Comeback post

I shall conveniently sidestep the question about where I’ve been for the last 5 months and begin this post

Updates:

1. The latest release of  Pakwheels.com  (the site that I’m the Product Manager of) was launched in late November and is growing at a steady pace. The biggest decision we undertook was to port our rudimentary forum section into vBulletin, the world’s leading forum software. Why was it such a taxing risk ? Answer: Data consistency. When you have tens and thousands of  posts to cleanly migrate into a new system, its like tip-toeing through a room with a blanket of infra-red detectors.

In any case, the demonic mission is over now.  There were a lot of boos and cheers on the launch but I guess the conflict of opinions is only natural. The thing that matters at the end is  whether people eventually acknowledge the shift as a good move.   In any case , we’ve also moved on to other things now…like we introduced a Bikes section a few weeks back to cater for a community thats we’ve been guilty of sidelining for years. We now stand poised to embrace them with closed eyes & sympathetic arms; whether they will return the love is a question that only time will answer.  Check out the site @ www.pakwheels.com.

2. My grandfather passed away last week.  Made me think how fleeting life really is. One moment I was passing him a glass of juice, the other I was burying him with my own hands.  Life really is a blur.

3.  I’m tying the knot (insha’Allah) late next month

I’m not feeling the hype that much. But I sense that there’s a tidal wave of anxiety/excitement etc waiting around the turn of the month. Hmm…

4. Pakistan lost to Australia again…and well…lets move onto point number 5.

5. I’ve been researching the “5-star” rating system and I’ve decided that its crap. Stats (even from Pakwheels.com) show that it results in a bi-modal distribution meaning people either rate content 5 or 0, which makes the rest of the spectrum quite meaningless. I’m thinking of concocting a new system based on 3 indicative metrics of “happening” content: number of views, number of distinct users that have commented on the content and  number of times content was shared. Note that I say “happening” content but not “content quality”.  Big difference.

6. I went on my first seh-roza in late December. Was an interesting learning experience. I never did understand what tableegh did for the participants but now I think I have an idea:
(1) you get to learn practical basics of religion that you don’t have time learning formally otherwise
(2) you learn to talk to others about the faith and, in the process,  understand why you believe in the faith in the first place
(3) you get to see, first hand, what kind of the relationship the masses have with Islam these days…and in turn, you realize that a lot of work needs to be done !

Thats all I can think of for now. I’ll catch you guys later then. Keep it Halal.

Advertisement