Extending John Buchanan's idea

John Buchanan came up a rather an unconventional idea of having multiple captains in a T20 game.

How about extending that idea and having multiple units within a team, with each unit having its own captain/coach - a la NFL type super-specialization? The team structure can be something like this - a batting unit, a bowling unit and a fielding unit. The batting unit can have about 6 members, the bowling unit can have about 5 members and the fielding unit can have about 10 members (including the wicket-keeper).

In any particular game, the members of each unit perform their task alone. For example, a fielding unit member only fields and does not bat and bowl; a batting unit member only bats and does not field and bowl etc. Similarly, a bowling unit member only bowls – at end of every over, a bowling unit member can come out of the pavilion to bowl the next over and goes back to the pavilion at the end of the over. Given his center position in the field, the wicket-keeper can act as the on-field coordinator with the bowling unit.

I strongly suspect that the super-specialization of tasks, particularly batting and bowling, will increase the efficacy with which tasks are executed, thus increasing the quality and the competitiveness of the game being played. There are couple other benefits that I can think of. Having lower number of wickets (batters) will increase the premium of each wicket and batters will have lesser incentives to take callous risks, thereby leveling the battle between bat and ball a little bit. Team management can use the fielding unit to introduce talented young players, who can possibly move to one of batting or bowling units, with relatively lower risk toward the result of that game.

While I realize that the above fundamentally tampers with the definition of a team in cricket, what are the big cons?

Broadband Speed

Here's a good way to test your broadband speed.

I get a download speed of about 1.8 MBpS when connecting to servers in India and about 0.8 MBpS when connecting to servers in US from my broadband at home in India. If you are in the US and happen to test this, can you please let me know your connection speed?

Articles on AIG

Here, here and here are a series of excellent articles that appeared in the Washington Post late last December.

The story spans about 15 pages and is divided into three parts. It traces the evolution of the current crisis starting from 1987 when AIG-Financial Products was founded. While I found some of the technical details a little hard to follow, it was an absolutely fascinating read!

Here's a Charlie Rose interview with a pretty good panel on the same topic. I liked the tone and demeanor of Hank Greenberg, the ex-CEO of AIG. I also think that Meredith Whitney was a rambling a bit off topic, especially toward the end!

Populism

Here's a very nice article that appeared in The Economist on populist rage AIG bonuses.

"Was the fuss over AIG a sign of a new populist mood in America? Or was it just a storm in a teacup? It is hard to answer this question in a country in which anger is a form of entertainment and where the political parties have turned partisanship into a fine art. Television personalities such as Bill O’Reilly are always angry about something or other. Many of the politicians who proclaimed their outrage at the “malefactors of great wealth” are delighted to take campaign contributions from the very same malefactors"

Change in the blog title

A minor change in the blog title ...Thanks, Ramesh! As a consequence of my rather irreverent attitude toward learning proper English grammar, I had misplaced articles, threw in a few more ellipsis than needed among other such nasty things!

These days, thanks to spell-check, my ability to spell has taken a beating as well! Well, that's how I guess I adapt to new technologies - by becoming lazier and lazier! I'm beginning wonder if the so called sixth sense will reduce the sharpness of the remaining five! I guess it is possible as I have heard and read that the absence of a "sense"tends to enhance the remaining ones. The converse may well hold true!

In any case, here's how I found out how dependent I was on spell-check!Phew!

Sixth sense

Here's a link to an amazing new technology! It decouples you from the computer yet enables you harness the full power of the web real time in a very intuitive and an elegant manner. This, when commercialized, will be a huge thing.

And here's the website of the genius who designed it.

Ten trillion and counting

Here's a Frontline documentary on the mounting US national debt.

As is the case with all Frontline documentaries, very well researched but slightly dramatized

An interesting parallel

Here's an interesting and a scary parallel to the current economic crisis. Hopefully things wont be anywhere as bad as this one!

I seriously doubt it unless, ofcourse, someone says, "What if they got laid off, don't they get bonuses?" Now, that might get the aruvaal out, as they say in my parts.

"The next year, Jacques Necker, a foreigner, was appointed Director-General of Finance. Necker realized that the country's tax system subjected some to an unfair burden; numerous exemptions existed for the nobility and clergy. He argued that the country could not be taxed higher, that the nobles and clergy should not be exempt from taxes, and proposed that borrowing would solve the country's fiscal problems. Necker published a report to support this claim that underestimated the deficit by roughly 36,000 livres; and proposed restricting the spending power of the parlements. This was not received well by King's ministers and Necker, hoping to solidify his position, argued to be accepted as a minister. The King refused, Necker was fired, and Charles Alexandre de Calonne was appointed to the Directorship.

Calonne initially spent liberally, but he quickly realized the critical financial situation and put forth a new tax code. The proposal included a consistent land tax, which would include taxation of the nobility and clergy...."

An emotional goodbye email

Here's an emotional resignation letter from a Executive VP at AIG

"As most of us have done nothing wrong, guilt is not a motivation to surrender our earnings. We have worked 12 long months under these contracts and now deserve to be paid as promised. None of us should be cheated of our payments any more than a plumber should be cheated after he has fixed the pipes but a careless electrician causes a fire that burns down the house."

I was a initially little uncomfortable with caps on bonuses and compensation for the same reason. We may be punishing the wrong people! Are the US lawmakers now hyper-extending the guilt-by-association argument? Are there ethical and moral issues in not honoring employment contracts?

Leaders leaders everywhere.....

.......and not a decision made. John Buchanan thinks otherwise. Here's an interesting idea!

"I really think in the course of this 20-over tournament we have the capacity to have the team coach, Matthew Mott, running the batting side of things. If we have to change the batting order or change personnel to fit a certain situation, then that is something that could fall under his control. "Once on the field, we have some very good leaders there in Chris Gayle, Brendon McCullum, Brad Hodge and Sourav Ganguly. The laws of the game state that you need a captain for certain formal roles, such as the coin toss, but that aside, I see there is scope to challenge the way teams have been run in the past"

Dileep Premachandran calls it Politburo captaincy. Here's his article on cricinfo. It is perhaps fitting that it was introduced in Kolkata.

The IPL saga

Here's a very nice article that captures several nuances about the IPL saga.

My thought on this was that the incumbent party (UPA) in India wants to hedge its risks politically in case there is a terrorist attack during the IPL. Given the enormous popularity of the IPL and also the fact public opinion typically turns against the government during such attacks, UPA stands to lose enormously (and that is being hugely euphemistic). There is literally nothing to gain for UPA if IPL is successful as that is general baseline expectation.

With this simple cost-benefit analysis, it looks like the UPA wanted to appear as the paternalistic protector of India democratic institutions. Now that IPL is likely to be played in England or South Africa, UPA has more or less achieved its political objectives.

But what is lost here is the opportunity to show-case to the world that India can conduct world class sporting tournaments in India. Now this discussion on security will become a vexing issue for BCCI at the beginning of every home tour, especially after 26/11 and SL attacks.

But why did BCCI not spend money to hire private security providers with intelligence support from the government? The government would probably not agreed to that, but would have helped BCCI from a longer term credibility stand-point. But then, why would BCCI (a registered non-profit organization!!!) want spend any extra money when they were allegedly paying only about 3-4 lakhs per game for security? It is a sad (and a selfish) self-goal in India's fight against terror.

Nonetheless, don't underestimate the relevance of holding IPL in England (if it turns out to be the case.) It is a snub on the boorish behavior of the ECB and, more importantly, a full house Chennai Vs Mumbai in the heart of London in many ways re-enforces the ever increasing reverse cultural colonization!! At the risk of being a lil' melodramatic, I'm tempted to quote the saying that the sun never sets on the Indian dispora!

As far I am concerned, it's go Dhoni and go CSK to the championship title this time around.

Obama on Leno

Check it out here, here and here...

"Being President is like being on American Idol, except that everybody is Simon Cowell"

"Smart kids coming out of school, instead of wanting to be an investment banker, we need to them to decide that they want to be an engineer, they want to be a scientist, they want to be a doctor and teacher...."

The Obamas were supposed to get a dog for their daughters when they moved into the White house.

"Leno: When is the dog coming? I keep hearing about the dog. When was it supposed be there by? I thought it was as soon as you moved in (to the White House)"
Obama: Well....listen, this is Washington and that was a campaign promise......."

Bugs in our moral code

Here is an excellent TED talk by Dan Ariely on why we think it may be okay to cheat and steal. Here is a link to very creative home page.

In his speech Dan mentions about one thing that strikes me as particularly interesting – the existence of “personal fudge factor” in our moral code.

Dan suggests that all of us lie, cheat and steal to a certain small extent – to an extent where we can look at ourselves in the mirror and still feel good. This is what he calls as a personal fudge factor in our moral code.

My hypothesis is that this fudge factor is a function of time and is more likely to expand for a larger proportion of people as they grow older (maybe until a certain age). Many times we are aware of our expanding fudge factor. But we tend to rationalize it as a reaction to our current situation, to the personal affronts we have faced, to the perceived behavior of our peers among several other reasons. Thus, conveniently cloaked in self-righteousness, we continually condone relaxing our moral code and as one direct consequence, we become increasingly self-centered.

At the same time, we also delude ourselves in believing that no one is noticing. But, I strongly suspect that everyone is noticing. They are, perhaps, just bound by a basic decency and also by the fact that in this world of excessive political correctness, there aren't too many socially appropriate mechanisms to communicate their observations. I'll stop here as I think I have digressed a lil' bit from the original subject, which ofcourse is a fantastic TED talk by Dan Ariely.

Of Dodo Birds and the Maltese Falcon

Here's a TED talk that Vivek sent me. Fantastic speech. It's so pointless yet so passionate that it is hard to be not infected by the enthusiasm. (you will need to listen to the whole speech ~ 15 min!)

Nandan Nilekani on the Daily Show

Here's Nandan Nilekani on the Daily Show.

There's a major cultural dissonance in this interview! Nandan was super uncomfortable and Jon was close to filibustering!

Here's a review of his book, Imagining India, by The Economist.

I'm currently reading it. The book is very informative. Perhaps, it could have easily been a li'l shorter for the same message!

Pak Passion

Here's an interesting thread on a popular Pak website. It was on the day of the SL attack

Retraining the business school

Here's an interesting article on businesscu school education

Jimmy Joned..!

Here, here and here are the videos where Jon Stewart toasts Jim Cramer.

Now, I'm not a fan of CNBC, am a big fan of Jon Stewart and am of the opinion that Jim Cramer is generally an idiot. But isn't Jon Stewart doing the exact same thing now that he accuses Jim Cramer of doing, which is pandering to his audience to boost his own GRPs?

He essentially accuses Jim Cramer and the CNBC network of incompetence or even unethical journalism. But when asked about his own journalistic credence he hides under the fact that he just a comedian and runs an unfair and a mostly meaningless show! But I don't find that explanation entirely credible. If we are talking about Drew Carey's 'Who's line is it anyway?', I'll agree. It is mostly meaningless and mostly funny. But Jon Stewart dabbles in mainstream politics and finance, has the most influential policy-makers on this show and is a hero of the liberal pseduo-intelligensia! With his type of content, audience reach and policy-maker access, it is quite irresponsible to claim that he just farting around yet at the same play the role of a self-appointed news media regulator.

If Jon Stewart is serious on holding people accountable, he has to cover why the rating agencies gave a AAA rating to subprime bonds, the drastic change in the situation before and after Lehman was allowed to fail, the reasons why Federal Reserve kept the rate too low for too long, the impact globalization had on masking this crisis and why Joe the plumber decided to buy a frekking townhouse when was he only employed part-time. But, that ofcourse, is serious journalism and Jonny aint doing just that. He is no different from a bully picking on people when they are vulnerable.

I just think Jon Stewart is playing as much to the gallery as Jim Cramer was doing for the best part of this decade. The only difference is that Stewart is funny, Cramer was painful!