Tribute to Randy Pausch

More thann a year since Randy Pausch died leaving behind him a legacy one can barely imagine. A man who achieved his childhood dreams. A man who taught people how to live their life. A man who gave family utmost importance. A man who battled out against all the odds of life but eventually lost to Pancreatic cancer.

For me his life is the epitome of how one should live their life. His last lecture became the most popular videos.

His time management lecture at one point the first google result for time management, something he was extremely proud of. Here is the last lecture! A must watch for those who havent!

His never-say-die spirit is what he is remembered for the most! For me he was te symbol of hope and persistent hard work. What I liked the most in the Last lecture was the way in which the great Virtual Reality Researcher describes Brick walls. He is says the brick walls are there to separate the ones who REALLY want something from the others!

His aim to teach and attract young girls to the field of science and technology was achieved through Alice. A software that visually imparts programming concepts to young girls.  http://www.alice.org/

He did all he could to increase awareness and research funds to fight Pancreatic cancer.

In May 2008 he was listed by Time among one of the Worlds most influencial people. He is known to have given hope to all people who had lost the zest for life. He has not only changed the world for his students, family but also for all those who have watched his video and got greatly inspired.

To me what is special about Randy are the attempts he made to leave his young children a legacy in various forms right from his lecture,to his book and to all those special things he did for his kids and wife. This surely will have a huge impact on the way his kids think. I am sure they would price these more than anything else. Here is a picture of the man doing what he is best at-being with family.

These two pictures are simply great but nothing beats the one below!

PS:I was working on this post and I was asked to speak about a famous personality I admire! I had no problems at all there! No second thoughts! 🙂

The Google Dream!

Dreams, Dreams and Dreams…..
 

I started thinking about my Childhood dreams after watching Randy Pausch’s last lecture which was about achieving your childhood dreams. At that point when I tried to think what my ‘Childhood’ dreams were I couldn’t think of anything specific except meeting Shah Rukh Khan 😛 lol.  The rest that came to my mind was just not specific enough! Things like doing something similar to what Steve Irwin did (for those of you who dont know I like snakes). No, I dint want to work in a zoo all my life but something like that! I told you it wasnt specific. 

 

That was the one thing that really got me thinking… We always have different desires at different times but it seldom sticks on… I started thinking that I wasnt focussed enough and thought my dreams were too weird to come true. Like Randy says the brick walls are there to separate those who really want it and those who dont. Probably, I was among the ones who just din’t  want it so badly and so I never got it also! 

 

But for a very long time now, it is to work for the Giant we all know as ‘Google’ …. When you dream you shouldn’t dream small things… So I started thinking BIG! And this is one of the things that did stick on! Well, now thats a little specific better than what it was earlier though I still have a long way to go in going down to the details of it! But there is something else I am clear about, whom I am going to share my cubicle with! 😛 😛 There are a few of us at college whose dream company is none other than Google! And we dream working there and sharing cubicles also! 😛 😀 I know it may sound silly but what the heck! By the way if you guys want to check out who the other google dreamers are, here are the links to their blogs http://www.bytehead.co.nr/ , http://avinashjoshi.co.in/. Sadly the others dont blog till now!

 

Many people often ask me why Google? why not Microsoft or any other giant! My answer always has been the same. I feel Google is the only company that DIRECTLY affects the lives of people! Right from a fifth standard student to a pHd student, for any projects or any home works Google has the answer. Like they say Google knows it all! There is even ‘The Church of Google’ which I have mentioned in my earlier post.

 

Getting back to ‘Why Google?’. We have all heard that we want t0 use technology for people, to change lives and that is the essence of what Google does.

 

There is an interesting story about the launch of Google Maps for Bangladesh. Google was supposed to launch maps for India aound the same time floods struck Bangladesh. They wanted to launch maps for Bangladesh also but there was not much time in hand. I am not surprised that in a short time the googlers made this happen! This was very much the site the NGO (Non-Governmental Organizations) used for relief operations. Talk about affecting lives of people, Google is the best example!

 

Another reason was meeting Dr. Prasad Ram who is the head of R&D at Google India at a conference on Web technology where he was the Keynote speaker. His talk was not complicated like many of the other talks.In fact, his was one of the very few talks that left an impact! More than the technology, he focussed on what we need to achieve from it. His spoke of Democratization of INDIA! While talking about technology either people speak about the technology in the most confusing manner possible to make themselves look like the intellectually elite class or they just DONT mention what the aim of this is keeping India in mind. He spoke about networking through NGOs to make outreach effective. That is what is making an attempt to solving the REAL problems of India! The enthusiasm I saw in him made it very clear to me what the ‘Google Spirit’ is all about. This was another major reason for this dream to stick on. 

 

Lets all hope that Google keeps doing what it is best at, ‘Changing Lives of People’. And hoping I too would be a googler sometime. Oooh! I almost forgot to mention another reason, I absolutely love Google t-shirts!!! 😀 😀