I had a very disturbing vision last night. In a deep reverie between consciousness and sleep I was abruptly transported into the cavernous interiors of the latest largest mall in town, Dubai Mall, which I recently visited. There on the obscene Olympic-size ice rink, bathed in the shifting neon glow of the giant LED screen looming over it, I saw a stampede of teenagers gathered. They were the cool kind of teenager, with their hair spiked just so, and their ill fitting jeans draped around their over-sized sports shoes just so. A murmur filled the air, and when I pushed through the uniform horde to listen in to what they were talking about, I was shocked.

Perfunctory social talk is absolute evil. In mindlessness, it is second only to reality television, and that too not by a large margin. In most times there are standard phrases and sentences that most people exchange to make conversation without having anything to say — a passing comment on the weather, a sufficiently troubled statement about the state of traffic on the roads, a generalised remark about a common acquaintance. In most times, however, these fragmentary verbal rituals are limited to a specific groups of people with something in common. Not any more.

You will be pleased to know that the romantic notion of people coming together in a crisis is true. The ongoing world financial crisis has brought together one and all across every geographical, cultural, racial, and sexual divide, in their collective inanity, to say in chorus as a universal panacea to aimless conversations: “Considering the current economic climate …” And there they stop, for to venture any further would be to reveal the lack of any point to the statement. What does that phrase mean really? Does it mean the economic situation is bad? Slow? Passable? Disastrous? Couldn’t you have said “Considering the current economic climate …”, with a dramatic pause to follow, just as effectively at the height of the Dot Com madness of the 1990’s?

Maybe it’s not too much of a mystery as to why the world is going through a recession. It is because of our collective culture of pretence. We need to pretend to be so much more than we are, to have so much more than we have, both in the realms of financial and mental resources. It would be remiss for any modern educated capitalistic citizen of the planet to suggest to the horde that they work to grow either asset. No, why grow when you can borrow? And so it comes to pass that paupers live like kings, and the ignorant parade around their social circles wowing their equally ignorant audience with tantalizing promises of borrowed wisdom such as, “Considering the current economic climate …”. Eventually, of course, the Emperor’s lack of clothing will be pointed out, and thus the advanced consumerist culture we have orchestrated stands today: obese, imbecilic, and stark naked in the winter breeze.

I have come across more than a few articles in recent publications that begin with the masterpiece of a phrase in question, and needless to say, conversations overheard in places both public and private have followed suit. My output on this site has been a bit sparse lately, mainly because I was out of town on a holiday, busy with paper work to do with business, and various other distractions. But why complicate explanations? Let me join my planetary brethren in their collective wisdom to simply say: I could have kept up with my writing, and been more regular on this blog, but considering the current economic climate …

Samir

ShareThis

Indians are festival gluttons. That’s not to imply that we all eat too much during festivals (only most of us do, not ALL of us), but rather that we have more commonly celebrated festivals that you can shake a large decorated Christmas tree at. Speaking of Christmas, the Indian equivalent in the realm of noise, public participation, and pornographic commercialisation would have to be Deepawali or Diwali (as it is more commonly referred to in the north of the country). That is what we celebrate today.

Now, as is customary for any writer or speaker introducing the topic of Deepawali to a general audience, I am obliged to incessantly repeat what the festival is about and regale you with a few canned phrases that will enlighten you about the significance of something distilled down from a few thousand years of history and culture. But wait, I needn’t bother because the honorable President, Vice President, Prime Minister, Shadow Prime Minister *cough* big cheese of the ruling party, and probably a miscellaneous collection of other political types have been so kind as to release statements meant for the Indian public that repeatedly tell us what that festival we all seem to be so compelled to celebrate is all about … in one or two redundant sentences. The generally agreed version seems to be that it celebrates the victory of light over darkness, which in turn symbolises the victory of good over evil. Yes, I know. It’s deep. I’m so glad the leaders of our country think it important to educate us on these matters so repeatedly. I am very much expecting to find a multiple choice question about the significance of Diwali on the ballot papers during the next election. After all, how can we be truly Indian without fretting over irrelevant exams?

Speaking of North India, aka Macho Land, they wouldn’t dream of basing their main festival on the victory of some vengeful superhuman woman over miscellaneous evil guy, so they insist it is the very day that Ram, of Ramayana fame, returned to Ayodhya after his many adventures and misadventures in the wild South. On the television news today I was informed that it all started when the people of Ayodhya lit up the city to welcome home their returning king and to celebrate his victory over the Demon King Ravana. I love it when people make unfortunate translations such as this one and eventually come to believe it themselves.

In the original Indian mythos, life exists in three realms (whether physical or spiritual is up to each person to decipher). Swarga (often translated as Heaven but not really) is the home of a race of super human beings called the Devas (often translated as Gods but not quite), Patala (often translated as Hell but not even close) is the home of the equally super human Asuras (often translated as Demons but not exactly), and Bhoomi (the Earth) is home to both human beings and all manner of other beings included the Rakshasas (also confusingly translated as Demons) who are actually meant to be nature spirits who inhabit the forests and the wilds. You can see the influence of Christian thought here, which made the Devil out of the playful Pan, but for Indians themselves to now consider the Rakshasa King Ravana as a “demon” while celebrating our wonderfully ancient culture (which we know nothing about) is truly sad and hilarious.

To confuse matters between Ram, Ravana, Krishna, Kali, Narkasura et. al., the second day of Diwali is also celebrated as Laxmi Pooja. For those who don’t know, a pooja is a ritual, usually directed at a particular deity. The Goddess Laxmi (pronounced Laksh-me) is the Goddess of wealth. Unfortunately, in our modern “enlightened” times, she has been reduced to the Goddess of riches, a major demotion from wealth, which signified so much more. On the day of Laxmi Pooja, people quite literally pray to and for money. The hardcore followers of the practice go so far as to not make any major purchases on the day, and hence keep the money from symbolically flowing away. Fortunately for the free market economy, they make up for this day of token level-headedness by going on a buying binge on all the days preceding it. Like Eid for the Muslims, or Christmas for the Christians, and Xmas for the cool folk, Diwali is an excuse for the urban Hindu to dig into their collection of fine vintage credit cards and live a life of blind consumption. And then there are the noisy fireworks that I am assured are “tradition” (that warrants a separate discussion).

This is the reality of Deepawali through most of the modern Indian world today. But, I have never considered myself a pessimist. Some where deep down in the dark recesses of the buying public there still exists some kernel of light. For what more do we need Deepawali to celebrate than light itself. We can marvel at the myths and revere the legends all we want, that is a healthy thing as long as we go beyond the fast food versions of the tales. But, do we really need Diwali to mean anything more than a few days in the year when we make night into day with our oil lamps and decorative kandeels(lanterns), our strings of cheap Chinese lights and faux LED oil lamps, and pay homage to the divine photon? It brings light into our lives, life into our universe, and beautiful sunrises over our horizons.

Happy Deepawali

Samir

ShareThis

This is a slightly self serving edition of Fresh Finds, but then this site is called SamirBharadwaj.com, so what the hell. Online social networking is the new porn. It’s official. I’ve never been an early adopter of this stuff, because random online socialising has never been my forte. But, I do see the benefits of some of these social network sites and I’m trying my hand at it..

• At long last I succumbed to StumbleUpon
  I’ve always found StumbleUpon to be the most homely of all the social-bookmarking-Web2.0 coolness that is out there and forever growing. For one, the people involved actually seem to care for what they’re promoting, and there’s a healthy dose of community involved in the best parts of the network. I signed up, and after plenty of procrastinating I’ve also started participating occasionally.

  While I often post themed sets of links in my Fresh Finds posts, StumbleUpon is a good way for me to tag and keep track of random stuff, and more one-off finds. There’s plenty of photography related material there, which seems to be quite popular on the site, and that fits in perfectly with my tastes.

  So, head on over to my StumbleUpon page, browse around, add me as a friend if you like, and I hope you find plenty to keep you busy.

• That XING Thing
  Professional networking through one of the handfull of online business social networks has intrigued me for a while now, because here is finally some purpose to the whole party. I actually got into Xing after someone contacted me through this site to use one of my comics. That’s how I signed up and I’ve had a account there for a while.

  I find the focused nature of this sort of network quite interesting. Sure, it has some of the random banter and incessant “friend” adding that comes with the territory, but at least most people connect here for common interests that go beyond the purely social. I’m not saying it is better, just different, and if you are at all interested in building contacts in your own field and others, it can be a useful resource.

  You can see my Xing profile to get an idea of how it works. The inclusion of “wants” and “haves” into the profile data is a clever one. It immediately adds purpose and common ground into the mix, something a many social network services lack.

• Shut Your Face!
  And then there’s Facebook. It is the most popular network of them all at the moment. I take that with a pinch of salt because there have been different “most popular networks” every few years ever since the birth of the internet. I do have an account there, but do I think it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread? No, not really.

  Facebook has to be the best example of a perfectly efficient machine that is almost perfectly ineffective. Of course, it is popular, and millions of people join, and I’m sure plenty of commerce takes place over it, but in the great cosmic balancesheet, the end result of somthing like Facebook will always be zero. It is what has unfortunately become the norm in internet social networks, to be self feeding, viral and completely incestual in focus.

  The reason people do anything on Facebook is purely so that they can be seen as being socially relevant on Facebook, by other socially relevant people on Facebook, for greater social relevance on Facebook! It’s a guinea pig on a running wheel.

  Could something like this be a positive force? Of course it could, but I don’t see it here. If anyone can explain to me what the greater purpose of this thing is besides a way to waste time when you are bored, or convince me that it really is more important than the discovery of electricity, feel free to go over to my Facebook profile and give me a good lecture on my wall while simultaneously hugging me, poking me, and paying to give me tiny pictures called “gifts”. Yikes! It really is the future!

Samir

ShareThis

Yet another hijinks-laden Anees Bazmee movie splashes onto cinema screens. But this seems to be the big one. Singh is King, oh sorry, Singh is Kinng … or is it Sinngh is King? Singh is Kinng is the next big Akshay Kumar movie. There, that should be enough of a review. I predict that the readership has immeditely split into those that hate Akhay Kumar’s guts, will never see any of his movies and say it is horrible anyway, and those who will go and see it no matter what and won’t care that it’s horrible. It’s Akshay Kumar. He needs to be watched on the big screen and that’s all there is to it. But if that’s not enough for you, the film also stars the talents of Katrina Kaif, Om Puri, Kiron Kher, Ranvir Shorey, Javed Jaffrey, Neha Dhupia, Yashpal Sharma, Manoj Pahwa, Kamal Chopra, Sudhanshu Pandey, and Sonu Sood. If there is still anyone sitting on the fence about this, and you’re impatient, let me just say that Singh is Kinng is stupid, badly made, and a LOT of fun.

It is interesting to be writing this review so soon after I put up a the review for Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na. There is a certain strange contrast between these two movies. While Jaane Tu was a completely stereotypical plot done exceptionally well, Singh is Kinng is an exceptionally original and interesting plot done terribly! In spite of that, I enjoyed watching both of them.

The plot involves Happy Singh (Akshay Kumar), a well meaning but bumbling villager who has made a nuisance of himself by trying to help people in his own dysfunctional way. The villagers, instigated by his long suffering friend Rangeela (Om Puri), decide to send him off to Australia to bring back a friend to see his old and ailing parents. A minor inconvenience is that this friend, Lucky Singh (Sonu Sood), has since leaving the village become the King of the underworld and is unlikely to come easily. The villagers think that should be a sufficiently herculean task to keep Happy out of their hair for a long time. Happy gladly takes up the challenge, never being able to stop himself from helping people, and Rangeela is roped into the trip in spite of himself. This is quite a brilliant premise, and one of this movies greatest assets.

Anees Bazmee once made Deewanagee, which while a complete rip-off from multiple sources, showed that he does have talent as a director. Unfortunately, he is more popular for having made No Entry and Welcome, which just goes to prove that talent isn’t everything. Singh is King follows the same manic disorganization of those two disastrous movies — they were disasterous in content but were hits with the viewership — only in this case the fact that there is some actual interest in the story makes it endearing.

The music by Pritam and RDB is painful and Punjabi. Granted a lot of Punjabi music is painful, but I’ll be the first to admit that it need not always be true (Rang De Basanti has a good example). In this case, it is. And if you think the music is deafeningly bad, I would suggest keeping your eyes shut during most of the song sequences — save yourself the inevitable headaches, the motion sickness, and possible epileptic episodes. Having said that, the song sequence shot in Egypt has some exquisite camera work that is very well worth keeping your eyes open for.

In the acting department, Akshay Kumar is brilliant and large as always. Then, in the second half of the movie, he seems to take a vacation at our expense, only to reappear in time for the climax. Katrina Kaif starts early and takes a vacation from the very beginning of this enterprise. I know this isn’t surprising for female roles in Hindi cinema, but this role is truly vacuous, irrelevant, and non-existent. Katrina Kaif has shown promise in some of here previous work. Here she isn’t seen enough to show anything, and her entire script booklet appears to have been the words “Happy” and “Criminal!” copied and pasted over and over again in random sequences by the writers, because that about sums up her dialoge throughout this film.

The supporting cast has a bit too much supporting to do in this movie. Remember all those complaints you hear about the supporting cast not being given enough scope to act in big star vehicles? Well, congratulations! In Singh is Kinng the supporting cast gets so much screen time that the protagonists are nowhere to be seen through large chunks of their own story. All the gangster sardars are entertaningly played by a vetaran bunch of actors, and once again Neha Dhupia does a wonderful job as the dumb chick. It’s a shame that she seems to be relegated to do these throw-away roles because she is obviously capable of so much more. In keeping with the chaotic nature of things Javed Jaffery plays yet another caricature in addition to one completely unrelated character for no logical reason.

Before you think this is a negative tirade against the movie, let me clarify that Singh is Kinng is an Akshay Kumar movie that is over the top, completely disorganised, execeptionally ridiculous, and very entertaining. Besides Akshay Kumar’s brilliant screen presence, it is the story that is the real star here. It’s like Bill Gates trying to dance in a musical. You know he’s going to suck at the execution, but you give him a little leeway for being such a brilliant guy, and because you can’t stop laughing your head off. The same can be said for Sing is Kinng.

Samir

ShareThis

Abbas Tyrewala makes his directorial debut with an Aamir Khan production. Not a bad way to start. Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na is a typical college-romance-drama-comedy with Imran Khan giving his debut performance. The movie also stars Genelia D’Souza, Prateik Babbar, Manjari Fadnis, Sugandha Garg, Karan Makhija, Alishka Varde, Nirav Mehta et. al. The most important question always is, “Is it a good movie to watch?” To end the suspense, yes, it is. Abbar Tyrewala’s first baby makes for a very entertaining couple of hours, but the best way to describe Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na would be well executed.

When I said typical college romance, I might not have emphasised enough just how typical this movie is. Boy and girl are the best of friends. Everyone else thinks they are romantically involved, except them. They start seeing other people to get people off their backs, until they finally realise their love for each other before the curtains fall. Classic Hindi film story. In fact, classic romantic plot in any language. So why should we bother with this, the Nth version of the boy meets girl genre? Because it’s so well done.

The Hindi film industry has been going through a rough patch in recent times. The movies have been tired, boring, and confused. Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na is a welcome bit of respite which returns to the basics and does them remarkably. This continues, what is now, a trend with anything tackled by Aamir Khan Productions, starting with Lagaan. In addition to introducing his nephew with style, Aamir Khan once again pulls of a great piece of execution on a movie project. We have come to expect no less.

Abbas Tyrewala comes with a certain amount of pedigree of his own. In the past he has written the dialogue for such wonders as Asoka, Munna Bhai M.B.B.S., and Main Hoon Na. Unfortunately, he also has writing credits for such immense blunders as Darna Mana Hai and Shikhar. While I wouldn’t quite equate Jaane Tu Jaane Na with his best work, I’m happy to report it is immensely distant from his worst. As a director he obviously has potential, because what is a tired premise is given new life in this movie. One aspect in which it succeeds admirably is in creating and maintaining a certain internally consistent atmosphere, and you can’t discount the contribution of the director in that achievement.

The performances too are well done, but in a typical sort of way. Like the plot, most of the characters are stereotypes, and the movie revels in it. Genelia plays the strong-headed girl with a certain comfort. The rest of the gang consisting of Karan Makhija, Alishka Varde, Sugandha Garg, Manjari Fadnis, and Nirav Mehta are expectedly two dimensional and entertaining. Ratna Pathak is effortless as the protagonist’s Mother, and Paresh Rawal could probably play Inspector P.K. Waghmare in his sleep. Prateik Babbar shows promise in his limited role as the female lead’s moody brother. Renuka Kunzru is a revelation as the excuse for the frame tale around which the story is set. Her reactions, dialogue delivery and timing put many of the other cast to shame, and it is unfortunate that she is more of a plot device in this piece rather than a significant character.

A lot of appreciation is due to the new kid on the block, Imran Khan. He plays his role with sincerity, a very rare quality in the world of Hindi films. He doesn’t try to play the hero but rather a human being, and my hat is off to him for choosing such a pacifist nice guy as his debut role. I do wish he continues to choose similarly thoughtful and considered roles, rather than jumping onto the Punjabi stud bandwagon. There are the beginnings of an excellent actor in him.

What might be one of the most popular things about this movie is in my book one of its most dire failures. The music by A.R. Rahman is immensely forgettable, and I don’t care what the record sales say. Also, it would help if some of the singers used here could actually sing. It might come as news to the music creators, but digital distorts and pitch correction do not fool everyone all the time.

In spite of its shortcomings, Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na is a sweet movie. It means well, it accepts its own limitations, and does everything by the book. Having said that, what lifts it well above mediocrity is that it takes that a bit further and throws the book at you. Strange dramatic situations that are obviously contrived, ridiculous reversals, and over-the-top climaxes, it’s all there. Either Abbas Tyrewala seriously believes in this stuff, or he is simply a huge fan of the innocent stupidity of this genre and wishes to celebrate it. I don’t really care which it is. What matters is that he has given us a very entertaining Hindi movie which I know I will watch again in the future.

Samir

ShareThis

Trying out direct advertising has always been on the cards, but I’ve never gotten around to it. One of main stumbling blocks with blog ads is the fact that, unlike contextual advertising like AdSense, you need to do all the hard work of finding the advertisers and getting them to pay your asking price for a lucrative spot on your (hopefully) much viewed sidebar — or where ever else you wish to stick those ads. That’s where ad networks often come in, and for those of us wanting to try our hand at banner advertising on our blogs and web sites, PerfomancingAds might have just come to our rescue.

What is PerfomancingAds?

PerformancingAds is an ad network, displaying ads in the now popular 125×125 pixel format. You sign up for an account, add your site as a possible advertising platform, set a price per week and the number of ads available, and people can then pay to have their ad displayed on your site. An elegant solution to a usually cumbersome process. You the publisher get 60% of the price and PerformancingAds keeps 40% as their service charge.

Whose idea is PerfomancingAds?

PerformancingAds is brought to us by Performancing.com, a well respected site for all things web and geek. I myself have benefitted with a decent amount of traffic when some of my articles on this site have been mentioned or linked on Performancing. That was one of the main resons I was immediately interested when I came across news of their new service.

I believe they had a similar ad network running before but it was stopped a while ago. Perhaps they learnt a lot from the shortcomings of the previous platform, and hopefully this one is smoother and more functional.

Why are blog ads of interest?

If you wish to make money online, break even on your blog hosting costs, or monetize your blog traffic in any way, blog ads are a lucrative alternative to automated contextual advertising like AdSense. While AdSense and similar programmes rely on users clicking on the ads for you to generate revenue, banners and blog ads are usually a renting of the space for a particular time period (1 week increments in the case of PerformancingAds). So as long as you have a decent amount of traffic, your advertisers pay you a fixed sum for being able to show their ads on your site. As long as you maintain the activity levels on your site, this can be a much more steady source of income than other methods. Targetted eyeballs are generally more easy to come by than clicks.

How do I join PerformancingAds and set it up?

1. Go to the PerformancingAds site at www.PerformancingAds.com
2. Click on Register under the Member Login box at the top right to sign up for a new account.
3. Fill in the details in the form. Note that you will need a PayPal account. At the moment Paypal seems to be the only way to recieve payment for ads.
4. Once logged in you can Add a Site into their system. And Add a region to define a specific instance/location where the ads will appear. This includes settings for how many ads you wish to allow.
5. You can then download the PerfomancingAds plugin by clicking on Download Publisher Software Now at the bottom of your account page.
6. The plugin comes ready to be used in WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, and also as a standalone PHP script if required. That’s a great amount of flexibity to have at your disposal, and a route more advertising networks should be taking.
7. The included installation instructions are detailed and clear, and the ads can be inserted by using some code that references the region that you setup in the PerformancingAds administration system.

What are the Pros and Cons of PerfomancingAds?

Pros

• Takes the marketing and administration part of blog ads out of your busy hands.
• A single standard size ad simplifies things and allows you to better integrate them into your blog layout.
• A publicly accesible marketplace means a lot of advertisers who would not have otherwise known about you can now be exposed to your site.
• Easy to implement in most blogs and sites with the PerformancingAds plugin.
• You can also fill your ad inventoy with your own ads for other sites, affiliate links, or even just important parts of your own site without incurring any charges from PerfomancingAds. This is a great way to utilise the ad space until more lucrative commercial advertisers come along. It’s also a great way to be very selective about accepting external advertisers while still reaping the benfit of being included in the PerformancingAds marketplace.

Cons

• You only get 60% of the money.
• Their marketplace tags each site with its Alexa rank, which is recognised by one and all to be an extremely unreliable measure of a site’s popularity or activity level. But, guess what, your potential advertisers are going to be judging you by this anyway.
• Other metrics appear on the details page for each site. These include Google Page Rank, Technorati Rank, Yahoo! inbound links, and Bloglines subscribers. Except perhaps the Yahoo! inbound links, all the rest are extremely subjective and inacurate measures of a site’s worth to an advertiser or the traffic it receives. For example, this site has a healthy and growing number of RSS subscribers and email update subscribers (over a hundred at this writing), but how many subscribers do I have through Bloglines? Two.

Are there any alternatives to PerformancingAds?

Sure there are. MANY! Many more than I could possibly list here, but here are some which are either particularly good or similar in spirit:

• Entrecard — An online business card exchange system of sorts, which also deals in similar 125 pixel wide images. Their system involves the accumulation of credits which can then be bought, sold, and traded.
• WP Text Ads — A plugin and service that lets you sell text ads on your blog directly without a middle man taking a cut. The free edition of the plugin is fully featured but limits the number of ads you can sell, while the paid edition gets rid of those limits.
• BlogRush — A traffic exchange widget that is quite popular.
• Kontera — Mostly unobtrusive in-text advertising that acts as a good complement or replacement to other contextual systems like Google AdSense.
• Google AdSense — The undisputed king of blog monetization resources. It’s the simplest way to start and there are enough professional bloggers who make a good income from this alone.

Hope you found this little guide to the new Performancing blog ads useful. If you are interested in trying this out for yourself, sign up at PerformancingAds. Let me know of your thoughts and experiences with blog advertising below, and best of luck with your blogging adventures.

Samir

ShareThis

Conformity vs individuality is a matter very close to the discussion about the originality of creative ideas, which I have gotten into before and I am sure I will again. The question of individuality was brought up again recently when I received a comment on my article about creativity and religious thought from Curtis who said:

If your life revolves around what others think of you, as these words seem to suggest, then Ayn Rand is not the author for you.

A grand pronuncement indeed on what was a personal story about my second-hand exposure to the works of Ayn Rand and how I hadn’t gotten around to reading them. I’m generally in the habit of questioning grand pronouncements, or at least digging deeper into them, so I thought it only right that I explore further this whole phenomenon of caring about what other people think of you, and also caring about whether other people think you care about what other people think of you!

My response to accusations about caring what other people think: So what?
Yes, you heard me right. So What? What devine herald declared caring what other people think to be incompatible with free thinking and individuality? Confusing? Let me attempt to make sense of it all.

First let’s tackle the idea of a person so independent they they never under any circumstances care what other people think of them. Some people might call such a person the ideal individual, I would call them dead. Metaphorically? No, I mean literally, because post mortem is probably the only time any human being can truly claim to absolutely not care about what others think. We can all pretend that it is true, but realistically it is one of those ideals we can all strive for but never quite reach. Besides which it would be biologically impossible unless you suffer from a very severe form of autism, or Klüver-Bucy syndrome, or some neuro-chemical disfunction of a similar ilk.

Next let’s ask a simpler question: Would you want to be so completely cut off from humanity that you never care? Just because something can be achived or done, should it be? More importantly, do YOU want it to be? If we don’t ask ourselves these questions then there is no thinking involved in our decisions, and a million human follies of the past can be ascribed to not having asked this same question. It is crucial that we take this thought experiment of the ideal individualism and ask what its purpose is. What do you want to achieve by being so “individual”? Is it fame and fortune? Can’t be, because those are simply ways to be more integrated with what people think of you and being more dependent on outside forces. Do you want to achive some technological marvel? Great, but wouldn’t that be for the benefit of more people? Do you want to achive some artistic excellence, in art, in literature, in music? Excellent idea once again, but what would be the point if your masterpiece were never seen, read, or heard by anyone else? We come back down to other people once again.

Last but not the least, let’s talk about the incompatibility of free thinking individuality and religious rigidity. If I want to be free thinker, do I really want to subscribe to some predetermined code of individualism? Does it make any rational sense to try to fit into the preconcieved requirements of individuality as ascribed by some authorotative club of people who have officially deemed themselves to be individualists of the higher order? “You’re not a free thinker unless you listen to and follow what I and/or so-and-so authority figure says!” That doesn’t make much sense. Not only is it counter-intuitive but it puts the moron back into the oxymoronic.

Individuality and free thinking may not be compatible with religious rigidity and conformity, but they are still perfectly compatible with regular human discourse, learning from other people’s experiences, and caring what other people think. What is incompatible with free thinking is if you not only cared what other people thought, but proceeded to change everything about yourself to conform to their expectations. That is conformity, and confromity is not the same as creative compassion. If you get to the point where you are so scared of caring what other people think that you are unwilling to listen to another viewpoint and take from it what you wish, then you have reached a stage where creative compassion is beyond your means and part of what makes you more than a purely instinctive animal has been lost.

That’s certainly not something a creative person can afford to do, because creativity isolated from function, intent, purpose, and ultimate audience, is random chaos. When I write an article on this blog, I can’t claim that I don’t care what people think about it. I obviously do since this site is publicly accessible and there’s a comment form at the bottom that lets them say what they want about my work. If I absolutely didn’t care, I would scribble these musings in a tattered old diary, you would be none the wiser about what I think, and one day the precious sheets of my thoughts would be recycled to make throw-away paper coffee cups.

So, by its very existence this site proves that I care what other people think, because I think, and therefore I value thinking even if it is not exclusively mine. In a similar vein by its very nature commenting on a blog indicates that you care what the writer (other person) thinks, by watching a movie you are caring about what other people think, by reading a book you are caring about what other people think. Ayn Rand was a human person too, caring what other people think is an irrefutable truth of being a human being, and an absolute necessity for being a creatively thinking one.

Samir

ShareThis

The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged top the list of the books people have recommended I read over the years. These are no idle recommendations. Almost every person I consider a dear and close friend has at some point told me very specifically that I must read these books by Ayn Rand. They have all gone so far as to say that I am perfect for these books and these books are perfect for me. Usually these recommendations have followed some impassioned monologue on my part about life, work, passion, and the virtue of being good at what you do and doing it well. I’m usually the quiet type, but in the right circumstances and in the right company, I have been know to break my silence for heart-felt tirades that get my friends to recommend Ayn Rand books and my aquaintences to shrink carefully away for fear that I might start hurling heavy objects in their direction. For the record, I have never hurled heavy objects on any occasion other than when forced to lob shot puts in school, and I have never gotten around to reading a book by Ayn Rand.

I’m as obsessed with reading as you can get. It’s true that in recent years my reading habits have been sporadic for lack of time, but I am one of those people who can and will read anything and everything, if for no other reason than to have experienced it once first hand. After all the recommendations from the few people in the world who know me best, needless to say I’m quite enthusiastic about the prospect of reading The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged and many of the Rand’s lesser know work. But, I know better than anyone else that there is a right time and a place for any book to be read, and I’ve still never got the feeling that I’m in that right time and place.

I speak from plenty of experience in this matter, because I have a large repertoire of books which I have started reading more than a handful of times and have never finished, often giving up after a few chapters. Are these simply bad books? No, I can safely say my gut feelings about books before I buy them have always been right, and I can’t remember a single one of my buys which I would consider to have been a bad book. Sometimes you’re just not ready for a particular book, and I have had phenomenal pleasure finally reading books I might have picked up more than a decade ago. I expect something similar to be the case with the works of Ayn Rand some day.

One aspect that holds me back at the moment is that Ayn Rand, like all good thinkers of the past has currently been reduced to a religion. Creativity, individuality, strong-willed single-minded fervour, all things I support, and I get the feeling they would be well reviewed in any book by Ayn Rand. But Ayn Rand’s philosophy of life has been reduced to an -ism: objectivism. Where begins the categorisation of free thinking ends any semblance of freedom, and ends most of the actual thinking.

Creativity is humanity’s greatest gift and religion its greatest obstacle — I don’t mean a religion or movement in particular, and I certainly don’t mean faith, but rather the very mental construct that is religious thought. Unfortunately religious thought is much more all pervasive than the minute arena of organised religion. People are religious about their sports, they are religious about their politics, they are religions about their ideas, they are religious about their view of the world, they are religious about their brand of dish washing liquid. In this chaotic milieu of frivolous certainties, it seems ironic that someone whose work was the ultimate counter argument to such behaviour is now packaged in similar garb.

Am I being religious in my certainty about what has become of Ayn Rand? Perhaps. After all, I have never read her work, but what pervades is the impression of her work and that seems clouded in movements, societies and supporters, critics and criticisms. The two teams are on the field and they will kick around the dead goat of Ayn Rand books and Ayn Rand quotes until all their feet are bloodied in a uniform crimson and the object of their affections has decomposed into the Earth.

Does this actually affect my reading of an Ayn Rand book? Possibly, if these thoughts and arguments are forever hanging over the act and are acting as a lens through which I shall perceive it. On the other hand it is perfectly possible to read a much debated work and get out of it something unique and something untouched by mob emotions.

Sometimes the timing just isn’t right and I await the fortuitous hour. I have written before about the positive aspects of delay in some situations, and maybe this is an example of me not wanting to approach this the wrong way for fear of missing the point in the noise. Creative ideas and creative thought often work that way. While those of us in creative professions train ourselves to function on demand to a large extent, there still remains that small element of chance and timing that truly takes things to new creative heights.

The acceptance and imbibing of new ideas is the same. We can choose to study them and absorb them on demand but sometimes we are not quite ready for the knowledge, and sometimes the knowledge is not quite ready for us.

I wrote this piece because I have been thinking anew of Ayn Rand and her work in recent months. Something has stirred and I am beginning to get the vague feeling that the time to partake in Ms. Rand’s thoughts draws near. It is nothing tangible, of course, just the instinctual feelings of the animal that perceives the coming of the distant rain and prepares for its arrival. I look forward to the experience, but I also mourn the loss of that enthusiasm I always engender in friends when they asked me if I had ever read The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged and I say no. Their eyes light up and their love for the ideas they absorbed from the books pours forth and suddenly I am not alone in my impassioned tirades. When the time does come for me to sit down and become one of those who has read an Ayn Rand book, most of all I will miss that feeling.

Samir

“The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.”
— Ayn Rand

ShareThis

All good things must come to an end, as does this edition of Comic Konga with this comic. I haven’t been the most punctual participant, but I’m glad I completed the set of five, and that too keeping to my parameters of using the same character. It’s been a great exercise and I will certainly tackle comics with less trepidation in the future. Anyone interested can subscribe to Vishal’s feed to know when the next one is happening.

Day 5: Love is in the Air, and our everyman robot is reacting in his own little predictably unpredictable way. The point of this one was to continue with the more complex scene setups, and to end with a straightforward caption piece. I’m quite happy with the finished visual because I had a specific look in mind and it took plenty of redraws to get it right.

The final, much erased and worked over, pencil sketch on A4 photocopy paper was traced with a black finetip pen. The inks were scanned and vectorised in Inkscape. Blue tones and text were also applied in Inkscape.

I hear love is a wonderful thing. And yet, everytime you see love visualised in images you see the same symbols and the same stale imagery. It gets to be very boring — to me at least. My try with this was to make an image about love that was not churned out by the Valentine’s Day marketing department, or by the Jilted Lovers Anarchist Cell. Is it romantic? No, probably not by most people’s standards. I do hope it is at least a little funny though and makes you smile.

Samir

ShareThis

With this, the fourth entry into Comic Konga, I’m practically on a roll. A major part of Vishal’s inspiration to start an event like this was to get people who are not regular practitioners into the flow of making comics. If you stick to it, I think Comic Konga succeeds in that very well.

Day 4: In Green Consumer Behaviour, our serial protagonist returns. I also return to multiple characters and dialogue with this one. I’m a fan of both the dialogue-based and the caption-centric single panel comic. I think they each have their charm, and one often works better than the other depending on the specific situation. I’m also exploring the medium a bit more and spreading my drawing wings by tackling more complex scenes. Staging is a lot of fun.

A pencil sketch on an A4 photocopy sheet was traced with a black finetip pen. The inks were scanned and vectorised in Inkscape. Blue tones and text were also applied in Inkscape.

I have tackled the issues of consumerism, consumer behaviour and the ever growing fad of green consumers in my writing before, but the topic is ever relevant and sometimes a single comic panel can communicate the situation as well, if not better, than long articles. Let’s face it, we’ve made a mess on this planet, and now a vast population of people think all of it can be undone purely my buying more stuff. Astounding!

Samir

ShareThis