John Matthew

4 Followers
3 Blog Followers
Following:
Following Blogs: 0

Latest Activity

"Sets Shouldn't Appear Lit." Bollywood Are You Listening?

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 10, 2009, 11:31 pm
"Yeh, kya hai boss?" I ask the corpulent man sitting on a plastic chair outside New Empire. (What is this boss?) "Yeh, vanity van, hai," he answers. (This is a vanity van, used by actors.) "Koi sho...
Comment - Like

This Blog Has a Technorati Authority of 123

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 9, 2009, 11:13 pm
I think a pat on the back, even if it happens on ones own back, is not a bad thing. Really. It's nice to know that this blog has a Technorati authority of 123 (the authority of all things in blogg...
Comment - Like

President Obama's Path-breaking Health Care Policy – Need Something Similar in India

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 9, 2009, 7:24 am
Just stumbled across this website of the White House showing Barack Obama presiding over a meeting. I also viewed a summary of Obama's famed Health Care Policy, salient points of which appear belo...
Comment - Like

Fairness Creams – An Invention of the Indian Mind

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 7, 2009, 7:38 am
Okay, okay, you are bored of my review of 2009. What has changed and what hasn't changed is subjective, really. Everyone will have an opinion on it in this opinionated nation. Just look at the con...
Comment - Like

Here's Looking at You, 2009 – Part III

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 5, 2009, 7:31 am
The saga continues…. I don't know what 2009 had done to me to be so nostalgic, not wanting to let it go, not ominous, because I am not a superstitious type. Nah! So here goes my list of things t...
Comment - Like

Here's Looking at You 2009 – Part II

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 4, 2009, 5:36 am
Yes, yesterday I nearly collapsed on my laptop writing the post that appears somewhere, ah, just below this one. It was about change and how it happens unannounced, how things change, how we grow old ...
Comment - Like

Here's Looking at You 2009

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 3, 2009, 12:19 pm
A colleague remarked how the month had gone so fast, I said, month? I don’t remember how the year went, nay, how a quarter century went. Actually time passes at its own speed, the clock ticks quite ...
Comment - Like

The Poet and His Poetry; Excuse the Pretentiousness

John Matthew posted an article on - Dec 1, 2009, 3:08 am
  Borrowed this from Aditi Machado's Blog. Since poetry is the soul of literature, just as the mind (or, whatever is in the centre of the body) is the soul of the human consciousness, the follow...
Comment - Like

Dear Teacher, Your Questions Are Mistaken!

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 28, 2009, 2:46 am
... and anarchic things, things that are never read (especially this blog). He shows me the homework teacher has given his six-year-old. Oh! I exclaim this is weird, as weird can get. I don't kn...
Comment - Like

The US's Chinese Obsession. Can Manmohan Undo the Damage?

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 27, 2009, 2:15 am
Regarding the recent shift in US's allegiance to China, Fareed Zakaria writes in The Newsweek, "Obama must keep in mind that South Asia is a tar pit filled with failed and dysfunctional states, sa...
Comment - Like

A Brave Wife's Account: Vinita Kamte's Book "To the Last Bullet"

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 25, 2009, 5:28 am
Vinita Kamte, wife of Ashok Kamte, who was killed in the encounter with terrorists on November 26, 2008 (the anniversary is tomorrow) has alleged in a book titled To the Last Bullet, co-authored by jo...
Comment - Like

How Credible Is Our Media?

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 24, 2009, 2:34 am
In this blog I had decried the vested interests that manage the media these days. According to commonly available information, editorial freedom and integrity that are vital to the survival and credib...
Comment - Like

Writing a Novel Is Tough, Really Tough!

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 23, 2009, 3:20 am
Writing a novel is a tough, difficult job. Apart from plotting there are the characterizations, the settings, the subject, the voice, the tone, the foreshadowing, the explication of ordinary things yo...
Comment - Like

New York Times Gives Blogs, Online Networks Their Due

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 21, 2009, 7:19 am
While on the subject of New York Times (NYT) I am amazed to see that the articles centre around people's experiences in online forums like Facebook, Orkut, Myspace, Twitter and such like. ...
Comment - Like

Obama's Men-only Obsession

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 21, 2009, 5:25 am
Over at the white House, as New York Times reports in a front page article, the major crib is that Obama is surrounded by men, and not pretty female interns. A picture shows Obama trying to basket a ...
Comment - Like

Why I Believe in Online - the Medium of the Future

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 20, 2009, 4:56 am
This is in reply to a poem by Alankrita on Shakespeare and Company and sort of sums up my experience on social media and the entire wired world. Like it or not, social media or networks, call it...
Comment - Like

The Gotul: Has National Geographic Got It Wrong?

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 18, 2009, 7:21 am
Saw this interesting documentary on National Geographic on the Madia tribe’s Gotul custom. Gotul, as apparent from the documentary is a place where young people older than ten years go and spend the...
Comment - Like

Frankly: I Don't Know

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 17, 2009, 12:21 pm
I will be frank about this one: I don’t whom to be more afraid of: the terrorists from within the borders or the “inner terrorists” or the fundamentalists from across the borders the “outer te...
Comment - Like

Google Wave, Making Waves

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 13, 2009, 11:30 pm
Read about Google Waves after requesting Amit Varma of India Uncut for an invite to use it. I read it up on Wikipedia in this article, and feel it is the next big step in online connectivity. Excerp...
Comment - Like

Bar News Coverage of Humpty Dumpty

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 12, 2009, 11:07 pm
Saw the latest edition of Bar News, and it sounded like a bar brawl to me. The news was about a prominent film director’s son caught in a muddle with extremists, hence the treatment is also a bit li...
Comment - Like

To Die or not to Die

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 11, 2009, 9:36 am
To die or not to die. That’s the dilemma facing most people these days. Even young people die these days. There are some who die every week, some who die every month, some who die every few months. ...
Comment - Like

Be Prepared to Be X-rayed, Stripped, Humiliated

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 7, 2009, 7:20 am
Guess one has to live the life of an over-protected, under-privileged human being from now on. So shout it from the rooftops: “you will never be free to walk into a library, a railway station, a gov...
Comment - Like

My Interview in Webneetech. Hubris? Nah. Well deserved? Yes.

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 5, 2009, 6:13 am
It feels nice to be interviewed for a change, though it took a long time coming. For most of my life I was at the wrong end of the mike or recorder, I now feel. Ah! But that’s just hubris, nah, it...
Comment - Like

Television, Movies, and a Lack of Indian-ness

John Matthew posted an article on - Nov 4, 2009, 5:30 am
I like to make these comparisons, now that my writing work can resume. The laptop has come back after repairs with a new keyboard, there’s a nip in the air, the dam where I go for a walk-cum-trot is...
Comment - Like

What's "Kachha" What's "Pucca", Gormint Decides!

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 31, 2009, 8:23 am
It’s a shame that the Gormint discriminates when giving what it calls “relief” to flood-hit people of Northern Karnataka in the districts of Dharwad, Haveri, Gadag, Bijapur, Bagalkot and Belgaum...
Comment - Like

Bloggers, Facebookers, Tweeters Rejoice - the Future Is User-generated Content

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 28, 2009, 6:56 am
Bloggers, Facebookers, Tweeters rejoice, the future of the internet is user generated content – that too real time user generated - according to this article quoting Google CEO Eric Schmidt. Excerp...
Comment - Like

Lest We Forget That Night...

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 27, 2009, 5:51 am
He is a sad old man selling boiling gram on Azad Maidan. He does a day job somewhere and sqats opposite the Bombay Gymkhana facing the Municipal Corporation building across from the cricket pitches of...
Comment - Like

"Jack and Jill" According to Indian Television

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 24, 2009, 1:21 am
This is hilarious, really is. We all know how Indian television reporting goes in a circle, circumambulates, and returns to the very point it started from. While on the screen plays repeated clippings...
Comment - Like

An Open Letter to Kapil Sibal-ji

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 22, 2009, 6:58 am
Dear Kapil Sibal-ji, This missive is my humble appreciation of the efforts you are taking to improve the education system (which has been pulverised and prostituted by the education mafia) in this c...
Comment - Like

chandelier

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 22, 2009, 6:18 am
Chandelier! This beautiful chandelier in the office lobby was lit for the festival of lights - Deepavali - meaning a row of lights. Deepavali signifies the victory of good over evil and the ce...
Comment - Like

Just Back from Kerala....

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 20, 2009, 7:02 am
Just back from Kerala, beautiful Kerala, the state of my birth, mother country, the state that confounds me still with its vivid contrasts and inexplicable charm. I was born there, but somehow I can...
Comment - Like

The Economists' Spat With Arundhati Roy

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 12, 2009, 1:46 am
The Economist published this review about Arundhati Roy’s Listening to Grasshoppers: Field Notes on Democracy which wasn’t very laudatory. I guess, in my humblest of opinions, the Economist revie...
Comment - Like

Executives Paid Themselves Rather Well During Recession

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 10, 2009, 6:18 am
Says this article in business.in.com: “In the search for culprits in the global financial meltdown, bloated executive pay and the excessive risk-taking behaviour it fuelled stand out as prime susp...
Comment - Like

Twisted Lines, Disappearing Acts on the Highway

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 9, 2009, 8:14 am
This photo is for making a statement, sent to me by a friend, whom I trust. So, it’s for a fair use, I guess. The highway functionary in charge of painting this road erred, err, sorry, the tree erre...
Comment - Like

The Problem with Digital, They Don't Listen!

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 8, 2009, 8:19 am
This is about penetration of digital media and its impact on advertising, which is what media companies survive on. The other day a Google representative contacted me for our online advertising acco...
Comment - Like

Of Chastity Belts and Feign-able Virginity Kits

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 7, 2009, 4:53 am
We have heard of chastity belts Arab men fastened on to their women when they went into the desert, we have also heard of abstinence, but the headline Los Angeles Times headlined “ Gadget to help wo...
Comment - Like

"That Thing Called Love"

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 6, 2009, 8:28 am
friend and fellow writer Tuhin Sinha (author of That Thing Called Love, which, I am told, has been translated into several Indian languages and has sold a record number of copies, into five figures,...
Comment - Like

In the Neighbourhood of Nostalgia

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 3, 2009, 8:29 am
This post is about nostalgia. Guess it’s good to look back when you are past fifty on my life, my times, how things were then and now. How time creeps up on you, unknowingly. For those of you who th...
Comment - Like

The Staring Man in Red

John Matthew posted an article on - Oct 1, 2009, 6:37 am
A man in a shocking red shirt stares at me when am having my post-lunch banana. I don’t know why. I have never seen him. I look up from my banana and he is staring at me. I nibble at my banana and s...
Comment - Like

William Safire Is No More

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 30, 2009, 2:59 am
William Safire, of the Nixon Administration, not the “howling pack of conservative pundits: Limbaugh, Beck, Coulter and Malkin” according to Maureen Dowd, is no more. I liked to read his rather si...
Comment - Like

Salman Rushdie on "Slumdog Millionaire"

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 28, 2009, 10:31 am
This is rather late, but what the heck, better late than not at all. Slumdog won a lot of appreciation for its provocative content, which were trumped up by a director who didn’t understand his subj...
Comment - Like

How Climate Change Affects Civilisation; What Are the Effects of Global Warming? Will We Become Extinct?

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 27, 2009, 5:50 am
Ah the October heat is almost upon me. The mind goes dithery, the body sweats a lot of fluids, a vague disorientation, the mouth dries, the fingers don’t move on the keyboard, mistakes are made and....
Comment - Like

"Managing your online afterlife"

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 26, 2009, 11:29 am
Time issue dated September 14, 2009 has an interesting article “Managing your online afterlife”. So what happens after one kicks the bucket, er, well, sort of? We think about these things, don’t...
Comment - Like

Bloggers to the Fore. Product Launches, What Next?

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 25, 2009, 8:25 am
So what’s up in the blogging community? Am a bit dense here because I haven’t attended any of their meet-ups or bothered to network, really. So the following comes as a bit of a surprise as it com...
Comment - Like

Of "Cattle Class" and No "First Class" in India

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 25, 2009, 12:59 am
What do you say to a man who comes and stands in front his ample and polyester-clad behind wiggling at you, prodding the book you are reading, shifting from leg to leg, talking loudly to his... T...
Comment - Like

The Largest Wave of Suicides in History

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 24, 2009, 7:49 am
This is from a blog called Progressive Rural India Forum, here’s an excerpt: “The statistics are staggering. From 1998 to 2006, over 100,000 farmers have committed suicides. In Vidarbha, 3,000....
Comment - Like

Recession's Silver Lining

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 23, 2009, 3:36 am
According to livescience.com, recession may have had an unlikely silver lining. According to this article recession has resulted in low carbon dioxide emission. Excerpt: “It may not exactly be a...
Comment - Like

Goodbye Rains!

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 23, 2009, 1:10 am
It had to happen. This monsoon (the word is derived, so I read, from the Arabic/Urdu word “mausam” meaning “season”) I had taken a solemn vow to not let the forces of nature, in this case: rai...
Comment - Like

Pain - II

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 22, 2009, 7:54 am
Was looking around for some poems to read on “pain” which I underwent during my recent backpain episode mentioned here. Came across this one by William Wordsworth on Bartlesby.com called “ I...
Comment - Like

Samuel Pepys, Blogger of Yore!

John Matthew posted an article on - Sep 21, 2009, 7:30 am
Just wandering on the net found this online diary of Samuel Pepys, the blogger (sort of!) of yore. Pepys seems to be a very down-at-heels man though he hobnobbed with greats of the like of Oliver....
Comment - Like

John Matthew's Blogs:

John Matthew's Followers

John Matthew is Following

Invite Your Friends

Invite your contacts to blogged from:
gmail yahoo