Visiting Megu, The Leela Palace New Delhi’s ultra-chic super expensive Japanese restaurant was never for the faint hearted. I remember, when they opened, they had an average spend per person of 5 figures. So, imagine my disbelief when they began their Rs 2,500 all-inclusive Obento Box lunch.
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Two big wars are being waged online. A big grab for content, and a tug of war between advertisers and ad blockers, writes Mala BhargavaAnyone who gets their fix of news articles, jokes, movies and other content on the Internet, knows what it is to be bombarded by ads. And not just pretty ads that sit around on the side minding their own business, but ads that fly out to cover the content you’re trying to see, ads that pop and ping and refuse to go away until you click on the little cross in one corner, ads that take you off to another site if you as much as touch anything by mistake. Sometimes they’re in so many multiples that by the time you get past all the ads, you’ve lost interest in the content. We are all familiar with the ads on YouTube. You have to wait out at least five seconds or sometimes see it several times in a long video, for the privilege of watching. I long since stopped arresting the ads on YouTube when I stopped to think how I was taking away from the little bit of revenue someone was getting for making or putting up that video. But I haven’t been able to be as charitable with ads that pop up in browsers, all over my phone, and in apps where I want to read undisturbed. Clearly, somewhere along the line, ad makers and publishers went overboard. The scales tipped and consumers’ tolerance snapped, making them forget that it’s the ads that are paying for the content to be created and presented. And that’s where ad blockers started to become prevalent. Technology may have advanced to the point where advertisers could throw ads at you in innovatively annoying ways — but it has also progressed enough to galvanise developers into coming up with clever ways of banishing those ads from your sight. In fact, ads don’t just irritate consumers but also track where a user is going online and gather more and more information to fine tune advertising messages, giving them a benign label of “personalised.” And so it was, that with the launch of iOS9, Apple’s operating system for iPhones and iPads, that ad blockers became a new part of the system allowing users to not see any ads. Users made a beeline for these, particularly for Peace, an ad blocker developed by well-known developer Marco Arment, who is also the maker of the reading app Instapaper. Peace was soon the No. 1 paid app on the App Store. And then suddenly and unexpectedly, Arment withdrew the app and offered users a refund. Arment realised that his app would hurt all ads, including ones that weren’t being annoying and decided that this didn’t feel at all good. Users who are busy consuming vast quantities of content online probably don’t give a thought to an intense war that has been going on behind the scenes. Not just between advertisers and those who want to block ads, but between the giants of technology who need to lay ownership to content so that they can channel users towards their own platforms, for if the web is about anything, it’s about numbers. And many publishers are giving in and partnering with these platforms. On the other hand, what is to happen to smaller publishers who rely more heavily on revenue from advertising to create content? Will new forms of advertising come up? Or new models of revenue generation? Will the web slowly change as the age-old format of users not paying for content but agreeing to see ads becomes redundant? That’s what will pan out in the next few years unless we hopefully stop to think of just how peace comes at a price. mala@businessworld.in,Twitter: @malabhargava (This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 19-10-2015)
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By all converging accounts, the last general elections had burnt close on Rs 80,000 crore, or $12 billion. (Over a five year period, with many state and city elections included, the figure goes up to 200,000 crore).
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Rachna Chhachhi offers tips for staying sharp, focused and youthful (in your brain) while multi-tasking your work, family and social life Some of you who are regular readers have been emailing us and we have received an overwhelming response to the columns. Except for one hate mail, which my therapist hat diagnosed as a lack of calmness and balance in the brain (the gentleman actually wrote to the PM and President complaining against me!), the rest of you have asked questions, been concerned about your health and complimented us for helping with your health issues. Please keep the communication flow going. So what causes an imbalance in the brain? And how can we stay calm and balanced? Are some people just born with it? Or can you acquire it? The answer is yes to both. A few issues ago, I had shared tips on keeping the brain calm and nourished through B-vitamins, good fats, pranayams and coffee for that memory boost. However, as we age, the number of neurons decline, leading to fuzziness, memory lapses and finally dementia or Alzheimer’s. So what causes this fuzziness and how can we avoid it? I’m listing down, for the first time, some don’ts so that you can stay sharp, focused and youthful (in your brain) while multi-tasking your work, family and social life. Nicotine & alcohol mix: There are many ‘social’ smokers who smoke only on weekends when they have a drink. Alcohol and nicotine (combined with caffeine) are common ‘psychotropic’ drugs that ‘normal’ people consume. The mix results in depression, erratic behaviour and memory loss. Remember the time when you didn’t remember a thing about last night’s party? Well, that’s what the mix does. And neurons, once dead, cannot be regenerated, so stay away from this mix. Alcohol on its own, more than two small drinks at a time, can also cause depression. Stress & lack of sleep mix: If you’re stressed, you lie awake thinking. Continuous stress along with lack of sleep raises the risk of high blood pressure and Type 2 diabetes as well as stroke. If you’re stressed, go for a long walk. It will clear your brain, calm it, tire you physically and help you sleep better. A simple solution to avoid so many deadly diseases, right? The low-fat, no-sugar mix: So you’re trying to lose weight. No fat, no sugar. But artificial sweeteners like aspartame make their way into your cola, coffee and your brain. This is a sure shot recipe for dementia and short-term memory loss. This is because fat keeps the brain calm, and in its absence, aspartame will harm the brain even more. Eat fat in small quantities, get off sugar, use honey and jaggery instead. You’ll be healthier and not crabby. Avoid the above three, and feed your brain with the nutrients it needs, and you will stay calm and focused at work, and patient with your better half too. Question Of The FortnightSend in your questions to askrachnachhachhi@gmail.com I have been taking nutritional supplements as per information on the Internet, but I’m now reading that there could be side-effects. Is that true?— Vivek Narain, Pune Dear Vivek,Just like you wouldn’t pop an allopathic pill without a doctor’s advice, popping supplements without a nutritionist’s advice is foolhardy. While all of us need certain supplements, please do consult your local nutritionist and get blood tests done to see what you need. While water soluble vitamins like B and C get flushed out, unsupervised intake of oil soluble vitamins like A, D, E can cause toxicity and lead to hair fall, gall bladder stones and increase the risk of bleeding amongst other effects. The author is a certified nutritional therapist and WHO certified in nutrition. She is the writer of Restore, a book on how to fight diseases for working professionals. Order your copy from amazon.in (This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 19-10-2015)
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The recent culture war in the country is violating the image of India Modi wants to hard-sell all over the world, and the entire purpose is very arbitrary, writers Nayan Chanda Despite the Modi government's international investment road-shows and warm invitations to ‘Make in India’, foreign investors continue to shy away. According to the latest figures from the ministry of commerce, monthly FDI equity inflow has fallen from $4.4 billion in January to $2 billion in June. Not really a stampede of investors to a reforming India promised by Modi. Analysts can point to plenty of structural economic issues — from the global financial situation to domestic infrastructural and tax problems — to explain the reluctance of foreign and domestic investors. However, it is also likely that the heightened sense of an ongoing culture war since the BJP’s stunning 2014 electoral victory could be an additional factor giving foreign investors pause. The accusations against Muslims of conducting so-called ‘love jihad’ and the campaign to convert Muslims and Christians to Hinduism — the so-called ghar wapsi (return home), and provocative call by BJP leaders for Muslims to go to Pakistan have not created an atmosphere that is conducive to social stability. The reinvigorated nationwide campaign to ban beef has already strained relations with Bangladesh (which imported most of its beef from India) and has seriously hurt the country’s leather industry, which has seen exports drop by 13 per cent compared to last year. The economic costs of the culture war might be insignificant in the broader scheme of things, but arbitrary rule changes and whimsical bans now dominate the news and send the wrong message to foreign investors. The first of two glaring examples of the arbitrariness was the retroactive tax on foreign companies, which led to howls of protest from investors about ‘tax terrorism’. The government retreated and put the issue before a committee for review. The second was the botched plan to block porn sites on the Internet. The foolhardy short-lived attempt at defying the Constitution by blocking alleged porn underscored the erratic policy-making style of the government. The latest round of the culture war, banning meat, especially beef, aimed essentially at hurting the mainly Muslim communities that work in slaughterhouses and are also traditionally major consumers of meat, has taken the whimsical abuse of state power to a new level. Different BJP-run state governments banned the sale of meat for varying numbers of days during the period of a Jain fast. The argument was that Jains are offended by the sight of animals being slaughtered, and meat sale bans would help avoid offending their sensibilities. Different BJP-ruled states came up with different decisions. For instance, the ban in Mumbai covered the slaughter of buffaloes, goats and hogs, but excluded fish and poultry. The Maharashtra government permitted consumption of fish on the specious grounds that “it is already dead when it is taken out of water.” The argument implies that a life is not taken, and therefore this is acceptable to Jains, who might otherwise suffer emotional damage by witnessing animal slaughter during their holy period. Amused and irritated by the government, Twitter users came up with a new hashtag: #banistan. The proliferation of religion-inspired bans, and the arbitrariness with which they are implemented, are creating an image of India akin to the authoritarian theocracies of West Asia. This is clearly not an image that aligns with the Modi government’s slickly-packaged appeal to multinational CEOs to join the ‘Make in India’ campaign. Modern India demands tolerance, openness and regulatory stability, not comically half-baked restrictions targeting minority communities. The author is Consulting Editor of YaleGlobal Online, published by the MacMillan Center, Yale University; boundtogether.bw@gmail.com (This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 19-10-2015)
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The culture jammers force brands out of their comfort zone and branding managers are finding it harder than ever to control the terms of this monstrous brandenstein.
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BW Smart Cities organised its third ‘Enabling Smart Cities’ conference in Bengaluru on 28 August 2015. Adding a new dimension to the discussion on infrastructure and services crucial for realising the government’s vision of 100 Smart Cities by 2022, it added ‘Startups for Smart Cities’ and a panel discussion on the ‘Internet of Things’ to the agenda.Interesting thoughts included a speaker wondering whether by making metropolitan cities like Bengaluru better we were actually making them worse as we increase their magnetic appeal. Another spoke about the difficulty of limiting the genius of people to only four or five interventions that can make a city smarter. Re-emphasis on the optimisation of resources, sustained citizen engagement and an optimal management formula for cities resonated with the audience, along with the need to reduce the pressure of cars on roads — especially for a city like Bengaluru.The next in the series is scheduled for 30 September in New Delhi.(This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 05-10-2015)
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Everything Experiential.com celebrated its second anniversary with the launch of BW APPLAUSE, a magazine that will cater to the experiential marketing and events industry in the country.The launch, organised by BW Businessworld, was held on 5 September 2015 at Shangri-la's Eros Hotel, New Delhi. The event was attended by the country's leading brand owners, event planners, marketers, agencies, event service providers and other stakeholders. They discussed the needs of the experiential marketing industry.(This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 05-10-2015)
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