Blogs R Us

Few days back, I had shared some facts and POV on blogging. Yes, its a niche sport:-)Many planners in India are into it...We(Iqbal, Kajal, Saurabh, I...) just started thotblurb, the thots and musings by planners on hopefully everything under the sun!

However, blogging within the larger Indian advertising fraternity is still seen with amusement(that's what the research-by-one suggests),'passing-fad-hai glances', indifference, etc.

A friend of mine who is reasonably senior in account management refuses to see the reason why anybody would blog. And somebody who is nobody to that anybody would read!!

Another creative guy I know refuses to acknowledge blogging/my blog/ any blog...Yet another long-time ad veteran is reluctant to blog. And the sharing of private thoughts in a public domain doesn't seem to be the reason for his hesitance!!

What's the big deal about blogging? There are 100mn of them...

It's just a medium to express yourself, sans the filter of mass media censorship...It's a digital store-house for thoughts-never-penned-by-you, ideas-from-the-attic-of-the-mind, dreams-hidden-in-the-heart...

In my case also provides the space to share few-old-ads-as-brand-prints-languishing-in-powerpoint/hard-disc:-)

In contrast, a young friend of mine shared her thots on blogging...What a whiff of young thots...Here it is.

I knew of a professor of English Literature who used to wash dishes to vent frustration. She had told us that she imagined each plate, bowl, spoon to be a face of one of the myriad mischief-makers of the class. And when she explained the poem, Two Tramps in Mud Time by Robert Frost, to us, I realized that my habit of releasing pent up emotions on the last pages of my notebook wasn't exactly without reason. The poem begins with a man chopping wood to destress, I knew then that the pen was my axe!

Over time this pen has turned into the keyboard of a Compaq Presario M2000 and my notebook into, well, still a notebook but a digital one. Everytime i have a particularly gratitude-worthy day or a moronically frustrating one I get myself some coffee and chocolate and let the juices flow.

Everytime I learn from an especially stirring experience it's converted into a new page in my digital novel on life. The experience need not be a great loss like death or a happiness like a new life into the world. I don't have them, not too often at least. What I mean by 'stirring' is slight turbulence in my equation with those around me. Sometimes the most subtle of things can teach you an invaluable truth which you failed to see while floating on clouds of happiness, your sight distorted by the mist that had settled on your judgement.

Blogging is free therapy...and with demands for psychiatric help skyrocketing, blogging is a relief to the economically challenged. Personally just writing down my troubles is such a weight off my head, it's like having spoken to Oprah about it. And the comments you get from anonymous well-wishers is another bonus.

The "Blogopolitan" is a place where there's room for every intellectual, every moron, every terrorist and every zen aathma. 'Your opinions are your's and no one can change that' is the principle that the blogging world flourishes on.

Devdas drank himself to death to beat frustration, Hitler destroyed half the earth and Marilyn Monroe popped pills. I blog. Sweet addiction, isn't it.

Well, I wish my suit friend and the creative guy read this! Other stray thoughts/ rant/ hope...

1. I think marketing must soon realise all those years of lip-service that they paid to 'Consumer is King' has found a voice...Now we can't fool everyone all the time...

2. Authentic is in. Hype is out.
Conversations are in. headlines are out.
Content is in. Pretty pictures, expensive films devoid of ideas are out.

Brands with attitude/ rough-edges/grey shades/unique voices are in.
Brands with just USP/ only smooth edges/ standardised voices are out...

3. Advertising can wait at the periphery a lil longer or join in...

4. Looks like it's the beginning of the end of only templated advertising/ communication. CGC will hit India hard...

5. It's the beginning of the era of CEO/ brand manager as blogger.

6. It's the beginning of the democratisation of creativity...

As I approach the magic figure of 100 posts, I can tell, I have deeply gained from blogging...It has been a creative outlet for me...I have learnt a lot from everybody else...

It's been a humbling experience...I have become Nikon-friendly, I chat a lot, I enjoy my work more and have discovered new voices, friends...

Brands are like people. I think if they start a conversation, they can build more authentic, bigger brands, one conversation at a time...

It's very tough I would assume. There are no operating manuals at the moment. But I believe it can be done. It needs brave and honest attempts and loads of creativity!

BTW, Rithika has made the board for the Valence levels of creativity. Will upload it shortly...cheers

Blogging in India - Facts and Future

Looks like blogging is spreading like wild wire in India. Read the first blogging India survey done by MSN and Windows Live - an online survey of more than 1,000 MSN portal visitors in India!

Was trying to read into the numbers...and look ahead! The future looks promising and nothing like the past:-)

1.The numbers . Some 14% of India’s netizens actively blog! And a total of 39% are aware of blogs.
I think that's a very healthy number...Also, I suspect from now on they will grow exponentially.

Almost 90% of bloggers spent up to five hours per week reading blogs or updating their own blogs.
My personal average would be somewhere around 10-15 hours! What about you guys?

2. Male skew . Not surprisingly, the Indian blogosphere is heavily dominated by men(74:26). In the asia-pacific, blogging is fairly evenly matched between the sexes.

3. Youth skew. 54% of bloggers are between the ages of 25-34 years;
32% under 25 years and 15% over 35 years.

4. Trust factor. Close to 45% of the respondents believed that blog content was as trustworthy as traditional media!
I would fall in this category as well! Not just trust, I mostly find blog content to be 'more intelligent', more POV than facts. I also love the personal flavour and the interactive, dialogue nature of blogs!

5. Key drivers. (a) Fervour for self-improvement and personal development.
(b) A large majority of online users read blogs to stay informed about world events
The split between topics - Technology (32%), followed closely by news and education (24%). This is in contrast with the region where technology was ranked by only 19 % as the most interesting, with travel being second most popular ranked by 17%.

(c) Celebrity obsession of Indians continues in the blogosphere as well!
The Report revealed that majority of India’s online users found reading blogs to be an excellent source of entertainment, with those written by actors, popular music artists, and sports personalities rated as the most popular at a combined 77%.

I personally have only come across Shekhar Kapur's blog which I just visited once...
Which are the better celeb blogs? Meraj told me yesterday the bollywood director Anurag Kashyap has a nice blog. Must check it tomorrow!

I think celeb blogs could be the next killer app...I am sure Karan Johar will convince Shah Rukh to blog for his next movie...Kabhi Blog Kar Lena:-)
The making of the movie will not just be a DVD item but actually a director's blog during the scripting and shooting!
There can be a virtual 'Koffee with Karan' in the blogosphere!

(d) Having a platform for self-expression factored heavily into the motivation to blog in India with 58% of bloggers starting a blog because they wanted to express passionate views and commenting on the world around them .
But this I guess is the fundamental reaosn why anybody, anywhere would blog.

(e) Some 40% of India’s bloggers do so to entertain others through their writing.
Don't know what this really means!

6. Favourite blogs . Blogs written by business leaders were found by half of all online users in India to be the most enjoyable to read. This is in contrast to the region where the blogs by business leaders and politicians were far less popular.

In my case, apart from Rajeev Karwal's(if you can call him a business leader) blog I haven't read any other's!

24% of respondents found blogs by politicians to be of regular interest :-)
Who are they? Does a Murli Deora, Sachin Pilot, Rahul Gandhi have one of their own?

7. Other Learnings . Aesthetics play a huge role in attracting and retaining an audience in the blogosphere.

Respondents indicated that a good blog should, firstly, be updated regularly and secondly, be well-written with eye catching pictures.

Amongst the most annoying aspects of blogging, India’s netizens listed badly written entries (42%), self-centered blogs (36%), and not knowing when a blog is updated (34%) as things that turned them away from blog sites.

For me the following are equally important.
- The 'newness of the ideas' discussed in a blog.
- Element of surprise and interesting-ness
- Honesty of writing
- A conversational tone
- Great conversation threads( perhaps even more important than the actual post)

Guys, any other observations on Blogs R Us? Shoot, share...

The Feminisation of the Internet

Meraj forwarded me this link from NYT. Thanks Meraj, somehow it feels you still work for me(and that too without pay..LOL). It's an article of how more girls than boys are creating content on/for the web!!

Come to think of it there are more and more women creating content on the web or are more conversant with technology in India as well. The other thing is many of the content-creating guys have a strong feminine side to them(including you Meraj and me:-)

Some key points from the article...
1. Among the youngest Internet users, the cyberpioneers of the moment are digitally effusive teenage girls.

2. A study published in December by the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that among Web users ages 12 to 17, significantly more girls than boys blog (35% of girls compared with 20% of boys) and create or work on their own Web pages (32 % of girls compared with 22% of boys).

3. Girls also eclipse boys when it comes to building or working on Web sites for other people and creating profiles on social networking sites (70 percent of girls 15 to 17 have one, versus 57 percent of boys 15 to 17). Video posting was the sole area in which boys outdid girls: boys are almost twice as likely as girls to post video files.

4. A Pew study published in 2005 also found that teenage girls were the primary content creators — but the gender gap for blogging, in particular, has widened. The findings have implications beyond blogging, according to Pew, because bloggers are “much more likely to engage in other content-creating activities than nonblogging teens".

It's interesting. The idea that the gender of the world wide web might be changing over time...Mental Bookmark.

Picture Source : www.jupiterimages.com

Aamir - the blogger Khan

There is a sliver of a chance that I may get to meet Aamir(Khan) for my book. One of my close friends has promised. Maybe post the release of Ghajini...

So, while I keep my fingers crossed, I also decided to google all his interviews and other facts and trivia. He is a meticulous man I gather and I better be prepared.

And so I spent about an hour on his blog yesterday. I had stayed away from these celeb blogs earlier because in my own mind I just couldn't reconcile the Bollywood stars(so used to fame and manipulating mass media) with the simple, democratic and conversational act of blogging.

But alas I was wrong as far as Aamir's blog is concerned. This khan gets it. I mean he really gets blogging!! While many of my clients and few of my digital savvy colleagues(from past and present)still don't get it:-)

1. The posts are written exactly in the manner one would imagine Aamir to talk in say an interview.

2. The posts sound real. He talks about his anger and helplessness at the Mumbai blasts. How he felt screening TZP in Seattle for the IDA (International Dyslexia Association). Even the fact that he couldn't sleep one night because of ants in his bed:-)

Now this isn't rocket science. The being real part. But brands and brand managers seldom get it right.

3. It's okay to make mistakes.Blog posts are never meant to be perfectly crafted messages. Often they are random thoughts. They are the first opinions. They are amateurish. They might reveal mistakes and flaws. They can have spelling errors. Aamir's posts have spellos. He even spells the movie Memento as Momento and later acknowledges the error:-) Brands too must learn and adopt this degree of humanness when they want to converse through the medium of social media. It is more important to be human and share honest feelings than to be correct and share dessicated facts...

4. Inviting feedback. Bollywood stars or any stars for that matter have largely communicated from a pedestal. That's part of their mystique. Yet when one blogs one has to be receptive to feedback. From the commoner. The audience of One. Aamir does. Even the micro-feedback of giving indents in his paragraphs for better readability:-)

5. Contextual. Again brands arrogantly assume their primacy all the time. That they are the centre of the universe/ conversation. Whereas when you blog(the general sort of blog), context is everything. The content is a variegated play of life, your work, the important and the trivial thoughts...Again, I have found it difficult for clients and their brands to appreciate the context when it comes to any form of social media.

So, if nothing else, star bloggers like Aamir can teach marketers how to converse with their audience. One on one...

However, on the content front, I was largely disappointed. I don't think he has articulated his thoughts as well as he acts in his movies:-)( on the basis of the 4-5 posts that I read randomly...)

You may want to read a few of his posts - 'Sleepless in Seattle', 'It's a bird, it's a plane' - by Abbas Tyrewala, 'Ghajini'...Ah, you will will have to register and then log on...a bit annoying!

The Future of Entertainment

Just read my blog friend Neil Perkins's detailed post on the 'Future of Entertainment. Since many of the trends 2008 pieces in the Indian media-sphere have been quite vapid and vacuous, catching up on this post was quite a relief...

Neil, allow me to quote from your post and salt & pepper it with my India-centric thots.

1. Entertainment is becoming more fluid and flexible, interactive and active, individually defined, networked, varied in time, location and place...

2. Growing affluence underpins higher expectations. Even children have increasingly sophisticated demands. They are not confined by traditional constructs of consumption!

Just this morning, my 4 yr old son, Neo asked his Nani for a 'real mobile'. He was specific & assertive - 'Khilona nahin chahiye. Baat karna hai'!! Our own expectations from customer service, vacations, lifestyle, fashion & technology brands have grown exponentially and continue to do so...

We are all on a hedonistic consumer treadmill. We need better experiences to give us the same or less kick!

3. There is a powerful role for the shared collective experience (seen currently in the growth in live music, and strong demand for sports viewing).

This is one area where we cud spend some time in 2008. Brand conversations, activities and planned actions largely happen with a one-to-one marketer mind-set.

4. Networks of communication are already ubiquitous but our understanding of their full potential and operation is still pubescent. But huge potential exists beyond the blogging phenomenon and current popular networking sites for evolving forms of creativity and expression.

Ad agencies will take a while understanding the potential of community communication here in India. My guess is that media agencies, digital out-fits and new web based entrepreneurial companies, small and mid size will show the path. Then maybe the large networks will wake up and shake up!

5. A growing proportion of the population is and will be consistently multitasking. According to this research, people are currently fitting in more than 7.2 hours of additional activities into the average day!!

- How do I calculate how many more hours did I pack in my day in 2007??
- So do we do MGFs(Multi Tasking Group Discussions) now to elicit new behavioural patterns?
- And how do we measure attentive eye-balls!:-)
- How does it impact the 30 sec commercial, or the viral video.
- Do we need a new guy, say called the Media Landscapist to do the thinking around this subject...

6. The ‘new meaning of luxury’ is about time oases and getting away from it all. And reinforces the long term demand for the ‘bring it on’ realm of media-delivered entertainment on TV and magazines, as well as creating interesting links to the ‘cult of the home’ with home as primary site for downtime, in our busy, choice-overloaded daily lives...

- Hey, this trend I had predicted in 2002-03( pre blogging days). Had written a piece called the 'Division Economy' back then. Maybe it was ahead of its time. LOL
- Will this new time oasis be age dependent?
- Is it a big enough business to leave my planner job and jump into? LOL

Thanks Neil for getting me thinking as always and Happy New Year buddy!

Conversations vs Presentations

As a planner I am often forced to converse in slides...There was a time few years back, when close friends accused me of even thinking in power-point LOL.

Luckily I have managed to wriggle out of power-point thinking! I have tried to embrace conversations. Must admit I was quite an average conversationalist. In fact, it's the constant blogging of the past 10 months which might have added some flavour to my thoughts! Last night at THUGS - the bar in Hotel Broadway, close to Daryaganj, my friend John Lambie suggested this post title!!

When I look at our business. I find many clients want presentations and not really conversations from planners. One notable exception would be Dharam -who almost gave me his business to have conversations with him!!(Straight guy)

1. Have you ever realised that often you are forced to form/ solidify your thinking at the beginning of a power-point whereas thinking in a conversation gets better as you go along!

2. Once you start the power-point, if you aren't really careful, after a while the template takes over...Whereas conversations always allow you to keep on exploring fringe thoughts...

3. Presentations have a start and an end. Conversations don't. There is no urgency to converge. No tyranny of CONCLUSIONS.

4. Power-points tie you to a lap-top, conversations free you to the outside world!

5. Power-points subtly take a lot of one's time in dressing up the thinking. Conversations give all the time to sharpen core thinking.

6. In a presentation, you are stuck up mostly with an aging Microsoft. Conversations allow you millions of sexy thought partners...

I wish they would ban power-points from an agency. Conversations are the thumb-nail of thoughts...Before technology took over and destroyed most of the joy of thinking...

Imagine blogging in power-points...Pukey thought. Isn't it...

Do write to me. I am always ready for a conversation! Everyone's invited - clients, strangers, prospective new business guys, fellow-bloggers...

Fark and the Market of One

I, the 18 day old blogger, was thinking blogging is for the under-ground men. Its for venting the thoughts, memes and other trapped emotions! But now a crop of entrepreneur bloggers, among them Drew Curtis, the founder of Fark.com are on their way to earn good money through blogging!

What is so insanely beautiful about Fark.com is that it's just a collection of reader submitted links to kick-ass videos, jokes and sundry trivia from around the web.

And even though many such sites might just be catering to markets of one, as the Long Tail points out there might be moolah there finally!

By the way, Drew of Fark is making at least $600,000 a month!!

IndiAdrant is Two Years Old Today!!

And this guys is the most amazingly consistent thing/work/writing I have ever done in my life! Pat on my back:-)(Small barely noticeable flutter/ blip in the blogosphere LOL) And here's the link to my first post Viruses of the Mind written on Aug 18,2006 in case you don't believe me...LOL

And the second year of blogging has been harder, more lonely! More repetitive(perhaps) but consuming lesser time...With RSS feeds taking away the sense of micro community the blog had once, it's been difficult keeping the momentum...

Also, often I feel sucked out. As if whatever I had to say, I have said earlier. And yet it's still addictive as hell! A week away from the blog and there is this gnawing desire to write something, anything to keep it going...As if it's a plant left unwatered or something:-)

It's the best piece of public narcissism devised by man/ technology. At the end of the day, even if nobody indulges you or humours you, you do it to yourself!

With about 355 posts,IndiAdRant has out-lasted a merger and a job change!! In the afternoon, I felt like cutting a cake for the blog:-) But then felt too lazy to do it.

What an atlas of my mind this has become! Maybe after I finish my Bollywood book next June, will hunt for a publisher indulgent enough to thread this atlas into a book...

I feel good and empty and lonely and happy and tired and energised and nostalgic and confident and lucky and knowledgeable and connected and good...

Goodnight!!
P.S. The small vase in the picture is my first pottery assignment!! Made after a sumptuous meal at the Taj property at Kumarakkam when we visited Kerala last December!!

IndiAdRant is 1 year old today

I've Just Been Tagged

As I was about to go to bed, just thought I would check my gmail and I discovered that I had been tagged by Neil Perkin- a marketing director based in London. Thanks Neil. Feels good to know that people whom I do not know(in person) have an interest in my thoughts, ideas and observations(often from the ordinariness of life around me). As I first discovered on John's(Grant) blog - “Tagging is this meme/viral that is going on for few weeks now where bloggers share 5 interesting personal stuff and then pass it on to 5 other bloggers.”

Before I tag 5 people I know, must download the few thoughts that are swirling in my head.

I have written in Blogs R Ushow blogs are changing our world, one tag/post at a time:-) and also about Blogging in India - Facts and Future.

Few new thoughts(and emotions), in no particular order...

1. Before Aug 18, '06 - the day I wrote my first blog post - Viruses of the mind, I was largely a lonely planner in a country where I feel there are plenty of planners but planning itself is in a stage of nascency. Well, we are planning to change that. Tomorrow might be a beer meeting(at Sports Bar)of at least 8+ planners(inter-agency). Looks like a first for Indian planners!

2. While there was Google and YouTube and sundry technology to get unfiltered and abundant data, as a non-geek, there was little I could do to connect with a global brain/ conversation/ POV(that's what I feel the blogosphere is turning out to be for me). And POV(new) is in short supply in the media space. Don't just go by the ra-ra press and mass media self-congratulaory gurgitations(of the media, by the media, for the media)!

3. I haven't read the James Surowiecki book - 'Wisdom of the crowds' beyond a few pages but funnily enough have written on the subject. And what a journey these last 6 months have turned out to be. The wisdom of the crowd through the blog world is a humbling experience. In the past 6 months, have gained/ gleaned more than I did in the last 6 years(maybe, most thoughts/ analysis these days are coloured by the recency effect.)

The blog world allows one to think like a micro-consultancy of one!

On Google amongst the millions of (lately badly matched data)pages, one still doesn't learn/ discover as one does linking through the nodes of the blog world.
It's like searching through the 'mind of people'(and it's more decent and fun and not as macabre as it may sound:-)

4. I haven't had much time to read too many blogs. Think am slow and am still low on experimentation. But John(Grant and Dodds), Russell. thotblurb are staple diet...
They keep me pre-occupied through the day and the week-end!

5. Coming back to the lonely planner syndrome. With the conversations in the blog world, I feel lonely no more:-)In fact, soon the problems might be of never being alone.LOL

Blogs are also the Low Cost Carrier of thoughts. They flit and travel at the speed of electrons. I feel there is so much positive energy all around. Some of the best minds are connecting and much good will happen sooner than later...

6. Why aren't more Indian planners a part of this. But that's one strange thing about many Indians(at least within the advertising/ media fraternity). We are too hierarchy driven(excluding the young planners on thotblurb:-). When I started my blog, I passed on the link to six of my ex-colleagues(no soured relations here:-) and 'three' of them didn't even bother to reply. The most enthusiastic response was from a planner friend who is at ChiatDay(therefore not in India technically).
I find most of the media guys(over 30) wanting in collaborative working. The few times when they do, its purpose driven. WIIFM(whats-in-it-for-me)variants!

7. The average number of thoughts I entertain on any given day has shot up dramatically. Does 'Technorati' measure that:-) I realise I also have become more observant because of my blog...And I sorely needed that...

And more aware of issues that I wouldn't have cared/ had the time to think about.

8. Blogs have also allowed me to discover my voice. It even forces me to be true and honest at all times. As a culture we find it difficult to retort and be aggressive(although we argue all the time - read the Argumentative Indian by Amartya Sen). IndiAdRant has helped me release the pent-up emotions and thoughts...

And now let me get back to the tagging business. Okay 5 interesting facts about me...
Although as I trudge through the web, I realise every day how boring I am compared to the rest of you! And Neil, you make me look even duller:-)

1.I believe am as good(or bad)a creative as a planner. But agencies in India stuck as they are in the narrow silos are unwilling to buy my creative services LOL
This piece of creative strategy won us the account at TBWA Mumbai. Of course the great rapport which the branch head enjoys with the client had helped.

2. My favourite planner is Javed Akhtar and the planning book(Indian) is Talking Films - Conversations with Javed Akhtar(he is amongst the best Bollywood script-writer, lyricist and poet of our times!

3. I have changed my career 4 times in the last 12 years - from a 'network marketer' to a 'school teacher', 'computer engineer' to a 'creative strategist'.

4. On my current to do list, the most exciting item is to start a picture blog for my 3 yr old son - Neo.
5. Sometime soon, I want to start a social communication agency. Looking for partners and some funding! I might call it SCAM - Social Communication And More LOL

Okay now to tagging 5 of my fellow Indian planners
Saurabh Sharma(Inquiring Eyes)
Roop Mukhopadhyay( Tissue Issues)
Meraj Hasan(On Movies books, music, poetry and life)
Fink
Pooja Nair(Seeing Things Clearly)

cheers
M\

Small Joys Amidst A Lot Of Jet Miles

I was cribbing to my friend Kumar about the drying of blog posts as my travel schedule continued unabated for the 3rd week running!

Frequent travel drains the juices...So I decided to catalogue all the Small joys that happened this last week as counter to the BIG travel.

1. When Neo rushed to hug me with chants of 'Papa aa gaya' as I reached home on Wednesday!

2. On the flight back to Delhi on Wednesday, I met my friend Rajul after two or more years...Chatted up with her...Her friend offered me a job at a branding company:-)

3. The hot dal-chawal-chutney-chokha after 3 weeks of regular hotel food...

4. Watching Metro with my friend DP at Priya Cinema...after ages...

5. Counselling from my mother yesterday on how to keep my cool amidst work pressure...

6. E-mail(few hours ago)from the French girl in London who wants to work in India as a planner!! Actually it was a power-point that I had asked her to do...Good stuff. Reverse BPO here:-)

7. SMS from Russell a while ago who wants another session of SchoolOfDavid.

8. The drive to Alibagh with my family. Watching the analog sunset when I should have been at the digital workshop. Sorry John. Had to take this break buddy!!

9. Getting drenched with Shilpi, Neo and Ved at Nishiland - the water park on Khopoli Road.

10. Checking my technorati ranking 10 minutes back and finding its risen by 1614 places even with erratic blogging in May... LOL

I feel these small joys are very important to cherish in order to stay sane amongst countless e-mails and meetings and discussions around soaps, mobiles and whisky...

Sunday, The Book and Javed Saheb's Angst

It has been a very busy and hard working Sunday. I am now in week 4 of writing my book - broadly around the theme - 'New Marketing learns from Bollywood'...

Writing a book does demand a very different level of conviction and attention. I thought my 2 years of blogging would be discipline enough but the book is a totally different monster...

Just managed to browse through the papers. Read this view-point piece on 'Terrorism and the Muslim community' by Javed Akhtar...

The problem of our times is that the best and the most learned and talented are silo-ing themselves from the real India - the angry, festering with violence(mostly engineered) India. So a departure from the normal rants on media and advertising...

Javed Saheb's angst ridden voice on 'Terrorism and the Muslim' in this DNA piece here made me restless...

1.'Muslims only get toothless commissions’ - Whenever they are killed, raped or burnt alive or their property destroyed, all they get is a commission which sits on the case for years, and ultimately gives a report. It may indict some people, but the report eventually finds its way into the dustbin.

2. You don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure that the VHP and Bajrang Dal are behind the church attacks in Orissa and Mangalore, but somehow this is not discussed. After all, this is also terrorism.

3. I recently heard a TV anchor ask someone if it was time for the Muslim community to do some introspection. This is a loaded question, even if it was not intended that way. It suggests that the Muslim community is, in fact, responsible for the various acts of terrorism its members have been accused of. Would you say that since the Bajrang Dal is burning churches, the Hindu community should do some introspection? I won’t ever say that because I don’t believe that the Hindu community as a whole should have to bear the responsibility for the actions of some of its members.

4. In our country, ‘Terrorist’ seems to be a word reserved exclusively for Muslims. Those indulging in unrest from the border of Nepal to Andhra Pradesh are naxalites; in the Northeast they are insurgents. And in the case of the Bajrang Dal and VHP, they are ‘social activists’.

Couldn't agree with you more Javed Saheb. But we need many more angry poets and angry common men/ women in this country...

The Salt Curve

I want to do a Edward de Bono week...I came in contact with this father of lateral thinking at the 'dilli gate' second hand book bazaar over a decade back(maybe more...)

Since then I have been regularly snacking on his ideas and concepts. It's a bit difficult and exhausting to read a Edward Bono cover to cover, but snacking Bono regularly has been both delicious and healthy!!

In his book, New Thinking for the New Millennium, Bono has argued that our judging system is flawed as we believe that 'if something is good, then surely more of that thing is better'!

No salt in the food makes it bad/ bland. When we add a little salt,it tastes good. But if we add more of the salt, it tastes bad again!

Technology is good. So more technology is better. However, it took more than two decades for worker productivity to actually rise after computers were first introduced in offices in the US.

Communication is good. So more communication is better. But I feel there was more information, more emotion and better communication in the monthly letter I wrote to my parents during my engineering days than the daily staccato communication on the mobile phone!

Blogging is good. So twitter is better!! Highly questionable I feel...

Humour in ads is good. So more humour in all ads is better??

Information is good. So more information is better. But 100 slide power-points often have less to tell than a 20 slide presentation!! More information might actually clog human decision making ability. And intuition tells me is the number one planner malaise:-)

de Bono's Salt Curve is therefore a great concept to keep in mind when devising communication solutions!

Marine Plaza, D&AD and Creative Lessons

I had made myself a promise last year to attend more industry fora, at least the ones in Mumbai. Have been quite regular. And would urge all of us to do the same.
With an industry already reeling under a talent problem and the fractious industry bodies getting impeded, we must do our own little bit!

There is no point blogging our rants. Even the smallest of changes need one action step!

Anyways, it was a thinly attended gathering. Actually, this was just a front to market D&AD( the UK based creative and design excellence award guys). Two half drunk, not-so-young, Brit women marketing the D&AD brochure, bad beer and peanuts and some chicken kebabs(which weren't bad!)

However, I have decided to be positive and get something out of every contact/ experience.
So, at night I breezed through the hand-made paper brochure and here are some nuggets I gleaned! Some questions, some observations, some pointers!

1. Is the left side of your brain always right? Think about all the instances when it wasn't. When it was.

2. Writing for advertising requires a warm feeling for words. You also have to look outside books, you look in unusual places and you encourage words to work on you; to surprise you, intrigue you, move you.

Then you experiment, bending and stretching language to find you own voice. It takes a while!

I find this particular bit of advice is relevant for planners and account management people as well! None of us need to draft boring, uninspiring briefs or memos!

3. Writing for design. Words give design a personality that engages the ear as well as the eye. They give the work a voice. But will others recognise it when they hear it?

It's important to sharpen our sensitivity to language. Rummage around it, strip it down, get opinionated about it. Track down our own writing voice.

Art directors must not be word blind. They must think beyond the pictures and learn to love the words too!

4. Talking Digital. Walking Digital.. The digital audience aren't consumers anymore: they are users. They are inhabitants of new worlds. They are adventures, story-makers, shape shifters, voyeurs. They are hands on and they are waiting to see what we are going to give them next.

Working in digital needs everything that we are already good at - and then some.

In the digital domain we must learn to create a dialogue with the user.

We must know how to build virtual space.

We must know how to transfom ideas into experiences.

And the surprising thing is that it's possible to explore all that without turning on a sigle computer. Digital needs to be demystified!

5. Interaction - the people formerly known as audience.
These days audiences do not sit quietly and watch and listen. Now they want to lay hands on our work. They want involvement. They want control.
Interaction is beyond 100cc ads and 30sec TVCs. They are making bus stops sing, park benches walk, dust bins emote and make 'chaddi' brands work of art!

No piece of communication is merely an object anymore. It's a relationship!So what are we going to do next?

Well, there were other thoughts whirling after bad beer went to my head...

6. Execution is 200% more important than the idea itself( most of the time)
7. Don't blame planners for a bad brief. Collaborate with them to explore the boundaries of a creative idea. I don't particularly find Honda's 'The Power of Dreams' original or greatly inspiring. Yet the creative leap is world class!

Of course planners must focus on making inspiring stuff like the book of dreams!
(visit Russell's site)

8. The answers are not necessarily locked in insights. They are more in the media landscape and in the interactivity of our ideas!

For 400 bucks, this learning was not a bad deal! Harshal/ Roop - recommend some good design books to read over the week-end...cheers

Twitter Frees

Read this story few days back about James Buck, the US student who got out of the Egyptian prison after his solitary tweet activated his strong US network! Read the story here...

I had never really understood the social utility of twitter. And therefore had stayed away from what I felt was a micro-blogging wasteful effort!

But this incident and a few others have finally made me realise that twitter is awesomely useful.

1. It's like slicing and opening up my brain to the world. And similarly sharing the thoughts of hundreds of people...

2. Twitter is still an attention-killer but the social utility over-rides all negatives I feel.

3. Twitter isn't the wisdom of any crowd; it can be the wisdom of a carefully-selected crowd. This and other nice thoughts on why twitter isn't such a waste of time by Sheila Scarborough here.

Late in the day but I am getting it:-)

Great Train Journey

My off tonite on a train journey to Patna along with young Neo. Father and son, both are very excited...

The questions have started pouring...
- Kaun se colour ka train hoga
- Driver boogies ko pull kaise karata hai?
- Driver bahut aagey kyun hota hai
- And over the next 30 hours, a zillion others:-)

So, will be donning the father cap and not the planner one for the next week or so...

Blogging will be intermittent, if at all:-)

The Size of Thoughts

I had/have a book by this name. By Nicholson Baker - a contemporary American novelist, whose writings focus on minute inspection of the narrator's stream of thought.

Baker is difficult to follow. Past attempts have been bouncers. But I love this phrase - the size of thoughts...

So, I decided to compile 10 Size of Thoughts Thots:-)

1. Very often, my immediate pressing work requires very small sized thoughts. Nano thoughts. Sometimes, no thoughts at all.

2. If we are satisfied with mid-sized thoughts, that's all we will ever have!

3. The company we keep, affects the size of our thoughts. Some people, organisations just shrink the size of your thoughts! Stay away from them...

4. Children have a habit of why-chaining(aisa kyun hota hai) everything! Their constant company can increase both the size and the shape of one's thoughts!

5. One person can change the size of thoughts of a country, an industry - Gandhi, Ratan Tata!

6. The more we stay with a problem, the more the size of our thoughts increase!

7. In advertising, who has the thought/ or sometimes the department of thought determines the size of thought:-)

8. Has constant blogging increased the size of my thoughts?! Decreased the size of my thoughts?

9. Do you only wonder about the size of thoughts related to work? What about the size of thoughts outside of work? For a social cause, any cause...

10. Have you noticed how News TV is squeezing the size of our thoughts?

I don't know whether it's making much sense...But I enjoyed the shape of these thots if not their size:-)

Go Episodic - Conceptoids and Factoids

Had written a post sometime back on what we can learn from tea bag marketing! Revisiting the theme of smaller SKUs of thought!

As planners( time starved & stretched) who routinely handle tons of data, information and tasks, our ability to do fundamanetal enquiries into consumers and other stuff gets heavily constrained!

Sometime back, I discovered a small trick of storing thoughts which I call conceptoids. These are essentially 3-5 slides of thoughtlets around a brand problem, a consumer insight, an observation from the media landscape, learning from the fringe, etc. They do not demand the time or the rigour of a full scale presentation or analysis. Yet are immensely useful later. I have a collection of about 100 conceptoids developed over a 2 year period!

In the last 40 days of active blogging, have realised that blogs are another way of concepting! Stray thoughts that earlier withered away now get stored. Often amplified by others' comments. Many a time become fodder for presentations. Or lead to other ideas. Other thought destinations!

As knowledge workers/ planners - conceptoids, factoids( bytes of information about the consumer or brand which shed an interesting light/ tell something new)and other smaller SKUs of thinking are very important to navigate through the info-glut.

The latest Economist issue says even gaming has realised the importance of episodic extensions rather than full scale ver2.0s. As a rule of thumb, when content in a game doubles, four times the intial resources are needed. So, the new trend seems to be game add-ons, which cost a fraction in time and money of a totally new game version and can be bought through micro payments!

Conceptoids help me sample more thoughts, keep a track of new learning, and generally stay afloat and sane among all the giga bytes of new information and content! Any similar experiences of new thoughtware for our times?

Browsing the Newspaper, Reading the Net

Everyday I feel, there is a war out there between the two media worlds that I am familiar with - the off-line and the on-line. NRS 06 says print readership is actually on the rise! But so has internet penetration, the visitors to MySpace and Orkut. The blogosphere has reached 50mn and shows no signs of abating.

And I,the media grazer am juggling between the off-line and the on-line worlds. Work demands that I consume a lot of information and news. So, in 2006 am getting four newspapers up from two last year( the subsidised annual subscriptions are the real cause). And grazing a lot of NET and TV as well!

But my newspaper reading time has not dramatically increased. Net readership time has! Increasingly I find myself browsing the newspapers, and reading the net, be it wikipedia, google news RSS feeds, John Grant and Russell Davies blogs, and more trivia and junk than ever before!

My media habits in the last 2 years have changed beyond recognition.
- I consume news as entertainment
- There is no fixed time of news consumption. They happen like internet packets all through the day.
- TV is for breaking the news and chat shows
- Internet for following up stories of interest
- My news sources have ballooned from 2-3 to at least 6-8 on a regular basis.
- News sharing is a new acquired habit
- And recently I have started logging and blogging my POV on the news that I browse.

But for the organised media, am still the SEC A, age 30-35 unit. I guess there are thousands of media animals whose grazing grounds and habits have fundamentally changed. Yet they do not feature in the large scale, print or TV skewed researches.

Would love to hear similar tales of new grazing habits from you...