WiredVijay’s website is now live! Featuring all of Chennai photographer Vijay Venkatesh’s works, the site features a neat and accessible design. With a black background, photographs can be viewed in a way that creates maximum impact. BusinessBlogging is proud to be associated with this project.

Vijay specialises in portrait photography and provides on-location photography services to everyday people. He has been working in Chennai for the past four years, and is also available to photograph public and private events.

The website also has buttons linking to Vijay’s social networking website profiles. You can follow him directly, and keep track of his work on his Twitter and Facebook profiles.

Please share your opinions and give us feedback on the design. Also, feel free to drop in suggestions and any ideas that you might have, which may help in improving the website.

Cerebrate Tapovan Invitee and Mountaineer Sandhosh Kumar,who is into his challenging Mission Mount Everest, has been sending some really interesting and up close photos of the Mount Everest, along with updates.

Sandhosh will be going for the kill starting this evening, 9pm as he and his team would attempt the final summit. By tomorrow morning he would have climbed the top of Mount Everest… We wish him all the best…

While complete details are available at his blog, sharing some selected photos and updates with our blog readers here…

Day 44 – Ted climbing the wall

Mount Everest, up close

Ladder Crossing

A broken piece of ice

Day 36 – The traffic jam down to base camp

All photos copyrighted to Sandhosh Kumar. Do not reproduce without permission.

PechaKucha Night, the wildly popular presentation/networking event now has a presence in Chennai! The first PechaKucha Night Chennai is scheduled for 7 PM on Saturday, May 15. BusinessBlogging is proud to be associated with this event.

PechaKucha crudely references the Japanese word for ‘chit-chat’. The format was devised in Tokyo in February 2003 as an event for young designers to meet, network, and show their work in public. Ever since, it’s popularity has soared, and the event has now been hosted in over 230 cities globally. It involves the speaker presenting 20 images in 20 seconds each, on a topic of his/her choice, and providing a concise explanation for the same.

The first edition of PechaKucha Night Chennai will be held at:
The Madras Center, New #21, Old #9/1, Dr. Thirumurthy Nagar Main Road, Nungambakkam, Chennai – 34 (Near Hotel Ranjith).

Registration fee for the event is Rs. 100.(Inclusive of light refreshments)

RSVP to the event HERE.

For more information regarding location etc., visit the PechaKucha Chennai website.

Look who’s attending Cerebrate Thekkady…

Here’s the impressive list of participants invited for Cerebrate’s latest edition at Club Mahindra Tusker Trails, Thekkady, Kerala

1. Dr. Balaji Sampath, Founder CEO, AID India
2. Anusha R Mahesh, CEO, Park Group of Institutions, Coimbatore & Chennai
3. Eric Miller, Storytelling and Videoconferencing Educator and Artist
4. Kishi Arora, TED Fellow, Food Consultant
5. Kakoli Sen, Visual Artist, Consultant, Visual Arts IB Teacher & Examiner
6. Prahlad Kakkar, Ad Guru, Scuba Diver, Restaurateur, Cigar Manufacturer, Globe Trotter and a Celebrity Cook
7. R V Rajan, Chairman, Anugrah Madison Advertising Pvt. Ltd.
8. Kuruvilla Abraham, marketing, sponsorship and media management specialist
9. Seetha Gopal, GM RAB India
10. Sridhar Lakshmanan, CoFounder, EcoLogin
11. Vijay K Raghavan, Ex MD and CEO, Banyan Networks

View the complete list here

World’s first book on Unconferences is due for release… The much awaited book by Kiruba Shankar, that took more than 3.5 years in the making is now all set for release…

The book has already received some praises worth noting…

It’s like hitting the refresh button for conferences.- David Feng, President, Asia Pacific Mac Union, Beijing.

Read it, practice it, spread it. – Raj Datta, Chief Knowledge Officer, MindTree

A must read. – J.Murali, Technology Columnist, Hindu.com

http://www.unconference.info/index.html

Cerebrate Thekkady is just one week away… Preparations are in full swing…

Checkout Cerebrate.in for more details

This particular edition of Cerebrate is sponsored by Club Mahindra

Kiruba Shankar, in this weekly column in Financial Express, writes about Google Android vs iPhone…

The first time I heard that Google was coming out with a phone, I thought it was a well laid-out prank. After all, Google is notorious for fooling people. Very soon, many reliable news outlets on the Web started to talk about it and the first pictures confirmed that it indeed was real.

I had the first real look at the phone during TED Active in February 2010 when Google decided to give a free phone to every participant. Not to mention, I was overjoyed. This was my first real smartphone. I owned a Nokia N82 and a Blackberry, but I really won’t put them in the smartphone category.

Read complete article here

Business Blogging team effeciently live blogged IAMAI’s Marketing Conclave in New Delhi last week.

To read the event coverage, please visit IAMAI’s official blog

The team was headed by Kiruba Shankar and Shrinidhi Hande.

Chanakya and Sujoy lent a helping hand…

In his weekly column at Financial Express, Kiruba writes about his experience on using Amazon Kindle…

It’s been over three months that I’ve been living with an Amazon Kindle. For those of you contemplating investing in an Amazon Kindle, this review would come in mighty handy.

Amazon was one who practically created a market for eBook readers when they launched Kindle, very successfully way back in 2007. The first model was clunky but the technology was path breaking. The success of Kindle spawned an entire generation of rival products. In keeping with competition, the Kindle2 is a far improved product.

The biggest advantage for ebooks like Kindle is that they use the E-Ink technology that closely mimics the printed paper. You are almost tempted to touch the screen and feel the roughness of the paper!

Read full article

RangDe is hosting a Live-in Concert in association with Vasu Dixit’s band, Swarathma, today in Chennai. [Watch Vasu Dixit Videos]

Yesterday I happened to attend their press conference, along with few other bloggers, in the presence of Ms Waheeda Rehman, a reputed actress of yesteryears, who is supporting the cause of RangDe.

Here’re some interesting points noted during the press conference:

Rs 100 from each ticket (of the concert, priced Rs 300 and 500) will be diverted as social investment in the name of ticket purchaser. This way, as you enjoy the concert, you’ll also be helping out micro borrowers in remote places of India. Investment in RangDe can start with as low as Rs 100. RangDe doesn’t lend money directly to individuals, but they form a community of borrowers and lend them as a group and mentor them. This way, because of the collective responsibility of the group, the recovery rate is as high as 98.5%

* Demand for micro credit in India was Rs 200,000 crore in 2006, but the availability was just 10% of that, at 20k crores. Today in 2010, we’ve not been able to meet the demand beyond 15%.

* Less than 6% of bank branches are located in rural India. This is a prime reason why majority do not have access to finance (Stated by Soumitra Ghosh of CSO partners, an ICICI venture that supports organizations like RangDe)

* RangDe went live on Jan 26, 2008 and so far has helped over 2800 micro entrepreneurs, with the help of over 1400 social investors.

* RangDe is planning to expand into vocational training, thus extending its reach further.

Couple of photos taken during the press conf: Above: Left: the RangDe Team, with founder CEO Ram NK in the Centre, Right: Press meet with Ram, Ms Waheeda Rehman and Soumitra Ghosh.

Below: Ms Waheeda Rehman

RangDe is very careful in selecting its field partners, who get 5% of the interest and do most of the work-lending money to communities, mentoring them, ensuring recovery and so on. Answering my question Ram detailed various parameters (experience, accounts, team etc) they look into before signing up a partner.