The Third Slip: Issue 49 - Breaking News: This Just-in
Hello Slippers! Welcome to The Third Slip where we are in the business of breaking news - into its constituent elements, ruminating about the week’s news through some masochistic mastication with some thoo inducing humour and some teeth-gnashing points of view to feed you with some digestible information with the sex appeal of an engineering student on the dance floor. But we also have our flaws, such as our fascination for random math.
This is issue 49 - 49 is the first number that’s a square with its digits also being squares - much like this newsletter where two engineer MBAs who the cool kids often refer to as squares have created one larger square, complete with some 2ab synergy. But we’re not just about math, we are also about the news…
At Home
Trudeau or False?: After successfully contracting the dream pair of Virat and Anushka, Manyavar went one step further and signed up one whole Canadian family for its brilliant marketing campaign. Or so it seemed for this whole week when Justin and family came to India, and he looked more sanskaari than most Indians who know who Trudeau is.
Nobody quite knows why he came or what transpired. For the most part, it looked like he was Just-intruder - since he met Modi only briefly (imagine Mr. Modi passing up a PR opportunity, that’s like Virat Kohli shouldering arms to a free hit. So Modi did finally meet the Trudeau family to keep his child-ear-pulling record alive. Trust us, you want to see this), and courted controversy by meeting a Sikh separatist - but clearly, the “darling of Buzzfeed 2015” scales are falling around the world.
Likhte Likhte LoU ho jaye: Forget Roger Federer, the best tennis we’ve seen all year is between the BJP and Congress, as they keep lobbing the ball of the PNB scam into each others’ courts (and playing some supremely creative shots while they’re at it!). The score is LoU all in the second set. Again, the government has as much business being in banking as two Mallu MBAs have of trying to make sense of the news.
If they can’t have rice, they can rot for the flies: What he stole was rice. The reason, hunger. What he got was death. In an incident that has rattled the conscience of the state of Kerala and the nation as a whole, a mob beat to death Madhu, an Adivasi man in Kerala. And to show how progressive God’s Own Country is, they took selfies and made videos while they were at it. Shame.
Which way the river flows: Gujarat elections around the corner? Khakra gets cheaper. Elections done? Cool, now take water away and divert to a state that has elections coming up, we’ll deal with the whining farmers in 4 years’ time. Thankfully, in Karnataka, they’re adopting a different strategy - communalism and fake news. Phew!
The Kamal blooms in Tamil Nadu politics: Kamal Hassan launched a party in TN - it’s difficult to say what’s going to happen, but it’ll be interesting to see what happens to the DMK-AIADMK duopoly the state currently has.
You accuse of being raped? Go to Pakistan: After all, they delivered justice to a rape accused in 6 days. Meanwhile, here, a Hindu group defends a cop accused of rape, while waving the national flag. Jai Hindware. (In Arunachal, though, people are taking justice into their own hands - lynching a rape accused.)
Noino (not the Onion)
Going to Pakistan? Learn Mandarin: Bizarrely, Mandarin is now one of the official languages of Pakistan. High stakes game of Chinese Whispers anyone?
This week in “These Japanese are Crazy” - you can apparently say how the stock market is doing by analysing eyebrow trends (Not a Priya Prakash Varrier story. *wink*)
That went too fart: When the Wright Brothers invented the airplane, they gave the human race the ability to break through the winds. In an ironic twist, breaking wind caused a flight to land ahead of its destination this week.
Around the world
There is hope: The US’ recent image as a laughing stock is changing. Not thanks to politicians - far from it. Teenagers around the country - including survivors of the Parkland shooting - are making sure that the debate and coverage are not dying down. Maturely. All this, despite despicable hate from the pro-gun lobby. Meanwhile, politicians look foolish, clumsy and heartless. This is history being made. (Meanwhile! The Prez says “just arm the teachers”, went to a nightclub on the day after the shooting, and his son is touring India to sell real estate, and another Trump associate pleaded guilty about colluding with Russians.)
Broadbandh: The FCC chairman, Ajit Pai, along with trying to kill net neutrality, wants to take broadband internet away from poor Americans. We apologize for this one, America.
Elon Musk has eyes on Washington DC! Haha, we only meant he’s boring his tunnels there, nothing else. What were you thinking/hoping for? (Also, he’s shooting up internet satellites into space)
Military BlockAd: Google making Chrome block annoying ads is not fully altruistic, given that it makes most of its money through ads - it hopes that if people are less aggravated, they won’t install more aggressive ad blockers which would, in effect, impact its revenue.
Brexit? More like “No Brentry”. Nobody wants to come to England anymore for work.
The world’s battleground: Whenever countries want to fight, they go to… Poor Syria. After hosting US + friends vs Russia + friends, we now might be seeing Israel vs Iran. That is if the country can stop killing its own citizens (250 people were killed in a strike this week). Basically, take out your real estate investments in Damascus.
Tech
Phone-due: The biggest mobile tech event of the year, Mobile World Congress, is coming. Which means all the iPhone X-‘inspired’ phones will be there.
Pi goes on infinitely: The Raspberry Pi can do anything. Including power glasses that can ‘read’ for the visually impaired.
Oh, Snap! Kylie Jenner said she doesn’t use Snapchat anymore, sending the stock plummeting to the tune of $1 billion. Now THAT is actual influencer power, not a stupid hashtag.
Cryptocurrency of the Week The ‘Petro’ - launched by (get this!) the country of Venezuela to solve their economic crisis. We still don’t know what cryptocurrency means.
LinkedOut - the best things we read this week
The Pyeongchang Winter Olympic Stadium will be torn down after use. That’s actually not a bad idea, given how many stadiums just end up being unused.
Like it or not, clean ‘lab-grown’ meat is coming.
Two young comedians superbly analyse how AIB doesn’t represent women enough. It’s more diagnostic than accusatory, and the collective themselves have taken it sportingly (even if their supporters, predictably, haven’t), and promised change.
Perhaps AI researchers should… Slow down (and get more paranoid) till, y’know, we figure shit out. (“Slow down? What’s that?!” - Silicon Valley)
How the internet is coaching Nihal Sarin, India’s latest chess prodigy.
Baradwaj Rangan remembers Sridevi, the star who could do everything every kind of director wanted her to do.
That’s it for issue 49 of The Third Slip. If you’d like to get in touch with us, give us feedback, or generally increase your following count, you can find us on Twitter (Chuck | Tony). You can also reach us on email and we may feature your email in the next The Third Slip if your madness matches ours. If you prefer doing anonymous CSR, why not get a friend of yours to sign up for The Third Slip? Until next week, may your life be as random Justin Trudeau’s visit to India and as colourful as his socks. Bye!