Peepli live ! and rural India

September 8th, 2010 • general • No comments

One frustrating movie after the other, Bollywood intends to kill me ! The flavor of the season seems to be satires, especially political ones. After watching some mythology based stuff in Rajneeti, one has to deal with this other end of the spectrum. Its all good, and giving valuable exposure to the plight of our fellow citizens, the actual drivers of our still agrarian driven economy. What is disappointing is that it shows what exists, but not how to go about resolving it. Again, let me put it in context of what is around us. We all know and understand the following

1. Our media is as impartial or partial as world media. The highlight was Barkha Dutt in kargil for me, and ever since its been on a downward irresponsible slide. I cannot bear to watch news channels anymore, they don’t seem to inform but an attempt at some lame means of brain-washing.
2. We all feel bad for the farmers, well what difference does it make to the farmer or the daily wage laborer. He does not want our sympathy, he wants his children not to do what he is doing ! So in principle, they do what they do because of lack of opportunity. Unless the day comes when a farmer wants his children to farm, every policy intended at agriculture will fail.
3. Hysteria, and more hysteria. That seems to be the default mode for our administrators and politicians. Use inflation, terrorism or something to justify lack of growth, government performance. We just do not seem to snap out of it as a country at large.
4. Its about the people, and from what I see around me … we are the last in the queue.

Good movie, wished they would push the solutions and not the questions. Movies can be used to show an alternate reality, just like cartoons like
jetsons push a certain future agenda ! It all may mean nothing, but it all counts as potential solutions and a common vision of the future.

Touchscreen, health effects ?

September 6th, 2010 • general • No comments

Well, I was thinking today the whole world is suddenly all about touch screens ! Just like all other devices, I am sure it has some effect on humans. I started doing some research as to the published papers on this topic, turns out that there are none. So here is my take on what can be the potential issues with touchscreens

1. ergonomic issues, it can lead to issues with your finger with longer term use of such devices. I wonder what solutions will people come up to solve this, he he.
2. You can potentially loose your sensation on your finger tips, due to excessive usage. This is more to do with nerve endings than anything else .
3. There is a good chance that over time your fingers will become weaker, as unlike before they do not have to perform physical tougher activity.

Well, given more time I could have freaked whoever is reading this out more ! Well, point is this … anything that makes us less social or utilizes our body parts in excess [than we were originally designed for] usually ends up being harmful for us. I am not too sure these new devices are making us a new social creature ?  We shall see what precipitates over the next decade. It should be one touchy ride !

Why does ebay india suck !

September 6th, 2010 • general • No comments

This would definitely count as a rant post ! I am a gadget freak and it seems that all the good stuff is only available at an affordable cost [even after USD to INR conversion] on ebay US or UK. No matter how much one says, ebay India or formerly bazee is a whole lota noise, and little auction. Lets do a small study on what I am talking about here

Search ebay US for “iphones” and see the results

http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p3907.m570.l1313&_nkw=iphone&_sacat=See-All-Categories

Now go ahead and do this on the India one !

http://shop.ebay.in/?_from=R40&_trksid=m570&_nkw=iphone&_sacat=See-All-Categories

What is the difference, the US one actually shows ones which are being auctioned ! While the Indian one shows extremely lame results for an extremely popular product. I can draw couple of simple conclusions out of this simple activity.

1. We Indians do not believe in second-hand bidding ! [Well, this is untrue, as a significant number of people do buy and make good use of second-hand goods in a country like ours]
2. The audience which sells and buys stuff online do not believe in second-hand bidding [both buying and selling]! [This can be true given the low number of auctions one sees on ebay India to be honest]
3. We only like to bid on new things, get discounts on them. [This is a fairly observable generalization, if you go through the stuff on ebay India]

Harsh as it may sound, we Indians are bad recyclers as we have more money. I also joined the freecycle Delhi club, and believe me you only have people asking for stuff and not giving away [and in theory we all generate some sort of electronic waste that can be re-used].

The good ol’ gel pen

May 16th, 2010 • general • 1 comment

Well this is a post about something very common, the gel pen. Yesterday, i bought yet another one of them and i should say that my affair with them continues. It all goes back to school, at least in India when i started writing with an “adult” pen it was a messy ink pen, definitely something that would not lend itself to rough handling. Then the discovery of new lands in the form of the ball pen happened, in around 1997 there was a whole range of cool new pen which arrived one of them was the Mitsubishi ball point, one fine pen it was [still is]. I used that consistently for 4 years, after which things became a bit murky !

The last ten years have been the decade of the gel pen in my opinion, it has been something that has become brand independent and possibly helped thousands of kid access writing in some form. It is cheap and still gives the performance of an ink pen within some constraints. Some of the brands that i have used are

• Reynolds
• ADD – No idea what that stands for
• Cello

In very simple terms, there are too many of these brands trying to sell the same stuff. Lets have a look at what problems the gel pen has if any !

• There is a temperature range to its functioning, the stopper which is a liquid of higher viscosity sometimes drains away giving you the complete ink pen experience.
• The ink gets consumed very quickly!

Those are the only problems that i experienced ! What about you …..

Rain Malayasia Redbull & fun

April 3rd, 2010 • F1 • No comments

The qualifying today has opened up the Grid completely, with the Ferraris and McLaren way behind this race of attrition will bring together the magic of what weather can do to the best of teams [and plans]. If you followed the qualifying today [12.30 IST] it was clear that something fun was going to happen. Some crucial things that are becoming a regular

• Good qualifying performance from Kubica and Sutil. These guys seem to have mastered qualifying in a mid-field car and seem to do it consistently. Kubica is a top guy and his partnership with Renault may just be the right one. Sutil has been good on the single laps but needs to get started in a race and score some points.
• Over confidence in the Ferrari and McLaren camps, these guys really seem to think that the racing is for them and not them for racing. The attitude is one of arrogance and this particular session displayed that not all variables are known ! I would want such situations to arise more often than not.
• Lotus being the top of the new guys, so the lesson learned is simple. Focus on reliability before looking for speed, something which Newey would agree with. The car seems to be a solid base and expect them to be mid runners later in the season, and next year. Much like Force India, if they did decide to shift their engine supplier they may actually accelerate the process.
• Cosworth has the power to deliver ! Williams seems to have a great working relationship with Cosworth and seem to getting more out of the engine than anyone else. Expect Barichello to actually score tomorrow, i am confident that he will.

This is going to be a good race ! and I for one will see it, I think the red flags will be out during the half way mark …. one never knows. A lotus win !

Chuck : Season 3 episode 10

March 17th, 2010 • sitcom • No comments

Well, chuck with his flashing is good fun … but his kung fu is not funny. I was okay with flashing about intelligence, but all this new flashing shit is irritating !

This episode revolved around the much in the background John Casey [good man blah blah] who at the end is relegated to civilian life [how tragic]. It finally goes into the machine he is, his patriotism and all that which we all already knew about. Throw in the mix the love of his life.

Still looking forward to Chuck becoming a full CIA operative !

Effy – Skins season 4 Episode 7

March 17th, 2010 • sitcom • 1 comment

So i just finished watching skins 04E07 and it was okay, me and Maitrayee were not looking forward to it as Skins to be honest has become super dark [beats dexter] and painful to watch. But surprise it was good and they threw in the google about Freddie at the end.

Effy Stonem is shown as a very dark character in this particular season, and with some help from her counselor has managed to get Freddie killed ! That pretty much sums up what happened in an exciting 48 minutes, it starts with the mental facility where Effy is at and this interesting treatment she gets which basically involves the removal of all traces of the past [so to say a complete character replacement]. I was under the impression that it was other things that had Effy all messed up, but turns out Season 3 accident of her brother Tony was the real cause of all the issues.

Cook comes out very positive and he has been like that for the last couple of episodes at least, it seems they want most of the characters in this rather short season  to end on a high [or death in Freddie's case]. All in all, the last one is going to be interesting.

ESPN F1 fantasy league : India league

March 10th, 2010 • F1 • No comments

So i finally paid for playing a fantasy league, been following F1 news quite closely. Very excited about the new teams and their approaches to car design. Nick Wirth is a rockstar who will define CFD to be the game changer in F1 for sure. I am a big supporter of such changes which can potentially make F1 budgets much lesser and who know maybe we can have the entry of much smaller teams in the future. Innovation is potentially driven by a lack of resources most times, and it was high time we all used the excuse of recession to do stuff much better and efficiently.

So ESPN has this F1 fantasy league, which has an entry fee of 10 pounds, I started my team “nerdbase” and have created a private league called India [code: 724], please join it and we can start having some fun. This time my lineup is focused on the RB6 and FW32, I am excited with the speed and momentum that Red bull carries from the last season, Williams pace is refreshing and makes me think that Cosworth is not going to be a pushover in the engine department. Anyways, do join the league  and here is the link for the same.

http://espnf1.fantasyleague.com

Let the races being !!

Must reads for entrepreneurs !

March 9th, 2010 • books • 1 comment

I would recommend the following books for all into strategy and value creation. The list of course is bloody subjective and intends to put across my perspective

• Entrepreneur journeys by Sramana mitra – Its a good book, though a bit out-dated in the context of the fast paced internet market [its 2007 writing]. The interviews were exceptional and there were numbers which really gives someone like me something to objectively thinking about.
• Art of War – Classic and one has to read it, analyse it to get where modern capitalism has roots in [assuming that all major thought processes all over seem to germinate at the same time]. The tactical analysis and understanding is clearly superior than any text of that time. In comaprison, Arthashastra and Laws of Manu are focused on the ground [number of elephants, governance hierarchy] while this is a philosophy text.
• The Prince – Highly rate it for its objectivity ! Caesar Borgia is an influence … so it is very honest about power and its dynamics. One must understand that its a beast which needs to be mastered and understood. Another classic written by someone who walked the talk.

Well these were some reads that i found to be enlightening and i am sure a lot of other unaware souls would benefit from them. Next planning to start on a book about the history of hindus … that should clear out whatever doubts I had about my passport religion.

Road : the movie ! What was it about again ?

March 8th, 2010 • Movie • 3 comments

Just watched Road the movie at PVR priya ! For one i am a fan of weekday movie watching … Much better the crowd is less and i can hear everything real loud and clear.

It turns out that this movie with all its “starbucks” lines is clearly meant to be an art movie of the US and European audiences. It is highly improbable that a kid in middle of Rajisthan is talking about this particular brand and over it actually moves on that easily from his current dhaba employer. Lets assume this never happened ! it gets way worse with the water dacoits, the whole oil sequence takes the absurdity to another level.

Enough of criticism, i am sure it was a fun movie to make. More than anything it is clear that all the actors were under utilized. There were no boundaries [except for the depiction of thirst] pushed within whatever topics the movie choose to discuss. It was a whole lot of new things skimmed at the surface, which i guess was the whole purpose of a road trip.

The lack of commitment was visible not only in the areas it delved into, but also in how Abhay Deol’s character reacts to various situations. Even the end was less than satisfactory. Phew, i still cannot stop criticizing it …

Maybe .. just maybe i liked it a lot ! It really thought that it was going into new areas where hindi cinema fears to tread. I loved the scenic salt desert … it reminds me of how little of the country i have seen. It may be a great learning of what India has to offer for the many native directors who dream of shooting SRK in the swiss alps. Utah salt desert !!! We can do better with our own Rann of Kutch ….

Would recommend this movie if you want to know what Indian cinema can be at times. Just a notch above than the whole lot of bull shit that we put up with [& very happily too]. A 7.5 out of 10.