Effect Of Social Network Sites For Youths

"Believe it or not, Britain’s “Facebook generation” — the 16 to 24-year-olds — are lonelier than any other age group, a survey has revealed"
    In the survey, one in three said they were bored with their lives compared to just 8% of pensioners and 28% complained loneliness was making them unhappy and so they are taking to drinking. More than a quarter of the Facebook generation revealed they turned to alcohol for comfort, and half admitted to using junk food as an emotional crutch, found the poll into national happiness levels, conducted for BBC.
 
    Asked what made them unhappy, 70% of the 16 to 24 year olds said finances topped their list of concerns. More than a third were worried about holding down a job, compared to a quarter of middle-aged respondents. One in three said they were tormented by family or relationship problems, and they were also the age group that were most likely to struggle over their social status. Overall money was the biggest cause of unhappiness across all age groups, above work, relationships and loneliness. 
    But while older age groups shared the Facebook generation’s finance fears, they were more fulfilled in other areas of their lives. Almost a third of youngest generation reported they had relationship problems which dropped to eight per cent among 55 to 64-year-olds. And one in three of the Facebook generation said they wanted to move abroad in search of happiness.

Networking site to block pics of users’ exes
 
    Social networking website Facebook keeps a record of users’ former lovers, if they had typed in the data earlier, but has now been forced to change a feature which caused their photos to appear when they logged in. After users reacted over the Photo Memories sidebar, which gave users an “unpleasant surprise” by dredging up old photographs of ex-wives or husbands, Facebook has now blocked such photos. However, in order to successfully block the “hurt-inducing” snaps, the site is now keeping a record of its users’ ex-partners — those who have used the site. 

Think Global, Think Strategic

" This excitement for President Obama’s visit is not surprising. His life is one that Indians and Americans directly relate to and embodies many of the shared values that make the US-India strategic partnership so strong"

    Through hard work, dedication, education and commitment, President Obama rose above the difficulties that life presented him. His multiracial heritage and childhood in many cultures have given him a strong belief in tolerance, a trait commonly seen in India. As an admirer of Gandhi, he worked to empower people in underdeveloped neighbourhoods of his hometown of Chicago and, after graduating from two of America’s most prestigious universities, he spurned more lucrative career opportunities to defend the civil rights of ordinary citizens. So it is not surprising that he is highly thought of by many Indians. His story of hard work and education, hope and opportunity, is the story of the American dream. It is also a shared value and story in India. 
    President Obama’s visit will be marked by excitement, pomp, and ceremony. Underlying this excitement is the opportunity to make the US-India relationship what he has called “one of the defining partnerships of the 21^st century”. To do so, his visit will focus on expanding trade and commerce; infusing the relationship with new innovations; and partnering with India as a rising and responsible global power. 
  

India a Part of Supercontinent

"A new and exciting piece of research from IISc has confirmed what has long been believed: that India was part of a supercontinent that later broke away into smaller physical entities and transformed into small continents and countries as we know them now"

    Geological research conducted recently by assistant professor Sanjeev Krishnan of the Centre for Earth Sciences, IISc, has revealed that certain rock crusts or granulites in Sri Lanka, southern India and Madagascar have properties that demonstrate India as being part of a supercontinent.
 
    “The ancient supercontinent of Gondwana once consisted of what are now the smaller continents of South America, Africa, Madagascar, southern India, Sri Lanka, Antarctica and Australia. Our research reveals that massive tectonic activity had occurred 600 million years ago and had brought together all the earth formations into a supercontinent,”. 


Krishnan deduced the tectonic activity from the massive underground temperatures rock crusts in Sri Lanka, parts of Antarctica and southern India were exposed to and withstood over a period of 500 million years. The high temperatures, especially at the lower crust of the rocks, reveal the chemical composition of the crusts from which the tectonic activity has been deduced. These crusts/rocks, which go back 500 million years ago, are now visible in the form of granules and crust deposits on the surface. 
   

Be Like Them

"Catching the latest movie or gadget and hanging out with friends in cool cafes with an occasional study hour thrown in, pretty much summarises the weekend schedule of high school teenagers"

1. This is not so for Basanagouda Patil, Prabhu Suresh and Aditya Dev Gupta — three students pursuing their International Baccalaureate Diploma at The International School, Bangalore (TISB). They prefer to pack their bags and head for the slums during weekends to teach their less privileged counterparts computer science through the initiative IT4ALL.
2. At present, they cater to about 40 students but want to take the figure to 500. This, they say, will only be possible with help from voluntary teachers and sponsors. 
3. When the trio entered the prestigious TISB, computers was a part of their curriculum. But they soon realised that for students from the slums, IT was a far cry. Deciding to bridge this disparity, they stared IT4ALL. “With the help of the NGO World Vision, we started the project a year ago to make IT and computers accessible to students from the slums. 
4. World Vision set up community centres in the slums of Koramangala, Ramamurthynagar and Yeshwanthpur. These centres were then fitted with computers, some of which were donated by my father and some by his company,” said 16-year-old Patil. The centres have about four to five computers each, but the students could definitely do with a few more. 
5. “We have made appeals to various IT companies to chip in. But obviously, there is some hesitation as they feel that this might not be a credible process. So we are trying to create awareness about this project,” added Patil, a Koramangala resident.
     
   

Learning Language From Mestru

"For them, Kannada is a foreign tongue, but they are mastering it with some difficulty and a lot of determination. And Mestru says it is foreign nationals who are more disciplined when it comes to speaking Kannada Mestru is B V Raghavan, Bangalore’s most well-known Kannada teacher — and he should know best, for he has been teaching Kannada without a break on weekends, since 1973"

    Raghavan has so far taught Kannada to hundreds of Americans, Germans, French, Russian and British who stay in Bangalore. For Lyudov Kulikovich, 31, learning Kannada became necessary as her English, with a Russian accent, was not understood by many English-speaking Bangaloreans.
    “Whenever I asked for directions, the usual reply was, ‘Can you speak in English?’ Nothing can be more embarrassing. Then I decided to learn Kannada and attended classes for three months last year. Though I cannot speak well, I understand conversations in Kannada, which is what I required,” says Kulikovich. She is working in an outsourcing company here and thinks English alone cannot save a foreign national in Bangalore. Especially when they take a trip to the outskirts.
    According to her, it is easy to understand the culture of a place by understanding the regional language spoken. “I watched Kannada movie Mungaru Male, and could understand it within the context because I made efforts to learn the language. I recognize the vegetables by their names in Kannada, which makes buying easy,” she added. “Nange Kannada swalpa swalpa baratthe,” says Kovila C, 28, a Mauritius national living in Bangalore for over seven years now. Learning Kannada was a choice she made. “I love learning languages. I have learnt Tamil and Hindi, which helped me learn Kannada. There are striking similarities among these Dravidian languages, which have their origin in Sanskrit. I travel across Karnataka just out of passion for tourism and my learning of Kannada has helped while conversing with non-English speakers,” says Kovila. Kovila is working for the French Consulate here.

Technology Is Speaking

" Engineering students will learn not just nuts and bolts of their chosen subjects but Kannada as well as the culture and heritage of the state, with a lesson or two on how to don the iconic Mysore peta"

1.   This is part of Visvesvaraya Technological University’s ambitious Rs 2-crore plan to popularize Kannada culture and language among engineering students in the state. Under a state government-sponsored scheme, the varsity will conduct functional Kannada classes for non-state students and lectures in culture for those from the state. 
2. “There are thousands of engineering students from other states in the state. Since they spend at least four years here, we want to help them pick up functional Kannada. The Kannada Kali (Learn Kannada) scheme is under way for first semester students. We’ll roll out programmes on culture and heritage for state students who have passed out of English-medium schools and not well versed with the local language,” VTU vice-chancellor M Maheshappa.
3. Interestingly, the sessions, voluntary in nature, will be open to non-state professors.The university plans to set up a Kannada language laboratory in the university and publish a technical glossary in Kannada. To coincide with the 150th birth celebrations of Sir M Visvesvaraya, the university is preparing a compendium of his works in Kannada for free distribution in schools and colleges.