The future of humanity

This post stems from a very interesting discussion I had with my flat-mates today. The question was - Does our modern society have traits similar to the varna system of Hinduism?

For those unfamiliar with the Varna system - The Bhagavad Gita, the holiest book for Hindus, describes the system as "The four orders of society were created by Me [Krishna] classifying them according to the mode of Prakrti predominant in each and apportioning corresponding duties to them; though the author of this creation, know Me, the immortal Lord, to be a non-doer."

The four orders were brahmins (teachers, religious experts), kshatriyas (warriors, political leaders), vaishyas (merchants) and shudras (servants). Each had a fixed role in society and by and large one could not move from one order to another. Thus, the son of a shudra remained a shudra. The varna system is said to have led to the more draconian caste system in India, the effects of which are seen even in modern India. The fuedal system in Europe was very similar with the lord giving land to his vassals who would then force serfs to do the dirty work.

Do we still have an invisible caste system in the world? Is the son of a farmer forced to remain a farmer, etc.? To understand that, I propose the following 4 postulates of my theory:

a) Humans have always been divided into groups. And there is mostly some kind of ordering of those groups in terms of power/influence/social status - i.e. group A > group B > group C > ... > group Z

b) Let f(X) be the function which decides the ordering of groups. I propose that if X has parameters x1, x2 ... xN, there X is a weighted sum of all the parameters. And the weights keep changing as we "progress". For eg. let x1 = physical strength, x2 = caste, x3 = knowledge, then in the hunter gatherer era, x1 had the highest weights (practically 1) and all the other features had 0 weights. i.e. physical strength was most important and thus those with more physical strength had more power. So the ordering of groups would actually be a line in the x1 dimension. And all the groups fall on this line. Those in lower groups would have lower values of x1 than those in higher groups. Also, X is not equal to money. After all, money is just a payment for some good or service. Money does not affect f(X), f(X) brings money. Also, some people may have less money but still be higher in the order (e.g. Barrack Obama).

c) It is the natural tendency of humans to aspire to reach a group higher than the one they belong to. Say X and Y are groups and f(X)

d) I have said that weights of x1, x2, etc. change as we progress. I believe that this progress is due to technological advancement - the invention of fire, agriculture, speech, printing, guns, nucleur energy, computers, etc.

So given these, it is easy to see why the caste system, let's call it system A, was not an ideal system. Remember, if it were an ideal system, then it would never have been abolished. So I take it as a fact that it was not ideal. In that system x1 (physical strength) was not so important, but x2, the caste of your parent, was. {Brahmin,Kshatriya}>Vaishya>Shudra. Also, a person from one caste was rarely allowed to go up the ladder. In fact, the system prevented one from doing so. Thus (c) which is a natural tendency was suppressed leading to malcontent and finally revolt and the system was overthrown to be replaced with the system which we currently have in place.

I do not claim to fully understand our system, let's call it system B, but I would like to believe that our hierarchy gives a very high weight to knowledge, which is x3, and lower weights to everything else. What you know matters, not your physical strength or caste at birth. How does this system differ from system A? In B we still have people aspiring to reach higher levels, but the difference is that the system allows people from lower groups to reach higher groups by providing them with tools like education, welfare schemes, information, etc. Also, it is not allowed (in most civilized societies) for people from higher groups to actively obstruct the progress of those in lower groups. In fact, the higher levels play a very important part in designing the very tools which allow the lower groups to reach higher.

But our system is not ideal too, because the tools are inefficient. They do not guarantee success. Not everyone attaining education rises in society. Not everyone wanting education is given one. There are people being pushed from higher levels of society to lower levels. So B is definitely not the ideal state.

So what is the ideal state? Does one exist? Is that the end of progress? To understand how the ideal state will be, one must understand that the problems in both systems A and B have never been that the people have been divided in various groups in ascending order of importance/power/prestige etc. The problems have been with the way they are treated - not allowing them to go higher or actively suppressing their progress. So the ideal state will definitely have hierarchies. I think hierarchies are a part of nature as well as humanity and are actually good for us because it makes us all discontent and want something higher.

So I propose that then that even in the ideal system C the hierarchies will always exist. The only difference is in the weights of the parameters. I propose that in the ideal system we will completely understand all the parameters x1 to xN and provide the most efficient tools for anyone to increase their f(X). Also, no one will have a tool to decrease anyone else's f(X), and it is assumed in postulate (c) that everyone wants to progress, which means there should not be anyone in the system whose f(X) decreases with time.

It is very important to understand this last sentence as it means that humanity will always keep on progressing and never fall. To explain my ideal system, let us assume that we have 4 people - a farmer whose f(X) = 0, a trader (f(X) = 1), a CEO (f(X) = 2) and the President (f(X) = 3). As the system is completely efficient the farmer will be given all the tools to increase his f(X). But so will everyone else. So it is entirely possible that the farmer may become 1, the trader 2 and so on with the farmer remaining at the bottom. But the important thing is that this does not mean that the farmers life has not improved. It now means that when once he could not get food, provide his children education he is now able to do both. In the next generation, it could happen that his children aspire to achieve much more than he did and thus one of them could become the President. There is nothing stopping him from doing the same, and because tools are efficient, if he does not it will only because he did not aspire enough.

Also, I think it is not in human nature to push others down. That only happens because currently there is limited place at the top tiers and hence if 1 goes up, 1 has to come down. But in system C, each tier will have infinite capacity and thus no one will want anyone not to come to their tier.

So how will this system look like? Imagine it like a lift going constantly up. As technological progress happens, the top of the lift keeps going up. Also, as the lowest areas aspire, the bottom of the lift also moves up. Those in the middle levels who do not aspire do not go to the lower level, but just remain at the same height. But because the lift is moving up, the lower levels catch up and his level then becomes the lower most level, thus making it a fair system.

It looks like this system has no problem at all and is a utopian system. But it is not if the universe is deterministic, we may reach the peak of technological innovation and know everything there is to know about the universe. At this point the upper level of the lift stops going up. And with increasing time the lower levels will catch up and thus humanity will finally all be on the same level. There is nothing left to aspire for, hence everyone will be reduced to drones doing whatever they have been doing without there being any hope for progress. Such a future is really scary and I hope it never happens.

So the only hope for humanity to keep on progressing always is for there to be a reset button. As soon as we reach the peak, reset and we are back to square one. This may be the root of the belief in cycles of the universe. From Wikipedia - "This universe is simply the current one, which is in flux and constantly changing, when it finally ceases to manifest, a new one will arise.". This is also backed by physicists, with phenomenon called the Big Crunch - "In physical cosmology, the Big Crunch is one possible scenario for the ultimate fate of the universe, in which the metric expansion of space eventually reverses and the universe recollapses, ultimately ending as a black hole singularity."

I had not even thought about Hinduism and the Big Crunch when we started of this discussion. Urjit and I had concluded that actually humanity has a bleak future if the universe is deterministic and then we were depressed for a few seconds. Then suddenly I said "then the only way out is a reset button!" and voila! everything fell in place. Thus, my facebook status message - "I just concluded that either the universe is non-deterministic or Hinduism better be true. Otherwise humanity has a bad future"

"Help! I'm being mugged"

My thoughts on the muggings happening in Home Park (by Home Park I mean the general area bounded by 10th, 14th, State street and Hemphill avenue). This does not deal with armed home robberies, which I plan to think about later, as that is rarer than muggings.

Cure (by which I mean you are already being threatened by a stranger to give all your belongings, and you do not want to submit to being mugged)

• Carry a gun - Will definitely lead to a gun fight in which I am certain not to have an upper hand
• Taser - The mugger most likely has his finger on the trigger and I do not want to force an involuntary reflex due to a gazillion volt charge
• Run fast if being mugged - Bullets are faster than you, unless you are Rajnikanth
• Shout - I don't think I am going to dare doing that with a gun pointed to my face/back
• Talk your way out of it - Yeah, right.

Prevention (by which I mean how to avoid being mugged)

• Do not go venture out during the night - There have been many muggings during the day
• Do not go out. Period. - I have to go to classes. And there have been plenty of home invasions
• Do not carry anything valuable - This is definitely not going to stop you being mugged as the mugger has no way of knowing that you do not have a ton of cash on you.
• Don't walk alone - This will definitely help ward of the amateur and lone mugger. But there have definitely been group muggings so not guaranteed to help you.
• Ask the police to drop you - The Georgia Tech/Atlanta police know that Home Park is not safe. So if you see a police car standing on your way, do not hesitate to ask them to drop you off home. A good opening like would be "How are you doing today, officer? I am a bit scared to be walking all alone at this time. I live down this street near the church. Would you mind driving with me/keeping an eye on the road/giving me a ride till I reach home. And thank profusely when obliged.
• Be alert - This is the best prevention strategy. Make sure you keep looking all around you especially in those dark nooks and corners of Home Park. Make sure no one is following you. Make sure you know the phone number of the Georgia Tech police, and make sure it is on speed dial. Better still, keep talking to some person till you reach home. If you see anything suspicious like a potential mugger 100 meters in front of you, stop, and get the hell out of there. Better safe than sorry as the saying goes.

Damage-control (this lies between the above 2 things)

• Do not carry anything valuable - Most of the times I cannot avoid carrying a laptop and a phone. Also, if I do not carry anything, my theory is that it will infuriate an already nervous mugger
• Carry some cash, give all your belongings and do not act smart - This I think is a safe strategy. But the question is how much cash is enough? I think around 10-15 dollars should suffice. And that much is a good premium to pay for insuring yourself against physical harm. Also if it is inevitable to carry your laptop everywhere, make sure you back up all your data every day and do not keep the backup drive in the bag with the laptop!

Vengeance time

This is the most important part of my post as my conclusion is that there is nothing that can be done to avoid being mugged when probability catches up with you. So the next best thing to do is to get vengeance - help the police catch the person and get your valuables back

• Use your phone! - This ties in with my "be alert" point. Make sure your phone is fully charged at all times. When you are talking to your friend on the way back to your place, keep him/her constantly updated with your position - "Stingerette has now dropped me near Papa Johns. I have reached that school, lots of rats here. Okay, reached the church. Am safely inside my home. Thanks. Good night". Decide a panic code word. Make sure it is short. Something innocuous but uncommon, like "Frodo". As soon as the person hears that, he/she is supposed to treat it as a code red. Immediately drop the phone and call the Georgia Tech police with your last known location
• Mugger's description - You've put the phone down and you are being mugged. Don't panic! Remember, the mugger's main intention is to take money from you and get out of there as quickly as he can. Get a close look at him while you are giving him your belongings. Anything will help - golden teeth, funny belt, orange pants, brown shirt, green shoes. Just something better than "6 foot male". And be careful when you are looking at him. Try not to look at his eyes, and try not to make it obvious that you are committing his description to memory. Also, make it a habit to notice things about people so that when time comes you are somewhat good. By that I mean when walking home next time, try and look at a person for 5 seconds and memorize his physical appearance.
• Car description - This is the harder part, especially for me as I come from India and am not aware of the various car models in US. So like before, try and remember the digits of a car's license plate number as you pass it the next time you are walking back home. Also helpful will be the model and color of the car, and any special features like a major dent on the left side, or left rear view mirror missing. Remember, this is going to be a getaway car and you are most likely not going to get more than a glance at it. The mugger is also going to make sure that you see as little as possible and thus you may be punched to the ground, or worse. So be prepared.
• Use the "Help! I'm being mugged" application. This is what I was actually thinking about when I started writing this post - how to use technology when you are being mugged. Here's a description of what I have in mind

The "Help! I'm being mugged" application. - This is a web/desktop/mobile application with the goal to inform the police that you are being mugged, and providing them with your location. The most important part of the application is code red

• Code red - Code red is function "code_red(location)" called by the application. Code red automatically calls the Georgia Tech police/special emergency number and provides them with my details (name, physical description, photo, etc.) and location. It also updates my Facebook and Twitter with a very strongly worded message saying that you are being mugged and that you were last seen at X location. A similar mail is sent to practically everyone you know who can help - your lab mailing list, your friends, etc. Remember this message must convey with the utmost urgency that you are actually being mugged and that this is no prank. A good thing would be to provide the Georgia Tech police dept number (so that they do not have to look for it - every second counts) and also remind them not to call you. The application should operate in stealth mode. The mugger is most likely going to take your cellphone/laptop away. So if he sees "georgia tech police" on the screen, he is going to get really panicky and angry.

Ok. So that defines what a code red does. But how to know when to call the code red?

• The phone/laptop GPS constantly keeps track of your position. If you are stuck in some place for more than 15 seconds then it automatically goes into the alert mode. If then you still remain in the same place for 15 more seconds without doing anything, or start deviating from your path suddenly, then it goes into code red.
• It is possible that you do not have a GPS on your phone/laptop. In this it needs to know the route that you take and approximately how much time it will take for your journey. The program needs to be manually started with your start location and stopped at your end location. It also needs to know the route that you take and approximately how much time it will take for your journey. You have to stop the program when you reach home. If you don't stop the program at the approximate time, then it goes to alert mode and after a few seconds into code red giving your path to the police.
• A variation of the above is if your phone does not have an active internet connection. In that case you need to call a number to start the program and give your start and end location. When you reach home, call the number again and press the abort key. If you don't call at the appropriate time, then it goes into alert mode and calls your mobile phone. If you do not pick up, or press some emergency key instead of the abort key, then it goes into code red giving your path to the police.

That's all I have for now? What do you think of my post? Do you think there is some prevention/cure measure I have missed? How would you design such an application? Do you think it would work?

Languages I want to learn

* French - I started learning it after class 12. I loved the language and could learn it quite intuitively.
* Mandarin - Spoken by the most number of people in the world. And the language of the soon-to-be most powerful nation in the world.
* Spanish - Spoken in the entire continent of South America.

* Arabic - 500 million speakers and official language of 25 countries
* Kannada - Language of Bangalore!
* Japanese, German - These are maybe languages. To be learnt after I master the above.

Prevention is better than cure

Google recently discovered the Government of China was involved in a massive hack attack on Google and at least 20 other large companies. It seems the hackers used a security loophole in all versions of Internet Explorer and also some security vulnerability in Adobe products (this is what you use to open pdf files). The hackers would, using these loopholes, download malicious software to computers used by prominent Chinese human-rights activists and keep a track of all their activities. Such malicious software can have complete control over your computers and do things like track every web-page you visit, keep a track of everything you type, turn your web-cam on or off at will, and much more.

Today it was human-rights activists, tomorrow it could be you. Today it was the Chinese government, tomorrow it could be some other agency, your worst enemy, your company, your rivals, anyone. In light of these events, I urge everyone to keep their computers secure. I am no computer security expert, but here are a few tips that take little time to implement and make your computers quite secure.

• Stop using Internet Explorer as your web-browser. It is by far the worst browser when it comes to security and web-standards. The browser is also the slowest in the market. And if you are using Internet Explorer 6, then stop using it right now. It is the equivalent of driving an Ambassador when Ferraris are being given away free. At the very least, upgrade to Internet Explorer 8. But I would recommend switching over to Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome. I've been exclusively using Chrome for the last year and it is blazing fast.
• Don't ignore Windows updates. Microsoft constantly discovers loopholes in their programs and pushes the updates to plug those holes through Windows updates. Ignoring the updates is very risky. At the very least make it a habit to install all security and highly critical updates.
• Upgrade to Windows 7. This is the latest and best installment of Windows till now. It is also considered to be quite secure. As you can see from this link 7 is the most secure of all Windows operating systems.
• Install a good anti-virus and keep it updated. If you are using Windows it is absolutely critical to install a good anti-virus program. McAfee, Norton, AVG are the few good ones out there. Install one right now if you haven't already. An anti-virus slows down your computer, but it is a price worth paying. Malware like viruses, trojans, spyware, etc. can be pretty deadly and render your computer unusable. Run a complete virus scan once every month or so, and immediately if you feel something is not right with your computer.
• DO NOT CLICK ON RANDOM LINKS - this point cannot be stated enough. This is how malware will be installed on your computer in most cases and this is how they think the Chinese government spread it's malicious code too. These links may be on Facebook, or Twitter, or your mail or in chats. Before clicking suspicious links, ask the person who sent it if he actually sent the link and what it contains.
• Use internet in public places at your own risk - Wi-fi in public places is not secure. Anyone with access to the network can potentially snoop on whatever you send over the internet. So if you are just browsing the net, that's ok. But if you are using Gmail/Facebook/Banking or any other site asking for passwords, then know the risks involved. To reduce the risk of someone stealing your password by watching what you send over the network, there is a technology called encryption. This is not enabled by default in most cases. You can see if everything that you get is encrypted or not by looking at the website address in your browser. If it says https then it is secure, if it says http (without the s), then it is not. Not all webpages need to be secure. Most of the times only the one asking for your password will use https. Google has turned this feature on by default after the China fiasco.
• Beware of phishing attacks. Phishing is used to steal your vital information like password, bank details, etc. To protect your self from phishing, a good policy is to always type the web-address of bank-sites, gmail, yahoo, etc. For example, type www.yahoo.com/mail when you want to access Yahoo mail. That way, no one can direct you to a wrong site.
• Have a strong password. Passwords should not be dictionary words! A good password should be something with a combination of small are CAPITAL letters with some special characters in them and you should be able to remember it too. For example Psnbdw! is a good password (first letter of every words in 'Passwords should not be dictionary words!'). Keep separate passwords for really important sites like mail and banking and different passwords for other websites. This ensures that no one can know your bank password from your daily sudoku website password, for example.
• Consider moving to a non-Windows world. There are too many things out there to worry about in the Windows world. Linux is so much more secure and safe. It is not that difficult to get used to things in Linux. Probably 2-3 months for a novice computer user.

That's enough for now. If you follow all these, then you will definitely be as secure as humanly possible. But know that it is not that difficult to steal your information. Just like no home-security system is secure against determined thieves, similarly no computer system is completely safe for determined hackers. But the least you can do is make life more difficult for them. There are millions of dumb computer users out there for them to waste more time on you. Have a safe and secure Sunday, and enjoy your online experience.

A case study of BidRivals.com

Today I came across a website called BidRivals (www.bidrivals.com). I consider their's to be one of the most cunning business plans ever.

Let me explain their business model first. So the home-page displays some 16 products. Some products right now are a PS3 slim 120 GB, Nokia N97 unlocked, Canon T1I. This is an auction site. So each product starts with a minimum price of 1 cent and with every bid that you make, the price goes up by another cent. There is a timer which starts counting down from 15 seconds once a bid is made. If at 0, no one outbids you, the product is yours. Simple, right? No potential for evil here, right? Wrong!

Let me give you outcomes of some recent bids - an Iomega 2 TB HD sold for $1.26, and iPod nano 16 GB sold for $1.63, a blu-ray disk player for $1.12. Surely this is a hoax, you tell me. No one sells an iPod for less that 2 dollars. What if I tell you it isn't? And that this is a perfectly legitimate website and if you were the person who bid for 1.63, then you will definitely get the iPod. In fact, I think the company would at that point be willing to give you the iPod for free.

To explain why, let me present the Canon T1I worth $900 on sale right now. I have been observing the bidding for the last 60 minutes. When I started observing the bid was for 17.46 dollars. I said what? No way! A T1I for 18 dollars? Where is the bidding button. I want to register. And then I googled a bit, analyzed the data a bit. And started writing this blog post. And I have not even bid for the camera, yet.

So what makes the whole process evil is that you have to buy bids. Yup. Each bid costs you 60 cents. That's all. If Alice made the winning bid for the T1I at 17.46, that would have cost her 17.46+0.60 for the bid. But this is where the fun part begins. Because Alice is not the only person bidding. So every time Alice bids, someone else has 15 seconds to outbid you. So after Alice bids, Bob comes into the picture. Sees the price as 17.46 and outbids Alice. Price become 17.47. The price went up by 1 cent, but Evil Co. pocketed 60 cents. This goes on and on, Cal joins in, followed by David, Ethan, Alice decides to bid again and you get the picture.

The T1I is at 22.37 right now. Which means 2236 bids have been made on the product. Evil Co. has made $1341.6. In the past 60 minutes, there have been 490 bids = $294. There are 16 products on the home page and the same pattern is being repeated everywhere. So $4704 per hour. Say I am wrong by 50% in my calculations, that makes it $2352 per hour. Or close to 20 MILLION dollars in 1 year. There is more. This is just the US website. They have 18 websites for different countries, each with different products. Say each country earns them 10% less than the previous, that is still 170 MILLION(!) dollars. Even if this company lasts for a year, the founders will have made enough to last many generations.

So the question to ask is - should such a company be allowed to run? It is not much different from gambling. Or from insurance companies. Yet we consider the first to be evil, the second to be good.

While you think that, I will go back to bidrivals.com and wait for that perfect moment to spend the 1 free bid I got for joining on my DSLR. Who knows? I may get it for $50 (a 94% discount for me, a 233% profit for the company). Now isn't that a win-win situation!

Remove those annoying quiz messages from your Facebook Homepage

Hello all. After months of tolerating those annoying quizzes, then blocking them left-right-centre, blocking people from my notifications and then giving up and then starting the process all over again, I finally decided to do something about them today. Wonder why I didn't think of this some time back. Laziness has its disadvantages too.

So here's what you must do to remove those quizzes, tests, and other annoying apps from your notifications once and for all* (* more about that later in the post).

1. Start using Firefox. If you are still using Internet Explorer then, well, you are an idiot to say the least. The previous comment is directed to people who know what Internet Explorer is. For those who don't here's a brief explanation. Things like Google, Facebook, Yahoo are called websites and need a web-browser to display them on your computer. Internet Explorer (IE) is the browser that comes installed with your computer. Microsoft is the company that makes IE. Firefox is another browser. It is free, and it is much better and faster that IE. But most importantly, given our frustration over those silly quiz notifications, Firefox allows you to add small programs (called ad-ons) to your browser. These programs will enhance your experience on the web. For example, there is an ad-on which will remove all ads from most of the pages you browse. Yes! No more ads flashing up on your screen when you visit CNN-IBN's website. So given this background, time has come for you to download Firefox. Go here and on the "Download Firefox" button on that page.
2. Now that you have installed Firefox (now referred to as FF) (congratulations! btw (which means by the way btw)), you need to install one of those ad-ons I was talking about in the previous point. The one that you need to remove those intensely moronic quiz notifications (don't forget our main goal now) is called Greasemonkey. Now what Greasemonkey does is to allow you to install small useful tools which will read the webpage that you have loaded and make small changes to them (like removing those at (most) times racist, sexist, downright irritating quiz notifications from your notifications!). So what you need to do is to go here, and press the add to firefox button. After a few seconds there will be an alert asking you if you want to install Greasemonkey and like all things that you usually agree to without reading the text completely, you will press install. Greasemonkey (GM from now... yeah you are getting the hang of these abbreviations already) will be installed, it will ask you to restart FF, which you will and voila! GM is installed.
   
3. I have rid myself of IE, installed GM in FF, what next? you ask. Well, just one more step. You are now going to install one of those tiny tools to remove notifications using Greasemonkey. This tool (called script in computer lingo) has been written by a guy called Stephen Fernandez. If I can meet you right now Stephen, I would hug you and start crying. You are amazing. So this tool is called (very aptly) Facebook Purity. As he (SF) describes it

   If you are like me and are sick to death of seeing messages about quiz results and other silly facebook applications, then you have come to the right place!

   So now all you have to do is to click here. As usual click on install once you are asked for confirmation and let FB Purity install itself. It may ask you to restart Firefox. But worry not - all your open web-sites will be loaded back after the restart.
   
4. That's it! Nothing more to do. Just visit Facebook and those notifications are gone. Start dancing with joy.

Now to deal with that * and explain you how Facebook Purity works. Spoiler - some technical jargon here which I will not explain.

From what I understand, and I don't understand Javascript too well, is that the script calls an event once the notifications are loaded. First thing it does is to add a counter on the right-side panel of the Facebook homepage which keeps a count of the number of applications hidden from your feed and gives you an option to see them. Then it goes through each notification and hides all notifications from Facebook Third Party applications keeping only native Facebook apps like status updates, wall posts, links, notes, photos, etc. thus 'purifying' Facebook. How it performs this magic is by identifying all notifications with facebook.com/apps/ hidden in the code. That's it. Those bloody quizzes are gone.

The only caveat is that Facebook may change their homepage design anytime. This script totally depends on how FB names various blocks in their homepage and so can be broken very easily. The good news is that the developer seems to be active and constantly working to keep the script updated with FB homepage changes. According to him, the link I gave you in point 3 will always point to the latest script. So in case it stops working, just click on that link again. So please bookmark this post for future reference.

That's all for now folks. Hope you are able to remove the notifications and make your FB experience much cleaner and better.

Making a case for Binary Surveys

Do you like this blog?

Isn't that a easier question to answer than a question like "How would you rate my blog on a scale of 0-10?"

Am I not bound to get more truthful and accurate answer with the first question? After all, our minds can easily distinguish whether we like things or not, but it is very difficult to quantify your liking/disliking for something.

If I have 100 people taking a survey and then rating it 0/1, I can still come up with a 0-10 figure in the end by just taking a mean of the answers and multiplying by 10. Would that figure be any less or any more accurate than an average derived from making people give a 0-10 answer?

Feeding a 0-10 answer obtained by averaging 0/1 answers into a larger calculation might still work, but I think the basic inputs should always be binary.

Airtel's new "fair use" unlimited broadband policy

Airtel has introduced a new "fair use" clause which entitles them to curb your download speed if you exceed a certain threshold of data transfer per month.

Here are the thresholds for respective unlimited download plans:

128 kbps = 10 GB download limit per month
256 kbps = 15 GB download limit per month
384 kbps = 20 GB download limit per month
512 kbps = 25 GB download limit per month
1 Mbps = 150 GB download limit per month

After you reach this threshold, Airtel will halve your download speed keeping the unlimited data limit intact.

Suppose you are on a 256 kbps plan. This means that you should be able to download 256/8 = 32 kilo bytes of data every second = 2700 mega bytes of data every day.

The revised policy means that if you are downloading continuously, then you will reach the threshold after 5.69 days. After this you will get a speed of 128 kbps for the remaing 24.31 days. Which means that instead of the 65637 MB of data that you could have downloaded in the remaining period, now you will only be able to download 32818 MB.

So in all theoretical limit before threshold = 65637 + 15360 = 80997 MB
Theoretical limit after threshold = 48178 MB = reduction of 32819 MB or a whopping 40.51%

So you end up paying the same amount every month, but at a reduction of 40.51% of the service that they give you in return.

So all of you who are on Airtel's unlimited plan, please calculate how much internet you use every month. If it is more than the limit above, do get out of Airtel as fast as you can. For all those who are not reaching the above limits, consider going for another plan with limit data downloads, but higher speed, as you are not using your internet optimally anyway.

I think BSNL's Dataone should be a safe bet now. I have had Dataone for many years now, and have not had any major issues with it's connectivity. And they are less likely to throw bombshells like the one Airtel has thrown at it's loyal unlimited internet customer base.