In my previous post , I outlined why the bookstore, even if inefficient in selling books, has reasons to exist beyond mere 'sales'. If the bookstore is to continue to exist, without the inherent value of selling books, it needs to find other ways of generating cash flow, and that too while it serves the other purposes outlined. But let me first recap the purposes which a book store should serve: Serendipity and discoverability of books  Browse a book before buying  Meet like minded people One key element which is implicit to the above is quiet surroundings. The list sounds more like the requirements we have from community libraries than from bookstores, but indeed good bookstores are no less than libraries! So let's start in the reverse order: To satisfy #3, the bookshop needs to have sufficient real estate which should be utilized through a combination of large seating area - preferably a coffee shop - and enough room between the aisles for customers to

Indie book stores have seen a revival around the world; In US, numbers increased from 1,651 in 2009 to 2,094 in 2014 http://t.co/gWKLGZCiIQ — Nikhil Kulkarni (@kulkarninikhil) September 12, 2015 This article in Mint  made me think of the dying trade of bookstores, which as a bibliophile pains me.  Independent book stores have been downing shutters for a few years now - Borders the iconic bookstore chain - its Oxford street store was a landmark (even tourist attraction for Bibliophile Asians like me where I have spent couple of Sundays just reading) - shut shop in 2009 ; Fact & Fiction a similar iconic store in Delhi shut shop  recently. Some non-bibliophiles wonder why are bookstores needed when you can buy any book online much cheaper? Well, (at the risk of sounding politically incorrect) any woman would tell you why - the pleasures of Window shopping! Yes indeed - for bibliophiles, bookstores offer the same pleasures of serendipity - discovering a new book in a compl

I was listening the radio day before and heard legendary actor Manoj Kumar describing his first experience of India's independence. The anecdote he related has been one of the best stories of freedom; I would hence like to record it here on my blog. I am trying to reproduce his words as much verbatim as I can remember: चौदह अगस्त की रात को मेरे चाचा का देहांत हो गया । मेरी माँ उस समय घर पर बीमार थी । अगले दिन सुबह मेरे पिताजी ने मुझे उठाया और नहाने धोने के बाद मुझे कहा, चलो हम लाल क़िले जा रहे हैं । वहां पहुचने के लिए उस वक्त, जिस रेफ्यूजी कैंप में हम रहते थे, वहां से २ घंटे की एक बस पकड़नी पड़ती थी। हम बस से लाल क़िले पहुंचे और उस भीड़ में खड़े मैंने देखा की लाल क़िले की प्राचीर पर एक शख्स सफ़ेद कपडे पहने खड़ा है।  बाबूजी ने मुझे बताया की वे नेहरू जी हैं।  नेहरू जी का नाम सुना था मैंने, पता था वो कौन हैं। खैर, नेहरू जी ने अपना भाषण दिया और आखिर में नारे लगाये । सारे क़िले में खड़ी भीड़ नें भी नारे लगाये, बाबूजी भी इनमें शामिल थे। तब पहली बार में मुझे लगा की कोई तो चीज़ होगी ये आज़ादी,

This post is co-authored by Hemantkumar Jain who writes on the shoOOonya Blog . Personal Computing is probably a word from the 90s, not quite apt for the post iPad era. The reason we use it though is because, this post starts with a recap of a discussion from 2006. As the news spread about Flipkart.com and its affiliate Myntra.com moving to mobile only websites - our minds went back to a discussion we had in 2006 which started at Hemant's apartment in Geneva and continued for next 5 days through our train journeys across Switzerland . The 80GB iPod had just been released, and Hemant mentioned that at the end of the day, the iPod which fits the pocket had hard drive space and a processor. So all we needed now was to load a light weight OS on it, connect it to a monitor, keyboard/mouse and you have a personal computer ready. Today, the relevance of the personal computer is almost lost in context of tablets and mobile phones. The question is - will this 'mobile-only

Steve Jobs didn't let his kids use iPads (as per  this website ) - even though he invented them himself. A lot of parents might want to follow him. " Especially in Silicon Valley, there is actually a trend of tech execs and engineers who shield their kids from technology." The claim is that technological addiction prevents kids minds from becoming creative " setting up our children for incomplete, handicapped lives devoid of imagination, creativity and wonder when we hook them onto technology at an early age. " To me this is an extremely biased and dystopian view of technology exposure - though it is nothing new - the same type of concerns were raised few decades ago for TV and before that even for newspapers. My view is that it depends on how and what kind of exposure you give your kids. For ex. kids today already know the whole ABC, 123, almost all poems by the age of two. This is all thanks to nicely made kids rhyme videos which you can play in ab

Narendra Modi's Swatch Barat campaign faces lot of hurdles - changing people's mentalities, overcoming the chronic issues of open defecation, lack of cleanliness infrastructure (starting from dustbins to garbage collection trucks) etc. But one problem faced by it is indeed the no-man's-land syndrome also known as not-my-problem syndrome or outside my zone problem :-). Check out the image - the house owner has cemented the ramp up from the road to his porch and the municipality has made a cement road right upto the pavement; yet a short portion between the two cemented portions is left out for mud and water to accumulate. I must admit that this picture was taken a day after the festival of Holi , so the muck of mud and water is more dirty than usual with remains of water balloons and color from previous day's holi celebrations. Nevertheless, this does not take away the problem - the fact that our systems fail at boundaries. This manifests across levels of o

Mint editorial has the following to say in response to induction of Kiran Bedi by BJP in Delhi CM race. Bedi is being seen as the answer to Arvind Kejriwal. If faces could change governance, then Bedi and Kejriwal would have made all the difference to Delhi. Delhi is a megalopolis with problems that don’t have easy solutions. Its consumption of water and electricity is way beyond what it produces. Every summer, their shortage creates a crisis-like situation. None of the parties has a clear idea of how to solve this. An election campaign that is so focused on personalities is unlikely to pay attention to the problems. As in other elections in India, the emphasis is to win first and think later. Read more at: http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/Lo4XZPg9qejrwpK9jQVrJK/The-battle-of-faces.html I disagree. If the mere problem of good governance was solving issues 'at hand' then a bureaucracy would have sufficed to run a country. And that was the precise mistake we made in th

I was at a workshop last week conducted by Prof Ashish Nanda [ 1 ] and Prof Biju Varkkey [ 2 ] - and it was an enlightening experience. There was one thought which came from them towards the end of the session which has been reverberating in my mind ever since. This was about the future of the workplace. In response to a question about handling the 'new generation' Prof Nanda mentioned that most of the theories and media talk about the Millennials or Next Generation being different and changing the workplace is bunkum; but what he said next was insightful - the workplace of the future will not be influenced so much by the entry or the new generation but by 3 factors: Women in the workforce - for the first time in the history of mankind we are going to have a large number of women who would have spent more than 30 years at Corporate and Academic careers. Many of them have reached or are reaching leadership positions and the workplace is going to be far different with so

A couple of years ago, an NGO started a campaign called 'Bell Bajao' against domestic violence. The concept was simple, if you are an audience to (i.e. overhear) domestic violence in the neighborhood, don't intervene directly - but make the perpetrator of this violence aware that someone is hearing / watching - social pressure of being watched will compel the perpetrator to stop. The video below illustrates, where the neighbor simply rings the bell to stop the domestic quarrel but when the door opens, he asks for Milk.  This is a very effective mechanism - I am intrigued if this can only be applied to domestic violence - why can't it be applied to international diplomacy to reduce crimes against humanity such as the ghastly events at Peshawar? As much as one is pained by the events and acts of Taliban, the larger pain is the apathy shown by most of the world's Governments including India. Just a message of condolence, a statement condemning the attac

One of the most popular posts on this blog has been this one , co-authored by me and Shubham while we were still students at NITIE. Even after 10 years, the post has stood the test of time and continues to guide new aspirants to take a right decision choosing between taking up a placement offer vs. going for an MBA. This post however is dated and also leaves some key questions unanswered. One such question is as to what is the ideal work experience prior to an MBA. One visitor to this blog asked me this question on email and while I was replying to him, I realized that the answer may benefit several others who visit this blog. Hence reproducing a generalized summary of my reply to the reader here. If you look at it from perspective of jump in salary that you get before and after an MBA , then, the earlier you do an MBA, the better it is. For example, if you are a fresher, as an engineer you'll end up with a package of 3-4 Lakhs, while after an MBA may be 6-8 Lakhs. If you

Continued from here Sadly, with what I witnessed in the decay of the Sports facility is an indication that we have not only lost the infrastructure, but also lost the spirit. The fall of PSU towns like Bhilai, Bhopal, Rourkela and rise of IT towns like Bangalore, Pune, Hyderabad has led to a breakdown of the self-contained ecosystem of work and life which was built in these towns - and fall of Sporting facilities and Sporting spirit is a collateral victim of this tectonic shift in lifestyles.  This is actually quite ironical given that the newfangled IT crowd happily pays tens of thousands every quarter even to gyms housed in a 2 BHK apartments and would also possibly pay similar sums for Sports facilities of the scale of the BHEL Sports Complex. In fact, Bhopal city itself which has grown all round the BHEL Township, would have people who would be ready to pay for membership in the Sports complex if  it was maintained properly. There are several of these medium and super-ric

This interview with Sports Authority of India Director General - Jiji Thomson - highlights almost everything that is wrong with the Sports administration in India. Thankfully, Thomson seems to be aware of all the lacunae himself and is taking on each issue head-on; and while it seems that the new government at the Center is being more proactive, he still needs more executive support. I want to relate my personal experience in this regard. I am not a sports person - so much so that I have never enjoyed playing any sport (with exception of swimming perhaps) - in fact I don't enjoy watching sports as well. However, being brought up in a PSU township at BHEL Bhopal, I had the privilege of enjoying some of the best sporting facilities then available in India. So, even a non-enthusiast like me spent a lot of time playing badminton in a professional covered court, football in a well organized ground (unlike the uneven patches most people get to play in) and had my tryst with learnin

Flickr image by  sayan51 I was listening to my grandma and my uncle talk about the nonsense they show on TV nowadays, about how Children in TV are shown to be arrogant or uttering things which do not suit their age, and then the topic turned to how there is too much 'freedom' given to today's youth, the fact that they are not bound by cultural ethos is making them directionless achievers; and as the discussion got accented, there was a hint that the world needs a dictatorial order - how youth need to be disciplined and made to act within the 'bounds' of our culture, how this will result in a more fruitful generation. This, I am sure, is a common debate in many households in India and even elsewhere; the conclusion of course is very typical of the rightist philosophy bordering on, though not absolutely, vigilante approach. I agree and disagree. Yes, freedom is a double edged sword, but absolute freedom does not have an alternative irrespective of its blemish

Continued from here The root cause with several nations such as Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan or even Pakistan, is that they are still kingdoms, and have not transformed themselves into modern democratic nations. There remains no way to govern them apart from a totalitarian and dictatorial government. [The fact that Pakistan is a kingdom, not a nation unequivocally explains why Pakistan’s history has been marred with coups and why the nation goes into tizzies of instability every time a ‘democratic’ government rules it.] The problem with kingdoms is that kingdoms cannot be multipolar, they exist because there is supremacy of one and only one force at any time - as Jean Bodin's concept of absolute sovereign commands. If that force is not a monarch or military dictator, there ensues a war between various factions to become that 'one force' which would govern the kingdom. One of the reasons why Pakistan has seen so many bloody coups is that it was not gifted with the visi

Continued from here  The consolidation the territorial boundaries was only half the job done – what was in the hands of the provisional government in 1947-49 was just a kingdom and not a Nation. The forging of a nation from this kingdom required visionary wisdom and unflinching determination to principle of ‘multi-cultural’ nationalism. Operationally, the issue of sub-nationalities was resolved by instituting a pseudo-federal governance system. ‘Pseudo’ because unlike an ideal federal system, the ‘union’ or whole was not made up of the smaller ‘states’. Upholding the original territories (some of them governed by Royalties) and ‘combining’ them to form the nation would have been disastrous. It would have meant allowing each state to have its own territorial borders, and a deluge of pacts and negotiations to freeze them – which would have broken down time and again, sinking the region into perpetual strife. Instead, the first step was, to consolidate all military power with

Continued from here  When the British marched into India – the geopolitical landscape wasn’t much different than that of the then Europe – several small and big kingdoms dotted the subcontinent, and treaties, alliances and assurances balanced power among them.  During the Raj, the British did make some efforts to unify the whole mass in some ways (like establishing railway and postal systems), primarily to suit their commercial needs, but the basic fabric remained as divided till 1947 as it was in 1857. In words of Lord Curzon, the Viceroy of India under the British Raj,”The political system of India is neither feudalism nor federation. It is embodied in no constitution and bears no resemblance to a league.” In fact, before leaving, the British gashed a new divide within the subcontinent - the ‘two nation theory’. If the partition was an injury, several more potential wounds lay ahead of independent India in 1947. With the region left in a fragmented mess of erstwhile royalt

Continued from here With similar culture and past India has developed a vibrant democracy which functions without conflict (bombings in Syria, Iraq, Egypt or Lebanon are no comparison to the problems of Naxalism or Communal tensions we see in India), with a unfettered record of elections and democratically elected governments, and with an unprecedented record of development. So, what makes India tick which most other Eastern nations experimenting with democracy lack? The answer may lie in  this column by Sidin Vadukut  which explains how the Indian delegation to help resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict in 1947 proposed setting up of a federal republic instead of the two-nation Israel-Gaza-West Bank state that struggles in conflict today. I quote: India, Iran and Yugoslavia, instead, proposed a minority plan that would avoid partition: “An independent federal State of Palestine shall be created following a transitional period not exceeding three years. The independent Federal

Israel and Gaza Image Credit: Amir Farshad Ebrahimi via flickr Since the past 3 decades, the US has tried (unsuccessfully) to spread, its model of capitalist democracy to the rest of the world. Most of Europe is already subservient to the the US interests; in several cases the interests of the West, which includes US and Europe both, are common - for example Oil interests in Middle East. But, economic interests aside, the US has failed utterly in its political goal of establishing 'US style' democracies in Afghanistan first, and then Iraq. And while these two new wars were waged, settled and then sizzled again, the Israel-Palestine conflict shows no signals of subsiding. Why has the US, a successful 200+ year democracy, adept at understanding the nuances of how-democracy-works failed to make the model work outside its borders - more specifically - outside the West? Does the answer lie in the typical difference-between-east-and-west debate or should we simply accept th

Many people here might be running a SoHo and might have faced the problem of either restricting access to certain websites or simply to channelize all internet traffic through a common internet pipe. When a friend of mine - a non-tech entrepreneur - asked me on how he can achieve this, I went into writing him an email (with multiple embedded links) explaining how to use a Proxy Server to achieve the above. Below is a reproduction for everyone to use: If you are using a NetGear router, the router itself might have the setting for restricting users from accessing certain sites - check this http://www.netgear.com/lpc or this link http://documentation.netgear.com/wndr3300/enu/202-10301-01/pdfs/Content.pdf - Page 3-1 Blocking Access to Internet Sites If your router does not have these features then use the method below: Task 1: Install a Proxy Server on your server machine or any other powerful machine Download CCproxy from this link http://www.youngzsoft.net/ccproxy/proxy-se

2013 has possibly been the busiest year of my life till date; it was busy as hell and the hangover still persists. The year started with a Baby Shower in mid January, after which Divya went to her parent's place - beginning a persistent nomadic life for me for more than 6 months. I would dash through the week, managing groceries, maids and bills and run off to either Indore or Pune over weekends to spend alternate weekends with Divya or my parents. If there were weekends when I would be in Mumbai, there would be enough office work piled over to catch up. I spent several train and bus journeys working on my laptop sitting in awkward positions, and being the source of the dim (and for my co-passengers - irritating -) light emanating from my laptop screen. I have been on con-calls at all kinds of odd places - the hospital, highway Dhabas, on way to Mumbai-Pune expressway and Food Plaza on the expressway near Lonavla. Also spent several Monday's coming back from work and goi