Month: May 2012

We are planning to go to Sydney and Gold Coast for the summer vacation in late June / early July. Any suggestions for things to do? I will of course to the web scanning, checking TripAdvisor, reading LonelyPlanet, and so on. But it always helps to ask for unique individual experiences that people would have had in their travels.

I had been to Sydney many years ago to attend a conference on ICT for Development. But I didn’t do much of sightseeing.

Our total vacation time will be about 8-9 days, split between Sydney and Gold Coast.

We have finally begun this project that I had written about a year ago:

This week’s links:

• What motivates successful entrepreneurs? From Forbes. “Solving a problem you are so passionate about that even if the solution doesn’t result in wealth, you are still thrilled you “solved” it.”
• What is a school far? by Seth Godin. “School was invented to create a constant stream of compliant factory workers to the growing businesses of the 1900s. It continues to do an excellent job at achieving this goal, but it’s not a goal we need to achieve any longer.” Also see Thomas Friedman’s column in NYT.
• Browsers and Apps in 2012: by Tim Bray. “It seems very likely to me that there’s something simple and beautiful lurking inside the browser platform that will hit the greatest 80/20 point in software history. But I’ve been thinking that for a decade or more, now.”
• Yahoo and Flickr: A sobering story from Gizmodo. “This is the story of a wonderful idea. Something that had never been done before, a moment of change that shaped the Internet we know today. This is the story of Flickr. And how Yahoo bought it and murdered it and screwed itself out of relevance along the way.”
• India’s Economic Predicament: Bibek Debroy writes that “2004-14 will be as damaging as mid 60s, 70.”

I recently gave a talk at a meeting on higher education. I began by giving some advice on how conferences can be made much more interesting, and then spoke on three themes: the type of education that is needed for tomorrow’s world, the role of technology in education, and the role of government in education. Here is the 20-minute audio of the talk.

I was meeting a friend, and he invited me to given an impromptu talk to his staff. I said what I have often said in my company.

First, get rid of the fear of failure in all that you do. More often than not, it is not failure that holds us back, but the fear of failure. That takes away our risk-taking capabilities and makes us ultra-cautious. And that is not good for the company, in general. Failure can be the biggest teacher. And if we don’t have the gumption to fail, we will never succeed.

Second, make decisions as if it is your own company. Not every decision can be referred to a manager for permission. People have to make decisions regularly. And the principle to be followed is – what would you do if this was your own company. If that thinking can be pervasive, one can be quite certain people will do what is right more often than not.

When I read interviews or hear with some of the government officials, it sounds really good. All of them seem to know exactly what the problem is, and are very good at putting forth solutions. Just like editorial writers.

The problem, of course, is that these same officials are the ones in charge and running the government! Their advice is what they should actually be implementing. And that is what makes one angry. There is a complete disconnect between the talk of such people and the action. Their actions are either not there, or they are the opposite of what they talk.

This is the problem today. Those in power are not acting based on what they know and what they know they should be doing. Clinging on to power has become the paramount focus. I just hope we are able to see through these empty and hollow words.

I was talking with a friend the other day of how the government is starting to hurt industries through arbitrary regulation and policies.

I was myself witness to what happened to the SMS business with the TRAI regulations that came in last year. Other than that, the telecom industry is hurting. So is the microfinance industry. The gold finance companies too have been severely impacted by the spate of regulations brought forth by RBI. And there are perhaps some others.

On top of this, the Finance Minister is still intent on bringing forth those retrospective taxation laws.That has the potential to hurt many companies.

I don’t remember the period just before 1991 much since I was in the US then, but I can only imagine how it must have felt. Unfortunately, we don’t have elections for another couple years.

A good book can open up the mind in a way nothing else can. A book transports us into the mind of the author, and makes us see the world through the author’s eyes.

I thought of this in a recent Book Club meeting. I had missed the past few meetings, so it was good to be back. I realised how much I had missed as I listened to the various books being discussed.

I really think everyone should not just read good books, but also discuss them with a small group of people on a regular basis. Create a Book Club of your own. Pick people who are very different from you, so you will get exposure to a world of books that is very different from the kind you read.

In my case, it has now been more than 12 years since we have been meeting. I hope you too can foster such ties with both books and a small set of book lovers.

From a post a year ago:

This week’s links:

• 3 Reasons to Master the Art of Storytelling: by Riley Gibson. “Most entrepreneurs don’t realize the art of storytelling can help you succeed in the start-up world.” (via Atanu)
• Apple’s 2 brilliant moves that created the iOS powerhouse: by Dalton Caldwell. One of them: “Apple is doing market segmentation off of a single product line.”
• Promising Startups: from NYT. Who will become the next Instagram? “…whether because they’ve seen explosive user growth, or are attracting investors or a new demographic, or just because they have an unusual idea that seems to be taking off.”
• 2 Indias: by Swapan Dasgupta. “Paralysed by their own predicament, political India has been left with one option: to squeeze productive India and hope that this yields fiscal and electoral returns.” Also see: The Regulation Raj, A Haymarket warning and the coming jobs crisis.
• America and the value of ‘earned success’: from WSJ. An interview with Arthur Brooks. “Earned success means defining your future as you see fit and achieving that success on the basis of merit and hard work.”