Just another blog

Rains. Damned Rains.

leave a comment »

Thanks to incessant rains and my insistence on travelling by my super bike, my feet havent been properly dry in the last 5 days. I hate rains. Truly. Madly. Deeply. I wouldnt really hate them so much if it werent for the wetness. I am still very much a baby, like the ones they show in diaper ads, I like being nice and dry.

Posted via email from Just some random stuff

Written by Karthik

November 10, 2009 at 7:18 pm

Posted in I Think

What is your favourite TED video?

leave a comment »

Written by Karthik

November 4, 2009 at 10:54 am

Posted in I Think

Karthik, the farmer

with one comment

I have always been a romantic, not just any romantic but Gladiator-Russell-Crowe kind of a romantic. When I look into my future, I do not see karthik, the coder or karthik, the entrepreneur, but I see 'karthik, the farmer', living by a countryside, upon his couple of acres of fertile land. I dream of the day when I would wake up to the warm scents rising from the earth swept by aqueous bovine excrement. I have even chalked out my typical day, I would wake up and take that half feet wide track to the banyan tree overlooking my farm.

Now before I go too far into this fantasy, let me make it clear that this is the future where farming methodologies and genetic engineering have advanced to the point that I really dont need to know any real farming to be a farmer. This isnt so unrealistic, today we have folks using computers without really knowing what's under the hood, i expect that the really major farming decision that I would have to make will be choosing the color of the farm, I have decided, its gonna be purple. I expect that the entire farming process will be encapsulated in the press of a few buttons(and that too only to make me feel like I am doing some work). And once I have done that I would have nothing to do except wile away my time by the shade of the tree, reading a book or two, when mayil or kuyil or ponnatha or any other bharathiraja-village girl would hop down that track, with her arms outstretched like a pterodactyl, one hand holding the saapattu tooku and the other stretched wide for balance. Did I mention that she would be following the dress code of pathinettu patti, the one about no blouse during working hours?

Once I am done with my meal, I would try getting to know the neighbourhood, I plan to start with sending gifts to my neighbours. I would then venture into a stroll over my neighbours' farm, where if I find crows spoiling the farm I would heartily chase them away, I expect to be good at this and who knows I might even earn a buck or two. Upon returning to my farm, if I find any black sheeps roaming there, I would try my hand at shearing, the worst that could happen is that I end up mutilating it into a sheep orc, but if I succeed I could sell the black wool at the market. My gut tells me black wool will be the a big hit in the future. As the day wears on I would visit my barn of genetically superior animals. I plan to have three cows, O. Lakshmi, S. Shenbagam, C. Gomatha. 'So what's the deal with the initials?' you may ask, well, O lakshmi gives good old Ordinary milk, S Shenbagam squeezes out Strawberry milk and C Gomatha lends nice creamy Chocolate milk, which I could drink and also sell at the market.

That was a nice fantasy, but do you know the worst thing that could happen to a wild fantasy? it is seeing 50 million people living my fantasy. Why almost every one at my workplace owns a farm, enjoys a nice session of crow chasing, and sells chocolate milk at the market. The only solace is that they are yet to enjoy the pterodactyl hop of mayil. Did I mention her dress code?

Now I have to start all over again with a new wild wild fantasy. Aha!

I have always been a romantic, not just any romantic but Godfather-Marlon-Brando kind of a romantic. I dream of the day when I would be the head of a mafia family…

PS If you havent understood anything, you are probably not on facebook yet or if you have, you are in a statistically impossible social network of size 1, thereby allowing you to not get infested with the deadly farmville and mafia wars viruses. You have a life, I envy you.

Posted via email from Just some random stuff

Written by Karthik

October 26, 2009 at 8:10 pm

Posted in I Think

Docomo destined to fail

leave a comment »

I will try to prove here why docomo is destined to fail. As I am putting this blog, I am planning to do some SEO tinkering, a little bit of link farming so that when someone googles for docomo this blog entry would turn up. And when that happens, I dont have to prove anything, for 'if it is in google, it has got to be true'.
Until then, here is a half baked.. er.. highly cogent argument for why docomo will fail.
1. It doesnt seem right, pay-per-second that is. It sort of feels just as absurd as walking into a restaurant where the manager comes and says pay only for the number of parukkais you eat. If that doesnt feel absurd to you read point 2.
2. Commonsense tells me that the real fans of docomo will be those who are a) economical with words and b) economical with the little bits of paper and plastic in our wallets. Commonsense also tells me that the real real fans of docomo will be a combination of both. For a company that depends largely on people talking to each other to make money, having laconic misers as the primary audience is a sure road to doom.

Anyway, I have been wondering how docomo can get out of this mess. They can go the google way of making money from ads, they can play audio ads while the caller is waiting for the call to be answered and thereby make money from advertisers. Once that starts working.. ie annoying users, they can offer block-ads as a value added service and charge for that as well. Its a win-win for docomo. Damn, that is another million dollar idea that I have spilled in my blog.

Jokes aside, is anybody using docomo? how different is it?

Posted via email from Just some random stuff

Written by Karthik

October 21, 2009 at 2:19 pm

Posted in I Think

Barack, The Messiah

leave a comment »

Read this first -> http://beta.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/article34090.ece
Typical elitist iyer monologue that complains about the degeneration of society and offers hinduism as the best recourse. What is this decadence in northern hemisphere that he is talking about? Is he living in the same planet as me? And what is this grudge against science and technology? He speaks as if only science is abetting power crazy fanatics, what he doesnt realize is that we have had such fanatics ever since we left the trees. I wouldnt read much into such complains, I have seen enough mamas say things like 'the world is going to dogs' or 'kali muthi pochu' over perfectly normal incidents like saadam kozhanjufying or cycle tyre getting punctured. My only apprehension is that these hindu radicals are projecting advaita just as hitler did with ubermensch.

And what is this nonsense about some cosmic voice whispering in white house? If Barack is hearing disembodied voices, its time he takes a bath under Niagra falls, the kutralam of america.

And why all this Morpheus-like belief in Barack as 'The One'? Vitta Obamakku kovil katti, kumbashishegam panni, vyayakazhama-sanikazhama vada maala saathuvaaru pola. I am betting my bike that he goes '…Baracko devasya dhimahi…' while doing sandhi. What has Obama done to justify such adulation. He appears to be talking sense but so far it has all been rhetoric, I think we should wait for action and not prematurely beatify him.

P.S The author of the article, my father tells me was the CJI long while back, disappointing that such a respectable person can write an empty pointless article.

Posted via email from Just some random stuff

Written by Karthik

October 19, 2009 at 10:24 am

Posted in I Think