Web Site of Rajiv Pant

Born to Run by Christopher McDougall is one of the most inspiring books I’ve read in a long time. It is a book about adventures, travels, cultures, customs, ancient wisdom, evolution, anatomy, biology, footwear, anthropology, friendships and human nature. It is also a book about long distance running.

Through the stories of his warm characters, Christopher McDougall teaches that long distance running is more about cooperation, camaraderie and caring than about competition. It reminded me of my favorite quote: Victory is winning others, not defeating others.

Rating:

I’ve been reading the book SuperFreakonomics by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner. Like its predecessor, Freakonomics by the same authors, SuperFreakonomics is unputdownable once you start reading it.

What’s great about this book is that it argues against many things we believe to be true. Using statistics and challenging established wisdom, Levitt and Dubner make compelling arguments that give us fresh perspectives on knowledge we take for granted.

The authors cover a range of seemingly unrelated but interesting topics ranging from the economics of prostitution to the identifying potential terrorists using statistical data. The work of their colleague Sudhir Venkatesh, author of the gripping book Gang Leader for a Day is also featured in this book. They discuss the effectiveness of complex solutions like child safety seats (“car seats”) compared to simple solutions like seat belts. In their discussion of simple solutions to seemingly insurmountable challenges like preventing and controlling hurricanes, they remind us that simple solutions are sometimes the most powerful and reliable.

There are numerous things in this book that many people will not agree with. This book does not claim to be an encyclopedia of correct, proven information. If you are looking for established science and facts, compared to the hypothesis and opinions presented in this book, even WikiPedia would be a more authoritative source of facts.  However, what I liked about this book is that reading it inspires and challenges the reader to think in new ways. In fact, the same methods this book uses to challenge other wisdom could be used to dispute the viewpoints of the people whose opinions are expressed in this book.

Whether you agree with all, some or none of their findings, reading their book will benefit you: It presents and encourages ways of finding different and better ways of conducting experiments and studies. It sparks new ways of thinking, even if you use the methods to challenge some of their own findings.

The findings and statistical data are presented in their approachable storytelling that everyone can enjoy. It is an entertaining, enlightening and even educational read. I recommend reading this book.

Rating:

I thank HarperCollins for sending me a pre-release copy of the upcoming book for review. Below is a link to the book on Amazon. It will be released on October 20, 2009.

SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance

We spend most of our waking hours outside home wearing shoes. So it is important that the shoes be comfortable and promote good health of our feet and legs.

I’ve been regularly wearing a few different models of Vivo Barefoot shoes by Terra Plana for a few months now. They have become my footwear of choice.

I find them extremely comfortable and I feel that my feet and legs have become healthier as a result of wearing them. Compared to Vibram Five Fingers shoes, the Vivo Barefoot shoes have the look of regular shoes and can be worn in most social and formal occasions. The Vivo Barefoot shoes come in dozens of fashionable designs. My wife suggested the models I bought.

The Terra Plana Web page lists some benefits of barefoot shoes that I agree with:

1. Strengthens the muscles in your feet.
2. Realigns your natural posture.
3. Feeling the ground, stimulates sensory perception.
4. Flexes your feet as nature designed.

The casual shoes I wear on evenings and weekends are Vivo Barefoot (Oak Black Oil Suede and Oak Dk Brown Oil Suede) and so are the dress “formal” shoes I wear to work with a suit (Dharma Black Veg Tanned Leather). While Terra Plana does not currently make Vivo Barefoot formal dress shoes, I find that their black and brown leather shoes are fine to wear with a suit and tie to work. The comfort and health benefits provided by these shoes make up for the fact that they are not fully formal looking dress shoes. I find that they provide better grip on the ground than dress shoes and are thus great for my walking commute to work in Midtown Manhattan.

For outdoor sports like hiking and running, I wear Vibram Five Fingers shoes, but for social occasions and for work I wear Vivo Barefoot shoes. I find that the Vivo Barefoot shoes and the Vibram Five Fingers shoes complement each other well. Walking in Vivo Barefoot shoes most of the time keeps my feet in healthy and fit condition for when I hike, run, or otherwise exercise in Vibram Five Fingers.

For further reading, I suggest a recent article in the New York Times that discusses Vivo Barefoot and Vibram Five Fingers.

One drawback is that these shoes are expensive (about $150 for a pair) but I was fortunate to be able to get mine much cheaper. I had gone to the Manhattan store wearing my Vibram Five Fingers shoes. That led to a conversation about barefoot shoes with the store salespeople who were friendly and they realized I was seriously interested in such shoes. I politely and respectfully requested the store sales agent for a discount. She seemed agreeable. I then offered to buy two pairs if she’d give me a good price. She kindly agreed and suggested that if I buy the previous models which had been replaced by the new models, she could give me an even better discount. I agreed. By this time the salespeople and I had a good rapport. Before she started the paperwork for the sale, I further asked I bought three pairs if she could give me an even better deal. She agreed. So I purchased three pairs and got them pair much cheaper than the list price. In work and in personal life, negotiations should result in win/win for both sides and this was another negotiation that left both parties happy. (Note: I haven’t posted my purchase price here since that wouldn’t be fair. After negotiating a good deal it is not a good idea to publicize the terms. Market conditions and other circumstances vary and I don’t want to mislead anyone about what price they could get. )

I highly recommend these shoes.

Rating:

Sometimes simplicity and minimalism provide wonderful experiences. The Vibram Five Fingers shoes are excellent for outdoor activities and for working out at the gym. The natural feeling that comes with being outdoors with these shoes enables the wearer to feel one with nature. Walking while wearing these shoes is a sensory experience that allows you to notice and feel the Earth.

Time Magazine named Vibram Five Fingers shoes among the best inventions of 2007 along with other products like the Apple iPhone.

Besides Vibram, some other companies also market shoes that provide a barefoot-like experience. Nike sells the Nike Free line of shoes, though the Vibram Five Fingers experience is much closer to being barefoot. A company called Terra Plana makes their Vivo Barefoot shoes. These shoes do provide a good level of protection and safety compared to walking truly barefoot. Personally, I would not be barefoot while hiking in the mountains or walking the streets of New York City, so these shoes provide me with an excellent balance of safety, comfort, good exercise and the thrill of a natural feeling.

According to Vibram, Nike and Terra Plana‘s separate marketing materials and others’ independent research, the barefoot-like experience provided by such shoes is good for the health of your feet and legs on the long term, since they allow your muscles and bones to get proper exercise that other shoes inhibit.

Since these shoes do not offer the cushioning via a thick sole of protection regular shoes do, you do need to be cautious while wearing them, especially while you are getting used to them. If you go hiking with these, consider taking along a pair of regular shoes as backup. I plan to go hiking wearing these and they will likely become my hiking shoes of choice, a position currently held by my Nike Free 3.0 shoes. I’ve hiked in the Georgia mountains wearing Nike Free 5.0 shoes and on a part of the Appalachian trail in New Jersey wearing the even thinner soled Nike Free 3.0 shoes. Those hikes included treading on sharp rocks and river crossings. Walking through water over the riverbed wearing barefoot-like shoes is such a soothing experience. I kept a pair of regular hiking shoes in my backpack as backup, but was able to complete the hikes without needing to resort to the backup shoes. Hiking wearing the Nike Free shoes that felt close to being barefoot was a wonderful zen like experience.

One drawback: Since the Vibram Five Fingers shoes look too unconventional, they are not suitable for wearing to many social events. A suggestion for Vibram: To some models, add a thin cloth or rubber film/layer on top that makes them look more like regular shoes from above while preserving the independent fingers movement on the bottom sole. Such a thin layer of film would be for looks only. Beneath it, the toes would still be independent. With that, people would be able to wear these shoes in many social situations.

I love Vibram Five Fingers shoes and highly recommend them. I wish that Vibram decides to make other versions of these shoes that will provide all the benefits these shoes do, but also look more like conventional shoes from top. If Vibram does so, they would become the shoes of my choice for all casual wear. It would be even more awesome if Vibram one day designs Five Fingers shoes that look like formal dress shoes from aboce. If they do that, various models of Five Fingers shoes would become my favorite shoes for almost all walks of life.

Rating:

For an executive, having a management team of people who are good at their jobs and work well with each other is one of the most important factors that lead to success together. Observing a number of successful projects, I realized that it is critical that your management team members care for each other, work well together and give to each other. Their sincere collaboration is far more important than their individual strengths.

I began to write this article impressed by how well the management team comprising of my direct reports functioned, collaborating with each other towards shared success. I was pleasantly surprised by how these directors shared responsibilities, how closely they worked with people in each other’s teams and how comfortably they gave credit to each other. When conflicts arose between them, they frankly, respectfully and nicely expressed them to each other, often one-on-one. Every time, they resolved them quickly and came out with a closer professional relationship. They actively and regularly talked to quell any turf battles between each other’s departments before they could form.

They had a wonderful professional relationship. They barely knew each other outside of work, having busy personal lives with their families on most evenings and weekends. I felt that my management team and I were like a work-family, sticking together through good and bad times, always believing that our success comes as a team.

When you manage and organize your company or your department, spend time multiple times a week with your direct reports together so that you all work well with each other towards shared success. In turn, they should ensure that their direct reports care about each other and collaborate. If you have, say five direct reports, make sure that just the six of you get together in a room to work openly and collaboratively at least twice a week (assuming you are in the same geographic location). The forum for this need not be always a staff meeting, it could be a working session on a project.

I was struggling to come up with suitable words to describe this and its importance. While reading the book The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive: A Leadership Fable by Patrick Lencioni, I found that the first discipline described in the story talks exactly of this and hence is the title of this article. The book is written as a fictional story that teaches leadership lessons. It is easy to read being under 200 pages in large typeface which you can read in one evening. I highly recommend it.

I now use a device called Drobo (2nd generation), manufactured by Data Robotics, Inc. as the primary data storage and backup medium at my home location. I have attached it via a USB 2.0 cable to my Apple Airport Extreme wireless network router. The Airport Extreme enables me to share USB 2.0 based storage devices on my home network so they can be simultaneously used by multiple computers. This system of making the same hard disk(s) available to multiple computers in a network is called Network Attached Storage (NAS).

The Drobo replaced my USB 2.0 external hard disk drive manufactured by Western Digital (WD) that was earlier attached to my Airport Extreme. The Drobo has significant advantages over the previous WD drive:

• Data protection in the event of one hard drive failure as a result of wear and tear due to use over time
• Ability to increase the storage size of the device as the volume of my data grows (more photographs, music, videos, etc.)

A data protection strategy should include both local fault tolerance and remote storage in an offsite location. For off site storage, I keep copies of my data at online locations like Amazon S3, Smugmug, Google Docs, IMAP mail servers and Apple’s Mobile Me service. Since the volume of my data is in terabytes (~ 15 years of emails, photographs, music, videos), recovering large amounts of data from online locations is reserved for extreme situations when local storage is destroyed or corrupted. The Drobo uses technology to protect data in cases of failure (via normal wear and tear) of one of the hard disks inside the Drobo. The benefit I get is similar to the benefit provided by a set of technologies called RAID.

Unlike most RAID devices for home/small-business use, the Drobo allows me to mix and match hard drives of varying capacities. It has 4 bays to insert hard drives. For example, I can have two 1 TB drives today. Next month, I can add another 1.5 TB drive to the 3rd slot. A few months later, I can add a 2 TB drive to the 4th slot. Then when I need more space next year, I can replace one of the 1 TB drives with a 2 TB drive. As I make these changes, the Drobo will automatically recalculate the optimal distribution of my data across all these drives to maximize its storage space and provide data protection. Adding a new drive or replacing a drive with another is done without downtime. The Drobo stays up and running during disk changes and the data on it remains usable by my computers, even while I’m replacing a drive or when it is redistributing data on the new set of drives after a drive is inserted.

Benefits

• Save money by buying 1 TB drives today and 2 TB drives when they are cheaper in the future
• Save money by buying just hard disks for adding storage instead of buying a drive plus an enclosure and power supply adapter for each drive. This is also energy efficient (fewer power adapters) and good for the Environment (fewer drive enclosures made of plastic and power adapter units purchased)
• Save time by letting the Drobo take care of data protection at the local level. Also save time that would have been spent recovering data from remote locations in the event of a local drive failure.
• Peace of mind having good data protection at home.

Moving data from the WD external drive to Drobo

I transferred the files by having both drives directly connected to my Apple Macbook Pro: The Drobo to the Firewire 800 port and the WD to the USB 2.0 port.

My MacBook Air‘s Time Machine backups used to be stored on the USB external drive. Since it was attached to an Airport Extreme, the Apple Time Machine backups were stored in a special virtual storage location called a sparsebundle. I just copied the sparsebundle from the WD drive to the Drobo and now my Time Machine backups (including all the Time Machine history of my MacBook Air) are now transferred to my Drobo storage device. Thanks to my Time Machine bundles having been on a sparsebundle, it was easy to transfer them to my new Drobo storage device using a simple copy process using the Mac OS Finder.

Rating:

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini was as enjoyable to read on the Amazon Kindle as it would have been in a printed book. I started reading it on the plane during my flight back to NYC from Charlotte after speaking at a conference there. It took two evenings to complete.

The story is gripping and emotional: It makes use of back references and coincidences that fit in well for such a story touching Eastern cultures and societies. The descriptions of Afghanistan make you feel like you can relate to the place that is foreign to many of us. The depiction of the immigrant community in the San Francisco Bay Area feels like a genuine experience. Even though the author relates the storyline to Afghan history giving the tale a realistic feel, he does not dwell much into narrating the actual historical events like a part-history book. Instead, the book focuses on the characters and the plot, making it a thrilling experience to read throughout. The story isn’t a light read: It describes some of life’s gruesome realities. Overall, while he does employ cultural stereotypes, the author has captured the essence of different cultures and represents them well.

In most parts, the story feels real, as if it was someone’s amazing autobiography. Some coincidences do, however feel too eerie to be true. I recommend it.

Rating:

Below is an introduction to the book in a video interview with the author.

The Amazon Kindle mobile reading device comes with their NowNow service included, where you can ask any question you like and you get a response from a paid human researcher. I asked a question and got the unexpected answer below.

I do believe this was an honest mistake by a researcher trying to be helpful. NowNow is a very useful service.

Rating:

—–Original Message—–
From: NowNow [mailto:ask@nownow.com]
Sent: Tue 1/22/2008 10:48 PM
To: Rajiv Pant
Subject: RE: What are some good places to learn Spanish in evenings and/or weekends in Manhattan New York City?

Your Question:
What are some good places to learn Spanish in evenings and/or weekends in Manhattan New York City?

Answer from NowNow:
Get a job at any restaurant and work in the back.

Get a job in the back of a restaurant and you will make money and learn spanish from your co-workers.

Source:
Opinion

NowNow, let us be politically correct :-)

If they had said instead a Spanish or Mexican restaurant, that would have been acceptable, but in the back of any restaurant? That’s presumptuous.

If you’d like to suggest a better answer to my question about learning Spanish, please feel welcome to leave a comment here.

The Amazon Kindle is an excellent reading device. It is a good example of a product that serves its purpose well. Like a paper book, it you can use it in bed, bathroom, bus and boondocks.

The E Ink display presents an experience quite close to that of reading a book on paper: It is easy on the eyes and can be read indoors or outdoors in sunlight. It is lightweight, about the size of a paperback book and simple to use. It has excellent battery-life so you can enjoying read without worrying about recharging it often.

In some reviews people have criticized the Kindle as a Web browser and email client. As a satisfied user of the Kindle, I respectfully disagree with those criticisms: It is not meant to be a general purpose notebook computer or tablet PC nor a web browsing or email client. It is for reading books and documents, allowing you to focus on the content while providing you an experience equal to or better than reading on printed paper.

In fact, if Amazon had made web browsing too easy with it, it might end up being counter to the purpose of the Kindle, which is to read books: to learn or for the enjoyment of being engrossed in reading. Many of us prefer our book readers to not offer distractions like web browsing or email while reading. While I love the Web and its hypertext links, there are times I just want to focus and read a book or a document.

The Kindle enables you to be more environment-friendly by saving trees. Many books, newspapers, magazines and blogs are already available on it. You can also transfer your own documents to it for convenient reading without printouts. (You email your document to a special automated email address for conversion. Amazon gives you two options to have it on your Kindle: One for a small fee where your document is wirelessly sent back to your Kindle, the other for free where they email it back to you and you need to copy it over from a computer to your Kindle using USB. You can also download free software to convert documents on your own computer.)

You save paper, yet still can carry your document to read in a convenient, lightweight, portable and easy to read medium. As a bonus, your document is searchable and your bookmarks, clippings, highlighting and notes can be transferred to your computer.

You don’t need a computer at all to take advantage of all the main features of a Kindle, but a computer does allow you to get even more value from your Kindle: You can use it instead of printouts and you can copy audio books and music to your Kindle for listening via its speakers or a headset.

As an educational tool, the Kindle comes with another useful and time-saving feature. You can ask a question using the Kindle which is answered by an Amazon-affiliated human researcher at no additional charge. The Kindle not distract your reading with Web browsing or email and it gives you a way to save some time which you would have spent researching yourself via Web searches — and we know how that can be: Sometimes you go the Web to look up something and end up wasting time on other things. With this Amazon Kindle’s research service called NowNow, you send your question via the Kindle and a human expert does the research for you and sends you the answers they find.

The Kindle can be charged using the A00 Tip with an iGo Adapter, which is great because you can carry it on hiking trips and to places where an electrical outlet is not conveniently available and charge it using two double-A batteries using the iGo powerXtender.

Want to take a break from Web surfing that encourages the attention span of a goldfish? Try the Kindle and enjoy being focussed and engrossed in a book. You can learn about all its features and benefits, watch videos and read its reviews at the Kindle page on Amazon.com.¹

Rating:

1. Note & Disclosure: the links to the Kindle pages in this article tell Amazon that I referred them. If you happen to buy it in that session, I will get a commission but they will not charge you any extra. I like the Kindle and thus wrote this favorable, and in my opinion, fair review. It expresses my opinions and shares my experience with the Kindle. The purpose of this review is not at all to profit from selling Kindles. [↩]

I use an iGo adapter to power and charge my electronic devices when I’m traveling. The concept behind these is that you can use one adapter/charger for multiple devices like notebook computers, mobile phones, bluetooth headsets, music players, cameras and hand-held video game players. Having one charger for multiple devices cuts down on the clutter and makes it convenient to carry. iGo has been has been selling these for many years. Kensington and Targus also make similar universal adapters. Also, in the last couple of years, many phones and small devices have begun to support USB based charging.

Such universal charging systems have many benefits. For example:

• I have different makes and models of notebook computers at work and home. Sometimes I need to bring my work laptop home or take my home laptop to the office. With a universal charging adapter that can be used with either of my notebooks, I don’t have to carry a charger between home and the office.
• When I travel, I sometimes carry my work laptop. On other trips I carry my personal notebook computer. I can just keep the one (same) charger in my travel kit regardless of which laptop I’m traveling with.
• When I change my mobile phone handset, I only need to buy one tip (~ $10) for my new phone. I don’t need to buy a new set of chargers for my home, office, car and travel. The same applies to a new laptop computer.
• I love the iGo powerXtender battery operated charger which allows me to charge my mobile phone or iPod Nano using two standard AA batteries when doing outdoor activities like hiking or exploring a city walking.
• At places like Airports where there are not enough power outlets for everyone who needs to use one, I can charge up to three devices — my laptop, my mobile phone and another small mobile device (e.g. iPod, Amazon Kindle) while taking up only one power outlet on the wall. That’s a nice, friendly thing for my fellow passengers.
• If I happen to be carrying a compatible tip and a colleague/friend/relative of mine needs to charge their computer or phone, but doesn’t have their charger handy, I am able to help out.

iGo manufactures a number of different chargers. While they are great, they have one shortcoming: At present, notebook tips between different iGo chargers are not interchangeable. (Their sales agent informed me of this in our pre-sales conversations.) For people who only need to have one iGo charger (e.g. for travel only), this is not a problem unless they change their adapter. For e.g., to upgrade from the iGo everywhere85 charger to the higher wattage iGo everywhere130 charger to support their new Macbook Pro (which needs more power than most notebooks). In fact, the iGo Frequently Asked Questions page explicitly states:

No, parts including notebook tips and adapter specific cables can’t be interchanged between adapters. Each adapter falls within a certain electrical range. The parts are designed to regulate the amount of volts and amps that flow in and out of the product. Altering or switching parts can cause serious damage to your equipment.

It would benefit the consumers even more if the notebook tips (and cables) were interchangeable between different iGo adapters. For example, I’d buy 3 or 4 or more iGo adapters:

• One for travel that I’d take with me on trips and always keep in my travel bag. This would be a wall+car+airplane unit.
• One for home. This would be a wall-only adapter.
• One for the office. This would be a wall-only adapter
• I’d keep a car/auto-only adapter in my car all the time.

This way, when I am at home or in my office, I don’t need to carry or take out my travel adapter. I would only keep & carry the tip with each device (which is much lighter and easier than always carrying the device + tip + adapter).

Also, in the future, I may need to buy new adapters. Say, for example, if iGo came up with a very lightweight one for travel.

Given this situation, which I think is hardly unique to me, it would be useful if iGo notebook tips were interchangeable among different iGo adapters, present and future. It wouldn’t make sense if I had to buy new tips for each device when I get a new adapter.

Having said that, iGo adapters are still excellent.

Rating: