Why do we sleep? Here is an interesting talk which tries to answer: http://www.ted.com/talks/russell_foster_why_do_we_sleep?language=en I am a person who wants my 8 hours of sleep. 6 hours is comfortable. 4 hours is doable. Anything less than 4 hours is tragedy. I remember taking over night buses not being able to sleep in them coming home … Read more

One of the central philosophies that Naren espouses is that all customers are not equal – and should not be treated equally. The profitable ones need to be pampered – and the non-profitable ones to be neglected. To start this process of iniquity, one needs to start with data.The data should help answer questions like … Read more

Reached the Auroville ECR junction – and decided to follow instructions in the welcome mail related to hitchhiking. Every two wheeler seemed to be carrying three people – so started walking. As the evening progressed, and I had only walked 3 km, was not sure if I would finish the 8 km before nightfall. So … Read more

The program started with a film titled ‘Man’ by Steve Cutts. Is available on Youtube. Was an interesting way of portraying how we have converted everything in our path to garbage today. What is important is not the clean-up, but the steps that will lead to garbage not being created. The first talk was by … Read more

Took a Bla Bla car from Dehradun. Volunteered for driving duty around Muzaffarnagar. Nice to have someone correct your while you are driving – was warned of lane violations by the young car owner. Reached Ghaziabad by 2030 hrs. Got dropped off right on the Vaishali Metro station road. Met up with Rakesh, who was … Read more

A nurse has recorded the most common regrets of the dying, and among the top ones is ‘I wish I hadn’t worked so hard’. What would your biggest regret be if this was your last day of life? A palliative nurse has recorded the top five regrets of the dying. There was no mention of … Read more

What defines Apple? 1984 – Macintosh  2003 – Ipod 2008 – Iphone 2010 – Ipad What are its products known for? – Simple to operate, great to look at Why did the Mac have a translucent cover? – Perfectionism Why did Apple not get into dot com? – Focus What made Steve Jobs his first … Read more

It is said that mankind has progressed more in the last two centuries than it has in the last two millenia. And what could be the reason for that? The answer is quite a simple one: Because there are many more of us today compared to the numbers that existed till the 19th century. Is … Read more

Robert Bosch’s first product, circa 1887, was a low voltage magneto for petrol engines. It was only in 1927 that Bosch launched its bread and butter product – injection pumps for diesel engines. Contemporary engines use a technology called Common Rail Diesel Injection. In the older design of fuel pumps a mini engine of sorts … Read more

Atul Manohar did his schooling from Pune’s Jnana Prabodhini and then architecture from MM Pune. Immediately after finishing his architecture, he went on to IIT Bombay IDC to do his Masters in Design. He worked with corporates for a dozen years in companies like Mahindra Satyam and Informatica, mostly in the IT sector – intermingling … Read more