Long read: How Google Got Its Groove Back and Edged Ahead of OpenAI
Ever since the advent of ChatGPT3 in late 2022 until as recently as a year ago, investors have looked at Google with scepticism. Starting with its core cashflow engine – its search advertising business likely being the most prone to disruption by AI to the fact that despite its early lead in AI through its […]
Long read: Are doctors replaceable?
Charlotte Blease begins this provocative long read with an intriguing analogy: “If planes fell from the sky with the regularity of deaths due to medical error, there would be outrage, inquiries and sweeping reform. When doctors make mistakes, however, the narrative is gentler: they are only human.” Ms Blease’s background puts her in good place […]
Four Mega Reforms Which Opened up Global Investing for Indians
Whilst the US stockmarket has been a mega wealth-creator for the past 15 years, until 2 years ago it was out of our reach as a range of legal & tax issues made it impractical for Indians to invest a big chunk of their networth abroad. However, 4 blockbuster reforms changed all of that. Investing […]
Short read: For semiconductors and GPS, thank C V Raman, Satyendra Nath Bose, Einstein — and hay fever in 1925
Scientific discoveries and developments can have far reaching consequences towards human progress and hence it is important to recognise, acknowledge and celebrate them. It is the 100th anniversary of the biggest breakthrough in quantum physics, a field that continues to contribute to our progress through developments in semiconductors and GPS. This piece in the Indian […]
Short read: ‘Digital detox’ is now a booming business but it won’t do much to reduce your screen time
We have all read long articles and books on how we can kick our addiction to all things digital. We learn from Quynh Hoang that this is now a booming industry: “People are increasingly willing to pay to escape the technology they feel trapped by. The global digital detox market is currently valued at around […]
Short read: Leaf to life
Rudra Chatterjee is Chairman of Obeetee and Managing Director of Luxmi Tea (which owns the famous Makaibari tea brand). He begins by informing us of the origins of tea’s popularity around 1000 years ago: “Tea’s popularity was not inevitable. It gained scale around 1000 CE during the Song dynasty when productivity improvements in rice cultivation […]
Long read: China is building the world’s most powerful hydropower system deep in the Himalayas. It remains shrouded in secrecy
Jensen Huang famously proclaimed that China is going to win the AI race and his basis was simple – if electricity is the physical upper bound for AI’s progress, China seems to have highest upper bound by a country mile. And it continues to up the ante with a $168bn hydropower system, the world’s largest […]
Long read: One of America’s Most Successful Experiments Is Coming to a Shuddering Halt
It’s that time of the year when friends and family descend from their adopted western countries back to their roots. Inevitably with those from the US, conversations involve life under Trump 2.0 and it is clear that this time it is not just the fringe spewing vitriol on social media, but almost everyone seems to […]
Long read: Everything Santa Claus Has Come to Mean for Indians
Dr Kalpita Bhar Paul is an Assistant Professor at the BML Munjal University in Gurugram. Aveek Mondal is a freelance researcher and a writer. Together they have written an insightful essay explaining why in a deeply conservative society like ours, Christmas is celebrated by nearly 50 million Indian families (many of who aren’t Christian) with […]
Short read: The Rise of Slow Computing
Whilst technology was always meant to help us become more productive, it has penetrated our lives in a way that it is causing equal harm if not more. Smartphones and social media in particular have made us slaves to technology than tools that we can use for a better life. We have often featured articles […]
Short read: Kebabs, biryani and much more: Indian city on UNESCO culinary list
One city in India which has very few listed companies but which Marcellus’ analysts visit with metronomic regularity in order to conduct field research is Lucknow. The food in the Avadhi capital city is mind-blowing. Not just the starters (galouti), not just the main course (biryani) but also the desserts are out of the world. […]
Short read: The Entry-Level Hiring Process Is Breaking Down
Across the world, including in India, graduates – even from the most elite universities – are finding it difficult to get jobs. This is partly because there are fewer graduate-level jobs. Whilst there is no definitive answer on why this is happening in economies as disparate as America and India, it is widely speculated that […]
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