Have been a Rediff user right from its infancy and my intro to the https:// Its one of the first portals I started going to regularly, and felt particularly proud when it got listed on NASDAQ.
First, the good News
Rediff is an excellent source of news updates. Its become the software junta’s version of BBC and both international updates and the Indian perspective get equal weightage. One very good feature is the links at the bottom which invite reader’s responses to the news article.
Columns of smoke...
All Rediff columnists are opinionated. Highly so. And pretty strong in their convictions. The balance comes from the range of these - right wing to left wing and pro to anti establishment. DSouza, Varsha, Prem Panicker and a host of them offer a wide range of thoughts and perspectives on current issues - and these make for very interesting reading.
Yes - the facts are not always too well researched and arguments not always tenable - but overall its a good balance and you get a good picture of what various people and segments of India think and their reasons for the same.
Pictures worth a ...
The day in pictures and the slide shows are smart ideas - but it takes a while so I do not use these too often.
its online
A very useful and interesting feature is the Rediff guide to the net. I’m amazed how many of these sites or even categories I’ve never even thought of or come across in all my years of browsing. This is a big plus.
Masala...
No not the shopping - but the bollywood stuff. Pretty frequent updates and Stardust like meaningless writeups which nevertheless kill time pretty well when you’re in the mood to.
Mail
Ok. Quick enough. Do not still want to pay for mail/mobile access - hv enough tools at office and on the cell to manage. Yahoo Mail and accessories are way better.
Shopping
My first online buy was at Rediff - but have since migrated to FabMart (now FabMall) which is more complete and less ’cheap stuff for almost free’ - thus
has more stuff I really need.
Partner Sites
Numerous travel, auto, insurance partners - not enough choice or variety and certainly not all the best. The advice is often biased towards the vendor they’ve tied up with.
More Recently
Their Personal Edition is not all that smart - there’s no direct page to get there like my.yahoo - and you cannot decide the layout - just some amount of content can be chosen.
Also - the main rediff page has got quite cluttered of late - they’re trying to give visibilty to ALL their features on the main page itself.