The Third Slip: Issue 98 - The poll-ar vortex
Hello, Slippers! Welcome to The Third Slip—the weekly newsletter brought to you by two guys who have a very limited understanding of life, the news, or anything at all really. This publication according to experts had “a snowflake’s chance in hell” of surviving this long. But then, the polar vortex happened, so our response to them is also the motto of this newsletter “in your face, experts!”. We’ve just opened up a bank account to collect our big earnings because that was supposed to happen when “hell freezes over” which should be about a week from now.
This is issue 98. 98 is the average number of TV channels a user would have subscribed to since TRAI’s new guideline allowed the consumer to dictate which channels they need. And since you’ve wisely chosen the packages of your choice you now have more time and more money for TTS. Unless, of course, you didn’t know unsubscribing was an option. But before you realise that, let’s distract you with the news…
At Home
A slab in your face: For about 3 hours on February 1st, there were wild high-fives in offices across India as it seemed that the budget looking at the 2019 elections gave a tax bonus for all income up to 5 lakh. Later, it was clarified by looking at the fine print that the tax exemption was only for people earning up to the 5 lakh figure and that tax slabs don’t change for anyone earning above the cutoff. Basically, the government had applied the “lol no bro, this is only for people who will vote” filter. There were many other election-led promises as well, but the Congress took the cake with this beautifully bizarre tweet. What lovely election comedy awaits us.
Putting the ploy in unemployment: Oh look, we have the most unemployment in 45 years. But at least that gave us this gem of a tweet by Swarajya honcho R Jaggi, who said this meant more people are looking for jobs. The same logic that you applied when the opposition scored 400 against India, it meant that there was scope for two double centuries to be scored. The election season has also started hotting up and we’re too lazy to talk about anything here: a TL;DR is that BJP promises more ambitious versions of the same things it promised in 2014 (while not fulfilling much), while the Congress … Well… Yeah. And chances are, things are likely to continue being that way. Happy Election Year, guys!
That’s not Kochhar: The enforcement directorate has filed a criminal case against former ICICI bank CEO Chanda Kochhar, her husband and others. She’s also had to give back an amount of money that in financial jargon is referred to as a fuckton. The case which also involves Videocon which makes washing machines is appropriately against money laundering.
Tycoondom Bridge: Who knew you could buy tycoondom? Mukesh Ambani, apparently. He is aiming to become India’s first Internet tycoon. Oh well, if you can pretty much buy a Premiership win (hi, Man City!)...
Laurels and hardy: That adorable old grandpa from the MDH ads is also its CEO and is now a Padma Bhushan. The Tata Group has entered the “100 most valuable brands”, it’s valued at $19.5b. The intrepid TTS, meanwhile, is clearly anti-establishment and does not believe in meaningless awards or the existence of such things as a viable reader base.
Around the world
C0°ld Spot: A lot has happened in a freezing cold US (yes, Trump did wish for Global Warming to come back). The shutdown (which cost $11b) is over. A Trump aide got arrested and has a potential treasure trove of emails and data for Bob Mueller. Many Republicans (including the Senate leader) are finally getting balls to push back against Trump. Which is good—given that most of them are octogenarian white males, they probably haven’t been using said orbs for a while. And bereft of positive coverage, Trump invited the NYT over and blabbered about how awesome he was and how the presidency is actually losing him money. Also, “Freezing Cold” is a good way to interpret the US since Trump ended a Cold War-era treaty with Russia. So an arms race could happen. Fun! Starbucks’ former CEO, Howard Schultz wants to run for President (and that might only end up helping Trump. And department name misspellings). Finally, a fabulous article about why it makes sense to start the impeachment process against Trump now.
Cash hogi: Speaking of coooooooold, now that everyone’s forgotten about how Saudi Arabia murdered that journalist, its ruler can get started building stuff—$425b worth of it.
China ek pal nahi: Malaysia’s been a critic of China’s ‘infrastructure diplomacy’—and are now cancelling a $20b rail project. Oh, and the US hit Huawei with charges for fraud which should definitely help that trade war! Meanwhile, it’s business as usual in China as they jail a leading human rights lawyer for 4.5 years.
Thinking out of the box: Brexit is the gift that keeps on giving. This week, it’s given enterprising folks the chance to make an “emergency Brexit Box” amidst fears that there might be a shortage of food and other essentials immediately after Brexit. Of course, all of this is needless worrying; as your favourite Game of Thrones might say looking at these panic mongers: “Hoarder!”
War and peace: The Doomsday Clock update for the new year says that we’re still only 2 minutes away from annihilating ourselves—they’re being generous. On the less dark side, the US and Taliban are negotiating peace in Afghanistan and are close to a deal.
Things from the Biz & Tech Pages
You’ll never talk alone: Facebook’s merging Whatsapp, Instagram & Messenger—so much for “everyone operates independently”. Look forward to Whatsapp influencers / good morning Instagram DMs / fake news on FB (oh wait). This probably shows we’re probably back to “small groups of friends” rather than shouting from the rooftops. Sorry, Google+ Circles, you were before your time!
Stalk market: Zuckerberg wrote an op-ed saying “we’re not evil yaar”, but no one is buying it because maybe they shouldn’t have paid teenagers to install an app that spies on their phones. Oops! Elsewhere in the UK, TV has improved its targeting enough for advertisers to move away from Facebook. Despite all this, FB’s revenue grew 30 per cent and its stock 7 per cent. Yay capitalism!
Filtering the bubble: This week in tech finally getting their shit together—FB’s started working on that “Facebook Supreme Court” idea to have an oversight on content and YouTube will pappa-promise not to show so many conspiracy videos.
FDI-duddy:
Govt of India: Hmm, some rules would be nice to set right the policy on FDI in e-commerce. Feb 1 onwards? | Amazon/Flipkart: NOOOOO extend deadline plzz. | All other ecomm players & mobile companies: Feb 1 works well, thanks
LinkedOut - the best things we read this week
Buzzfeed recently laid off several staff members. And that’s sad for journalism, showing that Google & Facebook can’t be broken. And this time, sadly, you will believe reason #7.
America has an inferiority complex, and that’s dangerous for its society.
An excellent read about the state of Internet publishing (and why Facebook & Google aren’t really to blame)
Stop pretending to love “hustling” and working 15 hours a day to transform the world.
Tired of hearing about us ramble on about “Mueller investigation”? Here are 5 ways it could end. The investigation, not our rambling.
That’s it for this week. If you really like us, subscribe to The Third Slip and also send it to your friends. If you don’t like us, send our newsletter to your family WhatsApp group to get back against annoying good morning messages. If you’d like to get in touch with us, find us on Twitter (Chuck | Tony) or email us. Until next week, may you never have to mute a WhatsApp group that you’re a part of. Bye!
