I remember the time when our NRI cousins would visit us from the lands of plenty, laden with Toblerone chocolates, plump pink dolls with blue eyes that actually closed and clothes that would never wrinkle. How we fought over the coveted goodies, eking out each piece of delicious chocolate over several weeks. We used to listen wide eyed to tales of shopping malls, five storied structures that housed everything from apples to xylophones, where you could spend a whole day and yet not see half of what was on sale.

During that rare overseas trip, we would be dazzled by the glitz, glitter and the profusion of material wonders that were strewn temptingly in our paths. We would assiduously convert all prices to Indian rupees and cluck in horror on discovering that the tiny purse cost the same as a two bed room apartment in Bombay. We would return to India bemoaning the lack of choice and the poor quality of the stuff in our shops. The kids would show off the Mickey Mouse mechanical pencil to all the classmates and the ladies would flaunt the fake Gucci bag at every function.

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The old adage “Content is king” doesn’t seem to be borne out by the post-bubble resurgence of new media. The three companies that have benefited by this resurgence the most are Google, Apple and YouTube, which is now part of Google. None of them create content. In the post-bubble period the market values created by the three companies are as below:

1. Google – $144 B (Google was privately held before their IPO in August 2004).
2. Apple – $51 B (incremental since March 10, 2000)
3. YouTube – $1.7 B for an 18 month old startup.

On the other hand, Time Warner has lost a whopping $197 B in market cap from its high in March 2000. CBS, Viacom and Universal haven’t done too well either.
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…….Or Why I chauffeur at the tennis tournaments

Let’s face it – which well-off Indian in their right mind would willingly do a chauffeur’s job? Not me! Chauffeurs mostly drive and then sleep between driving assignments. For the most part, my memory of drivers is that of utterly bored, sleepy looking folks who often look like they are doing me a big favor!

So when a friend mentioned that her husband was a volunteer driver at the Seibel Open tennis tournament in downtown San Jose, I was intrigued.

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