Rahman to record MJ's song

Oscar winning musician A.R. Rahman will be a part of the historic remake of Micheal Jackson's 'We are the World' song. The music will be a part of the charity program organized to raise funds for earthquake victims in Haiti. According to reports, 75 world-class stars, including Celine Dion, Kanye West, Natalie Cole, Tony Bennett, Jonas Brothers, Pink, Barbra Streisand, Miley Cyrus, Justin Bieber, Jamie Foxx, Lil Wayne, Wyclef Jean, Josh Groban, Snoop Dogg, Carlos Santana, Gladys Knight and many others, will be a part of the charity anthem. The song will be recorded at the Henson Recording studio, where the original song was recorded 25 years back. Oscar-winner Paul Haggis of Crash fame will shoot the video and the album is expected to premiere during the Winter Olympics on February 12. 'We are the World' was originally recorded by the late King of Pop' Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. It featured around 45 American musicians and has reportedly raised over $30 million for African hunger relief.

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Dhanush's newest avatar

After acting and singing, Dhanush is all set to try his hand at writing lyrics. The actor has reportedly penned the lyrics of a song in his upcoming film Ready, directed by Mithran Jawahar and with music by Vijay Antony. Sources says that the entire film unit appreciated the actor for his clear lyrics. Ready is the remake of a Telugu super hit film of the same title, directed by Srinu Vytla with Ram and Genelia in the lead roles. The film narrates the story of Chandu, a final year engineering student. One of his friends falls in love with a girl, whose father arranges her marriage with some other person. So his friends kidnap the bride out of the marriage hall to arrange their marriage. However, Chandu's gang mistakenly rushes into the wrong marriage hall and kidnap Pooja. Later, Chandu falls in love with Pooja. What happens next makes up the rest of the film. Genelia will be the heroine in the Tamil version too.

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Harris's song for CM

Earlier, we have reported that the film fraternity will organize a mega event to felicitate Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi for allocating land to those connected with the film and small screen industry. The event is scheduled to take place on February 6 with a grand cultural show at the Nehru Indoor Stadium, Chennai. Now, the latest buzz is that a song has been peened by veteran lyricist Vaali in honour of the CM for his generosity towards the film industry. Guess who has composed the music for this song? None other than Harris Jayaraj. The popular musician has swung the baton for this song which will be rendered by Unni Menon, Tippu, Haricharan, Devan, Vijayagopal, Chinmayi, Charulatha, Madhumitha, Divya, Neha and Nathisha. The mega event will feature many leading stars, including Superstar Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan. Reports also state that Big B Amitabh Bachchan will be the guest of honour. The event is jointly organized by all the associations of the film and small screen industry, Nadigar Sangam, FEFSI and Producers' Council.

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Boney to remake Bodyguard in Hindi?

After remaking Tamil actor Vijay's all-time super hit Pokkiri in Hindi as Wanted with Salman Khan in the lead, Bollywood's leading producer Boney Kapoor is rumoured to have set his eyes on yet another South Indian film Bodyguard (Malayalam), starring Dileep and Nayantara. According to sources, Boney recently watched Bodyguard in Ernakulam and is interested to make a remake in Hindi. Boney was quite impressed with the story of Bodyguard and wanted to remake the blockbuster in Hindi. He wants to remake it with Salman Khan as the lead and Prabhu Deva as the director. He is currently in the process of buying the rights of the film, a source said. However, when asked, Boney said that while he has definitely watched Bodyguard, but nothing has been finalized yet.

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Film fraternity bids adieu to Cochin Haneefa

Renowned actor and director Cochin Haneefa, who died in a private hospital at Chennai on Tuesday, was interred on Wednesday evening at the Central Juma Masjid at Broadway, Kochi with full state honours. People from all walks of life turned up to pay homage to the actor as the body was brought for funeral prayers. Many were seen wiping their tears when the body was lowered into the ground after the funeral prayers with police playing the last post and offering gun salute in honour of the departed actor. Earlier in the morning, the body of Haneefa was brought to Kochi, where the actor was born and brought up. The body was kept at his residence in Pullepady in the city and later, it was placed at the Ambedkar Stadium for the people to pay homage. Kerala Ministers S. Sarma and Jose Thettayil and a host of film stars, including Mammootty, Mohanlal, Jayaram, Dileep, Sarathkumar and Siddique paid their last respects when the body was brought to his house in the morning. It is a great loss for the film industry. Haneefa was one of my close friends. I have no words. The film industry has lost a great human being, Mammootty said. Haneefa is survived by his wife Fazila and twin daughters Safa and Marwa

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Dr. Biju's Veetilekkulla Vazhi

Writer-director Dr. Biju, who shot to fame with his much acclaimed Saira (2005) and Raman (2008) which were screened in Cannes and Cairo film festivals, is getting ready with his next film titled Veettilekkulla Vazhi, starring Prithviraj, Indrajith, Dhanya Mary Varghese and Lakshmi Priya in the lead roles. Set in the backdrop of terrorist operations in India, Veettilekkulla Vazhi is produced by B.C Joshi under the banner of Soorya Cinema. Prithviraj plays the role of a jail doctor, who comes across an awful experience with the act of terrorism. Indrajith dons the role of a terrorist while Praveena plays a social worker. Nedumudi plays a book seller. The film was shot at beautiful locations like Ladakh, Kashmir, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Bikkamkur, Ajmer, and New Delhi. M.J. Radhakrishnan is the cinematographer. Ramesh Narayanan is the music director. The film will grace screens soon.

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The concern about Commonwealth Games in Delhi

After China stunned the world with the incredible show they put up for the opening of the Beijing Olympics. I do hope we in India have something at least more spectacular than our ever dependable star acts on stage. Actually they are very good and most of them (and the best really is A R Rahman's concert act) have developed very professional acts on stage. But we need to go beyond that now.

What is of concern are the constant news items that keep appearing of the lack of preparation for the commonwealth games, even though I know that in India we are all used to somehow pulling everything off at the last minute. But of far far greater concern is this article that appeared in an Australian paper about child labor being used to accelerate the preparations. Of course the Western (and I guess now the Australian) press loves to put down accelerating economies like ours, but the following article is pretty disturbing : Delhi's Commonwealth Games slave labour shame

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Jr. NTR gets 9999 for his car

Tollywood's superstar in the making Jr. NTR has bagged the fancy number 9999' for his BMW car for a price of Rs. 5 lakhs in an auction held by the Transport Department. According to sources, the actor bought the number at this high cost as the number 9 was believed to be lucky for his grandfather N.T. Rama Rao. Some say this is all is part of his forthcoming marriage to be held in May. Jr. NTR will tie the knot with Narne Lakshmi Pranathi, daughter of Narne Srinivasa Rao (chairman of the StudioN Channel) and Narne Mallika. Lakshmi Pranathi is completing her Intermediate at a private college in Hyderabad.

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Bhama's debut in Telugu and Kannada

Tollywood hero Tanish's forthcoming Manchivadu, being directed by Lakshmi Narayana, is indeed very special to Malayalee audiences! How? After being reluctant to many offers from Tollywood due to her language constraints, Bhama finally makes her Tollywood debut with Manchivadu, produced by N.V. Prasad and Paras Jain under the banner of Mega Super Good Films. Sources said that it was cameraman Venugopal who suggested Bhama's name for Manchivadu, in which she plays the role of Indu, a very bold and modern girl brought up in USA, who comes to her ancestral home in Andhra Pradesh to spend her vacation with her grandfather. The story mainly revolves around how the characters played by Tanish and Raji fall in love with her. K. Viswanathan, director of the path breaking film Sankarabharanam, is also playing a key role. Notably, Bhama is also making her Sandalwood entry with director Purushothama's Kannada film Modalasala, based on father-daughter relations. Produced under the banner of Karnataka Talkies, the film stars Bhama opposite Yash. Incidentally, it was actress Vinaya Prasad (Sthree fame), who recommended Bhama to Purushothama, who was looking for a fresh face for the lead role. Bhama has already completed both projects and is waiting for their releases. We wish all the very best to this ravishing actress.

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Can larger companies still be passionate and quirky?

Writing for The New York Times, Adam Bryant conducted an interview with Tony Hsieh, the chief executive of Zappos.com. Part of the interview that intrigued me was Hsieh’s explanation of why he and his roommate sold their company LinkExchange to Microsoft in 1998.

Part of it was the money, he admits. But, mostly, it was because the passion and excitement that permeated the company in the beginning was gone, and he’d grown to dislike its culture:

“When it was starting out, when it was just 5 or 10 of us, it was like your typical dot-com. We were all really excited, working around the clock, sleeping under our desks, had no idea what day of the week it was. But we didn’t know any better and didn’t pay attention to company culture. By the time we got to 100 people, even though we hired people with the right skill sets and experiences, I just dreaded getting out of bed in the morning and was hitting that snooze button over and over again.”

To avoid this happening with Zappos, Hsieh says he formalized the definition of the Zappos culture into 10 core values; core values that they would be willing to hire and fire people based on. Read the interview with Hsieh for details on how they went about this.

I think it’s an admirable goal — to try to maintain an exciting culture by formalizing hiring guidelines to support it. At least they’re making an effort.

But I wonder if any company can maintain, at 100 employees, the same culture they had at 5 or 10 employees. It has always seemed to me that when a company grows, it has to make concessions in order to introduce needed processes and procedures.

For example, whereas one could make personnel decisions on a casual basis in a very small company, you have to follow formal procedures more closely in bigger companies in order to be fair and avoid prejudicial practices. You can’t just promote someone on a whim if there are several other people who are interested in the same position and would be upset if not given an opportunity to apply.

I will go out on a limb here and say that goals and priorities are always clearer and feel more personal in a smaller company than in bigger companies.

I once worked for a publishing startup that had us working all hours — not because long hours were required but because we all felt a great sense of accomplishment at, say, getting a book to the printer seconds before a deadline. But the larger the company is, the less an individual employee can see how his or her contribution directly affects the company. And the result is a less passionate environment.

The communication is less frequent in a large company since there are more channels for it to travel through, so things aren’t felt as immediately either.

At least that’s how it’s always been in my experience. I wonder if this phenomenon of growth can be “managed out”?

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iPad and other slates have a place in business

Donna Trivison, Director of IT for Ursuline College, said, “Yes, there is a business case which can be made for iPad or other convenient, easy to use tablet computers. The iPod Touch /iPad is instant on, instant off, and instant load. This aspect alone makes a compelling business case. Time is money. Though I’m not sure if that would be considered a function of tablet per se. It is more a function of iPhone operating system and multi-touch user interface, push one button, touch one icon. App loads and performs flawlessly. All apps (a.k.a., software) have a standardized look and feel… Elegant, functional, revolutionary.”

Mitchell Gibbs, Vice President of Services at Advocate Charitable Foundation, said, “While I’m not sold on the iPad - too limited in functionality - the form factor has a lot of potential, especially in vertical markets like healthcare. We currently have tablet PCs in active use and making them lighter, faster, with better battery life is only going to drive the business case.”

Others agreed that health care IT is a clear target for this form factor. Jay Rollins, Vice President of IT for Trilogy Health Services, said, “[It's] still early, but in healthcare, iPads would be great for electronic charting applications. No need for in-room kiosks, and the price point is pretty good as well.”

Matthew Metcalfe, Director of IS for Northwest Exterminating, said “For mobile employees there is certainly a case for it. Hospitals and their tablets have proven the concept.”

Lisa Moorehead, Director of IT for MA Dept of Public Utilities, said, “Slate PCs are the latest tech toy. The screens break and get damaged too easily. I can see some benefit in a hospital campus environment for reading x-rays, diagrams, etc. but, not unless the screens can be hardened.”

Other CIO Jury members were also concerned about the durability of the iPad. “They will have to be much more rugged then they are now,” said David Van Geest, Director of IT for The Orsini Group.

Several CIOs expressed skepticism about whether slates would have enough power and connectivity to be effective. “Until the business workforce becomes mobile and the slates develop a natural user interface that is truly usable, and have the horsepower/connectivity to run applications required for business users to function, there will be little need other than as a ‘curiosity’ or ‘toy,’” said Michael Woodford, Executive Director of IT for USANA Health Sciences, Inc.

Joel Robertson, Director of IT for King College in Bristol, TN, has a problem with the iPad specifically. “Yes for the slate but not for the iPad. The incompatibility with non-Apple apps and the lack of built in expansion ports would prevent us from considering the iPad.”

Others doubted the short-term effects but still saw potential. David Wilson, Director of IT for VectorCSP, said “I believe that the immediate impact will be small, but the possibility of using these as e-book / document readers alone is enough to intrigue me.”

Delano Gordon, CIO of Roofing Supply Group in Dallas, Texas, said, “In our case, I can see an immediate use for board meetings.”

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Five business scenarios for the iPad and other tablets

When you talk to IT pros and business managers about tablet computers, the first question they tend to ask is, “Looks cool, but what I do with it?” This conversation has been happening for a decade since Microsoft’s pen-based Tablet PC was introduced at Comdex 2001. There, Bill Gates declared, “Within five years I predict it will be the most popular form of PC sold in America.”

That turned out to be a false prophesy. Microsoft’s tablet never attracted a mass audience, although it has gained some niche adoption in industries such as health care, field service, and hospitality.

However, the Apple iPad and the new breed of slate computers that are hitting the market in 2010 are looking to revive the tablet concept. They are doing it with a lighter, thinner form factor that uses a touch-based interface rather than pen computing.

It’s way too early to predict whether the new tablets will be successful, but it’s easy to imagine some of the usage scenarios for them in the business world. Here are five to consider:

5. Replace 200-page business documents

Large business documents waste a lot of paper. Most of these tend to be legal documents that people never read from cover-to-cover, but when you have meetings to discuss any kind of major business deal the piles of paper can quickly get out of hand.

While some of these types of documents have already moved to PDF, that requires people to bring a laptop into the meeting to read the PDF. That can sometimes stifle the intimacy of the meeting. Slate computers that can lay flat on the table could be more conducive to an open discussion. There’s also a security implication. If a company has sensitive documents that it wants to share with a potential partner, but doesn’t want to email the documents, a company-owned slate computer could be used to display the big documents for guests to flip through, but all the data on the slate would remain in company hands.

4. Business reading and audiobooks for road warriors

Frequent business travelers often have a briefcase full of newspapers, magazines, and books that they want to catch up during a trip. Plus, they also usually carry on iPod with a few audiobooks and/or podcasts on it. The new tablet computers could offer the opportunity to consolidate this media experience into a single device, if newspapers follow the lead of The New York Times and magazines follow the lead of Sports Illustrated. Of course, the digitization process is already in full swing for books, with ebook apps for Amazon and Barnes & Noble and Apple’s iBookstore.

3. “Back of the Napkin” sketches

With his “Back of the Napkin” concept, Dan Roam has successfully convinced a lot of companies and professionals to draw simple pictures to help solve problems and sell ideas. However, integrating these pictures into standard business processes and communications isn’t always as simple as it should be. It’s easy to draw these pictures on a whiteboard, but then you have to take a picture of the whiteboard if you want to circulate it. With built-in drawing tools like the ones in the iPad, it’s about to get a lot easier to quickly draw simple pictures and circulate them digitally.

2. Small-scale presentations

While projectors and slide presentations have their place - especially for large meetings - there is also the opportunity to bring those same types of powerful visuals to smaller meetings, even as small as 1-on-1s. With a slate computer in hand, an employee could go to another employee’s office and quickly show off a PowerPoint file, a Back of the Napkin sketch, a set of images, or several product mockups on a dev server. This kind of show-and-tell could streamline idea-sharing and amp up innovation. While all of this is possible with a laptop, the slim form factor of slates lend themselves to better portability and show-and-tell.

1. Conference room computing

One of the common behaviors in many of today’s corporate conference rooms is to come in, sit down, and lay down your smartphone on the table. Smartphones have become our way to stay connected, send short messages, and look up information while in the middle of a meeting. The one thing you can’t really do with a smartphone is to easily share any information you found with the rest of the people in the meeting, because the smartphones screens are so small.

That’s why slate computers could become the conference room PCs of choice. People could use them to access documents, emails, images, and illustrations needed for the meeting. A presenter could send a PowerPoint file before a meeting and attendees could access the PPT from their personal slates during the meeting, and make their own notes on it. And, employees in the meeting could share visuals with the rest of the people in the meeting just by pulling up the data on-screen and then flipping the slate around.

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