The Golden 80s

There were two lifts in that building. In front of one of the lifts, there was a blue chair, that cheap plastic variety I would have bought if I were a slum dog. The chair was facing the lift as if they were engaged in an infinite conversation. The other lift seemed to be working and a yellow flash of light showed that it was coming down. The lift opened, I said second floor to the lift operator, went to where I wanted to go, and climbed the stairs down as the lift had no buttons. The only sure destinations were the top floor and the ground floor. As I made my exit, I saw a man lying on a tree branch. The tree did not have much leaves and the trunk was dark. I thought of cutting one of the branches, or simply pushing the man down. Then I decided to walk towards the left from where a strong smell of fried fish was wafting in.

Real estate: According to real estate honchos, India should grow at 8% (including environmental clearances), to grow economically and to create jobs. But for whom is this real estate growing? Not for the middle class or the poor. Definitely not. But a big yes for the filthy rich. Just see the apartments, duplexes, and penthouses on offer. They are just five-star luxury suites packaged for the rich in India. These are not the typical Indian homes that we all grew up and would want to live in. These Rs 6-10 cr luxury suites can be bought by the rich and those with black money. Or those who are willing to pawn their entire life to the bank and the real estate company. In the early 90s, it was alleged that the IMF and World Bank would enslave all Indians and herald the second colonization of India after the British. Even the World Bank miscalculated the potential of Indian businessmen. And in the 90s, we said so many things. We don't remember most of them. Youth : As a youth I als...

The human nose can detect at least 1 trillion different odours, much higher than the 10,000 scents earlier estimated, says the Nature magazine . The noted science magazine also says that the human nose has around 400 types of scent receptors.

Have you ever wondered what constitutes a crime committed by an editor or a reviewer? In the days of proofreading, there were standard symbols associated with the changes to be made in a copy or manuscript. When it came to desktop publishing, the editor or reviewer used to turn the Track Changes feature in a word processing software like Microsoft Word on. Technical writing tools such as Adobe FrameMaker and Madcap Flare enable commenting on a document. Adobe Acrobat allows comments in PDF docs. So, despite all these modern facilities, what if someone goes to the extent of editing text on the sly in a document? Edits that the poor writer discovers later and finds them damn wrong. One reason may be overconfidence. The reviewer would have been so overconfident and would have never imagined that the edits would be wrong. The reviewer must not be knowing that industry practice provides the benefit of doubt to the writer. The mantra, "When in doubt, check it out." applies to...

If you believe that human beings are the ultimate species on earth bestowed with all the qualities that can ever be imagined, please think twice. BBC reports that elephants can recognise human voices and also differentiate the voice of a kid from that of an adult. And the reaosn why they can or have learnt to recognise human voices is that they are scared of human beings. For the poor elephants, human beings are the most feared predators. As human beings, we all know what that really means.

1 I love cricket. I like to waste time by watching cricket, even though the results many not be in line with what I want or like. Indian cricket fans know that. Team India will lose when we expect them to win; the team will win when we expect them to lose. Just like the lives of millions in this "developing" country and also the "Next Big Thing" in the world, we are used to frustration. Usually, the teams had the dressing room where the team, next batsmen, coach, and the 12th man used to sit and watch the game. But, somehow T20 heralded the arrival of a new term to cricket: Dugout. On checking at M-W.com, Dugout is "either of two low shelters on either side of and facing a baseball diamond that contain the players' benches." The key thing is "baseball". Yeah, baseball. With T20, cricket is or resembles baseball. Because, here, in T20, what matters is over the top ecstasy. Whether the batsmen can hit the maximum number of balls out o...

Analytics is the buzzword now and technical communicators cannot stay away from that either. There is a really interesting discussion going on at the "Users of MadCap Flare" group at Linkedin. The discussion is centered around how Google Analytics can be implemented in a Flare HTML 5.0 project. It is a good discussion and is pretty useful. Please have a check.

There is something called "principles" in journalism, just like those in other prestigious professions. Besides the cardinal principles of Truth, Verification, and Informed Criticism, there is a thing called uncomfortable "questioning" employed by professional journalists to ferret out information and truth, and to counter canards, lies, and misinformation. Flowing with the tide cannot be journalism in the strictest sense of the Fourth Estate, and it is a characteristic more suited to Public Relations (PR) and spin crafted in corridors of power. Now, cut to another story. A respected court of law found someone guilty in a serial blast case and sentenced him to six years in jail. As per the law, any convict is eligible for 90 days parole in a calendar year. The convict was released on furlough for 14 days on October 1, 2013 and had applied for an extension of another 14 days, after which he returned to Yerawada on October 30, before being granted parole in Decemb...

Ok. Hard rockers Wolfmother is gonna play live in India for the first time. The band will play in Hyderabad on March 8, at the BITS Pilani Hyderabad Campus, says the Bookmyshow website. The band rocked to fame with their retro-rock sounding hit, Woman , but my favourite song from the debut album was White Unicorn . And there is no special reason why I like this song.

After Dengue and Chikungunya, now it is the turn of Hanta virus suspected behind deaths reported from the state of Kerala. Madhu, a 43-year-old rubber tapping worker, died a few weeks ago and is suspected to be a victim of the virus, says The Times of India newspaper. According to The Hindu newspaper three suspected cases of Hanta virus were reported, but these cases proved positive for Scrub Typhus as well. While the Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology (RGCB), the premier biotechnology research centre in the capital city, stated that the deaths are caused by Hanta virus, the state Health Department reportedly disputed it. Hanta Virus infection leads to the fatal Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome (HPS), says the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) website. Earlier symptoms include fever, headaches, muscle ache, stomach problems, and chills. Later, shortness of breath appears along with coughing. The virus can also cause the deadly Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome . Rodents ...

Fish resources in the mesopelagic zone are of great interest to scientists. The mesopelagic zone is the vertical layer of the ocean that extends down 200 metres to 1,000 metres. This zone is also called the Twilight zone as the reach of sunlight is less here, but just enough for photosynthesis. It was earlier estimated that with 1,000 million tonnes, the mesopelagic fish population constitutes the dominant fish biomass in the ocean.  Now, a study by Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) published in the Nature Communications  journal claims that the mesopelagic biomass may be 10 times more than expected. The new estimates are based on acoustic observations made by the Malaspina expedition. For the scientists, the mesopelagic zone is important as it is through this layer that carbon dioxide must pass to darker lower layers of the ocean. The exact mechanism of carbon flux and the interactions of living beings in this ocean layer are still unknown. For example, the orga...

It is quite some time that the news channels based in Delhi and Mumbai keep mumbling on how the "youth" will usher in a new India in 2014 by casting their votes for the same old politicians. Huh! In an article on Mint , Sanjay Kumar, a professor at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, debunks the untested hypothesis unleashed by the media.  Excerpts from his article: "... Banking too much on the youth vote or the votes of the first-time voters may ultimately backfire, the reason being the Indian youth hardly votes as the “youth” or the “young”...Studies indicate the youth have never voted en bloc for any political party, at least not in the last five Lok Sabha elections (1996, 1998, 1999, 2004 and 2009). They have remained divided between various political parties like voters of any other age group are divided between various parties ..." "... It will be a gross misjudgement if someone believes the youth will determine the outcome of the 2014...

Jeetu Joseph's Drishyam starring Mohanlal and Meena is a welcome change from the slapstick associated with Malayalam cinema for some decades now. Mohanlal as Georgekutty is a cable TV operator and film buff, struggling to make both ends meet with a bit of agriculture thrown in for his income. His wife, Meena, reminds frequently him that he has forgotten to live due to his miserly ways, and wants the best in life for her family. The first half is entirely focused on the family and the picturesque land they live in. It belongs to Mohanlal. Misfortune strikes the family and Georgekutty vows to save the family from the police as well from the long arm of the law. The second half is occupied by how the family struggles to keep themselves together, while Asha Sarath as IG Geetha Prabhakar tries to prove a point. To me, the second half belonged to Asha Sharath and Kalabhavan Shajon as Constable Sahadevan.This is not to forget the entire cast who had done well in this film. The fil...

Leaders who pick and quibble and snipe are people who fear that a Mojofied team might threaten their own petty power. If your environment is a snipe-fest, good people won’t stay. From Ten Ways Companies Drive Away Talent, by Liz Ryan in the Forbes.

This post is about the word, refer, used in documents to indicate that the reader must go to another location within or outside the document for additional information. In general, technical writers know it as "cross reference". If you open any dictionary, it will say Refer is a transitive verb that requires an object. This means that in sentences like the following one, you have to be careful: For more information on installing the product, refer to the product Installation Guide. It is very common to see the above said sentence written in the following manner: For more information on installing the product, refer the product Installation Guide. Avoid such mistakes, or use "See" for such cross references. For more information on installing the product, see the product Installation Guide.

"...The speed of communications (a revolution, Rosa points out, that came on the heels of transport) rose by a factor of 10 million in the 20th century. Data transmission has soared by a factor of around 10 billion...,"says an article on how the meaning of "now" has changed in modern times due to the bombardment of faster and faster stimuli.

This is from Le Monde : "...That kind of atmosphere encourages a widespread Tea Party-style, neo-Poujadist movement outside the traditional parties, through intermittent outbursts of rage and the incessant tub-thumping of social networks." Encyclopedia Britannica calls it " Poujadisme ". It was interesting to know what this "Poujadist movement" was. The movement was spearheaded by Pierre Poujade, a French populist politician. The Wikipedia says, "...The main themes of Poujadism were articulated around the defense of the common man against the elites. .. Poujadism was opposed to industrialization, urbanization, and American-style modernization..."

Realized that you have to be very fast to do this: 136.6, Zaheer to Peterson, no run, pushes ball to cover  136.5, Zaheer to Peterson, no run,  good ball, a yorker, batsman oses balance and falls down 136.4, Zaheer to Peterson, no run, swinging ball keeps low after pitching, rolls down to Dhoni 136.3, Zaheer to Peterson, no run, pushes the ball to cover again  136.2, Zaheer to Peterson, no run, Comes forward and defends the ball towards cover  136.1, Zaheer to Steyn, OUT, wide ball outside the off, Steyn attempts a lazy drive, Dhoni takes the low catch TOOK A BREAK! 134.6 Zaheer to dU Plessis, no run, played straight to the fielder 134.5 Zaheer to dU Plessis, no run, full length ball, defended well 134.4 Zaheer to dU Plessis, no run, flicked to leg side 134.3 Zaheer to dU Plessis, no run, played straight 134.2 Zaheer to dU Plessis, no run, defended well 134.1 Zaheer to dU Plessis, no run 133.6  Jadeja toSteyn, no run 133.5 Jadeja toSteyn, no ru...

The question whether we are really "aware" in this information and smartphone age is a topic of a big debate. I use the word "aware" in the way it is defined in the Merriam Webster free online dictionary. Aware (adj): Knowing and understanding a lot about what is happening in the world or around you. Yes, there is knowing a "lot" about what is happening because we are all bombarded with messages of all sorts in various media unheard in the 80s and 90s. But do we really understand what is really happening around us? Let us check this tweet: While most of the people will focus on the person mentioned in the tweet, I have a problem with something else. That is, someone has built a forest in 30 years. If a forest can be "built" in such a short period , it is really wonderful. But as an Environmental Studies student, I very well need to dispute this fact. A forest is not a vast collection of trees in acres of land. A forest has a structur...

The phrase, Elegant Variation, was coined by Henry W. Fowler in The King's English (1906). The essence of that term will help Indian writers to understand how carefully one should write.  "...The use of pronouns is itself a form of variation, designed to avoid ungainly repetition; and we are only going one step further when, instead of either the original noun or the pronoun, we use some new equivalent..." Fowler then lays down two guidelines: "...It is impossible to lay down hard and fast rules, but two general principles may be suggested: (1) Variation should take place only when there is some awkwardness, such as ambiguity or noticeable monotony, in the word avoided. (2) The substitute should be of a purely pronominal character, a substitute and nothing more; there should be no killing of two birds with one stone." Try to practice it. It is very interesting.