Innovation

United States of America – what a nation!! When one thinks about the US of A, one thinks of the dominance the nation has gained in the spheres of – well almost all spheres of excellence, be it military, technology, films, infrastructure and so on. As we Indians experience it, we have been bombarded by their culture all through our lives; at least the Generation Y is. We watch the Hollywood blockbusters right from our childhood. Firs it’s the animated films that enters our world. From Mickey Mouse to Narnia to Bolt, the new generation has seen it all. Then as the teenagers starts watching the action films like Terminator, Bourne, Jurassic Park, Transformers etc. The same guy is also taken aback when he watches the thought-provoking ones say the Matrix Trilogy. Then comes a mature guy who admires the classics like Shawshank Redemption and Pursuit of Happiness. Along the same time, he or she also watches high quality TV series like Friends, Prison Break, Big Bang Theory etc. I know I might have missed a score of suitable names above but that’s not the point. The point is that media like that is an exceedingly efficient way of exporting a nation’s culture. I have heard so many friends who use phrases like “Jesus Christ!” even though they are not Christians. I am not against Christianity and have no objections with people making such statements.

People embrace impressive culture so fast that even their parents wonder, why couldn’t they learn what we taught this fast.

Then many of the youngsters also observe that all computer related stuff either comes from America or is somehow related to America. Say the PC processor, the only names that will come to your mind are Intel and AMD , both American Corporations. Think software, Microsoft, Adobe, IBM, Apple etc.etc. All American. Think web, Google, Yahoo, e-Bay, Wikipedia, Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Amazon all headquartered in the same nation.

Then one begins to ponder how one nation could produce “stuff” of so great quality that no other nation is even close. Well this is not at all surprising and neither it should be.

The nation that is the global power for about half a century is the innovation-engine of the world. The British Empire (On which the sun would never set same as they termed the Titanic the “unsinkable”) ,the global power before USA , was also the innovation engine for the 18^th and 19^th century. The real industrial revolution began in Britain and then spread to the whole Europe then to the entire world as we see it. The textile mills, lathe machines and steam engines came from Britain. English language as we see it is dominant in the world due to the British and American dominance on the globe called earth. But now what next?

The USA is on the decline as we know it. So who is on the rise? Asia particularly China.

So it seems as of now that the 21^st century would belong to China. Bam. Welcome to the Language Conflict. English would decline because the Chinese are not that eager to learn English as others are like say Indians or Brazilians or French. They would rather continue the Chinese language and bring more glory to it. It is a well known fact that the world learns the language of the superpower. Hadn’t it for the British Empire, English would not be the so called “internationally accepted” language. The same logic applies for currency. It was the USA who brought the American Dollar as the standard international currency. Look at the web, there are already so many Chinese websites because the Chinese people think twice before trying to learn English. It seems inevitable as of now, that the Chinese language would dominate the world. So what we (the non-Chinese) do? Learn Chinese?

The mighty Indian media

The media especially the news media is considered to be free and fair in India. Obviously it is free, no doubt about that. But when it comes to fairness, it crosses a line. Sometimes the line is subtle and sometimes it is not. Is it true, or maybe it is my perception that the private Indian media is quite patriotic. Look at all the news that is bombarded by them. Although the media constantly lashes out at ministers, which is a good thing by the way, but when it comes to Pakistan or say some important national topic like the Nuclear Deal or economically thwarting policies of the Left parties, it suddenly takes on a biased view. Talk about sensationalizing news and the private media would unanimously say, “Now we’re talking”.

When I was a child there were very few private news channels unlike today. Still most people used to watch the news on the stone-age Doordarshan. I used to wonder how they could watch such a mundane channel but now I see the wisdom in it. Although it took me about 10 years to realize that, it might be pretty obvious to others that Doordarshan news is one of the highest quality news that this nation has to offer, unbiased, sticking to the fact, not moulding public opinion but letting the masses sort out for themselves what the news means for them and for the nation. Although they don’t have an ostentatious studio with a dozen plasma televisions hanging in the background, but no private channel can match the quality of the content and the delivery of the news.

Although I won’t take it all from the private news channels, they do deserve the credit for spreading terror amongst all bureaucracy levels and the political class regarding corruption by exposing scams after scams be it the Tehelka or the latest medical college scam in Chennai. They are in a way also serving to churn out patriotic Indians which is no mean achievement in itself.

With the increasing penetration of the private media as the DTH, these media groups become more powerful. Their news is what the nation will swallow. They do have a tremendous responsibility towards the nation. But at the end of the day these are privately owned and what even a high school student knows is that profit is their main motive. What if the major media groups merge and eat up all the smaller media firms tomorrow and there is a single ever powerful media that can change the course of the nation at its will? I know the situation is far fetched, but is it impossible? Of course Doordarshan will be there, but its impact would have been drastically reduced with the DTH services spreading across the nation. If I visit a normal Indian village, I would be surprised if there is not a single DTH dish in that village. With the kind of growth these operators are having and the rates declining it is no wonder that these DTH operators might almost serve the entire nation. What if a political party owns such a mighty media group? What if the political party is the ruling party? Would we turn into a pseudo-democracy or rather communists? Is there a law to prevent that?