Selective Amnesia There was a point to this. But I forgot.

Coping with disaster

Amit Varma and Peter Griffin are at it again. Announcing two brand new CollaBlogs, that help Mumbaikars and others cope with a disaster and to help keep information flowing.

Mumbai Help & Cloud Burst Mumbai

As Amit puts it,

Announcing two new CollaBlogs, as Peter Griffin calls them, set up by Peter to deal with the aftermath of the cloudburst in Mumbai. The first is called Mumbai Help (http://mumbaihelp.blogspot.com/), and aims to collate information centred around Mumbai that might be useful at times of emergency, such as this. The other is called Cloudburst Mumbai (http://cloudburstmumbai.blogspot.com/), and it will contain news and links to news concerning the cloudburst and its aftermath. Mumbai Help will hopefully grow to be a resource that can be useful at all times of emergency, not just this one; Cloudburst Mumbai has a more immediate agenda.

But by no means is this restricted to Mumbaikars. Anybody who knows a little of the city, or who can contribute precious information and keep the updates flowing are welcome to contribute. Just send a mail to Amit Varma (amitblogs@gmail.com) to know more.

Blogging about Blogging

Blogstreet India, the premier Blog Directory in India reports an astounding 243 blogs from Chennai. Astounding, if you don’t know much about Chennai. I, for one, tend to think the number is far below potential. Here are reasons why Chennai Blogs should be in their 1000s.

• There’s a strong streak of self-indulgence and self expression in the south, especially Tamil Nadu
• There’s also a very marked desire to know what the other person is doing. Scores of magazines exist solely to feed off this desire to know about what the other person is doing. Most mainstream media have dedicated columns on what the starlet is eating or wearing
• Chennai/Madras has always been closely associated with the birth of Indian Journalism. Inspite of their recent mess-ups, Hindu remains the best objective newspaper in India (if one overlooks their leaning to the left.) As such, there is a strong tradition of reading the printed word, besides the fact that there are a lot of good writers/reporters around
• The need to know News. My dad watches news, first on Sun, then on Jaya TV, NDTV 24×7 and switches back to Sun
• This need to know, and obsession with news also means people here are more clued to what’s happening around the world, and will have more subject matter to blog about
• Too many book stores/libraries
• A highly literate state
• A highly literate state combined with a high level of technology and telephony penetration (Which should explain why Kerala, the most literate state, doesn’t have too many blogs)
• A community that values education and the spread of knowledge very dearly
• A large number of colleges – translating into a larger number of students, the natural adopters of new technology.
• A large number of students mean a large readership base, meaning potential bloggers
• Finally, English is still a preferred language

I haven’t bothered to rank the reasons I have mentioned, and a ranking wouldn’t be of any use. I believe all these, along with the fact that as a community, tamils are highly verbal by nature, is the reason why Blogging is so popular here in Chennai, and why it has not yet reached its peak.