Isn’t this great, for just Rs.400 a month, Netflix gives Video on demand on a lot of devices (PC,macs, mobile devices, gaming consoles etc.) with recommendations, resuming playback of movies/T.V shows where you left them off and a lot more. So if you’re watching a movie late in the night and you get too sleepy, you can shut off your movie and resume it the next day on your way to work on your phone.  We end up paying more for Tata sky which doesn’t even provide video on demand or multiple device viewing.

This model has helped Netflix become a major success in the US and Canada with Apple choosing to bundle a Netflix app on their Apple TV as well. This gets us wondering, why isn’t there a service similar to Netflix in India?

Although there have been a few companies which have tried to imitate the earlier Netflix model, i.e DVD rentals none of them have become hugely popular nor have they offered attractive policies like no late fees, no due dates etc. There was a post on gigaOM way back in 2006 pegging seventymm as India’s Netflix, obviously the service hasn’t caught on.
The posts points out a major hurdle for video rental services like these, piracy. With every railway station selling CDs of the latest movies on as soon as their release dates for as cheap as Rs.50 ($1), it becomes a bit difficult for the survival of this model, also with increasing penetration of the not-so-fast broadband in India, you see people downloading 700mb DVD rips from piratebay even if it takes them 24 hours.

So Indian players haven’t even succeeded in coming on par with the Netflix of the earlier years, let alone the current streaming based Netflix. The rental service not catching up is because these players haven’t been able to come up with an effective strategy, but the non existent streaming based service is majorly because of the pathetic internet service in India.

The Netflix page specifies minimum connection requirements for it to work fine “Watching instantly works with all different levels of broadband, however, we recommend a minimum speed of 500kpbs (0.5MB).” In average Indian homes unfortunately this sort of connectivity is absent. Speeds like these if offered by ISPs cost a lot. So right now if an Indian Netflix would startup it would remain restricted to the offices of Indian people where stuff like this isn’t permitted. Also the mobile market isn’t ready yet for on the move media viewing, the 3G tariffs are expensive, carriers aren’t ready yet to carry huge amounts of data on their network and a huge part of Indians still don’t have smart phones.

This coupled with the fact that many Indians don’t want to pay for something digital. For example: They won’t hesitate much to buy pirated CDs and DVDs but they have a problem buying a $.99 game from the AppStore. Fortunately this mindset is changing with the increasing penetration of Internet banking, online shopping etc. A lot of channels like NDTV, CNN, IBN, etc and events like the IPL are providing live streams online. So one can just hope for a Netflix like service to come up in India in the next five years. If they have enough partnerships for providing content then DTH services are doomed!

It was reported that Netflix’s competitor Google has also  launched a pay-per-view online service, in order to gain more traffic to their new service.

Source: I feel that we desperately need faster broadband connection for sure. It will solve a lot of problems. I feel piracy can somehow be reduced by providing faster broadband in homes and mobile phones. I would definitely want to subscribe for a 24×7 movie available for 400 Rs/per month. And save money on my broadband and electricity bill.

China started their family planning policy in 1970, India in 1952

In 2001 our birth rate was nearly 3 times more than China. 27 births per 1000 as against 8.8 for China! India is adding 18 million people per year, against 9 million per year in China. Total addition to population is a function of total births minus total deaths.

India’s per capita earning is US$440 per year against US$990 per year in China

As per the World Bank, the poverty line definition is US$1 per person per day or US$365/person/year, for underdeveloped countries like India, China etc. As per the official data from both governments, China has 3% population below the poverty line, compared to India’s 26 to 29%! Only better governance can help.

China attracts 87 million tourists per year (this is expected to reach 90 million in 2002) against 2.5 million per year to India.

The international Tourism Industry is [7 times the size of I.T. or software] about, US$3700 billion per year. India, in spite of its old history and 21 cultures and languages, seems to have ‘missed the bus’, in Tourism. Tourism is a very big employment generator. It is estimated that every one tourist generates 2 to 4 jobs. Tourism promotes International trade and understanding.
How will we provide additional 10 million jobs per year?

The Public Sector and State/Central Government, which is already overstaffed, has a total of 18.7 million employees, therefore offers very little scope for new employment. We have to look outside the government for new employment. The unorganized sector and the SME’s (SSI is not SME) offer the maximum scope for employment, like in all other countries of the world, including China. SME’s account for nearly 75% of employment and 80% of trainees!

The Government can only facilitate jobs; they cannot provide jobs for the 300 million partly or fully unemployed in India!

At 10 million jobs per year it will take us 30 years to remove unemployment, at 5 million jobs for year it will take us 60 years! The present Indian ‘mind set’ will require rethinking and reorganization of the existing perceptions about Public Sector enterprises, and the actual role they are supposed to play! Only efficient organizations can deliver results and growth. Only better governance and efficient administration can deliver results!

In Foreign Direct investment, FDI, China + Hong Kong received US$106 billion last year [US$70billion from NRC's] vs US$3.6 billion [US$0.2b from NRI's] for India! Only better Governance can attract FDI and Tourists. In exports, China is nearly +700% of India

Taking the exports of Hong Kong + Macau into account, China’s exports would be +1000% of India! China’s GDP is 50% in manufacturing or $ 650 billion per year. India’s GDP is 25% in manufacturing or $110 billion per year. China’s manufacturing base is nearly 6 times of India’s.

In agriculture our yields per acre, are well below the international norms.

India could be a giant exporter of food, only if we could put our ‘house in order’ to near world class standards! China with lesser cultivable land, produces double the food grains, at 415 million tons per year compared with India’s 208 million tons per year. God has been very kind to India with a lot of sunshine, rain, rivers, lakes, coastline and good hard working citizens.
The governance of hamlets, villages, cities, districts, Government and Semi-Government agencies, as facilitators, have not done enough to show the results that India is able or capable of achieving. India would definitely rate as the No.1 country in the world, for Potential vs Performance!
Indians score high marks on performance, outside India! This is because the Governance is better outside. In countries where the Governance & Administration is poor, the performance of its citizens is also low!

In Education, 99.1% of Chinese children attend school for 9 years, this ensures a high level of literacy. In India, literacy is 50 to 60%

While IIT’s, IIM’s are important, the country’s real growth will come because of primary and secondary education and vocational and educational training in all districts of the country. India can rise and shine in exports, agriculture, literacy and other areas with better governance.

This is why I have lost faith in humanity, because too many people believe what is told to them and would rather believe in the “make me feel safe, secure, and okay” state of mind rather than face reality. It is a reality that non-profit and profit organizations use fraud to gain extra bucks. This is not conspiracy theories as it is even reported in mainstream media. You would have to be either very naive or not informed of what is going on in the world not to realize this.

Look at the last decade during the many world disasters, the mainstream news media always reported on scams/misuse of funds/missing funds for donations drives for:

• 9/11 Victim families
• Tsunami relief 2004
• Haiti earthquake relief and many others.

Just watch/read the news the next time another major disaster happens and donation drives start up, and you will see it shows up. Now, having said all this, I never said that no one should not donate to Wikipedia. I consider Wikipeidia one of the most important acomplishements of human effort for this decade and maybe even farther back because its primary cause is to spread information, something I believe strongly in.

And that is exactly why I mention that donation drives are not 100% innocent just because they have the “non-profit” tag on them. Those that still refuse to believe this reality attempt to counter with “but they report what they use the money for!” And then further counter by saying you have no evidence in return to go against it.

However evidence does exist in the form of history of scams/fraud in past donation drives for various causes. Also, the excuse of saying they report use is very naive as it *assumes* that those reporting are not involved or prone to fraud or are 100% honest. Even in the face of history proving that people can’t be trusted, which is way laws, courts, and oversight organizations exist (which I will also add are also not immune to being corrupt [as proven by history]).

Beyond failing to observe or forgetting history, I believe most people don’t realize this because they have never been in a “controller” position without oversight, in which human bias and nature is unchecked. This is why in science, double-blind experiments are use to remove bias. However, in the controller position without oversight, this is not removed. If you study literature, this topic (i.e. Lord of the Flies) has been covered many times throughout history as well, even up until now and in films.

Again, I just want to say I support Wikipedia because I so strongly believe in the spreading of information, and by that believe I attempt to spread a little, perhaps unpleasant piece of information as well. Which instead of being pushed under the plate should be swallowed whole, even if it tastes bad and unsettles your bowels. Even still you should make it part of you, move on, and seek out more information.

What are your thoughts on this?

Recently read a news about US government asking Google to provide lots and lots of data related which is related to the services Google provides. I am sure they must be utilizing this data for get to the corrupts. And then automatically me being a typical Indian wanted to check our country’s  rank in that list. To my surprise we rank 3rd in that list after US and Brazil. Wow.. It feels great to be in a such a list. Well that’s one side of the story I was thinking. But after reading the data requests that Google received I started thinking about what would our government departments have actually asked for. Checkout for analysis after the break.

About Google Transparency : Its an interactive map of Government Requests that shows the number of government inquiries for information about users and requests for Google to take down or censor content. The interactive Traffic graphs provide information about traffic to Google services around the world. Each graph shows historic traffic patterns for a given country/region and service. By illustrating outages, this tool visualizes disruptions in the free flow of information, whether it’s a government blocking information or a cable being cut.

Below is the graph that shows the requests from Indian Government agencies to Google in the past 1 year.

I’ll leave you guys with that thought because I need to go to bed now. OK, still let me give you some perspective. Have you ever looked at our government websites. I have talked about it earlier as well. But I think the more we are so called developing the more our government is showcase that they are technically sound. I mean I am not talking about the politicians. We bloody pay some great amount of money in taxes can’t we hire some sound technical guys to handle these stuffs. Alright I think I am deviating from the topic.

OK, I was suppose to give you some perspective. Alright, I was just looking at my blog and saw an advertisement on my blog via adsense that I have setup. I did not click on the ad but copied the link to the URL. You believe me it was Delhi Traffic Police Delhi Traffic Police is advertising via Google Adwords. Anyways, then in curiosity I went to check out the website. Our government needs to accept the fact that their developers su*k.  So there were some nice presentations regarding common wealth games. I could not believe my eyes by looking at the presentation. I mean such a big country and not even one single fucking person in India who can make a good looking presentation. You don’t believe me check this out. And yeah I was in an impression since it being a website where the whole world would be browsing to look for updated information but then I saw a link to download flash player which still links to Macromedia site. Thanks to Adobe that they have redirected it to the right place.

• In India, tobacco use causes nearly 40 percent of all health problems and 50 percent of all cancers, according to Health Minister, Anbumani Ramadoss.
• In India The tobacco contributes to 56.4% and 44.9% of cancers in men and women, respectively.
• India ranks 2nd in smoking cigarette in top 10 countries.
• Nearly 17 percent of students in India, aged 15 and under, use some form of tobacco, mainly cigarettes, according to a survey conducted by the World Health Organization.
• India has the largest number of oral cancer cases in the world which is due to tobacco.
• In India, an estimated 120 million people smoke. But the problem is that smoking in India is on rising side unlike Western countries.
• Cigarettes compromise just 19 percent of tobacco consumption in India however Bidis account for 53 percent, according to the Bidi Smoking and Public Health report by the Union Ministry of Health and Family.
• Around 1 billion Bidis are sold in India every year. Bidis contain more tar, nicotine and other toxic substances but less tobacco than traditional cigarettes.
• Tobacco smoking accounts for 82% of Chronic obstructive lung disease in India.

It’s been around 1 year now that Indian Government imposed ban on smoking in public places including government and private offices. You might not know but this act was in existence for 2 years before our government thought of implementing it seriously. Seriously, imagine. We create acts, put them in files, make a pile out of it, put them in a room somewhere and then don’t look at them for 3-4 years. Then suddenly you wake up and try to enforce everything. And I’ll tell you some facts about this so called smoking ban in public places today. Well, I think I don’t really have to tell you anything as most of you already know it to some extent.

Alright let’s first discuss what the ban exactly is. As per the government, no one is allowed to smoke in public places including public transportation and public offices etc. As per the rules, smoking is banned in shopping malls, cinema halls, public/private work place, hotels, banquet halls, discotheques, canteen, coffee house, pubs, bars, airport lounge, railway stations. Public places cover all government, private and public sector offices as well. I work with an MNC and believe me there people adhere to the regulation. People go out of the offices for smoke. Earlier employees could smoke in the office premises but ever since the smoking ban everyone is prohibited to smoke inside the office premises. Also, any employer found to be letting its employees smoke inside the office premises are supposed to be penalized. Moreover I think people working with big MNCs in India are mature enough to understand what it means for our country. We tell clients coming from abroad that there are restrictions on smoking inside the premises, so we don’t want them to see us smoking in there.

Alright, that’s the rule now lets see how is our government who imposed the ban is doing about it. You remember me visiting MTNL office, I saw employees smoking inside the building. Well, that was not it. I shave seen many more government offices with people smoking inside the offices. But today was the height of everything, I went to a government office today (would not want to quote) and saw employee smoking in the building that too on his seat as well. And the head of the office was also smoking in the office.

I just want to understand why has it always been like this? Why do we citizens only have to follow all the rules? Why the people who create the rules, don’t have to adhere to them.

And believe me its not the only thing which is wrong these days Things like these keep happening in our country. It has been in existence in one or another form with each and every government department of India. For example, Delhi Police does not need any helmet while driving on the road but they want each and every rider in Delhi to wear helmet and don’t miss a chance of not giving ticket to the rider if he/she is not wearing the helmet. Similarly they want everyone to wear seat-belts while driving even if the traffic is not even moving. Every government department you go in, you’d find yourself on the verge of having an argument all the time. People don’t really seem to take their jobs seriously.

I am not able to understand the mentality of our government employees as in why do these people behave like this. I mean its good that you are sitting there in a government office but aren’t you suppose to work. Yeah, let me not just start that. I’d need an entire book on that just one post won’t be enough I guess.

Don’t know when would we be free, free as in FREE…! The ultimate question is should we try and ban these things from selling or should we ban smoking of cigarettes. ?

Some interesting reading about tobacco and smoking.

• Avoiding tobacco adds 20 years to the life of a teenager.
• In India, 900,000 people die due to tobacco related diseases per year.
• Tobacco smoking accounts for 82% of Chronic obstructive lung disease in India.
• Tobacco indirectly causes lung tuberculosis. Prevalence of TB is about 3 times as great among the ever-smokers as among the never-smokers. The heavier the smoking, either cigarettes or bidis, the greater the prevalence of TB among smokers. Mortality from TB is 3 to 4 times as great in ever-smokers as in never-smokers.
• About half of the teenagers who use tobacco will eventually be killed by it (about a quarter in middle age and a quarter in old age).
• It is estimated that India as compared to any other country will have the fastest rise in tobacco related deaths each year.

How about a service which lets you convert your normal mobile phone number to a premium call rate number. I mean I get to choose how much a person pays for a call whenever someone calls me. For example anyone calling me on my mobile would end up paying 100 Rs per minute. This way I would not be able to stop them calling me but I can ask them to call me up again and again and get them to spend money. I take revenge. And the amazing part is that you get paid a handsome amount of money at the end of the month. Because this is how premium call rate numbers work. The organization that owns these premium call rate numbers gets the share from the total revenue generated.

Now let’s talk about the downsides of this idea. Suppose I setup this service on my mobile and one of my old friends gets hold of my number and calls me up. He would end up paying 100 bucks for the call. Well I have a solution for that. I ask my operator to warn the users who are calling me about the premium call rate. That way anyone calling me would think twice before calling me.

But what about my friends, family and colleagues? Would they ever be able to call me on my cell phone?  Hmm.. I thought about that also actually. I got this idea from the recently held Apple Special Event, where Steve announced Ping. In Ping you get to choose who follow you. So basically, you get to choose a white list of numbers who would not be charged premium rates.

I know there are solutions like Block List which I used to use. But that is not universal to all phones. I think only on Nokia phones this functionality is available. And moreover the hassle of adding them in the list and keeping them updated. It’s not just worth it. And don’t forget about the limitation of number of phone numbers that you can add.

I need to think about some idea on Mobile Spam, the text messages because they seem to be bugging more than the phone calls.

Oh, one more thing. Did I tell you that well before even any mobile operator implemented this caller tune thing I had this idea in mind. I thought why not have something different than rather just that old boring Tring Tring. And to my surprise Indian Operators introduced Caller Tune to us.

First the British looted and looted our country to the fullest. Now the Politicians are looting our country every day, every second. When will these sick people be brought to Justice.  If it were to be any other country all these people would have been arrested by now. Now these people are boldly saying what is going on is right.

Government at the center is busy in getting ready to loot the visitors as well. Don’t believe me, look at the past annoucncements made.

• Beer price hike
• CNG price hike
• Auto rickshaw hike
• and many more..

I mean what a foreigner visiting India need after coming to India. Transport and Food. But if you as government in spite of subsidizing the price of normal commodity increase it. Then its called loot in the open. Government needs to realize that people coming to India are not coming to watch the games. They are coming here to have fun. And in all this mess we localites are getting penalized.

I don’t have much to say but I think since our politicians and these people in Organizing Committee are illiterate I guess they have literally taken the word Commonwealth Games to be “Common Wealth“, as in Common. So everyone wants to have his/her share of the wealth.

I wrote a post earlier for our countrymen on how they can contribute for a successful CGW but I think I was wrong I should have written a post for our government on DO’s and DON’Ts during/before/after CWG 2010.

I wish technology advances so much that it does not leave any chance of error for humans. For example

• People could freely shop online and never be afraid of their bank details being leaked and hacked.
• I want the examination system to be like that it does not let anyone cheat.
• A world where if a crime is committed the culprit can never escape and gets the punishment instantly.
• A world where piracy will not be illegal. It will be legal because it would be upto the publishers to protect their creations/products/music/movies etc. And because the technology would be so strong that it does not even leave a chance for anyone to pirate.
• Where Microsoft does not have to be afraid over WGA cracks anymore because they know that their activation process is so amazing that no one can make copies.

What do you think about it ? Do you wanna live into that kind of world. Where you have all the freedom to do anything in this world and no one would complain about that.

My first visit was quite short and simple. I took a form from the information counter and submitted it to the department who takes care of all the broadband movements. I was told that I would get my phone installed at my new house in 3-4 days. I remember it was Monday when I requested for the movement. Nothing happened for the next 5 days and I kept following up with them over the phone. The reason I was given for not being able to install the landline phone was that they did not have the wire. Even after 2-3 follow ups I got the same response over the phone.

I was really frustrated and I decided to pay a visit to MTNL. It was my second visit. It was Saturday and by the time I reached, the employees were about to go for lunch. I spoke to the guy whom I had spoken to earlier over the phone. He told me the same thing that they did not have the wire and I believed this guy. Well, I’ll tell you why, I had some problems initially with my Wi-Fi router so I went to the Area Manager to complaint about it. He told me that they did not even have the equipment for new connections how can they give replacements. So I know these linemen would not lie. This guy voluntarily asked me to go to the General Manager and complain about the same. I guess he wanted the issue of not being able to serve the customers due to non availability of equipments reported directly by the customer. I also felt the need to go to the General Manager. It was lunch time now and I had to wait for an hour. I decided to wait for the lunch to get over. All the employees had already gone for lunch except one guy who was still processing bill payments. I was amazed to see the punctuality of the government employees. BTW their lunch timing is between 1.30 PM to 2.30 PM.

While I was waiting I noticed some things which really shocked me and broke my heart. At the very same moment I had decided to write this post. It’s just that I was not getting time to write.

Ready!  Here we go!

• As soon as I entered the Building there were public restrooms and I could smell them stinking even from 20 meters.
• There was a water cooler but It was not working.
• There were around 40 Air conditioners in that hall but only 2 air conditioners were working. And those which were working had MTNL employees sleeping in front of them in their lunch time.
• In the hall around 30% of the people were sleeping on the chair and they all were MTNL employees.
• There were public displays of new products which had products displayed from ancient time. I wonder if the information on those displays has ever been changed from the time they were installed.
  The place was so dirty, people had spat here and there on the floor and walls.
• I somehow kinda started enjoying my wait. I went to the first floor to check if there was anyone sitting. And you won’t believe there was not even a single person sitting on the seat. It looked like I have come to an abandoned building. I peeked into some cabins but there was no one.
• Then I noticed something. A group of around 3-4 ladies were sleeping on the floor and tables during the lunch. I was so surprised to see that.
  I could have picked anything from there and no one would have asked me anything because no one was there.
• There were so many things, I have even forgotten half of them. Broken Window glasses, Out of order PCO etc.

Wait was over now. I headed to the General Manager’s cabin. I explained my situation to them. He made 2-3 calls. He also called the same guy who had sent me to him. Lineman told him the same thing. After 5 minutes I realized that he was no General Manager because there was another cabin where it was written General Manager on the door outside. Then I came to know that this guy was just an assistant to  the General Manager. I was also wondering how a General Manager of MTNL could sit in an open room where 3-4 people were also sitting. Anyways, he was helpless as well. He discussed the matter with his colleagues and asked me to meet the Area Manager.

I went to him and told him that I would have to get my broadband connection disconnected if MTNL does not have wire to install landline. Seriously why do I pay for the services when I do not get to use it. He wrote down my number and assured me that he would take care of it.

2 weeks passed. Nothing happened. Still no wires.
3 weeks passed. And I kept following up with the lineman almost every alternate day. Finally last week I got my phone installed and working.

But now, no broadband

Now I had to accomplish another mission of getting the broadband working. After so many calls with customer care and the lineman, I have finally been able to get my broadband connection up and running today.

I am not criticizing the services of MTNL here. Their services are superb, but only till the time its working. I have this connection for the last 2 years now and I did not face any major issues with it.

All I wanted to share with you all was that I think We can do good. We have good hardworking people in Indian Government offices as well. Its just that they have to come out of their comfort zone of being a government employee and start justifying their salaries.

BTW this was all about MTNL Rohini Sector 1

I am sure you would have had same kind of experience with some Government Offices. Do share it via comment.

People may use the power for wrong doing but I think we can start with some intelligent and responsible people like Bus Conductor, Shopkeepers who are sitting on a road watching it all the time. A Pan wallah on the Traffic Signal.

I am thinking of creating another website where I urge people to submit such pictures where people are captured while breaking the law. And our law enforcement team has to just identify the person and fine him/her.

Think about it. Bye !

Let me know your thoughts by posting your comments.