A "Social Dilemma" or a social call to action?

 I finally saw the Netflix documentary "The Social Dilemma" this weekend. While I have been aware of most of the issues created by social media platforms such as facebook and the like, I will give a lot of credit to the creators for putting it all together. It is a must watch for many reasons and through this blog I want to summarize the important ones.

First up, there are some key facts laid down in the documentary - 

• Social media and in general many services we use today created by big companies such as FB, Google, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok are fundamentally designed in a way to make them addictive. Experts in human psychology are consulted in designing these services and human vulnerabilities are ruthlessly exploited to achieve that purpose
• Senior leaders and executives in these companies are well aware of the nature of their products and services and the potential hazardous nature of them
• The "attention economy" or in other words the rat race to keep all of us literally "hooked" to our smartphones to feed us ads is fundamentally baked into the business models of these companies. That is the primary way for most of them to be profitable and to keep growing further
• While personalization of services to users for basic things (like restaurant recommendation for example) is beneficial, personalization of news and information is dangerous and could eventually be catastrophic. Facts cannot be personalized. Period.  
• By the very nature and design of social media, sensational claims and untruths travel much faster (6x per MIT) and wider than does the truth (which has a habit of being a tad bit boring most of the time)

It is hard for me (and I think you'll agree with me here) to believe that any of the statements are not true. We have all experienced it first hand with our own use of smartphones and these services built on top of them. The first step therefore is to acknowledge these fundamental facts.

Let's now analyze how the social media platforms and services have negatively affected us (by and large) during the last decade or so of intense social media boom -

• At an individual level
• Constant sense of anxiety, obvious self-centeredness, an inability/fear to connect and interact with real people, closed-mindedness due to "echo-chamber" effects
• At a community level
• Spread of tribalism and and "us vs them" mindset build-up, no real connections with neighbors or even within families, inability to form relationships with people we disagree with
• At a societal level
• Extreme polarization of political / ideological views, lack of one consistent set of facts or truths that summarizes reality, breakdown of long standing norms of public and private discourse and behavior, hyper-attention on fringe minorities point of views, radicalization of population through conspiracy theory groups and disinformation spreading campaigns, sycophantic following of political leaders (as if they can do no wrong!) and a general breakdown of the democratic principles that we've taken for granted (as if dictators and authoritarian regimes don't exist)

This is not to say that social media platforms and services are not useful to us - they are, but like everything else, we should analyze the cost we are paying to "be used" to get those services given "we are the product" here!

One particular deep concern of mine is around the fate of the two largest democracies in the world - India and USA. Both of them seem to headed in the direction of increasing chaos and unrest. Social media has undeniably played a huge role (and to be fair, they have been exploited by the political class and other vested interest groups) in getting these countries where they are today. Thanks to social media (and the traditional media too), citizenry have forgotten what their true role in a properly functioning democracy really is - to hold the party in power accountable for their actions irrespective of who it "voted for". Blind trust in anybody, anything or (in today's world) any "platform" is dangerous and history has proven this time and time again (it's not even been 100 years since Hitler came by!)

OK, so what do we do from here on to rectify the situation at hand?

• At individual level
• Take steps to avoid over dependence on social media as much as possible. Put down a price for your time and data when interacting on them. Live in the "real" world and talk to real people as much as you can, whenever you can
• At a community level
• Spread awareness about the social media, how it operates, how it can be put to bad use and so on. Participate in community events and get to know your neighbors and local communities, volunteer your time towards helping others in need
• Listen to differing points of view with an open mind. Avoid jumping to conclusions and "labeling" people based on their views on a particular subject. If you cannot agree, "agree to disagree" and move on... 
• At a societal level
• Regulate, regulate and regulate social media platforms and services. Singular focus on company bottom-line growth without any constraints on societal impacts is dangerous. 
• Until the above happens, be a hawk when it comes to relying on your news sources. Be as vigilant as you are when buying something valuable (i.e. shop around, price check, quality check yada yada yada...you get the gist). Understand and learn to separate fact from opinion and watch out for "media" folks who feed you the two together
• Remember our true role in a democracy and fundamentally treat the government and it's leaders as "business partners" - there is give and take and each side is accountable to honor their side of the contract. Be vigilant or you run the risk of being exploited by the business partner. Also, remember that a strong opposition is necessary to audit the "business partner" when suspicious activities occur. Progress on initiatives may be slow because of such checks and balances but we get longer term stability in return (which we are under-valuing as a society)

There are so many other things that the documentary talks about but the above is my gist of it...hopefully, it makes some sense and we take actions to course correct while we still can...thanks for reading! 

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

A few months ago I came to know that there are areas of floating garbage and plastic debris right in the middle of the Pacific ocean - one each to the left and right of Hawaii. These areas are about the size of Texas each (!!) and collectively this part of the Pacific Ocean is now called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

I was shocked when I came to know about this. These areas are thousands of miles away from human civilization and I could not believe that we could be polluting areas on earth that are so far from us. I subsequently did read up some books on this subject (for example, the book "Plastic Ocean" by Charles Moore) and it was an eye opener of sorts. The more I read about this, the more alarming it got. Turns out that there are such oceanic garbage patches in the Indian and Atlantic oceans as well (which, I guess, one can say, follows by induction)! Needless to say, these garbage patches are adversely affecting the entire marine ecosystems in ways that we probably don't even understand yet...

Plastic has probably been one of the worst inventions of the 20th century. It is cheap to manufacture, extremely convenient to use in our day to day lives and is not bio-degradable. Together, this is a lethal combination. Businesses have exploited the cheapness and convenience of plastic in ingenuous ways (the credit to the most glaring one would have to go to the bottled beverage industry) and have largely ignored the environmental impacts of all the plastic that is eventually "disposed" off in landfills (and oceans!). We, as consumers, are equally responsible for not thinking about what happens to that "plastic bag" after we throw it in our garbage bins. I, for one, now have a completely different view of plastic and now I am an extremely conscious consumer of it.

But unfortunately, I alone cannot solve the plastic epidemic. It will take all of us to collectively reduce our consumption of it in whatever we way we can - be eliminating it wherever possible and recycling it wherever applicable. The biggest excuses we have to not do so - "what difference does it make if I alone do it" OR "this is somebody else's problem that does not affect me" - are nothing short of an extremely myopic and selfish way of "passing the buck". If we genuinely care about our planet, its environment and its ability to sustain future generations of life, we really have to start looking at how we think about "that plastic fork" that we pick up for eating lunch or "that plastic bag" that we get our groceries in ... a fundamentally different view of plastic use needs to take root before it's too late.

The Indian Dream...

This week will be remembered for a while in India - this was the week when a girl was gang-raped in a moving bus in Delhi, the capital of India. While this is tragically and unfortunately, a very common occurrence in India (statistically, a rape happens in India every 40 minutes), the sheer brutality and disdain with which this crime was perpetrated caused a national furor and outrage. I got a chance to observe the events that followed this crime through the lens of the print/tv media and it left me with many questions and very few answers.

After watching hours of debates on national TV and sifting through many blogs/articles online, here are some of my observations regarding the incident and the actions taken in it's aftermath.

• The sheer violence of the act was unbelievable - why would any human being do this to another? The people involved in this act were not psychopaths and they seemed to know exactly what they were doing.
• The bus involved in this incident moved around the city for over 45 minutes, went through 5 police pickets without being caught at 9 PM!!
• The news media picked up this story and the extreme brutality and audacity of the crime triggered a strong response from people all over the country. Promptly, there were speeches in the Parliament condemning the crime and asking for capital punishment for the criminals. 
• Almost spontaneously, there were protest marches all over the country from all sections of the society asking the government for better security for women and in general for societal reform to improve the plight of women in the country.
• What followed from here on was even more shameful than the crime itself - the pathetic blame-game tactics employed by the government, the opposition and the police, the ineptitude and insensitivity of the political class in addressing an angered people, the political means employed to side-track the issue and divert attention (this includes lumpen elements who made an otherwise peaceful protest violent, the extremely crude handling of the death of a police constable) and to top it off, we had the ruling party chief of Andhra Pradesh and the President's (of India, I mean) son make the following remarks just days after the incident!!
• “Do we roam in streets at midnight as we got Independence at midnight? It would have been better if the girl did not travel by a private bus at that time”
• "Those who are coming in the name of students in the rallies, sundori, sundori mahila (beautiful women), highly dented and painted, giving interviews in TV and showing off their children. I wonder whether they are students at all. What's basically happening in Delhi is something like pink revolution, which has very little connection with ground realities." 

A very sorry state of affairs indeed. And it makes me wonder - how do you fix a system which is rotten to the core? Here is a fact - among the 550 odd folks who make up the lower house of the Indian Parliament (and who basically are responsible for the proper formulation, enactment and implementation of laws), almost one-third of them have been accused of criminal offences and many of them against women. The biggest deterrent against crime of any kind is a swift and efficient investigation and conviction process followed by certain punishment. Obviously, this is not desirable to any criminal and hence (not surprisingly) several loopholes exist in law which allow criminals to get away with literally anything in India. Consequently, there is no fear of the law  and laws are broken rampantly and flagrantly. While there are many other systemic and endemic flaws in our society that result in a poor and disrespectful attitude of men towards women which need to be addressed, the key issue of the "rotten core" will remain.   

Here is the final thought - surely this was not the India that our freedom fighters fought for and dreamt about. The only differences between the British rule and our so called independence is who is exploiting India and where the exploits end up - in one case it was foreigners and in the other it is our very own people. The "loot" went to Britain in one case and it goes to Switzerland in the other. Unfortunately, I am forced to admit  today that maybe, just maybe, India would have been better off with British rule.   

Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

This question has become a cliche of sorts -- it is a standard question that a manager asks his managee as a part of the performance appraisal process in the corporate world. This time when I was asked this question, it got me thinking -- really, where do I see myself in five years? Or for that matter in ten, fifteen or twenty years? And I am not thinking of this in the singular dimension of career growth in my professional life...

First and foremost, I do hope that I am alive after twenty years! If that happens, then I hope to see myself healthy and fit. I also would like to see myself having reached a more calm and tranquil inner state of mind -- where it's absolutely clear to me what is and what is not important in life. I want to see myself to be courageous enough to do what I want to do rather than what the world around me expects me to do. I really hope that I have an absolute frame of reference with respect to which I can say that I have been able to live a life worth living. I also hope that I am able to not fall for the temptation of using relative yardsticks to determine whether or not I have done well in life. I hope that I would have made a difference in the lives of at least a few underprivileged people. I hope that I would have at least five friends who I could count on for absolutely anything. I would like to see myself happy and perhaps successful in terms of the conventional measures of success. Last but not least, I hope that a few people in this world would be saddened if I suddenly ceased to exist after twenty years...

Actually, I would love it if I woke up tomorrow and all of the above were already true! But, I know it is not so (for some of the things I quoted above). So, I have a list of goals I need to work towards...I hope I can use this blog to motivate and remind myself of this journey I am taking. This is one journey where the destination is not as important as the journey itself.

I'll end with this fabulous quote I read somewhere a long time ago and which has stuck with me ever since -

Being successful is about getting what you want. Being happy is about wanting what you get.

Salute the Maestros!

This week, I had the unique opportunity to see three very famous proponents of indian classical art forms in action - Pt. Birju Maharaj and Ustad Zakir Hussain, in a Kathak dance concert in San Francisco and Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia, in an interview which happened in a small theatre in Palo Alto.

The first concert saw two extremely talented artists, Pt. Birju Maharaj, the Kathak dance maestro and Ustad Zakir Hussain, a tabla virtuoso face off and put together a show I will never forget. It was an amazing experience made memorable by the 75 year old dance maestro, who danced for almost 2 hours(!) and delighted the audience with his humor and very likeable demeanor. It was a sheer privilege to witness Maharaj dance, sing and play the harmonium with consummate ease. I realized for the first time that indian classical dance is the culmination of all the classical art forms in India - this is where the percussionist, the vocalist, the instrumentist and the dancer come together and convey the emotions and bhaava of the composition to the audience. Mastering each of the above four art forms is a lifelong study - Pt Birju Maharaj, probably is one of a kind whose mastery over all of these art forms is unparalleled.

The second event featured Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia, a very well known exponent of the flute or bansuri (as it is called in India), who gave a very engaging and personal interview to the audience. Some of the stories and information that he shared with us are

• How he stole a flute on which he started learning to play it (his father was against him learning music)!
• He has no formal training in indian classical music! He has learnt to play himself and by listening to others... 
• The flute is one of the few musical instruments which cannot be "tuned" unlike other stringed instruments -- which means that flute player has to tune it with his own skill
• His association with hindi film music in the 60's and 70's and the talented artists he worked with (they would work from 8 AM to 2 AM almost everyday just because they loved creating music so much!)
• His reverence for Lata Mangeshkar and Hridaynath Mangeshkar
• His wish that he be born in Maharashtra in his next life because of the immense interest and love that the common man in Maharashtra has for indian classical music
• How, even to this date, he gets emotional sometimes when playing in concerts, when he sees a mother affectionately holding her child (he lost his mother when he was six years old)
• His final remark that the key to happiness in life is to keep yourself healthy and invest quality time in your friends and family

It was unique experience - one in which I felt I heard an autobiographical commentary on the life of a world famous artist.

I salute these great, passionate artists who have dedicated their whole lives to study the arts, often, by not taking the beaten paths and living out their dreams!

The Dalai Lama Quote

Recently, I came across this quote on the internet (thanks to my FIL for this!)...

The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity, said -

“Man.

Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money.
Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health.
And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present;
the result being that he does not live in the present or the future;
he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”

Need I say more? How true is that? What's striking is that all of us are guilty of doing exactly the above at some point in our lives. 

I was well on my way to working like a maniac, not exercising, and in general, ignoring my health. Luckily for me, I had a chronic health issue to deal with for a year and half in my early thirties when I was in pain/discomfort all the time. That taught me a thing or two about not taking my health for granted and so I made the necessary life style changes which enabled me to eat well and get at least 30-40 minutes of exercise everyday. I was guilty of thinking that my body needs no maintenance, but I am thankful that I was taught a good lesson early on in life.

The second point that Dalai Lama drives home, I think, is equally important. Live in the moment. I am guilty of brooding over the past, regretting the decisions I have made and sulking over the mistakes I have committed. I have realized that it's time to settle with the past and make peace with it. While it is easier said than done, I will try my best to do this consciously.

Today, I came across this very thoughtful speech given by Sudha Murthy at Berkeley in 2008. Sudha Murthy, better known as the wife of Narayan Murthy, founder of Infosys Technologies, ought to be known in her own right because of the phenomenal philanthropic work that she has done in India with the Infosys Foundation. After listening to her, I was so humbled and moved that I have decided to "make a difference" in whatever capacity I can...

This week, I also heard the wonderful "Phir le aaya dil" song from the movie Barfi. It's one of those rare soulful, ghazalish songs which conveys so much emotion with great music and memorable lyrics... 

The Simple Pleasures

Usually, we get so caught up with trying to get the most out of life, that we sometimes miss the simple pleasures of day to day life. So, I decided to list some of the happenings that have made this week so much fun. Here it is -

• Visiting the Sunnyvale Farmer's market - This is a weekly must do for me. We always get seasonal fruits and vegetables from there. Nothing quite beats the atmosphere and the feeling of picking the best food available in our neighborhood.
• Cooking Okra - Okra is, by far, my most favorite vegetable. (Monday night is my cooking turn and my chance to cook something for S and hopefully impress her with my cooking skills!) This week I made fried Okra (which we got from the farmer's market) and it came out great.
• Watching "Barfi" - Usually, Bollywood movies disappoint me and are a waste of time. But, I was surprised by the refreshing and bitter-sweet love story in "Barfi". It's a cinematic ode to love (and all shades of it)...it struck a chord somewhere inside me. A. L. Tennyson got it right when he said "It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all."
• Bicycling to work everyday - Finally, I said good bye to laziness and decided to start biking to work again. In addition to good exercise, my contribution to CO2 pollution will reduce by half a ton(!) per year and I can think of doing better things with the $250 or so that I will save per year...which makes me wonder why I wasn't doing this in the first place. Anyway, better late than never...
• Enjoying awesome Bisibellebhath - I love south indian food. Sometimes, I think I must be of south indian origin because I like that stuff as much as my native Maharashtrian fare! I had the most amazing Bisibellebhath on Friday in Anand Bhavan...everything about it felt so perfect, it's hard to describe in words.  
• Reading Jimmy Carter's book on his mother Lillian Carter - I was intrigued when I found out that Jimmy Carter's mother lived in India for a while as a Peace Corps volunteer...haven't yet got to that part of the book by Jimmy Carter. But, I am already fascinated by the Carter family and their story which began in Plains, Georgia.
• Reading the theory of interpolation - I did not know about the mathematical and intuitive elegance of interpolation theory. Glad to have come across it in recent endeavors at the workplace. 
• Listening to Raag Jog - This rendition by Madhup Mudgal reminds me of why we say music is like playing with notes...nothing can soothe my mind as well as classical music pieces that I enjoy.  

I have realized (a little late) that it is far more important to pause, reflect and appreciate the simple, good things in life rather than sulk over the few bad things that happen in life. So, now everyday, I spend a few minutes recollecting all the events of that day that made me happy...