This article requires an entry-level knowledge of the western music theory. So readers of this article are supposed to know the following:

1. notes in a musical keyboard and their names
2. sharps and flats
3. what a musical scale is

If the above terms are new to you and still you want to continue reading this article, I would suggest you to learn them from the Connexions Music Modules. Also read Music Theory Wikipedia page and from Ricci Adam’s musictheory.net.

In addition to knowing the above it is also assumed that, when you hear the same musical note twice–one after the other, you must be able to make out that they are the same. And when someone plays your favourite tune on her guitar and she slips a note or two, you can clearly make that out too.

***

Well, let’s dig into the matter. For the sake of simplicity, we will discuss melodies to generalise music as melodies are music in the simplest form.

When you listen to a melody you can feel the following (recall your favourite melody; if nothing comes to your mind listen to this AirTel jingle):

It starts and a phrase is developed
It continues that way taking us to ecstasy
It starts a kind of coming back
It reaches home (we feel completion)

My curiosity was why this happens and what makes the mind enjoy the progression (the sequence in which those musical notes are played).

To proceed further with the discussion we need to understand a major concept in music called Tonal Interval.

Tonal Interval

Tonal interval is the “musical distance” between two notes on a keyboard. The tonal interval between any two adjacent notes is called a “semitone” or a “half step”. Similarly the distance between any note and the third from it is called a “whole tone”. For example the interval between the note C and C^# is a semitone or a half step. The interval between the note C and D is called a whole tone or a full step. This way you can enlist the distance between any two tones in the keyboard.

Try playing all two-note (one after the other) combinations. Start with two notes of one half step apart and then a full step and then one and half step and so on. While doing so give attention to how each pair sounds like and feels like. You would notice that certain combinations (or the transition) sounds better than another. Likewise certain combinations sound horrible or unstable.

Well, you just learned one of most important fundamentals of music. Now let us understand two aspects of tonal interval.

Consonance and Dissonance

The origin of the word Consonance is from the Latin word “consonare” which means simply “sounding together”. But in the theory of music this is used to refer a tonal interval that sounds stable, pleasant and completely at rest. The most familiar example to illustrate a consonant interval would be the “ding-dong” of door bells or wall clocks.

If you try to figure out the interval of the “ding-dong”, most likely the interval would be two whole steps (this interval is called major third and is used in all dual tone applications around us such as door bells, car horns, etc.). That means if you start with E (”ding”) and the note C (”dong”) which is two whole steps down makes the combination. Now if you play D^# (which is nearer to C by one half step) instead of E, you will note that it doesn’t sound as sweet. Repeat this experiment by reducing the interval by one half step each time. The pleasant sounding interval will become increasingly harsh as you proceed and you will hear the harshest when you play the “ding” just one half step away (i.e. C^#) from “dong”. This harshness is the opposite of Consonance and it is called Dissonance.

So the interval between any two notes in the twelve-tone system is identified to have a certain degree of consonance or dissonance. See the following table which describes the quality (degree of consonance or dissonance) of all possible tonal intervals in the twelve-tone system.

Please note that whether the consonance and dissonance effects of tonal intervals are absolute/universal or enculturated is a subject for debate. However here we just need to know that each tonal interval has an associated degree of consonance or dissonance to understand the concepts being discussed here.

Also note that the three-whole-step interval is neither a consonant or a dissonant. This interval is called diminished fifth. I have been told that diminished fifth (also known as devil’s interval) was banned in early church music because of its ambiguous nature. While playing this interval it does give a tensed and horrible feeling. This interval was first used in a song by Black Sabbath and then several bands after that.

This consonance and dissonance in varying degrees appear in a melody as it progresses. As we have seen earlier, our mind becomes restless when the melody proceeds to a dissonant interval and will feel peace when it enters a consonant interval. This sequential progression of consonant and dissonant intervals of varying degrees produces a sensation of movement through time. It is the combination of dissonance and consonance, tension and relaxation that defines this movement. This movement give a musical direction to the melody.

This is somewhat similar to what we feel when we read a novel. The thread of the story passes through tensed situations (dissonance) during which our mind becomes curious and long for a resolution (consonance) which we feel when we reach the phrase “they lived happily ever after.”

Now let us experience a simple progression to illustrate this. Try playing the following note sequence in keyboard.

(Press and hold each key for one second. Keys are numbered for easy understanding.)

C[1], D[2], E[3], E[3], D[2], C[1]

As we move from note to note, we feel respective intervals. An interval can either be dissonant or consonant. Here we can experience the following with the progression:

C: -
D: dissonant (tension)
E: very consonant (some what relaxed)
E: very consonant (some what relaxed)
D: very dissonant (climax)
C: pure consonance (resolution)

When we reach the last note C, we feel the that the melody came to a conclusion. Now let us see how we can make this simple melody a little more interesting. Try this sequence.

(Press and hold each key for one second. Keys are numbered for easy understanding.)

C[1], D[2], E[3], D[2], B[0], C[1]

(Notice that the note B is numbered zero because it comes before the note C)

You would agree that the this sequence sounds more enchanting than the previous one. This is because of the musical motion created by the sequence of tension and relaxation (dissonance and consonance) is more vivid in this sequence. Let us analyse it more carefully.

Have a look at the note sequences once more. Both the sequences give a feel of resolution by returning to the note C. But the second sequence is definitely sweeter than the first one. This is because, we simply postponed or delayed the resolution by playing the extra note B which intensified the drama, prolonging the mystery and sustaining the listeners attention! This is how sweet melodies are created.

It would be interesting to note that its is the interval between the notes is what creates music. Next time when you listen to a sweet melody remember that your mind is being tingled by those tonal intervals! And the background score in the movie is playing a dissonant interval when the villain shows up!

***

What we discussed here is the music in its simplest form. The songs and compositions we enjoy are more complex than simple melody. It contains harmony which brings in multitude of intervals at the same time. The effect of which is easier to feel than analysing it. But the fundamentals remain the same: tonal intervals, consonance, dissonance and the influence and the resulting feeling effected in our mind by a particular progression.

***
Bibliography

1. Pen, Ronald, Ph.D., Introduction to Music, 1992, McGraw-Hill Co. Singapore.
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interval_(music)
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consonance_and_dissonance
4. http://www.music-cog.ohio-state.edu/Music829B/notes.html

If someone asks my opinion about joining such a course, I discourage them, unless they know the fundamentals of Networking. And I suggest them to go through their text books once gain before they spend money on any such course. Many of them asks me to suggest a list of things they are supposed to know to start a career in computer Networking. This prompted me to prepare a list of articles entirely from the Web which will enable a fresh-out-of-college to gain knowledge and enable him to find an entry level job in computer Networking.

Here is the list I prepared. Go through it and I am sure that you can start a Networking career with confidence once you finish it. All the best.

***

o Start your journey here [compnetworking.about.com].
This is a very good tutorial with a very good breadth of coverage. This will help you understand basic concepts and to build a vocabulary on the subject.

o Learn Linux. Linux is your best friend in understanding what really happens behind the scenes. I would recommend you to use a distribution like Debian Linux and not the ones like Ubuntu. If you use a Linux distribution with well-designed GUI such as Ubuntu, you will take longer to understand what you are actually doing. Once you learn what’s is happening underneath, you can do the same on Windows and Ubuntu insightfully.

This page [www.debian.org] will help you get started with Debian Linux.

o Once you have learnt Linux, you start the real learning here [linux-ip.net]. Don’t get discouraged that this tutorial is too much Linux specific. You gotta learn some tools to learn hands-on Networking and I would say that Linux is the one of the best tools around. So go ahead and graduate in Linux Networking.

o Now you can move on to Windows. Windows too has got a bunch of useful command line tools. Start with them. This tutorial [commandwindows.com] will help you to get acquainted with those commands.

o Now you are familiar with basic Networking concepts, principles and tools. Now you can have a look at Windows Networking. I am sure that you will be able to look at the already-familiar mechanisms of Windows such as File Sharing and Firewalling with a deeper insight now. Read it here [compnetworking.about.com].

o Still most of the Network administrator jobs are in medium to large organisations running Microsoft Windows. I think now you have reached a position to design and implement a Windows Network. This Cisco Web page will help you to get started.

o Now, send me your résumé You will get to know IP Networking inside out at Linuxense.

PS: Let me know if this list of URLs helped you improve your knowledge. More importantly, if you come across a useful URL, please forward it for inclusion here so that others too will be benefited.

[Correction 2: Thenmala is around 10Km ahead from the KTDC restaurant we had lunch at. This restaurant is exactly opposite to the Palaruvi road in NH208]

We at Silver Bullets have been consistently riding on all one-day holidays for the last one year. The latest in the series was May 1. One-day rides normally covers a round-about distance of around 300Km.

In Kerala you can choose to ride along the coast lines (straight Highways and a deviation at any point towards the east will take you to some beach) or through the eastern sides of Kerala which are full of twisties and hills. Most of the time we choose to ride through the eastern side called Western Ghats. This ride was no exception.

By Wednesday we kind of finalised the route: Trivandrum, Ayur, Anchal, Punalur, Achancoil, Shenkottai and decided to choose the return route along the way depending on the road conditions and mood.

There were not many takers for this trip. SB Trivandrum members were unusually busy with work/family this time. There were just me, Sankar (cutcrank) and Bala. But we had a few guests this time: my buddy Binuraj (who originally suggested the route), then Gokul and Shahu (both from Linuxense). Binuraj rides a Honda Unicorn. Gokul rides a brand new TVS Apache RTR 160 (who is running-in the engine as per the MotoTune theory and the reason for participating in this ride) and Shahu was pillion riding.

We gathered at Paruthipara at around 6:00am. Weather was cool and crisp and luckily the unexpected downpour prevailed since last week has stopped just the day before. So we had a very nice morning and we hit the MC Road by 6:30. This time too I was the sweep and cutcrank was the obvious choice to be the lead.

Ayur, the first deviation, was around 50Km from Trivandrum and then another 10Km to Anchal. We reached Anchal by 7:30am. Binuraj is a native of Anchal and we waited for him to join us. By that time cutcrank took out his Canon EOS400D and started flashing. Here is one pic from that lot (which I clicked):

Our next destination was Punalur which is 12Km away from Anchal towards the East. We had a nice breakfast there and headed towards Achancoil. To those who are planning to venture this route: you need to take the Ranni route and take the road that goes to the right at around 4Km (the junction is called Alimukku). It’s very easy to miss this deviation; some of us did.

I used to accept hitchhike requests, when I’m riding, from locals if my luggage permits; especially from aged people. I kind of chat with them and get some geo/socio information from them. I found it interesting. This time too, I offered ride to an ammavan (uncle by age). But this time I was in a kind of trap.

As mentioned above, I missed the deviation at Alimukku. I was riding along the Ranni highway enjoying the scenery and the weather, one aged man in his 70s asked for a ride. I offered. As usual I started chatting with him and a few minutes later I explained where I’m heading. Then he realised that I’m a lost guy heading in a wrong direction! He said with exclamation that I lost my way. And the situation was more interesting because he was in trouble too: I either should get him back to the place where I picked him up or I should take him to the next point where he can get another ride (or catch a bus). I said to myself; well, I’m out here to ride and why not do a social service. And I decided to ride three more kilometres to the wrong direction and dropped him in a junction before I headed back.

That’s one of the good sides of motorcycling I enjoy. We can never do (or we don’t prefer to do) this if we are driving a car. With a motorcycle you are more free, more local and you can afford to show some random act of kindness.

***

Punalur Achancoil is the leg in which we leave civilisation and enter forest. Houses and grazing cattle begin to disappear and the green lush will get thicker. What you would notice while in a forest is the “deafening” silence. We stopped at several places to enjoy that and roamed around to get the feel of oxygen-rich unpolluted atmosphere.

Achancoil is a township in the midst of the forest and at the border of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. People speak Malayalam there. I think they can speak Tamil too. We approached a local corner shop in Achancoil hoping to get some drink. We were totally tired by then. Bala was prudent enough to stock a few bottles of water but the terrain combined with this riding style made them pop out and fell down along the way; leaving all of us thirsty and tired. We found pre-packed sambharam in the corner shop. But that guy discouraged saying that that was not good (it may be of low quality butter milk prepared for local people for a cheap price) and offered Soda-Naranga Vellam (Neembu paani). Surprisingly he has got a Mr. Butlers Sodamaker in his shop and he prepared enough glasses of drinks for us in no time. We were recharged and ready to proceed to Shenkottai.

Achancoil–Shenkottai is more scenic. It has some excellent twisties for those who enjoy it. cutcrank and Binuraj were racing through the twisties pushing their bikes to the limits. And we reached Shenkottai by around 1:30pm. Our next priority was to find an eatery.

Shenkottai seemed deserted. May be because it was May 1. And we found it strange that we could not locate any restaurant. To add to the difficulty, majority of the team voted for a non-veg (read “mutton”) meal. So we checked with the locals for any “non-vegetarian” restaurants around. They said “yes” and pointed us to some direction. But, surprisingly, each time we landed in front of a vegetarian restaurant! Then we found out a small bug in our communication: the “non” in “non-vegetarian” was not understood by the locals and so it was ignored!

Gradually we realised that we were not going to get non-veg food in Shenkottai. The weather was gruelling; the temperature must be above 35 though humidity felt to be lower than that of Trivandrum. We decided to have some soft drink and head back to the Kerala border.

For our return trip we decided to take the Ariankavu, Thenmala, Madathara, Nedumangadu, Trivandrum route. NH208 takes us from Shenkottai till Thenmala. NH was excellent till we cross the Kerala border. After Ariankavu it was totally broken. It was an acid test for the shocks and an endurance test for our body. At Thenmala we stopped at the KTDC restaurant for lunch (finally we found a place!).

But disappointing some of the ardent mutton fans in our team, they had only chicken in stock. But [luckly] our folks lost their ability to distinguish mutton from nicely prepared chicken. So they didn’t make much noise this time. We enjoyed homely meal there, took a 20-minute rest and we were ready for the last leg.

***

It was around 3:30pm when we started from Thenmala. There were around 80Km lying ahead to reach Trivandrum. We decided that there won’t be any scheduled stops hereafter and we would stop only on as-needed basis.

Kallada dam is located in Thenmala and it was visible from the road we took. We can ride over the dam. There weren’t much tourists there when we reached that spot. So we decided to have a stopover and take some snaps. Here are some: . Bala riding down the dam:

Binuraj said goodbye at Kulathupuzha (5Km down from Thenmala) and deviated to Anchal. From Kulathupuzha to Trivandrum, were almost solo riding. cutcrank and Gokul were riding ahead with considerable lead, followed by Bala and me.

We were safely back home by around 6pm covering around 300Km. Rough roads and lack of physical activities these days made us tired and caused some body aches here and there. But we were totally charged. I found a great way to fight the hang over: plan the next trip! Yeah, we are going to ride through Munnar soon!!!

–
1. cutcrank’s Picasa album.

2. Binuraj’s Picasa album.

Once upon a time, the government had a vast scrap yard in the middle of a desert. Parliament said, “Someone may steal from it at night.”

So they created a night watchman position and hired a person for the job. Then Parliament said, “How does the watchman do his job without instructions?” So they created a planning department and hired two people, one person to write the instructions, and one person to do time studies.

Then Parliament said, “How will we know the night watchman is doing the tasks correctly?” So they created a Quality Control department and hired two people. One to do the studies and one to write the reports.

Then Parliament said, “How are these people going to get paid?” So they created the following positions, a time keeper, and a payroll officer, then hired two people.

Then Parliament said, “Who will be accountable for all of these people?” So they created an administrative section and hired three people, an Administrative Officer, Assistant Administrative Officer, and a Legal Secretary.

Then Parliament said, “We have had this command in operation for one year and we are $18,000 over budget, we must cutback overall cost.”

So they laid off the night watchman.

America never had good breakfast. So they invented items like cereals. In India, there are plenty of options right from idly and dosa to puri and nan. Many of them are centuries old and simple. Besides these known items, each locality has its own dishes. You will notice it if you travel across India especially by road. You will notice differences even within a state–each locality has its own distinctive food culture. Compare this to the globalised food culture.

One attribute of globalisation is to make everything uniform across the globe. If you go to any McDonald’s in the world you will see the ordering counter in the same red and yellow which offers more or less the same menu. There is nothing wrong in that per se. But the inrush of such eateries are killing the traditional ones.

In Kerala, the chaya (tea) is made in a very special way and it requires skill to make it taste like that. Nowadays it is increasingly difficult to get Kerala tea in urban shops. You will either get tea from a vending machine or a “global tea” item from chains. Fresh lemon juice is another traditional drink in India and especially in South India. Now it is difficult to find a shop which will make you a fresh lime. Instead he will offer a ready-made lemon-tasting drink.

Not many people in this generation are bothered to learn cooking. And I’m afraid that it would be difficult to get some puttu, payaru, pappadam after a decade or so unless you or your spouse learn to prepare it.

I tell my friends to visit local eateries if they enjoy local food and help them sustain.

Local food vendors too need to do certain things from their side. They should make eateries look clean and tidy. A friendly dealing would be cool. These are some of the feel-good things everybody enjoys in a global eatery and the same can be provided at a traditional eatery as well (without incurring any additional expense!).

Here is a small list of eateries in and around Trivandrum and on the highway where you can enjoy local food:

1. Ramu’s, Gandhari Amman Coil road (near Pulimood), Trivandrum.
2. Buhari, East Fort, Trivandrum.
3. The no-name place opposite to Kazhakootam Police Station, Trivandrum.
4. The mutton joint near Vettu Road, NH47 (where you turn in to Sainik School), Trivandrum.
5. Brothers’, Alappuzha
6. Lekshmi, Cherthala (NH47).

There are numerous tea shops around the corner. Though not all of them offer full meals, still it is enjoyable to have a quick tea and snack there.

I would request my readers to write about the places they know in the comment column.

–
References:

1. Harmful to local/conventional culture, threat of one-culture world.

2. Our children don’t learn anything from their mothers. The aroma of food is missing from our kitchen and above all, our kids don’t converge on the dining table.

3. Coca Cola find its biggest “competition”: indigenous drinks (such as tea and nimbu paani).

Suddenly a motorcycle entered the intersection from my left side. Though it was real quick, I wasn’t surprised as there was ample room for him to pass me. But what surprised me that, he rode straight to me and hit my car head on and fell down!

Heck! Was he mad? Did he try to commit suicide or something? What has just happened here?

***

There is a phenomenon called “Target Fixation.” It helps you most of the time when you drive/ride any kind of vehicle. But it if you don’t know how it works, it can hurt you; just like what happened above. Read on.

Wikipedea defines Target Fixation as:

Target fixation is a process by which the brain is focused so intently on an observed object that awareness of other obstacles or hazards can diminish. Also, in an avoidance scenario, the observer can become so fixated on the target that the observer will end up colliding with the object.

In practice, while riding a motorcycle if you find something on the way and if you panic, you forget about the rest and fix your mind on that object. Once you does this, your body steers the motorcycle (or any vehicle for that matter) straight to the object. There is no law of Physics governing this; it’s a plain and simple psychological phenomenon.

I am sure that you have noticed Target Fixation in action while trying you avoid a pothole or an oil patch in the road. If you fixate it, you will run over that object for sure.

This explains what has happened the other day at the University campus. I hope that that rider will read this post some day
and drop me an email.

Now you know what Target Fixation is. You can use it positively, indeed. Simply take your eyes away from the object which you want to avoid and look at the direction you want to take (in order to avoid that object). This helps you especially when you handle a skidding or when a dog or pedestrian runs across your way, unexpectedly.

This is easier said that done; especially when you are scared (yet another psychological phenomenon which makes you take wrong decisions most of the time). It needs conscious effort in most cases. Then it will become natural to you (through practice).

Once you know the existence of such a danger, you can learn more about it. Learn how to reduce its influence and to utilise it positively.

Safe riding.

PS: Today happened to be the first anniversary of my first real motorcycle accident. It is an interesting coincidence that I wrote something on motorcycle safety on the same day.

Refreshing basics is a good idea–in any domain. However experienced you are. I found “Entrepreneurship 101: How to Turn Your Idea into a Money Machine” states the basics of entrepreneurship very clearly; covers almost all points.

It starts with the spirit of entrepreneurship. It strongly states the fact several entrepreneurs learned with their lives:

“You can’t do it alone. Building a world-class team is the only way to big success”.

It tries to define an entrepreneur in a very interesting and convincing way. I liked that section very much; I’m sure it’s gonna be a whack on the head for many.

Gordon explains the difference between an idea and an opportunity. Many think they are same. He explains the differences and provides means to find out whether an idea is an opportunity or not.

Gordon’s list of “Essential Entrepreneurial Power Skills” is a great one. I liked a practical tip called “Power of Zero” on how to step up your inflow in a phased manner. He defines phases of business which many entrepreneurs forget to track in their day-to-day rush.

Then he talks about how ideas can make or break you. The need of selecting and examining ideas which best suit you and your skills; very important I should say. An idea which is good by itself may not be good for you. He emphasis the need of finding the fit between you and your idea.

Business design is something all entrepreneurs take for granted. They go with “as soon as it makes money, it’s fine” approach. Gorden goes a level deeper and talks about designing your money machine very objectively. I liked that. It’s more scientific and rational. Again nothing new in this but a good refresher.

Once you have identified your idea the next thing you need to define is your competition. “Good” and “bad” industries are identified with this. Consider all aspects while doing this: competing products and substitutes, bargaining power of suppliers, bargaining power of customers, etc., etc.. He says “it’s a jungle”.

There is a chapter on “Raising Money” which will be a handy one for all new entrepreneurs. Gordon explains what are the options available to raise money with pros and cons of each equipping you to take a decision of your own.

I’m not from a business family. But I wanted to do business ever since I started thinking about my career and life. But I was often worried about the fact that mine is not a “business blood”. But later on I started realising that an inherent desire is enough to become an entrepreneur. This book underlines that. Gordon clearly states that entrepreneurship can be learned just like any other skill. That’s true. The question is whether you want to be entrepreneur.

The author talks about the importance of finding the lacking skills in you as an entrepreneur. This is a much-ignored element especially with self-funded entrepreneurs (who usually manages everything by themselves and “be his own boss” in literal sense) and can severely affect the growth of business.

This book referres many excellent entrepreneurial and business books. Most of them are must-reads. Read them too if you haven’t already. Entrepreneurship 101 is very informative and inspirational (an unusual combination) and includes a pep talk section at the end of each chapter.

What this book doesn’t cover are day-today running and operational matters of your business. That subject is in a domain of its own. So I would recommend reading Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done along with this book, if you want to have more comprehensive coverage on entrepreneurship. Another element missing in this book is the human resource part.

What the author talks about web sites and other IT related subjects lacks up-to-date knowledge. For example, he talks about the importance of meta tags in web pages to get it listed in search engines. The days of meta tags with respect to search engines are gone. Now you need to look at SEO techniques.

Conclusion

If you are a wannabe-entrepreneur this book is a must-read for you. If you already wet your feet, read this book twice over (you might need to unlearn something).

I would rate this book 4/5.

It doesn’t make any difference whether you are a giant MNC or a garage start-up and it doesn’t make any difference either even if your client is overwhelmed with your service/product. They will have an accounts department which functions in isolation and its sole duty seems to deliver enough verbiage and delay your payment.

Ever since I started doing business I have been seeing this pattern. I had discussed this with other business people and accountant/finance people whom I met on non-business occasions. They all secretly agree that delaying payment is considered to be “a revenue” and is a standard practice. So better be prepared for that.

It doesn’t matter where in the value chain your position is. Or whether you are in B2B or in B2C business (I know one private utility company with INR 3cr. (30 million) outstanding to be collected from its end-customers). Outstanding debt in B2C business is a global story though.

Further to my research I found out that everyone in the business chain is practicing it! So that means none is benefited out of it, isn’t so? I think so. So why can’t we decide to be principled to release the money we owe to other businesses and clean up the entire chain?

A Few Notes for Start-Ups

You gotta learn to live with this unfair practice or you die. See the following notes; they will save your business.

Take control of your cash flow: That is the life blood of your business however big or small your business is. Having everything right, the only thing which can upset your cash flow is the unexpected delay in collecting your money from your clients. So leave room for that. Check out with your peers in the business about the payment norms in your sector (it is there in very sector; only difference is “how long”). Make sure that you do not expect an inflow too ahead of it actually reaches you.

Plan only after money reaches your account: This is an extreme defense you can adopt. Do not spend before you get the money in hand. But this can slow down things a little bit. So practice a safe balance.

Plan as if delayed payment is the norm: For all your long term plans which are based on your business inflow, plan as if delayed payment is the industry norm. I have seen a business with a healthy turnover of INR 2cr (20 million) and with a strength as low as 10 crumbles just because of delayed payments.

Do not spoil relationships: Collecting money is a tough thing. They will make you feel like you are in their house to ask a favor! Be prepared as they will have stories to counter your arguments. Such situations are emotionally demanding. You whim and yell and shout; but make sure that it won’t cost your relationship. The world is so small; a spoiled relationship can cost your business–not just with them but in the entire sector depending on the influence of the people you are dealing with.

You made a sale? Do not relax. The real job starts after you deliver. Do not forget this.

Players in India

All those companies who extended a piece of wire (”last mile” connectivity) to homes can be a potential provider of IPTV service in its broadest sense. So your cable provider, wired/land phone service provider or even the state electricity board can enter into IPTV business.

Telecom companies such as Reliance which doesn’t have last mile connectivity to homes are fast lying fiber connections to homes these days. They are preparing for the IPTV market.

Actually these companies are looking at a broader spectrum of services called “Triple Play” (combining voice, data and video) or even “Quadruple Play” (where wireless communications is introduced as yet another media to deliver video). This way one provider can cater all communication needs of a home all by themselves (and get all possible revenues).

In India, predominantly land phone service companies (BSNL/MTNL, Reliance, etc.) and cable service providers (Hathway, Asianet, Sify, etc.) are the potential players. MTNL in Pune and BSNL in Calcutta have already launched IPTV services on experimental basis. Reliance, with their newly laid FTTP (Fiber to the Premises), seems to be ready to follow.

What IPTV Provides

With IPTV, subscribers can expect to get what they are currently getting with their normal cable TV/CAS system. In addition to that it can provide Video on Demand (VOD). Those who subscribe to Triple Play providers can enjoy broadband and VoIP as well–all through just one connection and one IP device. All from a single provider.

Which Player has the Advantage?

BSNL is far ahead of the rest in terms of number of homes and coverage/geographical area. But coper pair has its own limitation in terms of the bandwidth it can carry.

One channel at SDTV resolution will take up to 1.4 mbps with fairly good compression. Simultaneous delivery of channels is necessary to keep user demands. For example, this is required if a subscriber is using a DVR which can record one channel while another channel is being viewed on the TV. Sometimes subscriber might prefer to use picture-in-picture which, again, needs multiple channels to be delivered simultaneously.

BSNL employs ADSL. ADSL can carry 2mbps which is too inadequate to support this. I’m not sure what technology they are using at Pune and Calcutta. One technology I can think of is ADSL2+ which can deliver up to 25mbps. But this bandwidth reduces substantially as the subscriber distance increases from the DSLAM.

Cable providers has an advantage here. HFC, theoretically, can carry up to 4.5gbps of data. It is a lot more than required to deliver multiple channels simultaneously even at HDTV resolution. So cable operators has a an edge over BSNL which uses coper as last mile.

Who Can Ride the Wave

Though people are waiting for the rollout of the service to sign up, business viability of IPTV service is yet to be proved. But if people receive it, IPTV can be a lucrative business. (It is possible to build several business models based on the viewer demography information IPTV system can provide. No such thing is possible with conventional cable.)

Those operators with HFC has the advantage of bandwidth capability. But HFC installations which are originally laid for analogue cable TV may fail to carry digital signals without quality degradation. Reliance with FTTP closely follows the above lot. Though their home count is less compared to that of cable TV operators, Reliance can provide better quality service due to obvious reasons.

Local cable operators are another category who can enter into this business. And thus they can move higher up in the value chain. Local cable operators can provide more localised content. They can stream targeted ads. But one thing which may prevent them from doing so; entry barrier of IPTV business.

High entry cost of IPTV business is constituted by IPTV/networking equipment costs and media rights. But local cable operators can buy media rights jointly. Equipment costs will continue to remain as a real entry barrier.

One good thing that can happen is the commoditisation of IPTV equipments including CMTS. If chip manufacturers can come up with solutions which are based on PC architecture, for example, rather than using specialised electronics (which drive up cost), this would become possible.

TRAI may consider unbundling BSNL’s last mile in future. If this happens local players can lease BSNL lines to run their business on.

Let’s wait and see.

Roughly, one in every two people who searches the Internet uses Google and Google handles more than 200 million searches every day.

When you run a search in Google for the first time in your browser, Google will set a Cookie with a unique ID in your browser. There after, Google knows that all the searches you are running are coming from “you” and presumably they keep record of them all.

So, based on the searches you run on Google, they can build a “picture” about you–what you want, what you do, what’s bothering you, your interests, hobbies, and probably what are you planning to do this weekend. May be, after God (”Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of Him to whom we must give account” –Hebrews 4:13), Google knows you best. Now closest friend of man is not his wife or even a human being any more; it is Google (or Internet search engines in general). People share the most private thoughts with Google.

This is harmless till they link that “picture” with the real you. That happened with the introduction of Gmail. You might have noticed that even if you type gmail.com, you login to mail.google.com. The moment you successfully log in, they can associate the above-mentioned Cookie with your Email ID.

An Email ID in Gmail is not like yet another ID in Hotmail or Yahoo. Each Email ID has the “genealogy” information attached to it. Each Gmail ID is created out of an invite sent out by an existing Gmail ID. So it is almost impossible to disguise yourself before Google. Besides knowing who you are, Google also knows whom you are related to. For example Google knows that you are Ram, husband of Meena and friend of John.

Google even knows what you do out side Google to a certain extent. For example when you sign up for a new third-party service (with your Gmail ID), Google knows that you did so. They even keep track of the links you click in Emails and chat texts.

They are the best in the world for text parsing and analysing. And if we closely examine we can see that that makes the core of all their technologies. Google can even analyse your chat live. So think twice next time you chat with your friend on Google to discuss a new business idea or when you use Google Documents to type a new business plan. The point is that Google is a privacy bomb which can blow up any time either though a security breach or by the data mining bureaucrats of Washington.

Google, after handling trillions of queries from around the world by now, might have an interesting picture about the people in this world, I’m sure. Nobody has ever got a chance to see the world at such a macro level yet.