Netflix – Oasis in the stock tumbling desert

Last updated on: March 5, 2009 at 7:14 pm By Desh Kapoor

In the midst of all the economic crisis and downfall in the stock market and tremendous layoffs.. there is one stock that seems to be shining. And when you look at it.. you almost say "Duh"! Well, the company is Netflix (NFLX). In februart it surpassed a major milestone - 10 million subscribers. It has added 600,000 since Jan 1 this year. The stock has gained > 25% YTD! Why is it suddenly growing so much? Well, now for the low price that you got the DVDs from Netflix at home, you can also get to watch serials and movies on TV via the Netflix ready devices. And what are these Internet Ready Devices? Read more

Peace is the business of the FEARLESS

Last updated on: March 5, 2009 at 3:15 pm By Desh Kapoor

"Pakistan's Image" is a strange animal. If one were to believe the rhetoric that goes in the media is Pakistan and fanned by some ministers (like Sardar Nabil Ahmed Gabol, minister of state for shipping) [1], one would come to believe that India's sole obsession is with sullying Pakistan's Image. Because of this one reason it conducted: - Mumbai Attacks on ITSELF, killing its own citizens and hurting its tourism and other industries. - Lahore Attack on Pakistan, killing Pakistani citizens hurting Pakistan's cricket now. So, no matter who gets killed and where he or she gets killed, the sole and the greatest motivator for such killing remains - Pakistan's Image. One would assume that this elusive thing that India is after, namely "Pakistan's Image", must be really a spectacularly shining and exquisite commodity that everyone wants to own... and if one cannot own, as ostensibly India may not, then it is a strong enough reason for us to go ahead and dent it. Such is the clamour for image like that Pakistan has been able to build for itself in the 60 years of its existence through a series of failed democracies, junta rule, and export of terrorism and Nukes. Read more

AIG's failure could be catastrophic!

Last updated on: March 4, 2009 at 11:14 pm By Desh Kapoor

AIG is in trouble..... again! And its wants fresh induction of money in it to survive. Its recent results have been terrible. Another (fourth such bailout) 30 billion dollars have been promised to AIG taking the total commitment to $160 billion. Worse this is not even the end of the road. There is more to come. Many Republicans have been arguing against this bailout suggesting that the Government should let it go. But all those who say the Government should let AIG go belly up are not necessary the greatest Financial wizards or not the ones to share the downside of the fall - since they arent in the Government anyways. They are professional career critics. AIG is not just a simple Financial Institution. It guarantees the loans of other institutions so that they can function. All those S&P, Moody ratings.. of AAA or whatever are based on these guarantees. If you lose that, the chances are no more credit will flow. Liquidity markets are bad right now. Wait till AIG goes belly up! That will END the credit in the market. Watch this interview with JIm Cramer - an explosive guy but very smart! He almost suggests that if such a thing happened, the Dow may go down to below 2000 levels! I don't think people are getting it!! Read more

Sri Lankan Team Attacked in Pakistan – an analysis

Last updated on: March 3, 2009 at 6:15 pm By Desh Kapoor

Srilankan team has been attacked in Lahore's Gaddafi stadium. 12 gunmen ambushed the team's convoy close to the cricket stadium with rockets, hand grenades and automatic weapons. They killed 8 pollicement, and 5 Srilankan players were hurt, but not critically. All the gunmen fled the scene after the ambush. The team members ducked on the floor when the attack happened. The van was bullet ridden, the tires were blasted, and radio system disabled. One rocket fired by the terrorist barely missed the bus and a few hand grenades thrown under the bus failed to explode. So, what could have been a terrible and bloody tragedy was somehow avoided. Importantly and intriguingly, none of the gunmen was caught despite the open area and forces guarding the Sri lankan team. Let us understand who could be the players involved. In 1999, an LTTE operative, Subhalakshmi, was arrested at the Kolkatta airport. She was trying to go through to Bangladesh to target Sheikh Hasina. The entire plot had unravelled as the Indian intelligence got the whiff of it at the last moment. Days before this arrest, owner of a software company was killed in a car acciddent. He was "selling" software products with a "decent" margin to a former military officer, Col. Munirul Islam Chowdhury "Munna", who ran a software company in North Virginia in the US. The money that "Munna" deposited in the Indian Bank in Kolkatta was frozen as the owner died and no one could operate it. It was then that Harkat-ul-Jehad of Bangladesh went to Plan B and detonated RDX in a Sheikh Hasina rally. Read more

Forums on Immigration, Economy and Jobs

Last updated on: March 3, 2009 at 12:57 am By Desh Kapoor

We are introducing a new set of forums on Drishtikone.com - which will include Immigration Forum for US Immigration topics. The questions people ask on the Immigration forum will be answered by Immigration Attorney Sunita Kapoor. You can register on Drishtikone and sign in to post the questions on topics ranging from H1B visa, Visitor Visa, Green Cards, etc. You can also participate from others' discussion over there. Also added are forums on economy and jobs. These are tough economic times and we all need to do that extra bit. Let us discuss and post any leads or any thoughts on these topics as well. Hope this would be of use and help to the community. Read more

Movie Review of "Delhi 6"

Last updated on: March 2, 2009 at 3:32 am By Desh Kapoor

Have you ever seen anything where the whole is way lower than the parts? I saw one such creation last night - Delhi 6. It was such a big disappointment to watch it. It just seemed as if from start to finish it went from one idea to another. These parts should have been its strengths but instead these in totality became their weaknesses: Philosophical sarcasm: "Kala Bandar" was a brilliant idea to convey the idea of communal hatred that people have had in India. The way it was used to create a news story - with the way media goes beserk and over board was also hillarious in itself. The thought and the concept was brilliant! But its execution was utterly disjointed and uselessly done. Simillarly, the way that beggar was used - who kept showing the mirror along with speaking out those verses - was also in the similar vein. Great philosophical concept but again the execution and the detailing of the character was badly done. It was as if someone thought of a great idea but the one who was writing the story didn't know how to do a good job of it or was simply lazy. Contrasting Symbolism: The idea of secular peace and community feeling and what creates the issues was a great idea. Using contrasts in such depictions also help a great deal. But there was an overdoze of the "positive" to "negative" symbolism. What the director and the story-writer wanted to show was true at a very broad level (global level) but in a community, such things don't happen right away. Read more

Zakaria's Distinguishing between Response to Taliban vs Al Qaeda Is Faulty

Last updated on: March 1, 2009 at 9:33 pm By Desh Kapoor

I have a very high regard for Fareed Zakaria as an analyst of world politics and economy. But today I was very disappointed at the way he addressed a very major crisis in the South Asian world. And it is more disappointing because he is from India and has been in touch with the folks here on many occassions. His topic today was the difference in the world's response for Islamists who don't hurt the "world" (like Taliban) and those who do (like Al Qaeda). I firmly believe that the difference is minimal. And here is why: "The extent of Taliban/ISI/Jihadi cooperation was revealed during the Indian hostage crisis of 1999, the resolutiion of which I witnessed first hand" Says Zahid Hussain in "Frontline Pakistan" while referring to the Indian Airlines hijacking crisis in 1999 - which best showed how ISI, LeT/JeM and Taliban were joined at the hip! And that is the central issue to understand. Taliban is not a separate set of people. They have an aim. And according to Fareed, that aim is "Islamic rule" and not "Global" Jehad. I feel it clearly goes beyond that in its totality. But lets first analyze Fareed's statement. Ok, first let us be clear of some basic hometruths in the context: Read more

Zakaria's GPS talk with Martin Wolf and the coming crises

Last updated on: March 1, 2009 at 8:16 pm By Desh Kapoor

Watching GPS where Zakaria is talking to Martin Wolf. And he is predicting a long and bad economic times.. where the consumption and GDPs will fall a lot over the years. According to one stat he cited - the stock markets have lost $40 Trillion in this downturn around the world.... and somebody has lost that! Its a loss of wealth that is not going to come back. The loss in home prices according to him will be "permanent" or for a very long time. And so the bankruptcies need some kind of strong decisions by the Government. There are only two ways - either put money in for the homeowners facing the bankruptcy or have the creditors face the music. Both have their costs, but one has to see what the social cost is of either decision. This is definitely a very serious situation and times.. and there is no way that the economy is going to come out of this by half baked measures. Wolf is faulting Obama's team on being timid on pushing the changes through. Well, he is not factoring in the politics that Republicans and the "free enterprise" brigade creates. The world is indeed in very serious crisis and despite how it affects me personally, I can clearly say that this economic crisis will persist for between 5-10 years. In fact if the effects of this crisis end in 10 years, then we should be very happy. But I don't think it will be so. It is a generational shift. Read more

The Trouble with Indian Bloggers

Last updated on: March 1, 2009 at 2:46 am By Desh Kapoor

I have a big list of RSS feeds on my Google Reader running into well over hundred. Now, i don't read all of them, but I do read some regularly. For some reason, I have very few blogs from Indian bloggers! And that I thought was surprising given that my blog is so overwhelmingly India-oriented (or South Asia oriented). I have been asking myself.... WHY? In fact, a friend asked me to go over to other bloggers in my niche to check where they are doing well, and what they are publishing that I am not looking at. For, I can see, that most of the known bloggers from India do get a lot of traffic and also comments. I do get a substantial traffic but not as many comments. When I started blogging, I got inspired by Atany Dey and his blogs at Deeshaa. He has extremely excellent analysis and it is original. All that he writes is HIS viewpoint. He does not copy-paste and just include a comment to a picture and get "away with it". He is one who will say things that ONLY he can write. So, as I used to say when I was starting out "I want to be an Atanu Dey when I grow up as a blogger!". The rest - including the most hyped - are simply pedestrian in my view. Most of the bloggers fall in one of the two main categories: Read more

Gharib ka Haq by Desh

Last updated on: February 28, 2009 at 7:29 am By Desh Kapoor

When we are driven by a fixated ideology and not by true awareness, then we degrade human dignity. No matter how high the ideology may promise to take the mankind, as long as it looks at the world with a conflicting viewpoint, it will divide man and create wars. PS: Wanted to thank all those who have listened and even downloaded my audios! Would greatly appreciate if you could leave a comment to let me know what you think.. what you like and what you don't. Any topic that you liked more than others? Any topic that you can suggest for me? Read more