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Autposy of the I Vote for Nobody email Fwd

Post 26/11 Mumbai is totally different. In fact, it has spread across the country. Everybody is charged up and has an urge to do something, take an action, be a part of or trigger a revolution in order to take charge of the country. Citizens are putting their words into action and putting in all efforts to channelize their anger and pain into building a better, safer future for all of us.

Post the terror attacks, citizens are engaged in constructive activities ranging from organizing peace/protest rallies, candle lighting, debates, blood donations, creating FB orkut groups and discussion fora, writing blog posts etc. The motive being clear: to challenge the system and make sure that we create a diligent and safe society.

One such initiative was forwarding of this email across groups and individuals that challenges the politicians and threatens them indirectly by describing an option of voting nobody in the election.
This act however, also stands as an example of the trouble and confusion we might cause and create amongst ourselves if our initiatives are not checked upon with due diligence.

Here is the email as I received it:

Dear All,

Section 49-O of the Constitution

Did you know that there is a system in our constitution, as per the 1969 act, in section "49-O" that a person can go to the polling booth, confirm his identity, get his finger marked and convey the presiding election officer that he doesn't want to vote anyone!

Yes such a feature is available, but obviously these seemingly notorious leaders have never disclosed it. This is called "49-O".

Why should you go and say "I VOTE NOBODY"... because, in a ward, if a candidate wins, say by 123 votes, and that particular ward has received
"49-O" votes more than 123, then that polling will be cancelled and will have to be re-polled. Not only that, but the candidature of the contestants will be removed and they cannot contest the re-polling, since people had already expressed their decision on them. This would bring fear into parties and hence look for genuine candidates for their parties for election. This would change the way, of our whole political system... it is seemingly surprising why the election commission has not revealed such a feature to the public....

Please spread this news to as many as you know...Seems to be a wonderful weapon against corrupt parties in India... showing your power,expressing your desire not to vote for anybody, is even more powerful than voting... so don't miss your chance. So either vote, or vote not to vote (vote 49-O) and pass this info on...

"Please forward this mail to as many as possible, so that we, the people of India, can really use this power to save our nation".

Use your vote right for a better INDIA.

I was excited on reading it, as it seemed to be an interesting piece of NEWS. However, after scouting for related info over the internet I came down with the following notes:

• Here is the link to an official government PDF that confirms the rule :
  http://www.eci.gov.in/PROPOSED_ELECTORAL_REFORMS.pdf (pg 15/32)
  
  
• You dont end up voting for Nobody. You just identify and not vote.
  
  
• This means --> that the polling officer will come to know of your decision in this case. This will be recorded.
  
  
• Here is the pdf that gives info on the consequence of doing so:
  http://archive.eci.gov.in/handbook/PRESIDING%20OFFICER.pdf (pg 49/119)
  
  
• Note that: Constitution of India has Articles and not sections! This particular item is a part of Rule 49 O of the Conduct of Election Rules
  
  
• Beware : The original post has a lot of loose ends.Don't take it as is. If elections were to be redone in this manner, then the EC would end up spending loads of cash; there also exists the possibility of an infinite loop in some constituencies.
  E.g. :
  
  

  Candidate wins, say by 123 votes, and that particular ward has Received "49-O" votes more than 123

  
  Did he get 123 votes and win? OR Did win by margin of 123 votes?

It is very crucial for all of us to think rationally and with due diligence before we act; else there is a high probability of adding more to the prevailing anger and confusion instead of channelizing it properly.

Jai Hind!

ROCK ON ... and keep rocking

The Movie: Rock On

Producer: Ritesh Sidhwani, Farhan Akhtar |Writer, director: Abhishek Kapoor |

StarCast: Farhan Akhtar, Arjun Rampal, Purab Kolhi, Luke Kenny, Prachi Desai

Plot Preview:
The movie oscillates between the successful present and the happy past of 'MAGIK'.
Magik is a band formed by the four protagonists in their early twenties, when they escaped the quarter age crisis by doing the thing they wanted to do.
The band that rocked the crowd and set the stage ablaze moved apart for self centric reasons to give some of its members a successful and 'well settled life': the life without a calling.
The story takes you across the split and merger of MAGIK with the magic of meaningful music combined with a coherent sense of direction.


USP of Rock On:

• Emphasis on minute real life details:
  The viewer is an intelligent being. He will be impressed by fantasy if he is looking forward to it. So if a film maker shows a series of impossible acts, the viewer is bound to loathe it unless, the movie is called “The Miracle’ or ‘Mission Impossible”.
  
  With Rock On, we finally have a rare Indian production that shows a guy playing an electric guitar without a piano/keyboard/acoustic guitar playing in the background. It is every actor’s fantasy to be a rock-star and hold a Kramer; but then you can’t do hip hop numbers holding that electric guitar.
  Farhan Akhtar indeed has a sense of detailing, which he exhibited in 'Dil Chahta Hai', his directorial debut, by manifesting a no nonsense , no fantasy story of three young men on the crossroads of life. With Luke Kenny on board, Rock On had to strike the perfect chord with the subject technicalities.
• Something to take back home:
  Rock On is about the youth too. It talks about a crossroad of life too. Yet, it was a totally new and refreshing experience. The movie focuses on a popular dilemma that everybody faces in the younger 20's and 30’s. The one that gives us a choice of doing the thing that we want to do v/s the thing that we are expected to do. Life goes on either ways; success would come to you both ways too. The root of the dilemma is, was, and will always remain about happiness and satiation'.
  
  
  Rock On beautifully captures 'the quest of the calling with the pursuit of happiness' and puts it in front of you in a captivating manner.
  
  

• The Rock says:
  
  Rock on is a Bollywood flick and that too about a Rock Band. It is obvious that it would have several songs and, as per past trends, they would be wannabe rock tracks or rip offs.
  I am not a big music digger to guarantee their originality, but I can surely say the stuff was genuinely rock (formerly 'the blues') and in case my intuition counts they were far apart from the Indian rip-offs that we have been exposed to.
  
  The way this genre of music has been portrayed will do a lot of good to its image. It'll break the myth that equates Rock n Roll to sex and drugs, and limits its domain to sub-genres like Death Metal, Heavy Metal etc. which are perceived as a portrayal of sheer noise for the uninitiated. The movie will help the junta identify the Indian rock scene and respect the genre as a source of meaningful lyrics and passionate music instead of head-banging and mosh pits.
• Silence is blissful:
  
  The adage has a lot to teach, especially to the Indian film directors. A complete lack of human and other artificial sounds including a background score adds a huge impact on scenes that are heavy on the emotional/senti side.
  The scene that features Joe (Arjun Rampal) sitting alone in his balcony with the guitar on his lap had only the sound of crickets playing at the back.
  This style of direction has been depicted in Dil Chahta Hai too. A few other directors like Nagesh Kuknoor have also deployed this fundamental of film making in their movies and has always been the differentiating factor.

The Verdict:

Two Time watch.
Rating: * * * * 1/2

Producer: Ritesh Sidhwani, Farhan Akhtar |Writer, director: Abhishek Kapoor |

StarCast: Farhan Akhtar, Arjun Rampal, Purab Kolhi, Luke Kenny, Prachi Desai

Image courtesy: www.daijiworld.com

The Smart Shopper Series

Let me to introduce you to the smart shopper series that I propose to initiate here at !!pseudonormicks!!

This series would comprise of posts that deal with various aspects of consumer shopping spanning across topics like how business works, tips and tricks to smart buying and of course some great deal listings.

This is not a well thought of and a well planned attempt, so kindly bear with me if it doesn't live up.


Currently I am also researching on building up a service that caters to individuals who value their time and money while out shopping. For the same purpose I've initiated a survey that would help me understand consumer preferences.

The short questionnaire would take you approximately 7 minutes to fill up and you can find it over here.

Data portability on social networks : Bain or Boon ?

Last week's Trend Candy (Trendhunter’s weekly newsletter) got me a catchy piece of news in their Hot trends section. The head line went like “Celebrity MySpace Hacking - Paris Hilton & Lindsay Lohan's Private Pics (GALLERY)”. After being a spectator to most of their private videos, the ‘private pics’ dint lure me as much as the phrase ‘data interoperability’ which was featured as a teaser for the aforementioned trend.
I decided to Google the phrase ‘data portability” and came up with the observations:

• Dataportability.org is a work group, on the lines of ‘Open id’, that works on the philosophy of promoting the capability of controlling, sharing and moving data from one system to another thereby enabling the user to control, move and share all his personal identities and data.

• If enabled across a variety of social networks, it will allow the user to control all his accounts across these networks in a central manner. For example if you wish to change your email id from abc@xyz.com to def@pqr.com , then using data portability , you wont have to undergo the pain of changing this across every other social networking website.
Furthermore, the myriad web apps that drive users crazy can also interoperate the user’s data across various networking websites. So you can buy your friend a beer or buy him for $x at social networking site A and sell him for $y on website B. All thanks to data interoperability.

• Even though data portability lets a user access all his friends and media across all the websites and widgets, there is a possible downside to it. Different websites and web apps govern the users with their own terms of service (TOS). So In case if a user wishes to interoperate from a popular social networking site to a lesser known website then there is a fair chance of TOS conflict and in the process the user may lose his rights over his own data, very aptly phrased by Nitin Borwankar at Gigaom as

“The real problem — and the elephant in the room – is not whether web app vendors “allow” me to take my data and go play elsewhere, but whether they “play fair” with my data when it’s in the web app.”

• Going ahead on the TOS conflict, in case a user wished to delete his account from website x, he would do that in a simple manner, but website X might have already provided his email and other identity details to all the networks in the DP workgroup. Which means, there exists a possibility that the user wont be allowed to delete his account from website Y, that already posses the ID details of the user thanks to data interoperability. The argument can be furthered to a point where certain websites allow users to make different friends group thereby restricting certain friends from personal data like say ‘birthday’ or 'relationship status', while other websites in the network might not respect the same set of restrictions thereby ensuring that the users privacy is not guaranteed.

Some social networks who have already adopted data portability
|Myspace.com |Yahoo.com |Twitter.com |Ebay.com|
*courtesy Techcrunch

With all these pros and cons, it seems data portability is definitely a novel initiative trying to sort out the mess for web2.0 users; but for it to implement, a heavy collaboration amongst various social networking websites is expected else the user would eventually land up into a bigger pothole trying to save him self from a puddle of mud.Till then, I'd recommend that you read all the TOS and stop the old habit of blindly clicking on "I accept the TOS" for the sake of safeguarding your own sovereignty in Web2.0.
These are my views from a little bit of browsing across the web, I'd like to know your comments to reach a more stable conclusion.


* picture courtesy :dataporatbility.org