Tag: Jaipur Lit Fest

  • Comic Gone

    Some time back, Comic Con India had its first edition. And it promises to remain, for me, just like the Jaipur Lit Fest. I’ll come back to that in a while. Meanwhile, unlike the Jaipur Lit Fest, I wasn’t found living in a cave for this one. But that didn’t stop my participation from being limited to virtuality – a Comic Kaun tweet, (which someone thought was a genuine event  resulting in a #facepalm moment for me), wordplay with Roshni resulting in #CommieKaun – finding revolutionaries, tweeting photos and using the new display of global solidarity – the Facebook Like.

    So, the comparison to the Lit Fest. For the last two years, I have been making hazy plans to get there. Every time I see camels here in Bangalore, I also wonder whether they might consider shifting the venue, but I guess that’s unlikely. And especially after the controversies this year, I don’t think I’ll bother going again.  Can’t stand places where you can’t say things in a lighter vein. So I will just sit here in Bangalore, and hope for some controversy so I can have some fun with it on Twitter.

    The Comic Con event seemed quite popular this year.  So I asked myself why I felt I wouldn’t drop in next year. There seemed to be something more than the  omnipotent but generic laziness + shyness combo. Given my affection for superheroes and costume creation, Comic Con would probably be fun.

    If I were still the boy on the left, I would probably have been there instead of writing a post. But somewhere in a couple of decades, I’ve forgotten how much fun it could be even when Spiderman was just a Rasna sponsored mask, Bajaj bulb covers and a piece of thread. Now there are other roles, and other audiences, and playing for an audience of one is just a distant hazy memory. When I can remember it better, maybe I’ll go.

    until next time, cosplay time doesn’t last forever.

  • The Long Tail of Caves

    I read about the Jaipur Lit Fest, only thanks to a tweet from prolificd/roshnimo, this despite the fact that I fancy myself to be quite a voracious bibliophile. So, I wouldnt have been surprised to be asked ‘Have you been living in a cave?’.

    I blame it on the information overload, and wonder if we have reached full circle. Once upon a time, the means of communication was so minimal that most people lived their lives without most of the information they’d have liked to have. These days, its the other extreme of communication means, but the effect is the same. Even if I have an interest for something, I might end up missing the information, simply because of the large amounts of data I’m plowing through in terms of Twitter, blogs, Facebook, news sites and so on. Don’t even think of saying noise, or filter. There are limits and it doesnt help if you have interests in the social web, Bollywood, puns, books, Formula 1 and so on.

    The more interest I have in different verticals, and the more conversations I have in any one of these, I expose myself to being in a ‘cave’. Different people based on their interest areas and levels of interest, would thus create a hmm, long tail of caves!!

    I’m getting by now by paying special attention to those whom I trust, in specific fields, to give me the latest, valid information. A sort of virtual look out. But I’m hoping for a better solution, like say, a few vertical networks?

    until next time, wassup? 🙂