I appeared on Ravishankar Iyer’s Story Rules Podcast in June ’22. Typically, The Story Rules Podcast doesn’t publish transcripts. I requested Ravi for the transcript as I thought it would make it accessible to a wider audience. Ravi shared it promptly but I got busy, and this sat in my ‘To Do’ folder for proofreading and review, for a long long while. I finally got down to it earlier today, …
Miscellany
Unbundling Religion
“There are two ways to make money in business: You can unbundle, or you can bundle.” – Jim Barksdale, cofounder of Netscape
Unbundling / (re)bundling is a powerful framework to rethink any topic or entity from first principles. It also helps us visualize what opportunities could be unlocked.
I have explored bundling / unbundling of human creation previously suggesting possible opportunities. In this essay, I will explore how unbundling / …
Unbundling Humans, or, Unbundling Human Creation
“There are two ways to make money in business: You can unbundle, or you can bundle.” – Jim Barksdale, cofounder of Netscape
As frameworks for identifying opportunities in startupland go, unbundling / (re)bundling is amongst the most seminal ones out there. Here is an example of how it works.
Visualize a product that helps you read (for a fee) any magazine / newspaper story – effectively you have unbundled or …
Network States and Nation SPACs, or Westphalia Redux
The title of this piece is of course a play on The Peace of Westphalia, the name for the two treaties signed in 1648 between various delegations representing the micronations and provinces of Europe. The Peace of Westphalia brought into being the concept of the sovereign nation state. One that has a monopoly on state violence and …
I joined Amit Varma on ‘The Seen & The Unseen’ podcast
I joined Amit Varma on his acclaimed The Seen & The Unseen podcast to talk about venture valuations, the VC playbook, the evolving media sector, my productivity hacks + stack, and lots more.
It is long podcast (Amit’s signature style) but certainly the most interesting + important one I have done. Do give it a listen! Link below. (The wonderful illustration that appears on the Seen Unseen page is by …
Bandra in a box
I heard from a friend who is attending the present batch at ISB Mohali that they have all moved to campus. Classes had begun in May’20 but were online. So, this is the surprise; he tells me that classes are still online (at least for a bit). But they are all staying on campus now, and hence all the interactions are in person, socially distanced or not I dont know. …
Good Rupee, Bad rupee – A Thought Experiment
What if liquor and other sin goods had to be purchased with a different currency called B(ad) Rupee?
Similarly the government could depute other goods – some not desirable (say imports) or those that cause environmental damage or have negative consequences, such as fuel – to be purchased solely via B rupees.
There could be a small tax or fee to convert A rupees (or rupees; those to be spent …
Personal Information Management Assistants
A quick post, led by the relentless pileup of ‘reading for work’ articles and podcasts, on a new role / career option waiting to be created.
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It is common for CEOs / CXOs in Indian or international companies to have assistants / secretaries who do scheduling + travel bookings largely along with some office management or personal chores. They are typically many paid anywhere from 5 to 10% of …
MERIT Schools, national track India, & privilege blindness
I remember a passage from a book, or perhaps a magazine I read long ago, about a U.S. college student talking about his fellow French interns. The gist of his account was that all of the French interns he encountered seemed to know each other from before, or knew someone in common in the colleges they studied back in France. The U.S. student found this unusual for he felt U.S. …
MERIT colleges, national track India, & privilege blindness
In this rather extended essay (~4,500 words), I suggest the term MERIT (Metro-based / Residential, English-speaking, All-India intake, Tough to get into) Colleges as a moniker to replace the IIT / IIM tag we use for elite Indian colleges.
I then use MERIT as a framework to explore facets of privilege in India – national consciousness, rise of subjective merit, and finally blindness to our own privilege.
I tried to …