Wednesday, March 28, 2007

How about barring mini skirts, noodle tops too?

Smoking poses serious health risks. So does driving in New Delhi. And combining the two is deadly, according to two New Delhi judges who have barred smoking at the wheel, apparently the first such ban in the world.

Declaring “New Delhi roads dangerous to human life,” the city’s High Court this week imposed a slew of new measures aimed at deterring habitually bad drivers, including the smoking ban and a prohibition on using a mobile phone while at the wheel.

“Anything that distracts the attention of driver is dangerous. The human mind cannot do two things simultaneously,” said New Delhi’s traffic commissioner Qamar Ahmed, welcoming the ruling, which goes into effect 9 April and only covers New Delhi, a city of 14 million people.

Source: The Mint

Monday, March 26, 2007

Indian Cricketers Seek Irish Citizenship in Desperate Bid to Play Super 8s.

A good piece...picked up from Son of Bosey. Read on....


In a cunning and daring move, several members of the Indian cricket team have hastily applied for Irish citizenship in the hope that they will be able to represent Ireland in the latter stages of the Cricket World Cup, from which India was eliminated in the first round.

Anil Kumble, all decked up in green, appeals to the Irish Government to grant him citizenship.
“I think it's a great idea. This way, we can finally achieve our dream of getting tonked by all the top cricketing nations in the Super 8 stage, where we truly belong.”, said Irishman-to-be Sachin Tendulkar, grinning evilly at press persons gathered to hear the announcement.
Apparently, the applications of the Indian players are being fast-tracked to enable them to qualify for the team before the Super 8 matches begin. “Thanks to our newly introduced Tatkal scheme, we can process the applications and have the necessary papers ready by lunchtime”, said Pavan Kachibatla, chief executive of the Board for Creating Citizenship for Indians (BCCI), and strangely, also of cricketology.com.
A spokesman for the Irish Government said, in between gulps of beer, that his Government was delighted to offer citizenship to the Indian players, and did not consider it unfair to the present Irish cricketers. “Look, mate, we're going to get our butts kicked by the big boys of cricket anyway. So how does it matter if there are some Indian players in this sorry, losing side? Doesn't change a thing for either team.”, he said, quite reasonably.
Sources have revealed that several of the Indian players are also changing their names for the occasion, resulting in names such as O'Ganguly, O'Tendulkar, and O'Dhoni. “This shouldn't be a problem. They've been regularly adding Os against their names for years”, quipped Wildlife Photographer S.U.Saravanakumar, adding a touch of his trademark tongue-in-cheek humour before leaving for Bristol once again.
“Brilliant! Whoever said that the Indians lacked strategic and tactical thinking?”, said Sunil Gavaskar, before adding “Australia sucks! England sucks! Oops – sorry!”
“Well, at least now we can say that we beat Pakistan again at the World Cup. Heh, Heh.”, pointed out coach Greg Chappell, clutching at straws as usual.
“We're focussing on the processes. Once the processes are taken care of, the results will take care of themselves.”, said Indian captain Rahul Dravid, pointing frenziedly at some Power Point slides. When questioned on why this thinking had failed to deliver results, he retorted “What do you mean? Of course we've produced results. They may be bad results, but they're results all the same.”
“Yay! I'm so happy, I feel like showing my . . . “, squealed a delighted Mandira Bedi, before abruptly deciding that perhaps it wasn't such a good idea to imitate Dilip Vengsarkar after all. She also reiterated that she was happy that there would be more matches featuring her favourite players, so she could continue to do what she does best - wear bizarre clothes, annoy viewers and cut off Charu Sharma in mid-sentence - for a few more weeks.
Harbhajan Singh was not available for comment, as he had rushed off in the direction of the Sheraton Towers the moment he learned that he was to report in Dublin.

The 'Axe' Effect...

Sachin out of Sunfeast ad

We have had meetings whether to continue with the Sachin ad. We may now promote our product through the Shah Rukh Khan ad, as he also endorses the brand. The decision will be taken today- Manager, Sunfeast

Team gets the boot from Reebok

We had a campaign with cricketers like Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh and others. But now, we will drop them and launch a new campaign with basketball and soccer stars in a couple of days - Sajid Shamim from Reebok India

After Friday’s defeat against Sri Lanka, Team India not only lost its popularity among the masses but also suffered a blow in the ad world. Corporates, who had based their ad campaigns on cricket and cricketers, are now on back foot.Sunfeast biscuits’ ad featuring Sachin Tendulkar could soon be off air. The company will instead use the alternative ad featuring Shah Rukh Khan. Pepsi has now pulled out its commercial ‘Ladega to Jeetega’, which featured Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh and Mahendra Singh Dhoni. Instead, the company has started running an ad shot, yet again, with Shah Rukh Khan, said Pepsi’s publicist.

Sourav Ganguly, who had made a singular comeback, is the brand ambassador for Puma Sports. The company, which was planning a huge campaign with Ganguly has now shelved the plan. “We had done a photo shoot with Ganguly with our products before the World Cup. We were going to follow it up with a huge campaign, but now we have decided to cut costs on the campaign and restrict it to a short one,” said Rajiv Mehta, managing director, Puma Sports. According to advertising agencies, the change of plans follows negative sentiments among Indians about cricketers. Said ad maker Prahlad Kakar, “Sony Entertainment Television and other companies will incur losses to the tune of Rs 150 crore because of the fall in the rate of advertisements as viewership will fall.” The matches were screened on Set Max and Sony Pix.

However, Kunal Das Gupta, CEO of Sony Entertainment Television isn’t worried, “The companies cannot remove any advertisements, as they have already entered into a contract with Sony. They can, however, change their ads.” Rahul Dravid is the brand ambassador of Hutch. According to Genesis, the PR agency for Hutch, the company will not face any problems as their ‘Chalo World Cup’ contest with Dravid was a pre-World Cup one. “Since it ended before the Cup started, we aren’t worried,” said a source.

Source: Mid Day

Nothing would change...

A few heads would be chopped...
The coach would be replaced....
The debate would go on till it loses steam...
In between, we will play against some minnows, win some matches and everyone would get hooked on to matches again.....
A few wins against any of the top teams (be it in the dust bowls of India), and everything would be forgotten & forgiven....
The cricketers would be again elevated on high pedestals, shrines would be made again, companies would flock again for endorsements...

...and life would go on.

Change is needed but not of heads but of attitude.

SALE!! SALE!! SALE!!

Something that I would expect soon outside all shops promoting Indian cricket merchandise.

The best ad of world cup

If you ask me, the best ad of world cup is of Tata Sky. Why?

Coz while evry other ad promoted its product thru cricket stars, mind n body..heart n soul kinda stuff, Tata Sky ad. promoted what many corporate customers are doing now - cancelling their bookings to West Indies. Like Hritik says " Where are you going Pappe? Cricket dekhney ka mazza wahan nahi (West Indies)..yahan hai". I agree dude.

I don't know if tata Sky would increase their "world cup" specific sales, but out of the entire lot, I guess their's is the only product that can get played again & again on TV without making you shut off the TV :D

Reader's contribution (on world cup)

Got this piece in today's mail from a friend of mine. Posting it on the blog. She added random Musings in front of it, so I am assuming she wanted me to post it on my blog ;-)
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The World Cup & I

For some reason, my love for cricket emerges only at the time of the World Cup.

Been really busy with work since January but every time I saw a Sony Max hoarding reminding me that World Cup was gonna begin in mid-March, my spirits would soar. Besides, my client Pidilite was planning a huge spurt of advertising during India's matches, so I had to keep up anyway.

A couple of weeks or so before the World Cup started, Anil and I were lazing around at my-in-laws place one Sunday afternoon (that's what Sunday afternoons are for, isn't it?). Anil's brother and he were having some conversation about cricket, and Bhaiya asked, "When's India's first match?" Without looking up from the book I was reading, I offered, "17th march, against Bangladesh."

The room went silent suddenly. I looked up to find Anil, his mom and his brother all looking at me, jaws dropped. "How do YOU know a thing like that???" Anil asked when he found his voice at last.

"Well I'm looking forward to it. I like World Cup Cricket." I said quite matter of factly, wondering if my family was going nuts.

"You DOOOO?" asked Bhaiya. "Holy shit. Even I didn't know that."

"Well my first Fevicol ad is also going to play during the first match, so I have to know, cos I gotta deliver the tapes to the channel by the 10th."

"Ohhhhhhhhh okay. No wonder you know then." said Bhaiya, almost with a sigh of relief. Anil and his mom also smiled and gave me a look like 'Ah! That explains it' and went back to doing what they were doing. I was puzzled. C'mon! It can't be that hard to believe I like cricket.

So anyway, on the evening of 17th March, a bunch of us friends got together at one friend's place to watch the match. India lost that one finally, as you know. I joked that on the following Monday, the Bermuda eleven would be standing against the boys in blue 'seena taan ke' a la Bhuvan and his team from Lagaan, after India's miserable innings today.

Monday evening, India won against Bermuda by a margin of over 200 runs. Not surprisingly of course! You don't deserve to be playing World Cup cricket if you can beat a bunch of kacha nimboos, do you!

The big match was gonna be at the end of the week. India vs. Sri Lanka. Big not only cos it was two well-matched teams (or so we thought), but cos it was going to be the decider match for India. Win or go back home. As simple as that.

On Friday, there was a buzz in the office. No one wanted to work! And everyone was scheming as to how to go home early today. For the poor guys who had to work, the company actually hooked up the 2 televisions that had been promised to us this year. I was outta the office by 6pm, and home by the time India had won the toss and chosen to chase Sri Lanka's score.

Anil and I were watching this by ourselves at home, albeit with all the equipment one needs to watch a cricket match in style. Beer, popcorn and some awesome tandoori food from Kareem's down the road. Sri Lanka's innings was an entertaining one, ending at 254 runs. And India's innings promised to be an interesting and nail biting one.

The excitement was building in my head cos I was 100% SURE India was gonna win this one. Not cos we have a team that showed promise. Not cos of some mindless intuition. But simply cos of the mindnumbing numbers involved. 150 crores of advertising revenue hinged on India's ability to win today's match, and therefore remain in the World Cup. I dunno if anyone noticed, but Pepsi released a new ad with SRK and the blue wristband that day, which urged people to 'wear the band and show your support to India.' Knowing Pepsi's distribution network, they'd probably spent millions on just making sure the damn wristbands reached every kirana shop that sold Pepsi.

There was no way India could lose. And there was no way today's match wasn't rigged in India's favour.

Like someone who agreed with me said earlier that evening, 'Cricket these days is better scripted that blockbuster Hindi films. All you gotta learn is how to read the script.'

My interest was not in the end result, but in the way it would be executed.

But by the time India lost Sachin at 0, I was getting drowsy. Don't know when my eyes shut and when I woke up, India was already 7 wickets down, with Dhoni out for a duck too, and the score at just about 150 I think. I think I was too sleepy. I drifted off again, and found myself being woken up by Anil a little later. I got up with a start, "Shit the match...whats happening? How long have I been asleep?"

"They butchered us. We lost." Anil said sleepily.

LOST. India lost. We're out of the World Cup. WHAT?????

I couldn't believe it. I still can't believe it. All logic (and economics!) goes against it. All that advertiser revenue, all that hope, all that electric excitement in this mad cricket crazy nation. All gone.

But as another friend remarked, "Atleast now the Indian cricket team has gone back to its old ways. Oh well..."

Oh well....*sigh* another 4 years. My interest in cricket awakens only during the World Cup you know.
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Contributor: Sheetal Goel

The height of optimism at Reliance Communications

I get a call from Reliance's call center -

"Saaar...very gud morning to u". I Yum caaling from reliance communications. Aapka naam selected customers mein shaartlist hua hai and hum aapko ek aafer dena chatey hai"

Me: Offer? Hmmm... knowing reliance's mastery in these tricky offers, I wanted to cut him short there itself, but before I could speak, the guy went on with his sales speech, and what he said, made me play on with him further.

" Saar hamarey paas World Cup ke liye ek special live score plan hai jiska naam hai - SACHIN NAZARA Plan" (now at this moment, I just didn't know what to do - laugh my ass off on this poor guy who obviously must be sticking to his sales pitch coz he has a job to do or simply snap him off)

Me: Are you Ok dude? Are you really selling this plan to me? You said I am the lucky customer...kis baat mein lucky mere bhai? India world cup se bahaar ho gaya hai and you STILL selling this pack!!!! :D Or is it that you offering heavy discount on it :D

"Saar...ab India bahaar ho gaya to kya..haar jeet to chalti rehti hai...par doosri countries to hai na...unka score sunney ke liye you will need this pack... " (@ this point really felt sorry for this guy..but still managed to restrain myself from snapping)

Me: Ok..I will subscribe to your pack..but on 1 condition. "Kyaa saar"?

Me: I don't want to hear it in sachin's voice. I want to hear it in...hmmm...Adam Gilchrist's voice.

"saar...yeah Nazaara pack hai..(he tries to bring the pich pack to the script..while I deviate it again)

Me: nazaara to dekh liya...ab bataao... adam ki voice me de paoge? nahi..to good bye. And i shut the phone.

I wonder if reliance is seriously thinking that people would still go for pack like these...even now! :D

Friday, March 09, 2007

EYES TO REPLACE MOUSE! What next….?

Fed up of clicking on the computer mouse? Relief could soon be on its way thanks to the efforts of Stanford University researchers Manu Kumar, a doctoral student and Terry Winograd, a computer science professor. They have created an alternative to the mouse that allows computer users to click links, highlight text or simply scroll by just looking at the screen instead of tapping a key on the keyboard. The technology is called Gaze-enhanced User Interface Design, or GUIDe. Kumar, 31, is part professor Winograd’s team, who interestingly was one of the early advisors to the Google founders and actually worked at Google for a time. Besides letting people browse, GUIDe will help switch between applications. It will take pressure off hands and fingers. The technology works with standard eyetracking hardware.

The software requires that a person look at a document, for instance, and hold a hot key on the keyboard (usually found on the number pad on the right). The area of the screen that’s being looked at becomes magnified. Then, the person pinpoints his focus within the magnified region and releases the hot key, effectively clicking through to the link. As the eye is not very stable Kumar wrote an algorithm that allows the computer to smooth out the eye pupil jitters in real time. The rest of the research involved studying how people look at a screen and figuring out a way to build an interface that does not overload the visual channel. Hopefully GUIDe will soon hit the market and help do away with mouse clicks.

-Economic Times

Thursday, March 08, 2007

Good Product Design Idea but Bad Usability


A real good example of a wonderful product design idea but I doubt it some thought had gone into product usability. The idea is really wonderful. Instead of stooping down each time and shuffling the CPU to insert the pendrive, build in the usb port in the keyboard itself. But as we see in scenarios like the one shown above, a slight nudge to the keyboard, and there is a great risk of the pendrive getting damaged. And it has actually happend with a team mate of mine. The keyboard concept with built in usb port works really well when the keyboard is kept on the table. I really can't say how many people would really remove keyboard from the tray and keep it on table whenever they want to use the pendrive port (as I saw from my team mate's case recently, not many would take that pain). But again, a really wonderful idea....wish I could really probe on how people find it to use in their day to day work and in all kind of scenarios (keyboard stand and without that).