ಸುಮ್ಮನೆ ಕುತೂಹಲಕ್ಕೆ ಕರ್ನಾಟಕ ಸರಕಾರದ ಅಂತರಜಾಲ ತಾಣ ತೆರೆದೆ. ಅಲ್ಲಿ ಇಲ್ಲಿ ಕ್ಲಿಕ್ ಮಾಡುತ್ತ ವಿಧಾನ ಸಭೆ ಮತ್ತು ಪರಿಷತ್ತಿನ ಸದಸ್ಯರ ಪಟ್ಟಿ ತೆರೆದೆ. ಅಲ್ಲೊಂದು ಆಶ್ಚರ್ಯ ಕಾದಿತ್ತು. ವಿಧಾನ ಪರಿಷತ್ತಿನ ಸದಸ್ಯರ ಪಟ್ಟಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ಇತ್ತೀಚೆಗೆ ನಿಧನರಾದ ಬಿಜೆಪಿ ಸದಸ್ಯ ಡಾ. ಎಂ. ಆರ್. ತಂಗ ಅವರ ಹೆಸರೂ ಇತ್ತು. ಹೆಸರಿನ ಮುಂದೆ ೨೧-೬-೨೦೦೬ ರಲ್ಲಿ ನಿವೃತ್ತರಾಗುತ್ತಾರೆ ಎಂದೂ ಇತ್ತು. ಏನನ್ನುತ್ತೀರಾ? ಈ ಹಿಂದೆಯೂ ಕರ್ನಾಟಕ ಸರಕಾರದ ಅಂತರಜಾಲ ತಾಣಗಳ ಬಗ್ಗೆ ಇದೇ ರೀತಿಯ ಹಲವು ದೂರುಗಳು ಬಂದಿದ್ದವು. ಈಗಲಾದರೂ ಸುಧಾರಿಸಿರಬಹುದು ಎಂದುಕೊಂಡರೆ ...

It was a long pending demand from India. We need a low cost OS for India. Indians can not afford the heavily priced in US$ equivalent - converted to Indian Rs - software from Microsoft and other biggies like Adobe, Macromedia, Quark, etc. Finally, Microsoft has relaised that if it has to reach the 90% of the Indian population who do not speak English, they need to bring down the low cost versions of Windows. Microsoft announced the availability of started edition of Windows for India. Bill Gates announced 7-point formula for Indian when Dayanidhi Maran, the IT minister of India, visited Redmond, Microsoft. This is a good step. These will help the propagation of IT in India and will help in reducing the digital divide.

I came to know the availability of Service Pack 2 for Microsoft Office 2003. As anybode would do, I opened the web-site and started reading the knowledgebase article accompanying the download. Here is the excerpt from the web-site -

I bought a Samsung ML-5200A laser printer 4 years ago. In just 4 years, the printer has become outdated, obsolete and out of market. The sad part is that no toner cartridges are available in the market for that printer. I can understand new products are being introduced and production of old models being stopped. But stopping the support all together including the daily requirement like toner cartridges is un-acceptable. Compare this situation with that of HP laser printers. Toner cartridges are available in the market for very old HP laser printers like Laserjet Series II. Finally, I had to get the toner cartridge re-filled by some vendor. I am aware of the fact that I can pull-on like this only for some more time. It is not possible to re-fill the toner cartridge forever.