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 …
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. …
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 …
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 …
This is a long post. Microsoft Word puts it at 4,542 words! Possibly the longest I have written. It explores a diversity of ideas and themes: a moniker called MERIT colleges to replace the inelegant IIT / IIM we use to earmark an elite college in India, the emergence of two parallel tracks of merit, a national consciousness that elite Indians share, and finally their privilege blindness. I hope you …
I recently came across the concepts of clock time and calendar time in an essay by Patrick McKenzie (@patio11 on twitter).
Clock time is the actual time it takes for you to do an action (send a mail, draft an article and hit publish, code a change and set up an A/B test etc.). Calendar time is the period in which the impact / consequences / results of the above …
Given that I help hire for Blume, and also given my presence in the startup-VC ecosystem, I get a lot of requests from friends, friends of friends, acquaintances and even strangers reaching out for chats, advice, answers to queries etc.
In the pre-COVID days, I had a solution for the ones I couldn’t convert into an email / whatsapp exchange – give them a slot during my travel time, i.e., …
Links to recent writings of mine. As usual, they happen on LinkedIn or other publications. My website seems to have become an archives list. That wasn’t the original plan when I started this website nearly a decade ago, though. Sigh!
Thinking of a media category I want to call ‘Nosumer Media’ (nosumer as short for no consumer). These could be books, podcasts, apps etc. They are created not for consumption as much as for the benefits from creating, or the pleasure of creating accruing to the creator.
Nosumer media creators are aware that it their creations are unlikely to be consumed (in large numbers), and have no overwhelming desire to …
I haven’t been updating this website as frequently as I have hoped to. But those who follow me on twitter or linkedin, would know that I have been writing regularly, with all of it being published on other websites or publishing platforms.
Here are links to some recent writings of mine, in order of recency.