HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE- HINDI

Google will put 100 Indian monuments online

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) and Google have partnered to map and create 360-degree virtual views of 100monuments in India. Once the data has been collected, it will be put online, allowing web users to get a virtual tour of a monument. Almost all major monuments, including the Taj Mahal, are part of the list.

Google says that it has already photographed and mapped Qutub Minar. The virtual tour for this monument will be soon available to web users. Humayun's Tomb will be mapped next. The company says that creating 360-degree imagery of a monument takes around 7 to 10 days.

Google is using a special tool called Street View Trekker to film the monuments. This is a camera mounted on a backpack. A traveller can wear the Trekker and go into places where Google's Street View cars cannot. Using this tool the company has brought several tourists attractions, including Grand Canyon and Palace of Versailles, online.

In India, the project to film 100 monuments is an extension of Google's earlier project for which the company collaborated with museums in the country and filmed famous paintings housed in them to make them accessible to web users.

"India's historical and archaeological sites are an important part of world's knowledge and through this partnership we hope to engage more people, both around the world and here in India, in discovering and learning about our country's rich cultural history," said the union minister of culture Chandresh Kumari Katoch at an event in Delhi.

Google said that once it has collected the data to create virtual tour of a monument, it will be put online at Google Maps as well as on the World Wonders Site, which is part of Google Cultural Institute.

Rajan Anandan, vice president and managing director at Google India, said, "The company was honoured to be working with the ASI to make Indian heritage sites available to the world to experience online."

Pravin Srivastava, director general of ASI said that the project would not only make monuments more accessible but would also "digitally preserve India's heritage for future generations".

Though the project carries Street View tag, this is a not a part of Google's Street View service. In 2011, the company started filming Indian roads in Bangalore to put them online but had to stop after cops objected. At that time Google said it had necessary clearance to film Indian streets and was talking to Bangalore cops to resolve their concerns.

But two years later, Google is yet to get permission to film Indian roads, the way it has done in most of the developed countries.

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/internet/Google-will-put-100-Indian-monuments-online/articleshow/23457218.cms

Science Reporter- October 2013

DEPARTMENTS

REACTIONS ...................................… 6

EDITORIAL ....................................… 7

SPECTRUM ...................................… 8 

BOOK REVIEW ...............................29

POINT-COUNTERPOINT .............… 38

TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE ...............42

PUZZLE CORNER ........................… 50

INVENTIONS ...............................… 53

WILD HAVEN ................................ 54

INDIAN SCIENTISTS ....................… 56

FUN QUIZ ..................................... 58

WHAT'S NEW................................. 60

CROSSWORD ................................. 61

                                                                                                                                                                             

                                                                                                                                                                                                           Pratham Jain

                                                                                                                                                                                                           5-C

                                                                                                                                                                                                           Bal Bharati Public School ,

                                                                                                                                                                                                           Brij Vihar , Ghaziabad  

                                                                                                                                                                                     

Sport Star : October 2013

Cover Story

 Farewells and fare thee wells 

Mumbai Indians, the champion team of the IPL, won the Champions League too! It was a fitting farewell gift to Sachin Tendulkar in his final season of the Twenty20 format! Vijay Lokapally takes stock. 

Cricket

FEATURE

a core player

With his well-documented injury problems, it seems rather certain that Shane Watson's long-term future lies more with his batting than bowling, writes Priyansh.

INTERVIEW

 unyielding fielding 

"If each guy saves me one run, it gives me ten runs. Margins in most 20-over games come down to three or four (runs)," Jonty Rhodes, the Mumbai Indians' coach, tells N. Sudarshan. 

Shooting

INTERVIEW/RONJAN SODHI

 80 per cent of shooting is between the ears

"I don't see myself continuing in the sport after the Rio Games. I want to give it my best shot and get that Olympic medal," says Khel Ratna Ronjan Sodhi in a chat with Kamesh Srinivasan. 

Rowing

FEATURE

 sculling success

The Indian rowers dish out a noteworthy performance in the Asian Championship in China recently, claiming one gold, two silver and two bronze medals. By V.V. Subrahmanyam. 

Boxing

FOCUS

the Mary Kom of Andhra

Nikhat Zareen is only 17… but she has decided to brave it out in boxing. V.V. Subrahmanyam profiles the teen. 

Athletics

FOCUS

 sprint, the glory of Tamil Nadu

There were quite a few sprinters from Tamil Nadu who felt special that evening in Kochi. Apart from Augustine, there were four others from the southern State who had sparkling gold medals dangling around their neck. By Stan Rayan.

ASIAN SCHOOLS MEET

India shines

There were some superb individual efforts from the Indian contingent at the Asian schools meet in Malaysia. P.K. Ajith Kumar has the details. 

Football

KICKING AROUND

 celebrating arsenal 

The principal director and shareholder of Arsenal today is the American billionaire, Stan Kroenke. There could hardly be a greater contrast than with Sir Henry Norris. Where Norris was dominant and dictatorial, Kroenke is almost always absent. By Brian Glanville.

STARWATCH

playing his part

Kieron Gibbs is now hoping a new health regime will help keep him injury free for Arsenal this season and could end with a recall to the England World Cup squad. By Jim van Wijk.

Steadily rising up the rungs

Despite making his first-team debut in April 2008, Jonjo Shelvey had to wait until Charlton's FA Cup third-round tie against Norwich in January 2009, for his first goal, one which made the 16-year-old the club's youngest ever goal-scorer. By Andrew Lawton. 

Chess

FOCUS

lalith, s fruitful journey

What is 20-year-old GM Lalith Babu doing to climb the chess rungs? J. R. Shridharan finds out.

FOCUS

making steady progress 

Koneru Humpy is pleased with her recent performances which propelled her rating back to 2600 from 2589, writes J.R. Shridharan.

Krish Chawla

V- C

Bal Bharati Public School, Brij Vihar, Ghaziabad

Poster exhibition based on the theme ‘Say No to Crackers’ and ‘Say No to Child Labour’.

Date & Time :  20th to 30th October, 2013. 11:00 am - 8:00 pm

Entry : Free

Age Group: 4 to 15 yrs. 

Address : West Court, DLF Place, Saket, New Delhi - 110017

About the Event: DLF Place Saket brings to you poster exhibition based on the theme ‘Say No to Crackers’ and ‘Say No to Child Labour’. 
Artworks displayed in the exhibition are made by the students from the Age Group of 4 to 15 years from different schools. This is a sincere effort of the mall to spread the social message across.

Alice In Wonderland - Told With Objects, Puppets, Shadows, Music & Actors

Date & Time :  26 October, 2013. 7:00 pm

Duration : 60 min.

Entry  : by Tickets priced at Rs.250 available at :
Offline : Oct.14 onward at the Programmed Desk for IHC members only. Open to all from Oct.17 onward. 

Address : Stein Auditorium, India Habitat Centre (IHC), Lodhi Road, New Delhi-110003
Parking : Gate No. 1, 2 & 3 (Cars), Gate No. 2 ( Bikes & Bicycles )


About the Event : Tram Theater presents Alice In Wonderland - Told With Objects, Puppets, Shadows, Music & Actors! 
An Old World Culture Presentation

Language : English / Hindi

Director : Choiti Ghosh

Devised & Performed by : Rachel D'Souza, Rakhi Prasad, Suraj Tomer, Vikas Baid. 

New Book Releases for Children

World Almanac and Book of Facts 2014

BY-  

 Sarah Janssen (Editor)

RELEASING DATE- November 26th '2013

Get thousands of facts right at your fingertips with this updated resource.

The World Almanac® and Book of Facts is America's top-selling reference book of all time, with more than 82 million copies sold. Published annually since 1868, this compendium of information is the authoritative source for all your entertainment, reference, and learning needs. Praised as a “treasure trove of political, economic, scientific and educational statistics and information” by The Wall Street Journal, The World Almanac® contains thousands of facts that are unavailable publicly elsewher. The 2014 edition of The World Almanac® and Book of Facts will answer all of your trivia questions—from history and sports to geography, pop culture, and much more. The World Almanac® and Book of Facts is America's top-selling reference book of all time, with more than 82 million copies sold. Published annually since 1868, this compendium of information is the authoritative source for all your entertainment, reference, and learning needs. The 2014 edition of The World Almanac reviews the events of 2013 and will be your go-to source for any questions on any topic in the upcoming year. Praised as a “treasure trove of political, economic, scientific and educational statistics and information” by The Wall Street Journal, The World Almanac® contains thousands of facts that are unavailable publicly elsewhere. The World Almanac® and Book of Facts will answer all of your trivia needs—from history and sports to geography, pop culture, and much more. Features of The World Almanac® 2014 include: • The Year in Review: The World Almanac® takes a look back at 2013 while providing all the information you’ll need in 2014. • 2013—Year in Sports: Hundreds of pages of trivia and statistics that are essential for any sports fan, featuring complete coverage of the 2013 World Series, the brand-new National Women’s Soccer League, and much more. • 2013—Year in Pictures: Striking full-color images from around the world in 2013, covering news, pop culture, science, and sports. • 2013—Top 10 News Topics: The editors of The World Almanac® list the top stories that held their attention in 2013. • World Almanac Editors’ Picks: Time Capsule: The World Almanac® lists the items that most came to symbolize the year 2013, from news and sports to pop culture. • Offbeat News Stories: The World Almanac® editors found some of the strangest news stories of the year. • The World at a Glance: This annual feature of The World Almanac® provides a quick look at the surprising stats and curious facts that define the changing world today. • Marriage in the U.S.: After a year in which the U.S. Supreme Court declared DOMA unconstitutional and the federal government began to extend some marriage benefits to same-sex couples, a feature on marriage in the United States reveals surprising details about the state of our unions. • Voter Guide: Prior to the 2014 midterm elections, The World Almanac® provides a user-friendly, state-by-state guide to key election dates and information, including voter-ID laws adopted by many states. • Need-to-Know Information: Browse all-new statistics on topics in the news: firearm violence and crime rates, the health and employment of U.S. veterans, and the latest in digital technologies—and who is using them. • Health News and Statistics: Details about U.S. health care policy, including ongoing implementation of health care reform. Factual information on common diseases and disorders (including a new section on ADHD), nutrition and diet, and Medicare and insurance. • World Almanac® Editors’ Picks: Memorable Winter Olympic Moments: From Tonya and Nancy to the Miracle on Ice, the editors of The World Almanac® choose their favorite moments of past Winter Olympics to prepare readers for the 2014 Games. • and much more.

Source: 

http://www.amazon.com/World-Almanac-Book-Facts-2014/dp/1600571824/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1382002787&sr=1-2&keywords=WORLD+ALMANAC

By- 

ELIE JAIN

VI -A

BAL BHARATI PUBLIC SCHOOL,BRIJ VIHAR, GHAZIABAD

The Life of a Newspaper

This is the last time you will be reading The International Herald Tribune; as of tomorrow, it is The International New York Times. But weep not:

This is not the first name change for what was popularly known in its early years as the ‘‘Paris Herald,’’ and if the genealogy of a news paper is reflected in its name (the original parent, The New York Herald, at one point the most profitable and popular paper in all the United States, ended its days as The New York World Journal Tribune), the DNA of a great paper is defined by evolution of the complex and intimate interplay of reader and editor, owner and technology.

And that is best discovered in the figurative basement of the paper, in those stacks of brown, brittle copies of old newspapers that trace the ever-changing interests, dramas, world views and pleasures   —  all that we call ‘‘news.’’

Mining these vintage broadsheets is a pleasure that may be lost to future generations if the ‘‘paper’’ goes out of news papering.  The real gems buried in these stacks are not necessarily the ‘‘first rough drafts of history’’ that reporters like to claim as their product   — these are easier to access in footnotes and online   —  but rather the obscure little story on an inside page (‘‘Is London Hairdresser 

Really a German Spy?’’) alongside an ad for a forgotten product at a forgotten price (‘‘Take Carter’s Little Liver Pills … The stomach, liver and bowels will be cleansed of poison …’’) or the society news from a time when everybody knew who everybody was (‘‘Mr. Irving Marks, an American resident of Paris, has moved from the George V to  the Plaza Athénée, where he plans to remain indefinitely’’). 

Many a brief item leaves us craving for more: An 1897 dispatch from Kronstadt, the port of St. Petersburg,  describes the arrival of President Félix Faure of France: ‘‘Ladies faint and utter strangers embrace affectionately.’’ Why?  

The paper of Feb. 20, 1898, described how it took 12 Parisian policemen aided by two victims to get two muggers to the station house. Even then, one of the suspects would have escaped ‘‘had it not been for the appearance of a gigantic policeman, who goes by the name of Napoleon and who is kept on the premises specially to overpower disorderly prisoners.’’

This was the daily cafe fare of the gilded generation of ‘‘An American in Paris,’’ of the Lost Generation (‘‘America is my country and Paris is my hometown,’’  Gertrude Stein declared), of doughboys and tourists. The Paris Herald flourished at a time when the goings-on at England’s Downton Abbeys were still news even as a new social era was fast rising: A cartoon I found from 1896 shows two women resting in front of their modern bicycles. Bell: ‘‘Why did old novels all end with ‘And they lived happily for ever after?’’’ Nell: ‘‘Because the New Woman was not known then.’’

The paper evolved with the times. The European edition founded in 1887 by the wild and wealthy owner of The New York Herald, James Gordon Bennett Jr., for his fellow American expatriates in Paris spread first to London (‘‘In order to ensure an extremely rapid delivery of the New York Herald in London, the airplanes of the Air Union Company carry it over every morning’’   —  1932), then across Europe, and finally to Asia. 

Its names and owners changed from time to time   —  it became the European Edition of The New York Herald Tribune in 1924; then, in 1967, The International Herald Tribune, under the joint ownership of The Herald Tribune, The New York Times and The Washington Post. This troika was reduced in 1991 to The Washington Post and The New York Times and then in 2003 to only The Times. And thus, as of tomorrow, it will be The International New York Times.

Whatever the name, the connection between the paper and its audience has long been clear. Already in 1911, an art magazine of the time called Lotus noted, ‘‘As all American travelers in Europe know, or should know, the ‘N.Y. Herald’ publishes in Paris a European edition that usually is spoken of as ‘The Paris Herald.’’’ (The Herald had reported a claim by the Prado Museum in Madrid that its ‘‘Mona Lisa’’ was the real one, not the Louvre’s.) And by its 100th anniversary   —  a birthday marked by a memorable feast at the Trocadéro, with the Eiffel Tower across the Seine recruited as a spectacular birthday candle   —  the Trib, aka the IHT, had become ‘‘the first global newspaper,’’ the trusted daily fare of Americans and other English-speaking travelers, businesspeople, diplomats, expatriates and journalists across Europe and Asia.   

I became a regular user, and contributor, when I went abroad as a foreign correspondent 35 years ago. In my years as a New York Times correspondent in the Soviet Union, we would get the Trib in stacks, the freshest never less than four days old. But we would still devour them all   —  not so much for the news, which by then we’d learned, but   —  as with those musty stacks of Gilded Age and Jazz Age Paris Heralds   —  for a taste of the life in the world out there. 

Of course, a lot of people will lament the latest name change, just as they do any change. Among the letters to the editor I read in the papers of yore, one railed against ‘‘the loud-speaker radio’’ and the ‘‘croaking and screeching of unseen tenors and sopranos’’ filling Parisian apartment houses; another ranted against central heating   —  ‘‘What can beat a good coal fire for comfort and health?’’ And newspapers, I have learned, are notoriously habit-forming   —  loyal readers resist any alteration of their daily fix. 

But even back in the day, lurking among those who lamented change were always a few who welcomed it. The paper itself devoted an entire page in 1896 to advising ladies how to ride a bicycle and what to wear (and eat   —  this was France) when cycling. In 1932, one James J. Montague submitted a poem (something we don’t see much any more, alas) addressed to an infant growing up in an era of rapid technological advances: ‘‘The progress of science foretells/ That when you grow up all your work will be done/ By photo-electrical cells.’’ 

The fact is that The Herald/IHT/INYT (will that be the next nickname?) was itself from its inception a child of revolutionary technological advances. According to the history of the paper by Charles L. Robertson, it was industrialization and the rapid development of steamship travel after 1850 that created a new class of wealthy, Atlantic-hopping Americans. And it was the trans-Atlantic telegraph cables, first laid in 1858, that made it possible to keep them in close touch with their country, their businesses and the world. Bennett, in fact, was instrumental in lowering the cost of trans-Atlantic communications   —  and thus making a European edition of his paper economically feasible   —  by partnering with another magnate to break the monopoly of Western Union in laying trans-Atlantic cables. 

The world has not ceased shrinking since. The first trans-Atlantic transmission by cable moved 98 words in 16 hours. Today, suppliers fight to shave milliseconds off the speed of transmission via fiber optic cables. But Mr. Montague’s prophecy of photo-electric everything, including eyes, has not come to pass, and it takes us as long to read those 98 words as it did in 1858. So long as that doesn’t change, we will still need trusted reporters and editors to sort out the vast waves of information sweeping this chaotic world of ours. We need those first rough drafts, the smart commentary, the impartial news, to function in these times. And we should hope that our grandchildren will delight in finding telling tidbits about our era when they find this newspaper in your attic. 

Source | http://www.nytimes.com

Why our future depends on libraries, reading and daydreaming

Neil Gaiman: Why our future depends on libraries, reading and daydreaming

A lecture explaining why using our imaginations, and providing for others to use theirs, is an obligation for all citizens

It's important for people to tell you what side they are on and why, and whether they might be biased. A declaration of members' interests, of a sort. So, I am going to be talking to you about reading. I'm going to tell you that libraries are important. I'm going to suggest that reading fiction, that reading for pleasure, is one of the most important things one can do. I'm going to make an impassioned plea for people to understand what libraries and librarians are, and to preserve both of these things.

And I am biased, obviously and enormously: I'm an author, often an author of fiction. I write for children and for adults. For about 30 years I have been earning my living though my words, mostly by making things up and writing them down. It is obviously in my interest for people to read, for them to read fiction, for libraries and librarians to exist and help foster a love of reading and places in which reading can occur.

So I'm biased as a writer. But I am much, much more biased as a reader. And I am even more biased as a British citizen.

And I'm here giving this talk tonight, under the auspices of the Reading Agency: a charity whose mission is to give everyone an equal chance in life by helping people become confident and enthusiastic readers. Which supports literacy programs, and libraries and individuals and nakedly and wantonly encourages the act of reading. Because, they tell us, everything changes when we read.

And it's that change, and that act of reading that I'm here to talk about tonight. I want to talk about what reading does. What it's good for.

I was once in New York, and I listened to a talk about the building of private prisons – a huge growth industry in America. The prison industry needs to plan its future growth – how many cells are they going to need? How many prisoners are there going to be, 15 years from now? And they found they could predict it very easily, using a pretty simple algorithm, based on asking what percentage of 10 and 11-year-olds couldn't read. And certainly couldn't read for pleasure.

It's not one to one: you can't say that a literate society has no criminality. But there are very real correlations.

And I think some of those correlations, the simplest, come from something very simple. Literate people read fiction.

Fiction has two uses. Firstly, it's a gateway drug to reading. The drive to know what happens next, to want to turn the page, the need to keep going, even if it's hard, because someone's in trouble and you have to know how it's all going to end … that's a very real drive. And it forces you to learn new words, to think new thoughts, to keep going. To discover that reading per se is pleasurable. Once you learn that, you're on the road to reading everything. And reading is key. There were noises made briefly, a few years ago, about the idea that we were living in a post-literate world, in which the ability to make sense out of written words was somehow redundant, but those days are gone: words are more important than they ever were: we navigate the world with words, and as the world slips onto the web, we need to follow, to communicate and to comprehend what we are reading. People who cannot understand each other cannot exchange ideas, cannot communicate, and translation programs only go so far.

The simplest way to make sure that we raise literate children is to teach them to read, and to show them that reading is a pleasurable activity. And that means, at its simplest, finding books that they enjoy, giving them access to those books, and letting them read them.

I don't think there is such a thing as a bad book for children. Every now and again it becomes fashionable among some adults to point at a subset of children's books, a genre, perhaps, or an author, and to declare them bad books, books that children should be stopped from reading. I've seen it happen over and over; Enid Blyton was declared a bad author, so was RL Stine, so were dozens of others. Comics have been decried as fostering illiteracy.

No such thing as a bad writer... Enid Blyton's Famous Five. Photograph: Greg Balfour Evans/Alamy

It's tosh. It's snobbery and it's foolishness. There are no bad authors for children, that children like and want to read and seek out, because every child is different. They can find the stories they need to, and they bring themselves to stories. A hackneyed, worn-out idea isn't hackneyed and worn out to them. This is the first time the child has encountered it. Do not discourage children from reading because you feel they are reading the wrong thing. Fiction you do not like is a route to other books you may prefer. And not everyone has the same taste as you.

Well-meaning adults can easily destroy a child's love of reading: stop them reading what they enjoy, or give them worthy-but-dull books that you like, the 21st-century equivalents of Victorian "improving" literature. You'll wind up with a generation convinced that reading is uncool and worse, unpleasant.

We need our children to get onto the reading ladder: anything that they enjoy reading will move them up, rung by rung, into literacy. (Also, do not do what this author did when his 11-year-old daughter was into RL Stine, which is to go and get a copy of Stephen King's Carrie, saying if you liked those you'll love this! Holly read nothing but safe stories of settlers on prairies for the rest of her teenage years, and still glares at me when Stephen King's name is mentioned.)

And the second thing fiction does is to build empathy. When you watch TV or see a film, you are looking at things happening to other people. Prose fiction is something you build up from 26 letters and a handful of punctuation marks, and you, and you alone, using your imagination, create a world and people it and look out through other eyes. You get to feel things, visit places and worlds you would never otherwise know. You learn that everyone else out there is a me, as well. You're being someone else, and when you return to your own world, you're going to be slightly changed.

Empathy is a tool for building people into groups, for allowing us to function as more than self-obsessed individuals.

You're also finding out something as you read vitally important for making your way in the world. And it's this:

The world doesn't have to be like this. Things can be different.

I was in China in 2007, at the first party-approved science fiction and fantasy convention in Chinese history. And at one point I took a top official aside and asked him Why? SF had been disapproved of for a long time. What had changed?

It's simple, he told me. The Chinese were brilliant at making things if other people brought them the plans. But they did not innovate and they did not invent. They did not imagine. So they sent a delegation to the US, to Apple, to Microsoft, to Google, and they asked the people there who were inventing the future about themselves. And they found that all of them had read science fiction when they were boys or girls.

Fiction can show you a different world. It can take you somewhere you've never been. Once you've visited other worlds, like those who ate fairy fruit, you can never be entirely content with the world that you grew up in. Discontent is a good thing: discontented people can modify and improve their worlds, leave them better, leave them different.

And while we're on the subject, I'd like to say a few words about escapism. I hear the term bandied about as if it's a bad thing. As if "escapist" fiction is a cheap opiate used by the muddled and the foolish and the deluded, and the only fiction that is worthy, for adults or for children, is mimetic fiction, mirroring the worst of the world the reader finds herself in.

If you were trapped in an impossible situation, in an unpleasant place, with people who meant you ill, and someone offered you a temporary escape, why wouldn't you take it? And escapist fiction is just that: fiction that opens a door, shows the sunlight outside, gives you a place to go where you are in control, are with people you want to be with(and books are real places, make no mistake about that); and more importantly, during your escape, books can also give you knowledge about the world and your predicament, give you weapons, give you armour: real things you can take back into your prison. Skills and knowledge and tools you can use to escape for real.

As JRR Tolkien reminded us, the only people who inveigh against escape are jailers.

Another way to destroy a child's love of reading, of course, is to make sure there are no books of any kind around. And to give them nowhere to read those books. I was lucky. I had an excellent local library growing up. I had the kind of parents who could be persuaded to drop me off in the library on their way to work in summer holidays, and the kind of librarians who did not mind a small, unaccompanied boy heading back into the children's library every morning and working his way through the card catalogue, looking for books with ghosts or magic or rockets in them, looking for vampires or detectives or witches or wonders. And when I had finished reading the children's' library I began on the adult books.

They were good librarians. They liked books and they liked the books being read. They taught me how to order books from other libraries on inter-library loans. They had no snobbery about anything I read. They just seemed to like that there was this wide-eyed little boy who loved to read, and would talk to me about the books I was reading, they would find me other books in a series, they would help. They treated me as another reader – nothing less or more – which meant they treated me with respect. I was not used to being treated with respect as an eight-year-old.

But libraries are about freedom. Freedom to read, freedom of ideas, freedom of communication. They are about education (which is not a process that finishes the day we leave school or university), about entertainment, about making safe spaces, and about access to information.

I worry that here in the 21st century people misunderstand what libraries are and the purpose of them. If you perceive a library as a shelf of books, it may seem antiquated or outdated in a world in which most, but not all, books in print exist digitally. But that is to miss the point fundamentally.

I think it has to do with nature of information. Information has value, and the right information has enormous value. For all of human history, we have lived in a time of information scarcity, and having the needed information was always important, and always worth something: when to plant crops, where to find things, maps and histories and stories – they were always good for a meal and company. Information was a valuable thing, and those who had it or could obtain it could charge for that service.

In the last few years, we've moved from an information-scarce economy to one driven by an information glut. According to Eric Schmidt of Google, every two days now the human race creates as much information as we did from the dawn of civilisation until 2003. That's about five exobytes of data a day, for those of you keeping score. The challenge becomes, not finding that scarce plant growing in the desert, but finding a specific plant growing in a jungle. We are going to need help navigating that information to find the thing we actually need.

Libraries are places that people go to for information. Books are only the tip of the information iceberg: they are there, and libraries can provide you freely and legally with books. More children are borrowing books from libraries than ever before – books of all kinds: paper and digital and audio. But libraries are also, for example, places that people, who may not have computers, who may not have internet connections, can go online without paying anything: hugely important when the way you find out about jobs, apply for jobs or apply for benefits is increasingly migrating exclusively online. Librarians can help these people navigate that world.

I do not believe that all books will or should migrate onto screens: as Douglas Adams once pointed out to me, more than 20 years before the Kindle turned up, a physical book is like a shark. Sharks are old: there were sharks in the ocean before the dinosaurs. And the reason there are still sharks around is that sharks are better at being sharks than anything else is. Physical books are tough, hard to destroy, bath-resistant, solar-operated, feel good in your hand: they are good at being books, and there will always be a place for them. They belong in libraries, just as libraries have already become places you can go to get access to e books, and audio books and DVDs and web content.

A library is a place that is a repository of information and gives every citizen equal access to it. That includes health information. And mental health information. It's a community space. It's a place of safety, a haven from the world. It's a place with librarians in it. What the libraries of the future will be like is something we should be imagining now.

Literacy is more important than ever it was, in this world of text and email, a world of written information. We need to read and write, we need global citizens who can read comfortably, comprehend what they are reading, understand nuance, and make themselves understood.

Libraries really are the gates to the future. So it is unfortunate that, round the world, we observe local authorities seizing the opportunity to close libraries as an easy way to save money, without realising that they are stealing from the future to pay for today. They are closing the gates that should be open.

According to a recent study by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, England is the "only country where the oldest age group has higher proficiency in both literacy and numeracy than the youngest group, after other factors, such as gender, socio-economic backgrounds and type of occupations are taken into account".

Or to put it another way, our children and our grandchildren are less literate and less numerate than we are. They are less able to navigate the world, to understand it to solve problems. They can be more easily lied to and misled, will be less able to change the world in which they find themselves, be less employable. All of these things. And as a country, England will fall behind other developed nations because it will lack a skilled workforce.

Books are the way that we communicate with the dead. The way that we learn lessons from those who are no longer with us, that humanity has built on itself, progressed, made knowledge incremental rather than something that has to be relearned, over and over. There are tales that are older than most countries, tales that have long outlasted the cultures and the buildings in which they were first told.

I think we have responsibilities to the future. Responsibilities and obligations to children, to the adults those children will become, to the world they will find themselves inhabiting. All of us – as readers, as writers, as citizens – have obligations. I thought I'd try and spell out some of these obligations here.

I believe we have an obligation to read for pleasure, in private and in public places. If we read for pleasure, if others see us reading, then we learn, we exercise our imaginations. We show others that reading is a good thing.

We have an obligation to support libraries. To use libraries, to encourage others to use libraries, to protest the closure of libraries. If you do not value libraries then you do not value information or culture or wisdom. You are silencing the voices of the past and you are damaging the future.

We have an obligation to read aloud to our children. To read them things they enjoy. To read to them stories we are already tired of. To do the voices, to make it interesting, and not to stop reading to them just because they learn to read to themselves. Use reading-aloud time as bonding time, as time when no phones are being checked, when the distractions of the world are put aside.

We have an obligation to use the language. To push ourselves: to find out what words mean and how to deploy them, to communicate clearly, to say what we mean. We must not to attempt to freeze language, or to pretend it is a dead thing that must be revered, but we should use it as a living thing, that flows, that borrows words, that allows meanings and pronunciations to change with time.

We writers – and especially writers for children, but all writers – have an obligation to our readers: it's the obligation to write true things, especially important when we are creating tales of people who do not exist in places that never were – to understand that truth is not in what happens but what it tells us about who we are. Fiction is the lie that tells the truth, after all. We have an obligation not to bore our readers, but to make them need to turn the pages. One of the best cures for a reluctant reader, after all, is a tale they cannot stop themselves from reading. And while we must tell our readers true things and give them weapons and give them armour and pass on whatever wisdom we have gleaned from our short stay on this green world, we have an obligation not to preach, not to lecture, not to force predigested morals and messages down our readers' throats like adult birds feeding their babies pre-masticated maggots; and we have an obligation never, ever, under any circumstances, to write anything for children that we would not want to read ourselves.

We have an obligation to understand and to acknowledge that as writers for children we are doing important work, because if we mess it up and write dull books that turn children away from reading and from books, we 've lessened our own future and diminished theirs.

We all – adults and children, writers and readers – have an obligation to daydream. We have an obligation to imagine. It is easy to pretend that nobody can change anything, that we are in a world in which society is huge and the individual is less than nothing: an atom in a wall, a grain of rice in a rice field. But the truth is, individuals change their world over and over, individuals make the future, and they do it by imagining that things can be different.

Look around you: I mean it. Pause, for a moment and look around the room that you are in. I'm going to point out something so obvious that it tends to be forgotten. It's this: that everything you can see, including the walls, was, at some point, imagined. Someone decided it was easier to sit on a chair than on the ground and imagined the chair. Someone had to imagine a way that I could talk to you in London right now without us all getting rained on.This room and the things in it, and all the other things in this building, this city, exist because, over and over and over, people imagined things.

We have an obligation to make things beautiful. Not to leave the world uglier than we found it, not to empty the oceans, not to leave our problems for the next generation. We have an obligation to clean up after ourselves, and not leave our children with a world we've shortsightedly messed up, shortchanged, and crippled.

We have an obligation to tell our politicians what we want, to vote against politicians of whatever party who do not understand the value of reading in creating worthwhile citizens, who do not want to act to preserve and protect knowledge and encourage literacy. This is not a matter of party politics. This is a matter of common humanity.

Albert Einstein was asked once how we could make our children intelligent. His reply was both simple and wise. "If you want your children to be intelligent," he said, "read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales." He understood the value of reading, and of imagining. I hope we can give our children a world in which they will read, and be read to, and imagine, and understand.

• This is an edited version of Neil Gaiman's lecture for the Reading Agency, delivered on Monday October 14 at the Barbican in London. The Reading Agency's annual lecture series was initiated in 2012 as a platform for leading writers and thinkers to share original, challenging ideas about reading and libraries.

Source | http://www.theguardian.com

Bringing Back The Library Trend: Startups On An Unusual Mission

Bangalore: If you think back to the days where the world was yet to be introduced to the modern digital technology that we are so accustomed to today, the only source of knowledge to a majority of people who could not afford a computer or internet connection was through a visit to the nearby library. Library is the ’Mecca’ of the printed word and offers its readers a variety of reading experience. From comic books and graphic novels to historic events and literature, a library is like a key to an avid reader to unlock a vast treasure of knowledge.

With the changing trend in terms of technology and digital media, public and private libraries across India have been severely affected in terms of losing a loyal group of readers. Other major reason include travelling displeasure as readers have little time on their hands to travel a long distance in the ever increasing busy Indian streets to visit a library. The only way for libraries to stay in the game is to adapt to the current trend and come up with innovative ideas to up keep the interest in their readers.

As compiled by ET, we present to you three such startups that are on a mission to trend set libraries amongst the young crowd with their unique ideas.

Librarywala.com
Founded in Mumbai in 2007 by Hiten Turakhia and Hiten Dedhia, Librarywala.com is one of the first online libraries in India. Members can choose from the various plans available on the website and have books delivered to their homes.

New Book Releases for Children

Wings of Fire Book Four: The Dark Secret

 

Wings of Fire Book Four: The Dark Secret

by Tui T. Sutherland

Releasing Date: 29 October, 2013

The WINGS OF FIRE saga continues with a visit to the mysterious land of the Night Wings, where Starflight must face a terrible choice---his home, or his friends?

                            

Like all the dragonets of destiny, Starflight has always wanted to see his home -- but he's also been afraid of his fellow NightWings. Starflight doesn't have mindreading powers like his tribe, and he doesn't understand why they're so secretive. No one has ever even seen the NightWing queen.

But now Starflight is the dragonets' only hope -- he must find a way to negotiate with his fellow NightWings to free the RainWing dragons they've captured, and perhaps end the war in Pyrrhia altogether. Starflight is the smartest of the dragonets... but is he brave enough to speak up? Or will he falter in his mission, and accidentally betray them all?

Aakriti Adhikari

VII-E

Bal Bharti Public School 

Brij Vihar

Magazine Sportstar: October 5 2013

Cover Story

Now, this prancing horse will have to gallop
All-round drivers of the calibre of Fernando Alonso are hard to come by in modern-day F1 racing. It is not always that a driver's performance — whether he has won, finished on the podium or off it — receives such compelling attention. By G.Raghunath. 

Cricket

PROFILE
a role model to core!
Vijay Lokapally spends some time with the "nice, obedient, down-to-earth" paceman, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, in Meerut.

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CLT20 DIARY
long ranger
In three matches, Misbah-ul-Haq alone scored more runs (195) than all his team-mates put together (190) and it exposed the lack of depth in one of the elite sides from Pakistan, writes Y. B. Sarangi. 

Tennis

APPRECIATION
forever young
Leander Paes has really shown what it takes to stay a champion and turn the staunchest of his critics into adoring fans. By Kamesh Srinivasan.

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FOCUS
 sania and her pet project
"I am greedy to keep winning. I mean this is the attitude of any professional sportsperson. Wanting more is the key to success," Sania Mirza tells V.V. Subrahmanyam in this interaction.

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when money isn't everything…..

In what's definitely a fine gesture, Sania Mirza has come forward to provide free training to the Deaflympics player Shaik Jafreen from Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh. When Sania came to know about the plight of the passionate, ...

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FEATURE
unconventional guide
"It is a great feeling to share my experiences when many of the top 100 players (mostly women) come to me," says Christian Filhol, who has guided top players such as Mary Pierce, Elena Dementieva, Justine Henin, Marion Bartoli and Cara Black. By V.V. Subrahmanyam.

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FEATURE
nadal winning streak continue in 2014?
For Nadal, all along, in spite of his phenomenal exploits on clay and commendable displays on grass, it's the U.S. Open that has really marked significant shifts in his career. By N. Sudarshan. 

Table Tennis

INTER-INSTITUTIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
a boost for the game
In a maiden step, an inter-institutional table tennis event was hosted in a district and the crowd and the players alike lapped up all. By Avinash Nair.

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FEATURE
showing promise
Akula Sreeja won a bagful of medals at tournaments held in Guatemala and El Salvador recently. By J.R. Shridharan. 

Football

KICKING AROUND
best of best
George Best drank immoderately and self-destructively. Saved once by an expert surgeon with a liver operation, he died after a string of sordid episodes. But at his peak, what a talent he was, recalls Brian Glanville.

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FOCUS
a star, but not yet a united legend
As games and goals are always used as a statistical yardstick to judge greatness, Wayne Rooney, irrespective of the future, has firmly established his position among footballing greats, writes Ayon Sengupta.

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In search of further glory
It will be yet another chapter in a colourful career for Samuel Eto'o, who has been playing at the highest level since 1998, writes Andrew McDermott.

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STARWATCH
Hungary for success
Determined to be part of the England squad for next summer's World Cup finals, Gareth Barry adds a wealth of experience to Everton's young side and by leaving Manchester City on loan in search of regular action, he has proved he still has the motivation and appetite. By Andrew Mcdermott. All-round drivers of the calibre of Fernando Alonso are hard to come by in modern-day F1 racing. It is not always that a driver's performance — whether he has won, finished on the podium or off it — receives such compelling attention. By G.Raghunath. 

Krish Chawla
V- C
Bal Bharati Public School, Brij Vihar, Ghaziabad