These context sensitive Google AdSense ads are a hoot. Where did I have any context which was relevant to the above ad? Weird … huh?
Author: Prasad Ajinkya
Prasad Ajinkya is the Big Fat Geek and often he spends his time working on the WordPress or Google eco-system. He loves to solve business problems with technology.
Aamchi Mumbai
This just in.
Thank god for some good sense!! Saamna was bound to slam one of their own. The moment Raj Thackeray must have said those words, there would have been some minds tracing the eddies those remarks must have caused in the social currents of the city.
Slamming non-mumbaikars to garner the vote of the marathi manus is one thing. This is more like trying to take the cake and eating it too. At any point of time, if you see what is running a huge city like Mumbai, then it is the corporates, the financial markets, bollywood, underworld, politics, et al. How many maharashtrians (I am trying to use the politically correct term here!) do you know in any of these fields?
Take the non-mumbaikars out of Mumbai, and the city does not remain Mumbai!! It looses its proverbial charm! The economy goes down, unemployment goes up … from a T1 city, it might plummet to as low as a T3 city. I am not exaggerating here!! What are you standing to gain after coming to rule in such a city?
Some things are better when shared. Aamchi Mumbai is open to all. It feeds on precisely that.
Microsoft Vista
Do not worry, I am not going to complain about (or sing paeans) on this product of MS. Its about their much needed SP1 release. Just read a release here.
This is precisely the kind of impatience that results in a bad product. I do not blame the firm for this excuse of an OS. I blame its users and its channel partners. Microsoft is a business organization after all, also one that is customer centric. So, it will follow the market demand … needless to say, if customers want a new thing now!!, then a new thing they will have. Who cares whether it works properly or not.
This reminds me of Howard Roark from The Fountainhead, and his stubborn indignation to do things his way. At least that way a good product is delivered. Could this be a case of escalation of commitment? Now that you have decided on Vista being a marketable product, make it better and within a given timeline.
I do not envy Microsoft. Lets leave it at that and thank the Ubuntu guys for making it run perfectly on my laptop.
Fire the product placement guy!
You’ve been an MBA for TOO long when…
- You ask the waiter what the restaurant’s core competencies are.
- You decide to re-org your family into a “team-based organization.”
- You refer to dating as test marketing.
- You can spell “paradigm.”
- You actually know what a paradigm is.
- You understand your airline’s fare structure.
- You write executive summaries on your love letters.
- Your Valentine’s Day cards have bullet points.
- You think that it’s actually efficient to write a ten page presentation with six other people you don’t know.
- You celebrate your wedding anniversary by conducting a performanceb review.
- You believe you never have any problems in your life just “issues” and “improvement opportunities”.
- You end every argument by saying “let’s talk about this off-line”.
- You can explain to somebody the difference between “re-engineering”,”down-sizing”, “right-sizing”, and “firing people’s xxx”.
- You actually believe your explanation in the above point.
- You talk to the waiter about process flow when dinner arrives late.
- You start to feel sorry for Dilbert’s boss.
- You account for your tuition as a capital expenditure instead of an expense.
- You insist that you do some more market research before you and your spouse produce another child.
- At your last family reunion, you wanted to have an emergency meeting about their brand equity
- Your “deliverable” for Sunday evening is clean laundry and paid bills.
- You use the term “value-added” without falling down laughing.
- You ask the car salesman if the car comes with a whiteboard and Internet connection.
- You give constructive feedback to your dog.
- You give your boyfriend / girfriend a golden handshake on the way out!
- You can add value to this list by contributing to it
Democracy
I just finished reading the sixth book of the Dune series. The story behind the plot is so esoteric that I do not want to divulge the details of the same in this blog … what is more interesting is that how the book sheds lights on issues like religion, governance and governance using religion.
If you decide to reflect on the same, then you will realize that there is some sense to it all. Right from our childhood, we have been taught that democracy is a government of the people, by the people, for the people. Is that really true … from school we come into real life all misty-eyed and full of ideals, then real life hits us with shades of grey and a despairing need of black and white.
The very leaders we adulated over, and voted into power, we know are of no good. The false promises that they make will be of no use. Thus, democracy itself is based upon and runs on mistrust. I do not trust my government, thats the whole reason for having an opposition party in parliament so that I have a double check on them.
The entire system is based layer upon layer of mistrust. The lower layer knowing and not trusting the higher layer. And surprisingly, it works!! Well, thats just democracy for you. What will heckle you further, is that when you think of a governing system which is hierarchical (like democracy) and is based on trust (rather than mistrust), then we have dictatorship!!
Funny, isnt it, whats good at an individual level, is not a necessary thing at a cumulative level? hmm…
God as a Brand
I tend to have these philosophical discussions with my roomies. It can meander from God to Good and from behavior to endeavor. The works. If I document these entire discussions, then that itself would be a blog. So, one fine day we were discussing God. I know, its such a great topic … if only I had a rupee for every time god was discussed on a blog, I would not need to work then.
We were discussing God as a Brand … and a very successful brand at that as well. Imagine, even the non-believers discuss god … effectively people who refuse to accept the existence of the brand also accept the brand. Can there be a greater brand recall and brand value. I think not!!
Also, imagine, each religion has a different brand of its own. So the concept of god is actually a category and not a brand :-). Being a Hindu, I can only say that my religion has a multi-pronged strategy … multiple brands. A good example of Segmentation-Targeting-Position. What say?