All because of a friggin’ movie..

February 19th, 2006 § 18 comments § permalink

Today, I did something I shouldn’t have done.

I watched ‘Rang De Basanti.’

Having heard rave reviews from my friends and others, I decided to give it a go.

And that’s where it all began.

Questions that had been long hidden and stashed away resurfaced. Questions to which I had avoided giving answers long back, resurfaced. Questions to which the only answers were (and had been) ‘It will always be the same’ resurfaced. And now, I find myself rejecting these answers.

It will never be the same again.

No, it is not the movie that is speaking through me. The movie is simply an excuse. These are thoughts that I have been ignoring, neglecting for a long, long time.

The movie ends with the ‘kids’ beng shot to death.

I don’t want to argue whether it was done to gain public sympathy or to show reality. I don’t care. I don’t even care if the end could have been made any different. Nor do I care if it was technically sound or not.

It hurts me to watch such movies. It hurts me to think about them. It hurts me to think about the possible consequences it might have if such an event ever transpired into reality. It hurts me to think what I would have done if I were one of the characters in the movie.

Why? Because the answer is nothing. I would have done NOTHING. Period.

Because I do not have the guts or the glory to do something like that. Because I am a coward by nature. Because, I wouldn’t. Because I am afraid of death. Because, I can’t change anything. Because I am one of us. Because I know I will forget. Because I have forgotten.

Because, I have too many excuses and not one valid reason.

What is it that drives men willingly into the hands of despair? What is it that drive sane people to such ‘insanity’? What is it that makes martyrs out of common men and treachers out of loyalists?

Is it belief in Principles? Is it belief on ethics and morals? Is it the law? Is it the system as they wold have us believe? Is it the corruption? Is it the frustration? Or is it everything in equal, or even unequal, parts? Or is it none of these but something higher or unexplored? Or is it something we see everyday but fail to notice?

What is it?

If the system has been existing since time itself, why did it take the death of a person to bring about the winds of change?

If we know the system is responsible, what have we done to prevent it from happening?

If public memory is short, why make such movies?

What do we take from these movies?

I saw Swades and appreciated it. I saw RDB and appreciated it. Sometime in the future I might see another movie and appreciate that too.

So?

Where does it all begin and where does it all end?

What role do I have in this entire process?

Is my role that of a mute spectator watching it happen?

Is my role that of the protagonist who’s making it happen?

Is my role that of a director who’s directing it when it happens?

Is it that of a screenplay writer who charts the course to make it happen?

Is my role that of an extra who is simply there when it happens?

Where do I stand? What is my role? What is the purpose of my existence?

I believe that:

  • There is an answer to every question. We just have to ask the right questions.
  • That my job is to find the right questions.

Am I being too optimistic? Am I being too cynical? Am I delving into unnecessary details? Am I asking too many questions?

I know that I will forget about this entire thing withing a matter of hours. Seven hours to be precise. Seven hours later when I wake up from my nightmare-ridden sleep, I will start a brand new day with the same old routine.

No, I will not blame my routine, for it is the routine that gives me the strength, the will, the money, the time to live. I am, in fact, thankful for having a routine.

We keep telling ourselves the world need to change and shy away when the time come to orchestrate it. We will, ourselves, have nothing to do with it. We always want someone else to do it. We always want to stand at the sidelines and watch it happen.

I may not be speaking for the world here, but I speak for myself atleast.

Honesty is one thing I will not give up on until the day I die. At the same time, I do, occasionally, tell a few white lies to save my skin. Or, rather to save my time. Without those white lies, things would become unnecessarily complicated.

I do not wish to compare myself with anyone else regarding this matter. There are people better than me, there are people worse than me. Everyody is entitled to his opinion.

A discussion has no end. An argument has no end. The very fact that people are entitled to their own opinions brings about a stalemate to an argument even before it begins.

Enforcing views is dictatorship. Having opinions is democracy. Has anybody ever noticed that the most radical of all changes have happened through enforcement of views? Only in anauthoritarian state, where you are forced to follow a particular viewpoint, do people seem to progress. Is that a myth or an illusion? Or the bitter truth?

If democracy works, why do we need political parties and leaders?

If everybody is entitled to his own opinion, how do we acheive harmony in thoughts?

Opinions may and will always vary from one end of the spectrum to another. Acheiving harmony with them is simply having a common consensus. Some non-conformist elements will always stand out of the consensus. Remind me again, isn’t that what dictatorship and authoritarianism all about?

No, wait a second, dictatorship is when one man decides the consensus, democracy is when many men decide it.
But then, if each person is entitled to his own opinion, which he obviously bases on his own good, how do you decide the greater good?

On what basis? By which standards?

How do a select few get to decide what the greater good of the masses is?

If we give them the right to do so, how and why do we give them the right? Based on a few promises thay make?
We ‘exercise’ our ‘precious’ franchise, fully knowing that they will never fulfil their promises. We call them hypocrites and we blame hope for driving us. Yet, we still carry on doing the same thing. Guess who’s the hypocrite?

All of us feel that we would do a better job if we were given the authority to do so. But none of us feel the need to work towards it. The armchair critics of all generations have always made it a point to criticise and blame. None of them have ever shown any kind of resolve to sit up and take notice and change what they feel is not right.

‘But what can we do?’ is a too common refrain I often get to hear. Or sometimes, I hear the polar opposite: “We gotta do something…”

Something? Like what?

Spreading the word? Starting a revolt? Mutiny? What?

Sitting back and discussing what is to be done is not an answer. Nor is giving up the answer. Extremism solves nothing, only brings in new questions. Liberalism only hides the existing questions behind a veil of freedom. How do you determine what is right? Or what is wrong for that matter?

Where do the concepts of right and wrong fit in a democratic society where everybody is entitled to his own opinion? If you are entitled to have your own opinion and I am allowed to have mine, how do you determine what is right and what is wrong? How do you determine what is good and what is bad? How do you determine the greater good of the masses in a state, which basically denies the existence of anything polar by simply defining a concept called freedom?

What is freedom?

Is it the right to do what we want?

Is it the right to behave as we wish?

Is it the right to say whatever comes to mind?

Is it the right to roam when we choose?

Is it the right to go wherever we want?

To determine what is right, we choose to have a consensus. We choose our rights and wrongs, our goods and our bads through a common consesnsus. For example, it is wrong to bribe and it is bad to kill. Agree.

But then, who chooses these options? A select few?

What happens to those who choose their own options? Do they die off with the long tail?

If a consensus is allowed to choose right and wrong, what’s wrong with letting one man choose it? If you allow your leaders to make decisions for you, what’s wrong with letting a dictator do it?

People are scared of dictators because, dictators have been known to kill people for no rhyme or reason simply because of inherent prejudices. Yes, I am talking about the Hitlers and the Idi Amins and the Saddams. But who says there cannot be a sane dictator?

Haven’t we had rulers in the past? Forget the British Raj, don’t we accept Shivaji as a role model? Don’t we accept Akbar as just king? Haven’t we all heard tales of Solomon and Ranajit Singh? Or do we accept them simply because they are mythological figures and too unreal for us?

When does truth cross boundaries into mythology? A hundred years? Two hundred? Two thousand?

Are we being too myopic about the entire thing? Or am I hyperventilating?

If we hold opposite opinions, only one of us can be right. There can be no two ways about it.

We as a nation have long held on to irrational beliefs simply because we could. It is time to shake off all those irrational beliefs. It is time to decide what is right and what is wrong. If you as a person cannot decide, let someone else decide for you. If you do not agree to it, then reason it out and finish the argument. We need to decide and we need to choose. We have sat and discussed for too long. It is time to choose. Until we make sane, rational choices we will stay where we are.

We have, until today, chosen to stay silent. We have chosen to accept everything mutely. We have chosen to stand back and watch it happen. We have remained mute spectators all along.

Not anymore.

I choose to be a part of the action. I choose to orchestrate. I choose to make myself heard. I choose rationality. I choose sanity. I believe that we as a people can be much better that what we make of oursleves. I choose to accept freedom as a right to life above enything else. I choose to believe in right or wrong.I choose to accept the rights, wrongs, good, and bad based on rational explantion and rational explanation only. I choose to find answers and ask the right questions. I choose to make respect a mutual affair.

I choose to believe.

PS: I gotta get myself one of those digital sound recording contraptions. Sitting down to type is something I find tedious now…

Tags: , , RangDeBasanti, , , ,

Desk-top this, baby!!

February 9th, 2006 § 14 comments § permalink

Mike Arrington over at TechCrunch reports that the Big G has released the next version of its Desktop Search utility: Google Desktop Search 3. And he’s being very cautious about it..

I am not happy.

Mike’s stand on this?

This is of course a touchy privacy subject, but the ability to search from a remote computer will be very welcome by some users.

The point of contention is the new “Search Across Computers” feature which horrifed me. Until now, the Desktop Search explicitly declared that all your results would be stored locally, and locally only.

I haven’t been much of a fan of the Desktop Search anyway, but this release is just too mind-whacking not to report about. Compare this, the older versions of the Google Desktop Search (Link probably expires soon) :

These combined results can be seen only from your own computer; your computer’s content is never sent to Google (or anyone else).

with this, the new answers by Google:

Search Across Computers enables you to search your documents and viewed web pages across all your computers. For example, you could find files you edited on your desktop from your laptop. To activate this feature, you will need a Google Account (the same login you use for Gmail, Orkut, or other Google services). Remember, to search your other computers you must also install Google Desktop on them as well as enable the Search Across Computers preference using the same Google Account on each one.

My “other” computers? Heck, If I had two computers in different places I would be using some CMS or a Collaboration tool or some other Sync software. Why should I Search Across Computers?

A touchy privacy subject, eh? Well Mike, you are damned right on that one!

Oh but wait, I had given up my privacy the day I accepted the Gmail, Orkut, etc. and all those ever-forever-’beta‘s… Have you read their privacy policies? Actually, all of the Google ‘Programs’ have only one standard privacy policy.

So, I shouldn’t be complaining at all…

Moreover, ain’t I forgetting something??

“We’re not Evil!!”

Oh yeah! Right!! Hmm… Let’s see:

Here is a short version of the Google ‘We’re-not-evil’ Policy over the years:
(with subsequent ramifications-due-to-ambitions)

  1. We’re not evil.
  2. We’re not evil, we just want to access all the data in the world so that we can give you better results.
  3. We’re not evil. After all, we’re offering you 2000MB to store your mails. But you’ll have to let us read them? Why? Ads, of course!! Somebody’s gotta pay for that right??
  4. We’re not evil, we just want to access your data so that we can give you better searches on your desktop.
  5. We are not evil. We are just keeping an eye on you if you are doing anything illegal so that we can sell it to the world and thus, earn our ‘pious’ money .
  6. We’re not evil, but we don’t want to show you the truth. So what if the world calls them slants? WE slant towards ‘other’ things – World Domination, for example…
  7. We’re not evil, but we will refuse you entry into our living room if you do evil things. Yes, Optimising your site for our Search Algorithm is an evil thing. Why? Because only we are allowed to do that!!!

Excuse me, I have to go throw up.

Tags: , , , , , ShrikantJoshi, CorporateSpices

Technical Evangelism: Crusade or Crushed?

February 6th, 2006 § 0 comments § permalink

There’s a new kind of ‘Evangelism’ around the block and it has nothing to do with the word of God.

So what is Technical Evangelism?

According to Guy Kawasaki, (Expert on VC & Startup Advisories), Technical Evangelism entails falling in love with the product. Technical Evangelism involves preaching the word of the company to all and sundry in a way that they would appreciate. In his article, “The Art of Evangelism,” Guy notes:

Learn to give a demo. An “evangelist who cannot give a great demo” is an oxymoron. A person simply cannot be an evangelist if she cannot demo the product. If a person cannot give a demo that quickens the pulse of everyone in the audience, he should stay in sales or in marketing.

Remind me again, isn’t that what people in Sales and Marketing do? To sell a product you HAVE to give a Demo, without which the client will NOT accept your call. So where does a Technical Evangelist score over a normal Sales person? Passion? Pride? Love? Cause? Or simply his ‘title’?

Over here, Robert Scoble of Microsoft has this to say about Technical Evangelists:

I’m not a Guy kind of Evangelist.

Scoble plays a defensive hand saying his Title (Technical Evangelist) bothers him. He says it has religious connotations. The one thing he does agree with Guy on, is about the demos. He also agrees that TEs have to be great at (Customer) relationships.

OK. Agreed.

Call me foolish, or old-fashioned even. I have always believed that this was the job of the Pre-sales Team, i.e. buttering up the client and setting him up for your S&M Team (pardon the double entendre, but it somehow fits…)

And Michael Swanson (again, MS) is -surprise, surprise- hiring Tech Evangelists. He wants his future (junior) colleague to have:

Persistence – no, I’m not talking about serialization or permanent storage (but extra points if those came to mind), I’m talking about your innate ability to push forward despite setbacks and frustration. Your friends probably use terms like driven and unstoppable to describe you, and in rare cases, maybe even annoying. Hopefully not too much of the last one.

And what does he expect the guy in his Sales Department to have? Impatience? Frustration with handling irritated cutomer calls? Since that is now redirected elsewhere, it doesn’t even remotely apply to them anymore.

May be I am being naive, but all these factors indicate one of two things:

    The Sales Job will soon be taken over by the Technical Evangelist Forces and companies will soon no longer have a Sales Department.

OR

    Techincal Evangelism is a grossly over-rated title for someone who does exactly what a dedicated and sincere sales-person would do.

There may be more factors, but I see these two prominently.

Previously, if a person spoke at length about his company’s product, he was supposed to be ‘pitching’ and an an ‘aggresive marketeer’. Some even went to the extent of calling him a ‘perpetual salesman’.

Now, with the web 2.0 meme, it turns out that it is a fashion to speak ‘lovingly’ about your product. Congratulations! You are not an aggressive marketeer any more, you are now a “Technical Evangelist”!!

Oh, and one more thing: you can be a Tech Evangelist, if (and ONLY if) your company has a four letter NYSE acronym . If not, then you are a T-R-O-L-L.

The policy of Sales is a simple circle:

  1. You gotta have a great sales pitch to bring in the revenue.
  2. You gotta have a great Product to have a great sales pitch.
  3. You gotta have good product sales to keep your development team happy.
  4. And finally, you gotta keep your development team happy to have a Great product.

So where does it all begin and where does it all end?

You cannot make a job any more glamorous than it is by simply giving it a new name.

Whether you are hiring a Techincal Evangelist or a Sales Executive, the first and probably the only thing you look at is the passion which he displays while talking abount his likes and dislikes. All the rest follows as a corollary. If a person cannot be passionate about something, he cannot be passionate about anything. It doesn’t matter what he is passionate about. It could be anything for cars to cricket and from Samba to sex. The passion is what drives men to their goals.

Tell me truthfully guys ( Yes I am referring to you, you and you.) Are you driven by your job or your passion?

Or better still, is your job your passion?

Wants & Needs…

January 5th, 2006 § 22 comments § permalink

Last night while I was reading I suddenly realized this:

“I don’t know what I want, but I know what I need…”

Is that what is causing all the trouble?

Tags: Born Stinger, , ,

The Anti-Microsoft war.

January 5th, 2006 § 0 comments § permalink

On New Year’s eve, Zhao Jing a.k.a Michael Anti, an out-spoken Chinese Journalist found his blog taken down. Note the words “TAKEN DOWN”. Not censored, not blocked, but TAKEN DOWN.Rebecca’s post dated 3rd of January, brought Microsoft’s high-handedness to the notice of the world. Rebecca MacKinnon, co-founder of Global Voices Online, and a research fellow at Berkman Center for Internet and Society, quotes:

“Anti is one of China’s edgiest journalistic bloggers, often pushing at the boundaries of what is acceptable”

And it does not end here. MSN Spaces continues to support the communist Government of China (the Peoples Republic?) to censor anti-China blogs.

Rebecca had already found MSN Spaces censoring controversial titles. Words like “Falun Gong”, “Tibet Independence” received error messages saying the language was forbidden. Huh? However, a post containing inane words in the title and the controversial words in the body was accepted but was taken down within three days of its publishing. This proved that there was a human editor behind the systematic search-and-destroy operation.

It was soon taken up by Robert Scoble of Microsoft who invited the wronged Chinese journalist to setup a guest blog on his personal. Among all this, it was heartening to see Robert Scoble of Microsoft stand by Rebecca . Scoble extended an invitation to Anti to blog on HIS site as a guest. It will be interesting to see what happens to Scoble’s blog if Anti does accept the invitation.

An update on Scoble’s blog states that MSN Spaces has woken up to the blogosphere’s outcry and is looking into this.

What is worrying is the arrogance shown by MSN Spaces. A blog was taken down simply because the Chinese Government would be offended. Words blocked because they are controversial. By blocking Anti’s blogs MSN Spaces has made a big mistake. The repercussions of this are sure to be heard far and wide…

But I sincerely doubt whether anything is gonna happen. The topic has already begun to die off. The blogosphere memory is short and restricted to the comments per post. As soon as a new post crops up the older one is forgotten. And along with it go all the sentiments and the outcry.

Here’s what I think will happen (in chronological order):

Day 1-5: The blogosphere will make a noise about the tyranny of Microsoft and MSN Spaces. Bloggers will make a hue and cry about Microsoft’s high-handedness.

Day 3-7: Some hopeful posts (like this one) will try and garner people to their blogs with the expectation of making it big in the Blogosphere.

Day 7-9: Discussions on the necessity of free speech in the Blogosphere will crop up. People will cook up stories on how Microsoft tried to censor their blogs.

Day 9-11: Another anagram/MS Easter Egg/whatever linking Bill Gates/Microsoft to the Devil will be found.

Day 12: Steve Rubel will post a funny incident involving a cat, a rabbit and his keyboard with pictures. It will soon be the most tagged item on del.icio.us, Flickr, Technorati and will rise to rankings for the keyword “bizarre”

Get the picture?

Yahoo! ate my homework!

December 9th, 2005 § 0 comments § permalink

The newest excuse for teenagers and youth wishing to avoid the chore of homework!

Sounds exaggerated, eh? Well, not if you visit Yahoo! Answers

Sample some of the questions asked by ‘Yahooligans’:

If you think I am kidding, I urge you to go check it out.

I do agree that Yahoo! Answers is in a nascent stage and it needs to evolve (whatever that means) and that people using the service need to mature, etc. etc. Personallly, I think that’s a load of tosh.

I am particularly pissed off at the people who answer such stupid questions. Their only excuse is they get points for answering them and more points get you into better levels?

Points? Levels? WTF?

Web 2.0 – the way I see it.

October 20th, 2005 § 1 comment § permalink

The answer is simple. Web 2.0.

So what is Web 2.0? Think of it this way: You create a software that caters to a section of the market which nobody has tapped until now. You release the first version of your software. People like it and start using it. It becomes so popular nobody even dares to touch it. You are the sole leader. Over the time, better machines come out but your software is still the same. Your consumers slowly begin to dissent. You realize that it is time to act now.

So you gather your team of developers. They have been waiting to do it. In fact, most of them have been working away on small projects. You build new features and new additions to go along with the latest in the market. And you release a new version.

The Internet until now was the Web version 1.0. It is now time for a newer, more stable, more power-packed version to take over. Why? Simply because we as consumers want more. We are not satisfied with innovation. We want innovation tailored to the latest trends on the Internet. A couple of years ago it was the eMail and web-based eMail clients. Now it is Collaboration and Web-based Collaborative Clients. And that is why, it is time for a new version of the World Wide Web.

Google, Yahoo and MSN complied with the AJAX trend and the results were Reader, MyWeb2.0 and Start (Live, to some extent, too…) respectively. With Web 2.0 being the hot topic currently, who knows what can come out of their kitties.

I, for one, am waiting to see what happens.

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