The Best of 2010 ;) !

          Everyone is posting the best of 2009. So I am sure everyone is going to know everything anyways. So this is my blog post that I would love to publish on 31^st December 2010 ;).

World :

India has successfully turned all the nuclear guns of Pakistan towards Nepal. (Why Nepal ?.. well.hhmm... who cares ;)) and Pakistan has finally ceased to exist in spite of all the money given by US and is no more officially recognized as a country.

Obama has finally said – ‘Yes we did’ instead of a perpetual ‘Yes we can’. (BTW: shouldn’t new year day be named as Obama day – it’s a day where everyone hopes for the best ahead and who else can show better ‘hope’ than him.)

Copens and Hagens**  have finally shook their hands on the heroic climate deal. Climate is not going to end humanity anymore – war may though ;)

India :

Mumbai police have finally started torturing Kasab publically… and we are loving it ;).

Chandrayaan 2 has successfully planted the first mango tree on the moon and is using the detected H2O to successfully water it. ;)

In a miraculous case of self realization, Raj and MNS have resorted to peaceful satyagraha.

Swine Flu immunization reaches India and perpetually no deaths due to H1N1 in full 2010. J

Sensex closed 45 points higher today at 35,452 pts.

Gossip :

Rakhi Sawnt’s sequel reality show – ‘Rakhi ka Honeymoon’ has gone on to become the most popular reality show in the world.

Woah ! Saif was bi and had Shahid tattooed on his lower back !

We have finally found 100 waitresses who have not slept with Woods ;).

Entertainment :

AR Rehman gets Oscar for 2^nd year in a row.

Aamir Khan had delivered a mind blower that makes 3 idiots look mediocre (now that would be something ;)).

Business/Technology :

Tata has obliged to the PM’s request to reduce emissions and has launched – Tata Pico – worlds cheapest bike for Rs 1k.

Google has successfully launched Google Life – It is an application that is going to scan through all the data on your laptop, your personal diaries, bank accounts, photos, video chats with your girlfriend, your search queries, the songs that you sing while bathing and pass it through the google black box to give out relevant Ads of what you should buy in order to lead a better life.

Facebook’s population that exceeded that of Chinas.

Windows 7 consistently sucks less than Vista.

Completely ‘working’ GPS active in the whole of India.

Sports :

Commonwealth Games 2010 were the best commonwealth Games hosted – ever. J(well atleast grant me a wish to be able to publish – Woah – nothing actually went wrong in the Commonwealth Games 2010 in Delhi ;) )

Sachin Completes 21 years and sets the record for the highest number of records anyone has broken and set in any sport.

India retains No. 1 in Tests and also in ODI’s.

Cheers !

Rahul

31 dec 2010. ;)

Also – check out this cool site to be used for the new year – http://www.futureme.org/. It lets you email to a future you ;). May seem a bit silly, but actually pretty cool to email a 30 or 40 year old you asking – hey man –  did you finally get the Ferrari ;).

Oh and ya – feel free to list down something that you feel would be great to have in news on 31^st dec 2010. HAPPY NEW YEAR ;) !

[**- Click here if the Copen and Hagen point confused you a bit ;).]

De-Branding of The Tiger ! ;)

               It would be an understatement to say that Tiger Woods is screwed. Accenture ended their contract with him and are no longer going to endorse him. The superfast and, thanks to the media, thrilling debacle of the tiger is actually an inspiring story for someone who wants to re-brand or de-brand himself.

                  Wiki defines a brand as a distinguishing name or symbol that determines your product or service. But brand is definitely much more than a flashy logo, a jazzy company name and a million dollar Ad campaign. For a company, its basically ‘who’ the company is. If its about a business, you are getting branded every minute – pick up the phone with a frown and a grumpy hello – you are branded, work harder to deliver on time – you are branded, default on loans – you are branded, don’t pay salaries on time – you are branded, communicate fair and honestly – you are branded, roll out a bad batch of products – you are branded, don’t do what you said you will – you are branded, have an untidy, unclean office/shop – you are branded, smile at your customer – you are branded, laugh behind his back – you are branded. So your brand is basically ‘who’ you are.

             Its clear that Tiger Woods had lost his brand value. But the funny thing is, he is still what he is – he is still the bloody best golf player in the world. That’s what has made him what he is. That’s what Accenture signed him up for. I hope they didn’t sign him for “Not sleeping with wrong women”.

              So you can have a flashy logo, jazzy name and be the best in the business – ‘screw’ up and you are screwed ;). And when God decides to set a freaky sensuous babe called destiny to screw you – all you have to do is just knock at the backyard of your own home, with your own car, having your own family in it, to unravel the deep secrets hidden in the hearts of god knows how many mistresses to the entire world.

    So the big lesson to be learned is :
Go to Bed – and you are branded ;).

Open Source- open Money !

                At EC, we have a lot of people coming to us with all these different ideas about building portals. More because we often push Ads like ‘Have an Idea ? We have the technology. Build your dream web portal with ECBuzz.com’. So we get to listen to a lot of ideas everyday. And as true software guys, what do me and sushant do when we have to work out a proposal for something new, we follow the standard coders maxim : Good coders code. Great coders reuse !, and look out for existing softwares. We look out for all that free stuff, or better call it open source to reuse. And every so often, we used to wonder- how do these guys make money ? With all the code up for grabs, are these people so noble at heart and want to earn so much goodwill – of course not ! So this leads to the all important question – how do open source companies make money ?
           There are 2 entities here, the ones who write the original software (‘original company’) and the ones who take it, reuse and deploy (lets call these ‘parasite company’). The case of the latter is easy to understand- why reinvent the wheel, if someone is just giving it to you, take it, polish it and sell it. So we will consider entity 1 here. Lets try and see.
           So you come up with this great idea, find a loophole in the market, or just have a super enhanced version of some existing concept and you decide to make a software solution. After toiling hard and working with great passion, you build your product. Lets say you spent about $20,000 building it. Lets see how going open source is going to help you make money, both in terms of saving of essential investments and actually generating revenue.

Marketing : once you have decided to go open, you give away your code for free download, have it for a free download on your product website, blog about it like mad and post about it in every possible place you can. You start attracting some developer community attention – obviously its free and no one has anything to loose to download and see what you have done. It’s amazing how the word FREE has a specific magnetic effect on your mind no matter where you see it. Anyways, so people start downloading and messing around. To your surprise, the software starts reaching customers who would have never have even considered or even come to know about it. Here comes the most important point about going open – you need a software that is seriously good – because it is naked out there, a good enough will never attract developers and downloads. You didn’t spend a penny and your software is already going places by harnessing the power of open source to market itself. This much about saving on money – now about actually making some-

Service : You then put up pages on your website about a complete installation suite(1st source) – a preinstalled OS, DB, App Server and your free application over that and offer it for some price, say $5000. You can now officially use – free, open source, $0 only to attract all the attention you want. There is a good chance that a lot of prospects considering your software will go for you as of all the parasites thriving on you, you yourself are obviously the most reliable. Next comes your customization : Many of the users who consider going in for your free software, would need some arrangements to suit their own needs and since the idea of getting the software for free has already gotten them excited, they would not mind shelling out something like a $100/hour for customization(source 2). And once you have gotten your customer – you always have the enhancements :-) @ may be $150/hour which becomes our 3rd source.

Support : By now, with some amount of downloads and some community focus on your software, you would probably have an active support and knowledgebase on your site. Its obviously free until now. But now onwards, you start charging for a support package selling support on case basis or a monthly or yearly basis(Say $100/month). Consultants depending on your software and serving customers will not mind paying you for all genuine support. Every programmer has their style of coding that other coders dont understand and trust me, even if its open- tones will need support which is our 4th source.

Demoware Open Source : This is a somewhat debated but definitely a very effective way. Give a really basic, almost commercially non usable version of the software as complete open source. And have a professional and enterprise paid edition over it(Say $500 and $900 respectively). The lowest version suffices the basic needs, but people are stuck up during critical customer custom deployments and have to upgrade. Sugar CRM does this. But attracts a lot of criticism for marketing itself as open source while truly being our demoware open source. But they seem to be better off than other truly open source CRM’s. Proprietary softwares like Salesforce.com, Oracle On Demand and FreedomCRM are way better off in the CRM market though. Anyways, so this is our 5th source.


Collaborative Money : This is where open source is used to collaborate and help some other aspect of your business to monetize itself. Google have Wave and Android open for developers and cant we see the android boom now(2% to 7% growth in market share in just 6 months). Turning these into open source is actually their marketing strategy to market their software through the power of the community in order to be able to sell more Advertisements. So that’s source 6 to use the self marketing power of open source to generate revenue through some other aspect of the business.

        So as per our(just some rough) analysis, you need to sell 4 Installation suites($20000) or 200 hours customization ($20000) to break even and we have not even considered other sources.

        So open source is not about goodwill or spirit, its about fierce competition and capitalism. You know that the company next to you has the same piece of clay as you have and it all boils down to who can mould it better and sell, thus fostering innovation and productivity. No one can put it in words better than Red Hat CEO, Jim Whitehurst “If we all had to walk around naked, we’d spend more time in the GYM”. :-)

Why making a bollywood movie is better than launching a new software !

Currently, at EC, we are working on launching our new CRM software: www.freedomcrm.com.

I always thought making a movie must be really fascinating, and hell it is ! I say this not just as an outsider, but  because I got an amazing chance to follow the complete production of a bollywood movie that my uncle is producing – Rivayat.

No connection between the 2 sentences above- well I have been doing both things simultaneously. And just realized, that both the processes, making of the movie and process of creating a new software, for any company,  are so similar.

                Like any software product, a movie starts with an idea, it can be anything, an inspiration, passion about something, some good cause, simply the idea of making money, or you are just crazy !. Then you write down the concept that becomes your IP(Intellectual Property) – the script. Most important similarity – you check what all your local competitors and international competitors (lets call them as mentors or innovators) have already done about the same concept and copy… oops – get inspired by what you like in them be it awesome scenes, good sequences, or an amazing GUI. Then you step forward and get a team together. And then all the regular HR procedures follow : interviews-casting, portfolios- resumes, packages and  negotiations. Even confidential upper management hiring- isn’t there a similarity between Steve Jobs pulling in John Sculley for Mac and karan Johar making Shahrukh Khan cancel other dates for K3G ;-).

                Just like the software has to be completed in the stipulated timeframe, the movie has to be optimized during its production to hit the mahurat on time. And for obvious reasons of enhancements (dream sequences to be shot in Switzerland that not originally in the script) and precision (blowing away 10 cars instead of 5 for better effect ), the budget overshoots much to the apathy of the chairman. Designers and developers have to work in sync to give the software the creative touch and the superior functionality and so do actors and technicians. Except of course designers wont get that sort of fame.

                After months of toiling hard, the movie is out for release. Lots of pre launch hype has to be created for the ‘revolutionary’ product we have created. After lots of internal testing, it goes out towards the first round of live customer testing- the premier. These are the elite class of testers(software experts) who supposedly have all the knowledge of the taste of the world and often go wrong at that..

                And now comes the big difference that makes the movie a really amazing product business to be in. There is no other product in the world, that comes to know its fate in a matter of 24 hours of its launch. A movie does ! You know your sales, revenues, profit or loss- everything within 24 hours. And that’s it- no further fuss at it. There possibly cant be a business plan for any software that has its base over what happens in a span of 24 hours. This is a real highlight of making a movie. You don’t have to bother spending more on trade shows, altering marketing strategies, or do anything if things have gone wrong. Just leave it and move ahead J. You don’t have to keep trying again and again to make it right in spite of people making it clear that they don’t want you – steve ballmer should wish he would have consulted ram gopal verma before trying so hard with Zune ;-)

                And if it’s a Hit- nothing like it. You turn into God overnight. And like all successful softwares, what do you do when the world loves you- go in for the version 2.0 (read sequel) of the product.

Products from small companies are like documentaries – coming next. !

If Google started in India !

Dr Venkatraman, Indian born US-based scientist wins Nobel Prize in chemistry, and undoubtedly makes our entire country proud, or does it ? One of the news guys asked him if such sort of a research was possible in India, he had to say that India lacks the facilities and has limitations for such sort of long term research projects. He also went ahead to say that if India does not invest now, it will place itself 10-20 years behind in harnessing such technology for better benefits. But is this the only issue – less infrastructure that hasn’t allowed a single company in India to come up with something that topples the tech world and keeps everyone watching. Is this the reason that prohibits research based product companies like google to come up in India – well there has to be more doesn’t it, what if Sergey Brin and Larry Page started out of India ;-) – lets try and see what the founders would have had to endure starting off through India -

1 > Writing on the Wall : While Larry and Sergey (lets call them L&S from here on ) were in their final years of graduation, lets say engineering, L&S would have had to defy the three ultimate career options that are written on the wall and continuously shown to almost all undergrad students here :

1>     Get a decent paying IT job.

2>      Give GRE and go to US.

3>     Become a full time MBA aspirant - CAT appearing professional - trust me, this is a career option.

I really don’t see anyone giving the students of their caliber the advice to go ahead for research. I don’t know how many engineering colleges here know that research can be a career option. Above all, they would have had to skip something that most of the colleges are formed for – placements. Is asked about their highlights, 99 out of 100 colleges in India would boast about placements. This think is actually global, but it should be more of a choice than a mandatory religious activity in colleges.

2> Peers : When google started, a whole lot of peers from Stanford picked it up in no time, understood it and started publicizing it. It must have been a perfect cross cultural and varied bunch of inputs from students from across the globe studying there at that time. To their credit, L&S would have definitely been in some top notch college of India for sure, but most of their peers would have landed with them due to a heavily paid management quota or through some sort of a caste quota. Googles initial troubleshooting would have been just a little bit haywire.  Forget cross cultural, imagine how a big agenda our politicians would get if we start accommodating international students – currently, there are problems of accommodating each other across states within the country itself.

3 > Edu Culture : L&S must have earned great respect while going ahead with their research. But how about thinking of doing the same where the only type of people opting for that would be mavericks or low graders . How is it that, in the west, we continuously see big shot innovations and creations coming out of dorm rooms and garages & going onto to silicon valley – micosoft, Apple, Dell and countless others. Why is it that hostel rooms of Indian colleges don’t produce companies. Or more surprisingly, how many students think of starting one while in college – certainly very few.  Our edu culture certainly needs some reform if any.

4 > Mentors : L&S endure all the odds and go looking out for advice and guidance. Just to come to know that most of the mentors here would just be able to help them with their textbooks and regular thesis curriculum. Because business here is considered to be meant for either for MBA’s or Gujjus ;-) – not for Phd or research type of people.  While guides like Rajeev Motwani gave the creators of google not just tech guidance, but also encouraged them to dream about building a business around their ideas. It’s the sort of advice that parents of young jawans in Punjab give their young kids in spite of knowing the risks behind it -  never come back without winning! Don’t we need that sort of a sacrificing attitude in technology. Shouldn’t a partially innovative concept for a final year project be rated above a fully working project that been done overand over for years. How often do we see college professors dropping projects because it may not work infront of the enternal ! Think its time for more ‘ go and dare ‘ gurus rather than ‘play it safe’ gurus.

5 > Value : Richard Branson mentions in his book ’Business stripped bare’ that they have managed to establish Virgin throughout the world, but they are having a really tough time in India because the only value that the people appreciate here is the value for money. A long term perspective, superior service, ethics, convenience all come second to it. L&S wouldn’t have had a tough time because they gave it free. That’s why India loves google and google generates very less revenue from India ! But is it because of this that most of the innovative ideas loose gas early here, because they try to establish themselves in this market first. Well, may be!

6> Name: On a lighter note, when L&S would have gone ahead to register – Google- they would not have been able to register google technologies pvt ltd. Simply because google is a misspelling of googol and to register company here, you need to mention the dictionary meaning of the name in the form– or you don’t get it – unless of course you know the alternatives. ;-)

7 > It would have worked : Well, these and there are a lot more points like do we have the sort of people like Andy Bechtolsheim who would, for the love of technology fund research projects and many more. But thinking of it, even if all these barriers would have come up, google would have worked had it started in any part of the world – because google is a spiritually correct product company. We all are searching for something in our lives - love, happiness, goodwill, money, success, meaning of our lives, something or the other. And Google, lets us do just that in the best way – SEARCH !