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Why the Great Indian Media Companies will Fail on the Internet

22 points by bosky101 17y ago

boundlessdreamz 17y ago
This is so so true!. Rediff can't even copy well. They tried to rip off facebook platform in june 2008 and they have not launched it till now. (It never will). More info here http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-rips-off-facebook/25/ http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-rips-off-facebook/25/ and here http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-platform-is-dead/34/ http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-platform-is-dead/34/ The ripoff was so bad that it was painfully hilarious. Their documentation was copied directly from facebook and they just changed FBML to RBML etc but there were places where they had forgotten to make the change!
karteek 17y ago
Rediff is a very bad excuse for an internet portal. It just lives on flame-baits, scarcely dressed bollywood divas and lots of mediocrity. A simple example of their technical capability - http://shopping.rediff.com/product/%22;-alert%28document.cookie%29;%22 http://shopping.rediff.com/product/%22;-alert%28document.coo... Few more @ http://karteek.selfdabba.com/tag/rediff/ http://karteek.selfdabba.com/tag/rediff/
- zaidf 17y ago
  And yet they make millions every quarter. I'm no fan of rediff yet somehow I end up visiting it often.
oldgregg 17y ago
I was strong-armed into opening an office in India for an american media company a couple years ago. The caste system is strong as ever-- it's just an economic caste. On the whole people don't give a shit about the technology -- only how many people work under them. It's really quite laughable. For instance, if you are a "fresher" right out of school you crashed through some .NET/Java course that didn't teach you a damn thing about how to think. But after an afternoon of writing shitty code that someone else will undoubtedly have to clean up, you'll be damned if you have to get up and pour your own hot tea. That's what servants are for. They are so openly demeaning to people it's disturbing. Strict hierarchy is so culturally ingrained that people rarely know how to function outside of a bureaucratic structure.
jdrock 17y ago
Speaking as an Indian by ethnicity but American (U.S.) by birth and heart, I can say I have always found India to be void of innovation. There is a general attitude there that there making leaps and bounds in terms of developing their economy and technology, when in reality they are just doing grunt work for the rest of the world. Being a cost leader is not sustainable, and they don't realize that.
- zaidf 17y ago
  Being a cost leader is not sustainable, and they don't realize that. I don't think it is so much that they don't realize it as it is that they see cheaper cost as a huge advantage, jump on that bandwagon and end up building some huge corporations(ie. Wipro, Infosys, Tata). I don't see anything wrong with those companies. Secondly, I get the sense that you are defining innovation very narrowly. All of the huge consulting companies out of India are a work of a lot of backend innovation. The smaller ones also do innovation--albeit at a smaller scale. Difference is they are innovating on things like management and education. they are just doing grunt work for the rest of the world So are many of the programmers at Google. I feel what you are seeing in India is a huge bunch of people for whom the Wipro and Infosys salaries were akin to selling a small startup in the Valley. Your standard of living takes a major jump. Overtime, and we are already seeing more and more of this, these employees of big corps realize they need more money and the once-enough salaries are no longer that motivating. This is when you'll see more startups. And if few of them end up becoming the next Wipro/Infosys, I don't care if people attack it for lack of innovation. There are far more companies known for "innovation" than companies doing multi-billion in sales. I'd rather be in the latter though that may be a personal choice.
  - jdrock 17y ago
    I'll admit that I only have a passing familiarity with consultancies and other companies in India, but I don't think I'm defining innovation too narrowly. A striking example is the IITs. These universities are lauded as some of the best in the world, but where is the ground-breaking research? Maybe I'm looking in the wrong places, but I haven't seen anything amazing come out of these schools.

22 points by bosky101 17y ago

This is so so true!. Rediff can't even copy well. They tried to rip off facebook platform in june 2008 and they have not launched it till now. (It never will). More info here http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-rips-off-facebook/25/ http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-rips-off-facebook/25/ and here http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-platform-is-dead/34/ http://www.manu-j.com/blog/rediff-platform-is-dead/34/ The ripoff was so bad that it was painfully hilarious. Their documentation was copied directly from facebook and they just changed FBML to RBML etc but there were places where they had forgotten to make the change!

karteek 17y ago

Rediff is a very bad excuse for an internet portal. It just lives on flame-baits, scarcely dressed bollywood divas and lots of mediocrity. A simple example of their technical capability - http://shopping.rediff.com/product/%22;-alert%28document.cookie%29;%22 http://shopping.rediff.com/product/%22;-alert%28document.coo... Few more @ http://karteek.selfdabba.com/tag/rediff/ http://karteek.selfdabba.com/tag/rediff/

zaidf 17y ago
And yet they make millions every quarter. I'm no fan of rediff yet somehow I end up visiting it often.

oldgregg 17y ago

I was strong-armed into opening an office in India for an american media company a couple years ago. The caste system is strong as ever-- it's just an economic caste. On the whole people don't give a shit about the technology -- only how many people work under them. It's really quite laughable. For instance, if you are a "fresher" right out of school you crashed through some .NET/Java course that didn't teach you a damn thing about how to think. But after an afternoon of writing shitty code that someone else will undoubtedly have to clean up, you'll be damned if you have to get up and pour your own hot tea. That's what servants are for. They are so openly demeaning to people it's disturbing. Strict hierarchy is so culturally ingrained that people rarely know how to function outside of a bureaucratic structure.

jdrock 17y ago

Speaking as an Indian by ethnicity but American (U.S.) by birth and heart, I can say I have always found India to be void of innovation. There is a general attitude there that there making leaps and bounds in terms of developing their economy and technology, when in reality they are just doing grunt work for the rest of the world. Being a cost leader is not sustainable, and they don't realize that.

zaidf 17y ago
Being a cost leader is not sustainable, and they don't realize that. I don't think it is so much that they don't realize it as it is that they see cheaper cost as a huge advantage, jump on that bandwagon and end up building some huge corporations(ie. Wipro, Infosys, Tata). I don't see anything wrong with those companies. Secondly, I get the sense that you are defining innovation very narrowly. All of the huge consulting companies out of India are a work of a lot of backend innovation. The smaller ones also do innovation--albeit at a smaller scale. Difference is they are innovating on things like management and education. they are just doing grunt work for the rest of the world So are many of the programmers at Google. I feel what you are seeing in India is a huge bunch of people for whom the Wipro and Infosys salaries were akin to selling a small startup in the Valley. Your standard of living takes a major jump. Overtime, and we are already seeing more and more of this, these employees of big corps realize they need more money and the once-enough salaries are no longer that motivating. This is when you'll see more startups. And if few of them end up becoming the next Wipro/Infosys, I don't care if people attack it for lack of innovation. There are far more companies known for "innovation" than companies doing multi-billion in sales. I'd rather be in the latter though that may be a personal choice.
- jdrock 17y ago
  I'll admit that I only have a passing familiarity with consultancies and other companies in India, but I don't think I'm defining innovation too narrowly. A striking example is the IITs. These universities are lauded as some of the best in the world, but where is the ground-breaking research? Maybe I'm looking in the wrong places, but I haven't seen anything amazing come out of these schools.