As the earth completes another ellipse around the sun for me, I make it a point to put fingers to a keyboard (though there is a renewed resurgence of “pen to paper” due to a newly acquired Lamy pen and a stack of Campus notebooks). Birthdays in general have never mattered to me, but I…
Tag: storytelling
A Personal AI Manifesto
I remember the very first time I played Super Mario Brothers on an NES console. It was 1989 and I was down with chicken pox. To stop me from scratching myself and keep me distracted, my dad rented a console and I played Mario (and Contra) non-stop over the next few days (with my mom…
Side Quests
I often find myself thinking about the Greek hero Odysseus (and NO – this is not one of those Elon Musk things where he claims he thinks about the Roman empire daily or how men supposedly think about the Roman empire multiple times a day. In the last year, I’ve only thought about the Roman…
The Mahabharat Mega Thread
I tried something a little crazy on Twitter: narrated the entire 18 days of the Mahabharat war as a mega Twitter thread. At 149 tweets (which I posted over 6 days) – this was exhilarating and tiring. Go ahead, click on the tweet below and jump in.
The Fire Born
This is the second in a series of character origin stories from the Mahabharat. They never gave her a name. She was her kingdom’s princess. She was her father’s daughter. She was the colour of dusk. Panchali. Draupadi. Krishna. She was born out of a sacrificial fire. So was her brother. He knew his purpose….
The Bird Prince
This is the first in a series of character origin stories from the Mahabharat. A young prince and his father, the king, are locked up in the deepest dungeon of their own palace. They have been utterly defeated by the enemy – their kingdom in shambles. The prince’s elder sister is to be married to…
The Product Managers of the Mahabharat
Over a meeting, someone recently asked me to describe the archetype of a product leader. While I answered the question, a broader thought stayed with me. What are the various archetypes of product managers? An archetype is a powerful storytelling device – making it easier for readers to identify and understand a concept. And PMs…
Here be Dragons
This is the second in a series of essays focused on the future of storytelling: the “Story Stack”. The first one was on the movie industry and covered the history of films and the rise of curators (and how they became the arbiters of quality). This one focuses on the written word and the publishing…
Cut to the Chase
I am working on a series of essays focused on the future of storytelling: the “Story Stack” – an entire ecosystem that I see developing around storytellers and creators. These essays will focus on the following topics: Part 1. Moving Pictures – Cut to the Chase (this essay) Part 2. Written Word – Here be…