Sunday, August 25, 2013

Weekly Digest - Must read online articles

For the past few months, I have been coming across some wonderful articles on varied subjects. Most of my content discovery has been through twitter. Given that I follow nearly 300 people on twitter, I come across articles of many different kinds. Since my the list of my browser bookmarks, and favorited tweets are continuously growing, I have decided to make a weekly digest of all the interesting links I come across the week, along with a short description of the article in each link. I do hope that it would be useful to you at some point of time, but I don't mind if it is not. Having said that, here is a list of articles that kept me engaged this week :

1) Here is the first one. A first person account of the sexual harassment faced by an American woman who studied abroad in India. There is nothing uplifting about this article. It is a depressing read on the state of affairs prevalent in our country. A little time spent in the comments section of the article makes one even more depressed. When I shared this link in FB, I was directed to this response to the article, which didn't convince me. But I would leave that to your own judgement.

2) Another related link, a super sad story (fiction or everyday-reality?) of an Indian born mother who experiences growing up as a woman in India, and is reluctant to come back to the country.

3) Meanwhile, my most favorite cricketer ever is back at what he has been recently best at. No, I don't mean batting in a test match to save a series. Here is Rahul Dravid speaking at For Cricket summit, reiterating the values of test cricket. He gives some interesting ideas on merging domestic structure of different countries, and scheduling matches based on prevailing conditions to preserve test cricket. At a convocation function in BITS, he attempts to inspire youngsters with his own story. He mentions a particularly interesting plant - the Chinese Bamboo, which does not grow at all for 5 years, and then grows up to 90 feet in the next 6 months.

4) Here is a mash-up trailer of the upcoming Tamil dark comedy Sutta Kadhai, where the voice over of the Tamil movie's trailer has been synced wonderfully with visuals from Django Unchained. Personally, this movie scores high on my expectation meter, and I hope it doesn't disappoint.

5) And here is the link to a quora question "What are the most profound quotes from the Calvin and Hobbes series?". Need I say anything more? 

6) Sportskeeda has collected a list of the best Indian test cricket team ever from various cricket commentators and observers and compiled it to form the Best Indian Test xi. What stands out is that 3 players : Sunil Gavaskar, Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid are present in every single list.

7) Apart from reading these various links, I also found time to engage in some twitter banter with @opindia_revenge, the Indian wing of the hacker and activist group Anonymous. The discussion is on the merits of an anarchist state over a statist state. I decided to try using Storify for the first time in my life, and save the conversation for posterity.

8) While India was reeling over another gangrape incident, it was announced that Ben Affleck will be donning the role of Batman in the Man of Steel sequel. Indians joined the rest of the World in outraging over the merits (or the lack of it) of choosing him for the role. Having seen only two movies starring Ben Affleck (Goodwill Hunting and Argo), and I have nothing intelligent to offer to this debate. But here is a link showing how the Internet World reacted when Heath Ledger was chosen as The Joker. 

8) Here is the pick of the week. A wonderfully written unauthorized biography on Yahoo's current CEO Marissa Mayer, and how she might just change the company's fortune. Even though it is quite long, the article is informative and inspiring on so many levels. I wonder how the real people who have been mentioned in the story would feel when they read the article. If they do not feel that their personal space is violated, all journalism should be like this.

10) Frederik Forsyth is one of my more-liked authors, and I was delightfully surprised to find his latest interview with The Hindu. For some reason, I felt very good reading the interview.

11) Roger Federer fans are having a tough time supporting their hero. Here is a longish article that considers the possibility of a comeback by the legend. The article maintains a balanced tone throughout.

12) And here is an story that touches upon the very reasons I dislike Science. The account of a social psychologist who fabricated data to become famous. It is also the story of a set-up that encourages such con men. And the story of a few brave souls who exposed him.

A quick glance at the list, and I realise that it covers Current Affairs, Cricket, Kollywood, Hollywood, Tennis, Politics, Comics, Technology and Science. No wonder I believe that the Internet is awesome.

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