Ghosts of cubicles present

I recently watched the excellently funny and darkly humorous movie Office Space, on the plague of the current times: The non-spaces that most offices tend to be, where a large portion of the intelligent middle class workers spend their days, years, their life.
Pair that with the brilliantly researched book by Nikil Saval called 'Cubed' and I was in introspective misery as I contemplated the speedily waning weekend and my own entry into the cubicle of my office. There are times when I feel a seething rage at the hiss of the coffee machine, the steady hum of the central air conditioning system and the unnatural, deeply unimaginative white light that everything around me is bathed in. 

People find their escapes in their screen and the headphones which are attached to their ears like extra appendages during work hours, and the atmosphere is borderline surreal at times. The surroundings have an alternate, suspended and stifling reality. 

To quote the protagonist in Office Space, are we truly meant to spend our lives in cubicles, staring at screens? The nature of most modern work being such, it's getting difficult to find jobs that require something more out of us. The computer seems to be the ultimate tool that needs to be mastered and offers infinite challenges and distractions to keep one busy, or to at least give the impression of admirably being so.

The evolution of the office space and the issues surrounding the same have been better articulated and referenced by many others. Why do I waste my breath on saying the same old things, that so many others have said before me? Mostly to make myself feel better out of the rant, yes. But to also suggest that whenever we do have a chance to rethink and structure the workplace; architects, technologists, designers, anthropologists and business folks need to come together to define a better system that is more open, modular and ultimately more productive for us. (And for people like me- well, just a window to stare out of would suffice for now, without the crushing knowledge that I will have to climb the proverbial career ladder to land a corner office for the same.)

Time to kill

Of all the epiphanies that can strike a person at utmost inopportune moments, the ones about ones own character and passions is the most monumental. There I was, reading through some of my daily customary internet garbage, that this one shook my world. Well, not something so intense, but exaggeration goes a long way in trying to make a story more digestible. Ironic, in a way. So the digressions aside, today while reading an article on the quality and experience of leisure, I realized what truly drives me.

I've always been very vocal about the fact that hard work is my drug, that I can sit for hours on end at some challenging enough task, one that tickles my grey cells and puts me in a stupor-like zone where the world seems to recede into the background. Today, it struck me that I can only be comfortable in my leisure time, a time of doing absolutely nothing "productive" in the conventional sense, when I have filled up my quota of "work" for the day/week/month.

When I'm deep in a project, working and clicking away on the mouse to make things happen on that rectangular screen, somewhere deep in the dark recesses of my being I am creating a time for leisure which is guilt free. So the question is that, do I really love working, or do I love the feeling of having "earned' the guilt free leisure time when it does actually come my way?

Has the conditioning of this capitalist world been so thorough, that I cannot allow myself a period of nothing-ness, without having deposited in the bank of workaholism? Even more worrisome is the fact that most of my free "me-time" is peppered with myriad versions of distractions and activities, which are universally considered to be fun. And today I realized a deeply latent fear of not doing anything with my leisure, as if leisure also has to be filled in and scheduled out in a likeness of the calendar at work.

Is this what I do to myself or is there a larger force at play,one that afflicts so many more in varying degrees, across all walks of life. Maybe I'll schedule an evening of not doing anything, so that can also be cancelled out of my to-do checklist.

Turning back time

The word "retro" derives from the Latin prefix retro, meaning "backwards, or in past times" – particularly as seen in the words retrograde, implying a movement toward the past instead of a progress toward the future, and retrospective, referring to a nostalgic(or critical) eye toward the past. 
The recent resurgence of all things 'retro' has me questioning the nature of the media, as well as what it says about the media consumers today. What is it about looking back into the past that seems so comfortable to us? Is it a very subliminal need to engage in processes and objects that have stories attached to them, the stories that we grew up listening to? Or is it a frustration born out of the sheer ease and ubiquity of most of today's digital technology?

According to this article, cassettes are the new(read old) media that are being considered cool again. The way we consume media, to be very honest, has changed very slightly in the past 5-6 years. We have shifted from the computer screen, to a phone/tablet/ipod screen, bringing with it a new factor of portability, but a whole new system has not emerged. If I were to try creating a mixtape, today, it would require a considerable amount of time and effort. ( I don't own a tape deck anymore) This perceived value of the object in terms of the effort and time required to create it becomes much greater than the physical object itself and will probably lend a hand into making the listening experience novel too. 

It is scary sometimes, to wonder what a world will be like, when all the media that we consume and love, is hidden away on our personal devices. These choices define us in so many ways. If I step into a stranger's house, and see a book shelf, lined with works from the authors I most respect and revere, it's sure to contribute towards our conversation. Records, Cassettes and CD's work the same way for music. Only that music doesn't exist on those formats anymore.
( I think it would be slightly creepy if one were to pick up a stranger's iPod and start shuffling through the music they own.)

I guess the point here if that the effects of media losing their tangibility are diverse and unpredictable. If I were to imagine a dystopian future, it would include people who were wired to consume media alone, on their personal devices.Sharing would recede into the background. The only entity who would truly know us, our choices and our tastes in media would be a faceless,nameless Big Brother; keeping  records of our likes and dislikes, majorly for the purpose of enticing us to buy something that they know we will appreciate. Or should appreciate.

I know books seem to be going the music way, losing their physical form slowly and existing only on a device. People say that art is free and disassociated from the form of the object that holds it. I disagree. I don't think I will ever feel that rush in my veins when I open a minty fresh book for the first time;  if the text is 'downloaded' as a 'file' on my tablet, one that I cannot smell, touch and make dog ears in.

Cricket, holidays and memories

I was watching the movie adaptation of Chetan Bhagat's popular novel ' 3 Mistakes of my life' - kai Po Che the other night. I haven't read the book, because I think the author sort of lost the plot after 'Five Point Someone' and seems to try and do more of the same thing every time he comes up with a new release. Frankly, it's not great writing, but it seems to be perfect for the simplistic formulaic plots of Bollywood movies.

Kai Po Che was a good watch, nothing extraordinary or new, but entertaining nevertheless.Other than the plot though, which circled around the lives of 3 friends, the biggest draw of the movie for the Indian audience was its cricket-centric setting. It made me think of the times when I used to watch the sport, as religiously and with the same fervor that my brother and father did.

I remember sitting in my old house in Lucknow, glued to the TV screen and following every minute of so many One Day matches.Loo breaks had to coincide with the finish of the 6-ball over and radios were kept on standby just in case the electricity-supply decided to play spoilsport. All sorts of superstitions were followed, from the mildly absurd to the ridiculously bizarre and movement was judiciously limited when Sachin Tendulkar came to the crease. Celebrations after a win had a very specific dance ritual which involved a group huddle and jumping /skipping in a retarded fashion till the post match ceremony came back on air.

Cricket was fun then. As with most things in life, the sport and its arena has become too commercial over time. Trying to woo new viewers and glamorize the game has resulted in a cricket match becoming more like a Karan Johar magnum opus, a potboiler replete with dancing girls et all. The 20/20 format, and more specifically the IPL have made the game a shadow of what it was before; and it seems to have lost its soul somewhere along the way.

Design and the Internet

I'm an internet junkie, I admit it. Sometimes, I don't realize where the day has gone, just because I have been too busy reading blogs,news,tweets,RSS feeds or watching videos.I should have a tool to regulate my time spent on the www. There has to be a point where it gets counter-productive.

It's the sheer glossiness and design of media content, all packed up in pretty little boxes that makes me sit in some kind of a stupor, ogling at the screen for hours on end. I become a sponge, soaking in everything the curators/bloggers out there want me to,sometimes making them writhe in pleasure if I happen to like,share or tweet a link a  my social media network.( It shows up on the stats, you see). 

Reflecting on it, it makes me wonder if most content on the internet today is like that well made 3 minute ad video; amazingly edited and presented, slick and communicating so much in the blink of an eye. These product/service/idea explanation videos are in a league of their own, meant to dazzle and mesmerize.But consider this,  do youtube views and facebook likes truly reflect the quality and importance of a project? I do believe that design is meant for the people, so their opinion should matter.What annoys me sometimes is the ridiculously low percentage of actual intelligent critical debate and discourse on a topic in comparison to the flash news sort of approach.

The internet and social media are great, I love them.When it starts to dictate terms about what is good and what is not, is when I feel slightly uneasy. It's like trusting an organic, unknown collective consciousness and not my own.

Design gyan..C/o DCC

We are approaching the end of a signature course here in NID called Design concepts and concerns.It has been a hectic, chaotic, enlightening and engaging experience that has left most of us thinking.The pressure of understanding a problem, coming up with an apt solution and then conveying it in the best possible manner has left most of us sleep deprived and longing for the weekend.

What follows is a list of the things that have dawned upon me in the process( a few of which need to be taken with a pinch of salt)

* Form and structure go hand in hand in making every design possible.

* Critiques are valuable.Random comments and opinions are not.

* Out of intense confusion comes curiosity, which in turn leads to clarity.

* Group work is hard.Persistence and responsibility are required at all times for the work to be cohesive and successful.

* When the mic malfunctions, it is a sign from above that you should stop talking.

* As an explanation gets verbose and lengthy, attention span decreases radically.

* Humor and interactivity go a long way in making a presentation memorable.

* Doodling in class gets one good ideas at times.

*What you know is as important as how you can communicate the same to your audience

* Taking a stand and doing self analysis is imperative, even if one's understanding of a subject is limited.One should only realize that there is more to learn.

* Sometimes good designs fail.It is possibly because it is close to impossible to impress everyone.

* Resources and experiences when shared lead to a huge database of knowledge that one can refer to

in times of need.

* Design for me , engenders an attitude to 'know more about more'

A few design gyan nuggets that I gathered in the process...wonder what more will I realize in the next 3 days.I'm curious to know...

http://www.design-concepts-and-concerns.blogspot.com/

Me and my friends

It feels a little empty inside. To leave behind so many people, so many memories and so many places is like letting go of a part of yourself; a part you had grown to love over a period of 4 long years.

I guess that is why so many people want a break after completing college.That lost part of you has to be replaced with something else.

I know that all of us promise to keep in touch and act as if things are going to change only slightly. But to try and console oneself with that thought is being stupid.Things will never be the same again.That is not to say that they will get worse...they'll just be different.

I hope then, today, that I can grow to love the 'difference' as much as I loved what was before.

I miss it a lot right now though.The hostel madness, the college vella-ness, the lanes of viman nagar, andhra, ccd, chicken momos, cribbing about work....and most of all the people.My friends who have become family. 

I love you all.

New life

I am just about to complete my first week at work.It feels good, though I have been alternating between

contentment and frustration.Bombay looks amazing , especially the area where I go to sit inside an AC premises.All day while I stare at my computer, I think of the beautiful structures outside, the amazing street shopping and the second hand book stalls waiting for me.I think I shall sneak out one of these days for an hour or two and have my fill of staring, browsing and buying.

Which makes me come to my first frustration: I want a decent camera.Everything I look at these days is new and I am noticing all sorts of details which I wouldn't otherwise.I want to capture them...sigh!

Work is good.I have been given a logo development assignment.I can safely say i've never worked so much for my personal projects too! But, whenever I do things under strict constraint, like this identity task, I find my mind wandering to all sorts of art practices, freedom to make whatever crap I want in whatever way I want.

ah well.Sigh! ( again)

Oh and  I miss college and my friends. Very much . I keep wanting to go to Pune, but then I realize that most of us aren't there anymore and it just won't be the same... :(

So there.I am in  a strange mood these days...wonder when it will get back to normal.( or maybe this is the new normal??)

Something's snapped.
I'm glad I'm going home.Without a heavy heart this time round.
And yea, I do need to clear my head.I will.