Went to the Google Wordmasters 2006 challenge today. While I am no creative nut, it sure was interesting to participate in writing of a different nature. Writing (yes, good old fashioned pen-on-paper types) 200 words using 20 keywords that are supplied and being creative, hmm, can be a challenge…In case you are interested in the exact set of words, check this post by another participant….While I did enjoy the 45 odd minutes of writing, what was more intriguing to me was the kind of participation that I saw at the venue. Google had originally taken a print ad stating that the contest was open to only the first 300 registrants. To my utter surprise, a good 25-30% of the entire junta there were pretty…umm…senior, the above 40-club. And quite a few above 50 too. While English as a medium of communication is quite popular out here in Chennai, however, the fact that these older people too exhibited a keen sense of purpose in reading the ad and registering online immediately suggests quite a few things. A quick chat with a few of such people revealed that a few of their friends regretted on missing out since they were late in registering, not because they did not know how to browse ! The form for registration was, in itself, quite basic. Just thinking of these….Are we under-estimating the internet-savviness of the older generation (I, for one, was!)? Or is it that a simplistic procedure attracts such people? Hmm..Interesting questions in these days of online marketing.

As for the contest itself, the best prize is a visit to the Hyderabad office of Google, which, imnsho, isn’t really something to look upto for..Yea, a visit to the googleplex would have been just the thing that the doc ordered for ;-)