30 – Sep – 2010

1. Rethinking CAPTCHAs as advertising tool – People give their undivided attention to them, making them the perfect micro-location for advertising (plus additional revenues for publishers as well – 600 words – Marketing – AdAge
2. Interview with Ernest Hemingway – Brilliant, last line gems in this one – 8000 words – Books Interview – Paris Review
3. Interview with Kurt Vonnegut – 4 different interview stitched together with a final interview by the author with himself – 10000 words – Books Interview – Paris Review
4. Acronyms and Initialism – The growth of acroyms and initialism in modern life – 2100 words – Culture – Economist

20 Sep – 2010

1. Writing about mediocrities, only drags you down to their level – A hostile review of the recent hit over the years – Freedom by Jonathan Franzer – 2600 words – Books – The Atlantic
2. Influencers, marketing and pharma industry – Key opinion leaders or influencers or the thought leaders and their shady role in promoting new drugs and being the bell boy of big pharma cos – 3000 words – Business Marketing Psychology – Chronicle of Higher Education
3. Teaching english to Tokyo underworld – where the teacher learnt more than the student – 1800 words – Culture – Blog
4. Tete-a-tete with Attenborough and Dawkins -Interview with the two scientists, where they argue on wonder versus magic – 1700 words – Science Interview – Guardian

14 – Sep – 2010

1. Profiling Ryanair’s CEO – Discomfort, paying for toilet, lifting your own bags to the aircraft – Think cost and think getting from A to B minus the show – 2700 words – Culture – BW
2. Away from it, into it, and then away from it – Third part in a man’s journey into war and away from it – 1600 words – Culture – NYT
3. Forgotten lessons in pricing – Making it tougher for people to market / sell. Old Marketing 101 concepts – 900 words – Marketing – Pop Economics
4. A furious novel and a girly cover – Author Lionel Shriver talks on the 80 – 20 divide in cover design of books written by female authors. Boy, she is furious – 1000 words – Books Culture – Guardian
5. Behind BPGlobalPR – Interview with the outed man behind BPGlobalPR, who turns out to be a comedian. Interesting – 3200 words – cyberspace – Theawl
6. First Africa, now Australia – A peep at how China is feeding its huger for resources. First it was Africa and now Australia and the model in same. At first – Come in, use locals and later use cheaper resources from home – 3700 words – Foreign Policy – BW
7. Future speak – A peek into the words that might be used tomorrow, who knows starting with say – Omniscience Fatigue!! – 900 words – Culture Cyberspace – NYT
8. From long short to long land – Land grabbing by firms, to position themselves on resource rich lands, is the next in thing – 1200 words -Business – Telegraph
9. The lies in the name of science – The limits of the science and media mediated science is not that good, really – 1500 words – Science – Blog
10. Sean Parker, the man behind Napster, Facebook and well many more – A profile of an extreme gifted person, who was behind Napster, FB and its not Zuckerberg – 4000 words – cyberspace Culture – Vanity Fair
11. Greece, Bonds, Stimulus and corruption – Author (of hugely popular Liar’s Poker) Michael Lewis writes a true as a fact, long article on the extent of corruption and how Greece self destructed – 12000 words – Culture – Vanity Fair
12. Part 4 / 5 – A soldier’s essay on his going in and coming out of Iraq (part 4 / 5) – 3100 words – Culture – NYT

08 – Sep – 2010

1. “You know, filling in the genitalia.” – Well, literally. Interview with the author on the rise, Gary Shteyngart, author of Super Sad True Love Story. Incidentally he also teaches a writing course in Univ. of Columbia called “The Hysterical Male” – 2700 words – Interview Books – FT (Also the book’s trailer)
2. Curving soccer balls – Science explains why long distance soccer shots curve magically in the air – 500 words – Sports Science – SciAm
3. Well, telecommuting is not so green – Do you think telecommuting is green? Hold your horses – 1000 words – Culture – Slate
4. “The result is a pair of religious books curiously devoid of ancient lore and esoteric beliefs, history and holiness—curiously devoid of religion itself.” – Critique on the minimalism and thinness of “The Secret” mystery books – 4000 words – Books – New Yorker
5. No dryers in China – Why the ordinary people don’t use cloth dryers (in washing machines etc) in China; clue – ingrained – 800 words – Culture – WaPo
6. The Rise and rise and rise and fall of Saatchi & Saatchi – The story of S&S, its rise, branding and the fall of a big bad company – 3500 words – Culture – The Independent
7. Long live the nose – A peek into the social history of perfumes, in which I got to know that Chanel 5 is 90 years old. Phew! – 2500 words – Culture – The Independent
8. Saving the EU – Profile of the man who will save the EU if required and his organization, the European Financial Stability Facility – 1300 words – Foreign Policy – Der Spiegel
9. Away from it, into it, and then away from it – An ex soldier’s account of doing it, the war I mean in it and away from it – 3000 words – Culture – NYT

07 – Sep – 10

1. Not explaining colour preferences – Human’s preferences for colours with a large subset of variations of hues and tones can still not be explained singularly. Feature v/s objects, preferential variation over time – 1900 words – Psychology – International Culture & Cognition Institute
2. The new geographical division of Europe – Hint – It is not along the horizontal lines, it is along the vertical lines of North and South – 700 words – Foreign Policy – Slate
3. Authors and their day jobs – Author John Grisham on his day jobs – 1000 words – Books – NYT
4. Saving the world and the Hegemon – How China saved the world but why being a hegemon is a thankless task? – 900 words – Foreign Policy – Project Syndicate
5. Whither Open Data? – An essential argument between access and means of access. How openly available data is being used and misused (empowering the empowered) on the basis of availability, skills etc – 2000 words – Cyberspace – Blog
6. At a war – an believer and an atheist – A chaplain and his atheist assistant in Iraq – 2000 words – Culture – WSJ
7. Word-bytes on business – Three point agenda on business – 900 words – Culture – The Atlantic
8. “Happiness is subjective, it takes many forms, and one of its forms is immorality” – Against the pursuit of happiness – 4500 words – Reflections – The Guardian
9. “Any attempt to get tough with the Chinese would also bite us in the ass,” – About the stance of labour unions on the rise of China and the debate on political stance “whither the carrot or the stick” – 4500 words – Foreign Policy – The Nation

06 – Sep – 2010

1. What’s up with Data mining? – Network analysis is the next evolution of data mining which takes into account the social setting in uncovering patterns in numbers. Spends a few paras on India and then as usual the focus is on US. I wonder why is that? – 1800 words – Numbers Culture – Economist
2. Against “Truman Show” and neo-consumerism – A blogmom’s advice on being minimalist and avoid/evade the fictional reality cast by media and its shenanigans – 1000 words – Culture – Blog
3. Save ye old bookstore – Peek-a-boo at saving brick & mortar book stores. “The Strand”, NY has been tagged as “browsing mecca”. Ooh, I wish I were there – 500 words – Books – Blog
4. Seduction, the pick up artist and love – The art of picking up (it’s not those cheesy lines), the seduction. The art of love v/s art of seduction – an argument against the latter – 14000 words – Culture – Point Mag
5. Interview with a graffiti artist – An interview with a graffiti artist – Banksy – 1200 words – Interview – The Sun

01 – Sep – 2010

1. Visualizing a quintillion – In words and images, literally – 1000 words – Numbers – Blog
2. Data Interpretation and Causality – On the linguistic studies, pointing at the differences in perception traced to differences in language. A good refresher on how not to interpret data – 2800 words –  Numbers Culture –  Language Log
3. Addendum to 10000 hours rule – Nice caveat to the 10000 hours articulated especially well by Malcolm Gladwell. Determined focus on a single game (in larger cities) doesn’t pay – 1400 words – Culture Psychology – Wired
4. “Language evolves, and even the name of a great author isn’t safe.” – Overabusing “Orwellian” – 800 words – Language – Good Mag
5. An Intern and an author – An intern (who I envy) describes her “miss” adventure with an author – 1700 words – Books – The Millions
6. “After creating an emotion, work harder to sustain it” – Brilliant, long, last interview with French New Age director – Francois Truffaut – 9000 words – Films Interview – New Yorker
7. “The act of writing is a conscious act of humility” – A recollection of sorts with the author Roberto Bolaño (whose name I have been hearing a lot lately – 2666, The savage detectives) – 1300 words – Interview Books – n+1 Mag