Tech Ka Masala

In this episode - Manan & I talk about the topic that may well turn out to be the biggest tech story of 2011 - Steve Jobs announcing his retirement. While there cant be a replacement, the succession plan has been well planned. The other stories discussed include Google's Motorola purchase, Samsung Annoucing ChatON, Reliance's 3G Tab, MapMyIndia's Carpad and we had almost forgotten HP's big announcement.

The sound quality is a bit choppy in this episode since we were both on cell phones but that didnt stop us from arguing about this week's tech stories. The stories includes Nokia's acquistion of Twango, Microsoft's ad based MS Office, China having only 244 MS Vista licenses and ended with yet another Google acquisition.

Manan and I talk about the much talked about Google Street view mapping program being launched but as soon as it did the Bangalore police sent them a shut down notice. YouTube also launched the Box Office with Band Baja Baaraat seems to be making an aggressive push into publisher content. We also spend sometime talking about 100 glorious years of IBM and wonder which new age company will still be around 100 years from today. We also briefly talk about Aaramshop.com, and NIC website getting hacked.

I have two TV Tech Show hosts - Sudhir Sayal of ET NOW and Aalaap Ghag, formerly of UTVs Techtree. We talk about Microsoft buying Skype - one of the most high profile acquisition in recent times. Microsof has received a lot of bashing in the press for the sort of money they spent to buy skype but here is the TKM panels take on it. Also, after discussing about the huge VC investments in the US, Indian enterpreneurs are finally seeing their share. There are no prizes that eCommerce is the focus area for VCs but is it too concentrated in one segment remains to be seen.

Another 40 mins of Tech Ka Masala is here for you. Manan and I talk about Infbeams 2000 crore MoU with Gujarat Govt to e-nable rural Gujarat and help them set up their stores online. The sheer value of the MoU is staggering from an e-commerce point of view in India. They obviously see something that Manan and I cant. We also spend enough time talking about Microsofts seriousness about the Windows Phone 7 Platform given the mishaps and lack of updates to the platform and also, about LinkedIn reaching 100 mn users in India and why the phenomenal service is so undervalued. Other topics include the iPad 2 launch, layoffs expected at AOL India and XXX domain being cleared.