Ravi S. Iyer: Worldly

Last updated on November 3rd 2014 When the bird flu fear hit the world, including India, with a lot of culling of poultry (including in India) to prevent the spread of the disease, I had done some reading & viewing up on the matter. That was when the true extent of the danger of such dangerous diseases to human populations really came home to me. I then could far better understand the terror and massive damage in lives lost that diseases like the plague & cholera had caused in past centuries. Even Shirdi Sai Satcharitra has a reference to a boy suffering from plague (Section "Master Khaparde’s Plague-Case" in http://www.saibaba.org/satcharitra/sai7.html ). So, plague in India was a terror even in the not-so-distant past (early 20th century). But the bird flu problem got contained and, at least in India, it did not reach fear frenzy levels among the populace. From the time that I have been studying such matters (say over the past five years or so), this Ebola fea...

Today's Hindu carries a New York Times article by Paul Krugman, Monopsony is not okay, http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/monopsony-is-not-okay/article6521133.ece . Some notes including short extracts and comments: "Amazon.com, the giant online retailer, has too much power, and it uses that power in ways that hurt America." [Ravi: That's how he starts the article! Direct charge at amazon.com!] ... [Ravi: About Amazon having "robber-baron-type market power" in the USA books market similar to what Standard Oil of John D. Rockefeller had: I think I have been reading about online book seller(s) putting a squeeze on publishers for quite a few years now. I wonder what's new now. Maybe the squeeze has increased dramatically.] ... "Book sales depend crucially on buzz and word of mouth (which is why authors are often sent on gruelling book tours); you buy a book because you’ve heard about it, because other people are reading it, bec...

Some concerns crop up with the Nobel peace prize being awarded jointly to India's Kailash Satyarthi (and Pakistan's Malala Yousufzai), like: a) Does this honour India and Indians or is it kind-of critical? Should Indians (including me) and people with Indian roots/connections feel joyous or sorrowful? b) Why was it awarded jointly to an Indian Hindu man (Satyarthi is reported to have been mentored by Swami Agnivesh, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnivesh ) and a Pakistani Muslim girl? Was it just coincidence or was there more to it? I think the Norwegian Nobel Committee chairman's answers as given in this Hindu article are quite satisfactory to me, Important to honour Indians working for the greater good: Jagland, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/important-to-honour-indians-working-for-the-greater-good-jagland/article6490465.ece . I found this Washington Post article on Satyarthi to be quite good, http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/peace-prize-recip...

The Hindu, a few days ago, reprinted a Harvard Busines Review Oct. 2014 article titled, The rise (and likely fall) of the talent economy, http://www.thehindu.com/business/Industry/the-rise-and-likely-fall-of-the-talent-economy/article6471593.ece [HBR link, multiple pages and so a little cumbersome to read, http://hbr.org/2014/10/the-rise-and-likely-fall-of-the-talent-economy/ar/1 ] My comments (and a few short extracts of the article in quotes): Ravi: Hmm. I did not realize that IBM marked that sort of change in the financial world (a non natural resources company making it to the top 50 mainly on creativity of its employees). Sure, it was really big in the computing world, but changing the status quo in the world of big business? That was something that I had not realized. When one thinks about it though it is not surprising at all. ... "By 2013 more than half the top 50 companies were talent-based, including three of the four biggest: Apple, Microsoft and Google."...

Given below are extracts from and comments on the US-India joint statement made on Sept. 30th 2014/1st October 2014 after the meetings of USA president Barrack Obama and Indian prime minister Narendra Modi. The full statement is available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/09/30/us-india-joint-statement and at http://pib.nic.in/newsite/pmreleases.aspx?mincode=3 under month October 2014 (click on left table entry titled "Joint Statement during the visit of Prime Minister to USA (01-October 2014)". The two leaders extolled the broad strategic and global partnership between the United States and India, which will continue to generate greater prosperity and security for their citizens and the world.  Prime Minister Modi emphasized the priority India accords to its partnership with the United States, a principal partner in the realization of India’s rise as a responsible, influential world power.  Given the shared values, people-to-people ties, and pluralistic ...