• Data beyond social

    A couple of weeks back, when I wrote about location based interactions, I’d said that the limits of my imagination prevent me from thinking of anything beyond brand ‘controlled’ interactive sensors in individual products as a way for non-retail brands to directly connect with their consumers – at the point of consumption.

    Thanks to RWW, I found this extremely interesting presentation which gives perspectives on the future of social media analysis and how brands will capture and use the data to increase business value – for itself and hopefully consumers too. I also remembered a McKinsey “Internet of things’ report from last year in this context.

    Augmented Research

    View more presentations from Face

    “social media is still viewed by many as just a tool rather than as an immersive environment.” Must admit I hadn’t thought about it that way. Meanwhile, there is indeed a lot of focus on the data we can get from social networks. But that’s only one source of data. There are many others too, including those which don’t even involve a consumer’s active communication. One look at the RFID wiki page will give you a perspective on the possibilities.

    If brands can take cognizance of the rapid advancements in technology, and work on how they can capture, analyse and apply data, then the contexts and ways they can interact with their consumers will substantially increase. Perhaps their dependency on existing communication platforms will decrease too, especially if they consciously build their own platforms. One old but still relevant example, which I have used earlier too, is Nike+, which uses popular social tools to augment the fundamental data capture.

    until next time, data entry barriers?

  • Running for eternity

    I must confess that I didn’t like Mitch Albom’s “Tuesdays with Morrie” as much as his other book “The Five People you meet in heaven“, but writing anything negative about a non-fiction book such as this is not in good taste, so I refrained from doing a review. I also think that it is not so much a bad book and this takeout is more to do with my evolution than the writing or the concept itself.

    The good thing though is that it does have quite a few nuggets that you can chew on for quite some time. 🙂 This is my attempt to thread together a few. To be precise, three of my favourites.

    At least a couple of times in the second half, Morrie talks about how people run after the next house, vacation, car, job etc because they think that this will grant them the elusive ‘meaning, and how our culture has ‘forced’ people to feel threatened when they stand to lose their materialistic gains. This is what makes money God, and them mean. This is, of course, completely debatable, but I brought this up only for context. It led me to think that how, in infancy and in old age (from several instances I have seen, read about) and perhaps sickness, we are more concerned with needs, and at all times in between, it moves towards wants.

    On a tangent, I remembered the ‘proof of good times’ thought that I’d shared earlier, more than a year back, in ‘Progress Report‘, and how we capture images and notes, sometimes for ourselves, and sometimes for others. Ourselves, for memories, and perhaps posterity, and others, because, I thought ubiquitous social connectivity is perhaps making us inadvertently live a life we want to portray to others. I discovered a nice usage in the book that connected to this thought of eternity attempts “And tapes, like photographs and videos are a desperate attempt to steal something from death’s suitcase“.

    And while on posterity and eternity, the last one, a quote from Henry Adams “A teacher affects eternity, he can never tell where his influence stops”. I think, in that sense, every being is a teacher, and thus lives on.

    until next time, wednesdays with manuscrypts, okay? 😉

  • Book My Banquet

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  • Oyster Bay

    In continuing with Koramangala’s tradition of multiple options for each cuisine type, we now have a seafood restaurant called Oyster Bay on the Jyoti Nivas college road. (map) This is right next to Bhima Jewellers, another good example of how we’re slowly converting it to Keramangala, the official Bangalore #mallu outpost. Oyster Bay also has a Kerala owner, I was told. 😀 The BBMP has a free parking lot nearby, so parking shouldn’t be a problem at all.

    Now I’m one of those strange Malayalis who have an allergy for most kinds of seafood. Stop looking at me like that! Piscean that I am, I’m fishy too, okay?! So I was a bit afraid that I wouldn’t have too many options here. But I checked out the menu beforehand on Zomato and found that I did have more than a few options after all.

    I quite liked the ambiance – stylish casual dining. Bright colors, functional but elegant furniture, and excellent (dish) presentation. You also have a chance to point and prey – a  seafood live counter of sorts, though only D checked it out.  (they also serve alcohol and have a sort-of lounge space)

    Though we contemplated the veg soup option, we finally settled on two starters – “Mussels and Sausage Satay” and “Finger 3”. (cubed) As you can see, the former also has mushrooms for company. The ‘paste’ in the centre, I thought, had a peanut flavour, D wasn’t sure, but it was quite good. With each starter, you also get a complimentary veg starter portion. In this case, we asked for  a ‘Hara Bara Kebab’, which was reasonably ok. Overall, worth a try if you like mussels. The other starter has 3 kinds of breaded ‘fingers’ – fish, chicken and cuttlefish. The cuttlefish was excellent, the fish came a close second and the chicken was only average. The complimentary potato wedges were decent too. Most importantly, I added cuttlefish to my seafood gastronomic repertoire. 😀

    For the main course, D ordered a Shark Ambotik and I asked for a Country Duck Roast. For all main course dishes, you can choose from Steamed Rice, different Pulaos, Parathas etc. D asked for a Jeera Pulao and I asked for Kerala Parathas. The shark dish is a Konkan one, and is sweet and spicy, though the former dominated more than I’d have liked it to. It went well with Jeera Pulao and even the plain rice which we ordered later. Shark was, I discovered, just like any other fish. 😀 The Duck Roast, despite the bones, was spot on in terms of flavour. I told D that I could actually imagine the Syrian Christian Kottayam home where it was made. 🙂

    We skipped desserts, despite a Palada option. All of the above, including a service charge and tax cost us just over Rs.950. The service was extremely good – helpful and prompt, despite the place being almost full by the time we were on our main course. If you’re into sea food, this place is a must visit. Even if you’re not, you’ll survive and judging by my experience, thrive 😀

    Oyster Bay, 77/A, Cygnus Chambers, Jyothi Nivas College Road, Koramangala Ph: 42090000

  • Weekly Top 5

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