Book Review: "Anything for You, Ma'am"

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One more attempt of an IITian to be an author. It is a simple love story with humor and suffering. It came in the era of Chetan Bhagat (CB), however, it doesn't have a vulgarity and sex which is always there in CB books. It is worth spending your free time to read this innocent love story.

Book Review: "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life"

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Last month when I visited crossword in Pune, I find this book. From title itself it looks strange to me and may be to many of you. When I read its short summery, I found it interesting. Therefore, I bought it and It is worth buying, for me at least. I consider it to be one of the best motivational book I have ever read. However, I can't compare it with the books from Robin Sharma. In starting, one might get bored with more use of " f " word but after first chapter, it is interesting. The real life examples and wisdom from other books and authors make it easy to understand. It is more of a casual writing than a typical motivational writing but still there are many hidden messages in the book.

Wisdom:

• The desire for more positive experience is itself a negative experience. And paradoxically the acceptance of one's negative experience is itself a positive experience.
• Not giving a fuck does not mean being indifferent; it means being comfortable with being different.
• To not give a fuck about adversity you must first give a fuck about something more important than adversity.
• Whether you realize it or not, you are always choosing what to give fuck about.
• Life itself is a form of suffering. The rich suffer because of their riches. The poor suffer because of their poverty. People without family suffer because they have no family. People with family suffer because of their family. People who pursue worldly pleasures suffer because of their worldly pleasures. People who abstain from worldly pleasures suffer because of their abstention.
• We suffer for the simple reason that suffering is biologically useful. It is nature's preferred agent for inspiring change.
• Life is essentially an endless series of problems. The solution to one problem is merely the creation of the next one.
• Don't hope for a life without problems. Instead, hope for a life full of good problems.
• Happiness comes from solving problems.
• Problems never stop; they merely get exchanged and/or upgraded.
• Happiness requires struggle. It grows from problems.
• The deeper the pain, the more helpless we feel against our problems, and the more entitlement we adopt to compensate for those problems.
• There is no such thing as a personal problem. If you have got a problem, chances are millions of other people have had it in the past, have it now, and are going to have it in the future.
• Self-awareness is like an onion. There are multiple layers to it, and the more you peel them back, the more likely you are going to start crying at inappropriate times.
• Pleasure is not the cause of happiness; rather, it is the effect. If you get the other stuff right, then pleasure will naturally occur as a by-product.
• Sometimes life sucks, and the healthiest thing you can do is admit it.
• Often the only difference between a problem being painful of being powerful is a sense that we choose it, and that we are responsible for it.
• I'm always wrong about everything, over and over and over again, and that's why my life improves.
• The more you try to be certain about something, the more uncertain and insecure you will feel.
• The more you embrace being uncertain and not knowing, the more comfortable you will feel in knowing what you don't know.
• The more something threaten your identity, the more you will avoid it.
• It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
• If it feels like it's you versus the world, chances are it's really just you versus yourself.
• Improvement at anything is based on thousands of tiny failures, and the magnitude of your success is based on how many times you've failed at something.
• Don't just sit there. Do something. The answers will follow.
• The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.
• We're all going to die, all of us. What a circus! That alone should make us love each other, but it doesn't. We are terrorized and flattened by life's trivialities; we are eaten up by nothing.

Book Review: "No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA and the Surveillance State"

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As the title suggest "No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA and the Surveillance State", in the era of NSA and surveillance there no place to hide for anyone. The fact is reveled by the famous whistle blower Edward Snowden. He leak some of the confidential documents of NSA which makes people aware about various surveillance programs run by NSA and how they access all the online data about anyone.

The story starts from Hong Kong and cover all the events occurred in the life of Snowden till he reaches to Russia and get asylum there. It is about how government abuses its power and how corporate media  work with government to hide many facts which people must know in democratic structure. The story is about USA government but other countries also learn the lessons from it.

Wisdom: 

•  Data security and privacy is as important as physical security and privacy.

• Democracy is about people not about governments and corporates

PhD Thesis Acknowledgment

Journey of a PhD is very much similar to an expedition the unknown. It begins with energy and excitement, continues with fear of rejection/ failure, and culminates with incredible delight. I am fortunate to have been encompassed by loads of good people who have been helping me conquer this fear and finish this journey with a joy. I like to pay my gratitude to every one of them for their benevolent help and support.

I am heartily thankful to my research supervisor, Dr. Udai Pratap Rao, whose encouragement, guidance, and support from the initial level which enabled me to develop an understanding of the topic. I am thankful to Head of Computer Engineering Department for providing me all the required facilities for my work. I am also grateful to my credit seminar evaluation committee members, Dr. S. Kumar and Dr. M. A. Zaveri as well as my research progress seminar committee members, Prof. P. L. Patel, Prof. Sanjay Garg, Prof. D. C. Jinwala, Prof. M. M. Vegad, and Dr. S. J. Patel for providing valuable feedback, which are very useful in improving my work. I am also thankful to my thesis reviewers Dr. George Trawick, National Defense University, USA and Prof. S. Nickolas, National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirapalli who spend their valuable time to review my thesis and provided suggestion which further improve the quality of my thesis.

I would like to dedicate this work to my daughter Brisha who is as old as my PhD. I am grateful to my wife Shweta who support me in all my decisions. I am also thankful to my parents for their continuous encouragement from childhood to this stage of life.

When I decided to go for PhD research, I was in a desperate search of a topic which can have significant impact on society as well as currently in trend. One of my postgraduate student Mr. Mikin Dagli came to me with his dissertation topic on big data which I find very interesting. I further studied some papers related to it which motivated me for the work present in this thesis. Therefore, I would like to thank Mr. Mikin Dagli for motivating me.

During my journey of PhD at CoED, SVNIT, many people helped me in one way or another. The faculty members who were not part of my credit seminar or RPS committee but help and encourage me, Prof. Dhiren Patel, Dr. Rupa Mehta, Dr. Dipti Rana, Dr. Bhavesh Gohil, and Mr. Satish Raj Goyal. My friends (seniors and juniors) Mr. Himanshu Patel, Mrs. Ruchika Gupta, Mr. Bhavesh Borisaniya, Mr. Nishant Doshi, Mr. Chirag Modi, Mr. Dipen Contractor, Mr. Kamal Macwan, Mr. Shivanshu Mehta, Mr. Kirit Siddhapara, Mr. Jagdish Vanara, Mr. Nikhil Kumar, and Mr. Sravan Gadekula with whom I discuss my work and receive feedbacks which help me a lot to get further direction. I am very much thankful to all of you.

I am also thankful to Prof. Naveen Choudhary, Head, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, College of Technology and Engineering, Udaipur for providing me all the necessary facility for my work. I am also thankful to my colleagues Mrs. Kalpana Jain, Ms. Diksha Goyal, Mr. Manoj Ashara, Mr. Praveen Sharma, Mr. Sanjay Patel, and Mr. Deep Manwar for the help and support they provide me during my tenure at CTAE.

I am also grateful to all the anonymous reviewers who spend their valuable time to review my papers submitted in various conferences and journals. I am thankful to all the persons who help me in anyways and I mistakenly forget their name to mention here. Without help and support of you guys I may not be able to reach at this stage.
 

Thank you!
 

Mehta Brijesh Balvantray

2019 resolutions? We seem to be keeping them

Yes, we did slip up by not sending you a customary new year's greeting email but we felt it would be more meaningful to assess our performance over January and then send you an update.

It's also been a month of action for IFF where we have taken a range of actions.

Free Expression: As threats grow to online censorship, through censorship codes, the revival of Section 66A (yes, we discovered it was still being used despite being ruled as unconstitutional!) and internet shutdowns we fought back. Our work over the past month includes a court intervention through the People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), parliamentary briefings and notices to various bodies, particularly on online video streaming services. Surely, we do not want to watch a censored final season of the Game of Thrones? 

Privacy: We have gone to Supreme Court to challenge not only the MHA notification but sought a meaningful review of digital surveillance. This is an ongoing engagement to safeguard your personal data through the #SaveOurPrivacy campaign. We have also organised parliamentary briefings for MPs and their offices on legislation that impact your privacy rights. We even revealed the full text of the Intermediary Rules and put out an analysis on how it was taking us towards a china model of digital command and control. 

Net Neutrality and Innovation: We have continued to correspond with government bodies, have participated and raised awareness around a TRAI consultation that could lead to licensing of internet platforms. We are not giving up on saving the internet!

Yes, this may seem like dull, boring work, but it is incredibly important. We fail in our battles for protections and rights because engaging with government bodies is tough and complex. This is not how it should be. That's why we post simple, concise explainers on the IFF website.

I would also like to take this moment to consider donating to IFF and helping us hire staff! We need your help to scale up as this promises to be a critical year for our digital rights.

Thank you for your continuing support. 

 

Apar,

Executive Director,

Internet Freedom Foundation