Just when we thought our Bollywood purveyors of misery couldn’t sink any lower, comes along a lousy movie like Welcome. 

We so enjoyed Anees Bazmee’s 2005 comedy No Entry that it was with much anticipation we headed for his new movie Welcome.

Alas, all our hopes were belied.

It would be an insult to the entire genre of comic films to call Welcome a comedy.

To use an analogy, Welcome is like an old man who suddenly finds himself in bed with the sensuous babe Mallika Sherawat. Yes, the old man is tremendously sexcited with Mallika but the infirm, decrepit body just won’t cooperate.

Likewise, Welcome starts well, has Aneez Bazmee as the director and big name stars like Akshay Kumar, Anil Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Nana Patekar and even Mallika Sherawat. So, your expectations are high but then the fizz goes off quickly and the movie just falls apart because the flaccid story just doesn’t cooperate with the other elements.

Except for the first 30 minutes or so, Welcome is plain rubbish. You know, it’s the kind of trashy movie that Bollywood so excels in churning out.

The story, if you can call it that, centers around Continue Reading…

Meraki, a Silicon Valley wireless Internet startup co-founded by a desi entrepreneur Sanjit Biswas, seems to be on a tear these days but we are skeptical that this Formula car will ever reach its destination.

The two-year-old Mountain View, California start-up offers networking widgetry that promises to make setting up wireless Internet access a snap.

Meraki’s Mini routers and an online dashboard tool to monitor and manage networks are supposed to let even non-technical folks set up a wireless network.

In a company backgrounder, the Meraki folks write:

Plugging a Meraki Mini router into a DSL line instantly creates a gateway. As more Minis are added nearby, the signals stream back and forth to build a web of wireless connections. Known as a mesh, this fabric of signals makes it possible to use just one DSL line to create a cooperative wireless Internet network, bringing access to more people than ever before. 

The fledgling claims it’s taking a bottoms-up approach that lets people affordably and cooperatively build a wireless network in contrast to the top-down approach that has mostly failed so far in the U.S. at least.

It’s true that municipal WiFi experiments - free or otherwise - in the U.S. have mostly turned out to be still-born. Come on, no one with sense would have picked Philadelphia, the headquarter of Comcast, the largest U.S. broadband Internet access provider, for a municipal WiFi project. It’s like trying to peddle oil-alternatives in Saudi Arabia.

In any case, we remain skeptical about Meraki’s prospects for multiple reasons.

The company may have tasted some success with Continue Reading…

Why the heck is India’s Tata group itching to buy Ford’s dying auto brands Jaguar and Land Rover?

Just doesn’t make sense to us as to why Tata - now the clear frontrunner to pick up Ford’s struggling Jaguar and Land Rover units - wants to acquire these two white elephants.

Both Jaguar and Land Rover are have beens that have no cachet anymore in the U.S., one of the biggest auto markets in the world.

Don’t tell us luxury brands like Jaguar and Land Rover that have failed in the U.S. are going to resonate well elsewhere in the world. Come on, get real.

As anyone who has driven on U.S. highways can tell you, the luxury auto brands that matter in the U.S. are Lexus, BMW and Mercedes. And it has been that way for several years.

Jaguar and Land Rover are part of Ford’s Continue Reading…