I went, I saw, I came out happy.
Read my review and decide. It could work for you.
Friday, June 29, 2007
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Apple iPhone: what about us?
The iPhone is a 'beautiful breakthrough computer', the Wall Street Journal has declared. Folks are queuing up for it already, in New York. The company has no plans to launch the iPhone in Europe or Asia anytime soon. But that doesn't mean we won't get our grubby fingers on it...DNA reports: According to dealers in Mumbai's Heera Panna shopping centre, the city's largest wholesaler in mobile handsets and iPods - the grey market has already placed orders for around 30-40 iPhones. The plans are to hawk it at prices that are Rs 7000-8000 more than the US base price of $500 (ie Rs 20,000).
Yes, the phone is currently rigged out to work with a single operator - AT & T - but never fear.
As Business Standard reports: Grey market operators say they can 'unlock' the phone for just Rs 1000 to Rs 1500 so that it can be used on any network in India. "Unlocking the iPhone isn't tough," said a dealer in central Delhi.
Cool, isn't it? But you have to ask, why won't Apple just go ahead and sell the phone officially? In India, and anywhere else in the world where there's a hunger for it??
Phir wahi bhool?
Fact is, India has never been a priority market for Apple. In the old days, ok, it did not matter.
The computer I worked on at my first job was a Mac. In the early 90s that was the ONLY computer any self respecting advertising agency or publishing house used for design work.
Today, there are still a few Mac fanatics - but very few. We embraced the more plebian but affordable PC, learnt to live with system errors and the Mac became a forgotten first crush.
Now, Macs are available at better prices but few consider buying them . There is just not enough exposure or marketing.
Then there's the iPod. In India, it sells mainly through the grey market. Official Apple resellers are few and far between and anyways, the pricing is a complete turn off. Again Apple itself did little to market the iPod. Khareedna hai to khareedo - aapki marzi.
The result is, the iPod is popular but other brands like Creative - and even generic mp3 players - have caught on too. With Sony marketing its Walkman phones and Nokia its 'Music Phones' a lot of young people don't even think they need an iPod.
A couple of weeks ago, for the first time, I noticed an ad from Apple in the Bombay Times. "If it ain't iPod, it ain't music' or some such headline and I thought,"Um... isn't this too little, too late?"
The moral of the story is that Apple is a guru at producing these amazing products. But then it would rather let them sell without much effort, especially overseas.
However we now have a global gizmo monster, hungry for the goods. India is Nokia's third largest market in terms of net sales. Of course, the monochrome and low-end colour handset segment (below Rs 3000) account for over 60% of the market.
But there is demand for high end phones in a country with 178 million mobile phone users. And it's not just pricing that's a deterrent when it comes to upgrades.
Many of us have checked out the N series but found it to be lacking somewhere. The market for a really beautiful and user friendly smartphone is still wide open. The iPhone could be the answer but if Apple chooses to ignore us, we may well embrace the clones which are sure to follow.
Why make the same mistake, once again?
Monday, June 25, 2007
Wanted: humour writers
If you can tickle a funny bone or two with your wit and sarcasm, do write for us.
JAM is looking for writers to do:
a) MAD style movie spoofs (you do the script, we'll take care of the cartoons)
b) Satirical articles on current topics. Such as Sunita Williams orbiting the earth without a bath for 6 months... (you get the idea)
c) Original khaak e shayari
d) Braking news
e) Topical PJs
f) Or well... just about anything.
Do not send me random blog links, just one sample of your best work. And what you think you can do next... Email rashmi_b at yahoo.com.
JAM is looking for writers to do:
a) MAD style movie spoofs (you do the script, we'll take care of the cartoons)
b) Satirical articles on current topics. Such as Sunita Williams orbiting the earth without a bath for 6 months... (you get the idea)
c) Original khaak e shayari
d) Braking news
e) Topical PJs
f) Or well... just about anything.
Do not send me random blog links, just one sample of your best work. And what you think you can do next... Email rashmi_b at yahoo.com.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Taking responsibility
"Nissan's Ghosn agrees to skip bonus as profits fall", reports Bloomberg.
Nissan just lost the no 1 spot in Japan to Honda, and its net profit took a dip for the first time in seven years.
CEO Carlos Ghosn is therefore not taking his bonus. "It is a symbolic way of taking responsibility," said Yoshihito Okimura, an asset manager with the Chiba-Gin asset management company.
Considering that most stories related to CEO compensations are about how grossly overpaid they are, this is certainly a refreshing change.
In India we aren't likely to see such gestures anytime soon. With a booming economy managers will take responsibility, if anything, for rising profits. And demand their share in the form of a bonus/ increment etc.
However, the idea of 'taking responsibility' I feel is still relevant. Even if a company is doing well overall, individual managers and employees may not be contributing their bit. Yet they expect equality when it comes to sharing the spoils from the gravy train.
Performance appraisals, for example, have become something of a joke. Take the example of employee X who receives feedback that he/ she has not been upto the mark and therefore gets a lower increment than the peer group.
Assuming there is no politics or backstabbing involved and this a 'fair' evaluation, does said employee take the feedback constructively? Does he vow to do better next time? Uh huh, but there is no next time. Because the hunt for a new job is well under way already...
Employers find a gun is being held to their heads. Salaries are inching upwards every 3-6 months. You have to pay more simply to keep people with you - performance is a secondary issue. Yes performers get more, but even non-performers get more than they deserve.
There is simply no choice.
In this context the message sent out by Ghosn is a meaningful one. Take responsibility - for both results and failures. That's what 'leadership' is about, at the collective level. And that's what 'character' boils down to, for each individual.
Otherwise it's all mere jargon.
Nissan just lost the no 1 spot in Japan to Honda, and its net profit took a dip for the first time in seven years.
CEO Carlos Ghosn is therefore not taking his bonus. "It is a symbolic way of taking responsibility," said Yoshihito Okimura, an asset manager with the Chiba-Gin asset management company.
Considering that most stories related to CEO compensations are about how grossly overpaid they are, this is certainly a refreshing change.
In India we aren't likely to see such gestures anytime soon. With a booming economy managers will take responsibility, if anything, for rising profits. And demand their share in the form of a bonus/ increment etc.
However, the idea of 'taking responsibility' I feel is still relevant. Even if a company is doing well overall, individual managers and employees may not be contributing their bit. Yet they expect equality when it comes to sharing the spoils from the gravy train.
Performance appraisals, for example, have become something of a joke. Take the example of employee X who receives feedback that he/ she has not been upto the mark and therefore gets a lower increment than the peer group.
Assuming there is no politics or backstabbing involved and this a 'fair' evaluation, does said employee take the feedback constructively? Does he vow to do better next time? Uh huh, but there is no next time. Because the hunt for a new job is well under way already...
Employers find a gun is being held to their heads. Salaries are inching upwards every 3-6 months. You have to pay more simply to keep people with you - performance is a secondary issue. Yes performers get more, but even non-performers get more than they deserve.
There is simply no choice.
In this context the message sent out by Ghosn is a meaningful one. Take responsibility - for both results and failures. That's what 'leadership' is about, at the collective level. And that's what 'character' boils down to, for each individual.
Otherwise it's all mere jargon.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Video on demand: the time has come
On Sunday Nivedita wanted to see Shrek 3. Just 2 weeks after release the film has been shifted to the morning show. It was already past 10 am... which means she would have to wait another week.
By which time the film may have disappeared altogether.
I really wonder when the day will come, when studios will have the sense to have a simultaneous release : Theatre, DVD and Video-on-demand (Tata Sky/ Dish TV etc).
Of course the critics would say we already have simultaneous release - people download films within minutes of official release. More so, young people.
JAM's recent survey on Downloading (which readers of this blog were invited to participate in as well) found that 58% of you download movies off the internet.
23% of this bunch download films... everyday.
Movie downloads are less popular than music (that's something 88% do regularly). But wait and watch. As fast broadband connections become more common, folks get PCs with bigger hard drives and figure out how to use BitTorrents.
There is no way the tide can be turned, the only thing studios can and should do is swim with it.
What are they afraid of?
a) People won't flock to theatres
Wrong! The need to visit a theatre is not linked strictly to the need to watch a film. People need outings. A place to dress up for and do something at. Yes, stuffing one's face with popcorn qualifies.
b) People will still pirate movies
Yes, some will. But there are plenty of people who are not tech savvy. Or happen to be time and energy starved. When an official release reaches a 'reasonable' price point they are willing to pay.
Take VCDs of Hindi films. With prices around Rs 149-169 many many more people are picking them up. The logic is, a ticket would cost me Rs 150-200 in any case.
By contrast, DVDs you think twice before buying. Rs 499 had better be for a movie with keep-in-my-collection value. Today, the official VCD/ DVD release is at least 3-4 weeks after the movie hits theatres, as far as Bollywood is concerned. What if it were within one week?
I think theatre crowd would remain unaffected. But a lot of people who wouldn't make it to theatres anyways would also get to enjoy the film. And not as pirates.
The other - and better - alternative is video on demand. Tata Sky has it - you order a film and can view it in a 24 hour window. But the most recent film available at the moment is Bheja Fry. Which is two months old.
Differential Pricing
One way to tackle the issue could be time-linked pricing. On a video on demand service you could allow official home viewing from the day the film is released. But, on the first weekend you could charge a premium - say Rs 500 per view.
From Monday onwards that price could be dropped to Rs 300 per view. And from the second weekend onwards, that could drop further.
Would people really pay Rs 500 to watch Jhoom Barabar Jhoom at home the day it's released? I think yes. There is an excitement to watching a film on day 1 and being able to have an opinion on it - good or bad. It's participating in the pop culture of the week.
But maybe you want to watch JBJ without battling the crowds and parking problems at your local multiplex. And without any planning, on impulse, at 2 am.
As everything in life accelerates, so does the half-life of a movie.
Once I've heard from multiple sources that JBJ is 'really bad' you won't get me to see it in a theatre in any case. But there is enough curiosity value to see it... at home. And maybe with my expectations tempered and over dus rupaye ka Act II popcorn I may actually find it to be 'okay'.
The movie experience I expect when I blow up good money in a multiplex is higher than what I expect from something I see in my home. Which is a huge opportunity for producers of films that are average to above average. The 'great' ones will always find a big screen audience.
Bottom line is, the thought of losing 'theatre business' scares the shit out of producers. But they're losing it to piracy anyways.
I may end up watching Shrek 3 on TV after 3 months when you could have got me to pay 200 bucks to watch it in my home last Sunday. Cannibilisation is hard, but the alternative... is slow suicide.
By which time the film may have disappeared altogether.
I really wonder when the day will come, when studios will have the sense to have a simultaneous release : Theatre, DVD and Video-on-demand (Tata Sky/ Dish TV etc).
Of course the critics would say we already have simultaneous release - people download films within minutes of official release. More so, young people.
JAM's recent survey on Downloading (which readers of this blog were invited to participate in as well) found that 58% of you download movies off the internet.
23% of this bunch download films... everyday.
Movie downloads are less popular than music (that's something 88% do regularly). But wait and watch. As fast broadband connections become more common, folks get PCs with bigger hard drives and figure out how to use BitTorrents.
There is no way the tide can be turned, the only thing studios can and should do is swim with it.
What are they afraid of?
a) People won't flock to theatres
Wrong! The need to visit a theatre is not linked strictly to the need to watch a film. People need outings. A place to dress up for and do something at. Yes, stuffing one's face with popcorn qualifies.
b) People will still pirate movies
Yes, some will. But there are plenty of people who are not tech savvy. Or happen to be time and energy starved. When an official release reaches a 'reasonable' price point they are willing to pay.
Take VCDs of Hindi films. With prices around Rs 149-169 many many more people are picking them up. The logic is, a ticket would cost me Rs 150-200 in any case.
By contrast, DVDs you think twice before buying. Rs 499 had better be for a movie with keep-in-my-collection value. Today, the official VCD/ DVD release is at least 3-4 weeks after the movie hits theatres, as far as Bollywood is concerned. What if it were within one week?
I think theatre crowd would remain unaffected. But a lot of people who wouldn't make it to theatres anyways would also get to enjoy the film. And not as pirates.
The other - and better - alternative is video on demand. Tata Sky has it - you order a film and can view it in a 24 hour window. But the most recent film available at the moment is Bheja Fry. Which is two months old.
Differential Pricing
One way to tackle the issue could be time-linked pricing. On a video on demand service you could allow official home viewing from the day the film is released. But, on the first weekend you could charge a premium - say Rs 500 per view.
From Monday onwards that price could be dropped to Rs 300 per view. And from the second weekend onwards, that could drop further.
Would people really pay Rs 500 to watch Jhoom Barabar Jhoom at home the day it's released? I think yes. There is an excitement to watching a film on day 1 and being able to have an opinion on it - good or bad. It's participating in the pop culture of the week.
But maybe you want to watch JBJ without battling the crowds and parking problems at your local multiplex. And without any planning, on impulse, at 2 am.
As everything in life accelerates, so does the half-life of a movie.
Once I've heard from multiple sources that JBJ is 'really bad' you won't get me to see it in a theatre in any case. But there is enough curiosity value to see it... at home. And maybe with my expectations tempered and over dus rupaye ka Act II popcorn I may actually find it to be 'okay'.
The movie experience I expect when I blow up good money in a multiplex is higher than what I expect from something I see in my home. Which is a huge opportunity for producers of films that are average to above average. The 'great' ones will always find a big screen audience.
Bottom line is, the thought of losing 'theatre business' scares the shit out of producers. But they're losing it to piracy anyways.
I may end up watching Shrek 3 on TV after 3 months when you could have got me to pay 200 bucks to watch it in my home last Sunday. Cannibilisation is hard, but the alternative... is slow suicide.
Sunday, June 17, 2007
Kitne aadmi gay?
When a stand up comic gives an interview, half of what he says is not to be taken seriously. Still, I think there is a point to ponder when Suresh Menon says to HT Cafe:
"I call him (Sajid Khan) everyday. In fact, there was a time when our friendship almost traumatised my wife... it nearly destroyed our marriage. Thankfully, better sense prevailed and my wife realised I was not what she thought."
Ah. A few short years ago, no one would have thought. Hanging around with guy friends was a perfectly normal, 'guy thing' to do. I mean guys even walked hand in hand without any embarassment.
But things have changed. And it's all thanks to Bollywood. Every other month we have a film in which perfectly 'normal' men turns out to be gay. No wonder the wives are.. worried.
It started with Page 3. Then came Honeymoon Travels where not one but two leading chracters are discovered to be gay. And the recent Life in a Metro... Poor Konkona, we hope she isn't third time unlucky!
A friend wondered out loud whether there really are that many gays - closet and otherwise - in India. He ticked off his friends and acquaintance list and said, "Well, I don't seem to know any. Maybe one... but I am not sure."
But the fact that you and I don't have gay friends - or friends who've admitted to being gay - doesn't mean anything, I countered. There is a whole world out there we know little of.
That's what I felt when I first read 'Shantaram' two years ago. I grew up just 2 kms away from the bylanes of Colaba where Shantaram and co strutted their stuff. And I inhabited a different universe. Antiseptic, middle class, falling asleep to Vividh Bharti radio.
And there, not far away, a world full of sex, drugs, cloak and dagger. Rock and roll, swing and swagger.
The few times you stood for a bus near Regal, late at night, you'd catch a glimpse of this world. But we never knew the intimate details...
And then there was 'Maximum City'. Again, a book which took you into the sleazy underbelly of the city. The underworld, the bar dancers, the transvestites. The people who exist in the same spaces as us but remain invisible in the light of day.
So it is with the gay community. Partly because no major public figure has so far had the guts to come out and declare, "I am gay." And neither has the media decided to go no-holds-barred on this one.
There are plenty of rumours of course. As Vir Sanghvi wrote in a recent column in Mint:
We are at the stage that Hollywood was in the 1950s and the 1960s, when the gay actors (Rock Hudson, Tyrone Power, etc.) all pretended to be straight for public consumption even though the film community knew them as queens. And famous gay directors (George Cukor, John Schlesinger, etc.) rarely talked about their homosexuality.
And speaking of rumours, here's a major wink-wink-nudge-nudge from Sanghvi...
Years ago, just after Abdul Kalam had become President,I interviewed Shobhaa De on TV. She argued that Bollywood was going more and more gay, pointed to that famous Filmfare awards function where Shah Rukh Khan and Saif Ali Khan did a gay routine to promote Kal Ho Naa Ho, and argued that homosexuality in India extended to public life and went all the way to the top (not difficult to guess who she meant).
Weirdly enough, all the conversation is about gay men. So I guess we women can talk to our girl friends everyday, twice a day. Go partying, shopping, and even out of town together. Without the men in our life getting all flustered.
That is, until Karan Johar decides to make a love quadrangle where Rani and Preity ditch their beaus at the mandap to elope with each other. But worry not... methinks that may take a few more years!
"I call him (Sajid Khan) everyday. In fact, there was a time when our friendship almost traumatised my wife... it nearly destroyed our marriage. Thankfully, better sense prevailed and my wife realised I was not what she thought."
Ah. A few short years ago, no one would have thought. Hanging around with guy friends was a perfectly normal, 'guy thing' to do. I mean guys even walked hand in hand without any embarassment.
But things have changed. And it's all thanks to Bollywood. Every other month we have a film in which perfectly 'normal' men turns out to be gay. No wonder the wives are.. worried.
It started with Page 3. Then came Honeymoon Travels where not one but two leading chracters are discovered to be gay. And the recent Life in a Metro... Poor Konkona, we hope she isn't third time unlucky!
A friend wondered out loud whether there really are that many gays - closet and otherwise - in India. He ticked off his friends and acquaintance list and said, "Well, I don't seem to know any. Maybe one... but I am not sure."
But the fact that you and I don't have gay friends - or friends who've admitted to being gay - doesn't mean anything, I countered. There is a whole world out there we know little of.
That's what I felt when I first read 'Shantaram' two years ago. I grew up just 2 kms away from the bylanes of Colaba where Shantaram and co strutted their stuff. And I inhabited a different universe. Antiseptic, middle class, falling asleep to Vividh Bharti radio.
And there, not far away, a world full of sex, drugs, cloak and dagger. Rock and roll, swing and swagger.
The few times you stood for a bus near Regal, late at night, you'd catch a glimpse of this world. But we never knew the intimate details...
And then there was 'Maximum City'. Again, a book which took you into the sleazy underbelly of the city. The underworld, the bar dancers, the transvestites. The people who exist in the same spaces as us but remain invisible in the light of day.
So it is with the gay community. Partly because no major public figure has so far had the guts to come out and declare, "I am gay." And neither has the media decided to go no-holds-barred on this one.
There are plenty of rumours of course. As Vir Sanghvi wrote in a recent column in Mint:
We are at the stage that Hollywood was in the 1950s and the 1960s, when the gay actors (Rock Hudson, Tyrone Power, etc.) all pretended to be straight for public consumption even though the film community knew them as queens. And famous gay directors (George Cukor, John Schlesinger, etc.) rarely talked about their homosexuality.
And speaking of rumours, here's a major wink-wink-nudge-nudge from Sanghvi...
Years ago, just after Abdul Kalam had become President,I interviewed Shobhaa De on TV. She argued that Bollywood was going more and more gay, pointed to that famous Filmfare awards function where Shah Rukh Khan and Saif Ali Khan did a gay routine to promote Kal Ho Naa Ho, and argued that homosexuality in India extended to public life and went all the way to the top (not difficult to guess who she meant).
Weirdly enough, all the conversation is about gay men. So I guess we women can talk to our girl friends everyday, twice a day. Go partying, shopping, and even out of town together. Without the men in our life getting all flustered.
That is, until Karan Johar decides to make a love quadrangle where Rani and Preity ditch their beaus at the mandap to elope with each other. But worry not... methinks that may take a few more years!
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Mera job tumhare job se II
Expectations of employees are rising - and not just for IT workers, MBAs and the like. A report in today's ET notes:
Scarce talent, buoyant growth and surging attrition have led to hefty pay hikes, pushing companies to focus on employee well-being and better work environment. But most of it seemed to be happening in the rarefied world of white-collar, air-conditioned corporate offices.
Scratch a little deeper and cast the net wider. Perhaps not as brightly, but India seems to be shining at the bottom of the pyramid as well... There could not have been a better example than the construction and infrastructure sector.
The story gives the example of 34 year old Panda, a high-school passout working for Gera Developments as a construction worker. The company he works for is providing a crèche and makeshift school for children, basic medical care, comfortable huts to live in. What's more, he's given training on how to use new tools and they are very particular about safety a well.
ET estimates that the $70-billion construction industry is likely to create 90 million new jobs by 2012. Around 60 million of these will be unskilled and 25 million skilled and semi-skilled workers.
The question is, how many will benefit as much as Panda? Honestly, I would still say he is one of the lucky ones. A few construction companies doing high end work, employing better work practices and also perhaps having a sense of social responsibility will offer such environments.
The rest will continue to operate in the old manner, where every pair of hands is a nameless, faceless and replacable asset.
Now in the longer run this will lead to a restless kind of situation for the bottom of the pyramid (BOP) worker. He knows a few, very few people out there are offering a chance for a better life. He is not one of the lucky ones.
Will he accept his fate and continue toiling? Or will he join some kind of agitation. Will strikes, lockouts and unions come back into fashion??
Ambition everywhere
A friend who went to Kolhapur on a market research project recently remarked,"I met a lot of young unemployed boys. They are sitting idle not because there are no jobs but because the jobs they are getting are not 'good enough'." A Rs 1200 p.m. job as a clerk, for example.
"The minimum they want is Rs 2000 p.m.," she said. So the moment a Big Bazaar outlet opens in Kolhapur, you can imagine the rush of applications. Incidentally, the first lot of applications was actually from nearby Sangli where there is already a Big Bazaar.
Hopefuls who were turned away there knew a new outlet was coming up in the neighbouring town and hence were the first to flood it with their resumes. The 'grapevine' already had it that this job is more modern, upwardly mobile and well paying than the regular small town variety. The excitement was palpable!
Of course, government jobs remain attractive to the average young person of Kolhapur. But as we all know there is a 'rate card'. It takes Rs 1 lakh to 3 lakhs to get into a lowly official post in the first place.
In comparison, a Big Bazaar offers the chance of succeeding on one's 'merit'. It's your English ability, knowledge of computers, personality that matter. And this is especially attractive for Muslim youth who perceive - as well as experience - that many other doors are closed for them.
So it's not just the white collar - or 'those who can' - raising their aspirations. Across the spectrum, it's a silent revolution.
The creamy layer of the workforce, however, has more options. More mobility. What happens when the BOPs start dreaming of - even demanding - the same?
Scarce talent, buoyant growth and surging attrition have led to hefty pay hikes, pushing companies to focus on employee well-being and better work environment. But most of it seemed to be happening in the rarefied world of white-collar, air-conditioned corporate offices.
Scratch a little deeper and cast the net wider. Perhaps not as brightly, but India seems to be shining at the bottom of the pyramid as well... There could not have been a better example than the construction and infrastructure sector.
The story gives the example of 34 year old Panda, a high-school passout working for Gera Developments as a construction worker. The company he works for is providing a crèche and makeshift school for children, basic medical care, comfortable huts to live in. What's more, he's given training on how to use new tools and they are very particular about safety a well.
ET estimates that the $70-billion construction industry is likely to create 90 million new jobs by 2012. Around 60 million of these will be unskilled and 25 million skilled and semi-skilled workers.
The question is, how many will benefit as much as Panda? Honestly, I would still say he is one of the lucky ones. A few construction companies doing high end work, employing better work practices and also perhaps having a sense of social responsibility will offer such environments.
The rest will continue to operate in the old manner, where every pair of hands is a nameless, faceless and replacable asset.
Now in the longer run this will lead to a restless kind of situation for the bottom of the pyramid (BOP) worker. He knows a few, very few people out there are offering a chance for a better life. He is not one of the lucky ones.
Will he accept his fate and continue toiling? Or will he join some kind of agitation. Will strikes, lockouts and unions come back into fashion??
Ambition everywhere
A friend who went to Kolhapur on a market research project recently remarked,"I met a lot of young unemployed boys. They are sitting idle not because there are no jobs but because the jobs they are getting are not 'good enough'." A Rs 1200 p.m. job as a clerk, for example.
"The minimum they want is Rs 2000 p.m.," she said. So the moment a Big Bazaar outlet opens in Kolhapur, you can imagine the rush of applications. Incidentally, the first lot of applications was actually from nearby Sangli where there is already a Big Bazaar.
Hopefuls who were turned away there knew a new outlet was coming up in the neighbouring town and hence were the first to flood it with their resumes. The 'grapevine' already had it that this job is more modern, upwardly mobile and well paying than the regular small town variety. The excitement was palpable!
Of course, government jobs remain attractive to the average young person of Kolhapur. But as we all know there is a 'rate card'. It takes Rs 1 lakh to 3 lakhs to get into a lowly official post in the first place.
In comparison, a Big Bazaar offers the chance of succeeding on one's 'merit'. It's your English ability, knowledge of computers, personality that matter. And this is especially attractive for Muslim youth who perceive - as well as experience - that many other doors are closed for them.
So it's not just the white collar - or 'those who can' - raising their aspirations. Across the spectrum, it's a silent revolution.
The creamy layer of the workforce, however, has more options. More mobility. What happens when the BOPs start dreaming of - even demanding - the same?
Monday, June 11, 2007
Mera job tere job se...
"No self respecting student goes for the TCS interview."
This piece of news was casually delivered to me by a student of a mid ranking NIT.
"Why, exactly?" I probed.
"Well, they pick up a lot of students", came the reply. "It's a mass recruiter."
So, is that a bad thing? Well, apparently yes. You see word filters back that "It's not as great as you think". "Be prepared to spend 6 months on the bench." Etc etc.
Much the same as joining Infosys but since Infy picks up less folks from this particular campus, the negative feedback is a trickle. Compared to the TCS flood.
Of course TCS does manage to get students. But it's not a top choice. The hot companies to join are the ones who take fewer people: IBM for example. Generally the companies which recruit more selectively pay more. So that's a first level of satisfaction for the new employee.
Secondly, they seem to have a better idea what to do with the people who join. They're not recruiting large numbers in anticipation of projects coming in.
Thirdly, even if some people have a bad experience their number is limited - so there is no overall negative impression.
In just 3 short years, the world has changed. When I wrote this column for rediff.com in June 2004, it was still a big deal to join one of the Big Five. Except, perhaps at an IIT.
With the rising aspirations of fresh grads the same jobs have lost their sheen. The net has to be spread wider and wider, to tier 2 and tier 3 colleges, which would not be on the recruitment map at all a couple of years ago.
At a lesser known college it is a matter of pride that 'Infosys picked up 6 students'. The feeling is that of having 'arrived'.
But next year when 60 join, and then 100, the same 'we are being recruited like alu and pyaaz' feeling sets in.
I don't know what the solution is because much of the problem is created by the external environment. Once you know many options are available, you feel less committed to making something work.
Companies recruit extra staff in anticipation of attrition and end up compounding the problem by not having proper roles and jobs for some folks to do.
But even the likes of 'Happy Kumar' who are perfectly content where they are get infected by the jobnotgoodenough-itis soon enough. It's like a virus floating in the very air we breathe - no one can escape it.
The thing, is we all want to achieve more. To stand out from the crowd. If 'everyone' can get a job in TCS easily, it must not be really worth it, is the feeling. And young people today are very quick today to form opinions based on hearsay, orkut scraps, forum discussions. And the view taken is of the immediate 6-12 months. Few can see a career path in terms of even a 3-5 year horizon.
The one thing these companies have going for them is the Parent Proposition. Moms and dads just love to brag about 'mera beta or beti working at TCS'. So even if it has little or no brag value in the peer group, there is a compelling reason to sign on.
Kam se kam Mummy-Daddy to khush ho jayenge.
And finally, despite all the cribbing and sighing these jobs are far more comfy than being on some factory shopfloor. Every engineer who disses IT knows that in the back of his mind.
So an uneasy equilibrium is maintained. Kal ki kal dekhi jayegi. The tug of wills continues... And no, draconian non-compete clauses are not the answer.
This piece of news was casually delivered to me by a student of a mid ranking NIT.
"Why, exactly?" I probed.
"Well, they pick up a lot of students", came the reply. "It's a mass recruiter."
So, is that a bad thing? Well, apparently yes. You see word filters back that "It's not as great as you think". "Be prepared to spend 6 months on the bench." Etc etc.
Much the same as joining Infosys but since Infy picks up less folks from this particular campus, the negative feedback is a trickle. Compared to the TCS flood.
Of course TCS does manage to get students. But it's not a top choice. The hot companies to join are the ones who take fewer people: IBM for example. Generally the companies which recruit more selectively pay more. So that's a first level of satisfaction for the new employee.
Secondly, they seem to have a better idea what to do with the people who join. They're not recruiting large numbers in anticipation of projects coming in.
Thirdly, even if some people have a bad experience their number is limited - so there is no overall negative impression.
In just 3 short years, the world has changed. When I wrote this column for rediff.com in June 2004, it was still a big deal to join one of the Big Five. Except, perhaps at an IIT.
With the rising aspirations of fresh grads the same jobs have lost their sheen. The net has to be spread wider and wider, to tier 2 and tier 3 colleges, which would not be on the recruitment map at all a couple of years ago.
At a lesser known college it is a matter of pride that 'Infosys picked up 6 students'. The feeling is that of having 'arrived'.
But next year when 60 join, and then 100, the same 'we are being recruited like alu and pyaaz' feeling sets in.
I don't know what the solution is because much of the problem is created by the external environment. Once you know many options are available, you feel less committed to making something work.
Companies recruit extra staff in anticipation of attrition and end up compounding the problem by not having proper roles and jobs for some folks to do.
But even the likes of 'Happy Kumar' who are perfectly content where they are get infected by the jobnotgoodenough-itis soon enough. It's like a virus floating in the very air we breathe - no one can escape it.
The thing, is we all want to achieve more. To stand out from the crowd. If 'everyone' can get a job in TCS easily, it must not be really worth it, is the feeling. And young people today are very quick today to form opinions based on hearsay, orkut scraps, forum discussions. And the view taken is of the immediate 6-12 months. Few can see a career path in terms of even a 3-5 year horizon.
The one thing these companies have going for them is the Parent Proposition. Moms and dads just love to brag about 'mera beta or beti working at TCS'. So even if it has little or no brag value in the peer group, there is a compelling reason to sign on.
Kam se kam Mummy-Daddy to khush ho jayenge.
And finally, despite all the cribbing and sighing these jobs are far more comfy than being on some factory shopfloor. Every engineer who disses IT knows that in the back of his mind.
So an uneasy equilibrium is maintained. Kal ki kal dekhi jayegi. The tug of wills continues... And no, draconian non-compete clauses are not the answer.
Saturday, June 09, 2007
Thank God for Roald Dahl
The summer vacation is drawing to a close. With it, karate, swimming, badminton, singing, dancing, acting and jazz ballet classes. All designed to keep kids out of their parents' rapidly thinning hair.
My daughter has no certificates, no end-of-summer performance to boast of. Blame it on my lack of planning, foresight or even kanjoosi. But all is not lost because she has achieved one important milestone. This was the summer she fell in love with reading.
Now reading was, is and will probably continue to be my favourite pastime. But then we grew up in a pre-internet, pre-mobile, pre-24-hour TV era. We had no choice - not that I'm complaining!
Times may have changed but reading is a habit you feel the need to inculcate. A joy you want your child to partake in. However, things did not go as per plan. Books failed to excite Nivedita. And at some point I had to ask myself, "Can the printed word compete with those mesmerising LCD screens?"
The question was answered quite unexpectedly. Nivedita discovered an author called Roald Dahl. No, it was not 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' which cast a spell but a book called 'Matilda'.
Matilda is the story of a little girl who happens to be a gifted child, born to two very dumb parents. These parents encourage her to watch TV, while she trots off to the local library and starts devouring books.
The only person who recognises Matilda's extraordinary talents is her teacher, Miss Honey. But the most interesting character is the headmistress - Miss Trunchbull. Perhaps the meanest headmistress on the planet. One of her favourite punishments is picking up children by the ear and then hurling them into the air, sledgehammer style.
Her idea of a perfect school would be "one in which there were no children at all.
It's all perfectly ridiculous, but the book captures the emotion of being a 6 year old at the mercy of a school system. There may be no principals as bad as The Trunchbull but trunchbullian streaks are everywhere. At least from the child's point of view.
Older people who don't understand them. Older people who create silly rules and punish you for breaking them.
In Miss Trunchbull (the mean older person) and Miss Honey (the nice older person), Roald Dahl has created a Villain and Hero which captures the child's imagination. The amazing thing is he did this in 1988, at age 74. Just two years before his death.
Which means, technically, he never grew old. He never forgot what it was like to be a kid.
Matilda was the first book Nivedita and I fought to read. We read much of it together, she a few chapters behind me.
The thing is, Matilda captured her imagination. She wanted to turn the pages and find out what next. And once it was over, she wanted more.
The moral of the story is books aren't irrelevant. But in the age of non stop digital stimulation and electronic excitement it took an exceptional book to get a 7 year old hooked to an old fashioned habit.
Thank God for the likes of Roald Dahl, and now J K Rowling. May the imagination soar higher and give wings to words.
My daughter has no certificates, no end-of-summer performance to boast of. Blame it on my lack of planning, foresight or even kanjoosi. But all is not lost because she has achieved one important milestone. This was the summer she fell in love with reading.
Now reading was, is and will probably continue to be my favourite pastime. But then we grew up in a pre-internet, pre-mobile, pre-24-hour TV era. We had no choice - not that I'm complaining!
Times may have changed but reading is a habit you feel the need to inculcate. A joy you want your child to partake in. However, things did not go as per plan. Books failed to excite Nivedita. And at some point I had to ask myself, "Can the printed word compete with those mesmerising LCD screens?"
The question was answered quite unexpectedly. Nivedita discovered an author called Roald Dahl. No, it was not 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' which cast a spell but a book called 'Matilda'.
Matilda is the story of a little girl who happens to be a gifted child, born to two very dumb parents. These parents encourage her to watch TV, while she trots off to the local library and starts devouring books.
The only person who recognises Matilda's extraordinary talents is her teacher, Miss Honey. But the most interesting character is the headmistress - Miss Trunchbull. Perhaps the meanest headmistress on the planet. One of her favourite punishments is picking up children by the ear and then hurling them into the air, sledgehammer style.
Her idea of a perfect school would be "one in which there were no children at all.
It's all perfectly ridiculous, but the book captures the emotion of being a 6 year old at the mercy of a school system. There may be no principals as bad as The Trunchbull but trunchbullian streaks are everywhere. At least from the child's point of view.
Older people who don't understand them. Older people who create silly rules and punish you for breaking them.
In Miss Trunchbull (the mean older person) and Miss Honey (the nice older person), Roald Dahl has created a Villain and Hero which captures the child's imagination. The amazing thing is he did this in 1988, at age 74. Just two years before his death.
Which means, technically, he never grew old. He never forgot what it was like to be a kid.
Matilda was the first book Nivedita and I fought to read. We read much of it together, she a few chapters behind me.
The thing is, Matilda captured her imagination. She wanted to turn the pages and find out what next. And once it was over, she wanted more.
The moral of the story is books aren't irrelevant. But in the age of non stop digital stimulation and electronic excitement it took an exceptional book to get a 7 year old hooked to an old fashioned habit.
Thank God for the likes of Roald Dahl, and now J K Rowling. May the imagination soar higher and give wings to words.
Monday, June 04, 2007
Shootout at Lokhandwala
I saw 'Shootout at Lokhandwala' last night. Although technically I didn't 'see' a lot of it. There was so much blood and gore, I had to keep covering my eyes.
You might think, gosh, how many films are they going to make on Police vs Bombay Underworld. Yet, each has its own distinct character and style. So while 'Shootout' covers much the same ground you can't call it boring.
The violence in 'Shootout' put me off but I think it is integral to the film. The whole point was to convey the fact that for gangsters like Maya and Buwa killing was a cool sport. They didn't even operate under the 'code of honour' (if you can call it that!) of the D company. So what if Builder X is paying bhai, hamara man kiya to hum usse bhi paise lenge.
Of course 'Shootout' is extremely filmi compared to the docu-reality style of a 'Black Friday'. But Black Friday was based on a book, about an event whose memory is seared in the public consciousness.
'Shootout', on the other hand is based on an incident which caused a sensation in its time but which has been forgotten by all except perhaps the residents of Swati building, where the siege took place. Hence the director and writer have taken liberties with the truth.
The film does higlight a couple of points:
# In the closing credits, there is a line which says during the period the Anti Terrorist Squad (ATS) was active, crime in Mumbai went down 70%. Yet the ATS was disbanded shortly before the 1993 serial blasts.
The reason, perhaps, was the recklessness with which the ATS had begun to operate. The shootout in a residential building being a case in point.
While I do agree that the police had no option but 'eent ka jawaab eent, paththar ka paththar' in the long run the encounter route is not sustainable. It makes a jaanwar out of the police and in the hands of those who aren't exactly ethical, it makes the officer a pawn.
Even in this shootout, it is hinted that Dawood tipped off the police about Maya & co's location. The idea being to eliminate a thorn in his side.
# It's not clear why ATS ie anti TERRORIST squad was running after the underworld. Maya and co were causing terror but only to extract money which they could lavish on bargirls. Not to run covert operations against the country!
# The ATS killing off some Sikh militants in the beginning of the film is a chilling reminder of how - just 15 years ago - we had a different kind of terrorist problem. Luckily, that's been tackled but you never can tell from where and how passions will be inflamed . It could be for a homeland, for a quota, or even just 'mere feelings hurt ho gaya hain'.
So, should you watch the film? Probably not. Unless you like 'blood ki Holi' type cinema. The acting has been soundly criticised - especially Tusshar Kapoor in the role of a 'ruthless killer'.
His mom is the producer of the film, bhai. If Maya Dolas ki ma usey gangster bana sakti thi to Tusshar ki mummy bhi koi kam hain kya?
You might think, gosh, how many films are they going to make on Police vs Bombay Underworld. Yet, each has its own distinct character and style. So while 'Shootout' covers much the same ground you can't call it boring.
The violence in 'Shootout' put me off but I think it is integral to the film. The whole point was to convey the fact that for gangsters like Maya and Buwa killing was a cool sport. They didn't even operate under the 'code of honour' (if you can call it that!) of the D company. So what if Builder X is paying bhai, hamara man kiya to hum usse bhi paise lenge.
Of course 'Shootout' is extremely filmi compared to the docu-reality style of a 'Black Friday'. But Black Friday was based on a book, about an event whose memory is seared in the public consciousness.
'Shootout', on the other hand is based on an incident which caused a sensation in its time but which has been forgotten by all except perhaps the residents of Swati building, where the siege took place. Hence the director and writer have taken liberties with the truth.
The film does higlight a couple of points:
# In the closing credits, there is a line which says during the period the Anti Terrorist Squad (ATS) was active, crime in Mumbai went down 70%. Yet the ATS was disbanded shortly before the 1993 serial blasts.
The reason, perhaps, was the recklessness with which the ATS had begun to operate. The shootout in a residential building being a case in point.
While I do agree that the police had no option but 'eent ka jawaab eent, paththar ka paththar' in the long run the encounter route is not sustainable. It makes a jaanwar out of the police and in the hands of those who aren't exactly ethical, it makes the officer a pawn.
Even in this shootout, it is hinted that Dawood tipped off the police about Maya & co's location. The idea being to eliminate a thorn in his side.
# It's not clear why ATS ie anti TERRORIST squad was running after the underworld. Maya and co were causing terror but only to extract money which they could lavish on bargirls. Not to run covert operations against the country!
# The ATS killing off some Sikh militants in the beginning of the film is a chilling reminder of how - just 15 years ago - we had a different kind of terrorist problem. Luckily, that's been tackled but you never can tell from where and how passions will be inflamed . It could be for a homeland, for a quota, or even just 'mere feelings hurt ho gaya hain'.
So, should you watch the film? Probably not. Unless you like 'blood ki Holi' type cinema. The acting has been soundly criticised - especially Tusshar Kapoor in the role of a 'ruthless killer'.
His mom is the producer of the film, bhai. If Maya Dolas ki ma usey gangster bana sakti thi to Tusshar ki mummy bhi koi kam hain kya?
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Cheeni kum, conviction zyada
I saw 'Cheeni Kum' last night. It is a brilliantly crafted movie.
The casting is perfect. The acting outstanding. The dialogue witty. Just about everything in the film screams "This has not been attempted before in Bollywood". And the amazing thing is, it works.
Except maybe the last bit, where the precocious kid got irritating and Amitabh went berserk at the Ashoka pillar.It kind of spoils the overall understated effect of the film.
I won't attempt a review because it would just be a repeat of what my friend Apu has already said here.
Cinematic excellence apart, I found the character played by Tabu to be most refreshing.
Witness this scene, when her father goes on a 'satyagraha', hoping his 34 year old daughter will call off her plan to marry the 64 year old Amitabh.
"Papa, kuch kha lijiye.."
"Kya tu us buddhe ko chhod degi?"
"Nahin.."
"To phir main kuch nahin khaoonga".
"Jaisi aapki marzi", she says calmly and walks out of the room.
A hunger strike may be a bit extreme. But these kind of power struggles are commonly enacted in our homes and especially at this time of the year, when students make choices related to careers.
What Neena Varma shows you is that if you know what you want and are determined to have it, no one can 'force' you into a different direction. Yes, marrying a guy 30 years older than you is not common. But agar meri khushi isi main hai and I am prepared to bear the consequences, then so be it.
"I love you, you're my dad, but finally it's my life!"
The trouble is few of us stand up for ourselves because we are unsure. We hesitate. We vacillate. We bow down. And then tell others, "Yaar... mere parents yahi chahte the."
The moral of the story is: if you stand firm for what you believe in, the world will come around to accept it. Let your passion burn bright - be it for a person, profession or philosophy of life. Fuel it with conviction. Only a candle in the wind is snuffed out by the slightest drizzle of disapproval.
If there is fire in your belly, it will burn on!
The casting is perfect. The acting outstanding. The dialogue witty. Just about everything in the film screams "This has not been attempted before in Bollywood". And the amazing thing is, it works.
Except maybe the last bit, where the precocious kid got irritating and Amitabh went berserk at the Ashoka pillar.It kind of spoils the overall understated effect of the film.
I won't attempt a review because it would just be a repeat of what my friend Apu has already said here.
Cinematic excellence apart, I found the character played by Tabu to be most refreshing.
Witness this scene, when her father goes on a 'satyagraha', hoping his 34 year old daughter will call off her plan to marry the 64 year old Amitabh.
"Papa, kuch kha lijiye.."
"Kya tu us buddhe ko chhod degi?"
"Nahin.."
"To phir main kuch nahin khaoonga".
"Jaisi aapki marzi", she says calmly and walks out of the room.
A hunger strike may be a bit extreme. But these kind of power struggles are commonly enacted in our homes and especially at this time of the year, when students make choices related to careers.
What Neena Varma shows you is that if you know what you want and are determined to have it, no one can 'force' you into a different direction. Yes, marrying a guy 30 years older than you is not common. But agar meri khushi isi main hai and I am prepared to bear the consequences, then so be it.
"I love you, you're my dad, but finally it's my life!"
The trouble is few of us stand up for ourselves because we are unsure. We hesitate. We vacillate. We bow down. And then tell others, "Yaar... mere parents yahi chahte the."
The moral of the story is: if you stand firm for what you believe in, the world will come around to accept it. Let your passion burn bright - be it for a person, profession or philosophy of life. Fuel it with conviction. Only a candle in the wind is snuffed out by the slightest drizzle of disapproval.
If there is fire in your belly, it will burn on!
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Looking for a web designer/ developer
JAM is developing a couple of interesting new websites and to make it happen, we need people who live and breathe the internet.
We're looking for:
a) Web developer: Must have a passion to make a difference, and be comfortable with joomla/ drupal.
b) Web designer: A keen aesthetic sense and understanding of Html, Dhtml, CSS, Photoshop.
If you'd like to be part of a small and motivated team which has big dreams and a definite, and different direction for the future email rashmi_b at yahoo.com.
We are looking for people who can work full time. Or at the very least, on a project basis for minimum 3 months.
We're looking for:
a) Web developer: Must have a passion to make a difference, and be comfortable with joomla/ drupal.
b) Web designer: A keen aesthetic sense and understanding of Html, Dhtml, CSS, Photoshop.
If you'd like to be part of a small and motivated team which has big dreams and a definite, and different direction for the future email rashmi_b at yahoo.com.
We are looking for people who can work full time. Or at the very least, on a project basis for minimum 3 months.
Things people notice
On the road. From Ludhiana to Chandigarh, and then on to Shimla, I amuse myself with a mental contest: "Most Creatively named Dhaba'.
But first, a word on the most uncreatively named dhaba. That khitaab goes to the 'Punjabi' dhaba, with 'New Punjabi' dhaba coming in a close second. After all, what can you get in a dhaba but Punjabi food. Chicken, black dal and the omnipresent alu gobhi!
The also rans list includes:
New Frontier dhaba
Taaran taran dhaba
Dimple dhaba
Fauji dhaba
Bunty Shunty dhaba (I kid you not!)
Din raat dhaba
Sunny full stop dhaba
The runners up prize goes to: Dhaba Non Stop dhaba. The name sounds all the more corny juxtaposed with the Airtel branding.
But the prize for 'Most Creative Dhaba Name' goes to: the one and only 'Indo German Vaishno Dhaba' near the Neelon bridge, on the outskirts of Ludhiana. I am sure they serve the same black dal, yellow gobhi and kadak brown chai as any other dhaba in Punjab. Still, I like their global attitude.
Why Indo German and not Indo Swiss? Next time around I shall definitely stop, seek out the owner and solve the mystery!
But the more interesting issue was raised by my daughter. The same highway landscape provoked this question:" Why are all the shops here named 'Amrit Lal and sons', 'Pyare mohan and sons', 'Tara Singh and sons'... Why not daughters?"
The signage on dhabas may change but society and convention will take much longer. Maybe a few more generations!
But first, a word on the most uncreatively named dhaba. That khitaab goes to the 'Punjabi' dhaba, with 'New Punjabi' dhaba coming in a close second. After all, what can you get in a dhaba but Punjabi food. Chicken, black dal and the omnipresent alu gobhi!
The also rans list includes:
New Frontier dhaba
Taaran taran dhaba
Dimple dhaba
Fauji dhaba
Bunty Shunty dhaba (I kid you not!)
Din raat dhaba
Sunny full stop dhaba
The runners up prize goes to: Dhaba Non Stop dhaba. The name sounds all the more corny juxtaposed with the Airtel branding. 
But the prize for 'Most Creative Dhaba Name' goes to: the one and only 'Indo German Vaishno Dhaba' near the Neelon bridge, on the outskirts of Ludhiana. I am sure they serve the same black dal, yellow gobhi and kadak brown chai as any other dhaba in Punjab. Still, I like their global attitude.Why Indo German and not Indo Swiss? Next time around I shall definitely stop, seek out the owner and solve the mystery!
But the more interesting issue was raised by my daughter. The same highway landscape provoked this question:" Why are all the shops here named 'Amrit Lal and sons', 'Pyare mohan and sons', 'Tara Singh and sons'... Why not daughters?"
The signage on dhabas may change but society and convention will take much longer. Maybe a few more generations!
Monday, May 28, 2007
My brand.. my brand.. my brand
Get a life. The 'consumer' is a human being for whom your brand is one of N million life choices. And unless you are something iconic, like the ipod, little more than that.
But professionals who spend all their waking hours - and perhaps their sleeptime as well - thinking of how to 'touch their consumers lives' don't quite get it.
A large multinational once sponsored a section of JAM magazine called 'Campus Buzz'. One of the regular columns in these pages was 'Hangouts'. Way back when Barista was a cool place where people played scrabble and strummed the guitar instead of holding quickie job interviews over coffee, we featured it.
Large Multinational Client (LMC) threw a fit. You see, this company also sells coffee. He felt we had violated cardinal principles and promoted a 'rival brand'.
We did not see it that way at all. And neither, I think, did the all important consumer. The choice is not: should I drink coffee at home, or should I go out and drink it at a coffee shop. If you like coffee, you do both.
In fact the boom in coffee shops would have made made coffee more popular in a tea drinking nation, IMHO. But, no sir. LMC cancelled his contract and maintained a cold war with us... For years.
I recalled this incident while reading Santosh Desai's column today on agencyfaqs. Santosh talks about why brands are unable to harness the power of the digital media. He writes:
I think the real problem is not that the internet in India is not ready for us, but that we don’t know how to use it. And this gap is not a technical one, but one involving a mindset...We want to control the narrative; we see ourselves as the creative prophets whose word the listeners must follow.
The very notion of creation undergoes a change when the user is involved; everyone becomes an artist. Creation becomes a function of collaboration over time. The idea that all work is unfinished, that eventually we, the owners of brands have no way of guaranteeing an outcome is too radical for most conventional marketers to be comfortable with.
Which is why we are quick to adopt that part of the digital world that fits into our existing frame of advertising. We have trouble with the part where we have to let go, where we surrender to the consumer. This is extremely uncomfortable since we have always believed that we, the emitters of message, are the owners of brands and they, the consumers, are part of some strange phylum of an even stranger genus that needs to be observed under the microscope called a focus group.
Look at the websites of the leading corporations of the world; they still speak in the crypto-corporate speak that signals their absolute terror of having a real conversation with the consumer.
Line of Control
Suppose a consumer gives a bad review of your product and it gets printed in a newspaper or magazine, what do you do? You assume they must have an ulterior motive (doosre brand ki PR agency ne unko paise diye honge). If you happen to be an advertiser with said publication, you threaten to withdraw your support.
Most journalists know which side their bread is buttered and will somehow cook up a product review which is moderately critical at best. The safest thing is to just list down the product specifications or print the press release verbatim.
A lot of advertising is linked to this press release garbage being printed verbatim as a 'value add'.
But then came the internet. You can't control what's said here, your advertising clout is irrelevant. If someone thinks your product tastes bad, well that's that. You can dismiss him as a crank or think to yourself, "Here is a voice that's not coming through to me on focus groups".
Let's face it - most of those groups are attended by 'professionals'. I was once part of a FGD on cooking oil (don't ask - favour for a friend!) and later found that all the housewives present did this on a regular basis. Kind of like a kitty party where you go home with a Shoppers' Stop voucher.
They know what clients want to hear. And that's further packaged by the MR agency into a document full of gobbledygook. "Cover Your Ass" research, it's called. If the product fails you have the report to wave around and say 'but we tested the concept extensively'!
The only industry which has learnt the art of letting go is entertainment. Movie companies invite journalists and other audiences for previews and special shows, without expectating a positive review. Music companies also know that opinions have a life of their own - they can't be controlled.
Of course these companies have the advantage of producing new 'products' on a regular basis. If one film bombs, there's always another release around the corner.
And, there's no accounting for public taste. Often the films with poor reviews get sizable audiences.
In sum, brands need to be less obsessive. Perhaps even less 'innovative'. The new trend is to start a site to 'engage' the customers around some kind of broad theme related to the brand. Most of these sites also use the brand name in the url.
By this logic, when satellite TV took off in India, large brands should've set up their own TV channels!
A website is relatively cheap to set up, so sure, brands are able and willing to experiment. But as long as the Creators see the end user as a 'consumer' it will never really work. When someone 'targets' you - there is an uneasy feeling.
Whether it's in the literal or metaphoric sense.
But professionals who spend all their waking hours - and perhaps their sleeptime as well - thinking of how to 'touch their consumers lives' don't quite get it.
A large multinational once sponsored a section of JAM magazine called 'Campus Buzz'. One of the regular columns in these pages was 'Hangouts'. Way back when Barista was a cool place where people played scrabble and strummed the guitar instead of holding quickie job interviews over coffee, we featured it.
Large Multinational Client (LMC) threw a fit. You see, this company also sells coffee. He felt we had violated cardinal principles and promoted a 'rival brand'.
We did not see it that way at all. And neither, I think, did the all important consumer. The choice is not: should I drink coffee at home, or should I go out and drink it at a coffee shop. If you like coffee, you do both.
In fact the boom in coffee shops would have made made coffee more popular in a tea drinking nation, IMHO. But, no sir. LMC cancelled his contract and maintained a cold war with us... For years.
I recalled this incident while reading Santosh Desai's column today on agencyfaqs. Santosh talks about why brands are unable to harness the power of the digital media. He writes:
I think the real problem is not that the internet in India is not ready for us, but that we don’t know how to use it. And this gap is not a technical one, but one involving a mindset...We want to control the narrative; we see ourselves as the creative prophets whose word the listeners must follow.
The very notion of creation undergoes a change when the user is involved; everyone becomes an artist. Creation becomes a function of collaboration over time. The idea that all work is unfinished, that eventually we, the owners of brands have no way of guaranteeing an outcome is too radical for most conventional marketers to be comfortable with.
Which is why we are quick to adopt that part of the digital world that fits into our existing frame of advertising. We have trouble with the part where we have to let go, where we surrender to the consumer. This is extremely uncomfortable since we have always believed that we, the emitters of message, are the owners of brands and they, the consumers, are part of some strange phylum of an even stranger genus that needs to be observed under the microscope called a focus group.
Look at the websites of the leading corporations of the world; they still speak in the crypto-corporate speak that signals their absolute terror of having a real conversation with the consumer.
Line of Control
Suppose a consumer gives a bad review of your product and it gets printed in a newspaper or magazine, what do you do? You assume they must have an ulterior motive (doosre brand ki PR agency ne unko paise diye honge). If you happen to be an advertiser with said publication, you threaten to withdraw your support.
Most journalists know which side their bread is buttered and will somehow cook up a product review which is moderately critical at best. The safest thing is to just list down the product specifications or print the press release verbatim.
A lot of advertising is linked to this press release garbage being printed verbatim as a 'value add'.
But then came the internet. You can't control what's said here, your advertising clout is irrelevant. If someone thinks your product tastes bad, well that's that. You can dismiss him as a crank or think to yourself, "Here is a voice that's not coming through to me on focus groups".
Let's face it - most of those groups are attended by 'professionals'. I was once part of a FGD on cooking oil (don't ask - favour for a friend!) and later found that all the housewives present did this on a regular basis. Kind of like a kitty party where you go home with a Shoppers' Stop voucher.
They know what clients want to hear. And that's further packaged by the MR agency into a document full of gobbledygook. "Cover Your Ass" research, it's called. If the product fails you have the report to wave around and say 'but we tested the concept extensively'!
The only industry which has learnt the art of letting go is entertainment. Movie companies invite journalists and other audiences for previews and special shows, without expectating a positive review. Music companies also know that opinions have a life of their own - they can't be controlled.
Of course these companies have the advantage of producing new 'products' on a regular basis. If one film bombs, there's always another release around the corner.
And, there's no accounting for public taste. Often the films with poor reviews get sizable audiences.
In sum, brands need to be less obsessive. Perhaps even less 'innovative'. The new trend is to start a site to 'engage' the customers around some kind of broad theme related to the brand. Most of these sites also use the brand name in the url.
By this logic, when satellite TV took off in India, large brands should've set up their own TV channels!
A website is relatively cheap to set up, so sure, brands are able and willing to experiment. But as long as the Creators see the end user as a 'consumer' it will never really work. When someone 'targets' you - there is an uneasy feeling.
Whether it's in the literal or metaphoric sense.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Migration: you can't stop it - II
American Consular Officer: "How do we know you'll come back to India?"
Student: "Sir, my roots are here - my family, my property, my business... I want to study in America, but I will come back and put my education to good use."
Hundreds and thousands of Indian students have given this earnest answer at their visa interview. A significant number never return. You have to wonder - why bother to ask? Because the idea of America, to a large extent, is to attract the brightest and the best from around the world.
But I guess can't give out the impression yahan visa party chal rahi hai -'everyone's invited'. We don't really want your tired, huddled and poor. That's so last century.
So both sides play out the charade but the visa officer knows there's a 95% chance the guy on full scholarship to Stanford is unlikely to return anytime soon. That in a couple of years his parents will be applying for 10 year multiple entry visas instead.
The H 1 B tangle
Of course, getting a job after a Bachelor's, or Master's in the US is apparently not a cakewalk. An employer needs to prove there is no American citizen or permanent resident skilled for enough to take on that particular job, in order to sponsor your visa. The company must want you pretty badly to go to that much trouble.
With Indian IT companies cornering more and more H1B visas in recent years, things seem to be getting tougher.
Businessweek reports: When Abhishek Sehgal came to the U.S. to pursue an MBA at the University of Texas McCombs School of Business, he expected to get some work experience in the country. But the second-year MBA student from India didn't anticipate it would be so difficult to get a visa to work after graduation.
Citigroup (C), the 28-year-old's future employer, submitted his H-1B visa application on Apr. 2, the first day petitions were accepted. But the pool of applicants was already oversubscribed, and Sehgal's application wasn't chosen in a random computer selection.
Abhishek has a few options. After completing his degree requirements, he can try his luck in a visa pool for candidates with Master's degrees. That's 20,000 visas above and beyond the H1B - for students who've completed advanced degrees in the US. Citi could also take him for a one-year "practical training" under his student visa and he can reapply for an H1B next year.
Sehgal is one of many international MBA candidates who's caught in a visa bind. With only 65,000 H-1B visas available for professional-level workers across all sectors for the 2008 fiscal year, the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services received 123,480 eligible applications on Apr. 2 and Apr. 3. After a computer lottery, about half the applicants were rejected.
The H1 B issue also affects another student group- the ones who've studied in India but secured the much hyped 'foreign placement'.
So even as the papers went gaga over the Lime group picking up IIT grads for $90,000 a year, the reality is that some of those who got the job never made it to New York. They did not get an H1 B visa.
Says one affected student: "Microsoft hired for US positions (at IIT) and then almost simply dropped their new hires because of the H1b mess (did not even give India positions), Merril Lynch took people to UK, same with Deutsche Bank, Capital One kept few people in India and moved rest to England and Canada.
LimeWire opened an India office. This year also many companies are in trouble including Bloomberg".
Not that working in India or Europe isn't a good experience. But the free flow of labour - at both lower and higher end of the job spectrum - remains more of a dream than tangible reality.
The Change Ahead
But thinking Americans are worried - talent migrating elsewhere to work and study may affect the land built on Immigrant Energy in the long run. Reforms are now being considered.
A new proposal - the Skilled Worker Immigration and Fairness Act - introduced by Senators Chuck Hagel (Republican) and Joseph Lieberman (Democrat). This act seeks to raise the existing cap on H1B visas to 115,000 and go upto 180,000 in years to come.
More importantly, the proposal seeks to allow a limitless number of H1B visas and green cards for foreigners with master's degrees or higher in any field from an American university. Or for anyone with such credentials in maths, science, technology or engineering from abroad.
This news was gleefully highlighted on page one of the Times of India late last week. They may as well have headlined it 'Chalo America'! Aapka bachpan ka sapna ab poora ho sakta hai.
Will the bill actually get passed? I am doubtful.
Because however attractive the proposal may be to industry and acadmia, there is a strong possibility of a backlash from the average American. When you let more immigrants in - using the 'talent' argument - there is a natural fear that 'my job could be at risk'.
The new guys may not be attractive only for their skills...
A December 2005 study by the Centre for Immigration Studies (CIS) found that 85% of those working in the US on H1B visas get paid less than US workers in the same occupation and state. $13,000 less, on average. This is against the law.
The study found that 36% of all H1B visas were issued to Indians, and occupation wise computer professionals dominate (25% of visas).
Based on this report, 9 Indian companies have been asked to provide details of how they use the H1 B. As Shubham Singhal notes in his blog, there is definitely some gochi. He writes:
Last year Infosys requested 22,590 H1b visas. Infosys has a total strength of around 70,000. Is it sending more than 25% of its employees overseas? I don't think so.
Moreover Infosys generally sends people overseas who stick with the company for sometime and hence L1 visa is suited for them. Then why do they want H1b?s? Plus let me add that they also have H1b visa holders from previous years. Have all these people left? I think this is just a pure misuse of the visa program.
Now, one may argue, as Basab Pradhan does, that for IT companies whose revenues come chiefly from the US, H1-B visas are like 'raw material'. "If they don’t have them they can’t start projects and this impacts revenue immediately"
Anil comments, in response: Wipro are trying to retain staff. I just came to know from an insider that Wipro has filed H1 B visas for all their employees in a particular practice (for which the count runs in hundreds) for a specific project even though the requirement is only for 2 persons. And those 2 persons are already in US under L1.
Cynical but could be true, because the chief carrot for IT staffers remains "foreign jaane ko milega".
There's so much desperation in this community for H1Bs that a desi consultants racket has apparently sprung up. Brijesh has an insightful post on his blog where he details how all it takes is $4000. These guys will create a fake resume loaded with work ex, fake job, fake paycheque - the works.
Within the first 5 minutes he will ask you this question “How old are you?” Why? The older you are the more experience they can show in the fake resume they prepare. My wife is 25 years old and many desi consultants are ready to hire her. When we told them that she doesn’t have any experience in the IT field this is what one of the consultant told us:
”Any year you lived after the age of 18 can be converted to relevant experience by making a fake resume. So to apply for H1B you need to be only 23 years. Any one above 23 years can easily get a H1B visa”.
Many of these consultants are frauds, making them no different from the agents who promise labourers jobs in theGulf or middlemen who weave dreams of a safe passage to Greece to the youth of Punjab. And now, our 'honourable' MPs as well...
Education is no barrier to being conned. The dreams are the same - only the sales pitch and the spit n polish different.
The Bitter Truth
The Americans are hotly debating the issue here . One gentleman argues: "Labor is work, not product, and if you are going to stand up and tell the US government you cannot possibly find a US Employee to do the job, and must bring in someone from another country to do it, you should be paying an abjectly high premium".
He adds: Look, here is EXACTLY how H1B works the vast majority of the time, and I know this because I’ve been in the meetings where the decisions were being made to do it! List for a job posting offering 50-80% of the market rate for the skill set you need... of course you can’t find anyone with decent skills to take the job.. so you then hire someone H1B and pay them 50-80% of what you should be paying.
You weren’t in a situation where you couldn’t find an american to do the job, you set up a situation where you couldn’t find an american to do the job for WHAT YOU WANTED TO PAY... not that there was no american who could do it... so instead of the company being forced to simply adjust to market situations, you give them a trump card to avoid the market forces, using government interference.
That’s all you have going on with H1B... its a COMPLETE and total scam, its a short circuit of the market, and to argue its “free market” is repugnant.
Well it may be repugnant but that is life. Skills are important but immigrant labour is attractive because it is willing to work for less. And longer and harder hours, as well
This holds true whether it's a Mexican restaurant worker, a Pakistani cab driver or an Indian IT engineer. Or the Biharis and UPites who stream in to Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata. Not to forget the Bangladeshis who simply jump our border - no passport, no visa.
No quick and easy solutions here.. the debate continues!
Migration : you can't stop it! - part 1
Student: "Sir, my roots are here - my family, my property, my business... I want to study in America, but I will come back and put my education to good use."
Hundreds and thousands of Indian students have given this earnest answer at their visa interview. A significant number never return. You have to wonder - why bother to ask? Because the idea of America, to a large extent, is to attract the brightest and the best from around the world.
But I guess can't give out the impression yahan visa party chal rahi hai -'everyone's invited'. We don't really want your tired, huddled and poor. That's so last century.
So both sides play out the charade but the visa officer knows there's a 95% chance the guy on full scholarship to Stanford is unlikely to return anytime soon. That in a couple of years his parents will be applying for 10 year multiple entry visas instead.
The H 1 B tangle
Of course, getting a job after a Bachelor's, or Master's in the US is apparently not a cakewalk. An employer needs to prove there is no American citizen or permanent resident skilled for enough to take on that particular job, in order to sponsor your visa. The company must want you pretty badly to go to that much trouble.
With Indian IT companies cornering more and more H1B visas in recent years, things seem to be getting tougher.
Businessweek reports: When Abhishek Sehgal came to the U.S. to pursue an MBA at the University of Texas McCombs School of Business, he expected to get some work experience in the country. But the second-year MBA student from India didn't anticipate it would be so difficult to get a visa to work after graduation.
Citigroup (C), the 28-year-old's future employer, submitted his H-1B visa application on Apr. 2, the first day petitions were accepted. But the pool of applicants was already oversubscribed, and Sehgal's application wasn't chosen in a random computer selection.
Abhishek has a few options. After completing his degree requirements, he can try his luck in a visa pool for candidates with Master's degrees. That's 20,000 visas above and beyond the H1B - for students who've completed advanced degrees in the US. Citi could also take him for a one-year "practical training" under his student visa and he can reapply for an H1B next year.
Sehgal is one of many international MBA candidates who's caught in a visa bind. With only 65,000 H-1B visas available for professional-level workers across all sectors for the 2008 fiscal year, the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services received 123,480 eligible applications on Apr. 2 and Apr. 3. After a computer lottery, about half the applicants were rejected.
The H1 B issue also affects another student group- the ones who've studied in India but secured the much hyped 'foreign placement'.
So even as the papers went gaga over the Lime group picking up IIT grads for $90,000 a year, the reality is that some of those who got the job never made it to New York. They did not get an H1 B visa.
Says one affected student: "Microsoft hired for US positions (at IIT) and then almost simply dropped their new hires because of the H1b mess (did not even give India positions), Merril Lynch took people to UK, same with Deutsche Bank, Capital One kept few people in India and moved rest to England and Canada.
LimeWire opened an India office. This year also many companies are in trouble including Bloomberg".
Not that working in India or Europe isn't a good experience. But the free flow of labour - at both lower and higher end of the job spectrum - remains more of a dream than tangible reality.
The Change Ahead
But thinking Americans are worried - talent migrating elsewhere to work and study may affect the land built on Immigrant Energy in the long run. Reforms are now being considered.
A new proposal - the Skilled Worker Immigration and Fairness Act - introduced by Senators Chuck Hagel (Republican) and Joseph Lieberman (Democrat). This act seeks to raise the existing cap on H1B visas to 115,000 and go upto 180,000 in years to come.
More importantly, the proposal seeks to allow a limitless number of H1B visas and green cards for foreigners with master's degrees or higher in any field from an American university. Or for anyone with such credentials in maths, science, technology or engineering from abroad.
This news was gleefully highlighted on page one of the Times of India late last week. They may as well have headlined it 'Chalo America'! Aapka bachpan ka sapna ab poora ho sakta hai.
Will the bill actually get passed? I am doubtful.
Because however attractive the proposal may be to industry and acadmia, there is a strong possibility of a backlash from the average American. When you let more immigrants in - using the 'talent' argument - there is a natural fear that 'my job could be at risk'.
The new guys may not be attractive only for their skills...
A December 2005 study by the Centre for Immigration Studies (CIS) found that 85% of those working in the US on H1B visas get paid less than US workers in the same occupation and state. $13,000 less, on average. This is against the law.
The study found that 36% of all H1B visas were issued to Indians, and occupation wise computer professionals dominate (25% of visas).
Based on this report, 9 Indian companies have been asked to provide details of how they use the H1 B. As Shubham Singhal notes in his blog, there is definitely some gochi. He writes:
Last year Infosys requested 22,590 H1b visas. Infosys has a total strength of around 70,000. Is it sending more than 25% of its employees overseas? I don't think so.
Moreover Infosys generally sends people overseas who stick with the company for sometime and hence L1 visa is suited for them. Then why do they want H1b?s? Plus let me add that they also have H1b visa holders from previous years. Have all these people left? I think this is just a pure misuse of the visa program.
Now, one may argue, as Basab Pradhan does, that for IT companies whose revenues come chiefly from the US, H1-B visas are like 'raw material'. "If they don’t have them they can’t start projects and this impacts revenue immediately"
Anil comments, in response: Wipro are trying to retain staff. I just came to know from an insider that Wipro has filed H1 B visas for all their employees in a particular practice (for which the count runs in hundreds) for a specific project even though the requirement is only for 2 persons. And those 2 persons are already in US under L1.
Cynical but could be true, because the chief carrot for IT staffers remains "foreign jaane ko milega".
There's so much desperation in this community for H1Bs that a desi consultants racket has apparently sprung up. Brijesh has an insightful post on his blog where he details how all it takes is $4000. These guys will create a fake resume loaded with work ex, fake job, fake paycheque - the works.
Within the first 5 minutes he will ask you this question “How old are you?” Why? The older you are the more experience they can show in the fake resume they prepare. My wife is 25 years old and many desi consultants are ready to hire her. When we told them that she doesn’t have any experience in the IT field this is what one of the consultant told us:
”Any year you lived after the age of 18 can be converted to relevant experience by making a fake resume. So to apply for H1B you need to be only 23 years. Any one above 23 years can easily get a H1B visa”.
Many of these consultants are frauds, making them no different from the agents who promise labourers jobs in theGulf or middlemen who weave dreams of a safe passage to Greece to the youth of Punjab. And now, our 'honourable' MPs as well...
Education is no barrier to being conned. The dreams are the same - only the sales pitch and the spit n polish different.
The Bitter Truth
The Americans are hotly debating the issue here . One gentleman argues: "Labor is work, not product, and if you are going to stand up and tell the US government you cannot possibly find a US Employee to do the job, and must bring in someone from another country to do it, you should be paying an abjectly high premium".
He adds: Look, here is EXACTLY how H1B works the vast majority of the time, and I know this because I’ve been in the meetings where the decisions were being made to do it! List for a job posting offering 50-80% of the market rate for the skill set you need... of course you can’t find anyone with decent skills to take the job.. so you then hire someone H1B and pay them 50-80% of what you should be paying.
You weren’t in a situation where you couldn’t find an american to do the job, you set up a situation where you couldn’t find an american to do the job for WHAT YOU WANTED TO PAY... not that there was no american who could do it... so instead of the company being forced to simply adjust to market situations, you give them a trump card to avoid the market forces, using government interference.
That’s all you have going on with H1B... its a COMPLETE and total scam, its a short circuit of the market, and to argue its “free market” is repugnant.
Well it may be repugnant but that is life. Skills are important but immigrant labour is attractive because it is willing to work for less. And longer and harder hours, as well
This holds true whether it's a Mexican restaurant worker, a Pakistani cab driver or an Indian IT engineer. Or the Biharis and UPites who stream in to Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata. Not to forget the Bangladeshis who simply jump our border - no passport, no visa.
No quick and easy solutions here.. the debate continues!
Migration : you can't stop it! - part 1
Monday, May 14, 2007
Big adda - or big anda?
Social networking is the next big thing. Correction - the current big thing. Anything 'big' and naturally, an Ambani needs to get into it. And I mean literally.
After the Big 92.7 FM stations, we now have a 'big adda' - an orkut-myspace clone from Reliance ADA. This is something like Rupert Murdoch deciding to create a myspace - instead of buying it out from some dudes.
Can it work? Hell, no.
When you join Myspace 'Tom' is your first friend. He is a real guy, a cool guy. Someone I want as a friend, if only in a notional sense.
When I register at Bigadda, I get this slob as my first friend. No kidding! And a message that reads:
"Hey friend! Welcome to Bigadda. Boss here, the dude of this wonderful place. Any queries, comments or feedback - Just scribble me and I will take care of it. Enjoy!" Sheesh.
The second problem is Bigadda is a free for all. Although they claim 'the website is accessible to internet users only via invitation' that is so not true. Anyone can join. In fact, you don't even have to be a member to see the profiles on the site.
Lastly, myspace caught on with young people. The average age of the recent Bigadda registrant appears to be 28. The age distribution is something like this (each page contains 24 profiles)
Males:
Age 16-20 - 4 pages
Age 20-25 - 17 pages
Age 25 -35 - 22 pages
Age 36-50 - 4 pages
Age 50-59 - 8 profiles
Females:
Age 16-20 - 14 profiles
Age 20-25 - 3 pages
Age 25 -35 - 3 pages
Age 36-50 - 6 profiles
age 50-59 - 0 profiles
As anyone in the s-n business knows, like attracts like. With tons of middle and aging folks on Bigadda which young people would see it as a cool hangout??
Now maybe Reliance figured that cool young Indians are on orkut (and now a bunch of them is moving to Facebook). So instead of weaning them away - too much hard work - let's just attack a different set of people. Bored office workers.
In fact who says a s-n site is for the young only? People of any age should be free to join. Why should Bigadda discriminate against people over the age of 59?? Let a hundred profiles over a hundred bloom. Let this be the site where the lonely octogenarian finds people with whom to swap tales of lost and found dentures...
Considering the user generated content on the site right now, that sounds seriously interesting!
After the Big 92.7 FM stations, we now have a 'big adda' - an orkut-myspace clone from Reliance ADA. This is something like Rupert Murdoch deciding to create a myspace - instead of buying it out from some dudes.
Can it work? Hell, no.
When you join Myspace 'Tom' is your first friend. He is a real guy, a cool guy. Someone I want as a friend, if only in a notional sense.
When I register at Bigadda, I get this slob as my first friend. No kidding! And a message that reads: "Hey friend! Welcome to Bigadda. Boss here, the dude of this wonderful place. Any queries, comments or feedback - Just scribble me and I will take care of it. Enjoy!" Sheesh.
The second problem is Bigadda is a free for all. Although they claim 'the website is accessible to internet users only via invitation' that is so not true. Anyone can join. In fact, you don't even have to be a member to see the profiles on the site.
Lastly, myspace caught on with young people. The average age of the recent Bigadda registrant appears to be 28. The age distribution is something like this (each page contains 24 profiles)
Males:
Age 16-20 - 4 pages
Age 20-25 - 17 pages
Age 25 -35 - 22 pages
Age 36-50 - 4 pages
Age 50-59 - 8 profiles
Females:
Age 16-20 - 14 profiles
Age 20-25 - 3 pages
Age 25 -35 - 3 pages
Age 36-50 - 6 profiles
age 50-59 - 0 profiles
As anyone in the s-n business knows, like attracts like. With tons of middle and aging folks on Bigadda which young people would see it as a cool hangout??
Now maybe Reliance figured that cool young Indians are on orkut (and now a bunch of them is moving to Facebook). So instead of weaning them away - too much hard work - let's just attack a different set of people. Bored office workers.
In fact who says a s-n site is for the young only? People of any age should be free to join. Why should Bigadda discriminate against people over the age of 59?? Let a hundred profiles over a hundred bloom. Let this be the site where the lonely octogenarian finds people with whom to swap tales of lost and found dentures...
Considering the user generated content on the site right now, that sounds seriously interesting!
Early morning internet
44% of Brazilians read in the bathroom, according to the study; in Saudi Arabia, 10% of respondents do.
More than half of all Indian respondents surf the Web before leaving the house, while less than one-third of Americans or Canadians do.
About 80% of Saudi Arabians pray or meditate before work; in Germany, 3% of respondents do.
- data from a BBDO survey on 'daily rituals' around the world, via PSFK.
Hmmm... wonder what the bathroom reading figure for India might be! I'd like to do a similar study, focussing just on the youth.
Asking stuff like... how many people take their cellphones into the loo. How many skip breakfast, by accident or design. And how many wake up feeling like shit everyday - because of late night TV/ orkut!
Meanwhile, I can feel 'normal', logging in to check my mail and even put up a quick blog post, just before leaving for work. Now that I have a Reliance Netconnect modem, this ritual should rightfully drop out of my day. Except it's a bit of a pain to stare at a laptop screen in broad daylight...
More than half of all Indian respondents surf the Web before leaving the house, while less than one-third of Americans or Canadians do.
About 80% of Saudi Arabians pray or meditate before work; in Germany, 3% of respondents do.
- data from a BBDO survey on 'daily rituals' around the world, via PSFK.
Hmmm... wonder what the bathroom reading figure for India might be! I'd like to do a similar study, focussing just on the youth.
Asking stuff like... how many people take their cellphones into the loo. How many skip breakfast, by accident or design. And how many wake up feeling like shit everyday - because of late night TV/ orkut!
Meanwhile, I can feel 'normal', logging in to check my mail and even put up a quick blog post, just before leaving for work. Now that I have a Reliance Netconnect modem, this ritual should rightfully drop out of my day. Except it's a bit of a pain to stare at a laptop screen in broad daylight...
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Sunday, May 06, 2007
FLAME: Education with a difference
Prof Indira Parikh retired in August 2005 from IIM A. She was one of the longest serving and most loved profs on campus. A professor in the OB area, she was best known for her involvement with the ERI program.
ERI - Exploring Roles and Identity - is a unique aspect of the curriculum at IIM A. An optional 'course' ERI takes you to an off-campus location (beach/ forest/ mountains) and all you do over 4 days is introspect. About who you are, what you wish to be, the things that hold you back, the regrets, hopes and fears you have.
I believe the program was originally conceived by Prof Pulin Garg, but for a whole generation of IIM A students Indira = ERI. Of course, there were other 'facilitators' - such as the wise and wonderful Sushanto.
The reason I am writing this, however, is not to recount days gone by. But to celebrate the future. Post retirement, Prof Parikh has set up FLAME - the Foundation for Liberal and Management Education. The initiative is funded by Parag and Nemish Shah and aims to impart 'holistic education'. Set up on a 75 acre campus on the outskirts of Pune, FLAME takes in students from this July.
FLAME has 3 programs:
- a 4 year undergrad course which promises 'the freedom to design your own education across science, humanities, management and creative arts'.
Students will graduate with a FLAME diploma in liberal education and a BA or a BBA (for which affiliation is being sought from Pune University). The course is fully residential.
- a 2 year MBA where students will take up liberal arts subjects along with the regular MBA course material. Emphasis will be given to personal growth, inter-personal skills and all round development.
- a 2 year 'MBA in Mass Media' which integrates creative and management skills for those interested in a career in the media.
FLAME also promises to revive the 'guru-shishya' parampara. Student teacher ratio will be 1: 14. There is an impressive roster of eminent visiting faculty, including specialist teachers from the UK to teach English literature!
Here's what I think:
The 4 year undergrad course which offers a more flexible curriculum is most welcome. As is the inclusion of liberal arts and emphasis on all round personal development. I think the undergrad course serves a real need - a gap in the market - and will find takers. But mainly with those thinking of studying abroad. Because it is expensive - Rs 3.62 lakhs per annum (which means Rs 14 lakhs for 4 years!).
The two year courses cost Rs 11 lakhs (Rs 5.52 lakhs per annum). That might deter many from the MBA, although I do think that the kind of spin FLAME is giving to the MBA is much needed.
The media course sounds a bit odd to me. In media you either join the creative side or the management side. Of course, exposure to both does not hurt... But the cost could be a turn-off. It's 5 times as expensive as Asian College of Journalism!
But then there aren't as many media schools as bschools. And yes, loans are available from Centurion Bank.
As a concept, FLAME sounds exciting. With Indira the helm, I am hopeful they can pull it off. My only concern is there has not been much publicity - and the pool of applicants may be small and not diverse enough.
FLAME should not turn into a cool school for rich kids!
Incidentally, the former director of SCMHRD, Prof M S Pillai, set up SCMLD (Sadhana Centre for Management and Leadership Development) in 2004. The institute offers a 2 year 'MBA with a difference'. For example, yoga and meditation form a compulsory part of the curriculum.
The support of former SCMHRD students has been crucial to the success of SCMLD. Although again, not enough people know about SCMLD and most would still prefer the conventional management institutes.
But it's good to see academics with vision and drive become, in a sense, 'educational entrepreneurs'.
Prof Bala Balachandran of Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai is the other name that comes to mind in this context.
I believe institutions led by academic-entrepreneurs are a new trend. These institutes stand a better chance of becoming brand names than a school set up by regular Mr Moneybags, who sees education merely as a business opportunity.
Faculty, placement, quality of students - the reputation and network of the founder makes a perceptible difference to all these crucial aspects.
Of course, in the longer run it's systems, processes and overall philosophy which results in Institutions of Enduring Value... Which live on long after their founders.
But this is a good start!
ERI - Exploring Roles and Identity - is a unique aspect of the curriculum at IIM A. An optional 'course' ERI takes you to an off-campus location (beach/ forest/ mountains) and all you do over 4 days is introspect. About who you are, what you wish to be, the things that hold you back, the regrets, hopes and fears you have.
I believe the program was originally conceived by Prof Pulin Garg, but for a whole generation of IIM A students Indira = ERI. Of course, there were other 'facilitators' - such as the wise and wonderful Sushanto.
The reason I am writing this, however, is not to recount days gone by. But to celebrate the future. Post retirement, Prof Parikh has set up FLAME - the Foundation for Liberal and Management Education. The initiative is funded by Parag and Nemish Shah and aims to impart 'holistic education'. Set up on a 75 acre campus on the outskirts of Pune, FLAME takes in students from this July.
FLAME has 3 programs:
- a 4 year undergrad course which promises 'the freedom to design your own education across science, humanities, management and creative arts'.
Students will graduate with a FLAME diploma in liberal education and a BA or a BBA (for which affiliation is being sought from Pune University). The course is fully residential.
- a 2 year MBA where students will take up liberal arts subjects along with the regular MBA course material. Emphasis will be given to personal growth, inter-personal skills and all round development.
- a 2 year 'MBA in Mass Media' which integrates creative and management skills for those interested in a career in the media.
FLAME also promises to revive the 'guru-shishya' parampara. Student teacher ratio will be 1: 14. There is an impressive roster of eminent visiting faculty, including specialist teachers from the UK to teach English literature!
Here's what I think:
The 4 year undergrad course which offers a more flexible curriculum is most welcome. As is the inclusion of liberal arts and emphasis on all round personal development. I think the undergrad course serves a real need - a gap in the market - and will find takers. But mainly with those thinking of studying abroad. Because it is expensive - Rs 3.62 lakhs per annum (which means Rs 14 lakhs for 4 years!).
The two year courses cost Rs 11 lakhs (Rs 5.52 lakhs per annum). That might deter many from the MBA, although I do think that the kind of spin FLAME is giving to the MBA is much needed.
The media course sounds a bit odd to me. In media you either join the creative side or the management side. Of course, exposure to both does not hurt... But the cost could be a turn-off. It's 5 times as expensive as Asian College of Journalism!
But then there aren't as many media schools as bschools. And yes, loans are available from Centurion Bank.
As a concept, FLAME sounds exciting. With Indira the helm, I am hopeful they can pull it off. My only concern is there has not been much publicity - and the pool of applicants may be small and not diverse enough.
FLAME should not turn into a cool school for rich kids!
Incidentally, the former director of SCMHRD, Prof M S Pillai, set up SCMLD (Sadhana Centre for Management and Leadership Development) in 2004. The institute offers a 2 year 'MBA with a difference'. For example, yoga and meditation form a compulsory part of the curriculum.
The support of former SCMHRD students has been crucial to the success of SCMLD. Although again, not enough people know about SCMLD and most would still prefer the conventional management institutes.
But it's good to see academics with vision and drive become, in a sense, 'educational entrepreneurs'.
Prof Bala Balachandran of Great Lakes Institute of Management, Chennai is the other name that comes to mind in this context.
I believe institutions led by academic-entrepreneurs are a new trend. These institutes stand a better chance of becoming brand names than a school set up by regular Mr Moneybags, who sees education merely as a business opportunity.
Faculty, placement, quality of students - the reputation and network of the founder makes a perceptible difference to all these crucial aspects.
Of course, in the longer run it's systems, processes and overall philosophy which results in Institutions of Enduring Value... Which live on long after their founders.
But this is a good start!
Saturday, May 05, 2007
JAM Engineering College Ratings - Final Update
UPDATE, MAY 2008: The JAM Engineering Admissions Guide is now out. You can order a copy online at 15% discount from here. It is also available at leading bookshops across India, distributed by IBD.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The survey is done, the book being composed and the website under construction. The fruits of all these efforts should be visible in early June.
Thank you all, for your feedback and participation. And a few final requests. After going through the matter we found some bits of information missing and/ or inadequate. Hence would request write ups on the following.
Overview of engineering education for the following states:
- Himachal
- Uttaranchal
- Chhatisgarh
- Madhya Pradesh
- Goa
- Tamil Nadu
- Karnataka
The last two - we do have write ups - but they don't do justice.
If interested, please email me rashmi_b at yahoo.com and we'll send you guidelines. But, we need the matter in a bit of a hurry - a week at best.
If you can't write but would like to simply share the info you have with us that's ok as well. Drop me a line with your contact no.
A couple of other topics we need short write ups on:
- Unusual courses at IITs
- Coaching Class scene - Kota and others
After Engineering
We'd also like a few paras from some of you who are:
- working in core engineering jobs (civil, chemical etc)
- engineers who went into research
- engineers who went into something completely unrelated
You could give your brief background and share the journey so far, in brief.
Lastly, if anyone has any tips or specific advice for engineering aspirants - even if it's just a para - please send it in. We are including a lot of 'tidbits'.
And yes, those of you who have contributed articles will receive a cheque from us this month. In case you haven't sent your address, pls do so at the earliest!
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