Quietly clicking my way through Bloomberg last Sunday afternoon, a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchiveamp;sid=aC4zbsgMD6x8"I came across this/a:br /br /br /blockquotestrongFacebook Members Register Names at 550 a Second/strongbr /br /Facebook Inc., the world’s largest social-networking site, said members registered new user names at a rate of more than 550 a second after the company offered people the chance to claim a personalized Web address.br /br /Facebook started accepted registrations at midnight New York time on a first-come, first-served basis. Within the first seven minutes, 345,000 people had claimed user names, said Larry Yu, a spokesman for Palo Alto, California-based Facebook. Within 15 minutes, 500,000 users had grabbed a name. /blockquotebr /br /Mein Gott, I thought to myself, if 550 people a second are doing something, they can't all be wrong. So I immediately signed up. Actually, this isn't my first experience with social networking since I did try Orkut out some years back, but ...

As Paul Krugman recently pointed out, one of the central points they made in the latest IMF World Economic Outlook was that recessions caused by financial crises tend to get resolved on the back of export-lead booms, with countries normally emerging from the crisis with a positive trade balance of over 3 percent of GDP. The reason for this is simple, since consumers are so laden-down with debt from the boom period, they are naturally more obsessed with saving than borrowing during the initial crisis aftermath. So much then for the typical crisis, and the typical exit. But musing on this point lead Krugman to an additional, rather disturbing, conclusion: since the present financial crisis is truly global in its reach, the habitual exit route to recovery will only work after we are able to identify stronganother planet/strong to send all those exports to (shades of Startreck IV). The joke ...

Guest Post by Manuel Alvarez-Rivera, a href="http://electionresources.org/"Electoral Resources On The Internet/abr /br /Contrary to exit poll findings and widespread expectations of a closely fought race, India's ruling Congress Party - formally the Indian National Congress - and its allies won a clear victory in the general election held in April and May of this year, emerging well ahead of the right-wing, Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In all, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) won 261 of 543 seats in the Lok Sabha - the lower house of India's bicameral Parliament - and came within eleven seats of an absolute parliamentary majority, while the BJP-headed National Democratic Alliance (NDA) secured only 157 and the Third Front - composed of leftist and regional parties - captured 80 seats. Meanwhile, the new Fourth Front also fared poorly, obtaining just 27 seats, while the remaining 18 seats went to other parties.br /br ...

blockquote"For what it’s worth, a key conclusion from the IMF’s new World Economic Outlook is that recessions caused by financial crisis typically end with export booms, with the trade balance improving,on average, by more than 3 percent of GDP. I find this a disturbing result: we’re now suffering from a global financial crisis, which means that the usual driver of recovery will only be available if we can find another planet to export to."br /a href="http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/27/japans-recovery-again/"Paul Krugman /abr /br //blockquoteblockquoteWith results still coming in, projections show the United Progressive Alliance is likely to win about 250 seats, making it a shoo-in to form the next government and provide continuity, a stable administration and progress on key economic and corporate reforms.br /a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124247401653426893.html"Wall Street Journal/a, May 16 2009/blockquotebr /blockquotePrime Minister Manmohan Singh’s electoral victory, the biggest any Indian politician has scored in two decades, may loosen political shackles that have restrained ...

India's industrial output growth bounced back again in July, reaching a five-month high of 7.1% year on year growth. This follows a 5.4 percent gain in June, and 4.1% in May, according to data out today from the Central Statistical Organisation. The result is not entirely unexpected if we look at the very healthy year on year increase in exports registered in July (31.2% year on year), on the back of a much weaker rupee. The important thing now is to be inflation back under tight control as agricultural and crude oil prices drop back.br /br /br /a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_ngczZkrw340/SMprbPaY1xI/AAAAAAAAH1M/9wx_GldKlg4/s1600-h/india+ip.jpg"img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_ngczZkrw340/SMprbPaY1xI/AAAAAAAAH1M/9wx_GldKlg4/s320/india+ip.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5245122831764215570" //abr /br /Indian manufacturing, which accounts for about 80 percent of production, gained 7.5 percent in July from 6.1 percent in June, today's report showed. Electricity output rose 4.5 percent in July from 2.6 percent, mining grew ...