the marketing jugglery

I generally refrain from commenting on any marketing hype or horrible media in our country because I believe; in the end they are doing their business and have to earn money to survive. A marketer’s critical work is to hype out self made trends and then make people believe that something like that is really happening. But then that is their job and I think what they are doing is not unethical either. No problems from my side.

Two advertisements off late have attracted whatever little attention span I have for them. One of Nivea promoting the whitening cream for boys and other Parachute advt in which the new chick on the block Deepika Padukone talks about doing “Champi”.

The advt are so contrasting in the message they want to deliver and the concept they are relying on. Nivea brand is associated with men’s product. Now to get into the facial products it’s trying to expand by conveying a message which goes against the general perception of a handsome man “Tall and Dark”. Dark color was ingrained in men’s handsomeness, but now to increase the market and make more money Nivea decided to turn the logic head on. Well we can always argue that this “Tall Dark and Handsome” was arbitrary and has nothing to do with handsomeness of a man and Nivea is an innovator when it challenges the unproven hypothesis.

And if you happen to ask Nivea guys about this advt which is against the accepted notions they would say with a straight face “Oh we found many men using women’s creams. Therefore we thought we have a market to serve”. This is what I was talking about when I said that marketing would make people believe that they are launching the product because a demand exists. This is because marketing led demand inducement is still not taken very well by the people.

I am not saying that demand for men’s cream does not exist. What I am trying to convey is that the demand would be minuscule and hence Nivea has to increase it manifold by advertisements and all sorts of gimmicks. By this it would be successful in inducing foolish consumers in trying a product which they would not really need.

In the parachute advt Deepika is trying to get a forgotten concept “Champi”, a concept which is not considered to be “cool” back to the mainstream. And why is she doing that, because Parachute finds itself to be a brand which is associated with the older generation. Therefore to get back into the grooves it’s trying to get an so called old fashioned concept to core. In another advt she would be promoting a “chip chip” less oil and may be advising not to use oil at all.

I am sure the consumers will buy both the arguments. That reminds me of a few notes I had written in the Kotler’s marketing book when I was doing my post graduation in management. Those notes were “if the people are so gullible and idiots to buy these preposterous marketing arguments, then they deserve to get fooled by these advertisements”.

Therefore whereas Nivea wants to break preconceived notions and is going against the accepted principles, Parachute is trying to bring back a concept which was omnipresent earlier but has been forgotten off late. I am also confident that these products like that of Nivea have a short life span and would go off shelf soon. The consumer finally is not that fool, apart from those who have excessive money to throw away. They may have tremendous growth phase earlier but their longer growth rate is susceptible.

Being a management graduate myself I however must congratulate the marketing campaign of both the products as they would be successful in inducing demand for their product where none may have existed.

Perspectives, Context and Benchmarks

Perspectives, Context and Benchmarks

Wanted to write about this topic for long. These three words may appear to be disconnected, however I believe they have quite a bit in common. Whenever we appreciate something or dislike something there is an unsaid benchmark we tend to compare it with. For example if someone says Jagjit Singh is a good ghazal singer he would be benchmarking him against Indian awful singers like Pankaj Udhas. However when we see Mehdi Saheb, then we realize where does Jagjit Singh and singers like Ghulam Ali stand. However this is my perspective. From someone else’ perspective I am sure they would have different reasons to give for liking or disliking Jagjit Singh, or say any food or any culture etc.

Whenever we read a book we tend to agree with it provided the author writes something which is in consonance with our predisposition towards the idea presented in the book. It appears enticing but is very tough to judge or read a book without any biases. We all are prisoners of our prejudices and biases which have impacted our upbringing and social context.

When we tend to compare two things we tend to forget the difference in context we are talking about. This mistake is most common in courses on leadership in management institutes. The students are asked to compare two leaders without giving a thought that comparing across time periods, across different socio-economic and geographical settings is impossible. However management minds are trained to perform comparison even when it has only academic value (if at all).

From Indian’s perspective Bhagat Singh was a hero but from British perspective he was a state criminal. From our perspective so called Mujahidin’s in Kashmir are terrorists but from their perspective they are messenger of God and fighting a holy war. Therefore finally most of the debate boils down to who holds the upper hand. For example saying that Greek was the older civilization which worked consciously towards making a nation and state is flawed as history belongs to the victorious and the arguments are preserved which are heavily biased towards something more popular.

We must never forget which context we are talking about. If we understand the context most of the futile debates which we see in our society won’t even exist. However most of the times the deeper we get into something be it music, management, literature etc we tend to become closer to philosophy. Perhaps that’s why philosophy is the ultimate form of human emancipation and learning. Most of the big authors talking about business strategy or some other mantra tend to give too much of philosophy in their books which appear to be ridiculous to the readers. From the reader’s perspective this philosophical thought is not tangible and hence it is not valued. However once these readers themselves have sufficient reading behind them they also tend to become philosophical.

Questions which appear inane once like “What do you want to do with your life” “What does happiness means” etc become the most important questions to address. That may be a reason why we see so many billionaires starting some social initiatives or some fund helping cause of the poor. For them that seems to be giving back to society and going nearer to the unseen power which is known as the God Almighty.

The problem arises when people tend to pass value judgments on others without fully understanding the contexts and the perspectives. That’s why so much of social tension is caused.

When we see poor homeless people we want to help, but when it appears that the person on the street is “happy” what should we do and how should we do? But the bigger question would be should we do something. We can see (again through our perspective) that the person is not living in a condition which is apt for a human life. But then we say that from our benchmarks. If his family is not getting three meals, or is not getting decent income or not getting medical attention we tend to analyze it based on our own benchmarks and standards. May be if these people had written the constitution they may not have made “right to food” as the fundamental right because from their perspective “regular food” is a luxury and cannot be a right per se.

This issues has always intrigued me and I have hopelessly tried to answer it. When we say “Every child should be a child and should be taken care of etc etc” what do we actually mean? And who gave us the so called “educated class” to jargonize and presume so many things that whatever we are thinking is indeed correct. I believe the answer would be that someone has to take the initiatives. If no initiatives or nothing new was said or done the humanity would still be living in the cages. However was living in cages a worse option than what we have today? The problem in answering these arguments would be that we would answer them based on our current benchmarks. We could say “see we would not have been able to talk to many people apart from close clan (under the influence of communication technology these days”, we would have said “we would have felt so much of heat, would have been eating uncooked food etc (under the benchmarks of eating cooked food these days, having AC etc.”) .

The fundamental issue is that all these answers are made from current benchmarks and hence can never be used to answer those days when these things never existed. Was the world a worse place before car, mobile, computer etc came?

Expanding music boundaries, Nusrat, Purist and the Dilemma

I was watching one video of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan singing in his usual unique and captivating style but could not resist seeing the shabby stage and facilities he was singing in. There were those cheap decorations on the wall, bad acoustics and sound systems. I had heard this debate where people say that Nusrat has made such a class of Sufi music "cheap". This kind of music was supposed to be for those people who really like, understand and admire it. It was not made to be heard in a paan or barber shop (figuratively speaking). However Nusrat (like Jagjit Singh in India for Ghazals) popularized the Sufi music to masses. This quest lead him towards west where the people would not understand what he was singing but based on the way it was sung, the clapping of chorus, the ragas, the rustic harmonium, tabla etc made them dance on this music. This gave Nusrat world wide recognition as well as money. Now he could sing in the Wembleys or Royal Concert Hall. However this also impacted in dilution of the following of real music appreciators of Sufi music. Sufi music became a fad which everybody wants to "do" now. However had Nusrat not expanded his musical boundaries he would have met the same fate like many other slatwarts who died penurious death due to want of money. At the same time this expansion introduced the West to a large degree about a different kind of music which surpasses any kind of music (apart from Mehdi Hasan's Ghazal singing). Therefore in a way it was a good initiative in terms of financial and recognition sense. Nusrat would have been singing in the same shabby PTV shows or those pathetic gatherings of rich people from from Lahore. Hence I believe once some phenomenon or concept expands beyond its natural habitat its bound to get diluted in terms of its quality, following, target segment etc. However this expansion may invariably be needed if that phenonmenon has to surpass the boundation of time.

Why english movies have this?

Despite the fact that however good or bad an English movie is, there appears to be common scene in all of them for particular scenarios. If there are two police or investigating agencies they would always be in the loggerheads. FBI would be screwing around LAPD or NYPD etc and would treat them condescendingly. If there is FBI and some other country's police (like Rush Hour 2) then also FBI would treat them badly and would always say "get the hell out of our way".

And when there is a bomb scare or some other scare why always they have to cry their heart out "out out, now" or "everybody clear the room right now" "go go go". Its so irritating to see these scenes in almost every second English movie. And then they would speak strange English "There would be no quite room no more" rather than "There would not be quite room anymore". I mean does not two no would make one yes? If we say "I would not do no more" does not this essentially means I would actually do more? May be these are cultural subtleties and how the English is spoken. Anyways Americans have this illusion and desperation of showing "American English" which in any case is no language, to be different than British English. Be the word called honour written as honor or colour written as color. Anyways none of my business.

Why one festival is more sexy than other?

I was seeing a movie named "Jhankar Beats". The movie was pretty decent and "young". However I saw they showed one girl (hindu) going to Church every Sunday. Now I am not against going Church or Mosque but it appears Church is a more glamorous place to speak about and show in a movie than say a Temple for a young lady. At the same time when the movie makers have to show a "traditional" heroine they would show her going to the Temple.

Is their a glamorization of certain religious principles? I could see students in colleges going out to buy cakes during Xmas, though none of them would be a Christian. I am not saying that celebrating XMas by Hindu is wrong, the point is why only Xmas and not Eid, which falls few days before Xmas. Again I believe the answer is Xmas is a more glamorous festival than Eid.

So what are we celebrating the festival for? To really celebrate it or just to be the part of this bottom less pit of enjoyment. How come certain festivals or days (like Valentine etc) became more "sexy" than some other days. I think the inherent inclination towards "having fun" and getting out of the usual drag of life is one factor and the marketers have also done a commendable work making money out of these festivals.

Every now and then we would have some days to boost sales of mall stores be it cards, apparels, food items etc. As human beings always are fun seeking its very easy to delude them and induce them into something which they may not at all want. This is one critical job of marketing. It may be termed as unethical however there is nothing really unethical about this practice. Thats the job of a marketer, to induce people, create demand and then fulfill it.

One more angle to these festivities is that how come Christian festival became bigger than a Muslim festival in terms of celebration by common people. Even I bought a cake last time to be cut in my room with few of my friends. What makes one festival more sexy and appealing over the others to a majority Hindu public despite the fact that both festivals belong to minority community. If at all we can celebrate all festivals in right spirit (a utopian argument) we would have lots of brotherhood in the country than the fickle consumerism.

Life in a Metro: The Movie

Writing after a long time. I generally do not comment on movies and books but then I could not resist myself after seeing "Life in a Metro". It’s such a safe bet to make movies like "Life in a Metro". No research, no story just figment of imagination. Show whatever you want under the camouflage of "oh yaa this is a true metro story, these days you can see this happening in society etc etc".

Did someone come to tell the story writer or the director about his or her story that he made into a movie. They just want to cash in the predisposition of people about metro city's life being bitchy, cut throat, sleazy, girls willing to get laid for promotion, boys performing all stratagems to get a better career, no one having good married life. Just want to ask these guys is life so bad !!!

What are they trying to show? What is the motive behind making the film? Well I must admit the movie is well made but the premise on which it is based is flawed. Its simply an unnecessary castle made by the filmmakers about something which he might not have ever seen or felt in metro cities. The viewer acceptance is a matter of research here. The simple explanation is that when you see a movie you say "Oh man this might be happening to someone" and take it as true. And then there would be these news articles by our "respected" jholachaap journalist writing columns for money about "When you see these kind of movies you would certainly say Oh I know someone like that, Oh this is so much close to my life, blah blah blah blah" .. Bullshit.

Anyway the movie was decent but the point the director was trying to convey was flawed and unrealistic as far as I am concern.

Ghazal and Sufi Music

I was reading some post on net and got the shock of my life. Where while describing the God of Ghazals Janaab Mehdi Hasan Saheb the person wrote that "Mehdi Hasan is as great an artist as Nusrat and Madam Noor Jahan" .. How the heck can someone compare the legends of legends mehdi saheb with these two artists. I agree the other two are also great in their own regards but no where and I repeat absolutely no where near to Fankaar-e-Aazam Mehdi Saheb. When I thought about it a bit more and talked to few of my friends in London I could realize that Nusrat is much more a popular artist outside Pakistan than Mehdi Saheb. I think the reason is pretty simple to decipher. Sufi music even if you do not understand the lyrics( high dose of high class urdu and Panjabi) can be appreciated by people just based on its music. Moreover it is more tappy and catchy than Ghazals. To appreciate Ghazals you need to be a music lover from the core of your heart. Especially you need to be like a data miner who finds hidden data trends. Similarly to appreciate high quality Ghazals that of people like Mehdi Saheb or Beghum Akhtar a strong liking of poetry and lyrics is of utmost importance. To understand and appreciate Ghazals you need patience as it not a rock music to give you high. At the same time need the knowledge of urdu to some extent. Remember poetry is lost in translation hence even if you try to decipher the Ghazal in Hindi or English it looses meaning. Like saying Jo Koo-e-yaar se nikale toh Soo-e-daar chale ... you need to appreciate inherently without translating that "Come out of house of my beloved and then go to the gallows" this simply does not make any impact. Any how this is not my diatribe against Nusrat saheb but I really do not appreciate people comparing Mehdi saheb to any one else. He is just one of his kind no one in past no in future can surpass him.

NGO's farcical "Social Activism"

At the onset let me clarify that I am all for those NGO who do credible work, and I know there are many out there. But then these sincere NGO seems to have attracted lot of attraction and now we are seeing a whole NGO industry out there wanting to grab its piece of share. Recently one NGO (probably GreenPeace) came to our office (obviously they wanted our money). I could see that the representatives they had were probably college or school students who were in need of some quick bucks. Unfortunately one of school going kind guy stopped me and tried to explain me what does NGO does. I could see how improper his prep talk was as he hardly had any facts right. Then he proudly said "Sir we did not allowed French ship Clemenaceau to reach India as it had high level of some toxic substance". I said "well it was not "some" but asbestos, Moreover the ship journey got derailed due to Egypt's intervention and not India's". Then I asked him "did you ever talked to the poor laborers at Alang(Gujrat) who were actually going to dismantle the ship and earn their bread. He candidly said "No sir we didn't". Well I was not shocked as I know the people who are really going to be affected are hardly taken into consideration when the more enlightened breed of NGOs talk in their favour in New Delhi while staying in Five Star hotels. Then I drew a parallel of it with my own life. Few days back I was trying to get a cycle rickshaw to reach my home. Then I saw few rickshaws standing near by. I chose the one which had the oldest driver. While on the rickshaw I said I would have never sat on this rickshaw few days back (before this GreenPeace incident had taken place), but now after this GreenPeace incident I will surely sit here. I must say I did not used to sit on rickshaws having old drivers respecting their age and health. Then I said to myself "hang on, what are you doing? aren't you doing the same thing which the GreenPeace guys did. You yourself decided what is good for the old rickshaw guy and never bothered to consider that he is plying rickshaw to earn money and to get two meals for his family. In my misplaced beinignity I was depriving him and his family that bread. In a way my ridiculous social empathy was actually a curse on these people. Then on I decided that people who want to earn money with all the legal means by their side needs to be supported, and I threw my preposterous social inclinations in a cold basket.

Arjun Singh and the Quota Conundrum

Well it seems that age got better of Arjun Singh and he has become insane (not that he had any sense anyway). Not that he wants to be another VP Singh but he must have been feeling sidelined on getting a trivial ministry and his falling support in the high command. On his last birth day Sonia Gandhi virtually advised him to leave politics and go hiding when she said that "X" years is too long a time in politics and people achieve whatever they want to do till then.
That probably rang alarms in Arjun's head. His feet in the coffin he just tried to become a cynosure by doing something which will irritate his party member and if he does not become famous he will at least become infamous. I doubt any one in the Congress would have liked this Quota juggernaut the way it has shaped. Students across the country are facing merciless policemen and their lathis. It seems that Mr Arjun Singh himself might not have thought that things will go such a long and disgusting way. He just wanted some quick publicity and a reckoning at the dead end of his career so that when he dies there is someone to remember him.
But now the coins have fallen on the wrong place. His head is on the burner and these protests have taken a Frankenstein form which will be very difficult to contain.

India mirroring the USA ??

The recent gruesome killing of Indian engineer Suryanarayana by the Taliban throws a malicious light on peripherals which have never been discussed. More and more I am seeing India having the same strenuous relations with her neighbour like the USA has across the world. The Indo US nuclear deal was a nail in the incubating coffin as the Islamist world derogated India from a "neutral" to a USA inclined country.

Well this does not mean that we pursue our foreign polices keeping in mind these mindless Islamist states but then we cannot deny that the Iran stubbornness has somewhere a link towards the Indo US nuclear deal. Agreed that India has a better nuclear track record unlike countries like Pakistan but then just because Iran has a hardliner at the helm does not mean they are maniacs. For the US it was a US puppy till the Shah was ruling and as soon as Ayotollah Khomenei came the country suddenly became anti US !! The flawed policies of USA towards many of these countries like Iran Iraq Palestine etc. have made the world an unsafe place. The whole world is paying dear for the ridiculous US foreign policies.

These are the people who made Taliban who is now out to destroy its master. These are the people who tried to bully around the whole Latin America and now we see a definite anti US Governments in almost all the major countries. Similarly the Indian subcontinent is heading towards the anti India direction. We have strained relation with Pakistan, Bangladesh Srilanka and Nepal. We are accused of hegemony by these nations. Our wish wash reactions on Nepal monarchy have alienated us further from the common people there.

Self Censoring... Are you kidding !!!

Well that was the first reaction I had when I heard a so called intellectual whose credentials were nothing more than that he was a celebrity. As has already been said years ago "Free lunch is yet to be invented" same goes for self censorship.

People simply try to push the boundary of the ecosystem they are in. When the system revolts back then they come to know that they have crossed the boundaries or else they continue in their disgusting manner. Then there was one more "intellectual" who said "let us rate the Indian Hindi Movies and let the people decide what to see and what to avoid". That made me laugh my hats off. It was so much similar to one of the Scott Adams Dilbert strip. In the strip Dilbert tells Dogbert that he feels guilty about working for a company which makes doughnuts which have thousands of calories. Dogbert says that you do not force anyone to eat it, you simply make them irresistible.

Here also in the rating system we are not "forcing" anyone to see our movies but by giving them XXX rating we are making them irresistible. One more thing in one of the Dilbert strip was when Dogbert says human beings are fun searching parasites and will do any thing for it. Whether that is in their favour or not, does not really matter to them. On the same line people will go to watch this XXX rated movies knowing that it might not be too well for their moral health. But people making these kinds of movies have mastered the art of "Human being is attracted towards forbidden". So once you XXX rate them you are essentially making them forbidden and hence more attractive for the buyers. Its simple voyeuristic economy and a shame.

Moreover the logic of "let the people decide" is a frivolous one. If people were so intelligent and honest we would not see so many crimes taking place. People would know what to do and what not to do. So we would not have any legal laws then. Let the rapist decide whether raping is correct or not. Gosh!! gimme a break will you.

One more issue is "who decides what is wrong and what is right in media". Now by this logic no limits can be put on anything. Anyone can happily say I am making a porn movie, who decides its right or wrong. In ancient time it was the king and his court which used to decide. Similarly in modern world someone needs to take initiative to decide what is wrong and what is right, inside a legal system. The problem is when moral decline creeps into the system we silently acquiesce to it and want "someone" to take matter in his hand. People appreciated what is shown in the movie Rang De Basanti. That the youth take control in their own hands for justice. Now again who decides whether they did right or wrong. Going by the public opinion they seem to have done right but as per law they were criminals. Similarly when Shiv Sena tries to protest the celebration of Valentines Day all the jhola chaap journalist who are pseudo apologists of "freedom of expression" jump the bandwagon saying who decides whether celebrating Valentines Day is right or wrong. I am not endorsing what Shiv Sena does what I am trying to explain is that "who decides" does not always work. Someone has to take the initiative and wrath of the public opinion. Remember if all objections to something are addressed that thing can never be implemented.

Indian eGovernance initiatives

The recent letter send by the National Knowledge Commission to the Prime Minister Dr. Singh, says that India should go the Open Source Software way to effectively implement the eGovernance initiatives. It is very clear that the panel wanted to minimize the cost of implementation and also wanted to have an open standard so that the proprietary software are kept at bay. Though the intentions are correct but it seems that this might not be the best of an idea to implement at this time. Why I am saying this is because Open Source Softwares have various problems in support issues. The education level and the technical comfort of the normal Indian is not unknown to anyone. In these circumstances the ideal solution would be to have solutions from some vendors who then can be held accountable for their systems. But at the same time there is a big problem in this approach also. Which is that once the Government staff bents towards eGovernance then in near future when we would definitely like to go for Open Office Documents it would be very tough to migrate whole systems towards it. Not only the training costs but also the transition costs for the SW would be prohibitively high. The recent Massachusetts incident in which Microsoft Office 12 OpenXML format was rejected by the panel and they went for Open Document Format and PDF gives a clear indication of where the world is heading. Moreover the Open Document Format being based on the OpenOffice.org's XML formats makes the work easier. The Government records needs to be maintained for several decades. The tax transaction records, land dealings and many other critical documents needs to be stored for very long time. By the time they are required in near future the reading application would have gone so many changes that it would be impossible to read it. But then it is also not guaranteed that even if we use Open Office Document format the versions in future would be backward compatible with an application which is 50 years old. It seems that we are getting into the mess of reinventing the wheel and that too for a shorter period. Here is where the pioneering words of legendary Adobe Chairman Dr. John Warnock come into picture that you can never replace the physical paper. The digital paper should try to be a subordinate of the master paper and should not pursuit a quixotic dream of replacing it. We need to reduce our dependence on physical paper but we should be aware that physical paper might exist till the world lasts.

Hamas in Palestine

The advent of Hamas in Palestine might not necessarily mean the victory of terrorism. It might actually mean the fundamental belief which the Palestinians have with respect to Israel. Hamas in its charter clearly states that its ultimate agenda is to get Jerusalem back from Israel which is rebuked as a land encroacher whose existence should be wiped out from their land. It is very shocking for the USA to see that its prescribed panacea of all ills "The Democracy" has led to formation of those Governments which are totally against its hegemony. USA is fast loosing ground in its own backyard where the countries in South America like Venezuela, Bolivia, and Chile are all up against its might. Also the Iran Government which came after election is bitterly anti US. Similarly in Palestine the democracy has brought Hamas whose hatred for the USA is not unknown from anybody. The incumbent US presidents might be working for some short term gains for their country but they are putting up a blind eye towards the alienation which their country is facing from the rest of the world. Their thinking that their prowess would yield other countries has boomeranged on them and their relations have been strained with almost all the nations. It is a serious time for the USA which they can ill afford to overlook. Their status as an economic center for world is already dwindling due to emergence of powers like India and China. Adding to it the military fiasco this country creates every now and then does not augur well for them. Moreover the rigid stance of non-cooperation which USA has taken towards Hamas will only alienate it from the Middle East. It is really ironical to see that USA bombs another country in the guise of "War on Terror" and want to establish democracy there. And then when another country gets a democratically elected Government then they say we will not recognize them!
Al Qaeda has seized the initiative and now its top leaders do not talk to USA Government, they talk to the American people and try to incite their emotions by saying that the Government is responsible for killing of their sons and brothers. We should not expect any respite in the anti US sentiments as long as George Bush is in power who cannot see anything beyond his oil. So let us hope that some sane leader would lead them in the new decade and they would come out with policies which are unbiased towards any country and unprejudiced against anyone.

The pernicious Multi Culture Fad

The recent spate of violence in France and recent bomb blasts in Britain about being too politically correct regarding multi culturism are opportune moment to discuss this topic. Britain and France have got violence in return of their multi ethnics policies and environment. Multi Culture does not mean that you give any idiot the freedom to do whatever he likes in the subterfuge of his culture. First of all let us be very clear that despite all the utopian arguments all the citizens of a country are not equal. There are rich, there are poor, there is a majority and there is a minority. The first and foremost task of any immigrant is to adapt the host country as his new motherland and inculcate the same feeling and respect he has for his original birth place. Without the unquestionable devotion towards host country we cannot fix the problem of kids blowing themselves up and killing innocent people in the name of jihad. The recent spate of killing in France where "beurs" went berserk killing their countrymen had a deeper malaise than being a simple repercussion of economic inequality. Britain and France are probably the best example to quote of countries which are most tolerant and infact most open regarding multi ethnic cultures and religion. But then let us not pretend that everything is fine in these gestures. Unless the immigrants bring themselves into mainline these sort of violence would continue. The onus is on majority also to make their minority counterparts feel at home. But then deeper dwell into this mess brings up question that why should a majority be considerate towards minority which has immigrated to their country. The majority thinks that why can't minority stay where they are rather than coming to their place and taking away their jobs, increasing their population and exhausting their resources.The incidents like banning of a sikh play in Britain shows the audacity of the sikh community their to get up in arms against authorities. Though sentiments should be taken into account in multi ethnic places but then the sensitivities should be manageable and should not be an impediment towards work being done in those places.

Save as PDF and other PDF antagonists

The pertinent question would be that why people use Acrobat. If they use it mainly to create PDFs then Acrobat could not have stood the onslaught of tones of free PDFMaker. Probably the quality matters to the end user. Therefore Acrobat has an edge over its free counterpart. But then may be the sales of Acrobat are coming more from the Creative Professionals rather than the Business Group.

Though we know that Business Users form a large chunk of Acrobat users but who are these Business Users. If they are the normal organizations executives then I am sure that sooner or later they would come to realize that Acrobat does not give that much of value for money. But at the same time if they are voracious user of Documents then Acrobat indeed have a critical role to play.

The save as PDF option in the coming Office 12 suite would target these casual PDF users who might be forming a considerable chunk of Acrobat users. All people like using jazzy softwares but then those times are gone where the CIOs used to have a free hand in implementing the best software for the people. Now is the time for good enough software which is more affordable than its counterpart. Here lies the importance of open office which is going to dent the document market for sure. The MA Common Wealth ruling is the first example for that and I am sure many more will follow.

Moreover OpenOffice suit is less buggy now. But a quagmire for OpenOffice guys is their revenue model which cannot be sustained unless they are funded by some angel investors. Most of the big corporations like Sun who were the harbingers of this OpenSouce movement have brought out their own softwares which ironically play against the OpenSource community.

Ignorance in USA

Most often we hear that how ignorant the people of USA are about the rest of the world. There world starts and ends in USA itself. But then a detailed analysis would make it clear that it is not their fault. For centuries USA has been the bastion for all the economic progress and great industries. Due to the helpful laws and transparent system the industries thrived there. You have all the great management institutes there having a heavily biased USA based study material. They should not be blamed either as there were hardly any growth outside USA when these institutes were getting formed and it was quite obvious that the whole management business became pro USA. But time has changed now. USA is seeing a metamorphosis unseen in its history. People are forced to give away their jobs to lower wages country. Now they have suddenly realized that the tunnel vision they had about the rest of the world is detrimental to their existence. There are fewer enrollments in their MBA and MS courses as people from China and India who were the biggest numbers are finding quality education in their own country. The challenge for USA is to gear up for this change. Rather getting blinded by the obvious it needs to show the world that it still has the depth and potential to be cynosure for investments and education. The road is tough ahead but I am sure USA will tread it and will come out as a winner.