Sir Arthur C. Clarke has left us

He is most well known around the world for creating the concept of Satellite Technology. Satellites play a vital role in today's world for communication and other purposes. If not for this man, when would such a conecpt have been created?

He also wrote a number of interesting science fiction books, and made many predictions about the future of mankind and the universe. He predicted that man would visit the Moon before the year 2000, and man did go there in 1969 and many times afterwards. Most of his other predictions too have proved to be correct.

Arthur C. Clarke lived in Sri Lanka (of all countries) for a large portion of his lifetime. I believe he liked the peaceful environment and beautiful scenery which would help him continue inventing, writing and predicting. He adapted to the Sri Lankan way of life and ofter enjoyed wearing a sarong and t-shirt like most other Sri Lankan men do.

Another major part of his life was his post-Polio syndrome which made him unabled to walk properly and placed him in the wheelchair. Yet he continued to lead an active lifestyle. Countless times I saw him at the Otter's Aquatic Club, sitting in his wheelchair, enjoying the scenery and watching the children have fun in the pool. He came there for regular exercise to keep himself as fit as possible.

Sri Arthur C. Clarke was awarded a CBE (knighthood) in 1989, although he was unable to fly to England and receive the honours from the Queen as he was too ill for the long journey. He was also the Chancellor of the Moratuwa University from 1979 to 2002. The Moratuwa University was the first to offer IT eduction in Sri Lanka, and Arthur C. Clarke would have played a major role in its development.

In 2005, Sir Arthur C. Clarke was present at the opening of CBN Sat, Sri Lanka's first Satellite Pay Television network. CBN Sat caused a revolution in the television industry of Sri Lanka, and Arthur C. Clarke would have been happy to be a part of its beginning.

In December 2007, Arthur C. Clarke celebrated his 90th birthday together with the President of Sri Lanka and numerous other dignitaries. At the same time he produced a video bidding farewell to his frined and fans, knowing that he would leave the world soon.

Early this morning, Sir Clarke passed away after being hospitalized for four days. He would have predicted his deaths months or even years ahead. And he would have been happy and at peace when he died, as he knows what a great service he has done for mankind.

Sir Arthur C. Clarke, may your sould Rest In Peace!

VerveEarth

VerveEarth is a new seach engine-type website which turns surfing the World Wide Web into just surfing the World. VerveEarth organizes registered websites and blogs according to their base position in the world. For example, my blog's link is in Colombo, Sri Lanka on the VerveEarth map.

When you visit VerveEarth, first you see a world map (via Google Maps), with RSS icons all over the place. You can zoom in to any region and all websites/blogs in that area will be shown clearly using those icons. You place your mouse over the icons to read their titles, or click on them to see the latest posts in short (thanks to RSS). If you are registered at VerveEarth, you can choose favourites and then view a map of only your favourite websites in the world.

VerveEarth gives everyone a more interesting way to browse the internet. Apart from just clicking around the world map, you can type in a website and search in normal fashion. If you really want to understand what I say clearly, then visit VerveEarth now.

I got to know about VerveEarth from a email sent to me from the CEO of the service (it was probably automated). VerveEarth's website is completely interactive and loads surprisingly fast on my snail-type SLT ADSL connection.

At the moment VerveEarth has very few websites documented as blog owners have to register for people to see it on the map. VerveEarth probably will not go for web crawling like other search engines. And also VerveEarth is still in beta, so you can trust the service to improve more as time goes on.

If you own a website or blog, I recommend you go over to VerveEarth and put it on the map. Once the service becomes popular you can expect a ton of hits to your blog/website.

In Sri Lanka - As of now only my blog and another blog are registered at VerveEarth.

Speed Test: Sri Lanka

Many users from Sri Lanka have tested their internet connections with Speedtest.net, a free download/upload speed testing service. The service also lists the Continents, Countries, Cities and Internet Service Providers according to the highest download and upload speeds.

Lets have a look at how Sri Lanka rates.

Internet Service Providers - Download
1. MTT Network (Dialog Broadband) - 994 kb/s
2. Sri Lanka Telecom - 432 kb/s
3. Unknown - 413 kb/s

Internet Service Providers - Upload
1. MTT Network (Dialog Broadband) - 309 kb/s
2. Sri Lanka Telecom - 147 kb/s
3. Unknown - 134 kb/s

Cities - Download
1. Kelaniya - 677 kb/s
2. Kotte - 658 kb/s
3. Colombo - 458 kb/s
4. Battaramulla - 458 kb/s
5. Kandy - 413 kb/s

Cities - Upload
1. Kelaniya - 233 kb/s
2. Kotte - 171 kb/s
3. Kandy - 168 kb/s
4. Colombo - 160 kb/s
5. Battaramulla - 148 kb/s

Interesting. Evidently Dialog Broadband takes the first place because they have only high speed connections. SLT lags behind Dialog, and what is the Unknown ISP in Sri Lanka? It comes very close to SLT. I can guarantee that the City-based lists are not very accurate.

As more and more Sri Lankan surfers test their connection speed, the listings are likely to change greatly. So keep checking Speedtest.net for the latest ratings and see if SLT can improve with their Mobitel Broadband.

Speed Test: SLT

Today I came accross a free online service named Speedtest.net which allows internet users to measure the download and upload speeds from the current location to a selected server. The closest server to Sri Lanka was Male in Maldives. The free service helped prove how awful the SLT ADSL service was becoming.

My home connection is SLT ADSL 512k download and 128k upload.

I tested my home connection in two stages: Daytime and Nighttime. Nighttime results are generally better as there is less internet traffic in Sri Lanka in the night.

Home Test: Daytime (1430h-1530h)





Home Test: Nighttime (2030h-2130h)

Lanka Internet shuts down services - Thousands of employees and clients left in the dark

One of Sri Lanka's first ever Internet Service Providers, Lanka Internet, was unexpectedly shut down at the end of February 2007 after filing for bankruptcy twice in the previous year. Lanka internet was one of Sri Lanka's few trusted Web Hosting and Internet Access service providers. The company was established in 1994 by a group of Sri Lankans living in the U.S.A. Afterwards, ownership and management of the company was continuosly changed.

The company soon began having financial troubles. SLT too filed a case against Lanka internet regarding unlicensed providing of IDD services. However, the company survived even after filing for bankruptcy in 2006, until it shut down services without warning. Employees suddenly became unemployed, and thousand of clients lost internet access and hosting facilities. Until today, no one has yet been able to find the management of Lanka Internet who disappeared after stoping services.

See Lankan ISP goes Bust.

PS: This same story could repeat itself in the near future. Most of you can guess what it is. Comet Cable is on the verge of bankruptcy and will soon have to shut down their services, having money or not. There is hardly much hope left for customers. The higher management will disappear leaving customers and employees in the dark.