www.youtube.com
See the real story of Anna Hazare , checkout what his ex-colleagues have to say about him. You will be shocked to hear the real truth hidden from all of us.
Friday, August 26, 2011
A Facebook conversation that illustrates the perils of copying and pasting status messages, or sharing links, without studying closely those messages or links-2
Commitscion Ankana Sinha (Class of 2009), who works as a brand manager with ProNature Organic Foods in Bangalore, graciously consented to let me reproduce this discussion we had on Facebook earlier today:
Sunday, August 21, 2011
"Chaicoffeeidlivadatomatrsoupsipsaaay!"
Samosapedia claims to be the definitive guide to South Asian lingo, though at first glance it appears to be more like the sub-continental cousin of the US-based Urban Dictionary (you will see what I mean when you check out both websites).
Definitive guide or not, Samosapedia is definitely an idea whose time has come. Don't we all want to know how to "have a bucket bath" and aren't we on the lookout always for "cheap and best"?
As for "Chaicoffeeidlivadatomatrsoupsipsaaay!", here's the entry from Samosapedia: SipsayAugust 05, 2011, Word of the Day
You know where to go now for your daily dose of chutney.
Definitive guide or not, Samosapedia is definitely an idea whose time has come. Don't we all want to know how to "have a bucket bath" and aren't we on the lookout always for "cheap and best"?
As for "Chaicoffeeidlivadatomatrsoupsipsaaay!", here's the entry from Samosapedia: SipsayAugust 05, 2011, Word of the Day
Most people who've traveled on the Indian Railways would agree that the best part of the journey is the endless barrage of food that comes your way.Depending on what region of India you're in, your choices might range from hot hot idli-vadas wrapped in banana leaves and newspapers, to steaming peppered tomato soup served in styrofoam cups, to chai/coffee, to SIPSAAAAY."What are sipsays?" you may ask. It took me a while to figure this one out. I would hear "Chaicoffeeidlivadatomatrsoupsipsaaay" bellowed as the vendors breezed pass our train cabin and always wonder what that last item was.Why, of course! Chips! An adaptation of the English word for "chips" — or, as the Brits would say, "crisps" — "sipsay" are those delightful deep fried, salted, spiced slices of potato/jackfruit/banana that we all love to munch on!Next time you're on a train and you hear "sipsay", stop the fella and grab a few. Then you'll really be able to sakkath majaa maadi on your journey!
Vendor: "Chaicoffeeidlivadatomatrsoupsipsaaay!!!!!!!!"
Child: Amma, I want banana chips!
Amma: OK mole.
Child: Amma, I want banana chips!
Amma: OK mole.
You know where to go now for your daily dose of chutney.
- Further reading: Samosapedia gets a mention in The Economist: The family tree of a mongrel language.
- Thank you, Satish Perumal (Class of 2011), for the tip-off.
A Facebook conversation that illustrates the perils of copying and pasting status messages, or sharing links, without studying closely those messages or links-1
Commitscion Noyon Jyoti Parasara (Class of 2007), who works with Mumbai Mirror, graciously consented to let me reproduce this discussion we had on Facebook earlier this week:
Noyon Jyoti Parasara
Also read: A Facebook conversation that illustrates the perils of copying and pasting status messages, or sharing links, without studying closely those messages or links-2
Noyon Jyoti Parasara
Interesting news feature. Indian corruption... congress and all involved
This
video is banned in India by Youtube...Please spare some time to watch
this video and share as much you can...its an explosive report on Indian
corruption which has never covered by Indian Media why? a big question
mark..this is self explanatory why Congress not in favour of JanLokpal
bill..
Length: 6:48
Friday at 12:20am · · · Share
Ramesh Prabhu Is this authentic? Or is this a propaganda clip? Does YouTube actually ban videos in India? Is that possible, Noyon?
Friday at 10:29am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara Sir youtube can ban videos according to geographic locations. Certain videos are not available in India.
Talking about facts.. Vadra is indeed a part of DLF as well as Unitech. There were reports in ET and some DNA.
Friday at 10:35am ·
Ramesh Prabhu Second question: Who produced this propaganda film? When there's no "author", what does it say about the credibility of the work?
Friday at 10:50am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara It should be a propaganda feature considering it is quite lop-sided. But then sir, propaganda is not always lies...
Friday at 10:53am ·
Ramesh Prabhu I agree. But please leave it to propagandists to publicise their propaganda. Journalists have no business asking people to watch this propaganda film.
Friday at 10:55am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara But sir, any such feature is worth watching. Propaganda or not... would you not agree? Even if it just means to know what Propagandists are up to. And what information they can throw forth. To use it in the newspapers is where we could use restraint...
Friday at 10:59am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara About youtube - the producer, the govt or the producer can decide
Friday at 11:00am ·
Ramesh Prabhu Sure, experienced journalists, who have a healthy scepticism by training, should watch all kinds of clips (and read all kinds of literature) to be able to better understand the world around them. But they should not publicise propaganda films on sites like Facebook without at least a disclaimer: THIS IS A PROPAGANDA FILM. KEEP THAT IN MIND IF YOU'RE WATCHING IT.
If there's no disclaimer, people watching this propaganda film will believe what they are seeing -- especially because a journalist is recommending it. Isn't that wrong?
Friday at 11:03am ·
Ramesh Prabhu As for YouTube's banning policy -- can I read an authentic version somewhere? Can you send me the link? I want to see this for myself. I have a healthy scepticism, you see.
Friday at 11:04am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara I will check and get a link. I know that they can restrict as I have come across such videos where Youtube mentions it cannot be seen in India. Infact films like Striker were released for free on Youtube. but indians could not watch it.. as the producers had an agreement with youtube. only viewers in US could see it.
Friday at 11:12am ·
Ramesh Prabhu That can happen with "legal" films, like "Striker", but I doubt YouTube has a policy banning clips like the one you are trying to publicise. Please continue the search for the link.
This is the trap one falls in when one copies and pastes status messages. If you were not sure about the YouTube policy, why did you not act when you saw that line at the top: "This video is banned in India by Youtube"?
Friday at 11:16am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara I did not see that line. i just saw the video. I saw it only when you pointed.
And sir, sometimes you can't fight evil by playing by the rules. :)
Friday at 11:21am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara having said that i will try getting to the source of the video
Friday at 11:21am ·
Ramesh Prabhu Don't you see what you are copying and pasting, Noyon? I worry about that. And are you telling me that you are trying to "fight evil" by publicising this propaganda film? I don't get it.
Friday at 11:22am · · 1 person
Noyon Jyoti Parasara The film does have facts. Facts i did not know... i checked that what the video mentioned about his business is not false. How people use those facts is again another matter. And i would like to leave it to them. No censorship.
Friday at 11:27am ·
Noyon Jyoti Parasara But as i admitted, I should have mentioned it is a propaganda film
Friday at 11:27am ·
Ramesh Prabhu Can you send me the links to the facts that you did not know since you checked them?
Friday at 11:30am
Telling it like it is... with cartoons
With a few deft strokes of his (computer) brush and pen, DNA cartoonist Manjul (he uses only one name) has captured the spirit — and the angst — of the current "people's movement" in a series of cartoons published in the paper this week:
In an interview published in DNA last year, when he had come to Bangalore to receive the Maya Kamath Memorial Award, Manjul had revealed that he began his first experiments with political sketches when he was only 16. His early cartoons were published by a local newspaper in his home state, Uttar Pradesh. Looking back, Manjul says that he found cartoons an appropriate medium for the expression of his own unique political commentary.
Manjul also talks about how he gets the ideas for his cartoons:
“The day begins with poring over newspapers. Through the day, there is much twisting and turning of matters in the head, as one settles on what the subject of one’s cartoon will be. Once I’ve settled on how to present it, though, the drawing is easy,” says Manjul, recalling the words of Abu Abraham: “A cartoonist is a liar who always speaks the truth.”
To read the full interview, go to "Manjul says it all between crooked lines".
"As a TV reporter, I know that my role is only secondary"
Writing in yesterday's DNA, NDTV journalist Sunetra Choudhury offers a stirring riposte to all those who have been critical of our television news channels' coverage of Anna Hazare's anti-corruption movement:
After explaining the hazards of her profession, which include "getting elbowed in the gut by other members of the media ... and getting felt up by some of the crowd", she gives us an insight into the problems of covering an event of this magnitude:
This is a very reasoned and cogent analysis of the issues that our television journalists have to deal with. Read the piece in its entirety here: "In defence of the subaltern TV reporter".
Everywhere I go, every non-TV person I talk to, says the same thing: 'You 24-hour channel people are really overdoing it' 'Don't you have anything else to do?' 'You have made a hero out of Anna Hazare' 'Look at the dumb TV anchors and the questions they are asking' 'How can you say India is with Anna when so many people are against Anna?'
I'm not even going to try to defend every complaint against TV coverage. Lord knows some of the cribs are really valid, but I think it is high time self-proclaimed TV critics really understood what the medium is all about, what logistics they deal with and what kind of pressures that TV reporters, anchors and producers face every second of the day.
After explaining the hazards of her profession, which include "getting elbowed in the gut by other members of the media ... and getting felt up by some of the crowd", she gives us an insight into the problems of covering an event of this magnitude:
Before Anna Hazare sat on his dharna, we TV reporters were called for an editorial meeting. Unlike what the cynics among you like to believe, the strategy wasn't to grab eyeballs by exaggerating the number of the crowds. The problem was more basic. How does a newsroom with limited reporters cover an indefinite fast like this? How do you ensure somebody is always at the site so that if anything untoward happens, we are there to bring you the news?
Remember the unearthly hour Baba Ramdev was shooed out of Ramlila ground? It was because TV reporters were there that any police excess was captured and checked.
This is a very reasoned and cogent analysis of the issues that our television journalists have to deal with. Read the piece in its entirety here: "In defence of the subaltern TV reporter".
Thursday, August 18, 2011
What a powerful argument about corruption and our hypocrisy!
Most Indians have paid a bribe. Most Indian businesses cannot survive or remain competitive without stashing away undeclared earnings.
Almost everybody who has sold a house has taken one part of the payment in cash and evaded tax on it.
Yet, the branding of corruption is so powerful that Indians moan the moment they hear the word.
 |
| MANU JOSEPH |
Open magazine editor Manu Joseph wrote in The New York Times yesterday about "India's selective rage over corruption" (excerpts above).
Joseph, who has also written a best-seller, Serious Men, is known to hold strong views, which he expresses in forceful language, and I admire his writing greatly. In this case, I also happen to agree with his views.
Read the article in its entirety here to understand how to offer a contrarian and, perhaps, unpopular view, without coming across as an insufferable know-it-all.
- To read an earlier Reading Room post about Open, click on "Open sesame...". If you want to know more about Manu Joseph, go here.
- Also read: "Fast and let loose", by Bachi Karkaria of The Times of India.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
How Shammi Kapoor saved the life of a Time journalist
 |
| BOBBY GHOSH |
Then came an incident in the summer of 2003. "I was reporting from a small village west of Baghdad, known to be a stronghold of Saddam loyalists who were fighting against U.S. troops," writes Ghosh.
He continues:
My translator and I were taking a chance that as a person of brown skin, my presence would not rouse any special suspicions. Things were going well for a while: My translator thought it best to introduce me as an 'a journalist from India,' which was, in the narrowest definition, true. People spoke candidly about their love of Saddam and hatred for the U.S.We were taken to meet the "Colonel," a 50-something man with an impressive moustache who was in charge of the village's fighters. He was a little more reserved that the others, and answered my questions warily. After the few moments, he asked me, in English, "Who do you work for?"
Reflexively, I replied, "TIME Magazine."
He frowned. "Times, of London?" he asked.
"No, TIME, al-Amreekiyya," I replied.
Immediately, he picked up his AK-47 and pointed it to my forehead. "You American?" he shouted.
"I'm from India," I said.
"No, you're American," he said again. "You will die."
What happened next? And how does Shammi Kapoor figure in this story? Read "How a Late Bollywood Icon Saved This Correspondent's Life".
- UPDATE (October 2, 2013): Bobby Ghosh is now Time's international editor. Another change at the magazine: Nancy Gibbs has just taken over as the managing editor. Read "Woman on top. About Time, some would say".
Monday, August 15, 2011
Why subs, or copy editors, are the lifeblood of a news organisation
Few readers, perhaps, know of the existence of subs, who play a crucial role in newspaper production. It is the sub-editor, now also known as the copy editor (an American term), who has read every word of every news report on the pages he or she has worked on. It is the sub who has, more or less, decided what the pages should look like. It is the sub who has, more or less, chosen the pictures on the page and written all the headlines, standfirsts, and captions. So when there are typos and other errors on the page it is probably because the sub has fallen asleep on the job and there is no second line of defence.
No second line of defence unlike in the olden days when there were teams of proofreaders to go through every galley proof and every page to catch the slip-ups.
I began my career in the olden days — June 1981, to be exact — as a trainee sub with Mid Day in Mumbai. I loved what I did then at the News Desk, and I continued to love what I did (and doing what I loved) for the next 20 years and more before turning to teaching (my life now is not only full but fulfilling).
Not many young people want to be subs now, though. That is one reason why good subs are rare.
And because they are rare, good subs are worth their weight in gold, which is why I tell all my journalism students to think seriously about desk jobs because newspapers all over the country are in dire need of subs...
Those are the basic skills of a good sub. But that's not all you need to be a good sub. Let Merrill Perlman, former director of Copy Desks at The New York Times, explain in detail what copy editors do. In a "Talk to the Times" column, she was asked this question by a reader, Bill Fischer:
Here is Perlman's illuminating response:
Now you know why subs, or copy editors, are the lifeblood of a newspaper.
(That last paragraph about the NYT's 150 copy editors may draw gasps of disbelief from subs at Indian newspapers, which are known not to employ more than a handful of subs in each shift.)
Merrill Perlman addresses many other important issues related to the operations of the News Desk. Read the Q&A in its entirety here. Study especially the questions and responses given in the two items headlined "Those Pesky Possessives" and "The Comma Before the And". Learning can be so much fun when the teacher has such a great sense of humour.
No second line of defence unlike in the olden days when there were teams of proofreaders to go through every galley proof and every page to catch the slip-ups.
I began my career in the olden days — June 1981, to be exact — as a trainee sub with Mid Day in Mumbai. I loved what I did then at the News Desk, and I continued to love what I did (and doing what I loved) for the next 20 years and more before turning to teaching (my life now is not only full but fulfilling).
Not many young people want to be subs now, though. That is one reason why good subs are rare.
And because they are rare, good subs are worth their weight in gold, which is why I tell all my journalism students to think seriously about desk jobs because newspapers all over the country are in dire need of subs...
- who have traditional subbing skills
- are excellent at spelling and grammar
- are good at rewrites and converting to house style
- are capable of coming up with great headlines, standfirsts, and captions
- are generally computer-literate but experts at layout using QuarkXpress (or equivalent page-making software), with management skills and the expertise to oversee the entire production process from raw copy to final pages.
 |
| MERRILL PERLMAN |
Does your job and that of the other desk copy editors entail
substantive editing and rewrite or is it mostly a matter of cleaning up
style, grammar, etc.?
Here is Perlman's illuminating response:
Thanks for walking into our trap, Bill, and allowing me to explain what our copy editors do.
Copy editors are the final gatekeepers before an article reaches you, the reader. To start with, they want to be sure that the spelling and grammar are correct, following our stylebook, of course. But they also want to be sure that they, and thus you the reader, aren't left with a sense that they've come into the middle of a movie, or that they don't understand how something works, or that they're wondering what comes next or what this development means for them, er, you.
They have great instincts for sniffing out suspicious or incorrect facts or things that just don't make sense in context.
They are also our final line of protection against libel, unfairness and imbalance in an article. If they stumble over anything, they're going to work with the writer or the assigning editor (we call them backfield editors) to make adjustments so you don't stumble. That often involves intensive substantive work on an article.
In addition, copy editors write the headlines, captions and other display elements for the articles, edit the article for the space available to it (that usually means trims, for the printed paper) and read the proofs of the printed pages in case something slipped by.
All of this, I might add, is done under crushing deadlines. For breaking news, a copy editor may have less than an hour to read 1,000 words and do everything the article needs. (It can be even less!) We like to get longer articles farther ahead of time, when we can spend a few hours or even a day to be sure it's perfect, but our goal is to get the information TO you, not keep it FROM you, so speed is of the essence.
We've got more than 150 copy editors here — in fact, it's the largest newsroom department — on 14 different copy desks, just about one desk for every section of the news report.
Now you know why subs, or copy editors, are the lifeblood of a newspaper.
(That last paragraph about the NYT's 150 copy editors may draw gasps of disbelief from subs at Indian newspapers, which are known not to employ more than a handful of subs in each shift.)
Merrill Perlman addresses many other important issues related to the operations of the News Desk. Read the Q&A in its entirety here. Study especially the questions and responses given in the two items headlined "Those Pesky Possessives" and "The Comma Before the And". Learning can be so much fun when the teacher has such a great sense of humour.
- Check the spelling, grammar, punctuation, and facts. Then the sub-editor's real work starts, says Andy Bodle on The Guardian's "Mind Your Language" blog. Read his engaging and entertaining post here: "Isn't there a computer program for that?"
- ALSO READ: What happens when subs fall asleep on the job.
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Editor Bill Keller on how The New York Times chooses Page 1 stories
The most important decisions in newsrooms all over the world usually involve the layout of the front page. So it will be interesting for aspiring journalists — and newspaper readers — to learn how one of the world's greatest newspapers goes about it. Here is Bill Keller, executive editor of The New York Times, telling readers how he and his staff select stories and photographs for Page 1:
Indian newspapers sometimes feature as many as 20 stories — big and small — on Page 1; more likely than not, you will see a dozen items on our cluttered front pages. The idea seems to be to have something for everyone on the cover itself. But the NYT has a different philosophy:
Keller also talks about the evolution of the newspaper front page in this era of hyper-coverage on television and on the web and elaborates on how his newspaper treats a news event whose "factual outline" has already been widely available before the NYT goes to press:
These fascinating insights into the workings of a newspaper come in a regular column, "Talk to The Times", in which The New York Times invites readers to submit questions for Times editors, reporters, columnists and executives. Just take a look at the long list of journalists who have interacted with readers and answered all kinds of questions. No newspaper in India cares to get so close to its readers. I wonder why that is.
Read the full Q&A with Bill Keller here.
PS: The New York Times policy is to not clutter Page 1 with ads. How refreshing.
 |
| NUMERO UNO: "WE THINK IT'S OKAY TO INCLUDE IN OUR FRONT-PAGE PORTFOLIO SOMETHING THAT IS FUN, HUMAN, OR JUST WONDERFULLY WRITTEN. IT'S PART SCIENCE, PART ART, WITH A LITTLE SERENDIPITY," SAYS BILL KELLER. |
There is no rigid formula to the selection of stories and photographs for the front page. We — an argumentative group of editors — try every day to assemble a selection of articles that are important and interesting, but many variables influence the outcome. Some days, we gather for our Page 1 meeting with no doubt about the main stories of the day. Sometimes an event that is undeniably important falls short of the front page because it is unsurprising. Conversely, an event that initially seems like more of the same can seem major when you take into account all the circumstances.
Indian newspapers sometimes feature as many as 20 stories — big and small — on Page 1; more likely than not, you will see a dozen items on our cluttered front pages. The idea seems to be to have something for everyone on the cover itself. But the NYT has a different philosophy:
Most days we have room for six stories and an "Inside" box on the front page, so every candidate jostles with competing news. We try, moreover, not to have an overly homogeneous page — ALL foreign stories, or ALL business stories, or ALL Washington stories. We think stories about how we live often outweigh stories about what happened yesterday. We think it's okay to include in our front-page portfolio something that is fun, human, or just wonderfully written. It's part science, part art, with a little serendipity.
Keller also talks about the evolution of the newspaper front page in this era of hyper-coverage on television and on the web and elaborates on how his newspaper treats a news event whose "factual outline" has already been widely available before the NYT goes to press:
The notion of a Page 1 story, in fact, has evolved over the years, partly in response to the influence of other media. When a news event has been on the Internet and TV and news radio all day long, do we want to put that news on our front page the next morning? Maybe we do, if we feel our reporting and telling of it goes deeper than what has been available elsewhere. But if the factual outline — the raw information — is widely available, sometimes we choose to offer something else that plays to our journalistic advantages: a smart analysis of the events, a vivid piece of color from the scene, a profile of one of the central figures, or a gripping photograph that captures the impact of an event, instead of a just-the-facts news story.
 |
| BILL KELLER |
Read the full Q&A with Bill Keller here.
PS: The New York Times policy is to not clutter Page 1 with ads. How refreshing.
"I am a college student who listens to music I download from the internet. This is probably illegal..."
There must be tens of thousands (millions?) of youngsters out there who qualify to make that statement, at least that first part. Should you continue to do it? That is, steal a work of art over which someone else has invested talent, time, and effort, not to mention money? What are the ethics involved, if at all?
Here, in his response to an anonymous New York Times reader's question (quoted partly in the headline), are the views of Randy Cohen, who till recently wrote The Ethicist column in that newspaper:
Mind you, Cohen wrote this back in 2000 (hence the witty reference to Candle in the Wind), but what he says still applies, don't you think?
Cohen also explains, again in an intelligently entertaining manner, why illegal downloading of music is also unethical:
Want to read more? Go here.
When my daughter and her fellow college students handed in term papers, their professor had them submit their work to Turnitin.com, a Web site that detects plagiarism, something he had never done before. This has a whiff of entrapment. Shouldn’t the prof have announced in advance that this would be required, giving the class a chance to clean up its work?
 |
| RANDY COHEN |
To download music from the Net illegally is theft, depriving songwriters, performers, music publishers and record companies of payment for their work. It is not so iniquitous as tossing a canvas sack over Elton John's head and swatting him with a stick until he sings ''Candle in the Wind'' (or stops singing it, depending on your taste), but it is dishonest, and you should not do it.
Mind you, Cohen wrote this back in 2000 (hence the witty reference to Candle in the Wind), but what he says still applies, don't you think?
 |
| COURTESY: STEPHAN PASTIS |
Cohen also explains, again in an intelligently entertaining manner, why illegal downloading of music is also unethical:
Your temptation is understandable. In a perverse kind of social progress, the Internet makes it easy to steal songs right in your own home, while you're still in your pajamas. You might almost make a case that it is unethical of Time Warner, say, to tantalize honest music lovers beyond human endurance. This is a ticklish line of reasoning, however, perilously close to blaming the victim. That is, even if I sashay around town in a sport coat made of $100 bills, your robbing me is unethical. Unethical, but understandable.
Want to read more? Go here.
- THE VEXED ISSUE OF PLAGIARISM
When my daughter and her fellow college students handed in term papers, their professor had them submit their work to Turnitin.com, a Web site that detects plagiarism, something he had never done before. This has a whiff of entrapment. Shouldn’t the prof have announced in advance that this would be required, giving the class a chance to clean up its work?
Cohen replied: I’m astonished you believe a professor should help cheaters “clean up” — more accurately, “cover up” — their deceit. It should be needless to say that students ought not cheat in any case. If the professor provided a distant early warning each time he intended to actually confirm students’ honesty, he would in effect encourage them to cheat whenever he did not issue such a warning. He might as well send out an Evite: Feel free to plagiarize this week; I won’t be checking.
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