Thousand Cuts

There are so beautiful many layers of irony about a desi sister who teaches English in University of Cambridge writing her thoughts about the coronation in a publication that may not the first choice of either Desis or Brits. The writing is solid and so is her perspective for a reader such as myself.

It is very strange business that the monarchy still exists and the people are expected to gather around and celebrate that they need to pay for it to exist. The same sort of people that are dying of hypothermia because energy bills are so high as the author cites in her essay. I could not agree more with Gopal when she says:

Far from being anomalous, the extravagance of this unnecessary coronation precisely represents and even glorifies this morally untenable social order in which to be rich is to have the right to rule and to get richer. "Subjects” not only become poorer by the day but are required to pay joyful obeisance to the very system that renders them so.

When the former empire acquired an Indian PM, the desi brethren got the last laugh. Maybe that is how the sun will on the empire. A desi brother here a sister there, a death by thousand cuts.

Clothes Horse

I was shopping online for some clothes and noticed how many of the models in the pictures were clearly AI generated. That did not make any significant difference to my shopping experience. Ultimately, human or not, the fit of the item will never be a given until I try it on. There is a threat to the modeling business due to AI. As always there are two sides to the story. The impact to the human models is negative

 ..we human models have worked really hard to have our stories heard and our authentic experiences considered, and we’ve fought to change the perception that we are just a sample size or a prop for clothes. We’ve mobilized in groups, such as the Model Mafia network that I am a part of, to advocate for social issues and push back on exclusivity in the fashion industry. In some cases our activism has even cost us jobs. But now that we are finally starting to see changes in the industry, digital models can just land the jobs that we took risks for. Or worse, brands can just create CGIs that champion causes instead of actually having to invest in those causes themselves.

On the other hand, all those young women pursuing an impossible ideal of beauty and suffering from body image issues might have a positive outcome. If the vast majority if not all models are AI generated, it is likely that women will not view that look as a ideal to aspire for. By being completely and verifiably unreal, it becomes unworthy of competition. Maybe women will learn to love how they look, their uniqueness complete with flaws and blemishes. 

Wendy's Bot

Wendy's use case of a customized language model is one that other fast food and fast casual restaurants might pick up. Placing the order is often the longest part of the process and not the most enjoyable one. If a chat-bot could engage the customer better, be friendlier and chattier and help them make their choices more effectively, that could help outcomes for both sides. Those preparing the order would have confidence that the order accurately reflects what the customer asked for. The customer could experience less friction in the flow. I was at a Cava recently pretty late in the evening. They were missing some items for my order so there was back and forth on substitutions. 

The same thing happened with three other customers in line behind me. With a chatbot, it would not be so hard to present the customers with options that the currently available ingredients will support. The bot can also recommend the right substitutions for your favorite item in the menu when some components are missing. All this can happen without stressing out the employees who have to prep the bowl while dealing with a hungry customer, missing ingredients and substitutions. In this kind of collaboration between bot and employee, it seems everyone comes ahead including the customer. Back to what Wendy' - not sure if the solution calls for custom LLMs, seems like an overkill for the job at hand. 

Role Reversal

I happened to be passing through J's city on my way back from a business trip on Mother's Day weekend. We met for dinner on Friday and brunch on Saturday before I flew home. The holiday itself never held much meaning for me but J has always done something to celebrate it which I very much appreciate. This time, I experienced the weekend in a new way - the mother of an independent young woman who took charge of me, made me comfortable and planned everything. I just had to show up and enjoy the time together.

As we talked about her work, life and other things there was this strange experience to me speaking to a much younger version of myself and seeing flashes of my mother from my childhood. It was as if J was a composite of three women living in a different place and time. The words she spoke could not have been mine or my mother's - she is her own woman and very distinctively so. She has wisdom far beyond what I had at that age and a sense of calmness that I still don't have. Time has come for me to learn from J and I can't wait to find out how she helps me become the person I could not on my own. 

Different Paths

Watched Run a few days before Mother's Day and it gave much food for thought. There is an universal presumption and expectation of a perfect love flowing from mother child. It is expected to be the natural order of things so any reports of deviation are viewed with great skepticism. The messenger is often killed and the message must wait another day to be heard if ever. Diane in the movie is a horror-inspiring mother - that is the point of the story and she delivers a powerful performance. 

But there are micro-aggressions leading to micro-traumas far more pedestrian mothers are responsible for. In my own extended family are a couple of mothers that clung to at least one of their children as a long-term security solution. These mothers created circumstances in which the kids remained emotionally stunted, unable to get into a relationship or marriage - embark on their own life journeys. The  mother has built a co-dependent relationship with this middle-aged person who has no life of their own and only knows how to be a child to their mother. 

These folks lead apparently normal lives, having completed their education and entered the workforce. They are free to come and go as they please but they just don't. Its as it they have an invisible fence around their lives that the mothers set up early and the rest happened quite effortlessly. It is not even clear if these mothers actually wanted to accomplish the outcomes they have with their children. The children in question are of my generation - we were once a boisterous set of kids running around causing trouble anytime the family got together. They were no different from the rest of us. 

We started to diverge little by little by our teens and beyond that we were too far apart. I count myself among the fortunate ordinary in this group - that has done mostly mundane things that people do in different phases of their lives - nothing remarkable one way or the other. To even achieve that status, it takes a mother not to abuse her incredible position of power in irreversible ways. 

Missing Bits

I met my one time neighbor and very old friend M when I was visiting her city for work. It turns out she lives in the heart of downtown, a few blocks away from where my meetings were. M is one of those warm, generous people that are very easy to be around. That was her when I first met her over twenty years ago and is true even today. We often met at the gym in the apartment complex where we both lived at the time. I remember the first time she invited me over, she made this wonderful rich chocolate dessert from scratch. It was an impressive production and by her description not that hard to make. 

My marriage was on the brink back then and unbeknownst to me, so was hers. A few years later, I reconnected with her and learned about the bizarre way in which her marriage had ended around the same time as mine. She said, she never saw any signs of trouble with me - I guess we both did a good job of putting on a show of normalcy. M's apartment as I recall was picture perfect. It was what I aspired to one day have my own home look like. The details escape me now but there was this attention to making the space work right and overall harmony that made a strong impression. I saw some of the paintings that used to hang in her apartment, on the walls of her beautiful condo. M has made a great recovery all around, achieved career success and found the right man for herself. 

The only pieces that don't fit nicely is how she went from being a gym rat to someone who has totally let herself go. And her home is a complete mess - nothing like the pages of Home & Garden magazine that I would expect it to be from what I knew of her back then. She was just starting out as clinician back then, now she is very well established so money is clearly not the problem. Notably missing is the greenery. M used to have a ton of wonderful houseplants back in the day that I watered for her when they were away. Meeting M made me wonder about the things we lose along the way that were once essential to who we were as humans. 

My mental image of M is someone who took health and fitness seriously, kept her home picture perfect and baked these amazing things that she described as easy. I am sure that they were infact easy for her. This apart from being a busy professional. She is a couple of years younger than me but I looked up to her as a role model - a classy woman who had her act together in every way, could be tough as nails while being very womanly. I believe she is still all that and much more given her rich life experience but there was price paid to travel this distance and travel it mostly alone.

Ebb and Tide

These lines from in Flights by Olga Tokarczuk, rang so true and familiar to me. Coincidentally, I was reading the book on Kindle on the plane and my layover, surrounded by people everywhere:

With the years, time has become my ally, as it does for every woman—I’ve become invisible, see-through. I am able to move around like a ghost, look over people’s shoulders, listen in on their arguments and watch them sleep with their heads on their backpacks or talking to themselves, unaware of my presence, moving just their lips, forming words that I will soon pronounce for them.

I don't know if this is every woman's experience, but I seem to have gone through a few distinct phases - very young and the male gaze had not fallen on me yet. Then suddenly it did - it was everywhere all the time with no chance of escape. Suddenly I had become visible and had some sort of power than I did not know or have control of. Then came the more steady state experience where I was visible but not the sharp focus. This was a good phase in balance - being able to retain power combined with steadiness. Then the fade out phase set in, where I can blend in perfectly, have a bubble of isolation in a crowd. It took some getting used to but I have grown to love and rejoice in it.

I do believe many women go through very similar life stages - it is how nature intended perhaps. And yet, when we are at the peak of receiving attention, we want to believe it is on account of something unique or special about us - as if nature graced us with some gifts that others were not so lucky to receive. When it fades out, we attribute it to being very ordinary and unremarkable - we wonder if that had always been the case. Neither is true. We are and remain a person unlike any other. The seasons come and go in our lives, bringing in the wake certain ebb and tide in the level of interest we are able to generate in men. Those "highs" and "lows" are part of what the seasons bring to everyone not any one particular woman.

Gruen Effect

For folks like me that don't enjoy shopping it could very well be that the Gruen Effect makes it so unlikable. When I was growing up in India, shopping for clothes was a event that took place a few select times for the year - connected with some important festival and something new for the birthday. There were two ways to go about it. Buy the fabric and visit the tailor to have something made or buy ready-made. I preferred the former so it turned into a multi-step process with no instant gratification involved anywhere along the way. 

The day of fabric shopping would have my mother and I dropped off at the largest fabric store in our town. It was pointless to go other places since the assortment was not comparable. This would be the one stop shop no matter what the project. The shopkeeper's assistant would pull down the bolts of fabric we liked, it would be unfolded a bit to spread on me. Everyone would look in the mirror and opine. So between my mother, the shopkeeper's assistants and other random people who were out there shopping, a piece of fabric would be pronounced a winner. It had the popular vote of looking nice on me. 

Some projects called for multiple pieces of fabric so we would go about the process step by step. Everything would be measured and cut. We would be done for the day. A few days later we would be dropped off at the tailor's shop. My mother and I would look over the design and style books to gain inspiration. Often we came with our own ideas. The tailor was a master craftsman and had my mother's respect. She laid out what she in mind, I provided my input and commentary. Kailash listened to us patiently, made notes in his ledger. Once we were done. He checked out the pieces of fabric that would need to make these ideas come to fruition. Then he would lay out what he believed to be the right solution. It would be a quick sketch accompanied by a flurry of words to describe his vision. Along the way, he would point out to some finished items by way of clarification. 

After some back and forth with my mother, there would be consensus and Kailash would have an assistant get my measurements which he would write down on my page in his ledger. Then we would wait for the appointed day several weeks out for the fitting. Generally all went well at this stage but he might task my mother with procuring specific lace, buttons and other trim that he did not have on hand. Depending on how long that took, it would be days or weeks after the fitting that I would have my dressed ready to wear. 

My first stop at Macy's upon coming to America filled me with a great deal of anxiety - I did not want a solution to my problem immediately. I was used to multi-week process to get to that point with hardly any choice - one fabric shop and one tailor. That was and still is my preferred way to get myself new clothing just that it is no longer possible home or abroad - I don't even know which is which anymore. India of today is a very far cry from those days with Kailash and his ledger.

Listening In

This story about AI decoding brain signals was the topic of an interview I tuned into on the  radio while driving between some errands. The person the host was interviewing was a social scientist of some sort but I had missed the introduction. The whole conversation was rather alarmist and insinuated that the day is not very far when random entities can eavesdrop on our brain signals, intercept them and direct them in ways that served their needs. A bonanza for advertisers and anyone who wanted us to act in a specific way to further their business goals. They went so far as to speculate that it would be possible to get a murder conviction without laying a hand on the suspect or ever interrogating them. The brain signals would be tapped to get the confession - nice and easy. 

.. the researchers addressed questions about potential misuse of the technology. The paper describes how decoding worked only with cooperative participants who had participated willingly in training the decoder. Results for individuals on whom the decoder had not been trained were unintelligible, and if participants on whom the decoder had been trained later put up resistance — for example, by thinking other thoughts — results were similarly unusable.

My first thought when I heard that interview in the car was if this technology gets close becoming viable and a threat to our last bastion in privacy, it will have people seeking out ways to control their brain and their thoughts. Maybe average people will gain skills to go into meditative trance at will and much more. The kind of mastery very few have today will become much more common as our survival will depend on it. That can only be a good thing if we collectively calm our minds and direct our thoughts to better things if only to evade AI-enabled eavesdropping.

Waiting Loss

My friend C has been at his mother's side in hospice for a few days now. The family has gathered about and the end is near. C is an English major and in times like this the ability to convey the depth of feeling words sparsely but effectively makes a difference. 

He sent us a note about what was going on and I read it a few times because it was so beautifully written. When she does pass, I am not sure we will have the appropriate words to comfort him. Reading this essay where Henry James is quoted on the topic of his mother's passing brought C to mind. The essay starts with a quote about motherhood more universally:

“Every man or woman who is sane, every man or woman who has the feeling of being a person in the world, and for whom the world means something, every happy person, is in infinite debt to a woman,” the visionary psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott wrote as he considered the mother as a pillar of society. Having a mother is a lifelong complexity. Losing a mother, no matter the nature or duration of the relationship, is the cataclysm of a lifetime.

Sonnet Writing

I like the parallels between painting vs camera and writing vs ChatGPT.  The logic is that the camera did not kill painting so it is unlikely that that AI will kill writing, If anything it should raise the bar for high quality writing where the voice of the writer is so distinct that it cannot be mimicked. 

Recently, I had ChatGPT write me a poem that explains microeconomics in Shakespearean sonnet style. It did as it was told and the results were amusing and entertaining. That said, it very much fails to make the cut of the real sonnets we know and love by the said Shakespeare. The AI's production was a good caricature of the style devoid of the feeling that words can produce in the hands of a master. 

The camera—which Susan Sontag once compared to a gun—didn’t eradicate painters or painting as a medium. On the contrary, photography led to the birth of Modernism. Much like how smartphone owners are all casual photographers, the prevalence of ChatGPT will, in theory, streamline the process of creative writing and production for the average person. How will this impending textual metamorphosis alter our relationship to language? The metrics of how we comprehend, create, and criticize writing will undoubtedly have to change.

Breaking Free

Love some of the ideas for how to break the stranglehold of dependency on devices - specially the smartphone. When I am driving alone and even to a place I have been many times before, I find myself turning on directions on my phone. Not because I cannot get there without assist but using the map on the phone to drive has become habitual. I actually like the radio being interrupted by instructions to merge, turn left or right. 

Logically, I should not want that specially that I know how to get to my destination. Every once in a while, the absurdity of my behavior makes me pause and drive without turn by turn directions. I feel better in the end. Can listen to something interesting or just do nothing but drive. There is a long way to go for me before I can do what the author is recommending:

If you approach your phone with your own version of ritual propriety, you may end up using it more, or less. You may use it at different times, or in different ways. The Way is not the same everywhere at all times, for you or anyone else. Trusting in it means trusting that whatever you get, it will be more harmonious than what you had before, and different from what you thought you wanted.

Color Range

Reading about Color Moods made me think of two things - how green the yard looks this time of year and my closet. The colors in my closet have been trending bolder and brighter over the years. Some of it as a result of gifts I got from friends and family in India who know of my tastes from a time when I was much younger. Once they planted the seeds of vivid orange, yellow, red and pink there, the overall mood of my closet shifted in that direction.

Yet, when I tested this thing online, I found my eyes resting most comfortably and a low level of stimulation. I generally love colors a lot brighter than that but it did not work that way on the screen. The trees outside are another story. There is no amount of green that is too much. Innumerable shades and riches of color and texture feel wonderful. Maybe because those are all natural colors and they work magically well together. 

Anyone looking for a mood-based approach to color combinations can benefit from this tool. Whether your practice is in graphics, industrial design, architecture, interiors or fashion design, or you are simply struggling to pick a wall color for your home after purchasing a bright velvet green sofa, Color Moods can come in handy!

Morally Wrong

Got to love it when the world's richest man tells the rest of us what way of working is morally wrong. Not only is what he is saying problematic for many whose only chance of being part of the workforce is working from home because nothing else makes them whole. They are care-givers to children and elderly in their lives because they cannot afford professional help no matter how long they commute and how many hours they sit at the desk to be "moral" and upstanding employees. There are women who have given birth and need to choose between exiting the workforce or continuing to work from home until they are able to return. Maybe in this man's book a mother wishing to stay home and bond with her baby is not quite "moral" because a the full battery of service folks she needs in her life do not have the same privilege. Imagine a new father wants to spend time with his baby because that phase of life is so fleeting. Wouldn't that be a complete outrage.

Not only will every news outlet report what he is saying because it is buzzy and garners the much needed eye-balls to keep the ad revenues coming in. But better yet a very large number of other CEOs will adopt the same position of moral outrage at the "laptop class" of people who could be so bold as to want to work from home. So easy to forget that these very people as reprehensible as they are kept the lights on for everyone else during the dark days of the pandemic. Things got moved to cloud in a heartbeat so services could be provided without interruption and so on. Some of these laptop people are just as essential as those who have to show up to their place of work everyday and did that through the pandemic - as it turns out, there is a world beyond Twitter. I have to believe that the research leading to the production of vaccines that helped end the pandemic were done by people who used laptops from home.

I wonder if he has a problem with the minimum wage earning call-center worker who cannot afford to pay for the gas to commute to work let alone pay for parking once she gets there, What if she needed to work from home to resolve problems for the people who have show-stopping issues with their service providers. In my neighborhood the ladies working at the local barbershop work from their home now because they cannot afford the commute to the shop anymore - they are priced out of the neighborhood where they provide services and the cost of commute is not supportable on their wages. They may or may not have a laptop but they most certainly are not immoral. The man who wants to label them as such should try standing just one whole day in their shoes. 

End Times

This story made for an intense and sad read. How the dreams we have at the end of our lives, can predict how close we are to the finish line. The author refers to the work of Dr. Kerr in this area: 

Kerr is one of the only physicians in the country who has studied this phenomenon in depth. He undertook the study of end-of-life dreams and visions (ELDVs) because he repeatedly encountered patients whose dreams and visions were important to them and were frequently predictive of death. Yet, without research findings that validated the importance of such dreams, Kerr could not get physicians to take them seriously.

I wonder if such dreams also come to those who are not hospice-bound and have know way of knowing that their time is up. Maybe such dreams are harbingers of such news to those as well except that there may not be such an organized body of data to demonstrate if the the dreams are truly predictive of the end.

Interview with Josephine Dorado

Josephine Dorado is a New York-based media artist, performer and social entrepreneur. In her work, she explores the extension of the performance environment with technology, often utilizing movement-based, sensor-driven synthesis and networked telepresence. She is also interested in the process of cultural exchange through creative interplay in virtual spaces, which led to founding ZoomLab and initiating the Kidz Connect program, which connects students internationally via creative collaboration in virtual worlds such as Second Life.

Me : What triggered the creation of Zoomlab ?

Josephine: I had gotten a Fulbright scholarship and went to Amsterdam to do interactive art & performance. I was fortunate to get an artist residency while there and immersed myself in the field of networked performance (are you familiar with networked performance?)

Me: No I am not.

Josephine: These are performance in which the artists are in disparate geographical locations, using networked technologies like streaming, etc - to link together and perform. So while I was on the Fulbright grant, I had a very rich cultural experience while living abroad and when I came back, I wanted to share that thought it was invaluable so I thought - why can't we create cultural connection using performance in a networked environment the technology is already there. So the idea of collaboratively creating art & performances together in order to promote cultural exchange came about and became ZoomLab and eventually the Kidz Connect project (and the pilot project)

Me: Have you found school systems being receptive to the idea of using Second Life to teach ? To an average layperson SL connotes "serious" gaming and there seems in that an inherent conflict of interest with education. Do you find yourself having to educate the educators ?

Josephine : Well, there's usually an advocate for using SL a really enthusiastic teacher it only takes one really enthusiastic advocate to push it through the biggest hurdles administratively have been things like setting up the infrastructure in SL for the youth communities and getting support from administration but otherwise, I've met with some very interested educators.

Me: Do you work with elementary schools as well ?

Josephine: Not right now and it is because of the logistics. TSL (teen SL) requires that the kids be between 13-17 so far, we've concentrated on working with teens. Are you an educator too?

Me: I am a mother of a second grader and very interested in her education :)

Josephine: I just met someone the other day that specializes in programs for elementary school kids - and getting them into serious gaming.

Me: Do you see the lack of cultural interaction as a significant miss in the education system ? Or in other words what are you hoping SL with bring to the table that real time interaction among kids - specially in those parts of America and around the world where there is a lot of ethnic diversity. I do have a question about gaming for kids but I'll save that for later.

Josephine: Oh goodness, yes there's a serious lack of cultural interaction. Within the US in general - we're so isolated - and especially within the education system. During our pilot project, one of the US teens, upon first seeing the Dutch students, was surprised and said, "There's black people in Amsterdam?" I guess she thought that they were all blond and wore wooden shoes. :-)

Me: :)

Josephine: Yes, a lot of the kids don't know what is going on outside their neighborhood and don't really care either

Me: I agree.

Josephine: Until you connect them with somebody in another country, and give them something fun to do together - and eventually, within that creation process, they'll bond and begin to care about what's going on 'across the pond'. I think there's a sort of magic that happens when people create and perform together - that's really experiential - what performers refer to as the 'performance high' and that's a very bonding experience that I think can be created within a virtual platform too.

For example, I've done networked performances in which there was a musician in NY and another in LA, and dancers in FL and Houston. The musicians didn't know each other and neither did the dancers. We rehearsed and performed a piece over 2 years, and even tho the musicians/dancers didn't meet each other, they really did 'know' each other.

You get to know someone's style when you improvise and perform with them - quite intimately, even tho it's at a distance. You create presence with each other and it can become quite layered. And I can honestly say that we all consider each other friends, even tho a couple of them still have never met. Similarly within the Kidz Connect project, even tho the teens haven't met, I know they will continue to be friends and connect in TSL.

Me: A big part of cultural connection in my mind has to do with empathy. Do you see SL playing a role there ? Would it perhaps helps kids around the world appreciate the suffering of kids just like them but growing up in Darfur or say Afghanistan ?

Josephine: Yes I definitely think so. you can create projects that promote awareness of those cultures. Are you familiar with global kids?

Me: No I am not

Josephine: They do some very good work. I and my colleagues end up working with them a lot. they also do quite a bit of work in SL they've done projects for example, in which teens are invited to make machinima in TSL around certain subjects, like human trafficking and such for example here's the 'Race to Equality' machinima some teens recently shot.

Me: Kids my child's age are growing up in a world where their most natural element is being connected and online. Does SL not add yet more virtuality in their lives when what they need is more of the real ?

Josephine: Yes, absolutely, they are growing up in a very 'connected' way where they immediately have a digital identity . Good question - I think that the virtual component is here to stay and the point is to learn how to negotiate it how to multitask effectively when to give your attention to reality as well as to virtuality in Kidz Connect, we do 'mixed reality' shows mixing RL and SL by using a combination of SL, avatar exploration and RL streamed video and, not surprisingly, the teens can negotiate the mixture of RL and SL with no problem at all one of the scenes that the kids wrote in the most recent show, starts off in SL and turns into RL

Me: Do you see there being a SL divide as kids of today grow up ?

Josephine: You mean like a digital divide but specifically having to do with SL?

Me: Yes. The digital as in internet and mobile apps is one thing but to be able to traverse back and forth between RL and SL is quite another skill.

Josephine: Well, I think SL might be the current metaverse platform du jour but in a year or less, I'm fairly certain another platform will pop up and be the 'next big thing' so I wouldn't call it an SL divide but I would say that 3D virtual worlds are here to stay. They will be developing more over time. Raph Koster who is legendary in the gaming world, is coming out with his own 3D virtual world that will be called Metaplace it will function from within a browser and will enable cross-world linking so rather than having to use a software client to log in, you'll be able to access it within your browser - now that's a big development the virtual world will be brought to you in your internet browser, rather than bringing the internet to the virtual world. but anyway, yes 3D web is really just on the horizon

Me: That's a game changer !

Josephine: Yes.

Me: How do you see ambient devices converging with SL ? Would it be within the realm of possible to see the world through my own rose colored glasses where everything in my world is just as I want it to be ?

Josephine: People are already experimenting with alternative interfaces for SL i.e., using sensor input instead of mouse input and when you look at interfaces like the Wii which is really just a set of accelerometers and infrared we're not very far from being able to use, for example, camera input which means that we'll be able to do some interesting things with human movement translation into virtual worlds which could also have some interesting implications for people that are physically challenged.

Me: You mentioned the importance of being able to start and stop living in SL and transition over to RL. Do you see every kid who has been exposed to SL being able to do so or would some just fail to learn that particular skill ?

Josephine: Not necessarily to start and stop 'living' in SL - rather, to be able to negotiate within and between the spaces most kids already know how to negotiate and navigate within a virtual world. Most have grown up with gameboys.

Me: See I find that a hard concept to grasp but then I have not experienced SL :)

Josephine: This just teaches them that they can be creative within it and they're encouraged to be. They really take to it very quickly, almost without effort.

Me: I have kept my 6 year old away from gaming simply because I am not sure when it stops being a good thing and becomes addictive. Do you have advise for gaming challenged parents like myself ?

Josephine: Well, there are certainly quite a few resources out there about it - here's a particularly good presentation on "Virtual Worlds, Real Skills" that was given by my friend Rafi from global kids at a conference at MIT and this one about collective wisdom which is a great article too. There is another study about MMO players and leadership.

Bird Model

Parrots and social media in the same sentence can happen to and not by accident either. Seems like they are not that different from human. Popularity is important and decides if you get calls or not: 

Pet parrots that are allowed to make video calls to other birds show signs of feeling less isolated, according to scientists. The study, which involved giving the birds a tablet that they could use to make video calls, found that they began to engage in more social behaviour including preening, singing and play. The birds were given a choice of which “friend” to call on a touchscreen tablet and the study revealed that the parrots that called other birds most often were the most popular choices.

That sounds just like us on with our curated to perfection lives in pictures and video -  full or "preening, singing and play". Mouse models have been standard in scientific research for longest time. With this parrot study, it seems like consumer product development could rely on bird models. If it is good enough for parrots, it would serve humans just fine. We do exactly what these birds did on social media.

“Some would sing, some would play around and go upside down, others would want to show another bird their toys.”

Growing Wild

Watched The Elephant Whisperers recently. It is beautifully shot and shows the loving bond between elephants and their human caregivers eloquently. A bereaved mother (Bellie) feels comforted by the elephant she tales care of - he reminds her of her now deceased daughter when she was his age. She is bereft when that elephant is separated from her to be given to another caretaker. I grew up in India very close to indigenous people and it is probably the best thing that happened to me in my childhood. I remember these folks as being hard-working, carefree and centered to something the rest of us not even see. You could think of their lives as "simple" but that would be wrong. They lived in a world apart from ours that was always alluring and mysterious to me. We may have had more and better things than they did but we but that was all we had. 

Watching Bellie and Bomman in the movie tending their blended human and elephant family took me back in time. Bellie reminded me of a tribal woman, P who came to our house to work in the garden sometimes. She came when she thought the time was right - there was something to plant or harvest. She expected we would do the tending between those times. I was always eager to watch P at work and had endless questions. She taught to recognize edible plants that grew wild in our garden like weeds. P would also know where to dig for mushrooms - we learned to eat mushrooms thanks to her. She had a grandbaby that would bring along sometimes. The most remarkable things about P was her smile. She had a few missing teeth and a wrinkled face but it did not diminish the brilliance of the smile. I always thought P was a wise woman but in ways that could not help people like me who inhabited a different world. 

Thinking Simple

So heartwarming to read about technology making a real difference to the most underserved. In this case making sure a person was actually paid for the sale

“Confirmation that money has come was a perennial issue for vendors,” Pai told Rest of World. “A lot of vendors had feature phones with SMS limits, and hence, confirmations of payments didn’t come in real time as SMS inboxes were full. Some asked to see customers’ phones or asked customers to send [the payments] again, which led to lots of arguments and a poor checkout experience. Sound box [services] seem to have solved that problem.

The customer for the solution is one I am very familiar with. They have not changed all that much since my childhood years in India to last summer when I was back home in Kolkata. It was always unclear to me how the small-time vegetable sellers with a little space on the side of the street was able to eke an existence. Just about everything was conspiring against their success. And yet they persisted year upon year making some sort of a living. Enabling them in any way possible to come out ahead is a big win. This is a great example of great simplicity coupled with proper execution - something to be inspired by for anyone looking to bring a product to market.

Crystal Ball

One bold author has peered into the crystal ball to see what lies a decade ahead of generative AI. It is a daunting task and this version of the story ends quite badly. I want to believe (even if naively) that more good than bad with come out of generative AI over a period of time. Being able to adapt and use it in creative ways is where the winners will separate from the pack and forge their path. 

This is true for every line of work, The question to ask at the moment is what jobs do I as a person need to get done in my personal and professional life where this can help. Once we get further along, the question should likely change to what have I never considered as a job to get done in my personal or professional life because it was never possible do. Of these are there any that I would love to get done and then can this technology help me. 

For those of us who were around for the dotcom boom and bust cycle, we recall the endless vomit of ideas and how everyone was in the dotcom and startup business. Most of that noise died in due course and the fittest few survived. It might go the same way with this one too. There will be an incredible number of ideas and creations that come along - some will die not because they were not good enough but because people will be not have the attention span to look at everything that is gushing out. Being seen, noticed, used and creating sustained value will be incredibly hard given the level of noise and opinions.

Maybe folks with the best, most promising truly world-changing ideas should keep in quiet and work things to perfection - get out of the breaking things failing fast style of building things that as been the norm of the last couple of decades. Maybe because so much more is possible now, it is time to slow down.

Losing Contact

J came home to visit for a weekend recently and it had over a year since the last time she did. We both took Monday off to hang out. This is the first time she is home a working woman living independently in her own apartment. She took me out to brunch and we talked for hours. As J has achieved degrees of freedom through her teens and now as as an adult, our relationship has ebbed and flowed. Sometimes she felt distant and mentally lost to me. At other times, it like I was her last and only anchor. Rarely was it then even-keeled place in between. This visit, for the first time in a long while, I experienced that fine balance. We were like two friends who go way back, understand each other and make each other laugh. It takes me constant work to grow alongside her, adapt to the evolving reality of J and keep pace with change. 

It is a lot of work and all to easy to slide into what was familiar and comfortable for the majority of my motherhood - treating her like a child. My mother simply did not do the work I am doing every day. Our relationship has a set point somewhere in my 20s I think. She must have felt like her work is done and there is nothing new to learn and adapt to. We have almost nothing in common today and our conversations are very formulaic. I wonder if comes an elastic limit in a person's life where they simply cannot keep up anymore - if mine might come in a few years. The thought is scary and keeps me fighting to stay relevant, not become a stranger to my own child. 

Going Back

A character in a movie I watched recently reminded me of K as a kid. He was my best friend M's little brother. M and I were in our early teens at the time. K was a quiet guy and lived in his sister's oversize shadow. She loved him dearly but was a bossy young woman. When M's family relocated to Shimla, K had just turned thirteen. That was the last I saw him. In my memory he remained this quiet kid, who followed his sister around and did her bidding. He was unfailing polite and respectful. He spoke only on occasion and very little.

K was programmed to be useful - at home and outside, always first to lend a helping hand. So when that movie brought the memories of K and childhood to mind, I  got curious to see what had become of the kid. His LinkedIn profile sounded like a dream - he was doing his own thing, had left the corporate world behind and found an interesting niche to thrive in. He still had the same face only an older man now. I imagine he is still holds doors for women, helps them carry their grocery bags and asks if they need help with anything. It is how he was raised. If he was married, he must have have made a great husband. 

Part of me wanted to reach out to the kid but it felt awkward because he was never my friend - K just came packaged with his sister whom I have long since lost touch with. But my efforts to touch base led to some not so pleasant discovery. A couple of years ago, K had been viciously assaulted by a local goon in the sleepy town he lived - the very place where I imagined he was living his best life full of work life harmony. He barely made it alive out of the incident which was covered in the news at the time. I wished I had not learned any more about this kid I once knew. I would have carried my recollections of him in less complicated times when the worst that could happen his sister would call him a "cartoonish idiot" - her favorite insult that never failed to land. In hindsight, K had it really good back then.

Divine Logic

All around me, trees and flowers seem to be flourishing exuberantly this year - more so than the past few. I have noticed it but never connected it to bad seasonal allergies that have bothered me for months. Apparently, the two are connected and we owe both to climate change. 

Climate change is caused by an increased concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which trap and hold heat. Carbon dioxide is one of those gases, and it's released in heavy quantities due to fossil fuel extraction and burning. However, carbon dioxide also serves an important role in pollinating plants by helping them "grow bigger and faster, flower more, and produce more pollen per flower," per the Journal​​​​​​. With more pollen comes worse allergic reactions. Combating climate change is necessary to stop the season from continuing to stretch longer.

There is a divine logic to this in a sense. Maybe this is how the earth heals itself, producing more plants and trees to help creatures that depend on them thrive better. It helps undo the harm we are causing. Maybe we collectively deserve our allergies so we would have diminished capacity to what nature does not want us to.

Slow Travel

Reading this article on slow travel made me think that travel for pleasure likely killed the concept of slow travel. For most people who have to earn their living, the right to leisure is one that has to be paid for through time and effort at work - no matter what the nature of that work. Once enough leisure has been earned, the person might take time off and travel. It is no surprise that the the earnings run out quickly and they have to go back. 

The travel under such conditions cannot be be too slow. When travel was a necessity to live and survive, there might have been few if any constraints on how long it should take or last. People left their land and home on account of floods, famines, wars and the like. There was nothing to return to and the only way was onward until they came upon a hospitable place. It would take whatever time it took with stops and detours along the way. Modern day travel is not tethered in such primal life-saving purpose. 

It’s hard to pinpoint its exact beginnings but the slow travel revolution—an intentional move towards more mindful, more environmentally responsible, less purely convenient modes of getting around—organically emerged from another revolution. 

We can try to be mindful, environmentally responsible and take the less convenient options but that would still not imbue our travel with the purpose it had for our forbears. Everyone who has been an immigrant will recall very the smallest details of the their coming to the new country which would become their home. The first town they saw, the first meal they ate, the people that they spoke to and so on. No detail is too small to ignore or be forgotten. The journey itself could have been mundane but the purpose makes it "slow travel"  in the person's mind.

Endless Distraction

Nice interview about the loss of conversation. The way the balance between having a real human conversation and a digital life is described makes sense:

..we have now created an environment that will distract us to distraction. My recipe does not involve my giving up my phone. It’s too useful. But it means not using it on occasions like this when I am trying to give you my full attention. The human voice occupies a lot of bandwidth if you listen to it properly. If I was also texting, you would not be getting a sense of me.

When J was still living at home with me, she used to call me out on being distracted by phone. To her credit, she used hers sparingly if at all when in the middle of a conversation. I acknowledged the problem and agreed on no phone at dinner table rule. As Turkle rightly points out, adults are often the worst offenders and kids want to have a real conversation. That is a short-lived period in their childhood when they want to hear and be heard. It is tragedy for the adults around them to squander it if the want to get to know this child. I am grateful J pointed out the error of my ways and I had time to recover. 

Title Inflation

This piece of news reads like an Onion article except it is actual news. We have a AI Czar now and the lady in question does talk a lot like a chatbot. Maybe that was one of the key qualifications for the role. More telling is that was thought fit to hire someone who has no track record of delivery in any related capacity (and some may argue in any capacity whatsoever). 

Back in day when she was elected, I remembered mixed emotions in desi circles. Some were elated because she could be claimed to be one of our own (atleast in part). Others were not sure they wanted her to represent the brand desis were aspiring for in the world. Now the hand-wringing will resume in sober earnest I presume. 

The poor woman has been saddled with a job way more qualified people would be afraid to take on. It is all but given that she will fail - it is not an if but when and how big. Inaction and ineptitude will have over-size consequences. She would be smart to find a well-credentialed and qualified person such as this guy who recently quit his job is now in the market to pick up the job and go way back-stage. The only problem is she may not find any takers for such a role. 

Being Broken

The aftermath of S's visit lasted a while in how many ways I felt pressure-tested. We have more in common than I would like to admit. S said during dinner the first night of his stay, that his daughter was the product of three generations of broken families where the parents of the child had little love and warmth in their marriage if the union lasted at all. I would say the same is true in a sense of J. My grandparents on both sides were in what would be called unhappy marriages in current parlance. Back in their time, in the aftermath of partition survival was the bigger more pressing concern - the lack of love in marriage was not something anyone had time to mull over. 

Both grandmothers became widows by the time I was in my teens. Sometimes they talked about their discontent in their marriages and how they accepted it as an unchangeable fact of life. It seemed like in their old age when they no had responsibilities left for anyone, both women reminisced about the wasteland that defined their marriages while seeking to find some memories they could hold dear. My parents had the kind of marriage I wanted to avoid at any cost - it made me dread the institution greatly. My own track record has been chaotic and difficult. In that sense J is also the product of three generations of loveless unions. It was an off the cuff remark S made in the context of how miraculous it was that his daughter had found love - though it was not clear if she actually had or it was his perception that she had. 

Whichever the case, there is indeed an element of miraculous for one such as J or this young lady to break the bad pattern. As parents it is what we dearly wish for them. In that S and I are exactly the same. We want to see every sign as one that proves our children have achieved such miracle and the reached the end of multi-generational tunnel of darkness. The comment also made me question what other kinds of brokenness we pass on because of where people like us come from. If maybe S is broken in ways that I am not but seeing him triggers me because I see parts of what I least like about myself reflected in him. 

Goldilocks Zone

Interesting article about the social cost for a woman who chooses to negotiate her job offer. It is a delicate balance. If you are a woman and negotiating there is a Goldilocks zone that you should try to hit. Don't undersell yourself or that will set the tone for how you are treated once you accept the offer. However, try not to become among the highest paid people in your level. That invites attention and scrutiny disproportionately. Specially, if you want to be bold and take chances on the job itself, break some glass along the way. Being somewhere in the middle of the pack is a good safety net to have for such experiments. You may even garner the support of leadership and they will reward you for your troubles because there is room to grow. 

If a woman negotiates a really good deal and then proceeds to makes a bunch of waves, chances are that she will be viewed as problematic and at some point that problem will be resolved in ways that will not be to her liking. Many of these rules don't seem to apply to men and when they do to only some types of men. Outside watching in the dynamic seems to suggest that for men there are in and out groups and what that comprises of varies a great deal by company. Those in the out group can have the same set of challenges as the average woman. Some women do make it to the organizational in group and they prosper a great deal but that is a highly select set. They have moved to the epicenter of the Goldilocks zone through their own efforts combined with the good fortune of having sponsors.

The article has some helpful ideas on how a woman can legitimize her negotiation. Particularly liked this one for younger women "I don’t know how typical it is for people at my level to negotiate, but I’m hopeful that you’ll see my skill at negotiating as something important that I can bring to the job.”

Bleeding Wounds

The arrival, stay and departure of S is on my mind. I could have done it differently and there were many chances to recover but I did not use any of them. I just wanted him to know I had not sought his presence in my home and felt imposed upon. Yet, I have been his shoes two decades ago - a very different phase of life but much of what he is dealing with at sixty I did back then. A life upended by the implosion of a marriage, no financial safety net and a future with responsibilities looming ahead. J was less than a year old back then and his daughter is in her 20s but very far from being settled. S has responsibility for her even as he can barely fend for himself. Notwithstanding, I could not summon any compassion for his cause. Desperate people need lifelines - maybe the short stay at my home was one of such myriad lifelines he depends on. 

I came to realize that my outrage was borne out his lack of candor and manners. When I was in his shoes, I was at my most vulnerable - my cards were on the table, everyone knew exactly how desperate my situation was and how hard I was trying to climb out my hole. There were no secrets and no filters. If ever there was a time in my life I experienced being devoid of any and all ego, that was it. Very random people offered assistance in the form of connections and introductions to help me land on my feet. I made myself useful in non-monetary ways to my hosts (and it might have not been enough) because that was all I could do. I did not strut around like S like the world owes him, did not overcompensate for my failures with bad attitude. S chose to treat the host who had cooked him meals as if it were maid service doing the job she was paid by him to do. At V's I offered to cook any meal they would let me because I could offer free labor and I was desperate to do so to pay off my debt atleast some. 

I needed to to see some humility in S because my time as V's was the most humiliating experience of my life. My upset with S was borne from the fact that he did show a shred of appreciation for the favor he wrested from us by duplicity. By getting a free ride, he had opened up my twenty year old wounds to the point of raw, hurting and bleeding. 

Feeling Foolish

A few weekends ago I suffered a crisis of moral compass in that I failed to live up to the principle of atithi devo bhava - an ideal I was raised on and had many opportunities to learn by observation in my own family. Guests were treated with kindness and respect, made to feel at home and when they left they knew they would be welcome back. It was how I was treated by the overwhelming majority of hosts I have spent time with in my life. It is also how I observed my parents conduct themselves. 

With that being my background, I don't have an excuse to fail at being the kind host I have come to expect as a norm -  behave like the exception. Yet, I failed quite resoundingly. The guest in question, S is a friend of a friend. We know of him more than we know him. That Friday, he texted us that he was visiting his daughter a few hundred miles north of us on his way down south to where he lived.

I assumed he would be driving but he was not - he was coming by bus. I also assumed that he was dropping by to say hello, rest a bit before resuming his journey. I was wrong there too. At first, he asked to stay overnight - and this was before we knew he lacked transportation. So we said yes. Upon arrival we find he will need a ride to whatever place is next and it was upto us to make it happen. It was unclear why the bus would no longer work. 

Even that would be okay, if S had any shred of grace or politeness - showed any appreciation for us making space in our lives to accommodate him. I went about cooking for him, giving up our weekend after having had a long week and a tough one to look forward to. Somewhere in the middle of his three night stay as it ended up being, I decided to completely ignore his presence in my house and carry on like he did not exist. It was the only way for me to reclaim some of the loss of control in the situation that I had stupidly got myself into. 

We promised ourselves this is the last time we would welcome S home for any duration of stay - mainly because I was so outraged at what I viewed as his connivance. All of those nights he was in our home, I slept deeply uneasy thinking about how I had failed my family, the values that I was raised on and become the very thing I had once found so abhorrent. 

Part of me wanted to reach out to to V for the events of 2003 at her house, where I was the unwelcome guest. I wanted to tell her I still do not understand what happened then but I also don't understand my own reaction to S. So in that sense there is something to share between us. 

Had I made V feel stupid in the same way as S had made me feel, had I shown some lack of grace and consideration given my pre-occupation with my life unraveling at speed of light. I must have done something unwittingly or not to trigger the high level of unease V had felt. I know that now that I have been in her shoes even if for a much shorter period of time. 

Cheese Garlic

I always check the gourmet cheese on sale at my neighborhood grocery store. Much of what I have tasted that is fall outside by typical range is because it was on sale there. While the assortment is far from remarkable, it is a small window that opens to the much bigger world of cheese. Recently, I picked up something I could not even associate with another cheese I know for form, taste or smell. It got me curious about an authoritative catalog of cheese and how to understand what I had in front of me. This led me to discover this listing and this one where I learned about cheese made of reindeer milk. 

My little tour around the world of cheese felt no different than a dive into anything. One of my favorite things in the kitchen is my fresh garlic cloves and no surprise that is there not just one kind of garlic. In years to come, the bar to dabble in a bit of everything in life will likely drop lower - which is generally a good thing. But to specialize in one tiny niche and make a prosperous living out of it is already hard and will get harder. Hobbyists wanting to try their hand at specialty things might be the ones to save the day for specialists.