Year: 2008

  • Willpower

    That’s what you need. When you go for a movie, when you go shopping for groceries, when you decide to dine out, on a Saturday night. Because after all, in the secular, tolerant country we live in, now you SIMI, now you don’t. So right here, right now, make your will, before its too late.

    until next time, where does the similarity end?!

  • Brand new media

    While reading up on the original premise of this blog – brands, I came across a couple of interesting articles that spanned both my interest areas – brands and social media. The first was on Brand Accretion. Accretion is defined as “An increase by natural growth or addition”. Now, in this instant age, this would be considered a ridiculous thought. But to me, I’d prefer to take it as one more argument against the ‘only large campaigns’ approach that I see many brands take. You can read an earlier rant here. A couple of tangential by products of an accretion approach could be brands being able to tackle the long tail more effectively, and being able to espouse causes with a long term vision, like environment-conscious efforts for example; in essence, a flexibility to scale up based on a dynamic business environment, and one that would help brands deliver their promise better, which will be critical, as we go along.

    The other interesting post I read was one that distinguished between new and social media. Now, quite honestly, they were very interchangeable terms to me, but I tend to agree with the post, and the way it distinguishes the two. The simple example would be this – a blog is new media, it becomes a social medium when there are comments and conversations that happen around a post.

    Both new and social media bring out a lot of creativity, simply because of the innumerable sources it throws up. It acts as a perfect background to riff. Here are a few interesting ones I saw recently.

    This one, by Idea is about a month old, and is here in case anyone missed it. Its called Rapchick Mumbaiyya test, and was a smart way to connect to the city, during the brand launch.

    Google did a cool marketing activity to to takeover the Email and chat infrastructure of various education institutes in India. Read about it here.

    Warner Bros has been doing some interesting stuff too – their ad-supported video on demand online network site “features full episodes of defunct series that gained cult status over the last decade. The WB.com is a new digital destination built from the ground up for the same 16- to 34-year-old audience that embraced the WB when it was a television phenomenon”. It has Buffy, roswell etc, but the bad news is that its only available in the US. And i thought the web has no boundaries. 🙁 

    And if Medianama’s thread of thought is accurate, they might be doing some very cool stuff on Twitter, by creating The Joker there. But I’m not very sure of that one, since I also have the Riddler, Two Face and even Rachel Dawes following me now!!!

    The last one is from NIIT (via Alootechie) , which has created a character called Preeti Technani, who has an Orkut profile, a wordpress blog, who is positioned as a mentor, but manages to plug NIIT in between 😉 Lastly, here’s a clue on how not to use social media.

    While on the context of social media, here are two great reads – one is on getting people who don’t use social media to use it, and the other is on agencies of the future.

    until next time, be social

  • Kubay

    Kubay has been around from the time that we’ve been in Bangalore. Earlier, i guess. There used to be a Mallu hangout in Koramangala called Ravi’s Kitchen. That unfortunately, no longer exists, but Kubay does, and now has a new management, though they have not changed the coastal cuisine menu. Kubay is on the same road as Imperial, (6th Cross, also called Koramangala Club Road), and is off the Intermediate Ring Road (Indiranagar-Koramangala) We missed out on a food festival that happened recently, so a visit was pending. 🙂

    Kubay now has a more ‘professional’ look about it. I used to love the clay masks they hung on the walls (from Mapusa market in Goa) and the very Goan yellow shade they used for the interiors. All of that have been replaced, and even the seating has undergone a change. But hey, we didn’t come to stay, we came for the food, so its okay 😀

    We reached there about 9.45, and got a table comfortably. We skipped the soup, and decided to start with a Kane (lady fish) Rava fry. It was done quite well, though I thought it could’ve been crunchier, since I’m usually able to polish off the bones too. We weren’t quite happy with the quantity either. Not very value for money, which is what we expect at Kubay.

    For the main course, we ordered a Chicken Stew, a pan grilled seer fish (you have other options like pomfret too) and a platter. The platter was supposed to have 2 each of Sannas, Panpole and Idiappam according to the menu, but we got 3 Sannas and Panpole each. We were too hungry to question. The stew, while different from the regular style we have, was quite delicious, and in sufficient quantity. But unfortunately, the fish failed on both counts. It was a bit burnt, though the masala was good. So we ordered a chicken pepper fry, and one more platter. The pepper fry was quite spicy, and made well. The sannas (a rice based dish that looks similar to Idli) though fluffy had hardened on the outside and so spoiled the taste to an extent. It didn’t have a coconut flavor either. The panpole (a very thin dosa, also called neer Dosa) was also not that great, again the problem was that it turned out hard instead of soft. There are not many dessert options, but you might want to taste the home made caramel custard, it used to be good.

    All of the above cost us just below Rs.500, and though that’s decent, our previous trysts with Kubay had given us higher expectations of taste and value-for-money. So we’ll wait a while before we visit again.

    Kubay, 110, 6th Cross, 6th Block, Koramangala Ph: 41105221

    Menu and Photos at Zomato

  • Talk of the Town

    A while back I’d read about Burrp, which started out as a great restaurant reviews site, expanding into lifestyle events – Art, Dance, Fashion, Film, Fairs & Festivals, Theater, and so on. Check out the entire bunch here. They’d also added TV listings. While it’s quite a diversification, I thought it was quite in sync with what they were doing so far, but it also means that it broadens their competition. 

    Among the bunch in the link mentioned, I thought Yulop was a great package, with their services spread across web and mobile. Meanwhile, I’ve been coming across a lot of websites appearing in the restaurant based services space – Grubhogs , which has reviews, and already shows the beginning of an event calendar, and A Place to Dine, which, in addition to listings, also allows for online orders and table reservations, and services for restaurant owners from website setting up and hosting to loyalty programs. It even has mobile versions. A very interesting path.

    I guess these new services ‘justify’ Burrp’s move into the events space, an expansion of the value proposition. I found some interesting associations here. Burrp has tie ups with Mirror (The Times Group) websites- Mumbai, Bangalore and Kolkata. I also read today that Buzzintown has tied up with MyToday SMS services, to provide its users events related information on the mobile, in three cities. 

    There are some very cool happening in the events space. Buzzd , a service in the US allows the user to find and share local events on the mobile. They have recently tied up with Virgin to provide data to the operator’s subscribers. I’m not sure on how the numbers are for city based searches on mobile, but I wonder if Yulop, with all their services and info, could benefit by tying up with an Airtel/ Vodafone. While on local events, Placecast, which describes itself as  “the world’s largest place-based interactive media company” has tied up with Eventful to produce some interesting location based advertising options. (via Mashable) 

    With the increasing usage of social networks, even events are finding their own long tails. So there are services which offer event planning for smaller groups. And while there are several event planning services available (including an Indian one called Funpiper), Doodle scores by having a facebook application that lets users collaborate on events. It also sends emails to non-Facebook users. Another service that stands out is Zipiko, which offers event planning on mobile.(via Center Networks)

    But before we get there, I think there’s a lot of scope for city based social networks, especially the mobile version. I came across an interesting net based service – Fwix, which, in addition to the usual stuff, and integration with Twitter, Yelp, Flickr etc, shows you “the most relevant and trendy information and media in your local area. It aggregates about 500,000 news stories per day, and delivers roughly 2,000 relevant news stories of those 500,000.” (via Startup Meme). But i guess, that will take us back to this earlier post of mine.

    until next time, text and the city

  • Meet and Greet

    Keralites in Bangalore are a strong force. But our influence has increased so much that this year, city authorities have ensured that our connection with our legendary King Mahabali, ruler of the netherworld, and the reason for Onam, becomes stronger. All major roads have been equipped with potholes which will take us straight to him.

    until next time, Happy Onam

    PS. Check out my earlier Onam stories here and here.