Idle Thoughts

Why is Google buying Motorola Mobility? Interesting question! A more relevant question – what will Google do with Motorola once they buy it? Given below are some of Google’s options. The assumption is that Google is most interested in Motorola’s patents and least interested in their Cable business. This assumption eliminated some of the combinations from the options. Option 1: Keep the patents, keep the operations – phone as well as cable. This option offers multiple advantages for Google: it will help Google get the protection of the patents, Google can attempt to achieve the same advantage that Apple has achieved through tight integration of the phone hardware and software. This option might help Google in their TV battle through Motorola’s existing installed base and partnerships. But there are many questions here. Is Google interested in the tightly integrated model? In fact, Google’s press statement says that it will keep the Moto phone division at an arm’s length f...

I had intended to write this in just two parts. But after I uploaded part 2, I went through some of my notes on the book. I realized that there are some more points (disagreements with the book, rather) that I would like to cover. Hence the unplanned part 3. When we started off in part 1, we started with asking some questions. Let us start part 3 with some more questions. What is the relationship between Democracy, Secularism and Tolerance? We might not be surprised to find a religious state being intolerant. But can a secular democracy be intolerant? What is more important – being democratic, secular or tolerant? In the book Gautam seems to prefer secularism above democracy and tolerance. He discusses the cases where secularism prevails over democracy and tolerance with tacit approval. The first is the case of France banning the display of religious symbols such as the hijabs in schools. He philosophizes that since the French state is secular, acceptance of republican virtues me...