Thursday’s Trekker
Indian Premier League —> Norman Borlaug
If you are a sports buff, or at least take to following cricket and football, then you are in for a treat in the coming few months. With all the football league action coming to a close by May, what would normally be a break from football would this time be replaced by the sport’s showpiece event. With less than a hundred days to go now, the expectations for the FIFA World Cup beginning on June 12 are on the rise.
In cricket, its the other way round. The conclusion of the World T20 on April 6 will be followed by the Indian Premier League, which starts on April 16. While the cricket news at the moment is dominated by WT20, there is a steady trickle from the IPL as well. For instance, it was recently confirmed that Shikhar Dhawan would be captaining Sunrisers Hyderabad.
Did you know that the IPL became the first sporting event to be broadcast live on YouTube in 2010? Not just that, the IPL actually has a watchful eye on all content posted on YouTube that might be related to it. This, I know, through a personal experience.
One of my friends made a video last year called “Dhoni Vishwaroopam” by mixing the visuals of Dhoni’s match-winning knock against Kings XI Punjab that took Chennai Super Kings to the semi-finals in 2010, with a soundtrack from the movie Vishwaroopam . Made for fun and shared through our blog and YouTube, it soon became viral and notched up more than 1,00,000 hits in no time. The ones in charge of IPL’s channel on YouTube took notice and pulled it down, as we hadn’t obtained the necessary permissions.
YouTube does not usually offer a download link to its videos. Dhoni faithfuls though, have somehow managed to download it and share it again through their own accounts!
Only a very few videos on YouTube provide a direct download link. U.S. President Barack Obama’s weekly addresses, posted through The White House channel, are among those few that can be downloaded directly from YouTube as a MP4 file.
Are you aware the Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, just nine months after being elected as the President?
Norman Borlaug, often called “the father of the Green Revolution”, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his contributions towards food supply. In fact, he is one of seven people in history to have won the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal.
Can you name at least three of the other six? Send in your answers to school@thehindu.co.in with your details. [subject: Qwikipedia]
So the path that we have traversed today is:
Indian Premier League —> YouTube —> Barack Obama —> Norman Borlaug
Three clicks! Hop over. It’s time for the next question:
Friday’s Free rider
>Cupcake —> >Ebola virus disease
Send in your paths for the above to school@thehindu.co.in with the subject “Qwikipedia”. Do include your name, class and school!
