Start of our VOYage...the making...:)

Following has been composed and written by 'Divya Prabha Acharya' on the first release of Mangalore Infosys - Voice of Youth's Newsletter - VOYage. Though she mentions that it's her personal experience but I feel that it beautifully summarizes the feelings of all of us who were involved in this newsletter's creation.

Here it goes...

"Newsletter will be out on 29th June..." --was this for sure? that too the first newsletter from VOY...? what to include? with all of us having project(s) in hand? All these made us atleast have a kick-off meeting on Sunday(24th June'07..). Farid, Shweta and me decided to meet in Rec block..to decide, what are we supposed to do..and how.. and by when...

As usual, until the deadline is actually near...all meetings are for namesake...we checked couple of newsletters, templates, events in mlore..etc and finally decided on some contents to place in the 'so-called' VOYage...
Little did we know at that moment, it was the strong base for our newsletter!!

Can't exactly recall, when Nitin and Shastri got involved, but work started - getting contents, reviews, template, new ideas..some which made sense, most didnot :) Farid did a great job, making us realize we are all in right direction, also making us realize we are still far from the destination.

Draft version was sent by Farid,which had all in place, when Shastri actually woke up from sleep(;)), said he can use iweb/MAC for the newsletter creation.

First thing came to our mind was..Dude, it is already late, are we going to finish by Friday?Shastri did reply safely, sayin he will give a try.

Well, one of those instances which makes you realize, no harm in giving it a shot..and it worked...if we realize it now!

Reviews on articles, contents, english, grammar, look of the newsletter..all being worked on by us..making sure, we catch every free moment we have inspite of appraisals, project work, parties..Suddenly comes to our mind..VOY logo..research on that, different ideas from people..finally we decide on one.

Day before the release - is the review..whole team was called..all happy with the way it is progressing, though we had 101 things yet incomplete..little did we bother about it, since somewhere in our mind we had a feeling we can somehow give a nice shape to the newsletter.

Draft version mails kept coming..reviews back for changes...bad reviews, good reviews..working on it...whether one liked it or not..took us to the final day of the release..

VOY Mailbox, well became Nitin's headache..guess, he can write a BOK on it now;) Newsletter took real good shape on final day...

Now came the Promo mail..oh..this me and farid had thought on a collage like format..which we forgot until the D-day..Again, me, shweta and Farid..thought, why to ditch this idea..when the newsletter has come this far..work started on this...luckily we had time, and call it my luck....customer call got cancelled;)

All would appreciate the different creativity..of the promo mail...Farid's patience was the big-winner, which I feel rest of us lacked..then..

All set, a nice ceremony for the release, suddenly looked as if..everything fell in place for good...
Good feedbacks started pouring in...everybody around, checking the newsletter, a great feeling...your work pays..all talking about it...and that was the birth of VOY newsletter...

Well, that looked like a long Journey..though this VOYage..looks as if it has just begun...

Lot of learnings, difference of opinions, fun and what not...Will never forget this memorable VOYage...the long journey we had in a short time...