangalore. Events were planned, dates final, lots of pre-event work done and then UK happened at the same time as SW Bangalore and Delhi. And right then, Pjain pointed me to Startup Weekend Cambridge and I signed up for it immediately. So as the folks in India were organizing Bangalore, I participated in Cambridge. Left home with a view of seeing startup action in UK, getting a feel of the event, floating around multiple teams and chilling over the weekend.

What happened was crazy. Read More

Office Office

2010 is here and after a good year and a half of blogging on Annkur.com; I have slowed down. The frequency of posts have fallen and now I can so much relate to @thakkar speaking about “his 6 dead blogs” at Blog Camp Mumbai around a year back. While blogging still remains a integral part of my day to day work (at OnlyGizmos) the reason Annkur.com was created, was to share what I like, what I feel and not just gadgets and technology.

I am wondering what I should do to get back those wonderful thoughts that made some really memorable posts here. Any suggestions?

One of the ideas I might explore is to integrate a photo blog here; but the writings for now are rare 🙁

Btw the post is titled office office, as I have just got started with a new office routine. Though not the first office for me, but a first with a good 5 member team and a hectic 12 hour office schedule almost everyday. And yes, I am loving it! Leaving you with a few pictures below: Read More

BarCamp Mumbai 6 – An experience

I am starting to like the idea of ruining my weekends running around volunteering for unconferences. hey did i tell ya that this will be one of those #random #incomplete posts. The fact remains that I declined the invitation to be an unorganizer and @vivekk forced (tricked) me into it. Btw: this pic below is after #bcm6 and was taken by @mahafreed. I kinda like this pic and so decided to write this post, so that I can put it on my blog … sssh! Barcamps are these weird meets, unlike the name – there is no alcohol here and that suits me well, well maybe.

So I started writing this post while listening to this, and I am originally supposed to put this on facebook, but i am too lazy to switch tabs and do that. (Update: this is this). Now as I write, I see that my sweet little sis is complaining that I havn’t posted anything psyco (did I spell that correctly?) (cares who.. jaane do), like this since a long time. (Update: This this is this, or perhaps something else) Yes I am now a little sleepy aswell. So what happened at Barcamp? Well I stole this T-Shirt from @sengupta, took 2 under tree sessions along with @priyankawriting and @vivekk (or rather stuck my foot in their undertree sessions),

btw the food was yummy. Imagine what would have happened if I would have okayed that food from the SPJIMR MESS 😛 (@vivekk saved you’all the horror). I also hijacked 2 sessions  or rather hijacked one for 2 mins with permission, helped @farrhad hijack one and stuck my foot / or ws it my tongue? in @monikkinom’s super cool session. OOPS this was about me at barcamp, so what happened at barcamp6 actually? Well when you are on my page, you better look for me and what i did, not bcm6  – shame on you. OK silly. Whtever!

bcm6

The Debate: Blog Came Pune 2 Video

Here is a small video from my talk at BCP2 in June earlier this year. This one is really special. It was the first time I took a session at any unconference / seminar and what better audience than my fellow bloggers to interact with. Though I was really nervous it was a proud moment for me. Thank you all for the support.

If you cant see the video click here

More BCP2 videos soon

Attempt to photograph the Eclipse #tse22

In a bid to get some exclusive and clear pictures / view of the Solar Eclipse we traveled to Surat on 21st Night. After 9 hours of drive and 2 1/2 hours of sleep we were all excited to climb up to the terrace of a 11 storey building in Surat… Read More

HeadStart Tweoples’ Road Trip

MBA216

Evangelizing twitter on juhu beach

Now since @iMBA is such a lazy busy ass, I would have to make this blog entry. One of my most memorable outings was this little Road Trip along with Mitesh, Amit and Rahul. The original trip starts from Belapur when Mitesh (@iMba) and Rahul take Amit (@abeoye) for Mumbai darshan. The first halt being Andheri where I connect with them and we head towards Juhu.

It was just a casual walk back to office after lunchtime when I decide to join these guys and I never knew that I would return home only 36hours later after loads of fun, action, drama, adventure, tweetup … you name it – we did it! 😉

— incomplete — View the pics for now

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#BlogCampPune 2 – Late Reaction

Attending Blog Camp Pune 2 at SICSR (Symbiosis) was a great adventure. We (myself, ankesh, tarun, thakkar) left right after the monthly #Aptw tweetup in Mumbai (thats around midnight). At past 3AM we were hunting for some humans on empty Pune streets to ask for directions towards ThakkarJr‘s house. Not sure what time we reached there but we enjoyed Pani Puri’s that were waiting for us and theplas that my mom packed with me.

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Busy June…

June 2009 is probably one of the most busiest months this year (yet). HeadStart, StartupSaturday, Nischay keeps me busy with events and on the other hand tones of smartphone releases makes things at OnlyGizmos Network hectic.

An upcoming Blog Camp in Pune is something I am really looking forward to. Its IMO the biggest meet of Bloggers in West India. Scheduled for 27th June. Also coming up on 26th is the Aperitweat in Mumbai.

So all in all I want to say though I am composing a few posts on mobile, I doubt if there would be many from me this month. Guest Posts most welcome (almost anything goes on my blog)…  🙂

Btw: hope to see you at HeadStart this saturday (june 10th) – Buy the tickets here! A peek-a-boo at the conference hall below

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