Watch that watch

The All India Federation of Horological Industry (AIFHI), India's official body for watches, released its statistics yesterday. There are two important statistics: Watches in the price range of Rs.100-250 are showing strong growth rate, while 27% is being clocked by watches which sell in the sub-Rs 100 price bracket. That apart, watches in the price range of Rs. 1000 to 2500 (one third of the market)are actually showing only 1-3% growth rate. Then again, watching at 2500-5000 are showing a strong growth rate. Also, another big issue with watches in India, is that the unorganized sector is growing at 61%, but the Titans & the Maximas are almost static.

I find this interesting. I think atleast two inferences can be made from these numbers:

1. Watches which are growing are either sub 250 or higher than 2500. This is something I have been predicting for long. The reason why 250-2500 watches are not growing, is that they have been substituted by mobile phone devices. As we might guess, if you can afford a watch at Rs.1000, you should be able to afford a mobile phone. And most people with mobile phones dont seem to be using watches anymore.

2. The unorganized sector is growing rampantly. This often happens under two circumstances:
a) The organized sector does not provide enough value to the customer. This could be happening. A watch is no longer a complex engineering device. Anyone can make a running watch.
b) The industry is getting commodotized. This is also likely, considering that margins are going to be razor thin from now on.

The solution, if I were a watch manufacturer, would be two fold: In the short term, to design watches beautifully, and start positioning them in the niche between jewellery and watches. If they can create a lifestyle product, they might still live.
In the medium/long term, I would strongly want to exit the watch business. I was once in a presentation where Titan's CIO was talking to IBM about their business. He didn't define Titan as a watch company. He defined them as a precision engineering company. I think every watch company that wants to survive must move from being a watch company, to being an engineering company. Titan, for example, moved into providing speedometers and precision instruments for cars. This was a great solution, and it would need to move out of selling medium-end (1000-2500) watches in a very short span of time. Titan wants to get about 400 crores in revenues from aviation and automotive equipment. Neat!

The biggest battle ever

The biggest ever acquisition of an Indian firm is in the news for the past two weeks: Hutch is selling out to the highest bidder. The developments have been interesting:

1. Anil Ambani sets up the finances, and values Hutch at about 15-16 billion dollars. This would mean that the Ruia's, the Essar group would get about $4.5 billion. This was one of the biggest sellouts in Indian corporate history.

2. Vodafone throws its hat in the ring, and values Hutch at about 16-17 billion. After their failed bid for AT&T last year, it was the second time Arun Sarin was looking for a big acquisition for Vodafone. This is in line with Vodafone's strategy of looking for investments in emerging markets. With 7 million new cellular subscribers being added every month, there was no place like Hutch. Hutch also possessed the highest ARPU (Average Revenue Per User) among all Indian operators. With 20 million such subscribers, the valuation was at about $750 per subscriber. This was in line with global valuations, though on the slightly higher side.

3. The Essar group decides to buy out Hutchison's share in Hutch. This would mean that they would only need to buy out 66% of the company, hence their cash requirements became considerably smaller. Of course, contractually, Ruias had the first right to Hutch's share, and if any Indian company was buying Hutch out, the Ruias had the first right to match their share. Anil Ambani's fortunes began to look bleak.

4. In the latest development, Anil Ambani has valued Hutch at a whopping $18 billion dollars. The Ruia's 33% share would be rich beyond their wildest imagination. Besides, considering that Hutch was registered in Mauritius, it would be completely tax free income. Earlier on Thursday, Vodafone seems to have made a $19 billion offer. Hutchison itself is valuing its Indian company at $21 billion. That is Rs. 95,000 crores.


My two cents: Look at the graph above. The war for Hutch is not a war for a telecom company. It is a war for an emerging India, where 7 million customers are being added every month. Hutch owns a 20% share in this country, so they are growing at about 1.4 million customers every month. This war could hand the future of Indian telecom in Vodafone's hands. It could be Anil Ambani's biggest bet yet. It would make Anil Ambani the biggest telecom player in India, and hand him a completely built GSM Network (a move he has been planning for long. In fact, 7-8 billion dollars were already being planned for this move). It could create the new czar of the telecom industry in India. But the bottom line is this: Hutch cannot be valued at its current customer base. It should be valued at its market share: 20% of India's market. When India is 405 million customers big, it would be 81 million customers. The potential is limitless, and no price is too high for it.

The economics of cinema

Over the past year, Indian cinema has seen some phenomenal highs. Every single week, some new movie comes into the scene and clocks about ten crores. This is phenomenal money. Now cinema is an interesting industry, especially because it mirrors the economy so directly. I would think that if there was a study done, the highs in the stock market should coincide with the highs in the movie industry of that region. If the economy is doing good, the movie industry always does well.

I have often mused on this blog that there is often too much money in movies. If every good movie can make about 20-30 crores, the economics of the industry are being incredibly skewed. The market had to intervene. Somewhere, something had to give, to rationalize the business. The following events have spurred my interest:

1. Yashraj is probably the biggest movie house in the country today. Largely, increasing revenues were because of multiplexes and their high ticket fares. PVR, on the other hand, was a leading multiplex chain in the country. As the revenues in the industry started to increase, PVR realised that they could do better than what they were making. Interestingly, Yashraj did not really want to. So PVR cinemas banned Yashraj films. This should definitely reduce movie collections in one way or the other. Either Yashraj films would be forced to part with more share of revenues, or they would stay off PVR, DT cinemas and Adlabs. The theater industry is in a consolidation phase, and studying it is really fascinating.

2. The tamil nadu government has capped the maximum fares that theaters can charge. This means that customers would now have to pay lesser to watch a movie. This would mean that there is again less incentive for piracy, and more people can pay a smaller premium in order to go to a theater for the full experience of the movie. This should definitely alter the dynamics of the movie industry in Tamil Nadu. A shocking statistic: The movie VCD/DVD industry is Rs. 200 crores in India. The movie piracy industry is Rs.20,000 crores.

3. Moser Baer, a world leader in DVD/VCDs, has entered the movie DVD industry. In a fascinating move, they have got into the content distribution business, and are planning to distribute DVD's at Rs. 34. Thats less than a dollar. Moser Baer has not been doing very well in its core business of selling blank CDs & DVD's, and this should definitely stir up the industry, and reduce piracy very effectively. Its the age-old Microsoft Strategy. Use your muscle to enter an industry below par. Then pump in money and research to gain initial market leadership. Then, when the market is dependent on you, hike your prices.

Any more changes in the movie industry, anybody?

Of coffee cups and innovation

I was sitting at the IBM office in Gurgaon late this evening, and I overheard a couple of people talking, while walking back from the coffee machine.

Apparently, IBM was on a drive to give every IBM-er around the world a coffee mug. This was done with the intention of reducing paper cups and helping the environment. The story goes, that an IBM-er somewhere submitted a business case about how paper cups in IBM were much more expensive, and how coffee mugs would result in enormous savings for the organization. A section was also on environmental impacts. That case was enough to spark off a management debate about paper cups and coffee mugs, and finally, in every IBM office around the world, 400,000 people would be given coffee mugs to drink coffee in.

Talk about innovation from within.

What is Zapak?

A few days back, I watched an advertisement for Zapak.com. In line with my usual concerns, I got worried for my investments in the stock markets, because start-up dotcoms were beginning to give advertisements in the newspapers.

An article in the economic times made my eyes pop out of my sockets and dip into the cornflakes. After dry-cleaning it and putting it right back, I realised what it was that made my eyes react so violently. Zapak is going to invest $100 million dollars in the gaming business in India. Thats Rs.450 crores. As I read further, I discovered that Zapak was an Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group Company.

This is quite an audacious statement: "Our aim is to create as many as 1,00,000 gaming seats across the country with 50-60 million registered gamers in the next 18-24 months," Reliance Entertainment President Rajesh Sawhney said. 50-60 million registered gamers in 18-24 months, when there are 50-6o million internet users in India today?

The plans are ambitious, but brilliant. There is nothing quite as exciting as creating a product where a market has never existed.

Essentially, a gaming site is also a social network. However, the only catch is that people dont get online and view other people's profiles. They get online and play games. It is as social as orkut, or any other site. If Facebook could be worth a billion in two years, and youtube worth 1.6 billion in 18 months, I don't see why Zapak cannot.

But here's the thing: Web 2.0 is built on a new business model:

1. Come up with a great idea
2. Build a community of fervent users
3. Let this community talk among themselves and to others
4. Get a couple of rounds of funding
5. Let this community grow to a critical mass
6. Start advertising slowly, so that investors know you are looking for money
7. Get acquired by Yahoo/Google/eBay, or go public

In all of this, you DO NOT start off by placing advertisements on your front page. That comes after step 6. You also do not offer free email. That died in 2001. Only 4 players offer email today, and one of them is hotmail and really dead.

Essentially, what happens after Step 7, is that the parent company clubs this community into its already existing community of users, and sells its basket of products to it. It could also use this acquisition as an advertising platform. But the vital link for a sustainable business, is to make revenues from a good business model after Step 7. This is why Naukri.com became such a successful IPO, because there was money to be made, and a job search market to be conquered.

Herein, Zapak seems like a great move. There is a business model at the end of the rainbow. There is a very rich company waiting to plough in money and wait for the returns. How far can they go? Only time can tell!

The iPhone wont be by Apple, VoIP, Wikipedia and other midnight ramblings...

Its bad enough that Linksys releases the iPhone, one of the most awaited Apple releases of the year. It is also said that the term "iPhone" is owned by Cisco, and Apple will never own it.

The good news is that VOIP (voice over internet protocol) is coming into the mainstream. VoIP is the technology that drives sites like Skype. Its a protocol for voice packets to travel with minimum distortion. As you will know from Skype, the difference cannot really be felt. VoIP provides infinite mobility, wherein you can move anywhere across the world, and still make/receive calls.

Of course, VoIP is still some way off in India, what with paranoid telecom operators against the move. Interestingly though, very recently BSNL and MTNL have promised to introduce VoIP in India in a big way. This should really slash rates by about 70-80% atleast.

Think about this: How many times a day do you visit Wikipedia? Wikipedia is collecting money to keep themselves going. Would you like to contribute to this venture which has changed the way knowledge has been shared in the world? They are at $94,000, and server space is expensive. Go on, donate!

Of news-channel SMS polls

Have you ever watched one of those polls on NDTV or CNN-IBN? They have these polls very often, where you can SMS your opinion to a number (often "Yes" or "No"), and the results are displayed on the screen once in a while.

What I used to find interesting was, very often, the most controversial opinion always used to get an overwhelming "thumbs up". The reason is quite obvious, and thats what makes a lot of these SMS polls quite farcical. An SMS poll is an optional poll. Only if you believed strongly in your opinion, would you participate. Thats why most of the polls would move in the direction of controversy.

That also explains why news channels itself get so embroiled in controversial news. Its not because there is nothing else to report. Its because nothing else would make you watch it. Thats why Karan Thapar can run a half-hour show discussing one phrase in the PM's speech, and taking

Thats also why Doordarshan news would always be the best news channel in the country.

Gartner says...

Yes, its that time of the year again, when all and sundry start making predictions about the next year. Now, its Gartner's turn.

Among the big predictions is: "Blogging will peak in 2007", with a total of 100 million blogs coming into existence in the following year. However, I disagree. I would not term this as the peaking of blogging. I would say that blogging has peaked, when the number of hits of the top 100 blogs put together for the whole year is greater than the internet big 4: Amazon, eBay, Yahoo, Youtube. Please note how google is left out of this list. But of course, Google is the gateway to the internet. It is an integral part of the DNA of the internet. It would always be the gateway to all the blogs in the world.

But this one is huge: Windows Vista would be the last major release of Microsoft Windows. This, I agree with. And this could finish off Microsoft, if it tries to pull off the gigantic project again. For the entire report on the predictions, you would have to pay. But here's a preview.

You!

Time has released its famous person of the year award. Guess what: Its you!

Its a symbol of your freedom of opinion, your communities and your collaboration. It was a year in which Youtube signalled the entry of the new age media, blogs exploded to about 60 million, and the long tail moved from a concept in textbooks to a viable business strategy. The concept of Web 2.0 has changed the way people look at you very differently.

2006 has been a year in which people began looking at you, not as a passive entity which viewed advertisements and went out to shop, but as an active builder of opinions, communities and value.

Its not that this movement began in 2006. Web 2.0 began with the dotcom bust in 2001. From 2002 onwards, people were getting online, posting their opinions online, reviewing books and making themselves heard. Over the years, this movement gathered strength, and soon these opinions became valuable. Primarily because these varied opinions began to be read, and the best of these opinions were voted to the top by a dear tool known as Digg. The tools which began sifting through these opinions began to deliver enormous value to the end customer, and hence became a powerful advertising weapon.

As people began to get online, they started to create their identities online. Friendster gave way to myspace and facebook, and India found its own in orkut. How orkut actually succeeeded, I will never understand. The closest I can begin to guess is that we are indeed a very voyeuristic society. We like the cover of darkness that orkut gives us, and we love reading other people's scrapbooks, watching their pictures, and making new friends. Second life is the next level of this, where identities would not only be a page, but also a virtuo-physical entity.

By end 2006, it is safe to say that Television is firmly on its way out. The internet is in, because it is not about websites or portals. The internet is about you, about video-sharing, about millions of blogs like this one, and your online identity.

The internet respects no geographic boundaries, no intellectual property, no Digital Rights Management, and no authority. If that has been the internet's greatest strength, I think it will also emerge as the biggest problem. And if anyone can provide a half decent solution to these issues, he's likely to be rich beyond his wildest dreams!

Simply addictive

You have to see this: Google Patents' lists out over 7 million patents, hence bringing to the online world all the patents in the american patent office. This has already been possible, of course, but it brings the google efficiency and simplicity to this entire effort.

You can just keep looking at some cool patents filed. Like the device for cooling an infants brain, for example. Or the original flying machine patent.

Dada and VVS

As I watched the one day series between India and South-Africa, I could not but help feel sorry for the Indian cricket team.

For many years, cricket was about batting, silken grace, wily spinners and thinking captains. Over the past ten years, Australia had changed all that. They made cricket about aggression. They made cricket seem like a battle. They psyched out the opposition before they went into play the game. The game became about aggressive fielding, negative tactics and fast fiery bowling. The captain's only job was to make audacious statements, and to wait for his team to stand up to him.

As I sit and watch Saurav Ganguly and VVS Laxman, I was reminded of those fine days, when a satisfying day of cricket was like tasting a bottle of Bordeaux-1787 Chateau Lafite wine. As I write this, out of 119 runs in the second innings, 84 runs came in boundaries. Most of these boundaries were delectable strokes of the front foot. Just like the good old days. Every stroke has been beautifully driven through the covers or flicked past square leg. The fielding side was South Africa, a new generation team. They tried everything they could. They bowled faster than they ever have, they dived to catch balls which were six feet away, and they sledged like they never did before. It is a beautiful ongoing battle, which is separated by ten years.

Saurav Ganguly is playing like he always has. Every ball that is more than two inches outside the off stump races to the boundary in a hurry, with the bat moving like a magic wand in the air. Every ball outside the legstump is missed or ducked or hit on the back. Saurav is playing like he best can: With his back to the wall, and every cricket lover waiting for him to score. Not because his fifty runs can change the game, but because it gives hope. It gives hope to a team which has seen its worst days in a decade. It gives hope to a cricket crazy country which has been losing continuously for months now, and to a cricket board which is embroiled in controversy and its own politics.

VVS Laxman has never looked bothered by worldly things like form. Everytime he walks in, he gets right into the act. The venue could be the spinning tracks of Chepauk stadium, or the fastest tracks in the world like Perth or the Wanderers. He walks out, and gets down to playing pleasing strokes from the word go. He just likes to look good and comfortable inside. It looks like David Gower came back to play his second innings in the world. When VVS gets going, it seems like there is no bowler, no fielder. He plays so beautifully that the world just sits back and claps.

ESPN Star sports invented the art of cricket telecasting in India. Harsha Bhogle, Sunil Gavaskar and Geoffrey Boycott made cricket an analytical experience, with each understanding nuances of the game like no other. About those glances between the batsman which no other channel would pick up. About that alignment of field which would be pureplay strategy that McKinsey would be proud of. About that straight drive which leaves the whole world staring. About the mind of the batsman when he comes back from a long layoff, and pierces the offside like only the Prince of Calcutta can.

Dada and VVS are no longer together, but every moment of their batting has been pure delight for the old timers. It seems like cricket is still in the 80's, and South Africa are a bunch of schoolboys trying to match the sheer class of the visitors.

Bangalore-d!

Kill the call center

Sometime back, I was talking to a friend who wanted to take a broadband internet connection. I kept telling her to take an airtel internet connection, and she kept insisting that she would go with her local cable-wallah, purely because she didn't want the hassles of the callcenter.

I found this very interesting: After all, call centers are the greatest innovation of the services age. As soon as you would lodge a complaint, "a complaint number" would be issued to you, and you would get a response within a few hours/days. Or so they said.

In India, a call center means that you would talk to a dimwit in some corner of the country, and your challenges would be the following:
1. Deciphering the accent of the person speaking
2. Getting him to understand your problems
3. Getting a time commitment from him to resolve the issue

The odds of all these occuring, are, as a friend once said, like winning the russian roulette.

Now, wouldn't you pay another 50 rupees just to know that you can call your cable-wallah, and he would come over in an hour and set things right?

Now the issue is this: The Big's can save a lot of money by selling to us faulty products under the support of call centers. On the other hand, the small's can charge a premium, and offer the human touch. In the long term though, sadly, these small's become big, and get sold out to bigger players: Like Tom's of Maine.

The solution, I think, is somewhere in the middle. A large corporation like Airtel should split itself into areas, have area sales managers, and put them accountable not only for sales, but also support in that area. Which means that a call would be logged directly to the manager in that area, and he would have to give his name, and an assurance that the issue would be resolved in four hours. He should be directly reachable if something went wrong. The selling party should not be independent of the supporting party.

I always had this thought of a business. I would own one aircraft. It would fly between many routes, but I would travel with them everytime. I would make sure my passengers are comfortable. I would know my passengers by their first name. It would be the anti-thesis of Air Deccan. We would decide the menu an hour before, depending upon what the passengers want. It would always be packed, because my clients would not dream of going elsewhere. But here's the thing: I would never buy a second aircraft. I would keep it at one, keep the quality high, and ensure that we have a fun airline where everyone would know everyone.

Now how's that for a business plan?

On 8th December...

Many days ago, I was walking in a large shopping mall in Noida. My expectations from the malls of UP were pretty low, but I was pleasantly surprised. As I walked past a the atrium, I heard a soleful voice which sang, "I'm just a jealous guy..". That's when it really hit me. John Lennon had never really left.


On the 8th of December, for the past twenty six years, a whole generation mourns. They travel from all across the world to visit Strawberry fields. Many of these people are younger than 26 years old. But they make the trip anyway. They all light candles around an inscription that says just one word: "Imagine".

For many years ago, a man gave us hope. In the throes of war, he showed the way to a whole new world. Every single day of his life, in every single word of his songs, he talked to the world, and wanted to change it. He went from heading a boy-band phenomenon which was arguable "bigger than Jesus Christ", to leading the whole world to chant "Give peace a chance" in the peak of the Vietnam war. John Lennon loved mankind, and only wished that mankind would love each other.

It is now twenty six years since he passed away, but the enigma continues. Sometimes its hard to believe that he is dead. Maybe he still isn't. Maybe he's sitting up there, and peering down with his boyish frame and wondering what the hell we are all up to.

This one's for John Lennon, the Beatle, the dreamer, the jealous guy.

Have you ever...

Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night, because you wanted to hear... and you waited and listened very hard, and you heard it all.

When you got up in the morning, you were all alone again.

The last of its kind

Microsoft Windows Vista released for its corporate clients yesterday.

A new operating System from Microsoft, five years in the making, and ten thousand of the world most brilliant minds, thats what it took to make Vista.

In a wonderful article in the Seattle times, Dean Takahashi talks about why Vista might be the last of its kind.

It is an interesting observation. Why do we need an Operating system when the browser can take care of all requirements.

Many years ago, Microsoft convinced the world that computing was moving to the desktop. Amidst jazzy marketing and excellent packaging, Windows and Intel became powerful brands and piled on the profits, while the entire world began believing that the age of the server was finished. Organizations like IBM began to pile on the losses, because the customer began to believe that the age of the server was finished. The network computer never really materialized. This was the nineties.

With Web 2.0, a new force entered the market: Google. Google convinced the market that the power was in the servers. It built probably the world's most powerful supercomputer using freeware and parallel computing. Search became the way forward. Microsoft and Intel's share price began to flatten, and their fortunes sank. Meanwhile, the mainframe corporation of the world, IBM, began to find its revival. The network computer was coming back to life. Microsoft began to diversify into a complete consumer electronics/entertainment company. Intel began its long road into the doom.

As it stands today, Microsoft has fired its last salvo, the project which is being hailed as Mankind's biggest project ever, beating the Manhattan project and all the NASA projects hands-down. Microsoft is trying to win back the desktop computing model.

By 2008 Microsoft will either regain its monopoly, or become an also-ran in the computer business. Grid computing shall make an entry, and the desktop model will die a slow death.

The complexities of politics

I was watching Karan Thapar on the "Devil's Advocate" today. The guest today was Vaiko, and he was being taken apart by the Doon school-Oxford educated Karan Thapar. He made Vaiko admit that he had double standards, and although DMK and Congress are against the LTTE, he joined them to offer them support at the center. He questioned that this was a contradiction, and like other political parties, Vaiko was not driven by ideology and changed his colors for every season. Vaiko tried very sadly to explain that it was a common decision, taken by consensus in the party cadre, and it was not his own. Of course, Karan was not in a mood to listen.

I find this talk very common in today's media. Everyone seems to be accusing politicians of having double standards, and changing their political affiliations everytime the election season approaches. For one, I do not believe that Politicians are the best thing to have happened to Independent India. But I have my reservations against how they are being targetted for having "given up" their ideology.

Politics in India has evolved over many years, and I do not blame them for having to change political parties very often. I will explain from a business I understand slightly better: Technology

Lets look at Microsoft. For many years, it has been fighting the Mozilla foundation with its Internet Explorer, for supremacy for the biggest browser in the market. In recent times, this market-share for Internet explorer has been coming down, and Mozilla seemed to be giving Microsoft a serious run for its money. Now, Microsoft and Firefox are collaborating on their browser technology, to offer better value to the customer. Knowledge-transfer is taking place between the two companies, and they are working together selectively to ensure that the customer can get optimum value. Similarly, after many years of fighting with Linux, Microsoft and Novell announced a pact to made interoperability better between Windows and Linux.

Another example: IBM and SAP do business worth $4.5 billion every year. At some places, they collaborate. At some places, they compete. IBM itself is so complex, that I myself know of deals where two IBM teams have bidded for the same contract and one of them has won it.

The moral of the story is: The business is about the customer. Whatever works for the customer would have to be the ultimate compromise among the vendors. Similarly, Politics is about the voter. If two parties feel they need to collaborate for strategic reasons, then they need to. They might have differences in many areas, but if they combine to deliver value to the voter, then thats the way it should be.

I believe politics in India is getting to be too complex to be defined by a single ideology, and we should respect this fact and live with it.

The economics of Indian cricket

Ok, now we know two things:
1. Saurav Ganguly is going to South Africa to join the Indian cricket team
2. The Indian team is playing just about as well as Umrao jaan did a month ago

What is interesting to me is that Saurav Ganguly is joining a losing Indian cricket team, and his fans expect him to turn the performance around. Now, I cannot comment whether he can do that, but for the benefit of all the three people who read this blog, I decided to put together a few scenarios:

1. Saurav plays well, India plays well: This is the best case scenario. As usual, Indians will confuse correlation with causality, and we will begin to assume that Saurav has "caused" India to play well. In this case, the selectors would keep Saurav Ganguly, and keep him as a player in the team. The management would be happy, but the tensions would rise because, as we all know, Coach Chappell can't see eye to eye with dada. Of course, from the current state of affairs, this scenario is not very likely. Bengalis call for Chappell's blood, for making India lose so many matches in the past due to mismanagement, and burn effigies of him in the streets of Calcutta.

2. Saurav plays well, India sucks: This is the dream scenario for Ganguly's fans, because this tells them that their dada is better than the whole team. They would refer to the isolated incident or two when he has played well in the past, ask for him to return as captain, and burn effigies of chappell in Bengal. This is very likely, and after this series, Chappell is likely to be dumped as the coach of the team if this happens.

3. Saurav plays badly, India wins: Saurav's fans start saying that Saurav added to the zeal and the enthusiasm of the team, say that he is lucky for the team, and that he has contributed to team morale and strategy and made the Indian cricket team perform much above their caliber. In this case, Saurav is still in the team for future tours, and the team management gets credit for re-finding the team balance. Saurav's fans anyway burn Chappell's effigies in Bengal because winters get very cold in Bengal and its good fun to sip tea beside a burning fire.

4. Saurav plays badly, India plays badly: Anyway, Saurav gets credit because he has been recalled in time of crisis and hence could not help. He is hailed for trying, and the occasional off drive which he would manage is hailed as India's next big hope. The selectors try to drop him in the next match, and the parliament gets vandalised and effigies of Chappell are burnt in Bengal.

From these various scenarios, two facts emerge clearly:

1. Saurav is in, and whatever happens in the test series, the Indian team management would be forced to give him an extended run in the team. Never mind that he is the biggest bunny when it comes to fast bowling, and has been figured out by bowlers all over the world almost three years ago.
2. Greg Chappell's effigies are all set to burn in Bengal, and he is going to be fired after this series. This presents an explosive business opportunity for effigy manufacturers in parts of the country which are made of inflammable material.

The biggest situation for me is not any of the above. It is this: Indian cricket is definitely atleast five years behind Australia and South Africa, purely in terms of preparedness. This augurs badly for the sport, because unless India wins, the big advertising revenues do not come in, and the sport itself might die. Cricket is anyway suffering under the onslaught of infinitely more interesting games like football and athletics which are fast gaining popularity in India. If we keep losing like this, cricket might die in India, and hence in the whole world. This brings me to the inevitable question: Would team managements around the world begin to ask their players to under-perform against India so that the game can live on? Or would the game find its revenues from another country? Or would the pressure to succeed find India's next Sachin in the streets of Mumbai and change the course of the game's future?

Indian cricket is buried under all the money, how will it survive?

Have you heard of second life?

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

John Lennon was talking about a world where everyone would be equal, happy, and free. He talked about a world where there was no religion, and peace was the only faith.

Imagine a world where you could live by choice, without worrying what the society thinks or does. So I got on Second life, with a unique identity and an entirely new character. The installable was pretty huge, by Indian internet standards, so I took my time with downloading it.

Many years ago, Microsoft had an initiative called Virtual Chat. I really don't know if it came through and what became of it.

But second life was really addictive. They have their own businesses, their own dollars (Linden dollars), lifestyles, personalities, and so on.

Of course, Second life will always have a long way to go, because the world is extremely complex and replicating this on the internet is no easy task. But my contention is, that if there had to be a start, this is it. This is our chance to create a world where each person can shape the future in his own way. A world where we have the choice to wipe out the stains of history, and to work together towards a world that will be the world of our dreams.

Of course, this is no game. You can buy stuff on Second life, which would be delivered to you, and billed to you in REAL dollars/rupees.

Its the start of a new future. Lets dive in!

As someone at Second Life remarked to me, "Its like being born an adult again!" The phenomenon is so significant, that maybe our world will never be the same again.

Or maybe the world is not ready yet for a second life! Only time will tell.