It’s a magical world, Hobbes, ol’ buddy… Let’s go exploring

The comforting, thought-provoking and the poignant look at serious family issues that the Calvin and Hobbes brings about in its readers is perhaps the reason why it has been one of the most successful comic strips of all time. It invokes in its readers a variety of emotions ranging from frustration and borderline anger to adoration. Also, the artistic excellence of Bill Waterson and his strive for perfection in his artwork astounds and delight the readers.

The character Hobbes is named after the 17th-century philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who held a dim view of human nature. Calvin is this hypocritical, trouble making child who ponders over the world around him with Hobbes being on his side to provide his rational views, occasional sarcasm and warnings to Calvin’s troublemaking ways. The friendship between the two has been endearing to the readers and perhaps that’s what makes people reminisce their childhood and relive their memories through this delightful pair.

The readers are prompted by Calvin and his adorable friend (stuffed tiger) Hobbes to look at the existing social issues like environmentalism, parenting, public education, media, popular opinion polls; from a different perspective and brings about a smile in their faces while doing so. The beauty of the strip is that it encourages a sense of questioning things around us that we might have taken for granted and evokes the philosophers in all of us. Calvin is extremely observant, has outlandish ideas and is extremely witty which appeals to people to take notice of his observations of the world around them.

Also as an artist, Bill always strove to achieve creative freedom (he managed to get a he got the unrestricted half page on Sunday Newspaper which was unheard of till then) and he fought against commercialization against the Newspaper Syndicate refusing to give up his control over the licensing of his work for merchandising, a battle that ultimately improved how artists are treated in the industry today.

Ranging from outlandish scientific inventions and creation of abstract sports to daily dose of mischief more than what his mother can handle, Calvin pushes our imagination to think and relook at the world around us. He subtly achieves this by undergoing the complete experience and then evaluating the outcome and sharing his learnings with Hobbes, thus eliminating any need to preach to the readers. Calvin is continuously thinking hard for the rest of us and has a ridiculously high standard on this front.

Calvin is the kid you wanted to be, as kids, as adults and as old people. A simple comic strip had so much impact on so many people from such different walks of life. The parents who read the strip in their childhood try to see Calvin in their children and have become more empathetic towards their children. Calvin and Hobbes revealed a new layer of parenthood to the society.

In Bill’s own words, this is why his strip differed from others and had more thoughtful content: “Behind the jokes, I try to talk about life in a serious way. I don’t look at cartooning as just an entertainment. It’s a rare privilege to be able to talk to hundreds of millions of people on a given day, and I don’t want to squander that privilege with mindless chatter. There is an opportunity here to talk about real issues of life with sensitivity, warmth and humor.”

The final strip depicted Calvin and Hobbes outside in freshly fallen snow, reveling in the wonder and excitement of the winter scene where Calvin exclaims, “It’s a magical world, Hobbes, ol’ buddy… Let’s go exploring!”

Why Do Companies Need To Develop Social Networking Policy?

Organisations using social technologies to spread the influence of their brands need to balance their social networking efforts with their responsibilities to their consumers and stakeholders, while adhering to the legal obligations and manage brand reputation. It becomes critical for organizations using social media to safeguard the internal and external stakeholders including children, minors and vulnerable adults. A strong framework for using social technologies can be established by developing an extensive organizational social networking policy which will go a long way in strengthening the social media marketing efforts.

By developing a comprehensive social networking policy, organizations can achieve the following objectives:

1. Social media marketers, moderators and internal stakeholders of the organization are given specific directions and guidelines for interacting using social networks which help to streamline and standardize communication with the external world.
2. Guarantees that the content published on the social networks is not discriminatory, insensitive, abusive or hateful, offensive, sexually explicit and illegal in nature which might bring the organization into ill repute.
3. Empowers consumers and external stakeholders to clearly identify social channels where brands publish the authentic information and also receive the intended communication as opposed to misrepresented information.
4. Ensures to safeguard the brand reputation and goodwill of the organization in social media.
5. A strong social networking policy empowers organizations to safeguard its intellectual property rights, including logos, trademarks, copyrighted material and financial disclosures.
6. Protects organizations against any unauthorized use or malicious benefit gained by employees & alumni of the company’s resources and social networking technologies including company data, account details, contacts and documents.
7. Organizations can be successfully aim to act in accordance with the regulatory and statutory requirements, with a comprehensive social networking policy.
8. Creation of a legally binding document ensures that organizations can seek remedies to any damages occurred due to the non compliance to the policies established.

Thus a social networking policy which sets specific guidelines as to what is and what is not the acceptable usage of social media supplemented with extensive trainings to all key stakeholders on the established policy, can enable organizations to productively leverage social technologies to achieve strategic and operational goals.

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First written for Buzzvalve: Information Week – Importance of Enterprise Social Networking Policy

The Digital Weapon of Choice – A robust and scalable social media management platform

The new age digital brand manager’s role is similar to that of a prodigal orchestra conductor; first to chose the relevant instruments to be used in the social media space in alignment with the organization’s objectives, compose and skillfully execute the strategies to stimulate consumer networks regarding the products/services, post which they need to take a step back; control the dynamics and monitor the flow of information in the networks and finally as a result of the diligently coordinated social media marketing efforts; stand witness to the most beautiful symphony unfold.

Digital media agencies with their comprehensive Social Media Management Platform (SMMP) offerings play a crucial role in successfully creating synergies with organizations, hoping to crystallize their business goals, vision and expectations and conceptualize the best execution tactics thus delighting their consumers over digital media. Participation by customers, suppliers, employees, the industry and the markets, and feedback from them all, must be monitored and addressed since it has the power to make or break brands. Social media management platforms serve as a centralized area where brand managers can not only consolidate information from multiple social outlets to coordinate their marketing efforts under one platform but also enhance the quality and success of the marketing campaigns through increased collaboration and innovation. Add to this a comprehensive array of user friendly support tools, cool widgets, fascinating applets and detailed analytics and you have a personal Sword of Peleus designed to make its wielder victorious in the social media marketing war.

Large brands can streamline their social media efforts with a robust social media management platform and derive the following benefits to attain operational and strategic efficiency:

Swabhimaan – The many faces of dignity

A short film on the SHG Movement in Uttar Pradesh.

“A Journey that made me Believe in Belief”

Rajiv Gandhi Mahila Vikas Pariyojana (RGMVP) is poverty alleviation and women’s empowerment program that is active in 48 blocks of Uttar Pradesh. It is linked to several national and international organizations that have provided domain support, funds, ideas and partner with it in running programs. RGMVP is different from other NGOs as it is a movement comprising women in the community that is facilitated and supported by the officials of the organization. There are several leaders of social change, from women who make a change in their own households to national level political leaders. It is therefore impossible to pinpoint one entrepreneur who could be captured.

The first stage of research included extensive study of the RGMVP website and Annual Reports from 2009-2011 of Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust and RGMVP. This was followed by a trip to Rae Bareilly during which the team interacted with officials and attended several Self Help Group (SHG) meetings. This gave us an idea of the working of the movement and its core values. Every member nation of South Asian Association for Regional Corporation (SAARC) was founded with aspirations of eliminating poverty. But after four decades of independence and spending vast resources for the purpose, poverty still affected a large section of the society in each of the countries.

A committee was formed by the SAARC member countries to analyze the causes of poverty and the failure of the various poverty alleviation schemes. The committee reported back in the year 1994 that governments treated poor as beneficiary and not as a partner in poverty alleviation. It also suggested social mobilization and empowerment as a method for poverty alleviation. As a pilot project, United Nations Development Program (UNDP) instituted a pilot project in Andhra Pradesh. We met and extensively discussed on ways by which the model could be s how-cased with project coordinator for the last 15 years, Ms. Vijayabharthi.

We also met officials of Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty (SERP) and Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India to understand how similar movements have been run in different parts of India. This helped us to contrast the style and effectiveness of RGMVP over others. One of the biggest successes of RGMVP was that it was able to form SHGs of women belonging to different religious and caste communities.

We tested the claims made by RGMVP by randomly walking into houses, especially those of Dalits and understanding their perspectives. We have interacted with over 50 women and several men off camera and interesting stories were recorded on camera. We tried to highlight personal and social transformation through our video.

It was the first time that our team worked on film-making and therefore we also had to learn several technical aspects such as script writing, editing and cinematography etc. We watched short films and documentaries on similar themes and analyzed the methods by which the stories had been presented. We interacted with National Award Winning Photographer- Mr. Andre Fantome on methods by which the movement could be captured in a short video. We also made use of the Sri Aurobindo Center for Arts & Communication (SACAC) Library and referred to a few books to learn more.

When we had made an initial pitch, we had hoped to make the short film on the role played by political capital in social entrepreneurship. But as we progressively understood our subject, we released that the work done by RGMVP more to facilitate and support a people’s movement that transformed the society by addressing multiple challenges than being driven by one person’s vision. The process of shooting the video had been a journey of discovering our own country and showcasing it to a larger audience through the lens of our camera.

Team RAyS:  Ayush Prasad || Rinju Rajan|| Shreyas Anur Jayanth || Shweta Subbaraman|| Soumit Saha

The Macht

“You try pushing him down, he rises up high…because he is the man who carries the storm in his eye. When I look at Shreyas, I see energy- a lot of energy. Be it the way he talks, moves or just walks. He adorns a fearless spirit with a knack for adventure. He is carefree yet cautious. The spirit with which he lives each moment is really inspiring.”

“Well now, I get low and I get high,
And if I can’t get either, I really try.
Got the wings of heaven on my shoes.
I’m a dancin’ man and I just can’t lose.”

–   Stayin’ Alive by BeeGees     

(A Visual Communication presentation by Bhawana U at the Young India Fellowship 2013)

Making of Swabhimaan

A team of 5 individuals from 5 premier institutes of the country embarked on a mission to create a short film on the slow yet steady integration of rural women into the mainstream economy of the Developing India.

 

Micro Enterprise Fund Pilot: Description of the Project

Backgound

The key growth challenges of rural enterprises are lack of business advisory services and lack of customized finance. Due to systematic challenges, micro-enterprises are not able to receive timely business advisory services. They are also not able to avail “need-based” credit, meaning that the credit size is not determined as per business need and repayment schedule is not set as per seasonality of business.

Lack of timely business advisory services and lack of need-based credit is attributable to “high transaction cost” relative to small business size. Due to non-existence of business accounts & records, lack of credit history, long distances of enterprises from urban areas, multiple livelihoods & complex economics of micro-enterprises, the cost of transacting with rural micro-enterprises becomes exorbitantly high.

Banks, usually, ask for collateral to make up for lack of business due diligence, leading to low disbursal of credit. Enterprises also do not get access to qualified professionals for timely business advisory advices.  High opportunity cost, inconvenience, low quality of life and long travel deter quality professionals from settling in rural areas and reaching out to enterprises.

All in all, high transaction costs, low density of rural bank branches and limitations of professionals to reach out to enterprises results in last-mile delivery challenges.

Field Survey: Understanding Micro-Enterprises in Katwariya Sarai

Abstract:

This exercise of understanding the nature of micro-enterprises in Katwariya Sarai has enabled us to understand the issues faced by small entrepreneurs whom we all usually take for granted. This exercise also allowed us to understand the amount of revenues generated by these enterprises and their potential for growth and higher profitability if they are provided with information, technical consulting and access to finance. An interesting trend was that though a significant number of these enterprises in Katwariya Sarai are family run businesses, where in the next generation usually learns the tricks of the trade by observing the parent at work and eventually handle the business to support their extended families but they do not want their children to end up in these family run businesses. Some of the common roadblocks to these growth drivers for micro enterprises were highlighted which set me thinking on what measures could be adopted to overcome these roadblocks to ensure growth of these micro-enterprises thereby adding value to the entrepreneur as well as to the community in which the entrepreneur operates in.

Concept Note 3: Nurture India Fund

NurtureIndia Fund is a social enterprise, powering the next disruption in India’s socio-economic development by addressing  interventions  which  have  traditionally  been  charity/grant  driven  such as  water,  health,  education with innovative financing models that value the 700mn Indians at the bottom of the pyramid as dignified consumers, suppliers and producers as opposed to helpless donation recipients.

NurtureIndia Fund raises low cost debt capital from social investors around the world  and partner with social enterprises, rural supply chain providers providing last-mile  financing to catalyze  the adoption  of  essential  services  for  the  poor  such as affordable healthcare, clean water, safe lighting and fair markets for marginalized farmers and artisans.

Focus Areas

Concept Note 2: Re-Structuring the Traditional Art Scene in India

The following concept note discusses the re-structuring for Handloom, Handicrafts and Traditional Artists.

Problems: 

1. Excessive focus on commercialization ignoring other parts of the value chain
2. Few number of artists
3. High costs for mass markets
4. Low access of art work
5. Poor Documentation and Promotion
6. Lack of training
7. Lack of Innovation
8. Artists do not get sufficient amount of money for their work