Indian Free Speech Costs Career
I recently read about Rahul Vaid’s arrest because he created an “I hate Sonia Gandhi” group on his Orkut profile and used profanity to express his opinions about the lady of Italian descent. Many people have blogged and commented about how Google was wrong in providing the cops his IP address, which doesn’t sound particularly unfair to me. Google was just adhering to a request from the enforcers of the law, thats all.
What is SHOCKING to me are the scare tactics that the Indian police and judiciary are using on folks who have every right to express their thoughts. Heck, if that were possible, then most of the Indian and international blogosphere will have to be eliminated because they express opinions of people and many a times, those opinions are not exactly positive!
This is definitely an attack against free speech. I know a thing or two about it. While the Indian police force has a hundred other things to do, they choose to spend their time going after one individual who had something negative to say about another person. Would they have gone after Rahul if he had written smut about you or I?
I think we both know the answer.
Turning Your Life Around to Win in Business
This is truly an inspirational story not because of the ultimate success in business but because the protagonist Bob Williamson was a former druggie and homeless man. He was like one of those guys you see on busy intersections today, juggling tennis balls or selling the local newspaper.
Bob is a man after my own heart because he is in the business of providing software to school cafeterias, among other such large institutions. I’m deeply interested in this space because if you’ve been to a school lunch room or University cafeteria, you’ll be amazed at the sheer amount of food. While I don’t have any hard facts on hand, I am sure that almost 75-80% of the food goes wasted. When looked at nationally, there are over 5000 universities in the US and far more number of schools. The waste is endless.
I’ve always believed that solutions to these socio-economic problems must be capitalistic in nature. Of course, a non-profit model also works, but we all know the clear difference between the two. People sit up and listen when there is money to be made in solving a problem. Also, it would be in a food service company’s best interest to better estimate food demand and reduce waste in order to boost profits. While I am sure the Sodexho’s of the world are already doing that, I will also tell you that they’re not doing a good job. And therein lies the opportunity.
A recent show about freeganism got me thinking about developing a for-profit business plan that will move wasted food out of the hands of grocery chains, bakeries and cafeterias and into the hands of the homeless and needy and quite simply, people who want to buy food at cheaper prices. I am also happy to discuss if you want to sound off on your own ideas about how a money-making idea can make it easier to take good wasted food and move it into the hands of hungry people.
Innovation – Update
My apologies to reader Geoff for the delayed response to his really great comments. I hope to be able to write in soon.
Thank you!
