August 2008 - Posts - A Romantic Realist

August 2008 - Posts

Headllines Above (and Below) The Rest

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
A weekly look at the good, bad and ugly when it comes to headlines. Heads Above 1. From The Economist , the home to some of the most cutting edge headline writing. A story about former US Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards admitting to an affair with a campaign colleague says " Tale Between His Legs " in the contents page. Oddly...

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Everything you wanted to know about corporate governance but were afraid to ask

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
On Saturday 30 August in Bangalore, an interesting new book Corporate Disclosures 1553-2007 AD: The Origin of Financial and Business Reporting by Shankar Jaganathan is being released. Shankar is a former Wipro Ltd corporate treasurer and has looked at the history of corporate governance in forty 'episodes." It also has detailed case studies...

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Should Indian journalists cover up the truth?

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Credit Hindustan Times with a fascinating Page 1 story on 27 August headlined " And a Gold for Press: How boxer Jitender's split chin was kept a secret ." Reporter Saurabh Duggal reveals how the Indian media contingent at the just concluded 2008 Beijing Olympics was asked by Indian chief national coach Gurbux Singh Sandhu to not report...

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My Dear Obama supporter, Show Me The Money

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Got to love what US elections and politics have become in the home of capitalism. It is intensely personal and the bottom line is, well, about the bottom line. Here are a couple of emails from the Barack Obama campaign from the Democratic Convention in Denver. ----- Original Message ----- From: Michelle Obama [ info@barackobama.com ] Sent: 08/25/2008...

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How The (North) West Was Lost

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Here are some morning news items to read, pictures to see and mull over in India on 26 August. 1. KASHMIR, India: Police shot and killed at least three demonstrators on Monday, as authorities tried to enforce a curfew in Kashmir in the face of some of biggest protests in two decades against India’s rule. Police had detained three separatist leaders...

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Dormant Anti-Gay Laws Are Still Bad Anti-Gay Laws

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
A recent Romantic Realist blog on gay rights in India titled Words Mean Little When It Comes To Gay Rights in India (Read it here ) as well as a recent Mint editorial on the topic Homosexuality Is Not A Crime (Read it here ) generated two very contrasting comments from readers. "I read the article on Homosexuality in Live Mint and wanted to post...

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Peanuts for IIM, caviar for cricket?

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
A news article in The Times of India on 24 August about salary packages proposed for new, paid selectors who will pick cricket teams for the Board of Control for Cricket in India (Read this BCCI story here ) made me wonder about how skewed our national priorities are in light of an earlier posting on this blog about what the Indian government wants...

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Reverse racism about the iPhone in color conscious India

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Amid reports that the steep prices for iPhones in India--at least three times more than what they retail for in the US with service restrictions--have kept launch week response muted, here is an interesting factoid that has emerged. Citing the example of a rather disappointed Pankaj Bajoria, who was unsuccessful in buying an iPhone because the color...

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Why this shouldn't be called a foray into blogging

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
foray • noun 1 a sudden attack or incursion into enemy territory . 2 a brief but spirited attempt to become involved in a new activity. Sometimes you come across a word so many times in newspapers that you don't realize how inappropriate the usage has become over time. I was reminded of this recently when a headline about Telugu film star Chiranjeevi...

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Why we should touch each other more

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Speaking of massages (or the lack of great ones-- read my lament about New Delhi ), The Economist, which is brilliant at spotting intriguing published research around the world, had this piece on experiments at the University of California, San Diego, on Evolutionary Psychology that show how Touch can inspire munificence towards those you trust "PEOPLE...

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If we pay peanuts...

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
The Government of India has advertised the post of Director of the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Kozhikode in major metro newspapers on 20 August. It is looking for a person with "eminent academic credentials in the field of management." The person "should also be an able administrator, a good manager with leadership qualities...

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When blogging narcissism comes face to face with readers

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
A reader comment on another post prompted me to post this recent email Raju: For starters, this is an excellent blog. The topics are various, the linking is very good, you've posted voraciously and you reply to comments. These are some quick points: Length - some of the posts are a tad too long. In the pursuit of comprehensiveness and fairplay please...

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How bad writing (and no editing) can bias readers

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Here is a Press Trust of India newswires story that ran in Hindustan Times on 19 August. I have put in italics and underlined some words that are worth paying special attention to as you casually read this story. Ahmedabad blasts: Ken Haywood slips out of India The US national, whose computer Internet connection was used to send terror e-mail minutes...

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The hills are alive with the sound of Indian bureaucrats

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Just how paranoid is India about Christian missionaries, CIA spies and Pakistan infiltrators across the Himalayas? The much touted embrace of Indians who live outside the country under the PIO , or Person of Indian Origin, program that was launched in 1999 based on "understanding the sentiments of persons of Indian origin to be closer to their...

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Insane waste of tax payers money to debate "reasonable" restrictions on mobile phones

Posted by Raju Narisetti at 
Not too many people would have noticed a Parliament of India ad on Page 13 of Hindustan Times' New Delhi edition on 18 August. It turns out that the Committee on Petitions of the Rajya Sabha has decided to consider what it dubs as a petition for "Imposition of Reasonable Restrictions on Use of Mobile Phones." Want to know what some of...

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