Friday, November 11, 2022

How to be featured in the Google Question Box?

What did you do with the time you saved without a commute?



I am an immigrant to the US. During the early years and today, I have been a fan of Marketplace and it is rare that I miss an episode. It got even better when Marketplace became a podcast as well. I did not have to jump into the car at 6 p.m every day to listen to this program on the car radio. By listening to a program for a long time, you get to know the hosts and reporters. Kai Ryssdal, Kimberly Adams, Amy Scott, Matt Levin, Savannah Maher, Meghan McCarty Carino, David Brancaccio, (Marketplace Morning Report), Victoria Craig ( listen every morning at 5.55 a.m. pm WAMU. I have to mention WAMU 88.5 as that was my first and long-standing NOR station. I am a big fan of Esther Ciammachilli. An added advantage is the ability to follow these radio personalities on Twitter. It gives me a meeting room feeling to interact with these media celebrities on Twitter.

Sometimes I get lucky. I was in India in October and I happened to see a tweet about a forthcoming story on Marketplace about how people were using the time that they saved without having a commute. Some of these things are serendipitous. My Twitter stream moves very fast and it was providence that I saw the tweet and responded. We spoke over Zoom between the US and India. I love the fact that India has such good internet connections now. I was taking a flight back to India that same night and could listen to the episode on my phone mid-journey.


One more bucket list item is checked off. 

Saturday, January 01, 2022

Acorn TV : When you have a fetish for Commonwealth TV shows

India was a commonwealth country, and when I was in India it never was something that affected my daily life. The time that I remotely came near to being part of the Commonwealth was the CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Meet) in 1983 where I was part of the hotel chain hosting the dignitaries. Fast forward, 41 years, my connection to the Commonwealth was surprisingly through recommendations from Twitter for TV programs to watch. I tested positive for Covid-19 and being vaccinated/boosted I self-quarantined not to spread the disease to anyone else. I was already on vacation and so had a lot of time on my hands. My friends on Twitter gave me these recommendations for Tv programs to watch:

AI generated summary of 60 minutes AI edition

In a 60 Minutes interview that aired on April 17, 2023, Google CEO Sundar Pichai warned that artificial intelligence (AI) is advancing rapid...