TED Fellows Program Accepting Applications for 100 TEDIndia Fellows

MYSORE, India — Organizers of the TED Conference today announced they would begin the search for 100 TEDIndia Fellows to participate in the TEDIndia Conference in Mysore, India, following upon the successful TED Fellows program launch at TED2009 this past February in Long Beach, California. The TEDIndia Fellows program will accept applications for fellowships from April 20, 2009 through June 15, 2009.

The TEDIndia Fellows program is a part of the larger TED Fellows Program, a new international fellowship program designed to nurture great ideas and help them spread around the world. This year, organizers will select 100 promising individuals from around the world to attend the very first TEDIndia Conference. At the end of the year, organizers will select 20 individuals from a pool of the TED, TEDGlobal, and TEDIndia Fellows to participate in an extended three-year Senior Fellowship, bringing them to six consecutive conferences. The principal goal of the program is to empower the Fellows to effectively communicate their work to the world.

Benefits of the Fellowship include conference admission, round-trip transportation, housing and all meals. Fellows will also participate in a two-day pre-conference with the opportunity to present a short talk for consideration for TED.com, elite skills-building courses taught by world experts, social opportunities and surprise extras.

The TEDIndia Fellows program will have international representation with a distinctly South Asian majority, with approximately 75% of the Fellows representing the South Asian region, and 25% representing other regions of the world. South Asia is defined as including the countries of India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Tibet, Myanmar, the Maldives, and Sri Lanka. For the global pool, applications will also be sought from the other five target regions: Africa, Asia/Pacific, the Caribbean, Latin America, and the Middle East, with consideration to the applicants from other countries.

The program seeks remarkable thinkers and doers who have shown unusual accomplishment, exceptional courage, moral imagination and the potential to increase positive change in their respective fields. The program focuses on innovators in technology, entertainment, design, science, film, art, music, entrepreneurship and the NGO community, among other pursuits. Applicants are generally between 21-40 years of age, though anyone over 18 and over 40 may apply. They must also be fluent in English; though moderate fluency will be accepted on a case-by-case basis.

The program was inspired by the TEDAfrica 2007 conference in Arusha, Tanzania, in which 100 fellows participated in a first-of-its kind gathering that featured trailblazing, entrepreneurial individuals vested in creating change on the continent. The TEDAfrica fellows brought with them new perspectives, enormous energy, enthusiasm and ovation-generating talks. Propelled by their energy, TED decided to develop the full-scale TED Fellows program, which debuted at TED2009 in Long Beach, California.

“TED2009 was a transformative experience for me, and several of my peers,” said Pragnya Alekal, TED2009 Fellow and now TEDIndia Fellows Coordinator. “For the first time, we were in a supportive community of enthusiastic innovators, all working to make the world better. And after only two months, so many new collaborative ventures and initiatives have come out of it.

“I want to share TED with other people; I want more South Asians to experience what we Fellows experienced. I would like the world to know about the genius brewing in this part of the world, and I look forward to them meeting their counterparts from around the world. I believe this will be an important launch pad for everything that is good for the future of India, South Asia, and the world.”

For more information about how individuals may apply for a TEDIndia Fellowship, please visit http://www.ted.com/fellows/apply. TED Fellows may apply or be nominated by another individual. To nominate a candidate, email the full name of the candidate and their contact information to fellows@ted.com.

About TED

TED is an annual event where some of the world’s leading thinkers and doers are invited to share what they are most passionate about. “TED” stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design — three broad subject areas that are, collectively, shaping our future. And in fact, the event is broader still, showcasing ideas that matter in any discipline. Attendees have called it “the ultimate brain spa” and “a four-day journey into the future.” The diverse audience — CEOs, scientists, creatives, philanthropists — is almost as extraordinary as the speakers, who have included Bill Clinton, Nandan Nilekani, Bill Gates, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Ashraf Ghani, Jane Goodall, Frank Gehry, Bono, Sir Richard Branson, andStephen Hawking.

TED was first held in Monterey, California, in 1984. In 2001, Chris Anderson’s Sapling Foundation acquired TED from its founder, Richard Saul Wurman. In recent years, TED has expanded to include an international conference, TEDGlobal July 21-24, 2009 in Oxford, UK; media initiatives, including TED Talks and TED.com; and the TED Prize. TED2010, “What the World Needs Now,” will be held February 9-13, 2010, inLong Beach, California, with a simulcast event in Palm Springs, California.

CONTACT: Laura Galloway for TED, +1-213-948-3100 or +1-212-260-3708, laura@gallowaymediagroup.com

After reading this book, a majority of readers would become Kishore Biyani Fans! or KB Fans for sure. Kishore Biyani is addressed as KB or KishoreJi within his organization & friends,

This book is a winner from the word Go.

True to his style & philosophy, Kishore Biyani has included all the people in the book who have made his happen. Not just by mentioning their names, but by interviewing more than hundred people, getting their thoughts in the form of ‘their stories & versions’, in each chapter of the book. Their narrative is appropriately placed within each chapter & their thoughts on that particular topic give a insight from the very people who were involved at that particular stage of the project.

To me, personally the most important part in the book were his views on Trust & Relationships.
These are from pages 192 to 197. I would request you to re-read these pages a couple of times & analyze as to how you or your organization correlates to this.
These pages are under the Chapter: Business @ the Speed of Thought, topic starting from number VII [7], in Kishore Biyani’s book: It Happened in India.

Here he emphasizes the important of a Win-Win situation between his organization, his business associates and his customers. He says, if you approach your business with this framework in mind, then you shall see benefit in all interactions.

However, this is not as easy as it sounds. To get to that level, every person’s aspirations & dreams have to be understood & more importantly, addressed appropriately. Therefore, to build great relationships, sacrifices will have to be made.

He goes on to say that “Most businessmen make the mistake of creating an environment wherein only then win. They see life only as a competitive arena & not a co-operative one. Relationships are built on principles, and not on the basis of power & position.”

Review to be continued…..

I am almost half way through this amazing book. Will be posting the review here soon.

*Update: Finished reading this amazing book by Kishore Biyani on how he built up this retailing revolution. This book is a must for all MBA students & aspirants, as well as all libraries in educational institutions. In fact, this book ” It happened in India ” is a must read for all entrepreneurs.

I was planning to write a review on this book, all in one post, however, I have deferred this. I shall re-read this book again & review selected sections of this book. At Rs.99/- it’s a steal. I received my copy personally signed by Kishore Biyani, since I was in the first 100 to signup. You can still buy the hardbound copy of It happened in India signed by Kishore Biyani on Future Bazaar website here. Click on the right hand side promo ad of It happened in India, which looks like this image above. Then proceed to purchase the book by first registering on the website by creating an account.

Other online media where this story about Kishore Biyani’s It happened in India Book, is featured are as follows:

Mumbaimirror.com: It happened in India: A retail raja’s story

financialexpress.com: Consumerism is king

TheHinduBusinessline.com: On a happening phenomenon

Business-standard.com Book Extract: India’s retail king tells his story

According to Google reps this competition is the first of it’s kind conducted by Google globally. Per city there were 300 selected participants, so 3,000 participants in all !!

Participants were given 20 keywords, from which they had to write an essay [minimum 150 & maximum 200 words].
45 minutes was the time limit to complete this.

Goodies by Google given to participants were a Google Bag containing a Pen, Keychain & a Writing pad, obviously all with the Google Logo.

3 winners out of 3000 participants of the Google Wordmasters Challenge 2006 will be announced on 30th October 2006.

Here are a couple of pics from Pune.

At the Nehru Memorial Hall, Pune.

Prash from iPrash.com @ Pune Wordmasters

Request to Google:

Allow users to add their Adsense Code into their Orkut profile page

Gautam Anand, strategic partner development manager with Google said “We have already tied up with thousands of publishers in the US and UK and are now in talks with several Indian publishing houses over the past few days,”.

This is a boon for Indian publishers, because, due to the craze for everything Indian nowadays, people are reading more on India & trying to get their hands on all India related stuff. So, people from abroad end up searching for more India related books. This way, the Google Book Search reaches a far more audience (global, in fact) for the Indian book publisher, who cannot have a global ad spend. The best part is that the Indian Book Publisher does not have to ‘pay-up’ to join, infact, they earn from the advertising revenue share.

Here’s the official explaination:

How does Google Book Search work?

Finding books with Google Book Search is as easy as finding websites with Google Web Search; just enter the keyword or phrase you’re looking for into the Google Book Search box. For example, when you search for “rock climbing” or for a phrase like “one small step for man,” we’ll find all the books whose contents match your search terms. Click on a book title and you’ll see basic info about the book just like you’d see in a card catalog. You might also see a few snippets – sentences of your search term in context. If a publisher or author has given us permission, you’ll see a full page and be able to browse within the book to see more pages. If the book is out of copyright, you’ll see a full page and you can page forward or back to see the full book. Clicking on “Search within this book,” allows you to perform more searches within the book you’ve selected. You can click on any of the “Buy this Book” links to go straight to an online bookstore where you can buy the book. In many cases, you can also click “Find this book in a library” to find a local library where you can borrow it.

On 7th Sepetember, there was a similar news: TCS plans to recruit 30,000 people this year !!

Similarly, if you trackback over this financial year, you shall find that all major companies in India are hiring in 1000s.

From the Financial Times article:

The problem of talent shortage that faces the nation’s infotech sector is also plaguing the banking, finance, insurance and manufacturing sectors too. The supply of talent is just unable to keep pace with the Indian economy’s growth rate, causing a major shortage, said the daily.

Well, with the shortage of qualified people salaries are going up, & with more companies announcing their mega hiring programs, I wonder as to “From where are we gonna fill this gap?”

TCS, Infosys, Wipro & others have already started hiring people from outside India. I can see that, in the near future there’s gonna be an influx of people from countries in Asia migrating to India in large numbers.

Where do we go from here??

A Google spokesperson told PTI: “Our M&A strategy has been to look for unique products, technologies and engineering teams that can help us provide innovative products to our users or enhance existing services.”

Google India website has a job opening for the position of Corporate Development Manager, South Asia, to be stationed in Mumbai or Bangalore, who would look after the development and execution of market strategies that drive market expansion opportunities.

http://www.google.co.in/support/jobs/bin/answer.py?answer=44402

Click on links to view this story featured in Hindustan Times, Indian Express, Business Standard & The Hindu.

I won’t be able to test it till Monday

But their designer seems to be a very colorful chap !