Outsourcing blues

In line with the previous post, I stumbled on this comic below. Too neat, couldn’t help share it. Here goes-

And Christmas seems to be catching up. Choir and all were happening in the neighborhood yesterday

Schools and Web

I trip on the concept of teaching. My grand father is a prof. My mother is a prof. Few of my uncles are profs. Few of my aunts are profs. A few of my cousins are profs. A few of my friends are profs. I have lived in universities for more than half my life – I am 24!

Education has been all around me. The present day which we love to call the Information Age can do a lot to the schooling system around. Just like how Web 1.0 graduated to Web 2.0 based on the key concept of interactivity, the same could be done to Schooling 1.0. Keyword: Interactivity.

How?

I keep my blackboard. I love to use the board – preferably a white board. Less dust!

New age schooling

I must have a projector in my classroom. I must have a laptop as a teacher and high speed internet. My classes would be full of Podcasts, Youtube videos, Slideshare presentations, Wiki and of course Google. My students would be smarter or more informed than I am. I am talking about your average Joe college in India and not IITs here!

Students would be encouraged to use their GPRS enabled phones, laptops and other gadgets – no, I don’t have a problem with it. Porn if the student is not interested is still ok! No point forcing a person in the 2.0 era. All doubts and clarifications would be done with the latest information available off the web. Also, good RSS feeds from the students. A real community. They would kick ass in the exams too!

Experiments on the Long Tail

I was tripping on what happened to music in the 90’s. Oasis, Nirvana and Soul Asylum. GnR and Metallica along with a little Megadeth. Limp Bizkit and Korn evolving to the end.

None of the above names could bring in the wow factor of the past. “Is talent dying out of the Generation X?”

2000s suddenly came up with the little known names and a plethora of genres. Psy Trance, Drum and Bass, IDM, Progressive Metal, Death Metal, Gothic Scandinavian Metal, Shillong’s blues etc. etc. Talent is hidden in the streets of Andheri West and Borilvali East. Some arbit college dude is spinning his tracks at some parties happening somewhere in Mumbai suburbs.

Long Tail has started rearing its head. Right on your face around your locality in middle class India. 17 year old sitting in a tier C city is tripping the shit out of Vimeo and Metacafe at 4 in the morning. He got his mixes running well too. One movie coming out of his mobile camera with sounds mixed last week at his home near the town hall!

Some obvious long tail stuff we could stumble upon and even publish some –

1. Mobile movies
2. Tracks
3. Photographs for auction; paintings
4. Comic Strips
5. Ebooks

and some 756 more things if ready to spend some time and effort on it.

Throw in your beanbags and get connected to the broadband.

Going Green!

With jealousy – no!

With responsibility – yes!

Happened to stumble upon quite a few articles which talked about Green Computing, Green Buildings, Green this and green that. Quite a lot of buzz in this direction I would say. Finally something good coming out of the whole noise in the scene.

Come to think of it, it is quite necessary to take some serious look at these issues. True! We can all sit back, throw our hands up, light up the next ciggie and say “Fuck man! The fuel prices has burnt a hole up my arse” or wait for that long power cut (Bombay may not know the pain though) sweating it out through the night. Can we make a difference? Yeah bitch – sure can!

Take a  look at your Moral Science Text Book in school. It helps.

1. Turn off the lights, fans, mixers, grinders, computers and such stuff that runs on electricity when you don’t need it. But DO NOT TURN OFF the refrigerator. The meat, fish and the milk can stink up the whole neighbourhood!

2. Make sure you buy “Green” products – the ones that emit fewer gases, consume lesser energy and produce fewer trash. It may look cheap. But on the long run, the electricity board would come up with larger numbers in that piece of paper – not a pleasent sight.

3. You got a car! The hot chick next door got a car too. Give her a lift or offer to be lifted . Lesser vehicles, lesser fuel consumed and more chances of meeting interesting and beautiful people. Oh, no hot chicks – don’t worry. That dude might have a hot chick who is ‘just a friend’.

4. You stay closeby to wherever you need to go. Get that bicycle. Its cool, its neat, its nice and in case of a bad traffic jam, you could lift it up and earn some good 200m. <Sense of acheievement of beating traffic and not having to walk>

5. Sleep mode is not really sleep. Turn that damn thing off. Have some sense. You need not download all trash that is available on the internet. Buy a damn CD. The electricty bill – like I was saying.

6. We all know about the CFLs and Tubelights – if you don’t Google it.  Who do you think I am to write all that bull up here

7. Simple living high thinking – Minimalism is in. You need not crowd your little living personal space with all kinds of stuff. Keep that space to walk around, lie down and stare at the ceiling or have a party at home – all guests comfortable and happy. Cut down on that shopping spree – you don’t need those things that look cute / cool / nice / <other adjectives/verbs/nouns>

8. Old stuff – throw them / recycle them. Anyways they don’t perform well and screw up the whole consumption deal. Old PC gathering dust at that corner. You could recycle it. Maybe some kid in Uganda could end up watching some educational video on that. Think about it. That old refrigerator which takes a good 7 hours to make ice. That could be recycled too. That old TV which needs a few ‘hits’ to change channels – could do with a better tele.

9. Step out – Evenings are bright. Watch the urban birds go back home. Check out the traffic lights come out. The breeze might be good too. Your head needs some clarity – fuck all boss/ hard to get chick/ frantic mom worried about your future/ increasing number of ciggies per day – a walk could clear things and keep the lights off at home!

Phew, Wish I could follow some of these.

Internet and Globalization – a paradox?

A lot of funny, crazy and interesting things happening around these days.

Work as usual is the most blizzare of all. Internet medium, web development, advertising, branding and a sheer inexperience in all these concepts do call in for desperate means. ‘Web’ persons and ‘ad’ persons with differences in opinions; ‘UI’ and ‘creative’ with differences in opinions; ‘Content Writers’ and ‘Copy writers’ with differences in opinion; hell the ‘tea’ persons and ‘coffee’ persons could have differences in opinions. Looks like the whole world revolves around differences in opinions. Are we gazing at a whole new paradigm shift over here with every tom, dick and harry wanting to move the online way?

I think we could start off with a whole new breed of people down here. Yesterday a colleague of mine was tripping on the concept of pure human breeds becoming the ‘in thing’ in say a hundred and fifty years from now. Gone are the days when a ‘Half mallu – Half gujju’ or a ‘Half sindhi – Half telugu’ used to amaze people. Good old down to earth mumbaikars being emotional over their South African and Australian expat girlfriends / boyfriends seems to have take Globalization to a whole new level in itself. So a pure ‘Tam Bram’ in a 150 years from now could actually just be a thing to watch out for.

Looking at this concept above, we need not wait for a 150 long years to trip on the ‘Once upon a time pure Web person’ or a ‘Once upon a time pure Ad person’. Online baby – it fucks you up! So grow up! Keep quiet and accept the facts. Your ’scenes’ might just be ‘less’ in the days to come (some chutney lingo to the uninitiated).

Wait! Did I just say Globalization some time back? Did we all not trip somewhere in the late 90s (ya, i was a little school boy then wanting to go to America) that the internet and ‘computers’ will change the world? Did we all not watch Arnold movies where our hero beat the shit out of bad ass aliens disturbing the peace of the Globalized world with his big ass guns, coolers, and bombs he keeps in his back pocket! Forget for now that this Globalized world usually revolved around some buildings, statues and bridges around New York or California! Still, the very internet which is supposed to take globalization to the next level is fighting over their local egos – ‘web’ vs. ‘ad’ and ‘UI’ vs. ‘creative’!

Something is weird! Serious weird! Should I just dial up a super hero – someone like Captain Planet to tell these kids to chill out! Or even a Shaktiman who comes spinning down through these crazy internet browsers and give you a speech about respecting elders, avoiding jaywalking and to tell these kids to chill out! I have already kept my “Sorry Shaktiman” speech ready!