Category Archives: Perspectives

What is common sense after all?

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Common sense is a form of seventh sense supposed to be ubiquitous, acquired at birth, and/or requiring, at the very least, nominal form of nurture for development. However, too often, we come across people using phrases such as ‘Use your common sense’, ‘Common sense is not so common after all’, and ‘Your opinion just killed common sense’. If common sense is what it is supposed to be, why do we come across folks who don’t seem to possess it!

If I came from a region on Earth which is perpetually tormented by the Sun with such horrendous intensity that I never had to ‘heat’ anything. If that region on Earth had such an abundance of edible, natural resources that I never had to process any item to satisfy my intake. Let’s just assume that I never have known what ‘cool’ is! I guess if you burnt a matchbox stick in front of me, I would not avoid touching it, would I? So doesn’t that mean I haven’t got what would be common sense to you?

Likewise, it’d be OK to be ignorant of the forces of balance which guide us to jump and land on two feet, but it’s common sense to know how not to fall. It’d be OK to be unschooled of the equation of a straight line but it’s common sense to be able to draw a straight line. Is it OK for a non-electronics guy to not know that the power symbol has its own sweet little origin story? Depends, doesn’t it! What the fuck is common sense then?!

This is what I think. Common sense is that line between being ignorant and being unscientifically knowledgeable; especially, knowledgeable to the point where validation is deemed unnecessary. I added the ‘unscientifically’ for a reason. Let’s talk about it later.

To break it down to rules, common sense is nothing but a set of rules which have been coached in to you since a time you don’t remember. It is a set of emotional, physical, mechanical. mathematical, geographical, or say-what-you-will phenomena, you knew were true. Or phenomena, which you have accepted to be true. Rather, phenomena which you are never going to have to verify. Ever. You just know.

Usually, it takes the form of collective observations amassed over time based on real-life experiences to which you get exposed to. They don’t necessarily apply to another human being. They are your observations. Stuff that you know will hold true when it happens a second time, but to you. Stuff like, if you are driving in the right lane then it might be common sense that you’re going to turn right on the next turn. Well, this won’t hold true if you are driving in Gurgaon. Here, you have free will. Nobody obstructs with your free will. Common sense obeys the driver’s rules in this part of the country, not the other way around. Anyway.

But, the wonderful part here is that common sense by itself can never be wrong and hence can never be right either. This, I say from an audience point of view. As I mentioned earlier, it is an acquired sense of perception of things just as an acquired sense of opinion, which may or may not have been influenced. To quote from NYTimes’s review of ‘Everything is obvious once you know the answer’:

Watts’s point is that however well we understand the parts, we do not thereby acquire a complete understanding of the whole. This is one of the big reasons that common sense is unreliable. We are prone to think in terms of individual actors whose doings set predictable chains of events in motion. But social systems can acquire properties that don’t easily jibe with this kind of common sense — through processes like self-­reinforcing cascades, in which outcomes feedback upon themselves, or nonlinear dynamics, in which small changes in input can lead to large changes in output.

This leads us to the ‘unscientific’ part of my definition. Certainly, you can use common sense to guide you through your chores. Like not dropping that ceramic coffee cup on the floor. But not for deciding that you have to revolve the car steering wheel clockwise to turn it right. When doing so, you’d have to check if there is an oncoming vehicle on your right lest you wish to dent his car. Another example:

If we drop a match on a forest floor, we cannot predict whether the result will be a conflagration or a campfire just by knowing a lot about matches. The outcome much depends on what is going on nearby: how dry is the terrain, how dense is the forest, how fast is the wind? When the right conditions for a fire exist, any spark will set it off; but when they do not, no spark will suffice.

Rightly so, common sense is not inherently consistent. Two people performing a similar action based on their respective common senses may arrive at two completely different outcomes. Common sense is ambiguous because, unlike a scientific experiment which can be performed n-times by following the same procedure under similar environments, common sense can’t be bound by procedures. Hence, common sense is also unverifiable. Essentially, a better common sense is a wise judgement developed through the right experiences over a period of time through your mistakes/knowledge/actions. And just as, there is always a decision or opinion better than yours, there is always a common sense better than yours. An article by HBSWK applies a similar concept to explain leadership skills requiring decision-making.

So maybe the next time you have to use your common sense, you might as well back it up with as many experiences as possible without failing to take into consideration those external factors whose effect on your decision might deem your common sense a screw up!

Thoughts on internet privacy

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Bruce Schneier, a technologist and leading author on security issues was quoted saying ”What the system defines as normal is what a child is quickly going to think is normal, and he’ll build his life around it”.

There is a huge chunk of internet users who show outrage on the manner in which companies save user information to create a customized, central, one-stop social product for everyone. These companies don’t steal information. They are smart, in the context of privacy, at making users agree to sharing information with the companies. The user agrees to the privacy policies and willingly shares information with companies such as social networking sites. Most of us don’t have a problem sharing information; and I agree, we shouldn’t have a problem with that. However, we should be aware of the extents to which our personal information is being used, distributed or even shared without our knowledge. The outrage over privacy doesn’t only include social networking sites. It includes a horde of different services right from file-sharing websites, banking-related websites, and even your local broadband service provider.

Facebook got it all figured out in social networking but, it almost went disastrously wrong before the Lane vs Facebook lawsuit. In 2009, the FTC warned Facebook to change its privacy practices when the FTC noted that Facebook was publicly posting posts which were meant to be ‘friends only’. Facebook was also charged with sharing user information with advertisers without notifying individual users; without the user’s consent that is. Since then, Facebook has hired a team of privacy officers. They’ve even submitted to ‘privacy audits’ for the next 20 years. They reformed their privacy policies and today we all seem so much more comfortable to share on Facebook. But, just two days ago, the FTC was urged to probe whether Facebook is violating privacy settlement. Plus, the 19 year-old Zuckerberg was smart enough to IM his way through users’ privacy concerns; in his long-forgotten chat, Zuckerberg calls users of Facebook ‘dumb fucks’.

Google, on the other hand, started with a ‘Do no Evil‘ motto. Then there were a few setbacks with the now defunct Google Wave and Google Buzz. There was some major competition to Google from Facebook. Then came Google Plus and the coherence to the Google account linked products. It was then that Google decided to refresh their privacy policies across all products; a unified policy for all products linked to a Google account. We also remember when Google was accused of collecting user information viz. emails, passwords, etc. while the Google Street View team was cruising the streets of the world. Google was also accused of overriding cookie settings in Safari for the purposes of ads tracking.

Just take a look at the number of times FTC is found accusing Google and Facebook with privacy charges.

So, we begin to realize that everything in user privacy has got to with the personal privacy policies of the tech companies. Come to think of it, it is very difficult for us to understand the privacy policies of each website we visit. And accepting privacy policy terms of a social network does not call for ethical use of the information shared on that platform. In fact, it may be just the opposite.

Most applications don’t use user provided data for unethical purposes. Think of the way Google has changed over the years. Do you think that there exists anything called a ‘standard’ Google search engine? No. The Google algorithm has been updated and refined over the years to cater to people individually. When I search for Greece, the Google first page lists out articles and news related to holiday destinations in that country (just the first page). When my girlfriend searches for Africa, she is provided updates about the economic position of the Euro-zone, specifically articles and news related to Greece; she being the well-read between the two of us. At first, such customizable search results seem like a good feature on search engines. But, beyond the ‘WTF line’, they seem creepy. Google searches which are performed without a user login should return neutral, unadulterated results. But, I don’t think that is the case. Not with me at least.

So where is all this leading us to? Well, nothing really. The Obama administration recently announced an interest in passing the ‘Privacy Bill of Rights’. Many more such privacy bills are being floated across countries to address people’s concerns over information sharing and the recent surge in data brokers. Jeff Chester of the Centre for Digital Democracy believes that it is actually the Europeans who shall be driving the privacy policy debate. His thoughts quoted below from the BBC website:

“In Europe, privacy is enshrined as a civil right, based on the experience that happened in Europe with Hitler and with communism, and you have embedded important civil safeguards around privacy that places the system in balance between the citizen and the corporate sphere and the government,”

“In the US, while privacy is a form of a right, it is in fact the free market which determines most of the policies when it comes to the internet.”

Internet privacy is a problem that it ubiquitously deep rooted, whereas its awareness and negative implications are equally unknown to the common user. Heck, I don’t mind sharing information with my friends or even allowing applications to store my personal information. But, as long as this activity takes place in the realms of my consent and for my benefit, I have no objection. After all, I have allowed the application to share and/or store my information. However, if sharing or selling my personal information is being undertaken without my consent, then I do have a problem. And in this age of mobile computing, location-based applications and turn-by-turn recommendations, so should you!

Related articles

Yo, why that headline no good?

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A girl holds The Washington Post of Monday, Ju...

The Washington Post: ‘The Eagle Has Landed Two Men Walk on the Moon’ (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Do I remember the moment when I started reading back when I was a kid? No. Do I remember the moment when I realized I had to read beyond the headline? Yes. Why do I remember that when in fact the earlier landmark seems more prime because of its importance in the journey of growing-up? Well for one, I can blame the bad headlines of most articles which were worth reading. Most content writers are wary of the dreadful effects of a bad headline. Yet, few try to analyze their headlines from the perspective of the reader, who dives into an article only after he/she has read the headline. I am one of them, we all are most of the times and I reckon the balance won’t ever change. Because in spite of global warming and rising sea levels, we shall never read an article unless the headline makes sense, intrigues us, or interests us, or unless we know the author.

We’ve all written essays in our life even if they were not by choice, be it as part of school curriculum or as the college thesis. I don’t think that such essays mandated special thought for the headline because those essays, in fact, originated from a topic at hand. For example, you have to write a report on ‘Effects of rice husk on properties of polyethylene’ – what better headline than the topic itself, no? Technically, these essays don’t need the headline that we are talking about. Really? Try running a search on ScienceDirect and you’ll realize that, as instinctive as it may seem, you’d go back to skimming-the-headline protocol before selecting an article to read. Agreed that technical headlines more or less relate to the articles’ content, but you know what I’m trying to say here?

Let’s come back to the articles which we are referring to in this particular post. The number of quality articles being published in a single day is enormous. You’d agree that it is not possible for you to skim through all those headlines, even if you consider only those articles worth reading. Unless you are a writer or a reader or an editor, you have a limited amount of time (per day) dedicated to pleasure reading. So, on an average, you are easily missing out on some really good articles just because those articles never went past your eye. What about those articles which went past your eye but you never cared to read them because of the bad headlines. So sad I say.

Content writers, and bloggers, are respectful people. Most of them are most often quality thinkers. We all are. But what is distinctive about these creative people is that they are so good at putting thoughts to words. They put in effort to juice the sense out of the thoughts. And, a lot of effort goes in writing, mind you. If you ask me, in addition to the effort spent on researching and writing, I have to spend an equal amount of effort, may be more, on steering my drive to sit down and write. And I am quite evidently a beginner level blogger! Blogging, seemingly so I realize now, requires patience. And very few of us are patient enough to sustain the levels of enthusiasm.

The difficulty in staying patient and focused arises majorly from the fact that as beginners, we are not sure what the standard levels of success exists. For example, the headline which you read for this article is the fourth version. From my perspective, I think I’ve given my best shot. But who knows, the headline I chose could be chosen for the worst headline of the year and probably even make it to collection of things-not-to-do when writing an article. Hah! So basically, it takes a while to set the headline expectations straight and develop one’s own style, a style that is satisfactory from the perspective of both the writer and the reader. I say satisfactory since I believe that better is what goes beyond satisfaction. So to become better, the minimum requirement is to at least be satisfactory in your own way.

What would help me become better at writing headlines? Well, God Google tells me there are many sources which I may refer to become better at drafting a good headline. One such quality link I came across is this. But there is one source which I think might just make me, or one of you, better at headlines. Twitter! Why? Well, I doubt that your headline is ever going to exceed 140 characters, and I assume the best headlines are those which are as concise as possible. So why not twitter to improve writing headlines! But that’s just a thought.

I don’t have any tips and tricks for the readers so that they can avoid missing those awesome articles. Such tips and tricks won’t really work since our instinct and a lack of 48-hour days is never going to change.

Guess, too much to write on such broad topics! Let’s end this with a quote by Seth Godin.

“To those who feel that they have no choice but to create, thank you.” – Seth Godin.

This mockery of ‘Official Sponsorships’!

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So I heard that McDonald’s is one of the official sponsors of the London Olympics 2012. Somehow, such things invite the mockery upon themselves. There is absolutely nothing that I have against sponsorship deals, revenue generating marketing strategies or other plain-old farces. I am by no means a marketing genius to comment on sponsorship deals. I am yet to pass the sponsorship 101, but this is something which makes me think. Why you ask? Simply put, I find it difficult to digest Marlboro sponsoring school uniforms for a certain school for whatever reason and for whatever outcome. I would puke at such a sighting of irrationality.

So to speak, there is nothing wrong in sponsoring events. I have seen Coca-Cola banners at chemical engineering institutes. They are the ones who advice against excessive consumption of soft drinks, yet I’ve never objected. What gives me the right to comment on a multi-national company choosing to be one of the official sponsors for a major worldwide event when in fact, I’m a rather decently fanatic McDonald’s fan. The right that I am talking about is the right to expect rational, and sensible foresight from a company sponsoring the London Olympics. I heard someone say fuck you. I know! Let me explain.

Say I am the owner of a company which manufactures condoms – deliciously flavoured condoms. Where would you prefer to see my products being marketed? Hospitals, chemists, or even public posters/advertisements. No restrictions right? After all, I’m trying my best to convince people to get hold of condoms before their cloud-9 trips. Hell yeah! With this argument, to which most of you must have not objected, I state that I shall be marketing my product (the flavoured condom) in ice-cream parlors, in chocolate shops, at amusement parks, and in fine-dining restaurants as aromatic napkins. You get the hang of it? Sensible foresight I say.

I mean come on! What does McDonald’s expect to happen out of this sponsorship deal? Sell more Big Macs at the Olympics venue? Fine! But then, how come I never saw them become an official sponsor for any of the football leagues. In the Barclay’s premier league, twenty teams play thirty-seven matches each with an average crowd of more than 30000. That is just the top league I am mentioning in England. Let go of the numbers for a moment. How does McDonald’s associate themselves with the London Olympics? Which part of the entire event do they contribute to? Other than business, what is the point of having chosen to sponsor the London Olympics? And why, out of all those Fortune 500 companies, have they chosen McDonald’s?

Now, I don’t really have a clear conscience. But it doesn’t stop me from commenting on an incident in an event held on the world stage, an event which has ‘Citius, Altius, Fortius‘ as the motto. Does such a sponsorship send out a wrong message? Do we care about the message? Are our kids sensible enough to restrain from McGluttony? Am I over-reacting? Am I being overly sensitive and under-estimating the maturity of fellow Homo sapiens? Or have our brains chosen not to evolve the rationality quotient?

The way I see it, I go to watch the 100m sprint to support my favourite athlete and I would be greeted with the McDonald’s poster/message/stall. On one side I see power, athleticism, fitness, and physical extremity competing and on the other side I see burgers – Big Macs, fries and milkshakes are part of the official menu for the London Olympics. The choice is as simple as the red-pill vs blue-pill in The Matrix. Is it really simple, is the question! And have we been offered that choice is a supplementary question.

Leave your comments and enlighten me!