Randy Pausch, Inspiring Professor, author of The Last Lecture, dies

Randy Pausch, the charismatic young college professor who fought his battle with pancreatic cancer in a remarkable speech widely-known as the "Last Lecture," has died at the age of 47 on Friday Jul 25th 2008. Pausch is survived by his wife, three children, his mother and his sister.

In addition to being recognized as a pioneer in virtual reality research, he became widely known as a gifted teacher and a mentor to many. Millions of people saw his inspiring "Last Lecture". The video went viral and has been downloaded by over 10 million people.

But Pausch's message was mostly one of hope. Even while dying, he encouraged people to embrace their lives and enjoy the time that they have.

In the two years since he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, the Carnegie Mellon University professor became the public face of the illness and developed an affiliation with the El Segundo-based Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, the only such advocacy group in the country.

Also Google source says that Randy was quite close to many of the people who were working at Google. Also Google condolences to Randy and his family.











Source: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/07/goodbye-to-randy-pausch-great-teacher.html

The 3 Mistakes of My Life: A Book by Chetan Bhagat

Chetan Bhagat, the Indian author, who has two bestsellers under his belt- 'One night @ the call center' and 'Five point someone – What not to do at IIT', is back in the limelight with his latest novel, 'The Three Mistakes of My Life'..

His third book three mistakes of my life is out on the stands, its like a bollywood masala film which has romance, action, drama , tragedy all packed in one to make it interesting and since the author Chetan Bhagat is well hyped and the book is smartly priced, no doubt the publishers will sell a lot of copies but is it a good read? Read on ...

The book starts in dramatic way as Chetan receives an email from Govind the hero of the book, who feels he has reached a dead end in his life and hence has consumed many sleeping pills. Bhagat tracks him down flies down to Gujarat and then starts the story of the three mistakes in govinds life.

The story focuses on the life of three friends as they turn entrepreneurs. Govind is business-oriented, Ishan sleeps and breathes only cricket. And Omi, is is ready to join his friends for almost everything that they are game for. So after wasting enough time, in their lives they reach the stage where they have to have a lakshya. A solution that works for all three of them is to start a sports shop..In the course of running a business, their lives take dramatic turns. And of course there are plots and sub plots going side by side.. one of them is Govinds love affair with Vidya , his best friend ish's sister.

Now with all the tragedy and unfortunate events in their lives, and with a lot of blood and death over religion and politics the story reaches its end. Ishan finds out about his sister Vidya and his best friend Govinds love affair that was on behind his back for which he will never forgive the two. And thus Govind takes sleeping pills and decides to write to Chetan Bhagat out of all the people in the world!