A cotton farmer, a fashion week and a bull run!
Beautiful women, designer clothes, opulent settings, flashy cars and celebrity film stars come together to make a very heady cocktail. Way more seductive than the story of some poor cotton farmer. For the producers as well as the consumers of media, sex and money always triumphs over almost everything else. Karan Johar, Shobha De and TOI rule!
Is it any surprise, then, that skimpily clad women walking the ramps of the Lakme India Fashion Week were all over the media - in newspapers, magazines, TV, radio and on the internet.
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2 minute read | 277 words
Nine hours of shut-eye each night?
Yes, that is what experts suggest – children should sleep for at least nine hours each night. A good way to know that your kids are getting enough sleep is to check if they get up refreshed in the morning, with little or no cajoling. They however may not be getting enough sleep if they sleep in class, are irritable, display low energy through the day, avoid physical activity, and display lack of concentration.
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3 minute read | 440 words
Recommended Podcasts (Includes Podcast 101)
If you are already familiar with podcasting and know how to download and listen you could jump to part II – a list of some wonderful podcasts available for free download. Most of these twenty odd podcasts are in ‘Talk’, ‘Documentary’, or ‘Interview’ format and are mostly informative, incisive, inclusive, and international.
Part I: So what is a Podcast and where do I begin?
A simple way to look at this is in reference to a radio.
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4 minute read | 753 words
Engagement media?
In any media, while the size of the audience is important, the consumers’ relationship with the media is perhaps equally important. ‘Engagement’ is the buzzword. But what does it really mean?
Is a commuter who is shuffling through FM radio stations in her car just as engaged with her media as someone who is listening to a downloaded podcast by hooking her iPod into the car radio? Who is likely to pay more attention?
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4 minute read | 654 words
Bhaji on the bypass
We’re on our way to peace, quiet and stupendous views of the Himalayas in the distant hill station of Kausani in Uttaranchal. Barely an hour out of Delhi, and the cow belt hits you, literally. Ambling senior citizens, regurgitating a late munch on some roadside grass provide ample experience in zig-zag driving. Cow on the right, swing to the left; tractor approaching on the wrong side, swing to the right; pothole ahoy, bump thump, oops too late, speeding Indica zooming up to kiss its maker, and a truck, swerve to avoid being spread like jam between them.
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6 minute read | 1150 words
#photography, #photo-features, #travel, #himachal pradesh, #walking
The consumption and seduction treadmill
The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) has filed a suit against Kellogg and Viacom for marketing unhealthy foods to kids. [Read SpongeBob SquarePants, Health Risk in ‘The Nation’]
What about parents? Do they have a role to play in deciding what their children will consume, and how much of it? Or is it ok for them too be too busy providing for the family to worry about what is it that they are providing?
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1 minute read | 207 words
Tiger Sighting!
When my son and I went to Ranthambhore I was not expecting much more than an opportunity to spend some time with my son away from TV, PC, PSP, GSM… Guess what, we encountered the big cat! Not one, but three – Mum and two of her fully grown. And, up close. So close that we could smell them. I exaggerate not! They were so close that I could not fit all three into one frame (I was using a telephoto).
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1 minute read | 132 words
"Criminal Tribes": Notified, then de-notified…
‘My father is a thief’ read the tattoo on the arm of a child in the 1980s hit Bollywood film Deewar. In genuine Bollywood tradition, the child grows up to become Big B and then the obvious happens.
Imagine tattooing that message for hundreds of years, generation after generation, on millions of children. No, this is not a Deewar sequel, nor is it a plot of some xenophobic fiction. Tens of millions of children have suffered this fate in India, starting sometime in 1871.
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5 minute read | 983 words
Internet censorship: Google, China and the rest of us!
Google’s submission to Chinese censorship rules is perhaps more significant than Yahoo, or Microsoft’s submission, mainly because Google has, over the years, become ubiquitous to search. More importantly, Google’s submission invites concern because many people see Google to be this ultimate poster boy of free speech – irrespective of whether they are aware of Google’s official policy of ‘don’t be evil’.
Google has responded to large-scale media criticism by saying, that this move will eventually expand access.
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4 minute read | 849 words
A Traveling Photographer and a Nomadic Museum
Gregory Colbert has traveled the world for more than a decade and photographed encounters between humans and large animals in Burma, Sri Lanka, Egypt, India, Ethiopia and Kenya. This traveling photographer’s photo exhibition is, appropriately, housed in a 56,000-square-foot nomadic museum ( see photos of the museum). Designed by Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, this temporary structure is constructed by stacking 152 steel cargo containers – the kind typically stacked on cargo ships and available all over the world in standard shape and size.
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1 minute read | 156 words
Lessons from LINUX Asia for non-geeks!
Thirty slides and one hour into the ‘utter meaninglessness of life without Oracle’ presentation I began to wonder if I had been suckered into paying to hear sales pitches that I did not understand or care for. This was just the first presentation of the first morning of LINUX Asia (February 8 to 10, 2006, New Delhi); the prospect of enduring such an onslaught for three more days was daunting to say the least.
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6 minute read | 1095 words
Razing MG1. Raising hope!
My sympathies to all the big shot designers who lost there outlets and their high-profile 1MG Road address. Really, I know it hurts to loose something that you have paid for – even if you buy Liz Claiborne rip-off and get a good deal on it… a loss is a loss. Similarly…
My sympathies go out to all the villagers who have land adjacent to radial roads like the MG Road.
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2 minute read | 264 words