Why We Are Silent Now...

Ramya had gone to a restaurant with her friend. On the adjacent table sat 6 guys who were barely conversing. Strange! Why? They were busy with their mobile phones. One must have been playing Temple Run, one must have been on WhatsApp, one on Facebook, one tweeting, and so on.

Silence engulfs a lot of gatherings these days. We’re lost in our smart phones connecting with people who are not in front of us and neglecting those who are. We prefer WhatsApp and Facebook chats to face – to – face conversations. We inform our friends of changes in our lives via Facebook instead of phone calls. “You didn’t know about it? I put it up on Facebook.”

I’ve been keeping a low profile on the web lately. So a friend called and asked “Where are you these days? You’re not tweeting, no Facebook updates, no blog articles, no WhatsApp messages...” “Well, you should’ve called,” was my response. “Aah! That slipped my mind,” he sheepishly grinned.

Smart phones were meant to supplement us, just like PPTs are meant to supplement our presentations. But just like we let PPTs drive our presentations, we let smart phones control our lives. Internet connections must be on until the battery runs low; switching off our phones feels like a bigger catastrophe than 21^st December 2012; most ads are now about mobile phones; we’ve lost count of the number of apps there are... wait, we never had count of them anyway!

We can't spend a minute without Smartphones

Tyler Dunden had said “Shut down Facebook and Twitter servers. People will make real friends when they come out on the streets rioting.” It is said that we cannot have more than 150 friends in our lives. But 150 friends on Facebook is nothing short of a shame, right? It doesn’t matter if only 10 of them interact with us regularly.

We agree that we need to spend more time in real life than online, right? Let’s extend that lesson to our phones also. Let’s meet people in real world than in the virtual one. Let’s make it a point to call at least one friend a day and speak for 5 minutes. Let smart phones make our lives easier, not become our lives. Let the conversation flow at dinner or lunch rather than on WhatsApp. Reduce playing Temple Run and take a dip in the pool. Stop looking for mobile phone apps and catch a snack with a family member instead. Stop listening to your iPod on a walk. Let your mind wander; you’ll be surprised at what it comes up with. Let’s remember we are humans, not robots; let’s live like them.

The Best Thing In Life Is...

FREE! Yes, the best thing in life is FREE! Your family! The family that brings you into this world, nurtures and nourishes you, teaches you values which steer your life, stands you up on your feet and then supports you for the rest of your life. This family includes your parents, grandparents, wife and maybe children.

But there is a price we pay for sustaining this family and maintaining its strength; the price of sacrifice, hard work, time, thought and effort. It’s a price we all gladly pay. Every individual has to do her/his bit to ensure the family functions smoothly (I know ‘functions’ sounds a little crude word, but you get the idea, right?). True, there are bad times, but as we have to remember what William Shakespeare says – “This, too, shall pass!”

Today’s manic world demands a lot of our time. So much time that we spend a lot more time with friends, colleagues, work buddies, etc. than with our families. I had talked here about how we youngsters have started focussing more on materialistic things. Technology, elite goods, fast food, movies, trash TV programmes, etc. now take up a lot of our time which we otherwise could have spent with family. More time spent with work colleagues than with a significant other is one reason for the spurt in extra marital affairs. We’re gradually being pulled away from our roots and being plunged into the culture followed in the West, something we prided on avoiding earlier.

File photo of my family some 2 decades ago

"I Don't Want It."

This is probably the most powerful sentence in today’s environment; exactly opposite to what people believe gives them power i.e. “I want it!” How often do we use these words today? And do we know what results it yields?

Google exposes us to new things almost every day. The world has become a much smaller place. New Apple/Android phones can be purchased even before they are officially launched in a country. Our desires have increased, and so have our wants i.e. our desire to own something backed by the ability to purchase it. But this increase in disposable income for us has also been beneficial to manufacturers and service providers. Not just because their sales have increased, but also because the surplus demand has gradually allowed power to shift to their hands. Impatience has become an innate tendency amongst buyers and sellers are cashing in on this.

Scarcity of a particular item has led to, amongst others, rise in prices, increase in waiting periods and outrageous demands by the providers of products and services. Sometimes these demands include extra charges we consumers must pay for issues which they (sellers) create. I have come across 2 such examples in the past 2 months. The 1^st one was when I was buying a new cell phone. The shopkeeper increased the price saying it included various taxes. When my friend said we were getting a better deal elsewhere and got ready to leave, all their taxes vanished and we got the handset cheaper than what was quoted at the other store. The 2^nd one was when I was buying a new car. The dealer told me about 3 – 4 ridiculous clauses and said I had to adhere to them as it was part of standard procedure (Details of those may prove very boring). Since I was not desperate for the car, I told them I didn’t want the car. They kept saying I would have to follow the procedure and that it was for my own good, and I told them I would approach another dealer who could see things the way I do. Once again, all clauses were done away with and my terms and conditions were accepted.

We pride ourselves on being the impatient generation. TVs, cars, durables, laptops, consoles, mobile phones, etc; we want them at the push of a button. Sometimes, maybe out of desperation, we pay a premium and also may end up being harrowed by sellers for more money under the pretext of ‘setting’. All this extra money is pocketed by sellers while we are made to believe they united heaven and earth to get our work done. Similar is the case of telecom service providers (TSPs) also. They do not care how much we complain about poor service or billing issues (as long as we are adding to their ARPUs). If one threatens to leave the service, they don’t mind; they believe they’ll find many more. But the same applies to us too. True, it is an oligopolistic market (few sellers, many buyers) for TSPs, but we have the option of other providers too. MNP just makes it that much more convenient for us.

India has evolved, or rather revolutionized, since the early 90s when we had to wait years for everything. Barely any company has a monopoly in the market now; the market is far more competitive and there are people implementing good business models to meet our needs. So we do not need to depend on someone for selling us what we can buy from anywhere. If our desires have increased, so have the options to fulfil them. Let’s use the best information source – Google, to find alternate people/places/techniques that will fulfil our needs without us having to cater to their whims and fancies. If we can induce some patience in ourselves and remove the cap on the time limit to fulfil our needs and wants, we will end up realizing we got what we wanted and it was a bargain. We save money, are more knowledgeable and feel good about it. Besides, it will once again dawn upon sellers that the customer is king. We just need to know how and where to prudently use the words “I don’t want it!”