The death of the email

Just a few years ago, we used emails for pretty much everything:

·         Informal communications between friends

·         Formal communications between colleagues working in the same company

·         Formal communications between folks representing different entities (including customer service, sales/marketing, job applicants)

·         Government to Government or citizen to government forums

·         Others

Social media has changed a lot of this and people rarely use emails for informal communications. It is mostly facebook or goople plus for informal communications.

Then came social media adapted by enterprise which is gradually killing any emails communications between employees of the same company, or even multiple companies collaborating on a single project or new product innovation. Companies could use Jive, for example, to communicate internally within.

Even customer service is turning to the social media to address customer redressal or just answer questions or lead them to company ecommerce sites when a consumer can make purchases. No more info@company.com or sales@company.com

We can also a trend when companies are increasingly using social media for attracting talent. LinkedIn has job forums or job openings advertised which lead applicants to company websites where they can upload their CVs. The hire@company.com or recruit@company.com is dying a slow death.

Governments and political formulations are increasingly moving to computer based systems and trending towards twitter or facebook to connect with their supporters. 

Email is dead! Long live social media!!

Predicting the future with the great Indian Epics & Scriptures

 

The debates on whether the stories contained in the Indian epics (Ramayana and Mahabharata) are never-ending, Irrespective of what the outcome is, they do provide some very interesting insights into what the future looks like.

 

Communication:

 

Current State

The epics and other ancient scriptures contain several instances where the Gods could communicate with their devotees or others in real-time. The Gods could just appear and disappear at will. Today, we already have skype and google hangout, which makes instant video communications possible.

 

Future State

The future of communications is 3D and 4D distant communications. 3D is already available, but very expensive and needs lot of infrastructure set-up, Future innovations will see 3D and 4D communications being adapted in regular life. We will be able to see the other person in 3D, almost as if they are near us. In a 4D environment, we will be able to feel the things near them thru smart devices. If they spill water, we will be able to feel the water drops on us. And you will be able to do all this sitting in the comfort of home or just anywhere with a smart phone.

It is very interesting to note the story of how the Mahabharata was written. Rishi Vyas, the author of the Mahabharata, spoke while the God Ganesha wrote the epic – very similar to speech-to-text conversion software. The future will see such software becoming more predictable and will change the way authors, writers and journalists interact with the media. Even home-works can just be talked, without the need to type. 

 

Health, Biology & Medicine          

 

Current State

The ancient rishis were healthy and probably never fell sick. They lived long lives and had near control over death. Test tube babies, artificial insemination are fairly recent topics that we have been dealing with. The Mahabharata contains examples of how the concept of  test tube baby was used in the birth of the 100 Kauravas. Also, Draupadi became of the mother of 3 sons, each born from a different father. Artificial insemination and usage of sperm banks are becoming so common today.     

 

Future State

Longevity is going up year by year. The future will see lesser people facing sick due to adopting healthier practices. Medicines will be more natural based, as opposed to over-dosage of chemicals. Artificial insemination and sperm banks will become bigger. More celebrities will take pride in sperm donation and more women will take pride in bearing children of the best in class men – the social stigma would disappear.  

There is an interesting story in the scriptures of how Ganesha’s head was severed from his body and he was killed. He was brought back to life by Lord Shiva by replacing his head with that of an elephant. The future of medicine is that it will be possible to transplant any type of organ from any living being to another living being as long as there is some basic compatibility. All living beings are made of the same 5 elements and have similar functions (e.g. blood circulation, brain functions, etc). Lots of medicines are lab tested on mice before prescribing for humans. There are enough indicators to show similarities in life across humans and other species. Therefore, such transplants would be very much possible in future.      

 

Travel & Mobility

 

Current State

Travel was so easy in the epic world. The gods just had to wish to be somewhere and they could be there in no time. The Ramayana does show  Ravana as owning a plane, which compares to a private jet in today’s world. Also, the Gods and Rishis could travel from place to place (earth and beyond). Humans have already conquered the moon and some of the other planets.

 

Future State

The future will see more mobility solutions, which are much faster. As humans gain more control over speed, you will see travel across continents in less than an hour. Also, inter-planet travels are restricted to astronauts and NASA scientists. The future will see movement of ordinary people with no background is space research, traveling to other planets or moons, for pleasure or other purposes.  

    

Social Issues

 

Current State

The 3^rd sex, same-sex marriages are the hot topics today. Almost every country is facing the pressure to take a decision on such issues. The Mahabharata does give its due importance to the 3^rd sex, in the form of Brihnala, an important character in the story.

 

Future State

The future will not see only see same sex marriages, but also, people maintaining multiple partners at the same time. In the Mahabharata, Draupadi had 5 husbands, while Arjuna, a husband of Draupadi, had multiple wives. The future will see such relationships- same sex marriages, multiple spouses. 

The factory approach to farming

Why should our villages be any different?

Collaborative farming (c-farming)

The factory approach to farming

Travel from an Indian city to a village and you will see a stark difference. There is severe lack of basic amenities like roads or other such infrastructure. Farmers struggle to make both ends meet. Whereas the cities have some quality of life, the villages, in several cases offer a choice between life and death, forget about the quality part, with many people choosing death over life - The reason why you hear of so many poor farmers committing suicide.

Agriculture is one of the 3 pillars of any economy, beside services and manufacturing. If you look back at history, the reason why manufacturing grew so much is because of organization and the fact manufacturing institutionalized a lot of core processes. Due to this, they could manufacture more with less. With services, it is similar - organization and institutionalization. These are noticeably absent from agriculture, in general. Any country or region that has sought to imbibe these attributes in their agricultural landscape has prospered.

We need to do the same thing at the smallest village in order to make farming a profitable sector. Organization adds discipline, robustness and guarantees success compared to chaotic farming. Run farming like factories should be the motto.

In this model, a village must organize itself as a partnership firm. The landowners come together, forge a partnership and investments and revenue are distributed in the same proportion as the landownership. The owners also appoint an agriculture expert to help with the right selection of crops. The expert need not be attached to a single village but can work at a district level or several districts together.

How would lease work?
Typically, their is an agreement between the landowner and lessee on the monetized value of the produce, say 50%. In such cases, the lessee would make full investments and income would be shared with the original landowner after adjusting for the investments, essentially, the in one and investments are shared between the lessee and landowner.

An example of the cFarming model
Imagine a village with 100 acres of land with 50 families, for sake of simplicity, each family occupies 2 acres. A farming specialist and an accountant is appointed by the village to advise on what to produce and to manage overall accounts.

Each family makes an investment based on the ratio of their ownership. In this case, equal for all the families.

The revenue accrued is divided amongst all the families- in this case, equally.

Economic Benefits of the c-farming model
There are several benefits with the c-farming model. I will list down only three: gain economies of scale,  increases profitable farm produce and enriches quality of life of rural farmers.

Social benefits of cFarming
Almost all villages have a very degree of social tension, enmity, family feuds, etc. CFarming will gradually inculcate the culture of social collaboration and make the villages an extended family. The social fabric would get enriched with this model.

Also, such a model is expected to generate better income for the families. What this means, is that families could send their children to schools and make their kids better farmers.

Making Change Stick with cFarming
Collaboration in any arena is always easier said than done. Collaboration in farming and agriculture is even more difficult. The mindset from an individualistic approach to collaboration and sharing is not an easy shift. Besides, in villages, their are lot more factors involved - personal relationships, enmity, local politics, casteism, religion, to name a few. But once people start seeing the rewards coming in, the new mindset will gradually start sticking.

The future village
If the villages progressed, urban migration would reduce, since their would be no genuine need. Villages would offer almost the same experience as any city in terms of basic and luxury infrastructure. A village with a shopping mall would become a reality and not a dream anymore.
Collaborative farming is currently leveraged at Australia and few countries and have met with success. There is no reason to believe why they could not be implemented successfully in any country.

Of 5f, 3s and from snake charmers to mouse charmers

It is not very often that you read about someone spanking the ball out of the field in the very first ball. Narendra Modi did just that, when he addressed at SRCC in Delhi recently. Unlike other “iconic” speeches of recent times, Modi’s speech was not old-school. It focused on today and a better tomorrow. It talked about how we can leverage our existing strengths to move to a bright future and achieve Vivekanand’s vision for the country.  

Here are some key takeways from the speech. You could argue that he said nothing new, but what is new is the speed and scale of the implementation of the ideas. These are thoughts that have seen the light of the day and not just on paper:

The 3 pillars of our economy: We keep talking about inclusive growth, without really understanding its meaning or significance. Modi spoke about the economy comprises of 3 pillars viz. agriculture, services and manufacturing. There is a need to strengthen all three. Only then true inclusive growth can be achieved. In this objective, there is no mention of any caste, creed, color, language or religion. And the idea is to balance growth in each pillar; in the event of an economic downturn in one of the pillars, the remaining two can support the other.

Technology upgrade: I would generalize this and include anything we do today. The most fantastic discovery may become commonplace in no time. There is a need to keep re-discovering and updating ourselves. Modi provided an example of how the old textile industry of Ahmedabad got wiped out due to lack of technology upgrades. The most innovative companies are the ones that understand the trends and use technology to provide better customer and employee value.  

Education: Indeed, Modi spoke a lot about education, Forensics University, special university for the police force and train the teacher concept. However, as Modi pointed out, merely opening a university doesn’t change the equation. We need good teachers. Bill Gates frequently talks about the need for good teachers in our system. I also touch about the need to bring good teachers to our rural areas in another blog 


The 3s – skill, speed & scale: I think this was the icing on the cake. Modi spoke about the 3s linking his vision to its implementation. India being a young country, needs adequate support in skill building. There is no fun just in numbers, but it is fun to have a high quality number. His vision and some of the work he has initiated on skill building are very scientific and provide the youth with multiple options. Secondly, it is good to have ideas. However, more important is the speed of implementing such ideas. We all like “quick wins” – there are always low hanging fruits and speed is achieved by quickly grabbing them to deliver quick wins. And finally, the scale of implementation has to be big. The world is our market. Having the skill to build something new, the speed or velocity to deliver in quickly and the scale of the world as a market to service/deliver – this will help the nation stand out and progress rapidly.    

Hope and Change are the new buzzwords in the political arena. Remember, they were used and practiced to perfection by Obama in his 2008 and 2012 elections. And Modi’s speech, too, was laced with hope and change to an aspiring nation. 

We may all have various degrees of opinion about the man, but you can't deny that he is the only leader in Indian politics today that has established sufficient credibility in inclusive development. He didn't deliver a speech, he simply shared his experiences on good governance and provided examples of how his governance model has helped the state achieve significant growth and why his model is the new benchmark not only for the other states, but also for the nation as a whole. 

Indeed, he came, he delivered and he conquered!
 

The importance of Delhi elections

Elections in Delhi are scheduled for later this year and this will be an election that has the potential of changing the political landscape of the country for years to come.

The Delhi assembly elections will not be a Congress vs. BJP eve, but rather an AAP vs. non-AAP parties’ affair. The party has been raising lot of local issues, which are really pertinent in the context of assembly elections. There is a sense of identification and trust being built with the local people. AAP has also taken a stand that it is people's responsibility to vote and not the politicians’ responsibility to ask for votes. This is a new paradigm, unheard of in Indian politics, since Independence; the positioning being that AAP, despite being a political party, is indeed a people's movement.

So far, everyone including the media has been pretending to ignore them. But not the people who cast their votes. The media too has been supportive of politicians since the politicians are in collaboration with the business persons. And it is the same business persons who run the media houses.

If AAP is voted in or at least constitutes the lead opposition, the entire political landscape will change. No media will be able to ignore AAP. And AAP will become a serious player in 2014 national elections. So far, the 2014 national elections are being touted as a BJP vs Congress – Narendra Modi vs Rahul Gandi. This could change with AAP coming to power in Delhi. The third force, which has been absent will emerge with Arvind Kejriwal taking the cake away from the regular politicians.2019, if not 2014 elections may well be Narendra Modi vs Rahul Gandi vs Arvind Kejriwal.

In the event, AAP comes to power and are able to achieve something major e.g. cut down electricity costs by 30%-40% (as they have been claiming), they will immediately be catapulted to be the most serious contenders nationally.

It will also be interesting to see how the personality’s wars shape up. Narendra Modi stands for “Development first, corruption will reduce along the way”.  Arvind Kejriwal stands for “Reduce corruption, development will happen by itself”. Rahul Gandhi is yet to build his persona, but really his persona is his last name. So, it doesn’t matter what he stands for.

Which paradigm will the nation vote for? Only time will tell.