WHEN YOUTUBE CAME AFTER ME - hguy.blogspot.com

This happened in the year 2012. I was back from my school reunion. That is BVBPS Hyd RCPuram Class of 1983.  The best reunion ever ever ever. The two-day affair is more memorable than my wedding day. Really.

Well. I became the self-appointed reunion archivist and went about collecting pics and video from the people who flashed their cams during the reunion. And I loaded videos on YouTube and lo... One video got banned right away. WT hell...

The reason - the video, they said, contained copyrighted material. What? I couldn’t believe it.

I protested, objected but to no avail.

What happened was this -Saregama saw the video which had us goofing around having a nice time and said that they have the copyright to the Amitabh song 'Rote Hue Aate Hai Sub' from Mukaddar Ka Sikandar. It was a laugh. We have copycats making outright copies of songs for a commercial purpose and here we are with a video that is miles away from infringing any copyright.

They asked me to remove the video. I refused. They said they will close my channel. I said I will take them to court. It went on and on (and is not yet concluded). It did result in a change of thinking and YouTube policy. We can now upload say old Hindi songs but all the likes and comments will be attributed to the original content creator. Nevertheless, that doesn’t apply to this video. It shouldn’t have been blocked in the first place.

Please see for yourself and let me know whether or not we have even remotely infringed the rights of Amitabh Bachchan, Prakash Mehra, Kalyanji Anandji and Anjaan.

And 50 bucks if you can name the peeps in the video.....

This is the video

For those who want to know what out class has been thru, here is the link. 

#youtube #ban #amitabh #bollywood #reunion #classof83 #bvbps #hyderabad

EIGHT REASONS WHY FACEBOOK ADS. SUCK - hguy.blogspot.com

I am being bombarded with ads. on Facebook. All wrong products or wrongly-timed products.

1. I purchased a pair of undies from Amazon. And as I opened Facebook, I found the buggers trying to sell me the same pair. WTF.

2. I googled 'Free tool for bloggers". And as I went on Facebook, I found that they filled my newsfeed with ads of products. I mean, every second post was an ad. What they conveniently forgot was that I only wanted 'free' products.

3. I am so frightened of googling anything becos these smart guys try selling me whatever I Google. I went to MailChimp and registered and even sent out my first mailer. FB picks that up and tries selling me MailChimp.

4. And the bombardment is nonstop. They have made ads. as low as 73 INR. And suddenly attracted scores of advertisers. Most of them individuals with no real product. They are only driving traffic to their blog. Or selling crap that I will never buy. What FB and others don’t realize is that I know them, but they don’t know jack shit about me. So don’t try selling me things.

5. I don’t want to be dramatic and say my newborn died and I wrote about it on FB and then they tried selling me a diaper. And I am now hurt and depressed and on meds. No, that’s not me. But buddy, aren’t you getting a little desperate and pissing off users. I have not bought anything from a FB ad. And don’t think I ever will. Nevertheless, FB must be selling me to advertisers as a 'handsome intelligent dude who buys any shit thrown at him’.

6. FB said that i can earn some money by writing instant articles. I enrolled. And the next day they ask me money to boost my article. WTF. It always is about them and not me.

7. Ok. If one friend likes a product or a service, FB keeps informing me of the same. And if two friends like the same thing, I will not know the end of it. Two of my friend enrolled their kids in MIT and liked the MIT page. Now FB keeps insisting that I too should like MIT. They are relentless. Morning evening. I now hate MIT, these two friends, and their kids.

8. More seriously, I have found a massive shift in user behavior on FB. And if not addressed it will lead to the end of FB. FB as a fundamental policy is encouraging users to talk about the past. Of memories. What u did 4 yrs ago? Or how long u know this person. So peeps are moving so much into their past, that the tool is slowly becoming irrelevant to the present and lesser so for the future. You can’t post ur upcoming movie or book and expect a response. But if I said I did this 4 yrs ago or met so-and-so 5 yrs ago, I get eyeballs. This may not be about ads. but I feel they are all connected somehow.

So FB- please.

#FacebookAdsSuck

What do you think? Is this article fail. Please do leave comments below.

GOOD OLD VIDEO GAMES...

I recently started playing Candy Crush and Farmville on FB. This took me back to the starting of video games.

Pacman

One of the first big hits was Pacman. I was a maha addict of this game.

Bricks

Bricks had a paddle and a ball. Lot like ping pong.

Space

Space was one of the first of the games to have levels.

Snake

Snake: It eats and it grows. This is still present on mobile phones.

Prince of Persia

Prince of Persia: This was on of the first to get good graphics. Had the 3D feel. It had hidden lives and wins. I remember those days the PoP cheat sheet was quite famous. No Google then so had to be passed on by hand.