Random Walk of Life

At times when you like something very much, and you start revering the creator, and later you realize that the creator had stolen that thing from some other place, you really feel let down.

I liked Pritam Chakraborty’s music, from the time of his first solo success Dhoom. He followed this up with some really cool tunes for the Bhatt Camp. Movies such as Gangster, Woh Lamhe made him a composer to watch out for. And the latest track from Bhool Bhulaiyya was such a big hit, you could see people swaying to it at almost every other dance party.  Jab we met and Life… in a Metro - movies which we felt should have won him the Best Music Director award in the major award shows. And the latest song “Pehli Nazar” sung by Atif Aslam from Race - some of my lady friends go bonkers when they listen to this song.

Imagine how would they all feel when they realize that each one of these songs is a rip-off from some international artiste’s composition? In the older days when people accused Anu Malik of copying tunes, not many would believe it and would demand proof. But today, with the internet connecting people unlike anything before, and platforms such as Youtube providing access to world music, I wonder what gives confidence to people such as Pritam to pass off somebody else’s work as their own, that they expect to get away with it ?!

If the intention is to introduce world music to Bollywood, I am fine with that. Just make sure that proper credits are given so that people can appreciate the original creator. This has been done in the past.Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy had licensed the rights to Roy Orbison’s Pretty Woman for the movie Kal Ho Na Ho.I guess it’s the producers of the movie who are ignorant. I am sure, they won’t mind negotiating with the original composers should they know that the song is so brilliant, rather than get involved in legal tangle later on.

Anyway, I don’t like making baseless accusations. So here’s the evidence. Decide for yourself

No, I am not talking about Eric Clapton’s song or Jeffery Archer’s senti short story.

I am refering to Number Theory, a subject which I have liked and aced since my high school upto my engineering. We had Number Theory and Cryptography as an elective and it was one of the most challenging papers I have written till date. And the most interesting one too.

But sadly for the past two years, I have been out of touch.

So, this friday when I was at Sapna book house , and I couldn’t help noticing this book.

Bought it off and am going through the book now. Brings back the sweet old memories of the well-lit room in the 8th Block hostel room, with Shuaib crumpled on the bed going through the faded xerox material, Vaiju on the floor, me on the table and Madhu on the other bed, all of us trying to solve some assignment problem on primitive roots. And the excitement when one of us found a solution or even understood a complicated theorem. And the pride in explaining how the thing works!

Ah, well! Those were the days

Ever wondered why can’t we have a chat-bot that responds when we’re idling or away ?

Sathya tried this a couple of times while he “appeared” to be away on GTalk by responding something like “The recipient of your message is currently inactive”.

One could argue saying that the status should reflect what the person is doing. But then, more often than not, my friends’ status always say they’re Busy, but ping them, and you’ll end up spending an hour or two chatting nonsense!

Anyway, requirement or not, I think it’s a pretty cool thing to have a Bot that can respond on your behalf. Even better, how about integrating a “Mirror Bot” which echoes back whatever the buddy has just typed, or a “Emacs Psychiatrist Bot” which will piss the shyte out of your buddy?

Hmmm.. Probably against the social networking etiquettes.

Thoughts on that?