Connexions...

Now everyone knows that, with the kind of revolution and global tie-ups happening in the telecom domain in India today, more Indians than citizens of any other nation would be signing up for mobile telephone services each month. This to me is a symbolic milestone in India’s rapid catch-up with other growing economies in the world.

I am not going to touch that bit, but what interests me more are the kind of changes in our social life that the mobile revolution has introduced. Let's keep the economic, business and technological related changes for some other day to discuss.

Long long time back, during the era of tring tring telephony, people had to wait for two and half hours or more to make a call. It would have been a privilege to have conversed over the phone then. More so owning one of those magic boxes at home would have been a matter of pride. I think in this direction because from whatever I have read, I learn that in those bygone days, to dial a number and stumble onto someone else's conversation was a common affair. Consider yourself more fortunate, if at all the call made the correct connection in your first attempt.

A call from Rangoon to Dehradun to one's lady love, would have been marked in bold letters as an achievement in one's curriculum vitae. Yes, I mean it because it had to surpass two major road blocks. One for sure is the connection getting through and other being to be an avant-garde to call and speak to your dulcinea. With an air of conservative, loog kya socchengye and closed-mindedness prevailing in the society, how would the newly married couples or lovebirds have interacted over the phone. May be our grandfathers and grandmothers can reply to this. Shhh....



India probably had the worst telephone penetration rates in the world till the time we entered the era of liberalization around 1991. The most common anecdote, to cite the government's impassiveness to improve India's communications infrastructure is to quote the words of C.M. Stephen who was the Communications Minister under the late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1984. In reply to a question of regular telephone infrastructure breakdown in India, he told that telephones were a luxury, not a right, and that any Indian who was not satisfied with his/her telephone service could return his phone. From that day till today a lot has changed, and in my view the Government's role in this revolution has always been there but not as much as the private sector telecom companies, who have drafted the new story of connectivity.

Apart from the regular services that I get while I am within the city perimeters, my connectivity is not lost while I am out of town too. When I travel within the different states in India, as soon as I cross the borders of a particular state and enter another one, I immediately get a message on my mobile, 'XYZ Services Welcomes You to 'A' State'. Here 'XYZ' is a service provider and 'A' refers to the state that I have just entered to. Most of the time, our mobile phones connects to its service provider's regular network. Now when my mobile phone is located somewhere not covered by my local carrier's network, I can still avail the facilities by the using services of another provider or a sister arm of the same service provider for connectivity. This is my understanding of what is called 'roaming' on mobile in India. Today this comes at an affordable rate of Rs 1.50 per STD call and Rs 1.00 for local calls.

Mostly, we Indians are a conscientious lot when it comes to spending money on mobile phone talk time. We know which calls can be cut short and which calls can be extended and we do that masterly in our daily lives. Over in India, Ph.D student Carolyn Wei of the University of Washington's department of technical communication has researched the important role mobile phones play in India's Tech city, Bangalore. Not surprisingly, she found that mobile phones play a crucial role in relationships among young people there.

The research was conducted last summer in the fast-growing city of 6.1 million that is experiencing forces of globalization and modernization. Many educated Indian people have moved to Bangalore to work for foreign corporations. The 20 participants in the study were aged from 18 to 30 years, and were fairly typical of young people who have moved to Bangalore for jobs, Wei said. They were financially stable, most had lived in Bangalore for less than two years and most spoke both English and Hindi but none of the local languages. More than half the study participants worked the graveyard shift because they provided technical support for people working during the daytime in North America.

"The people I studied were in this 24/7 environment and they were always on the go," Wei said. Many were involved in long-distance relationships with someone working or studying in another city. The phone provided couples with a "perpetual virtual connection." For people working long hours and commuting in Bangalore's heavy traffic, the mobile phone was even crucial for maintaining relationships with people in the same city.

Now if analyze it, deep down, it's a win-win for both the service providers and the customers. These days, the operating costs are low because the sheer volume of traffic generated by the ever increasing customer base has persuaded many companies to bring down call rates. The end result, invariably everyone, more so the mobile office worker, hopping different cities for business meetings/assignments would like to use a mobile phone for the convenience, add to it the emotional connection, it brings to day-to-day life.



Grandparents from one part of India, (say Delhi) call their grand children based in Bangalore and they carry on their conversations as if they are sitting in the next room. Husbands and wives, boyfriends and girlfriends, sons and daughters living away from parents, brothers and sisters living in different cities, for that matter you think of any human relation, and it's a fair bet that the ubiquitous mobile phone network play some part in the exchange of words. To me the 24/7 mobile phone connectivity today can be appropriated as a means of extending traditional sociality between friends, relatives and family members.



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Rush Rush to Head Start...

The Indian economy is on an upturn mode and there is lot of action and acceleration in various industries across varied segments. On a personal front, what I like is there are many people, at least the number is exploding who want to shake up the world of business and technology, driving away from serving in companies and starting something on their own. So if you are one such person or even otherwise someone who likes technology, business, ideas and innovation, make sure that you don't miss this Big Bang event Head Start happening from the 18th-20th Jan'08 at Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. Well if you are taking the auto rickshaw, to reach this place, tell the autowala Tata Institute as that's how this Mecca of research and technology is known to the common people.

Head Start is a showcase of most exciting products and technology in India, of course with a new color, goal, and impact and definitely has a broader goal and vision.


So what is that what makes this event exceptional and prodigious? In most of the existing showcase events, we often end up meeting people with ideas, VCs and entrepreneurs. That's definitely an Olympian concept. But at, Head Start, it has all these and also covers the entire innovation lifecycle in one place and under one umbrella. This means the participation is holistic from all the players in the innovation lifecycle: academicians, researchers, entrepreneurs, solution architects, marketers, large companies, technology geeks, venture capitalists and customers, etc. The synergy among all these discrete communities to discuss and debate is one of the focal spark points to accelerate the pace of innovation in India. There are many topics to be discussed across domains such as:

• Consumer Services
• Mobility & Communications
• Silicon & Embedded Systems
• Enterprise Applications and Development Tools

The Agenda tab on the main page of the site is a good place to get a bird's eye view. Do have a look and participate in this exhilarating event.

Have fun.

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The pen > all e’s and i’s....
('e' as in electronic and 'i' as in internet)

Today, morning when I checked my mail box, which was again by chance, I found a post-card.

Yes, a post-card and that's why I was all the more excited as it was after a long long time that I saw one of those vintage cards with the stamp. Though I find lot of journals, application forms, magazines, bill payments mails stacked in my mail box but this one was one of a surprise. This post-card had traveled all the way from Mauritius, if someone says there is heaven on Earth, this is one such place. This person lives in the world of 'e' and 'i' , makes a living out of it, infact handling multiple responsible roles in one of the biggest firms in this world.

I happen to know this person, for long and it's the simplicity of this person that’s enchanting. Being on a vacation and not in touch for a while, this person sends a message from the island of Mauritius. The bold and clear handwriting sent a simple message, but for me those were tangible reminders of respect and appreciation that this person deserves.

'S' could have dropped me an email, but Nah goes all the way to drop this card because I know for few people letters allow chance to impart a sense of whimsy. The varied fonts and backgrounds that pep up the e-mails, can't take the place of hand written words even if these are something of an anachronism.

I would treasure this for long. Le respect et l'honneur, apprenant tombe en place.

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Bawlers Vs Moderators In Online Conversation

In the last ten days or so, I made some observations that never existed before on this site, Desicritics. Suddenly many unsought words such as [EDITED - PERSONAL ATTACK], [EDITED], [IRRELEVANT RACIST CRAP], etc started appearing at regular intervals and these were sprinkled across many posts. So this was the fodder for my post, and I have tried to collate my views and present it the best way I could have.

"Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains". Probably Rousseau was clueless of the power of Internet, which is nothing but a network, a grid or an endless chain of computers/servers when he coined this phrase. Literally, with no strings attached, so much has happened till date that, 'chains' which has a negative connotation in the quote, has turned to be the positive catalyst for business, education, travel, commerce, administration, entertainment, for that matter anything and everything that one can think of. This has been aptly termed by Thomas.L.Friedman in his book, The Lexus and The Olive Tree as "The Democratization of Technology" and "The Democratization of Information". Global forums, which were earlier, confined to technical online discussion assemblies have now diversified and all the topics that were earlier discussed by print and digital media is now dissertated by common man. No wonder, why the TIME's Person of the Year for 2006 was You.

Diaries once sealed under lock and key are now discussed in the public, topics that were considered taboo have turned vocal and the playground is now the blogosphere and e-zines, where posts are made daily by all those who care to make the emotional investment, share opinions, and make this world a simple place.

But it is often not possible to carry on an online conversation without observing the difficulty with which a new element makes its way into the domain. When any person has strove for distinction, s/he would be surprised to hear herself/himself censured where s/he could not expect to have been named. S/he would find the utmost acrimony and tartness [note all this is happening online without physical human expressions] among those whom s/he never could have offended.

With internet as a staple equivalent to electricity supply or running water in our lives, it’s easy to follow some decorum and etiquette, when we are wired. For me the rules in real life and e-life seem to be same with a thin flimsy onionskin separating both, the physical presence. Just google on the word "Internet Etiquette" and everything is clear black and white.

But as the group blogs and e-zines grow with its increasing viewer ship, it divides the most miscellaneous and confused assemblages into discrete classes. The insects of the summer that torment these groups with their stings and the prosecutors of merit may be classified as Bawlers and the Moderators respectively.

The bawler is a dangerous enemy with the sole intention of gaining an air of importance. He has no other qualification for a champion of controversy than a hardened front and a biased voice. Vociferation is his weapon for any argument, failing to understand the thin line between a critical argument and an argument. He has little care to preserve the decency in the forum and always has a store of reproachable epithets and contemptuous appellations, ready to be produced as occasion may require, which by constant trolling he pours out with great ease. If relational database is mentioned, he without hesitation devotes it to mainframe systems; if the beauty and elegance of a lady is mentioned, he wonders how the town can fall in love with such deformity; if the achievements of a humble genius are discussed, he pronounces the champion a hopeless individual. His comments are generally without effect. Like a tree that bends to a tempest, to stand erect again when its force is past, the bawler sometimes hibernates and turns docile only to recover his former strength.
[look for the comments part for the underlined words]

The moderator is an unprejudiced person without any interest but honest curiosity. He is always disposed to rational, well-reasoned, sensible, humor tinged interpretations and last but not the least favorable unbiased opinions. If relational database is mentioned; he understands that it is the next generation information hubs for business and education. He believes that a young lady pleased with admiration and wishful of achieving perfection needs to be appreciated. The genius he knows to be a man of diligence who perhaps didn’t sparkle with the ball as did McGrath , but has the judgment to discover his own deficiencies and in his opinion modesty and humility is a quality so rare and amiable.
[look for the comments part for the underlined words]

As, no two children are the same and need to be respected and handled in different ways, similarly no two persons on an online forum are the same in terms of sensibility. This is where the job of the moderator becomes all the more critical. The moderator usually tries online peace to be maintained and the rules to be enforced by editing and deleting personal comments, warning members for offenses, avoiding flame wars, etc. The way in which the moderation system works depends solely on the site architecture and the software adopted, for example, the site algorithm may also allow the moderator to create word filters, automated scripts which strip undesirable text from commentator’s messages and spam comments. The algorithm like any other software product matures more with time and initially the word filters may strip off few desirable and legitimate comments and this draws in wrath of few readers.

There is an argument to be made on both sides of the coin. With the anonymity the Internet provides, people are more brazen or bold about what they voice. I feel that the conversations can be kept just fine without the stuff one considers dross. Peppered with regular dosages of humor and trivia, apart from straight comments actually make a better conversation. The Internet is teeming with passionate people, and passionate people are always the most eloquent, the most mindful of manners and outspoken with a call-a-spade-a-spade mentality. Treat your fellow humans and their views and opinions like one, would like to be treated, whether it is online or offline.

If the web 1.0 was centered on pages, web 2.0 is concentrated around common people. Web 2.0 is made up of ordinary people, who wish to opinionate their voice to the Web's great evolving conversation for the sheer love of it. It's amazing that this medium can bring out such varied potentials and ideas in human behavior. So if you wish to join the team at Desicritics, and let your voice be heard, do visit here and join the gang.

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