Saturday, June 16, 2012

GI-tsch-F

It has been 25 years of the GIF (this article best read with this in the background). The article questions if there'll ever be a Mona-Lisa among GIFs. Now, in my humble layman art admirer opinion a GIF could be a Mona Lisa in one of two ways, by being as great as the Mona Lisa is (in a purely technical art-form way) or by being perceived to be as great as is the Mona Lisa (in other words, popular).

The Mona Lisa, technically, is admired for being the first to allow for an imaginary landscape behind the subject and in its use of an aerial perspective, essentially viewing things from afar.The GIF, at least the first one, would be similar in its break from standard practice and its technological advancement. Like the Mona Lisa, the GIF has mostly been an expression of the mediocre, in terms of beauty and not ideas, also like the song you've probably been listening to. Lastly, and this might also be the least, the GIF has a penchant for losing details through overcompression just like the excessive cleaning made the Mona Lisa lose her eyebrows.

Coming to popularity, I'm not sure if in another 300 years, GIFs could be jostling for space inside the Louvre, but if they do, this one could probably make the grade.

  

Sunday, June 10, 2012

I Know, Right?!

This can't be right. I smell a rat everytime I read the Times of India. I used to think, it probably had something to do with where the ToI newspapers were stored overnight and how they got to my house (rat-infested aircrafts and trucks), but even the online version smells of rodents. I can now put my finger on it (thanks ipad touchscreen). The below recently published article, is what the rat-smell is all about. ToI stinks, of rats.

Yes, ToI is a shamless mouthpiece for the USA

The following describes why ToI has that inescapable rat-smell:

Disregard for History:
1971: Nixon finally makes a public announcement of a trip to China, after Kissinger has been there secretly many times. Even as a presidential candidate, Nixon makes no small bones of his imminent interest in finally setting it right with Mao's new china, ending what would be 25 years of separation. (why the term the manchurian candidate didn't stick to him, we won't know).
Before and during the 13-day war, the US stations the USS Enterprise (sadly not the pictured here) in the bay of bengal to cajole India to not press ahead with hostilities , boldly go where no man  New-Yorker has gone before.

The US supplied F-5s, 86-s and 104-s to Pakistan, routing them through, hold your breath, Libya, Jordan, Iran and Saudi Arabia. According to many experts, a prime reason for arming Pakistan at this juncture, other than to test out their new fighter jets in combat, was to express to China what a bonafide ally the US could be.

So while all of this was happening, Mr/Ms. Josy Joseph of the ToI expects us to believe that in the face of finally warming relations with China, a very cordial relationship with West Pakistan (Nixon to Yahya: nobody has occupied the White House who is friendlier to Pakistan."), and a war that the US opposed no end, proved amongst other things, by the USS Enterprise and its position, the US would have come out in India's support against China? Incredulous, unbelievable rat stench.

A reading of the entire article doesn't support the Headline
To be fair, their own article suggests loopholes in the support suggested by the US. Towards the end, in fact at the very end, where the ToI doesn't expect any of its readers to reach:

"However, the chances were that if the present situation escalates into a conflict, it would be very hard to tell who is to blame. Thus, if India sent two divisions of irregulars into East Bengal and Pakistanis sent four such divisions into Kashmir, it would not be a situation in which the US could possibly help even if China threw its weight on the side of Pakistan," Kissinger told Jha, according to the ambassador's letter.

 But at this point Josy (of the ToI) probably stepped in thinking, "Well, yeah, but that doesn't mean if India had sent 1.5 divisions of irregulars and Pakistan sent 4.2 (i.e the 1:2 ratio Kissinger talks about is maintained on the favorable side) they wouldn't know who is to blame!"

ToI Editor: "I know, right?!"

Incredulous, unbelievable, dead-for-20-days, plague-like rat stench.