India

I’ve been in India watching the cricket live on TV, which is much better than on my computer! But one of the downsides is having to watch the advertisements.

The India vs. West Indies series is being shown on Neo Sports which brands itself as “The home of Indian cricket”. A lot of the ads on Neo are house ads for the channel itself. Since it is a new channel, that makes sense.

Now, here’s where things get tricky. For the India-West Indies series, they have come up with a couple of ads to promote the series.

Ad #1 – A West Indian visitor is at an Indian outdoor dhaba. He takes a mouthful of the curry and his mouth is on fire. As he runs around for water, the waiter walks away, the other guests put their hands in the glasses, drop their dentures in their glasses of water and other things that prevent him from drinking water. Finally, in desperation, he turns to a tap and even that has no water. Tag line – “It is tough to be a West Indian in India “. And then there are images of the West Indian and Indian teams playing cricket.

Ad #2 – A West Indian couple are snuggling on a boat in the middle of a large and serene lake. The boatman looks at them and then he stands. He throws the oar away and then starts disrobing. The couple look at each other, frightened (I thought he was going to rape the poor woman). Then, when he’s down to his chuddies (boxers), he jumps off the boat, leaving the poor couple in the middle of the lake with no oar and the West Indian guy calling out “Hello? Hello maan??”. Tag line – “It is tough to be a West Indian in India”. And then there are images of the West Indian and Indian teams playing cricket.

At worst, these ads are racist. At best, they shout out a message that Indians are not hospitable and treat our guests terribly.

Let’s address hospitality.

“Atithi Devo Bhava” – The Guest is God

Every Indian has heard that phrase – hospitality has been ingrained in Indian culture. In fact, India’s Tourism Ministry has adopted this slogan as part of their Incredible India campaign. Clearly, this is *not* how we treat our guests. When someone’s mouth is on fire, would you deny them succor? Would you abandon someone in the middle of a lake? Clearly, no.

I understand what they were trying to say – they are trying to talk about how the Indian team will do well against the West Indian team. They thought the ads would be funny – any maybe they are for the first few seconds after you’ve seen them the very first time. But as soon as you think about it for a few seconds, that’s gone.

Here’s a better way do it –

New Ad #1 – The West Indian eats at a dhaba. He has a great time and makes friends with the locals. They go to watch the cricket together. India smacks the West Indies and the Indian hosts are happy. Tag line – “It is great to be a West Indian in India – except if you are on the cricket field”

New Ad #2 – A West Indian couple are snuggling on a boat in the middle of a large and serene lake.. Their guide is very chatty and friendly. The next day, they are in the stands next to each other. India smacks the West Indies and the Indian boatman is happy. Tag line – “It is great to be a West Indian in India – except if you are on the cricket field”

Wouldn’t that accomplish the purpose in a graceful, yet impactful way? I certainly think so.

Now, onto the charge of racism. I don’t believe that the ads were meant to be racist. I think that if the Australians were visiting, Neo might have made the same advertisement and said “It is tough to be an Aussie in India” (except the Aussies always win!). But the reality is that the Aussies aren’t visiting. The reality is that the West Indians are black and the ad could be perceived as racist. From a brand value perspective, as you are trying to establish your brand, why would you even take the risk?

I think Neo Sports and its parent company Nimbus Communications have missed the mark here. Time to pull these ads and issue a clarification.

Many Indians will head to the West Indies in March for the Cricket World Cup. How many will want to go if West Indian television had an ad where an Indian visitor was being treated rudely with the tag line “It is tough to be an Indian in the West Indies”?

As the saying goes, “Its just not cricket!”

UPDATE (January 27th): Another match today – they’ve now started putting out ads with the Sri Lankans. Here’s what they’ve done:

Ad #1: They have a Sri Lankan man being served food at the dhaba (the same hot curry) and the waiters gleefully waiting for him to start eating. The running around looking for water is not there since they’ve established what’s about to happen to him. Tag line ‘Now, even Sri Lankans will have a tough time in India”

Ad #2: A Sri Lankan couple in the boat. Shots of the boatman grinning expectantly at what’s about to happen to them. Shorter ad than the WI one. Same tag line as above.

So Nimbus seems to be sticking to their guns and by doing so, their message seems to be that there is no racist intent – they are treating the Sri Lankans (who are brown like Indians) the same as the West Indians. All very interesting.

Inside an elevator (lift) in Madras.

First post from Madras. So, it is apt that this video of a little pre-schooler who is quizzed by his dad, in Tamil, on the state capitals. The funniest part is when the dad mistakenly asks him for the capital of Alabama for the second time and kid says “I’ve already said that one!”

This is so funny, it is worth watching.

For background, India won a test match in South Africa for the first time ever (since South Africa was re-admitted into world sports). It was truly a blowout performance, especially after how they were whitewashed 4-0 in the one-dayers. The funniest moment though was from the Man of the Match, Sreesanth.

Note to the non-cricket followers: In general, the Indian team is a well-behaved if somewhat meek team. This guy though is all attitude. Sreesanth is a bowler and often has a word or two to say to the batsman when he’s bowling.

Here he’s batting. Right before the clip starts, the bowler, Andre Nel (who sets the gold standard for goading the batsman), tells Sreesanth that he doesn’t have heart. Sreesanth promptly tonks him for a six.

This award winning ad is a little old, but I just saw it. Powerfully communicated message.

The text at the end says –

Imagine the world today

if he could have communicated like this.

Yes, indeed.

Amidst all the brouhaha about the performance of the Indian cricket team, finally, Rediff has done some analysis. Amazing stuff, analysis – actually gives you facts to talk about!

Ganguly vis-a-vis Dravid as captain in ODIs

Captaincy record

Hmm… seems to me they are *exactly tied* at this stage in their captaincy careers. So I guess the moral of the story is that the Indian team has in fact been this pathetic before. Hopefully, this too shall pass.

Here’s the full analysis.

Apparently this concept is too hard for the Indian press to understand. As background, there’s quite a famous case in progress. The court of public opinion has convicted the accused. That’s fine — happens all the time.

But apparently they are having a hard time understanding why a leading lawyer, Ram Jethmalani, is defending the accused. Mr. Jethmalani, who is, if anything, brilliant, takes the reporter, Sagarika Ghosh, to the cleaners on her lack of understanding between public opinion and legal fact. The basic issue is not whether Manu Sharma is guilty or not guilty. The basic issue is that being convicted in the court of public opinion does not mean that he is guilty according to the law.

Sagarika Ghosh can’t grasp that distinction. It is ludicrous how she keeps asking him “why are you defending him?” – because everyone has the right to a fair trial and everyone had the right to representation. Even the guilty ones. Only by ensuring that the guilty have fair representation can you ensure that the innocent will get fair representation.

I love this quote —

That is my courage. I have moral courage, and who are the citizens of India? You are not the repositories of the citizens of India. I decide according to my conscience who to defend and please understand and tell those people who are asking this question that there is a statutory rule of the Bar Council of India that a lawyer who refuses to defend a person on the ground that people believe him to be guilty is himself guilty of professional misconduct.

Watch the video here. [Hat tip on video and quote: Confused]

While I personally might feel that Manu Sharma is guilty as sin, is using his political connections and must be convicted, I will also defend his right to the best counsel available. Why is that hard to understand?

The on thing I completely disagree with him on is that the press has overstepped their ground – India has too many instances where politicans get away with, well…, murder. So I think the press has done a great job of exposing this story and all it’s gory details. But, he’s entitled to his opinion. I hope Jethmalani doesn’t give himself a coronary with all the screaming.

I slept on the couch. I was up at 3:45 AM. I turned over; my computer was on and plugged in. The browser was open, set to Willow TV. I refresh the browser and start watching the India-Australia match at the ICC Champions Trophy.

Half way through the match, I was feeling quite good. India didn’t collapse. They had 249 on the board. Nice. But then of course, it was back to normal. The batting and the bowling can’t both work well — that is the cardinal rule for the Indian Cricket team. One has to suck!

And the bowlers duly delivered. They sucked (and continue to do so). Australia is just cruising along. They will win this match.

I’ve got to stop torturing myself like this!

UPDATE — This is a great post on why I likely won’t stop torturing myself. At least the World Cup will be in a closer timezone. That’s something to cheer about!

Deepavali, traditionally known as the Festival of Lights, is a celebration of hope for the world and the triumph of good over evil. It is one of the most important festivals on the Hindu calendar.

When I was growing up, we’d be woken up at first light, taken to the prayer room, given new clothes, and told to wash our hair and wear our new clothes. Then we’d run outside and burst crackers of all sorts (flowerpots, chakras, rockets, string bombs). It was a great fun for a kid. A few weeks before the big day, you go with your parents, choose your fireworks and then carefully use them, making sure to ration them out to last till Deepavali (so you get two weeks of nightly fireworks, and the whole neighborhood is filled with noise of kids celebrating). On Deepvali, after you set off the biggest and the best fireworks that you’ve carefully kept aside, you consume a delicious breakfast and visit family you hadn’t see in a while. The whole morning was spent driving from one house to the next until everyone was checked off the list. Of course, you ate incredible food all along the way and come home to eat a sumptuous lunch before napping it all off.

As an adult in New York, I’ve adapted the tradition significantly. Since I can’t really set off fireworks on my fire escape, I sleep in, get up when I please and then pick out the new, unworn clothes I’ve reserved for the occasion and dress up. Then, I call family, wish them and proceed to enjoy the wonderful food the festival demands. I think I’ve kept the most important elements!

It is interesting to see how Social Networking (SN) sites evolve.

Friendster took off like a rocketship when it launched. It was out of control – everyone was on it and everyone was talking about it. Then techonology problems (like an excruciatingly slow site) caused it to fall off a cliff. But, if you look at the graph below (from Alexa), they are reemerging…

Orkut, Google’s venture into SN, also took off with a ton of press about Orkut Biakutten. Everyone I knew logged on, added all their friends and then, maybe 6 months later, everyone got tired of it and stopped. Primarily because there was no point.

But Orkut is *huge* in certain places. The well known one is Brazil, but they are actually also huge in India. All the evidence is anecdotal. Go to most any Indian blog and you will see mentions of Orkut. I also get a fair amount of messages from Indians on Orkut. Actually, looking at the Alexa numbers, there’s been an incredible spike as of Q2 of 2006. Why?

And comparing Friendster versus Orkut, you can see that Orkut has clearly taken off.

Here’s an interesting blurb from ZDNet News (from July ’06):

In May, Orkut had 210,000 visitors in the United States, up 85 percent from the year earlier, according to ComScore.

Worldwide, Orkut enjoyed more popularity. It ranked fifth in May by ComScore’s measure, more than doubling its visitors for the year to 33.7 million. In contrast, MSN Spaces doubled its visitors to 101 million, and MySpace grew 250 percent to 74 million, according to ComScore.

Wow — US traffic is smaller than a speck of dust. Incredible how significant international growth is.

The only SN site that seems impervious to cycles is the juggernaut, MySpace.