The Automated future of today

Uncertainty: We all live in such uncertain times that to predict the future would require epic levels of algorithms with master codes of Artificial Intelligence. Everything that we do today and the way we live is up for change. Let’s start with the vaccination for Covid-19, which is underway. But what is not uncertain is how long the antibodies will remain, and the word “mutation” is by far the most challenging word to know. How the virus will mutate and what strain it will take is beyond imagination. It can be catastrophic, or it can just take the Covid- 19 saga to the history books. Let’s take cars, for instance. The future is undoubtedly electric, but lithium is in short supply, and the amount of power we would need will quickly outpace the power we can generate to charge all the EVs in the world. Autonomous driving is around the corner, and flying cars will soon fly us to the distant future.

The shape of our smartphones is continuously changing. Foldable smartphones are here. Next could be rollable and expandables which can pose a severe threat to the television industry and maybe laptops to a certain extent and the tablet space whose existence as a category will be challenged. The embryonic chips in the works can be instead in your skull and mapped to your brain, which will throw internal projection to the “screen lenses” you will be wearing over your retina, just like the regular lenses. And the Siri commands in the future can change to “play the Avengers movie with Jr Brad Pitt as the actor”, and it will be playing in your eyes, all connected seamlessly through the chip. Scary, right? But this could be a reality, just like the dystopic society of Pitta Kathalu, with one episode starring Shruti Hasan streaming on Netflix. A reality check is essential.

For now, we have the real-life hero Rohit Shetty, who, apart from flying blowing cars [his last one was lexus], is a very humble soul who has worked his way up. Success does not come easy. You have to start early and work hard. His whole journey to be one of the most successful directors, which started at the age of 16, is an inspiration. Only people driven by passion reach somewhere. Coincidentally, we went with Ananya Birla in a Lamborghini Urus, whose tag line is driven with passion, and Rohit Shetty owns a URUS. Enjoy the issue

Time To Believe in Karma | Editor’s Note June ’20

This is our second issue from home, amidst these gloomy times when suddenly every email, phone or WhatsApp starts with “How are you?” in a meaningful way. If you have never believed in God or are a staunch atheist, it’s time for you to do some good karma, just like Sonu Sood sending thousands of migrant laborers back and like a real ‘hero’ standing there in person to waive them and thankfully not contracting COVID-19 himself. This explains a few things.

He did not want us to abuse the climate and get to a point where global warming is alarming.

He did not want the rich and crony capitalist to become very powerful, almost like an oligarch, and get a feeling of invincibility. Covid-19 has come out as the greatest equalizer, it doesn’t spare anyone.

He wanted all of us to reflect and not run 9-6 with extra hours in travel, or worse, fly to another city for a 30 minute meeting, which today is just a zoom call away.

He wanted us to emphasize that only essentials matter in life, just like the stone age. Air to breathe, food grains to eat, water to drink. We can add the internet to this tech age as an essential and may be single malt every now and then too.

He wanted us to spend time with our loved ones, which we take for granted, converse with the kids and enjoy the simple pleasures.

He wanted to stop such massive urbanization and mass exodus to cities. Now the migrants have gone back and almost 50% will not return and some fine gentlemen like billionaire Sridhar Vembu of Zoho, who spearheaded a new movement with Zoho schools, has set up his corporate office in a small village 650 km off Chennai. This, after living in the sophisticated Silicon Valley for decades. He is our God or the Superpower or the almighty or the creator up there.

The fight is on, with the invincible COVID-19, with our physical neighbours at the borders, with the falling economy, joblessness and total chaos. The real winners are those who can find their real purpose in life and if the whole world starts believing in karma then the #WorldHasChanged for the better.

That was my spiritual side because I consider myself blessed to be nestled in my complex apartment along with the people who matter in life having all amenities including ice-creams and single malt delivered to my doorstep unlike many unfortunate ones who are fighting for the daily means of livelihood. During this lockdown, I held many roundtable webinars with industry heads and the conversations are laid out in pages ahead. All of them were universally and reciprocally enjoying this downtime with family while working more from home sharing some other great insights into the new world order.

Now coming to Rakul Preet Singh, the actress who I have known for a long time and seen her rise to fame with a whooping 14.1 million fans on the gram. We did this whole shoot at her home with the smartphone camera without the frills of hair, make up, lights, any ace photographers and rounded up with an interview via a video call. Her strong hesitance to shoot was soon overcome by her sportiness and some rounds of convincing.

We devised a strategy, the magazine’s in-house stylist, Simran had sourced her clothes before the lockdown which helped us tremendously  and we delivered that alongside the new Moto Razr to her house to be taken in after surface quarantine of 24 hours. Since Mumbai skies decided to turn gloomy, we sent across a ring light which we use in the office for YouTube videos which was Armageddon and what you see in the cover and the pages ahead, is a result of that.

Enjoy the issue and stay safe and start believing in karma or Sonu Sood or both.

Also Read:
Unlockdown 1.0 – The 3 Cs – China, COVID & Cure!

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