So, incredible news first. I saw Om Shanti Om, first day last show. And in D row. That bit is incredible because until 30 mins before the show began, I had almost packed my bags to go home. Wasn't feeling great too - light headache and bodyache. But things turned out surprisingly differently and I had a great time watching the most publicised movie of all time.
Coming to the story itself, I knew it would be total timepass because after Main Hoon Na, if I learnt anything it was that Farah Khan can tell a story in an entertaining way. I find her movie making style very David Dhawan-like, but a couple of notches higher. And of course, Shahrukh over Govinda helps.
The story then is quite simple and very Karz inspired, and although she may have said she doesnt like remakes, one look at OSO is enough to convince you otherwise. So there is one Om who is a junior artiste and lives life happily with his best friend (Shreyas Talpade) and hyperactive mom (Kirron Kher, surprisingly over-the-top). Along the way he is also in love with superheroine dreamy girl Shantipriya (Deepika Padukone) with whom he chats via a poster and later after saving her from a fire (Sunil Dutt-Nargis anyone?), he chats with her in real life, asking the same silly questions (tum mujhse bore toh nahin ho rahi naa?). Enter baddie Arjun Rampal (well acted, for once) who turns out to be a producer and kills Shanti to save his studio and name by not getting Shanti to tell the world they are married and are about to have a baby.
Hero sees all. Hero is killed. Hero is reborn. Hero wants to turn the tables. Hero gets what he wants. End of story. That's the second half by the way.
Along the way, questions about the script arise but are not answered properly. Where did Shanti's duplicate come from suddenly? Why did baddie not put his foot down being a hotshot Hollywood director himself to SRK's obvious gameplan?
The first half is entertaining and keeps you engaged. Farah lets her viewers see the arcane world of moviemaking. Shahrukh is good as usual, his energy levels unsubsidised by his advancing age. And he had the six-pack to prove for it.
The surprise package is Deepika Padukone. She acts right, her facial expressions are great and is not the plastic models Bollywood imports from time to time in its movies. Here is someone who will go beyond Aishwarya in the movie making business. Top heroines, better start working harder now.
All in all, OSO is good, worth one watch, if nothing then for the spoof on Bollwood Farah so endearingly touches upon. Aamir Khan, Sooraj Barjatya, Rajesh Khanna, Jeetendra and of course Manoj Kumar, take a bow.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
Testing a New Captain for a brand new Team India
You have to feel sorry for Tendulkar. The poor guy is in subline touch and the (airhead) selectors dont know whom to turn to to give the thorn .. oops .. crown of Test captaincy to other than him.
I agree with the majority of ex-cricketers who say Dhoni should not be made Test captain. It would be too much for the Jharkhand lad. A genuine talent can go haywire if overwhelmed with so much responsibility. He will crack. And when he cracks, he will break, never to ve mended again, least of all by the selectors themselves, who will have moved on to the next available scapegoat in the team.
Dravid is being shuffled around - the current bunny (pun intended) of the selectors - who've found their latest bakra. Yuvraj (when he is not getting clicked with Beyonce withou knowing what RnB and hip-hop is .. err.. I know that because I saw their small photoshoot at Room 1122 in Grand Hyatt couple of weeks ago .. more on all that in some other post) is not a Test certainty with his tempemental technique, so he cant be made captain too.
The others in the team are just that - the others - not capable enough to be even considered. Sourav cant be considered as well because of his 'history' with the selectors - their love story which went horrendously wrong. Tendulkar well .. he was not handled properly by the selectors again. He should have been, as Ravi Shastri rightly pointed out, be approached when he was made vice-captain for the England series. He doesnt want to compromise on his batting at any cost and captaincy might hurt his chances of walking out in the sunset with a glow of runs behind him. And after serving the nation for close to two decades, God knows the man deserves at least that much.
The selectors, who've already made fools of themselves over the coach issure now find another monkey on their back. They have to act fast and they have to act wisely, not the brightest of points of the yawning oldies. But here I come to their help. The name is Kumble, Anil Kumble.
He has just given an interview saying he would be glad to lead India. He plays only Test matches now. He's already an Indian legend. He is respected by every team member. And he has learned a lot over the years which can finally be put to concrete use rather than let is rot away. And by the time he decides to call it quits, Dhoni would have been groomed properly to take over the delicate mantle from a wizened hand than the selectors' gaffe-prone butterfingers.
The question is - who will have the guts to stand up for the Karnataka leggie? Or will the selectors deliver another googly to Indian fans today? Will the captaincy go to Dhoni as being predicted or will there be some twist in the Great Indian Cricketing Tale. We'll have to wait and watch for the final outcome.
Fingers crossed.
I agree with the majority of ex-cricketers who say Dhoni should not be made Test captain. It would be too much for the Jharkhand lad. A genuine talent can go haywire if overwhelmed with so much responsibility. He will crack. And when he cracks, he will break, never to ve mended again, least of all by the selectors themselves, who will have moved on to the next available scapegoat in the team.
Dravid is being shuffled around - the current bunny (pun intended) of the selectors - who've found their latest bakra. Yuvraj (when he is not getting clicked with Beyonce withou knowing what RnB and hip-hop is .. err.. I know that because I saw their small photoshoot at Room 1122 in Grand Hyatt couple of weeks ago .. more on all that in some other post) is not a Test certainty with his tempemental technique, so he cant be made captain too.
The others in the team are just that - the others - not capable enough to be even considered. Sourav cant be considered as well because of his 'history' with the selectors - their love story which went horrendously wrong. Tendulkar well .. he was not handled properly by the selectors again. He should have been, as Ravi Shastri rightly pointed out, be approached when he was made vice-captain for the England series. He doesnt want to compromise on his batting at any cost and captaincy might hurt his chances of walking out in the sunset with a glow of runs behind him. And after serving the nation for close to two decades, God knows the man deserves at least that much.
The selectors, who've already made fools of themselves over the coach issure now find another monkey on their back. They have to act fast and they have to act wisely, not the brightest of points of the yawning oldies. But here I come to their help. The name is Kumble, Anil Kumble.
He has just given an interview saying he would be glad to lead India. He plays only Test matches now. He's already an Indian legend. He is respected by every team member. And he has learned a lot over the years which can finally be put to concrete use rather than let is rot away. And by the time he decides to call it quits, Dhoni would have been groomed properly to take over the delicate mantle from a wizened hand than the selectors' gaffe-prone butterfingers.
The question is - who will have the guts to stand up for the Karnataka leggie? Or will the selectors deliver another googly to Indian fans today? Will the captaincy go to Dhoni as being predicted or will there be some twist in the Great Indian Cricketing Tale. We'll have to wait and watch for the final outcome.
Fingers crossed.
Monday, October 15, 2007
A blast here, a blast there.
What's with all the blasts happening in every nook of the country? It's almost become a game of guessing as to where and not when the next blast int he country will be. All this while, politicians mint their money and bureaucrats twiddle their thumbs and the public demands accountability from the police, whose own hands are tied up the bureaucrats and politicians.
What will help reduce the number of lives lost to the crazy will of a silly group bound together by doctored advice? First and foremost, a certain human regard for one another, a fraternity of humanity and then brotherhood. This does not mean we go and create a character like Peter Novak but rather learn to respect each other from the point of view of understanding, rather than aggressive misinformation squandering.
The authorities can make sure that a fast track justice system is created to finish off all bomb blast related cases. Waiting for a decade and ultimately letting the perpetrators walk away scot free can create a new breed of wannabe terrorists. But therein lies a schism. We must make sure that there is no introduction of draconian laws such as
POTA, which will only surve to defeat the very cause these courts would be formed for.
The most important thing for the public is to maintain calm, for the police is to find the culprits and for the intelligence authorities to be wise enough to know where the next blast in going to be. S difficult, but by no means, an impoosible task.
What remains to be seen is who's going to take up the cudgels now?
What will help reduce the number of lives lost to the crazy will of a silly group bound together by doctored advice? First and foremost, a certain human regard for one another, a fraternity of humanity and then brotherhood. This does not mean we go and create a character like Peter Novak but rather learn to respect each other from the point of view of understanding, rather than aggressive misinformation squandering.
The authorities can make sure that a fast track justice system is created to finish off all bomb blast related cases. Waiting for a decade and ultimately letting the perpetrators walk away scot free can create a new breed of wannabe terrorists. But therein lies a schism. We must make sure that there is no introduction of draconian laws such as
POTA, which will only surve to defeat the very cause these courts would be formed for.
The most important thing for the public is to maintain calm, for the police is to find the culprits and for the intelligence authorities to be wise enough to know where the next blast in going to be. S difficult, but by no means, an impoosible task.
What remains to be seen is who's going to take up the cudgels now?
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
12 things journalists can do to help us recreate journalism
I was just browsing through the internet when I came across this bit of nugget.
I personally found the whole thing too consumerist and without focus lacking insight. Also, how the points will help be a better journalist are unclear. Just an example: A Nokia - N Series phone can be mastered by anyone. What's the link and relevance with being a better and neo-journalist with it?
What do you think?
Here are twelve things journalist can do to help us recreate journalism for the 21st Century.
Become a blogger. By this, I don’t necessarily mean “start a blog,” but that is never a bad idea. More importantly, become an avid blog reader. Blogs should be a daily routine for every dedicated journalist. They should read every blog related to their beats. They should read blogs about their own interests and hobbies. They should read blogs about their profession. To get blogging is to get how things have changed.
Become a producer. Pick up a digital recorder, a point-and-shoot camera or a video camera and start producing content beyond text. Do this as part of your job, fine, or do it on your personal time. The goal is to understand DIY. Post stuff on YouTube, Flickr or any number of other UGC sites.
Participate. As you read blogs, leave comments. If your newspaper.com has comments on stories, read the comments and add your own. Become known as somebody who converses on the Internet.
Build a web site. It will greatly expand your mind about how the web works if you go a bit beyond just setting up an account on Blogger or WordPress. Learn a little HTML. Better yet, learn some PHP, Cold Fusion, JavaScript or other web development language. You should own your own domain, anyway.
Become web literate. You should know what Flash is, and how it differs from AJAX. You should know the meaning of things like HTML, RSS, XML, IP, HTTP and FTP. You should understand at least how people use applications and tools to build web sites. You should know the potential and the limitations of each.
Use RSS. You need an RSS reader and lots of RSS feeds to consume. This will help you better grok distributed media.
Shop online. Part of your goal is to become immersed in the digital lifestyle. You will learn stuff about the digital life if you shop on Amazon, Ebay and other ecommerce sites. As you do, think about how these sites work and why they’re set up as they are.
Buy mobile devices. Get a video iPod. Get a smart phone (an iPhone, Treo, Helio Ocean or Nokia N-series are all good places to start). Learn about distributed, take-it with-you-anywhere content. Buy a laptop and tap into some free wi-fi while you’re out and about. Learn what digital life is like when you’re not shackled to a desktop machine.
Become an avid consumer of digital content. Watch videos on YouTube. Download video and audio podcasts (take them with you on your iPod). Visit the best newspaper sites in the world and watch what they’re doing. Turn on your TV less and your computer more.
Be a learner. Technology and culture is changing fast. You can’t keep up unless you’re dedicated to learning. I love this quote from Eric Hoffer because it is so appropriate to what our industry is going through now: “In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves beautifully equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.”
Talk about what you’re learning with your co-workers. Be a change agent. Get other journalists excited about the new digital communication/media tools.
Finally, read Journalism 2.0 (PDF) by Mark Briggs. You’ll learn about the stuff covered above and how it is changing modern journalism. Brigg’s book is the best primer on the topic you will find.
Quality journalism, and the news organizations that finance it, needs individual journalists to become personally responsible for their own role in changing newsroom cultures and practices. The smartest publishers with the greatest strategic plans (even if they had bottomless buckets of cash to execute on all the best ideas) can’t save news organizations without the concerted support of individual journalists.
One last bit of advice: Don’t wait for a boss to tell you to become a learner and an explorer. Your job is just where you collect your paycheck. You career is what you do. Your boss isn’t responsible for your career. You are. Solely. Don’t wait on others to make changes. Start making changes now for your own benefit. It’s great if your employer benefits from your growth, but you will benefit more.
I personally found the whole thing too consumerist and without focus lacking insight. Also, how the points will help be a better journalist are unclear. Just an example: A Nokia - N Series phone can be mastered by anyone. What's the link and relevance with being a better and neo-journalist with it?
What do you think?
Here are twelve things journalist can do to help us recreate journalism for the 21st Century.
Become a blogger. By this, I don’t necessarily mean “start a blog,” but that is never a bad idea. More importantly, become an avid blog reader. Blogs should be a daily routine for every dedicated journalist. They should read every blog related to their beats. They should read blogs about their own interests and hobbies. They should read blogs about their profession. To get blogging is to get how things have changed.
Become a producer. Pick up a digital recorder, a point-and-shoot camera or a video camera and start producing content beyond text. Do this as part of your job, fine, or do it on your personal time. The goal is to understand DIY. Post stuff on YouTube, Flickr or any number of other UGC sites.
Participate. As you read blogs, leave comments. If your newspaper.com has comments on stories, read the comments and add your own. Become known as somebody who converses on the Internet.
Build a web site. It will greatly expand your mind about how the web works if you go a bit beyond just setting up an account on Blogger or WordPress. Learn a little HTML. Better yet, learn some PHP, Cold Fusion, JavaScript or other web development language. You should own your own domain, anyway.
Become web literate. You should know what Flash is, and how it differs from AJAX. You should know the meaning of things like HTML, RSS, XML, IP, HTTP and FTP. You should understand at least how people use applications and tools to build web sites. You should know the potential and the limitations of each.
Use RSS. You need an RSS reader and lots of RSS feeds to consume. This will help you better grok distributed media.
Shop online. Part of your goal is to become immersed in the digital lifestyle. You will learn stuff about the digital life if you shop on Amazon, Ebay and other ecommerce sites. As you do, think about how these sites work and why they’re set up as they are.
Buy mobile devices. Get a video iPod. Get a smart phone (an iPhone, Treo, Helio Ocean or Nokia N-series are all good places to start). Learn about distributed, take-it with-you-anywhere content. Buy a laptop and tap into some free wi-fi while you’re out and about. Learn what digital life is like when you’re not shackled to a desktop machine.
Become an avid consumer of digital content. Watch videos on YouTube. Download video and audio podcasts (take them with you on your iPod). Visit the best newspaper sites in the world and watch what they’re doing. Turn on your TV less and your computer more.
Be a learner. Technology and culture is changing fast. You can’t keep up unless you’re dedicated to learning. I love this quote from Eric Hoffer because it is so appropriate to what our industry is going through now: “In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves beautifully equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.”
Talk about what you’re learning with your co-workers. Be a change agent. Get other journalists excited about the new digital communication/media tools.
Finally, read Journalism 2.0 (PDF) by Mark Briggs. You’ll learn about the stuff covered above and how it is changing modern journalism. Brigg’s book is the best primer on the topic you will find.
Quality journalism, and the news organizations that finance it, needs individual journalists to become personally responsible for their own role in changing newsroom cultures and practices. The smartest publishers with the greatest strategic plans (even if they had bottomless buckets of cash to execute on all the best ideas) can’t save news organizations without the concerted support of individual journalists.
One last bit of advice: Don’t wait for a boss to tell you to become a learner and an explorer. Your job is just where you collect your paycheck. You career is what you do. Your boss isn’t responsible for your career. You are. Solely. Don’t wait on others to make changes. Start making changes now for your own benefit. It’s great if your employer benefits from your growth, but you will benefit more.
Friday, January 05, 2007
Days 2 at DNA
The second day at DNA was another series of lectures from editors of different sections out to explain why their section was the best.
In particular I found the points raised by Saumit, the editor of After Hrs., the mosr relevant. He is a 30 something guy who has his priorities clear. He asked us to get out the hypocritical belief that entertainment news is frivolous. In fact, he said, most of the news seen today is presented in such a flashy way that the effect of entertaining the audience into reading news is all too apparent. The thing with me is, on my test paper result, they had printed the words "After Hrs - Desk" in an all too apparent way of telling where I was headed, never mind the 360 degree tour of the paper.
THe other instance where I got charged up was the very first one where a certain Mr. Bhatia was talking about the Edit page. In newspapers, this is the most sacrosanct page and the only page where views are allowed rather than news. Therefore it is necessary to spell out the policy of the paper based on which editorials can be written. In DNA however, they seem to be liberal and secular to all issues which goes against the rules since it is impossible to be fair to your ideas if you publish any good piece of work. I argued, but the stand-offish response I got put me off.
OTher people from other sections came and spoke as well. But there was nothing much they could do for me to write about.
Let's see what happens tomorrow. We've been told that the deep end is awaiting us. How deep the rabbit hole goes will be apparent soon enough.
In particular I found the points raised by Saumit, the editor of After Hrs., the mosr relevant. He is a 30 something guy who has his priorities clear. He asked us to get out the hypocritical belief that entertainment news is frivolous. In fact, he said, most of the news seen today is presented in such a flashy way that the effect of entertaining the audience into reading news is all too apparent. The thing with me is, on my test paper result, they had printed the words "After Hrs - Desk" in an all too apparent way of telling where I was headed, never mind the 360 degree tour of the paper.
THe other instance where I got charged up was the very first one where a certain Mr. Bhatia was talking about the Edit page. In newspapers, this is the most sacrosanct page and the only page where views are allowed rather than news. Therefore it is necessary to spell out the policy of the paper based on which editorials can be written. In DNA however, they seem to be liberal and secular to all issues which goes against the rules since it is impossible to be fair to your ideas if you publish any good piece of work. I argued, but the stand-offish response I got put me off.
OTher people from other sections came and spoke as well. But there was nothing much they could do for me to write about.
Let's see what happens tomorrow. We've been told that the deep end is awaiting us. How deep the rabbit hole goes will be apparent soon enough.
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Day 1 at DNA
So finally I entered the hallowed (or hollowed) domain of journalists today when I stepped into the office of DNA (Daily News & Analysis) at Kamala Mills today. In a lot of ways this blog was supposed to be started by me a long time ago. I wanted to put my life out here, if only to check and see how similar and how different I am from the rest of my ilk. What further strengthened my resolve was the fact that I was told to maintain a diary as a journalist. So here we go, and hope you enjoy the ride.
I am a mass media graduate with journalism as my specialisation. Once I got my result in June last year, I began work at a company called Ness Technologies. There I worked on as Content Editor for their client - Baseline Studio Systems. It was good while it lasted, (6 months to be precise) writing about Hollywood movies that hadnt released in India and all. But it got repetitive, I lost interest and opportunity came knocking in the form of this job and I took it.
I came to office just after 9 30. I was quite relaxed since I'd just got to know I was expected at 10. I thought it would stretch to 11 by the time something really happens but this time things started off soon. It was induction day. There were 8 other people with me, 4 of whom were from Pune and incidentally, from the ame college as well, Indira School of Communication.
After brief introductions, we were addressed all through the day by different people including Zee head honcho Subhash Chandra. He is a man with weary eyes hidden by bushy eyebrows and has a shocker of white hair on his forehead in his otherwsie black hair. He speaks in a deep labyrinthic voice which can hold your attention immediately but one that lacks aura. He spoke to us about how DNA is just another business for him and that we shouldnt set too high editorial standards. Kind of unexpected, but then well.. really nothing that could be done about that.
One Mr. Suresh provided the only seminar which had zestful enthusiasm. He spoke at length about the campaign that was launched and all the hoopla and behind-the-scenes number crunching that went into it. We were also shown how the printing press at Vashi was built in a world record (their words, not mine) of just 176 days. Also, there was constant talk of increasing circulation and plans of unsettling sleeping giant Times of India soon. Mr. Ayaz Memon was particularly happy to share that today the circulation figure touched 392,000 copies.
At the end of it all, we were divided into teams that would work with different departments all through the month - but that hasnt been finalised so I guess there's no use of writing it.
Tomorrow there are lectures of an hour each from editors of various depts. It's like an extended college lecture day and I just hope they dont tempt me to bunk!
I am a mass media graduate with journalism as my specialisation. Once I got my result in June last year, I began work at a company called Ness Technologies. There I worked on as Content Editor for their client - Baseline Studio Systems. It was good while it lasted, (6 months to be precise) writing about Hollywood movies that hadnt released in India and all. But it got repetitive, I lost interest and opportunity came knocking in the form of this job and I took it.
I came to office just after 9 30. I was quite relaxed since I'd just got to know I was expected at 10. I thought it would stretch to 11 by the time something really happens but this time things started off soon. It was induction day. There were 8 other people with me, 4 of whom were from Pune and incidentally, from the ame college as well, Indira School of Communication.
After brief introductions, we were addressed all through the day by different people including Zee head honcho Subhash Chandra. He is a man with weary eyes hidden by bushy eyebrows and has a shocker of white hair on his forehead in his otherwsie black hair. He speaks in a deep labyrinthic voice which can hold your attention immediately but one that lacks aura. He spoke to us about how DNA is just another business for him and that we shouldnt set too high editorial standards. Kind of unexpected, but then well.. really nothing that could be done about that.
One Mr. Suresh provided the only seminar which had zestful enthusiasm. He spoke at length about the campaign that was launched and all the hoopla and behind-the-scenes number crunching that went into it. We were also shown how the printing press at Vashi was built in a world record (their words, not mine) of just 176 days. Also, there was constant talk of increasing circulation and plans of unsettling sleeping giant Times of India soon. Mr. Ayaz Memon was particularly happy to share that today the circulation figure touched 392,000 copies.
At the end of it all, we were divided into teams that would work with different departments all through the month - but that hasnt been finalised so I guess there's no use of writing it.
Tomorrow there are lectures of an hour each from editors of various depts. It's like an extended college lecture day and I just hope they dont tempt me to bunk!
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