Basket Case

The revolution has started. The long awaited change is upon us. No office is ever going to be the same again as the employees, long oppressed under the yoke of having to wear pants and going to office, march into the glorious future of sitting in their beds with their laptops and asking their friends, children and significant others to keep it down. But no matter how much fun we make of it, the world has definitely shifted. Large companies like Twitter have announced permanent WFH for employees who want it. There are already predictions of suburban price boom in real estate as employees start moving out of overpriced and overcrowded cities in US. Back home, it is not only the startups but even companies like TCS that are looking to have a large chunk of their workforce working from home even when situation returns to normal. Amidst all this, there is little discussion on the implications of WFH in context of India. How will different kind of employees affected by this? Is is...

Like fashion, even scientific research is subjected to cyclical fads. Topics, techniques come into limelight and then fall out of favor when the gains plateau.  In machine learning, NNs were in vogue in early 90s when SVM came onto the scene and blew them out of water on almost every problem and then got superseded in turn by the log-linear models, CRFs and others. Then in beginning of this decade, NNs have made a tremendous come back, this time becoming the tool of choice for NLP as well. Due to their name and a very crude similarity to how the biological brain is organized, NNs tend to invite comparisons with human brain and every improvement achieved with their help tends to be seen as an step towards Artificial General Intelligence, at least in popular media and common people.  Now, what would happen if tomorrow a different method, a different paradigm of Machine Learning were start performing better than NNs? There is no reason why it could not happen AFAIK. W...

I am not a registered voter in Bangalore. There. I said it. I am sitting here diddling my thumb as others around me go and elect their government. In the 14 years since I qualified as a voter, I have voted once. As it happens, shortly before I turned 18, I left home and have lived in hostels, other cities, other countries ever since, never remaining in one place for more than 4 years. Being politically aware at the national and state level but mostly feeling as an outsider to the proceedings in immediate vicinity. I voted in the last LS elections because I happened to be in Lucknow on the election day. In 2009, When I looked up the candidates I had to choose between, I was stuck. For me, Lucknow meant Vajpayee, someone I had come to admire. Given that he was a top level leader, his views on variety of issues were well known. But by 2009, he was no longer around. As his nominee, we had Lal ji Tandon from BJP - someone I had never liked. Congress had Rita Bahuguna in fray. Hardl...

Almost 10 years ago I started this blog. At 273 posts, it amounts to 1 post every 2 weeks. I can't think of any other habit that survived that long with that consistency. Of course, just like all statistics, this hides more than it reveals. For the past 3 years, I have written 7, 7, and 5 posts respectively. I don't know why I am writing this post. Not here to promise another flurry of activity. This is not the last ditch effort to save a dying relationship. It is not meant to be a epithet for something that has been lost. This is me spending some time with an old friend where the friendship has become such a part of you that gaps in time can be bridged at will. Threads can be picked up wherever they were left. And new yarns can be weaved effortlessly. Welcome 2014. Hope we will have a good time.

Let me confess something. While it has been years since Pothi.com has been selling ebooks and it has been years since I have been talking and thinking about ebooks, it is only recently that I read a complete book on a dedicated reading device. The book was Lean Analytics published by O'Reilly Media. But this is not a review of that book. This post is about what it felt like reading a fairly long book on an e-reader. I read part of it on Kindle and part of it on Nook touch. The first thing I noticed was that e-readers these days are very good and you don't miss the paper version all that much. I have said this to many people who express doubts about e-readers - Try one out for 1-2 days and do some serious reading on it. I bet a lot of people would change their mind one they try out a device. The key is to not see it as a replacement of paper books - the only way they are represented in most media coverage. Instead take them up as a device on their own and see if you like th...

One of the mantras of entrepreneurship is to build something that people want. The road to success is lined with geeks who dreamt of beautiful solutions existing in perfect worlds for problems that no one seemed to have. Lean startup formalizes this in terms of customer development. The aim is to identify a customer who is willing to pay you money today for what you can deliver tomorrow. Recently there was an article in NYT about how the American fast food industry  has filled people's plates with more salt, sugar and fats in an effort to sell more junk food. Many of the executives, when confronted with questions about these practices, defended themselves on the pretext that they were only giving people what they wanted. If they do not give it to them, someone else will. Why is it that these executives seem to be doing something wrong (or bad if wrong sounds too strong)? They were merely following the oft repeated advice for building a successful business. In fact, making food...

Some people seem to misunderstand the "high risk, high gain" maxim. They argue that if I am taking some risk, I should get the reward. I recently heard a candidate expecting 100% raise when considering an opening at a startup. When you hear "high risk, high gain", pay attention to the order. Risk comes before gain. Often much before. And the fact that the (monetary) gain is not guaranteed is part of the risk (in the startup environment). While you are at it, find out about the concept of expected value. Your aim should be to maximize the expected value of your reward over next N years of your career. Now depending on your definition of reward, that might mean that you are better off in a job with a bigger company which is perfectly rad. But at least, you won't have ridiculous expectations! PS: Just as I was posting the article, the right idiom occurred to me: You cannot have your cake and eat it too. So there.

That the education system in India is screwed up is no secret. When companies like Infosys, TCS and Wipro say that a large number of engineers graduating every year are unemployable, it sets a pretty low bar on the quality of technical education. The low standards of technical education are felt most acutely by the entrepreneurs trying to build technology companies in India. On one hand, very few good engineers survive the education system. On the other, the few who survive are claimed by the companies like Google, Yahoo, Amazon and other well established firms. Now it would be excellent to tackle this problem head on and fix the education system in a fundamental way. However I have been thinking about a much smaller problem recently. As a matter of immediate relief to the high technology startups, is it possible to help more geeks/hackers to survive the current system? What is the most effective way of doing that? Out of that huge swamp of mediocrity, how can we give a he...

I have mixed feelings for the Facebook "Like" button. In the Facebook universe, "like" is the uniform mechanism for interacting with various pieces of content flowing around. You can Like status updates, photos, comments on updates and photos, Pages and even ads! One interaction to rule them all. The reasoning behind it is that it reduces friction and leads to more people clicking on the like button. This is what Facebook would want the users to do. But what does it mean for us? How do you feel about coloring the whole world in the 2 colors of "like" and .. well, "no comments"? From the perspective of somebody who likes the human languages a lot, it is distressing. One feature of human languages is that they are wonderfully precise. The variety of expressions and words available to describe very similar but distinct actions, feelings, things is not only useful but also charming. And this precision is very selective. Different cultures develop...

In another 10 days, 2010 will be past. A past, we can never visit again. But we are humans, a inherently optimistic lot. We don't worry about past, we look forward to future. Well atleast sometimes :) One of the most popular and perhaps the most way of looking forward to coming year is to take resolutions. While they hardly last for more than few weeks in most cases, everyone keeps taking them every year. Which is fine - they make you exercise for at least for those few weeks. Anything is better than nothing! Now one way to make your resolutions last longer would be give them some momentum before hand. Why not start working on that reading list right away? Or start getting up a little early everyday starting today. By the time new year rolls in, you would already have started the journey, perhaps even stopped and started again. That should prove to be more effective then suddenly getting up on 1st of January and telling yourself that you are a changed person now. Try it. I am t...

If you ever find yourself saying, "If you don't believe me, you can ask <insert a trusted party>", stop. It is already too late. You cannot make up for the lack of trust by borrowing it from someone. On the other hand, you can borrow money in a time of crunch. So when faced with a choice between keeping somebody's trust or saving some money, choice should be obvious.

Recently MVP guys started this meme on Twitter which asks #whyamientrepreneur ? I am sure every entrepreneur at one time or the other has asked him/herself this question. Some ask it even before they start, while others ask it when they are considering quitting. Either way the answers which come out are quite eye opening - a wide range of reasons bring people to startups. Somebody wanted to create jobs, somebody just wanted to break free from artificial restrictions imposed by the system. Others wanted to be their own boss. All of these are very inspiring reasons and I am sure they have been given with complete honesty. But here is my question to all of the entrepreneurs - Are you an entrepreneur because you are an escapist? Before I explain what I mean, let me explain what I do not mean. Those who came to do a startup because they wanted to break out of the system or didn't fit in are not escapist by my definition. Neither are those who wanted to "escape" the corporate ...

This article about Room To Read in Business Week caught my attention, (through a Google Alert set up on Self Publishing). Specifically the last paragraph which I reproduce here: While Room to Read's accomplishments so far are quite impressive, John isn't satisfied. Children aren't using the libraries enough. Of the 5.6 million books in the libraries, only 1.3 million have been checked out so far. So Wood's local teams are working with schools to make the library experience more compelling to children. Self-publishing content is another piece of the strategy. The more books the organization can publish in local languages that are sculpted for young readers in those places, the more likely they'll want to read them. Unfortunately, it costs about $12,000 per book for writing, editing, and printing expenses. While generating more engaging content, content tailored to local culture, environment and in local languages is very important, I think there is one more importa...

Over the years I saw and wondered at the recruitment patterns at I-banks and other top notch financial institution. They took BTechs, MBAs and PhDs, in Mathematics, Computer Science and even Physics. These were some of the best brains around, armed with the best education our society offered. And we hoped we were in secure hands. Only that the mess we see now tells us we were not. It is one thing to be able to crunch numbers, to be able to understand and beat complex dynamics of markets, to churn profits years after years for your employers. Putting it all in perspective and seeing the big picture is another. When profit is the only marker one gets judged by, soon or later it will stop mattering where it came from. It has happened again and again but alas ! our greed gets better of us every time. I think, at one level, it all comes back to the familiar question of responsibility of science. Just because something can be done, should it be done? Packaging bad intentions into a intellect...

Recently, while talking to couple of my friends about the bomb blasts and the subsequent police investigations, they took the following two positions without any sense of irony: Police can easily crack these cases, the only thing missing is political will to let them do it. Example was Gujrat police was able to crack the case in few weeks while so many other cases have not been cracked yet in other states. In the cases of terrorism, you have to accept circumstantial proof and cannot hope to get good solid evidence. The question that remains is if the speedy cracking of cases related to acceptance of weak evidence? I totally agree that the political will to crack such cases is missing in general but I see no ground for accepting anything less than rock solid evidence. If we are not able to gather that, we are not cracking the case, we are probably finding scapegoats left behind by the actual master minds.

After the marathon journey of 14 hours and a missed flight scare, I am sitting here on Mumbai airport waiting for the final connecting flight to Bangalore but it has still not completely sunk in. That I am finally back ! This single journey has changed so many things ! So many thoughts claiming my attention ! Nostalgia about the lovely friends I have left behind, many of whom I will never see again ! Leaving PhD and returning back with a MS from CMU , something which was a dream come true 2 years ago ! Being back home after 2 years ! For the first time in my life, no security cover in the form of a job or studies! The new personal life that awaits me in months ahead ! New developments, new life or a promise made 2 years ago is getting fulfilled? My tired and jet-lagged brain is not letting me think about any of these right now and the only thing I am able to worry about right now is my luggage, I hope I get to see it and take it through customs today only. -------------- The luggage w...

दो कवितायें। दोनो ही कुछ अधूरी सी पर जिन अहसासों से वो निकलीं थीं वो अब अपनी ताज़गी खो चुके हैं और इसलिये इनके पूरा हो पाने की ज्यादा उम्मीद शेष नही है। अतः जो कुछ भी है, हाज़िर है। १) पूरब रवि तत्पर आने को, पश्चिम मे विधु ढल जाने को, धूमिल पडते जाते तारे, जग से अंधियारा भाग रहा । कल रात नयन से निद्रा का एक पल को मिलना हुआ नही, पलकों मे बन्द रहीं आंखें, मन का दरवाज़ा खुला रहा। कोई बुला रहा ! २) हर एक दिल मे हमें दर्द बेहिसाब मिला , जब भी आंख खुली, चूर चूर ख्वाब मिला । सवाल जब भी उठे इश्क़ के, मोहब्बत के, हर इक निगाह से एक टका सा जवाब मिला । मिला इतना अभागा, भर गया दामन मेरा, गगन मिला, ज़मीं मिली, तुम्हारा साथ मिला ।

Who knew I would be playing 'Aashiq Banaya Aapne' ... again .. and again !

This landed in my in-box today. Offered with no comments. dear friends one of my friends needs advice on how his brother needs to prepare for getting admitted to bansal classes. if you know anyone who could help, please reply to this mail. thanks, xxxx

Let me pick up this thread from my last post. I lamented there about the lack of higher education (PhD level) opportunities India. That is one of the reasons I am here. But make no mistake, majority of the Indian students who come to states every year, do not come here to get educated. That degree they get is just a stepping stone to this land of opportunities. In most cases, it is not even the oft repeated story of becoming used to things here and finding it difficult to return back. They made up their minds long before the passports were stamped and bags were packed. Considering that the job market in India is booming like nothing before, markets are open and shops are full, why do people still leave? And for most of them, money is not in short supply, these are not the people who didn't get the opportunity or faced oppression. In fact most of them belong to the most privileged class of people. And I don't know what you thought when Haneef after everything that happened, aske...