More about me here
Not really. This insightful article exposes this myth:
Tim Harford — Article — You’re wrong – we are all wealth creators
In the Indian context, in industries like Banking / Insurance etc, if public sector bank employees are going to compete with the private sector guys, I believe public sector guys would come out winning. May be even Telecom? I wonder.
If you injure a bug, should you kill it or let it live? This happens to me all the time. I accidentally step on a bug and injure it. It sits there struggling and I’m always confused over if I should kill it to relieve it of pain or let it live in hopes that it may survive
If you injure a bug, should you kill it or let it live? - Quora
Do you also have this dilemma? These days, I leave the bug alone and hope he recovers. But there was a time when I cut off a lizard’s tail to see if it really grows back. I have no clue if it amounts to torture & the lizard felt emotionally hurt etc. :-)
“Maybe there’s a better way, a gentlemen’s club where we all wear ties and speak in this Brahmin language and velvet code words, but I don’t know that way, because I am middle class from California”
says Steve Jobs (Pg. 569 in the biography - yes, I finished reading it)
This photo has nothing to do with the article. Found this when I searched for ‘Steve Jobs Brahmin’, that is all. (Every post should have an image, no?)
What does he mean by Brahmin language here? The only Brahmin language I know is to say “Vaango” for “Vaanga”, “Aathukku” for “Veetukku” etc. (Non-tamil readers may please read this WikiPage for more details)
But I am sure this is not what is meant there! :)
I did some search on this but could not locate anything. The business paper of Mount Road Maha Vishnu has done an article on the biography including this quote but does not explain :(
Knowledgeable people, please enlighten me!
At a recent meeting of residents in my locality, an innocent looking dude sitting next to me asked where I work. Once I answered, he said “Oh so you are not in IT?” with a quizzical expression. He seemed concerned if he will not be able to talk anything to me over the next hour or so for which the meeting was scheduled.
With a few career moves I have made, I get really confused on what to answer for such questions. For a moment, I thought I should say “I work on the intersection of technology & liberal arts” :-p but I simply said “You are right”.
And the conversation ended there!
MODS (Mobile Developer Summit) happened in Bangalore last week. No, I am not posting something that should go into my mobile news blog here, by mistake.
There was a contest in MODS - To pay tribute to Steve Jobs and pick up a free copy of his biography. I do not know how many people had participated but I was one of the 5 who were picked up to speak & get the biography. So, someone who has not owned a single Apple product (including the iPod) in life spoke about Steve Jobs & picked up the book :-)
Here it is:
Hello Everyone,
To a lot of us, Steve Jobs was “God”. And all of us want to emulate him. See, Steve Jobs personified 2 things – being a Genius and being a Jerk. A lot of us sub-consciously realize that we cannot become a Genius so we automatically become Jerks!
Jokes apart, over countless interviews, keynotes, tributes & videos of the great man I have come across, I have distilled 3 lessons for myself. This is what I will share today with you, as a tribute to him. These are all common-sense lessons but as with all common-sense related things, very very uncommon. If I can follow these at least in some areas of my life, I would die a happy man. Without further ado, here are the lessons:
#1 Of being an ‘A-level’ player:
In one of his interviews, Steve Jobs says, not so verbatim but along these lines: “In a regular domain, say being a taxi driver or a cook, the difference between the best guy and the average guy might be in the order of two to one or three to one. However, in the field of technology, the difference between the best guy and a the average guy is fifty to one, huge dynamic range. It is like the difference that exists between the best & average poets or artists. Artists & Engineers are just people who pursue different paths but headed to the same goal which is to express something. Therefore, in my domain, it really pays to go after the best people in the world.”
The learning for me here is to try to become someone who Jobs will hire! That is, be an A level player in what I do & be an artist. How do I become an A level player? That leads to the second lesson.
#2 Being true to the man in the mirror:
His father once told him – “You’ve got to make the back of the fence that nobody will see just as good-looking as the front of the fence. Even though nobody will see it, you will know.” The lesson for me here is: I need not be out there building the greatest company on earth, not even the greatest product. Even if I do a simple thing of writing an email, preparing this speech or doing a chore, for me to sleep well at night, I better do it with all the care & quality. That will make me an A-level player. Now, how do I give this attention to the smallest of things? That is the third lesson.
#3 Intuition & the Power of Now:
Some of the books he cherished were in the realm of spirituality. This is one area of his life that probably needs more study. I believe all the focus & determination he got was through the countless hours of meditation he did facing the wall. Which is why he said, “Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice.”
His biography says that he learnt about intuition in India – If only we can start practising that, people here, in this room and our children & co-workers, may be, over a period of time, one of us will turn out to be Steve Jobs!
Thank you, ladies & gentlemen. It was a pleasure to speak here.
Steve Jobs’s Genius - NYTimes.com
China and India are likely to produce many rigorous analytical thinkers and knowledgeable technologists. But smart and educated people don’t always spawn innovation. America’s advantage, if it continues to have one, will be that it can produce people who are also more creative and imaginative, those who know how to stand at the intersection of the humanities and the sciences. That is the formula for true innovation, as Steve Jobs’s career showed.
Sir, why bring in China & India here, in an otherwise good article!!
I do not really want to be showing I am a proud Indian or something (I do not even know if I am or not - it just depends on the mood & context, I guess) - But do you not say yourself like this:
He told me he began to appreciate the power of intuition, in contrast to what he called “Western rational thought,” when he wandered around India after dropping out of college. “The people in the Indian countryside don’t use their intellect like we do,” he said. “They use their intuition instead … Intuition is a very powerful thing, more powerful than intellect, in my opinion. That’s had a big impact on my work.”
If those Indians in the country side get Western education & start applying their intuition, are they not the best people to be at the intersection of humanities & technology? Just wondering.
Email Marketing gone wrong. I am a “Not Applicable” to this company! :-)
My favorite IRCTC never ceases to amaze me.
Of all things it makes you wait for, today I was waiting for the verification code for about 5 minutes:
Most of us do it everyday. But what is it called?
What we know is “bathe”
verb /bāT͟H/ bathed, past participle; bathed, past tense; bathes, 3rd person singular present; bathing, present participle
Wash by immersing one’s body in water
Spend time in the ocean or a lake, river, or swimming pool for pleasure
Soak or wipe gently with liquid to clean or soothe - she bathed and bandaged my knee
Wash (someone) in a bath - they bathed the baby
Suffuse or envelop in something - the park lay bathed in sunshine - mussels bathed in garlic butter
And then we have “Shower”
verb /ˈSHou(-ə)r/ showered, past participle; showered, past tense; showering, present participle; showers, 3rd person singular present
(of a mass of small things) Fall or be thrown in a shower - bits of broken glass showered over me
Cause (a mass of small things) to fall in a shower - his hooves showered sparks across the concrete floor
Throw (a number of small things) all at once toward someone - hooligans showered him with rotten eggs
Give someone a great number of (things) - he showered her with kisses
Give a great number of things to (someone) - senior officers showered praise on their young cadet
Wash oneself in a shower
But what is the act of “filling up a bucket of water and then pouring one mug at a time on oneself” called?
I demand an answer, NOW!
