Saurabh Garg on The New New Thing

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I have been really tired off the these copy paste blogs, “social media consults”, opinion leaders who are widely quoted in media. Something has to be done. The buck stops here.

This page is now officially the most useless page on the Indian Web scene because I would aggregate information about most boring and useless things on the Indian Internet. These people just add noise to already cluttered world of web and need to have a serious relook at what they do.

Please send in your recommendations here.

Ok. Focus 2.0. From now on I am only talking about Entrepreneurship, Starting Up, Innovations, Ideas, Communication, Technology .. contd ..

Social Media, Marketing, Digital World, Advertising, Business, Investing, Photography, Gadgets, Geekdom, Travel, Books, India .. contd ..

Customers, Engagement, Activation, Gaming, Politics, Education, Media. And I will try adding to that list.

P.S.: Messages on Twitter (1, 2, 3).
P.P.S.: I am serious.

Next in the 1v1 series. Whether vs When.

Today I will talk about Whether and When. Most of the times when you want to take a decision, there is often a debate between whether and when. You argue on things like “Whether you will do or not”, “When will you do it” etc..

I think the use of these words greatly affects the decision.

The WHETHER questions by its very nature brings along uncertainty and with it a possibility of not doing it. You might do it. You might not. You will ask more people about it. You will seek more approval for the idea. And in the end you might or might not do it.

Moment you start asking WHEN question, the whole paradigm changes. You have already made the decision. You are going to do it. If not now, later. But you will do it. And this decision makes all the difference.

What do you think you will choose when making decisions? Whether or When?

Not caring for literary flowerification and language style critics around here, this is going to be rude post. For people who dont know that specifics, Reliance ADAG is Anil Ambani and Reliance Industries is Mukesh Ambani.

Reliance ADAG has made clear their intentions on getting into organized retail. People might remember that ADAG and Reliance Industries had a non-compete agreement when Mukesh Ambani and Anil Ambani agreed to split in 2006. Terms of this agreement were not made public but how in the world can Anil Ambani get into organized retail when everyone knows about Reliance Retail and its hazaar different retail formats and more than 500 stores?

And if this was not enough, ADAG’s retail venture is called Reliance Big Bazar. Surprised? Not really. Shocking? Yes. What about Kishore Biyani’s company called Pantaloon Retail and their flagship retail store Big Bazaar?

Perfectly understandable that ADAG calls all their businesses BIG. Big FM, Big Music, Big Flix, Big Entertainment etc. but Big Bazar? I always thought that CGA will not allow you to name your company that confuses customer will an already existing brand. If there was small guy in some class C town in India doing the same thing, he would have been sued for his every penny for corporate lawyers.

If the name was stupid, the reason given by ADAG is even more stupid. They are saying that Kishore Biyani’s company is called Bazaar with two a’s and their’s is called Bazar with a single a. With even bad Photoshop skills, one can very easily make the two logos very similar and rest can be left to anyone’s imagination. They have said that they would not use the word “Bazar” or “Big Bazar” on standalone basis. They will always use “Reliance Big Bazar”. And this saves some grace for them.

But overall a very bad move. And Isn’t this piggybacking on someone who has put in time and effort to create a huge brand? What about customers? Isn’t this a cheap way to get customers?

India asks Y.

Image Credits: http://farm1.static.flickr.com/142/349070891_d279d63b80.jpg

A friend emailed me following

The problem with the progressing world and the ever-evolving generations of human is the overwhelming assortment of information, thoughts and ideas thrown around with little care leaving many dumbfounded and many others thinking and analyzing those bits that came their way. While there are some who are simply left confused because they don’t know what exactly to absorb and what to ignore and worst still how to interpret and how to infuse it with their understanding of the world and life. Left behind as a result are ambiguous thoughts and confounded souls living unfocused lives with hazy dreams. As they say “ignorance is bliss” !

An after-thought:
Meet the new generation… aware and confused. Just as we were as kids and now as youth… just as our parents were at the prime of their life… the information burden just keep on increasing with the passing decades… as the generation passes by, there is more to know and discuss with ever-increasing pressure to know…

Meet the kids of today… overwhelmed with the burden of knowledge… burden imposed by us… accepted by them… given the increased level of their curosity… given the easy access to information sources. With the progressing world, every time we pass on a larger information dump onto our future generations causing them to think and grow much faster than their predecessors.

And I wonder, if this more knowledgeable generation will be better prepared to face the world out there and lead an enriched life or will it just lead to the loss of innocence much earlier than required without helping them to grow into better humans?!!

Here is my reply.

There is only one peril. With the democratization of information and things available at finger tips, everyone is expressing themselves. Most people are not really thinking. They are just paddling what others have said. And thus the noise increase. Its the classic battle between signal and noise and currently there is a lots and lot of noise around.

And this noise adds to ignorance. People think its enlightenment but it truly is ignorance.

As far as the next generation of India goes, thing is that burden is only expected. Darwin once said and I totally agree that the fittest survive. If you are not fit enough, if you are not knowledgeable enough, if you are not intelligent enough, you would be in the lowest rung of the pecking order and that is not an interesting place to be. Once you are there, you loose everything that a human being wants from life - authority, power, food, sex, control and other things like that.

Any feedback?