Friday, March 23, 2007

Media Consumption Meme

I figured this would be an interesting exercise to do – taken from Jinal via Anastasia at YPulse. I am not highly tech-savvy at all, but here goes anyway:

Web: Plenty, plenty of websites, especially now that I have some time on my hands. I usually go to NYT, The Guardian, Salon, Slate, Rediff, BBC and NDTV for current affairs and generally interesting articles. The NYT Arts, Style and Travel sections have some good stuff going as well. For a list of events that are currently happening in the city, I check out Flavorpill. The blogs I usually read are linked to in my own blog.

Communication: Yahoo! Mail, Hotmail (yes I still use it, inspite of V’s repeated digs at me that I am probably one of ten people still using it!!) and to a smaller extent Gmail. I got a Gmail account when they were handing them out free and everyone’s opinion, since Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail had limited mailbox sizes then, was ‘You really should get a Gmail account, you know’. So I did, but then Yahoo and Hotmail woke up and that leaves my Gmail inbox quite empty now, mostly! I use Gtalk more than MSN Messenger or Yahoo Messenger though, funnily enough. I used to like Orkut, but I don’t anymore, though I still have an account. I find it a bit too intrusive, though it also helps re-discovering people you knew years ago (if you want to re-discover them in the first place, that is!!). I’m not on Facebook, mySpace, linkedin, Hi5 or any of the 100 other networking sites that exist – one exhausts me enough.

Music: I belong to the Stone Age, my friends, I admit. I do NOT own an iPod (for Heaven’s sake don’t shriek in shock so loudly, people!!). I rely on the good old ancient radio, and the computer as well – I just listen online. Viva Radio and 106.7 Lite FM are my current favorites. I don’t have a CD system at home yet, so I don’t listen to too many CD’s at the moment either. I used to, when I was in India.

TV: My saviour, LOL. I watch just about anything that can hold my interest for longer than 5 minutes, or else pique it. Of course, I always go back to the millionth re-run of Friends, Sex and the City, Everybody Loves Raymond, Home Improvement, Will and Grace or Full House. V likes Seinfeld and though I didn’t think it was THAT entertaining earlier, I think it’s pretty funny now. I also like Grey’s Anatomy and ER, and thanks to V again, House MD. I used to watch Desperate Housewives, but have lost interest now. That could also be because I’m not sure when it comes on in the US, so if anyone knows, shout out – thanks. I like watching cookery shows on occasion, and if I’m extremely jobless, What Not to Wear on Style. Yeah, that’s right.

Movies: Anyone who’s been reading my blog lately knows that I’ve been overdosing on them, so of course I love movies. I’m not going to repeat the names of the last few movies I watched - please scroll down to my last couple of blog entries and that should fill you in.

Magazines: The web pretty much covers most of it, but when I get my hands on Outlook, India Today, Femina, Cosmopolitan, Glamour and The Economist, I like reading the hard copies as well.

Books: I recently read Freakonomics (Steven Levitt & Stephen Dubner), Passion India (Javier Moro) and Shalimar The Clown (Salman Rushdie), and am now devouring Orhan Pamuk’s The Black Book. I’d also like to read Snow and My Name is Red by Pamuk, Breakfast at Tiffany’s (Capote), On Beauty (Zadie Smith), Sacred Games (Vikram Chandra), and Lord of the Flies (William Golding), soon. I went into the Strand the other day and can’t wait to go back to buy some of them. If anyone hasn’t read Gregory David Roberts’ Shantaram, that’s high on my list of all-time favorites.

Newspapers: In India, I used to read The Hindu and The Indian Express, and FT occasionally. For a good laugh and some entertainment, there was always The Times of India. Here, the NYT sometimes, but seriously I think in America the printed word is a slave to the internet. Check out what the Freakonomics blog is saying about the growth of newspapers in – where else – India!

Yes, and that’s about it for now. Ciao.

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