Mind u Read

Not the government, not some anonymous hacking group, virus or terrorist network; the greatest threat to the internet as it exists today is from none other than its biggest site, Facebook! Facebook likes you, but hates the internet! Before I explain why or how, let me first give you a quick background about why Facebook is in a position to threaten the internet. The back story: Newspapers, radio and television are the three main sources of news for us till date. They are typically run by Governments or Businesses that have commercial and political interests to cater to. There is always a danger of the news being censored, biased or sensationalized and one can never really believe every word one reads or hears through these mediums. Such is their reputation that the villain in the 1997 James Bond movie ‘Tomorrow Never Dies’ was a media baron who controlled and manipulated news to his advantage. That was the year before Google was born and the rest as we all know is...

A nod from the Oscars is a sure shot ticket for any film to achieve celluloid immortality and this year the big winner is the unassuming film ‘The Artist’, a well deserved winner grabbing the coveted Best Picture, Best Director and the Best Actor awards along with a few other awards. Not able to contain my excitement I managed to catch the film playing on a big screen nearby. Not a single word was spoken in the movie yet by the time I came out of the auditorium a thousand words filled my mind. Interestingly, the storyline of the movie can be summed up in one line; in fact it can fit into one tweet of less than 140 characters. I doubt if any other movie in recent times has such a simple story. ‘A superstar of the silent film era fades away from public memory as the advent of talkies makes him redundant.’ This one line story set in the late 1920’s and early 1930’s has a theme that keeps recurring throughout human history, especially relevant to us in current t...

What is the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the following word? BUSINESS MAN That was a question I asked on my Facebook Page couple of days back. The people that follow my page belong to multiple demographics and since there is no right or wrong answer for this question the answers were many, ranging from Dhirubhai, Ambanis, Profits, Gujjus, Suits, Money, Cheat, Trade, Profit, Loss, etc, etc. Most of the answers were universal and could be understood by everyone but there were a couple of answers that I am sure baffled the rest of the people and made no sense whatsoever. The answers were Puri Jagannath & Mahesh Babu. Now who the hell are Puri Jagannath and Mahesh Babu and what do they have to do with the word Business Man? Ask any Telugu person worldwide or anyone living in Andhra Pradesh; he or she would instantly identify the names and chances are, before this weekend ends would have at least tried to watch the latest Telugu flick relea...