Year: 2008

  • Invaluable

    There is a peculiar phenomenon that happens on Bangalore roads. Whenever the traffic stops at a signal,  some of the vehicles behind quickly make their way outside the median onto the side of the road belonging to the traffic from the opposite side. These vehicles move ahead a bit and then try to get back by fobbing the guys who have been disciplined enough to stick to their side. In most cases, they are not able to, and they are at the receiving end of contemptuous glares. I wonder what these guys believe-  the Bhagavad Gita moral of ‘end justifying the means’? Or is it to do with solving the immediate problem and figuring out the right/wrong of it later?

    The last few days have been bad for the global workforce in general. While the layoffs in the US seemed somehow far away, the Jet axing was closer. A few days back, a couple of my twitter friends worriedly spoke about how a few of their colleagues were being asked to put in their papers. They are young kids, in their mid twenties, perhaps in their first jobs. Most likely, they have grown up seeing (at least the first) trends of opulence. Even in their earning life, it has been a life of choice abundance, that has spawned a life on EMI.

    Sometimes, they remind me of the guys who go across the median. They get glares from those who feel they’re not entitled to be where they are, that’s okay, I think they have learnt to deal with that, but I am not sure if they have learnt to deal with the massive truck that will come bearing down on them from the opposite side. They will panic when they have nowhere left to go. But hopefully, it will help them gain some perspective.

    One of the good things about most people of my generation is that they have been brought up with the strong foundations of what is fondly or deprecatingly (depending on who says it) called the great indian middle class. There are a lot of values there that stand you in good stead. I sometimes wonder if the cosmos has its own ways of inculcating the values it wants to see in us mere mortals. Quite a humbling thought, that…

    until next time, keep the faith

  • Don’t shoot the messenger….yet

    A few weeks back, I’d written about Yahoo India’s TVC for Search. I was not impressed, because I felt that the ‘need for speed’ in search could easily be portrayed without making fun of a speech impediment. A few days back, I happened to see another TVC, this one for Yahoo Messenger.

    To its credit, it does manage to create some suspense with the one eyed character, and you wonder where all this is leading to, especially since there are things that suggest a certain line of thought. The ending, however falls flat when it turns out that there is nothing more than a  ‘It pays to know people better’ positioning communication. It plugs the revamped Messenger, with picture, music and video sharing, and friends’ activity updates.

    I also read a couple of days back that Yahoo profiles was being evolved into a social network. You can read about more of their plans here.  If Yahoo is serious about social networking, then I wonder if Yahoo will link some of its very popular properties, which together could create a formidable entity. A social network that utilises photo sharing flickr communities, the delicious link sharing communities, Messenger, Yahoo Launch for music sharing communities, and upcoming for geographical connect. The potential is enormous since all these are extremely popular in their own right, but yes, a star studded team need not be the best. What do you think?

    until next time, some greater than sum..

  • Accurzzzd

    Somewhere in the first half, Himesh sings “Hari Om. With the twang, it sounds like ‘Hurry Home’. I didn’t heed it. As the movie moved towards the climax, and Himself confronts Urmila, who plays the vamp, I half expected Him to sing ‘Ch***** banaya’ in tune with his old hit. This time I’d have agreed.

    until next time, but hey, its a must watch 🙂

  • Everybody, Friendfeed, right now!!

    In a way, Friendfeed’s latest offering has revolutionised my usage of social media services. My experiments with FF had been limited since Twitter used to give me a fair amount of good conversations on various subjects of interest – from Bollywood to advertising campaigns to social media to social issues. I didn’t see any value that Friendfeed could’ve added, inspite of it being an aggregator of several services i use including blogs, Google Reader, delicious, Linked In, twitter, Google Talk status messages and recently last.fm among others.

    With every new service, I’ve needed a catalyst to use the service more. With delicious, it was the toolbar plugin, with Facebook, it was the critical mass of friends to get me in there, and then apps like Scrabulous. With Twitter, it was the browser plugin. I’ve been lax on most services which make me open a separate web page. And that was the case with Friendfeed, Kwippy and Social Median. These three, because they are excellent services which i should ideally have used more. A quick plug for the last two before we move on.

    Kwippy, a very neat Indian startup, about whom I’d written about a few months back, has moved on from a ‘twitter like service’ to a great place to have focused discussions. It has an awesome crowd too. But I do wish they’d work on a few things I had mentioned in the earlier post. Critical since information overload is bound to cause a consolidation soon. Social Median, with whom i was very impressed, and had written about sometime back, is a great filtering service that connects you to people and topics, by sharing links that interests you, and then have conversations around them. You can also create customised news networks on topics you’re interested in and then add sources. It is well connected with other networks and even has a toolbar plugin that allows easy sharing of links. In a sense, it works better than FF on many fronts.

    And so, back to the catalyst. Last week, FF added a new feature – real time updates. What it does is that it helps me get instant reactions to the things I have shared via various other services. It can be anything from a comment to a blog post to a photo to a tweet to a Google Reader shared item. One small snag i see in the real time interface is the lack of bundling that the standard view of FF provides. It could mean I miss out comments and end up replying to them much later. I also have issues with my Google Reader shared items since they aren’t reflecting on ‘real time’. And lastly, why can’t I include my Facebook statuses??!!

    A look at how all this affects my usage of other services. Twitter Search has real time updates for specific queries, and as Louis Gray points out about FF, “the team hasn’t yet connected its capability to search or keyword filtering, which, if ever delivered, could be a body blow to Twitter search.” (via The Inquisitr). Now,  when i see a friend’s tweet on FF and decide to comment on it on FF, i am given an option to also send an @reply to twitter. How about pulling all the @manuscrypts tweets live for me on FF and giving me the same option?

    My usage of Google Reader as a sharing device was limited. I have noticed that with real time FF, that has increased. I am sure that will also influence the posts I do here. Meanwhile, I can use FF to share links, with a comment. I can also choose the room I want to share it in. What does this mean to Delicious and Social Median, especially if FF can bring the easy search (and tags) features of delicious and the functionality and interface of rooms is jazzed up to the levels of Social Median?

    With conversations happening everywhere, the need for aggregators will only increase, and whatever be your take on noise (there’s a great note here) a service like Friendfeed can only help. It’d be interesting to see the other services’ reactions to real time.

    until next time, when there’s information overload, a friend in need…..

  • Bombay Post

    No, its not a post on Bombay. Bombay Post is a restaurant from the BJN group on (the old) Airport Road. Its housed in the same building as TGIF and Indijoe, has valet parking and sufficient parking for two wheelers (behind the building). We reserved a table at 7.45, but called up later to check if they could hold it till 8, since we were delayed. We were told that’d not be possible, and we would have to walk in and depend on our luck. Our luck seemed intact since there were only 4 other tables occupied when we walked in. It started filling up around 8.30 though. They seemed to have changed the wall decor a bit, since the huge posters of the earlier era’s Bollywood icons were conspicuously missing. But the guard with the huge moustache (himself an icon of sorts by now) is still there. 🙂

    We got a decent table, and were given the usual heavy menu card (i always wonder if its anything to do with the prices 😉 ). Anyway, we decided to skip the shorba and starters, and went for the main course. Departing from the regular 2 non-veg custom, we ordered a Khatta Meethe Aloo (“sauteed potato in an earthy jaggery and tamarind gravy”), a Kadai Murgh Patiala (“boneless pieces of chicken sauteed and simmered in its own juices, then tossed in kadai masala. From the royal house of Patiala”) and to go with it, an onion kulcha and a plain roti. We also ordered a mixed raita.

    The aloo dish was made with baby potatoes, tilted towards the sweet side, and had a very thick gravy, but it was good nevertheless. The chicken was very well made, with an excellent gravy and though I’ve always had an egg involved wherever else I’ve had this dish, I would still recommend it highly. No complaints on the bread. The raita, though wasn’t great. It was diluted a bit too much, and hey, I just realised, you didn’t give me boondi!!!

    A few things you should check out. Bombay Post has a huge choice of kababs,  their Dal makhani is one of the best I’ve had, and i’d have liked to check out the lal/hari mirch ki roti. They also have an assortment of north indian desserts, but hey, there’s a Corner House in the same building. 😉

    The service was excellent, and all of the above cost us Rs.838, including the service charge. I suspect the Rs.70 mineral water (for 1 litre!!) made a significant contribution. 😐

    Bombay Post, Carlton Towers, Airport Road, Bangalore, Karnataka 560008, 080 41113939