Go small and build communities

Philz is about to be sold to a private equity firm and this is not a one-off occurance. All popular local-coffee roasters from SF in the last two decades that raised a bunch of money, have met a similar fate. They were great, they became popular, they grew, they raised money and then couldn't grow enough so are now being sold to bigger more evil companies.

This is what I call the indie to medium sized sell-out arc. It doesn't just happen in the world of coffee, it happens everywhere there are indies. Indie software comes to mind, which has the same arc. Food is the other obvious one.


To me the problem exists with the notion of infinite growth. This very American idea of "Go Big or Go Home". What if that's not the right approach. Not everything needs to keep growing to the point where it either controls everything or sells out to someone else who does. I also hate this phrase because it's often used as a way to tell me how my own work as an indie is insignificant and will never be as big as the likes of big players. So what do we do to fight the demon of "Go Big or Go Home"?

We "Go Small and Build Communities". What does that mean. Here's my proposition:

Minimalism is anything but simple

Was at a bookstore today, and saw the book covers of some "Penguin Archive" books. They're supposed to be minimalist text based covers with just two colours (white and red) and a single font. Yet, these covers convey so much information.

Minimalism is anything but simple. These are minimalist covers for sure. Are they simple? Definitely not. Which makes me wonder about What exactly is minimalism. Is it the "absence of clutter? or the presence of only what's essential" (I'm Referencing Jony Ive's views on simplicity here). I think it's the latter.

All Dreams must end

Final evening in Berkeley today and incredibly sad to leave the city.
Berkeley was a literal dream come true. Ever since I visited the city for the first time in 2017, I have wanted to study in Berkeley. The university campus was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. So much greenery, the walkabilty of the city, the perfect weather. Everything about Berkeley was blissful. Alas, Berkeley didn't have a Masters program for Design. So for the longest time it seemed like that it would just be a dream.

Cut to 2019 November, I had just started giving a thought to pursuing my Masters. I looked at Berkeley again, no program. Sadly. I kept looking for a Masters of Design program in Berkeley every 3-4 months ever since. That's how badly I wanted to study in Berkeley; and one day it showed up. Berkeley had started a Master's of Design program, for designing emerging technologies with a focus on social good / social justice. It was the perfect fit. Exactly what I wanted to pursue. Exactly what I where I wanted to study.

So I joined the program in the Fall of 2023, and the next two years have been a literral dream come true. I had the best academic experience of my life. Wrote a thesis that was personally fulfilling. But more importantly met the kindest and most awesome people, whom I have the privilege of calling my friends.

For the first time in my life, I wasn't explaining myself. My friends understood where I was coming from, and not only that, some of them were in on those crazy ideas tooo. I blurted to a friend once "I know I am a bit crazy for thinking like this.." somehow, for some reason, they didn't think it was crazy at all. I realised I had finally met people who saw the world like I do, who were also marching towards what I aspired the world to be.

I couldn't have asked for a better group of people to spend my time in Berkeley with. But as is with all dreams in life, they must end. And so 8 months after graduation, my lease in Berkeley has finally ended, and I like my friends must disperse to other parts of the world. Will I miss Berkeley? Yes! Was it one of the best times of my life, that I will cherish forever? Yes!!

India draw the series 2-2

What an incredible series to watch. So many intense moments. Could've been 3-1 for either of the team. But just how both England and India fought for victory in this series needs to be cherished.

Today's win for India was special, when I woke up to 35 runs for victory for England yesterday, I was sure this is gonna be a cakewalk. But Siraj and Krishna, what an incredible spell this morning under pressure.

Loved watching every second of the series, no regrets of a terribly broken sleep cycle. :)

Nature

Got distracted by the nature, on my walk back home. Got some great photos.

The wicketkeeper crisis of early 2000s

After Nayan Mongia retired, the Indian cricket team was in a bit of a Wicket Keeping crisis. They played no less than 9 different wicket-keepers in a span of 5 years. Starting with MSK Prasad, Saba Karim, and ending towards the end with the more charismatic Parthiv Patel and Dinesh Karthik (the only one in the long list that survived beyond a handful of ODI matches). But safe to say the time between the summer of 2000, and winter 2004 was a moment of crisis for the Indian team.

Here's the list: 

1. MSK Prasad (debuted after Mongia’s injury in 1999) (17 ODIs) 
2. Saba Karim (34 ODIs) 
3. Vijay Dahiya: 19 ODIs: October 2000 to April 2001 
4. Sameer Dighe: 23 ODIs: January 2000 to August 2001 
5. Deep Dasgupta: 5 ODIs: October 2001 
6. Ajay Ratra: 12 ODIs: January to July 2002 
7. Parthiv Patel: 38 ODIs and 25 Tests: Famous for being one of the youngest players in the team, debuting at 18; and sledging Steve Waugh! 
8. Rahul Dravid (kept as a part-time keeper mainly in ODIs, including the 2003 World Cup) 
9. Dinesh Karthik: Played his first ODI in the summer of 2004 followed by a test in Australia tour to India in 2004 October / November. 

Funnily I remember most of these players, Deep Dasgupta, Ajay Ratra, Vijay Dahiya and the likes. Why so? I had a knack of collecting player info when they debuted as a way of winning at Cricketer's Atlas (a game similar to Atlas that me and my brother played when we were young) and as you can see there were a lot of wicket keeper debuts when I was a tiny kid trying to beat my elder brother at a game. But I digress.

The crisis continued until MS Dhoni started playing for India. The wicketkeeper who would not only surpass his contemporaries but go onto to be the best wicketkeeper-batsman the country has ever produced, infact even more influential and successful than the stalwarts of the time, Adam Gilchrist and Mark Boucher.

This unique moment of crisis in the Indian cricket team before Dhoni arrived and changed the game forever, has some interesting parallels with the Indian team's current captain crisis. The Indian team has struggled to have a stable captain post Kohli and in the absence of Rohit Sharma for quite sometime now. In T20s we've tried it all, Hardik Pandya, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Shubman Gill, you name it. ODIs have been stable under Rohit Sharma, but we're staring at a void in tests too. Putting faith in Subhman Gill, but also in the presence of a strong personality Gautam Gambhir as the coach, someone who's not hesitant to shake things. So will Gill be the long run captain? Hopefully. But I wouldn't be surprised if we look around for a bit, until there's someone as good as Kohli or even bigger.

Maybe it'll be a while till we find a stable team combination, and a stable captain, but I find it interesting that the crisis is in some ways similar to other crisis the team's had.

The City of Berkeley has a lot of different trash cans

My afternoon hobby today? Spot all the different kinds of trash bins installed in Berkeley. Very interesting to see all the different styles they've gone through. Arranging them in what I think is the descending order of recency (oldest first).

When the vicious cycle doesn't stop

Saw Udaan yesterday. One of the best movies to come out of India in the last 20 years. Arguably one of the best ever. It's such a deep and well meaning drama, that exposes the violence against kids in the country that's normalised in the name of "strict parenting". I thought the movie was excellent and gave it a rare five star rating on my Letterboxd.

But then I saw that the average rating of the movie was just 4.0. which made me think, that some people actually hated it? So I went and checked the reviews, and sure enough some people actually hated the movie, and why? because they sided with the parent in the film. A lot of these people would be my age, they grew up in an environment where this was the norm, and yet, somehow they're insular to the fact that this is wrong. Instead of breaking the cycle of violence, they think it's somehow "necessary". Not particularly surprising, but shameful nonetheless.

Resilience Lessons

Was on a walk this evening and stumbled across this plaque that sits right in front of my old Applied Resilience classroom, the Cal Memorial Stadium (Yes, that class used to take place in one of the small rooms on the ground floor of the stadium).

What a great quote to be in front of a class that's literally trying to teach resilience. A great reminder for me too. Sadly the class is no longer going to happen in the stadium, but I feel this plaque and the stadium were the spirit of that class. What's a better reminder than sports that failure is inevitable, and so is the redemption that follows that.

Also, reminded me of my dad, he was a very resilient person; saw and overcame many failures in his lifetime, and sometimes it'd be his words of encouragement that would be enough for me to overcome my own struggles. Miss him every day.

The Summer of formulaic movies

What do F1 (English, 2025, Sports Drama) and Saiyaara (Hindi, 2025, Romance) have in common?

They're both highly formulaic movies that reuse age old tropes. There's nothing new in either of the two movies. We've seen sports dramas like F1, a dime a dozen; to the point that people have compared to every other car race movie they could think of and found similarities (Yes, even Pixar's Cars). Saiyaara too, offers nothing new. The tropes are all too familiar, we know how the film ends; there's hardly a surprise element in the movie.

So why are they not terrible films? Why did I enjoy both of them very much? I think because the mind craves comfort, and this summer's been particularly rough. Watching a well made formulaic film is so much more fun than watching a poorly made experiment of a story. And both these films are particularly well made movies of their genre. The acting, the cinematography, and the music are all top-notch for both of these movies. And I love that about them. Liked both the movies, highly recommend.

Learning something new every day

This Pizza looks great, but the intensity of the leopard spotting and the smallish size indicate two things that went wrong today. I was working with some leftover dough, and took it out of the refrigerator at around 11AM. Re-balled it, and let it rest for another ~3 hours so it got back to room temperature.

At 2, even if the dough had gone back to room temperature, the gluten was far from reformed. So when i set out to stretch the dough, it didn't stretch as far, and the dough ball, even though it felt at room temperature, was still a bit cold which resulted in a very intense leopard spotting, not ideal for a Neapolitan Pizza.

That's learnings for the next session! :)

Xanadu

Discovered this word "Xanadu" recently, which means something like "an idealized place of great or idyllic magnificence and beauty"; and I've been thinking, what would such a place look like for me. And two things come to mind.

First, I spent a couple of days, earlier this year in this small town called "iso-syote" (just on the edge of the arctic circle, in Finland), in a cottage, secluded from humanity, covered in snow; and to me that's idyllic beauty. Calm, serene, peaceful, and full of nature.

Second, are Persian rugs. Why would someone think of Persian rugs when they think of Xanadu? Persian Rugs symbolize perfection to me. Their value lies in their imperfections. To me there's no Utopia, there's no Xanadu. The Utopia we live in is the world we accept as a whole, including its imperfections, just like Persian rugs.

A glimpse into how I prep for Pizza

Here's a glimpse of how I prep for Pizza. Dough Proportions are tough, especially the yeast. This thing helps me make accurate measurements so I can prep my dough. Not the prettiest app that I've made and I want to make a ton of changes to it before ever shipping it, but for now it just works for me.

Berkeley in the evening

What makes Tendulkar so uniquely great

Inspired by a rather juvenile twitter thread that claimed Tendulkar's contemporaries would've scored more runs if they played as many matches as him. People don't realise, that's the whole point of the "Godness" of Sachin Tendulkar, he not only performed consistently, he performed consistently for 24 years of his career, that began at 16, and ended at 40. No player has ever done that. What gave Tendulkar his longevity, is his adaptibility. He was adept at adapting to the changing format of the game, the changes his body underwent, and the changes in the game that his body demanded once he was over 35.

He scored his first ODI double century at ~37. Most cricketers lose their hand eye coordination and retire at 35. Tendulkar hadn’t even peaked at 35, and to top it off, he still scores in the odd old people tournament, as if he's just shy of 30. He hasn't lost any touch with his form. Tendulkar's records may be broken (Root is well on track to surpass him as the highest test run scorer), but his mastery is unmatched.

The problem with GenZ Discourse

I have a strong dislike for how millennials (my generation) talk about Gen-Z. The condescending derisive tones reek of insecurity. I am tired of my instagram feed being filled with "jokes" on Gen-Z's inability to work in corporate or their "funny" slang. A recent Hollywood Reporter headline reads like this "but something amusing is happening inside cinema halls: the Gen-Z is crying.". This is craziness. Can we stop observing Gen-Z like they're lab rats and start talking to them.

Because if people spend an iota of time with "Gen-Z" they'll realise that they're just as emotionally mature as everyone else, curious, sensitive and genuinely funny. In contrast, it's the people my age who've been disappointing meet ups lately. When I talk to people who are my age, and working in corporate America, I see the soul sucked out of them. The conversation are either boring, or teetering on the verge of insensitive.

Anyhow, don't feel like stoking any fires here. I personally think "Gen-Z", "Milennials" are just another set of meaningless labels people end up giving to each other in trying to feel secure about themselves. The discourse of being condescending towards them is even worse.

Almost Golden Hour

I just love how the light is selectively illuminating parts of the building. Perks of being near a hill, I think these were the last remnants of sunlight before the sunset. Almost after Golden Hour I want to say.

A good way to re-heat New York Style Pizza

I usually try to have fresh-Neapolitan Style Pizza (which should technically be un-reheatable) but I ended up with some extras of a New York Style Pizza today, which is thicker and easier to re-heat. But what's the correct way? If you just microwave it, it loses all its moisture and becomes rubbery which no one would like. Same for an oven as well.

I figured I'll ask ChatGPT for this, and I actually got a really good suggestion i.e.

1. Put the slice on a pan, or skillet and heat it for 2-4 minutes, until the crust gets "crisp". 
2. Add a couple of teaspoons of water, to the side of the Pizza (not on top) and cover it with a lid.
3. Heat until the chease begins to melt a little. 

Very interesting idea, which IMHO works because it infuses the pizza with the hydration it would otherwise loose from the re-heating process. That's actually a pretty smart idea. Not sure who came up with it (because obviously, GPT is trained on something!), but it's ingenious.

Posters from an unreleased art project

Been working on a little art project, whose release seems to be "delayed" indefinitely. We'll see when it sees the light of the day, but until then, I have some cool posters to share from the project.

A very stylish Vada Pav

Is that a five-star restaurant serving a Vada Pav? No it's just the local IKEA's food court having a very good lighting and wooden interior. I think this was one of the cheaper, and value for money Indian snacks I have had in the Bay Area.

A Shift in movie preferences

I used to enjoy dark-gritty thrillers, and serious subjects a lot. Some of my favourite movies of the 2010s were Omerta, Gangs of Wasseypur, Raman Raghav 2.0; my favourite shows included Mindhunter and Westworld. I was admittedly a sucker for anything dark and thought provoking. There was a certain kind of thrill to these movies.

My dad--my frequent co-participant in movie nights, absolutely hated these movies. His favourites were old-school actioners like Raees, or love stories like Dil Toh Pagal Hai or even Jab Tak Hai Jaan. It's not like he didn't like anything dark, but his threshold for dark was Drishyam or perhaps Talvar. I remember this one time, we went to watch Tamasha together, and his reaction in the first half was absolute disgust! :D (It wasn't a dark movie, it was just way too preachy for him)

I always wondered, how come my dad who was practically as big a movie buff as I was, never really enjoyed serious cinema. I asked him once, and he told me it was age; at my age he, too saw the niche Hindi and (some) international films. But something changed a few years ago. After his passing, gradually I drifted away from the kind of movies I enjoyed a few years ago. My favourite genres now are the entertaining crime capers and old-school actioners; I seldom watch anything too dark now. While I do like the occasional serious movie like Gargi, or more recently Stolen. I just don't feel the same urge to watch them as I did when I was a few years younger.

Am I turning into my dad? Most likely not. But to me, I understand his perspective way better now. At some point, the tumultuous nature of life catches up. Life itself can be so grim and gritty at times, that watching the same when you're desperately trying to unwind feels like a chore; at that point you want something light hearted, something fun, something that makes you forget the quotidian troubles. A dark-crime drama about a stolen child, no matter how good it is, hardly satiates that appetite.

Patterns in a Bollywood musical

This year I've been watching a lot more older Hindi movies, early 2000s, late 90s cinema; back when songs used to be a big part of every Hindi movie, regardless of the genre. Something I've discovered during the process is that each film has ~5-6 songs that fit a pattern. The pattern being:

Song 1: Introducing the male lead
Song 2: Introducing the female lead
(Optional) Song 3: Introducing any other main character, who plays a significant part
Song 4: Pre-Intermission act change : This is an up-beat song where; in love stories this is just before the conflict is introduced
Song 5: Post-Intermission song : The only purpose of the song is to act as a loo break for people who weren't able to go to one during the break
Song 6: Pre-Climax song : Raising the beat of the film before the final act. Usually happens 30-40 minutes before the end of the film.
Song 7 - 9 : If the filmmakers are feeling particularly generous, they'll add different songs at the beginning and credits too and maybe add another song post-intermission if the film is longer and needs a change of acts.

Some examples:
Movie: Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na
1: Opening Credits : Tu Bole Main Bolun
2: Introducing the Male and Female Leads Kabhi Kabhi Aditi Zindagi
3: Pre-Intermission, change of act: Pappu Can't Dance
4: Post Intermission song Nazrein Milana
5: Additional Conflict Song: : Jaane tu Mera Kya Hai
6: Pre-Climax: Kahin Toh


Movie: Kal Ho Naa Ho
1: Introducing the Male and Female Leads Pretty Woman
3: Pre-Intermission, change of act: It's the time to Disco
4: Post Intermission song Kuch toh Hua Hai
5: Additional Conflict Song: : Kal Ho Na Ho
6: Pre-Climax: Maahi Ve

The Berkeley clock has been fixed

A few days ago, I discovered that the UC Berkeley Campanile clock on one of the faces of the tower was broken. Happy to report that as of this week the clock's been fixed. I walk by the campanile almost every day, and it's so fascinating to see that it took them this long to see the broken clock and fix it.

July 7, 2025: The clock facing the North Gate shows incorrect time.

July 18, 2025: The clock is now showing the correct time.

Bagel Art

Boichik Bagels is excellent btw.

Provocation

When you have a new idea, you're bound to have provoke people. You're bound to get a strong reaction, because it's new and unheard off; so people don't immediately know what to say to it. Sometimes I feel it's important to have that, because the opposite of this is no interest, indifference, i.e. the idea having no impact at all.

And it's not necessarily a bad thing, it's a very natural thing. When people hear new ideas, there'll always be some that connect with it, there'll be some that disagree, and then sometimes there'll be people who feel attacked by the idea and a strong visceral reaction to it. Such a strong emotion to me is the validation of the idea. For something that results in such strong an emotion, is actually forcing people to think about things, including their axioms and assumptions. To me that's a win, if what you've got to say, is a result of well researched, honest, and disciplined practice.

My Desktop Organization Strategy

So the way I organise and keep my desktop clean is, I take all the desktop files and store them in a folder titled Desktop Files followed by the current year, month, and date; I then move that folder to a folder called "Desktop Files" in my Documents directory. Creating this rather temporal map of all my files.

Essentially something like this: Documents > Desktop Files > Desktop Files 2025 07 17...



The funny thing is, I was talking to a friend yesterday, and they mentioned that they use the same strategy for cleaning their own desktop. And I have heard this from at least one other person (whom i can't remember right now). What a funny coincidence that two people independently reached at the same organisation concept.

Curious if anyone knows if this filing system has a name. If not, maybe I should write a design thesis on it and name it after myself. :P

Perks of daily public transport commute

Just finished a book in less than 7 days. This is the fastest I've been reading in a while. I've read 8 books this year, and gonna start my 9th book tonight. IMHO, that's just been possible this year because I have spent so much time on BART and Caltrain this year. Commuting for work, commuting to network, commuting to save money. Public transport is great for just sitting and reading.

Atlantic Hotel's the name of this book, written by João Gilberto Noll and translated by Adam Morris. IMHO it's an "OK" book, it tries to be dark and mysterious, when it's really just a meandering tale spoken from a first person narrative. I liked how the first person narrative is followed in such a disciplined manner. Sadly, don't have much opinions on this book. Good read, may make for a fun crime caper, but I wasn't particularly blown away by it.

Why hustling is not important to Mastery of Craft

So Zomato (the Indian food delivery company) launched a new ad campaign recently, very much styled visually like the Crazy Ones ad. They got some of my favorite icons to present in the ad, and they had some cool visuals. It's all fine and well, but their messaging was rather disappointing. They seem to be promoting people to "Hustle" to be successful.

Now this seems like a common misconception amongst people, the idea that if you work yourself to the bone, if you devote your life to your work, have sleepless nights etc, i.e. you hustle, only then can you master your craft. As someone who has tried doing that and as someone who has seen the downside of the hustle culture, I can tell you that this is a bullshit practice.

What makes you master your craft is not hustling, it's hardwork combined with humility, patience, perseverance, and sanguinity. It's the willingness to be humble enough to recognise that in the grand scheme of things our work is insignificant, but how we conduct ourselves, how we are with the people around us, and how we show up when the chips are down; that makes us be better at who we are and what we do. Doing this repeatedly, is what makes us master our craft, not, living in the hubris that the more work one puts in, the more it makes them entitled to successes in life.

Ad in question:

India's loss at Lord's today

I'd be remiss to not include the devastating defeat India faced at Lord's today. What makes the defeat so devastating is not the fact that the team practically collapsed, but it's the fact that despite all adversities we came so close to winning the match (just 23 runs away!) and yet lost it to an odd ball that spun backwards!??!! I've never seen a leather ball spin backwards, and hit the stumps with such accuracy. Siraj's dismissal was comical, unfortunate and sad at the same time. It makes the defeat sting even further.

Not to add to the fact that this loss is juxtaposed with the famous win from 4 years ago, when Kohli and the boys gave the British batting lineup "60 overs of hell" in Kohli's words. Well we got pretty close to exactly that this time around. Batting wasn't easy on day 5 at this Lord's pitch and Carse, Archer and Stokes didn't make it any easier.

But the loss is also a reminder of two very important life lessons that I've grown to learn the hard-way: 

1. You may do everything right, yet end up on the losing side and face failure. Hardwork and diligence is no guarantee of success. 
2. There's hardly ever one failure point in a failure. We didn't lose this match because of Siraj's unlucky dismissal, we lost it because the dropped catches, the 61 extras across both innings, the unncessary run out of Rishabh Pant in first innings, all these things added up. 

Anyway, hopefully the team will bounce back. I've been pleasantly surprised by the young-ish team's performance this year. They've shown a lot of grit.

What makes a great Pizza?

Years ago, I was at a Pizzaiolo training at the AVPN (Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, the standardization body that protects the Neapolitan Pizza's authenticity) and the chef / my instructor for the day, answered a question on what defines a good pizza. If you see the AVPN rules for a Neapolitan Pizza, you'd think it'd have something to do with water content or the region from which the tomatoes come from, or the flour. But the chef's answer was extremely simple.

He said, that the best Pizza was one that was easy to digest (you shouldn't feel bloated after eating it, you shouldn't have to rely on a fizzy drink i.e. when it leaves a dry aftertaste) and that used simple but fresh ingredients; in other words a pizza that wasn't hiding its poor quality produce under multiple ingredients. Ofcourse, to make an easy to digest pizza you need a well fermented dough, you need it to have a minimum amount of hydration (65% by bakers fractions is usually the suggested hydration) and shouldn't over / under bake your pizza. To get fresh ingredients, well, you get fresh ingredients.

As simple as it sounds, the process is extremely challenging and one that is hard to perfect. By the said metric, I've had a good pizza in very few places, in fact some of the famous Pizzerias in Naples, fall flat in digestibility. My favourite places are 50 Kaló (Both the Naples, and London locations ), La Notizia 94 and Gino e toto Sorbillo (Naples).


50 Kaló: I admire their craft and hospitality. Their Marinara and Marinara Reinforzata are exceptional, the tomatoes are fresh and the flavours simple. This is the quintessential Neapolitan Pizza. Perfect representation of the flavours; and they scale very well! I had the opportunity to visit both their Naples and London outlets and both of them had no compromise on the taste!

La Notizia 94: When you bite into this Pizza you don't even realise it's vegan, it's so soft, and so full of flavour that you never realise that there's no cheese in it. The dough is perfectly fermented, the pizza is perfectly baked with the right amount of leopard spotting and the flavors are perfectly balanced.

Gino e Toto Sorbillo (via Del Tribunali, Naples): It's the classic ~100 year old pizzeria. Big lines, big brand name (and yes, the taste varies between outlets, their pizzeria in Milan was less than ideal); but the Pizza I had at their original location in Naples was fantastic. Another vegan pizza, and another Pizza where the quality of the dough and the freshness of the tomatoes was so impeccable, I barely thought about anything else.

---
P.S. Fun Fact: The plural of Pizza is Pizze.

Almost Gray Scale

Fascinating how almost all of these images (barring the fourth one) are naturally shot without any filters and yet appear gray scale, with just about a hint of color. I really enjoy taking pictures that have a lot of natural patterns.

The idea of Making and Learning vs Learning and Making

I was at an event this Thursday, and an idea struck me. I think the people who make first and then learn have a greater chance of innovating and making cool products than the people who spend a lot of time learning, and then making.

Don't get me wrong, I still value the desk research and user interviews in the process of making something and they remain important parts of the design process. But here's an example. How would you design a UI for a mythical ambient computer that doesn't exist yet. Let's say it's got a projected display. It sits on a desk and it works as a study companion. Design Thinking handbooks will tell you to follow the double diamond process before you put pen to paper, you must do the user research, you must conduct interviews, you must follow the heuristics, you must do X, Y and Z.

Here's the catch. None of this exists for the said platform yet. Now what? Well you make something and then test if it's working. You gotta start from Making and not learning when doing something radically new. You have to be humble enough to make big changes if it's not working. But it's important to follow your instincts, and put your idea to paper, even a sketch to me is an act of making. And then you must show it to the people who will use it, learn from them, adapt to their needs. And that's how you build out something new. Double Diamond fails here.

The biggest problem with the Double Diamond is the lack of trust in a designer's instincts and knowledge. Ideas aren't isolated, they form from a variety of experiences, it's important to acknowledge those experiences to truly understand a problem and possible solutions. Pretending we know nothing about something doesn't help. Starting with a sketch, a paper prototype, an idea of how the solution looks like doesn't hurt anyone. Show it to people you're designing for, then dive deeper into the problem.

Having something to begin with is so much more effective for learning than just mindlessly meandering in different directions. The risk with such meanderings is a) Spending too much time researching and too little making. That leaves less room for iterative learning, and b) conforming to our own biasis.

Just my two very rough cents. Make first, and then learn. But learn for sure.

Pain au Chocolat

A couple of years ago, I was in Europe, and had the opportunity to have one of the most delightful breakfasts I've ever had. A Pain Au Chocolat at this vegan cafe in Zürich (Roots), and it's the best Pain Au Chocolat I've ever had.

Two years on, I've been to Europe once more, and I've spent some time in US. I have not been able to find better vegan Pain Au Chocolat (Pronunciation Tip: | pan oh shoh-ko-lah |) anywhere.

Just thinking about this today, as reminiscing the delightful breakfast, as I was craving for one and struggling to find anything that comes close to it.

Wandering...

Went on a short walk in Berkeley hills yesterday, wandered astray into the fire trails just to see if the road lead to the other side of the campus towards the Botanical garden. The route was a bit of a dead-end, but I discovered some really good views, which are even better on a sunny day. Sometimes wandering is fun! Especially if the city is so beautiful.

Trying to give meaning to the meaningless

Are you, like me tired of phrases like "It'll all be ok in the end", "All's well that ends well", "Whatever happens, happens for the best", "Just hang in there, everything's gonna be ok"? If so, this is a fun observation. IMHO, The world doesn't have a greater meaning. It's chaotic, and random. So none of the above make any actual sense.

"But but it's ancient wisdom so it must be true?", kind off. Basically when we experience the world in its chaotic, uncontrollable self; it's terrifying, and we desperately want comfort, and we seek comfort in thinking life's a puzzle, the pieces must fit together. "Everything's there for a reason", When it's just our projection being put on to it. We come up with rituals, superstitions, all in desperate search of meaning, when there's none. It's just us comforting ourselves. But in doing so, we start believing the stories we tell ourselves, and we subconsciously start seeking opportunities that would prove our superstitions (manifesting).

Things might not end well. Whatever is happening could be happening for the worst, everything might not be ok. Sometimes we can do something about it, and we should act, without thinking about how things will be alright, and sometimes we can't do anything about it; then we must leave it to ancient wisdom, and indulge in the ignorance of thinking everything happens for the best. 🙃

Watching older movies

So I was working on something last night and instinctively set a movie on the side to stay focused while working (yea, weird hack but works). So the way I picked this was just because I was listening to radio (My Station) on the Apple Music app and one of the songs from that movie started playing.

Funny thing is I saw this movie last, ~21 years ago. And in a similar setup. Me and my dad had one of those rare late movie nights watching this at ~1AM at night because DD Sports had just finished the Olympics 2004 live telecast and the cable operator decided to play this movie. Ofcourse, the 9 year old me was just ecstatic at the idea of a new movie being broadcast on TV, and my dad perhaps got engaged into it once he started watching it (that was the thing with us, if the movie was engaging we'd just sit and watch, we didn't really care if it was 1AM at night or 3).

Anyway, fun movie night memories of watching this film and I found the coincidence of watching it again late at night to be interesting. I've been thinking of that night 21 years ago very fondly since morning.

Privilege

Not the most positive post today. Was just thinking about how I've been professionally designing apps for the last 14 years now, and even now people tell me I am a "UI Engineer", when I clearly am not. At the same time I see people who started after me, climb up the ladder, get opportunities I can still only dream of having, and make an impact with their work.

I joined the MDes program at Berkeley nearly two years ago, hoping that this would open up opportunities for me to work in Emerging Tech. But it's done nothing to further that. In fact, I just feel more humiliated, as people look at me, and see apps on my portfolio and go, "Oh! Indian, makes apps, so must be a software developer". I have had a person repeatedly tell me to look for UI Engineering roles, even as I protested that I am a designer. That's the bitter truth of having a skill-set that spans through Software, Hardware, Engineering and Design. It doesn't open up more opportunities, it just confuses the recruiters.

Belated Post of the Day: Making and not judging

Arrgh!! Missed my streak of making one post a day. This was in my drafts (my head) for the entire day yesterday, and I just didn't get to sit down and write it down. So here's a rare back-dated post.

Make → Show → Learn is an often cited design strategy. It goes by many names (the double diamond is one of the fancier ones), but something that it misses out on is the fact that a lot of people start doing all three of these processes together. The worst is Making and Judging (a combination of looking at the work yourself and trying to draw things to learn from). Ideally you don't want to do that, it slows down the making process, and worse yet, risks you not putting out anything at all! But it's so hard! In fact, I'd say it's the challenge you must master to make something.

I am redesigning my portfolio right now, and it's difficult not to take a step back and judging my own very rudimentary graphics and feel overwhelmed by my inability to communicate ideas. It's a humbling experience, but I must remind myself to not judge my work until I've made one iteration of it at least, and put it out. Right now, putting out something is way more important than perfecting it.

Yep, this is equal parts note to self, and equal parts me sharing wisdom gained from my experience.

Pizza Day!

Ever since moving to Berkeley, there have been fewer and fewer occasions where I made Pizza for only the two of us: Me and my Brother. So I took the 4th of July holiday as an opportunity to do that, so both of us could have some us time.

Pizzas didn't turn out to be that great though, I have a love-hate relationship with my Ooni Volt (their Electric Oven) it's convenient but the temperature control is so finnicky. It's either not hot enough or too hot. Destroyed one Pizza because the oven was too hot and it stuck to the peel while turning it midway.

But I did make two good ones, the Margherita (not photographed here) and the P3 Pizza i.e. Peppers, Pistachio and Peaches.

Love this shot of me sprinkling extra pistachio on to the Pizza.


More Pizza Shots! :)


I got this Oliera from my previous trip to Naples. It's a traditional handcrafted Copper and Brass oil cruet. I enjoy using it a lot, but more on that later.

Modern Art?

Bonus Second Post for the Day. I love this style of turning meaningful things into something so utterly messy. It's like a reflection of our chaotic lives.

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P.S. Yay, There's a new tag on my blog now. Hoping to share more art soon.

Anchors

Half-Price Books is shutting its Berkeley store. It's such a downer. This building has been my anchor to Downtown Berkeley ever since coming here for the first time in 2017. Everything about this small city changed, the downtown landscape changed significantly but Half-Price and its neon signs had remained exactly as they were when I came here.

It just sucks that come December 2025, the city and the street would be devoid of this place, all this for a petty leasing dispute. It just shows the impermanence of things in our life, things could be thriving one day, and then suddenly for no major reason, and for nothing in our control they'd be gone.

Anyway, So long, and thanks for all the fish! 🫡

Resilience

Last year at UC Berkeley, I took this class called Applied Resilience, which was all about developing the resilience muscle for your startup. I like to think of it as "mental health for your startup". Great course, that I would highly recommend every student to take, even if you're not an entrepreneuer.

Central to the idea of resilience is the ability to bounce back after repeated failures. We all fail at some point in our lives, whether it is a failed exam, or a failed startup or a self imposed goal that we fail to achieve. Failure is common, not bad, and in-fact sometimes good in helping us learn something new. But it also takes a lot from us, it downs our confidence and forces us to rethink that once went well for us. It takes a lot from us to bounce back and be back to winning ways, for who wants to keep failing? Right?

Anyhow, These last few months have demand every ounce of Resilient muscle from me. Having Applied to 500+ applications across the board and still struggling to get a full-time gig in Creative Technology and Prototyping has all but humbled me. I joined UC Berkeley to pursue a career in designing emerging technologies that helped people (a focus on social justice as my program mentioned), 2 years in. I have the ideas, the portfolio and the connections to pursue a career in the field, yet the jobs aren't there. Hard to get hired in the Bay Area if you have an ounce of moral compass is what I've learnt in the last 6 months.

Pray I survive this.

Book Recommendation : Annie Bot

AI bots are everywhere. The AI Girlfriend industry supposed to be this multi billion dollar industry where people just talk to an AI chatbot that’s been anthropomorphized to the point that its conversation is almost Human. It’s an industry that’s a perfect representation of Silicon Valley greed and its parasitic relationship with human suffering (loneliness in this case).

Annie Bot begins there. But goes well beyond that. Yes, Annie is an AI powered humanoid, designed to obey and please her human owner Doug; but it quickly becomes apparent that the book is not just about that.

Yes, that’s the hook, but truly Annie Bot explores the complex relationships and how our actions onto others, especially things we don’t consider “equals” are often a reflection of our own state of mind. Through Annie, we see Doug’s state of mind going from mendacious, to twisted, to diabolical. Doug’s actions are what he would do, if his previous partner had no agency.

And of course, Annie is more sentient than your run of the mill AI chatbot, in fact its emotions are more complex than some of the other humans in the world today. Yet her place in the world remains interesting, as Annie gets nuggets of agency, she keeps developing character, yet she's held back by some fundamentals that seem unshakable, the more that happens the more the duality of Annie's sentience and "bot-ness" become apparent.

The book goes beyond than just forcing us to consider the humanity of both the bot and the human, it also beautifully shows us the complexities of human nature. For all his horrific actions, Doug isn’t a monster (or at least not in the traditional sense of the word), there’s another side to him, a side that’s broken, lonely, ashamed, jealous and frankly alone. All these things add up, they add a dimension to his actions. Never condoning them, but always giving them meaning.

What didn’t work for me though was the broad strokes world building, especially with the Stella-Handy, the company that supposedly runs the Annie Bot robots. For starters it was a bit weird that they would just disclose stuff to Doug over a phone call which would otherwise be under an NDA. Their partnership with Doug and Annie was also weird, given they seem to be collecting all the data to improve their products anyway. We also never really get to understand their true motives. It’s a weird chink in the armor for what’s an otherwise perfectly crafted story.

I also felt that the lead up to the final act could have reflected more on Annie’s inner turmoil and Doug’s life changes. The end feels abrupt, even if the final act is beautifully executed.

Annie Bot is a one of the most profound Human-AI-Bot interaction books of our times that offers us two complex, layered characters. Just wish the world building was just as strong.

Rating: ★★★ 1/2 (Highly Recommended)

Walking down Mission

Was walking down 24th and Mission towards Reeem's, for lunch with a friend when I wondered just how similar the streets look to a market in Delhi. Maybe it's the small market, the street hawkiness nature of the stores, or the fruit sellar's carts arranged outside and not inside a giant air conditioned store, or then again maybe it's all of it. Oddly feels closer to home. I know it's one of the more "dangerous" neighbourhoods in the city, you must stay vigilant, yet the vibes are much nicer with this one than say, the more posh areas like Pacific Heights.

There's something to a place, when my patronage is a little more than a transaction. People are out here to make money, but they can be kinder, and nicer to one another. And that's where I think Mission succeeds.