Facebook is now mainstream in India. It has seen 2.1 crore unique Indians visitors in July. The rival Orkut had two crore visitors and thus in July, there were a total of over four crore Indian visitors on these social networking sites.

The numbers are just too big to ignore and the company is in the process of launching its office in Hyderabad. This will be the social networking giant’s 10th international office, which will provide support for sales and multi-lingual operations.

Not so social after all

As the Facebook blog said: “The new offices come at a significant time in our international growth. Seventy per cent of the people using Facebook are outside the US and are accessing the service from more than 70 languages. In India alone, we’ve seen rapid growth and now have more than 8 million (eighty lakh) people there actively connecting on Facebook with their friends, family, and other people they know, both within India and around the globe.”

You could say that Facebook has truly arrived in India when a friend narrated a story of how his sister had sent him and her other brothers Rakhi greetings, not by calling, or otherwise, but on Facebook!

I am on both Facebook and Orkut. When I first became active, there was the flush of connecting with friends who had moved away and discovering much about their lives. Eventually came the realisation that many had moved on. Of course, the shared memories were wonderful to cling on to and revive contact, but soon I realised that I was spending too much time on these sites and I cut it down. Ironically, since I was an early user, this came at a time when the site was gaining popularity among people I knew, and they used to get upset that I had not responded to their friend requests or commented on their status. It took time, but now my friends have got used to my sporadic presence on these sites.

While researching on chatting at the start of this century, I logged on to a chat site and within days I found that I was just glued on to my commuter and ignoring other things, trying to dismiss people fast when they called on me and behaving in various other obnoxious ways. I soon realised that this was because I had started missing the high of being connected, and was well on a fast road to chat addiction. Within a week, the article finished, I logged out, and stayed logged out.

The downside of the “anywhere, anytime” mantra adopted by the communications industry has resulted in a deluge of data that affects how people think and behave, both individually and collectively. Today’s smart phones are virtually computers, with good processing power, high-speed Internet connections and cameras. Earlier this month, Yujuan Bao, a Facebook engineer, wrote in his blog that 30 per cent of the more than 500 million Facebook users are using a mobile device to access the site.

I recently met a young mother who said that she would “die” without her Facebook. At a dinner where we were together, she checked out her phone and updated her status on Facebook frequently, much to the annoyance of her mother, and irritation of the other guests.

All this tires the brain of the person who is deluged with data. A recent article by Matt Richtel in The New York Times quoted a study at the University of Michigan, USA, which “found that people learned significantly better after a walk in nature than after a walk in a dense urban environment, suggesting that processing a barrage of information leaves people fatigued.” Even though people feel entertained, even relaxed, when they multitask while exercising, or pass a moment at the bus stop by catching a quick video clip, they might be taxing their brains, according to scientists. “People think they’re refreshing themselves, but they’re fatiguing themselves,” said Marc Berman, a University of Michigan neuroscientist.

There is an incessant urge to “stay in touch” and it takes its toll. A friend recently narrated a conversation with his daughter. While travelling back from a party, she wanted to check her mail and used her father’s phone. “Look, how easy technology has made our life,” she said. “See, how it has shaved off our 10 minutes of the time we would have been conversing as a family,” replied the father.

How often do you walk into a coffee shop or a restaurant and see someone alone, just sitting and waiting? He or she would be fidgeting with a mobile phone, checking on e-mail or updating a status. Even during theatre performances, you will see the bright blue batons of those who find it impossible to enjoy something they have paid for, and fail to see the anti-social nature of action.

When you try to do too many things at the same time, you lose focus. Now, this should be a no-brainer. Try to tell that to someone who is texting while watching TV, or answering an e-mail while talking to another person, and someone who is juggling many, many tabs on his browser, trying to soak in information from everywhere. We have the multi-tasking myth. We believe that we can multitask, and that women are better at it than men. But are we doing some tasks well, or just doing more things badly? I, for one, feel that it is the latter. So, I love Facebook, but slot out my time on it, and when I am on Facebook, I concentrate on what I am doing. I feel that this makes my activity more meaningful. Would you agree?

This article by Roopinder Singh was published in the Lifestyle section of The Tribune on September 1, 2010.

The Sacred Grove

By Daman Singh
HarperCollins.
Pages 237. Rs 200.

Reviewed by Roopinder Singh

ASHWIN is smart, young, opinionated, and confused-a bundle of contradictions, that is, a teenager of today. He lives in a small town, and is the son of a ‘big’ man, the district collector. As for his mother, we are soon informed that he is expecting. Soon after she realises that she is pregnant, she goes about “as thought she has been dropped from the Indian cricket team,” says the first-person account of the youngster.

The Sacred Grove by Daman Singh

Welcome to the world of a 13-year-old, as envisioned by Daman Singh. The author, a student of mathematics, now writes works of fiction.. Ashwin’s world revolves around his parents, servants and friends, in that order. Like many children, he doesn’t see his Papa much during the day. “He was asleep when I left for school. I was asleep when he came home from office.”

He aims to master ‘Counter-Strike’, a video game in which players join either the terrorist or counter-terrorist team. “Of course, we (his best friend Ravi and him) decided to be terrorists.” Both teams try to complete their respective missions while getting rid of the other team. The game has been gifted to Ravi by his parents for Children’s Day.

“Naturally, my parents gave me nothing,” says Ashwin who cracks the game in three hours and becomes a hero in the eyes of his classmates, his victory telegraphed over the grapevine with such efficiency that he starts receiving congratulatory calls by the time he reaches home.

While he can crack ‘Counter-Strike’, he needs help in cricket, which the staff at home is ready to provide, by bowling to him all the time so that he can bat. His driver, Rafiq, puts him in place and among the fielders for the first time. Rafiq also helps him with the game. They become friendly, and this results in his playing a major role in Ashwin’s growth.

Ashwin’s cocooned existence unravels as he grows up and spends more time with his friends, his visiting aunt and even his driver. Obviously, while solving mathematical equations and building statistical models, the author retains a keen sense of awareness about her surroundings, and thus there is an authentic feel about the book and its description of a small town. The main characters are wholesome and we tend to identify with them quite easily. Rafiq, Ravi, Ganesh, Soma, Gloria, Sadhna Ma’am, Ram Singh, Mishra the SP, we have met them all in our lives.

The author introduces us to the mysterious Sacred Grove, which Ashwin sees for the first time in the company of his friends. It becomes a school project for them and soon thereafter a flashpoint of violence for the local administration, which means his father, and the new SP.

How the idyllic setting of the town in which Ashwin is the crown prince is disturbed can well be a metaphor for the nation as the venue of an innocent excursion into the wild becomes a communally charged hotspot, which is exploited cynically by the politically ambitious. Along the way, some lives are lost, much property is burnt and looted, and the lives of many are scarred. Rafiq’s brother, the physically-challenged Rehan, who had also become Ashwin’s friend, is also killed in the subsequent violence.

When Ashwin seeks to understand the riot that has taken place, his father tells him: “Some people believe that other people are different. They consider themselves better than the others. They think that they deserve more than others. And they need to prove this to everyone, especially to themselves. A small problem between the two sides becomes a big problem. And then things like this happen.”

In the book, we see Ashwin as a rebellious and caring son, a loyal friend with streaks of pettiness, an indifferent student with flashes of brilliance, a nerd with love for cricket-in short as the kind of a youngster who we are all familiar with.

Ashwin’s tantrums and how his parents deal with them, the secret hideout, jealous friends, boring elders, the coming-of-age story of the book has it all. What raises it above its genre is the substratum of social tension that runs through it. Through the protagonist, the author says a lot as she explores relationships, inter-religious interaction, and the working of the bureaucracy.

The 13-year-old can see a lot of that is going on around him, and through his eyes, we see a lot. Spending a few hours with Ashwin is a good idea. You may even want to visit his world again. I do.

The review was published in the Spectrum section of The Tribune on August 22, 2010.

Please click here to read a review of Daman Singh’s earlier book Nine by Nine.

A screen grab of the article “Jagdi Jot Bibi Inderjit Kaur Sandhu” written by Niranjan Singh Sathi, that was published in the Punjabi Daily Ajit, on August 20, 2010.

I have always had to share my mother with my brother Ravinder and other members of our family, but also thousands of her students, and many of her colleagues. This happened today also.

Since the morning we have been receiving calls and people as Mrs Inderjit Kaur, my mother, celebrates her 88^th birthday today. Many of our friends spoke about the article, written by Niranjan Singh Sathi, that was published in the Punjabi Daily Ajit, today. I will be putting the article “Jagdi Jot Bibi Inderjit Kaur Sandhu” online shortly.

Doordarshan Jalandhar is also running the Punjabi documentary they had made on her in the “Dhian Punjab Dian” series. Please click here to see the film, which was been broadcast many times over the DD Jalandhar and DD Regional channels since it was originally telecast in July 13, 2009. TV critic Randeep Wadhera wrote about the programme and its subject  in the Saturday Extra section of The Tribune on August1, 2010.   Please click here to read his comments.

As many of my friends know, my parents have figured prominently in my consciousness for long. I am attaching some links to previously written articles where they figure prominently:

Darpan comes alive

Mother’s day out

My companion, the compendium

Documentary on Inderjit Kaur

Excellence among Sikhs

Punjabi Univeristy, Patiala

Article in Ajit

When I first opened an e-mail account in the 1990s, it was a Hotmail account. I used to receive forwards from my friends, which I would actually open, read and spend time over. This was because of the novelty of the whole thing, we got so few emails every day that even something from an anonymous source was welcome.

Forward with care

How the time has changed. Today, at the top of the list of things that I just don’t want others to share with me are e-mail forwards. It’s not that I have something against them as such. We all get forwards and often we send forwards to others, but I am acutely conscious of the how much of a waste of resources they can be.

Some forwards are cute, but many make assertions, which are at unverifiable and often malicious. Heard about the latest offer from Microsoft that sounds too good to be true? It is. I also take exception to mails that say: “Please FORWARD to everyone you know”. Sometimes, bad grammar and spelling is enough to alert me to Google it and find out more about the mail.

Got a mail that says, “This is not a hoax?” I would not bet my money on it. When I get a forward, I am curious to know if it is true. I want to test the claims being made by an anonymous stranger who sent the mail to my friend and me. Often when a mail makes a claim that I suspect, I go to one of websites that track down such things.

Snopes is a common default. Searching the content of the mail on “Snopes” often exposes a fake email as an urban legend. Another site, “Truth or Fiction” also exposes latest hoaxes, as does “Hoax Slayer”.

Why do I go through this exercise? Because sometime I like a mail, I want to forward it to my friends, but I want to ensure that what I am sending is true. They will believe that because I sent it, the information must be correct, and thus my credibility is at stake here.

Now that I have found that the mail is OK, and I want to forward it, I still have some precautions to take. I click the “Forward” link in my web mail so that I have full editorial control over the mail and clean it before I sent it out.

What does that mean? Well, it means that I first change the subject and remove FW:….. automatically comes when you forward any e-mail. Sometimes, you see FW: FW: FW: which shows how many times the mail has been forwarded. On such a mail, the information is also repeated. I delete all that is not required so that my friends do not have to waste their time.

I also remove all the email addresses of other people who received the mail before me. I do not want their addresses circulating on the Net. I then send the mail to myself and use the BCC: (blind carbon copy) field for listing the e-mail addresses. This way those who receive the mail don’t see other addresses, and I preserve the privacy of my friends.

What is it that I never forward or reply to? Chain letters, including those which portend to be about a cause, the email petitions. Why? An email petition talks about an issue and asks for your support by forwarding it to your friends. You do so, and thus add to a chain letter that contains hundreds, at times thousands of addresses, which can be harvested by spammers and others with malicious intent. Email petitions do not work and they just are a great scam.

My friends Gupi and Mandy send me forwards. They are often interesting and I like going thought them.

Recently, Gupi asked me: “How did you like my forward?” I happily admitted that I enjoyed it. “I knew you would,” he retorted, “I only send you selected ones, which I know will be of interest to you.”

Now, that’s the kind of sharing I love, in which the person has taken care of your interest and protected your privacy. That’s what we should all be like.

This article by Roopinder Singh was published in the Lifestyle section of The Tribune on April 17, 2010

Roopinder Singh

Is nothing private online any longer? I am sure there is, but two major blows were struck to the perception of online privacy recently, and we should all take note of these events because they have, rather should have, a lot of impact on our lives.

Wikileaks came online in 2006. An Australian, Julian Assange, runs this international organisation that publishes leaks of documents that are not available otherwise. This Sweden-based body preserves the anonymity of its sources. This year, it has been in the news twice. In April, it posted a video titled “Collateral Murder” which showed an American helicopter shooting down what turned out to be Afghan civilians. Last week, it released the “Afghan War Diary”, in which more than 90,000 documents were opened to the general public about the war in Afghanistan.

The American government is incensed at the leak, the FBI is looking into it, and the US Secretary of State has condemned Wikileaks for ‘endangering the lives of soldiers’, but Wikileaks promises to post more documents in the near future.

Another event that shook the online world was the release of personal data of more than 100 million Facebook users. This accounts for 20 per cent of the members of the world’s most popular social networking site. Facebook announced on July 21 that it had 500 million users, up from 150 million at the start of 2009, and the question is not if it will have a billion users one day, it is when this will happen.

A company called Skull Security released the file that has publicly accessible information of the users, including their names and profile addresses, to point out vulnerabilities in privacy controls of the site. No doubt the private information of these individuals was not compromised, however, Facebook is being disingenuous when it says: “Similar to the white pages of the phone book, this is the information available to enable people to find each other, which is the reason people join Facebook.”

According to experts, the data “takes one massive step out of the equation for advertisers-finding and aggregating the data of millions of users who are searching for information on younger people,” who, incidentally, are a vast majority of Facebook users. And Facebook founder and boss Mark Zuckerberg has defended the sharing of data with advertisers on the grounds that it keeps the site free for users. It is safe to assume that few, if any, of the users of Facebook would have thought that even the public data that they posted could be valuable to advertisers, and could thus be trolled.

Soon after the announcement, I asked my son if he had changed his password. “We all knew about it in school and my friends and I changed the passwords. I have also deleted all the mail in my inbox,” he said.

At one point, I had seen his profile and those of some of his friends, and found that most of them had fairly strict privacy settings, something that is rare on Facebook. Many people tend to go for the default settings on Facebook, and don’t bother to change them to more private ones. Also, there is a widespread perception among youngsters that they are anonymous, since no one would be interested in them anyway.

They are wrong. What they do, how they go about it, what interests them, all is valuable information for marketers and others whose livelihood depends on identifying new trends and feeding them.

Many people are unaware of the amount of information that Facebook shares with others. When they enrol for various forums or games, or gifts, etc, they should be careful about letting the applications that they use access their data. Also Facebook, when it updated its privacy settings, did so without due caution, as a result of which some users’ settings reverted to the default ‘public’ options.

Just how powerful is Facebook? Here is what The Economist said recently: “A couple of months or so after becoming Britain’s Prime Minister, David Cameron wanted a few tips from somebody who could tell him how it felt to be responsible for, and accountable to, millions of people: people who expected things from him, even though in most cases he would never shake their hands.

“He turned not to a fellow head of government but to…Mark Zuckerberg, the founder and boss of Facebook, the phenomenally successful social network…. In a well-publicised online video chat this month, the two men swapped ideas about ways for networks to help governments. Was this just a political leader seeking a spot of help from the private sector-or was it more like diplomacy, a comparison of notes between the masters of two great nations?”

As of now, this comparison is a cyber illusion, but it is illustrative of how the overlap between cyberspace and real human interaction is growing. Thus, to get back to my favourite theme, cyber space is an extension of the real world, and actions in cyber space have real consequences.

Cyber users must be careful about what they put online. Please remember that anything you post can be public. Therefore, you must be careful about what you let out in the public. What goes online has a life and a momentum of its own. It can turn up at the most awkward of times, say when you are about to get job, or your potential (cyber-savvy) father-in-law is checking you out.

In the real world, what you do is often forgotten after a while, especially if it is something stupid and momentary. Online, everything that you do is there for people to see, and most often, it is your friends. Sometimes friends too turn into enemies, and you really don’t want to empower them, do you? If you think that something you are doing online is embarrassing, then don’t do it. For God’s sake, don’t post anything unless you really want it to be public. Online privacy is not quite dead, but actually, it is not quite there too, as the recent Facebook episode shows.

The article was published in the Lifestyle section of The Tribune on August 3, 2010