How many hours you spend on the Web ? Why wear hi-heels !!

Technology is to be made use of  - it helps mankind, but one should never become slave to technology !

Modern day children are crazy over the internet, to many, posting on their wall, uploading photos, updating status and adding photos are the top most priorities.  Then there are more of Social networking sites – even small children tweet !!    such obsessive ones  are called Nerds - Nerd is a derogatory slang term for a person typically described as intellectual, socially-impaired, and obsessive who spends inordinate amounts of time on unpopular, obscure, or highly technical pursuits, or relating to topics of fiction or fantasy, to the exclusion of more mainstream activities.  Simply, many a times, those who spend too much time on Computers,  remain in isolation and pursue technologies are known as ‘Nerds’.

There are newspaper reports of a woman in Taiwan  killed herself by inhaling poisonous fumes while chatting with friends on Facebook and none of them alerted authorities.  The woman stated as Claire Lin killed herself on her 31st birthday, March 18, and family members who reported her suicide were unaware of the Facebook conversations that accompanied it, Taipei police is quoted as saying.  Lin’s last Facebook entries show her chatting with nine friends, alerting them to her gradual asphyxiation. One picture uploaded from her mobile phone depicts a charcoal barbecue burning next to two stuffed animals. Another shows the room filled with fumes.  Lin’s last words, in Chinese, were: “Too late. My room is filled with fumes. I just posted another picture. Even while I’m dying, I still want FB (Facebook). Must be FB poison. Haha.”  Her FB postings reportedly indicated that  she was unhappy because her boyfriend was ignoring her, and had failed to return home to be with her on her birthday.   A Sociologist stated that the incident reflected social isolation in the Internet age.

Today a disturbing survey in TOI states that internet users in India spend an average of 58 hours a week online; that's more than half the time they are awake. What's even more disturbing  is that half the netizens interviewed admitted that they suffered from internet withdrawal within the first three hours of being cut off from the web.  The report quoting Norton, the anti-virus Company as stating  "Indians are spending 12.9 hours browsing, 9.7 hours socializing and 6.1 hours on email every week,". In fact, 83% of users said they couldn't live without the internet for more than 24 hours.  According to Norton, the need to stay constantly connected is a new trend among Indian net surfers.   The article further sates that Indian netizens clearly place a high value on their personal information and would not allow stranger full access to their computers even against hypothetical big money.   

Only solace is the fact that the sample size of 500 respondents is relatively low and cannot be depended upon on its entirety.  The other finding was that half of them had little or no understanding of online security solutions  and were mostly content with basic security.  

A totally unrelated news (interested me primarily because I misread the heading)     You can be 5'1" and still win the Miss World contest – I misread it as ‘you can be 51 and still win the Miss World contest’ – realized my folly only in the end.

It was an article featuring the interview of the Chairperson of Miss World Organisation - Julia Morley, on how the competition has evolved  in the last 62 years.  The Miss World contest is the oldest beauty pageant  - they claim the concept of the contest to be 'beauty with a purpose'.  In her own words, beauty is a superficial thing anyway. Even if you are the most beautiful in the world, you are going to get used to your face at some point. Where do you go from there? Eventually, you will get bored of your face.

To a Q on why so many tall women enter the contest – she spoke of her visits to Korea and other parts of Asia where she does not see many tall women.  So tallness need not be the only accepted form of beauty – she is quoted as saying  ‘You can be 5'1" and still win the Miss World contest.

With regards – S. Sampathkumar.