Hobby Lobby

 

Doing something which is ‘not work’ is the conventional definition of a hobby. Many youngsters are spending their time on extreme sports or physical endurance as a hobby. I have heard claims that these activities gave them an opportunity to spend time doing something exclusively for themselves and enjoying suffering and survival. Some people like spending an entire Saturday golfing, fishing, gardening, or attending a game every week. Real Hobby is when it didn’t feel like a choice, it just felt like a natural gravity. Not something you feel like you’re choosing, or scheduling — not a hassle, or something you resent or feel bad about when you don’t do it.   

Most hobbies are built in naturally as a part of childhood. The truth is, it’s really hard to start a hobby as an adult — it feels unnatural, forced, or performative. But then Childhood hobbies require a lot of dedication and effort from kids as well as Parents. I spoke to the parents of wonderkid Sarah Girach. Sarah has competed in inline speed skating events at the US national level for the last 6 years and won many national medals with awards from the state governor and local organizations as well as got 9^th National US ranking. She started skating in India at the age of 7, for school. Then, when her family moved to the US, she first did it for fun and later was invited to join a competitive speed skating team.  She works very hard to keep up with her training regimen each day. She trains six days a week: Monday, Friday, and Saturday for ice speed skating and Wednesday and Sunday for in-line speed skating. Tuesday is for workouts that help her focus on her muscles. Every practice is 3-4 hours. From a parenting perspective, there is a time commitment. Also, they need to spend on skating equipment, wheels, team uniforms, coaches’ fees, ice fees, travel to competitions that require a hotel, food, and sometimes flight tickets and rental cars.  Then comes hobby-study balance: as Studies is "the" most important focus for her as a child: more important than the hobby of skating.   Kids these days have to strive hard for success in hobbies and excel in them.  These hobbies can help even at later ages of their lives as in the case of my batch mate Arun Chillara, who has an IIT –IIM background.  He recently published well acclaimed Music Album:  Tu Hai Sahi.  He has been a professional musician for the last few years with a large number of ad jingles, film scores, songs, etc. He pursued his hobby as a profession. He is also engaged on the business & management side as well,   working with startups and has helped many over the last few years. He craved to be a professional musician throughout his childhood but could not pursue it. He followed his dream. He spends a lot of time on his passion. Melody and lyrics are just the start, then he has to think about production, distribution, etc.  But then he turned his hobby into a revenue-generating stream as the music industry is thriving once again, thanks to streaming platforms and youtube. That has happened in the last few years. His first album called Flying High was an independent release in 2014. He was working full time those days and learned that the music industry was broken only after finishing the songs. But he had the initial body of work that helped him get into the commercial side of the industry. ‘Tu Hai Sahi’ has been in the works for a while along with many other compositions that he has working on. These protagonists have put in serious efforts to follow their hobbies as a child and professionals respectively.   

 

But these days we end up ‘buying’ a hobby.  Peer Pressure, social media, and new economic models are the reasons for that. There is peer pressure generated by reading lifestyle influencers about what to do in leisure time: you should devote yourself to self-care, but also spend more time on your children and partner; you should liberate yourself from the need to monetize your hobby but also have enough money to do the hobby in the first place.  you should “embrace laziness,” “evaluate your career,” “have a family meal,” “fix your finances,” “do that one thing you’ve been putting off,” AND/OR “do nothing,” AND THEN tweet that influencer about what you did over the weekend! 

The new economy has new uncertainties and opportunities. We’re constantly being told to have side hustles—masked as hobbies—in order to have multiple streams of income in today’s gig economy. It can be hard to foster new skills that have nothing to do with a pay cheque. 

Then there are social media platforms. What does it actually mean to have a hobby, especially at a time when we’re living so much of our lives online? Our personal brands require continued upkeep and innovation at a great emotional expense. Social Media’s focus has always been on display the version of yourself you want others to see. Simply put, your Social media page has become a resume for how interesting you are. 

It’s weird to think of yourself as privileged to know what you like. It’s certainly privileged to be able to know it and have the means — the time, the money, the wherewithal, the health — to pursue it. But one of the saddest predicaments of the current millennial moment is feeling desperate for something that isn’t work but having no clue how to figure out what else there is. Serious leisure is the systematic pursuit of activity—like rock climbing or singing—that usually requires a “special skill.” In other words, we need to put serious effort into a hobby in order to reap its rewards over time. Just like we dedicate our time and energy toward a career, committing ourselves to a “serious leisure” activity is one of the keys to achieving a fulfilling life according to few.  

 

 

Art of Business in AI-Generated Art

 

For the software entrepreneurs there is a business in AI generated Art though artists are very upset about AI Art. But Artists themselves are in the business of Art for many years since the renaissance.  Some people are upset about the fact that art sometimes is intriguingly incomprehensible.  Every Business is an Art. The Business of AI generated art is definitely going to be Art which software entrepreneurs are definitely trying to master.  

Artificial Intelligence is so great that it will soon generate all human pieces of art. It is the machine that learns from the experience and generates the artwork. This type of artwork is the future as there will be no more human artists. The work of human artists is copied by machines through training. The machines are trained with the history of human artists, and their training is more than 10 years. This is the technology that will generate the art for the robots. In 2017 it was predicted that AI-generated art would take over within 10 years. So, today it is already here. It is everywhere. Some artists or agencies will buy and sell AI-generated art. And some online platforms will allow you to buy this AI-generated art. A big part of making money online today knows how to buy and sell AI-generated art. 

AI-generated art is art created by machines. Many companies have seized the opportunity that AI offers them and are creating art that is unique and something you can’t find anywhere else.  If you know how to buy and sell AI-generated art, you can make some really good money. Artificial intelligence, in its current state, can be used to imitate the works of artists. However, the current AI- generated artwork is still a far cry from the millions of brush strokes that go into creating a painting. For example, Some AI-generated paintings still rely on thousands of hand movements to come up with a complete painting. 

Artificial intelligence, in its current state, can be used to imitate the works of artists. AI artists are not yet able to replicate that movement and texture in a painting done by human hands.  AI-generated art brings a big change to the art industry. AI artworks are created by artificial intelligence technology and filled with art buyers’ unlimited imagination. The internet, AI, and blockchain technologies can not only generate art pieces but also save artists’ rights. Artists are sole copyright owners of the artworks they created. On top of that, blockchain technologies can deliver art pieces to buyers safely. AI can write lyrics for songs.  People have created bots, which write complete songs. The AI-generated songs are now selling. Today, many artists and designers are using AI technology to create dynamic images, videos, and interactive content. AI-generated art has become a vital part of the art industry. Some AI-generated artworks collect millions of dollars in art auctions. AI has been used to make paintings, portraits, and even portraits made using pictures of faces. Many of these pieces have sold for thousands of dollars. As well to paintings, other artists are using AI to generate digital 3D art. The AI has millions of algorithms that create a scene from a picture of an object. There are also allied revenues streams related to AI Art like Print on Demand (T-shirts etc.), Use skills for Services on freelancing formats, Collection of NFTs, Create contents about AI art, Training in AI Arts. Some entrepreneurs are also bullish about ad and marketing revenues for AI generated Art contents/portals.  

On the downside, Artists say they risk losing income as people start using AI-generated images based on copyrighted material for commercial purposes. But it’s also a lot more personal. Art is so closely linked to a person; it could raise data protection and privacy problems. Recently there was news that Artist Jason Allen sparked controversy by winning the top prize at the Colorado State Fair in the United States with his AI-generated artwork Théâtre D’opéra Spatial, which depicts three humans silhouetted by a gilded window. Several artists have expressed anger on social media over the prize, with some fearing for their livelihoods. Some are pushing for new policies or regulation.  But as in earlier instances, we can expect this issue to be resolved over time, as AI becomes more ubiquitous and different groups come to a consensus as to how to balance individual rights and essential AI/ML.  I have read recently that: “There is an industry initiative called Content Authenticity Initiative, which includes the likes of Adobe, Nikon, and the New York Times, are developing an open standard that would create a sort of watermark on digital content to prove its authenticity. It could help fight disinformation as well as ensuring that digital creators get proper attribution” to quote them verbatim. Some artists have opted out of “Training’ database and any scraping images from the internet without the artist’s consent to train an AI tool could be a copyright infringement. Another downside is costs and access to the required computing infrastructure. Also, there is a threat to replace human livelihood with the advent of AI just as every industrial revolution and technology did in human history.

But for Indian IT entrepreneurs, though unregulated, AI art can be new form of revenue stream. Though many still feel that AI Art is not the original art as well lack emotions, one needs to consider this as another tool to express the artistic emotions. An algorithm can’t immediately create art that accurately represents a prompt. It needs to collect data and learn from it, improving its understanding like a human would. Users’ approval and rejection of created images also affect some models, so they improve their skills even more through trial and error. The more they’re used, the better they’re able to satisfy prompts. In other words, AI artwork can be seen as craftsmanship and artistic achievement, something these programs and their developers should be proud of. Human Mind has new frontiers and no frontier is final. 

 

Booming Population

 

Humans have something against humans at every point in History. I am not talking about wars and ideologies here, humans also historically have fought about the number of living beings as counted in their community, region, nation, or the world. In popular context, this number is called the population of that community, region or nation, or mankind. Some people feel that there are more human beings that this planet can house. Though humans have started exploring space, there is a long way to go. Meanwhile, we have changed this planet irreversibly to be an ideal house for humanity.  We can introduce a delta change that can delay the inevitable or get some magic wand to dissolve all the impurities of this planet.  But the question is how many human beings are too much for this planet.  Some on the other hand have justified that numbers are beneficial. No one seems to be totally correct or wrong. Ancient folklores had predicted doom due to population explosion across the ancient cultures. In the Indian context, we have stories of destruction and restarts.  Philosophers from Plato to thinkers like Malthus have warned humanity against numbers. On other hand, Developed countries that scorned under-developed countries for lack of resources are now feeling the pinch of low fertility rates. This is a tricky issue for mankind.  

But one fact is undisputable: we have limited resources on this planet. Experts say ” Our species evolved from apes and has undergone a population explosion, damaging every habitat on the planet.  In 2018, scientists found a plastic bag 10,898m at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, while another team recently discovered man-made "forever chemicals" on Mount Everest. No part of the world is pristine – every lake, forest, and the canyon have been touched by human activity. But on the other side, our sheer numbers and ingenuity have enabled humanity to achieve feats that no other animal could dream of – splitting atoms, sending complex equipment nearly a million miles to observe planets forming in distant galaxies, and contributing to a staggering diversity of art and culture. Every day, we collectively take 4.1 billion photographs and exchange between 80 and 127 trillion words.” On the specific date of 15 November 2022, the UN has predicted that there will be eight billion humans alive at the same time. Some view our rising numbers as an unprecedented success story – in fact, there's an emerging school of thought that we actually need more people. In 2018 the tech billionaire Jeff Bezos predicted a future in which our population will reach a new decimal milestone, in the form of a trillion humans scattered across our Solar System. Others, meanwhile – including the British broadcaster and natural historian Sir David Attenborough – have labeled our swarming masses a "plague on the Earth". In this view, nearly every environmental problem we're currently facing, from climate change to biodiversity loss, water stresses, and conflicts over land can be traced back to our rampant reproduction over the last few centuries. Back in 1994 – when the global population was a mere 5.5 billion – a team of researchers from Stanford University, in California, calculated that the ideal size of our species would be between 1.5 and 2 billion people. As a result of its controversial history, population engineering is a deeply divisive area. At one end of the spectrum lie those who see lower fertility rates in some areas as a crisis. One demographer is so concerned by the localized drop in the birth rate in the UK that he has suggested taxing the childless.  The opposing view is that slowing and eventually halting global population growth is not only eminently manageable and desirable, but it can be achieved via entirely voluntary means – methods such as simply providing contraception to those who would like it, and educating women. In this way, proponents of this position believe we could not only benefit the planet but improve the quality of life experienced by the poorest citizens worldwide. 

But there is a collective consensus to identify the problems and create a change. The absolute number of people in a country is not the most important factor. Instead, it's the rate of its population's growth or decline that is key to a country's future prospects – this determines how quickly things are changing. India will overtake China as the most populous country by 2025 or perhaps sooner. However, this should not be inferred to assume that India is undergoing a proverbial population explosion. Population statistics show that India’s population growth peaked decades ago and it is already on a downward trajectory. According to the United Nation’s population projections, India’s population will increase by a multiple of 1.09 between 2021 and 2031. This number was 1.25 between 1981 and 1991. From 2060 onwards, India’s population will start falling, which happens when fertility rate falls below replacement levels. By 2100, which is as far as UN population projections go to, India’s population will be 1.45 billion after having peaked at 1.65 billion in 2059. It’s the not the change but rate of change that matters. A low population, which means fewer workers, also means a scarcity of productive hands in the economy. This actually generates headwinds, rather than tailwinds for economic growth. An increasing share of older people in its population, thanks to its one-child policy, is what has forced China to abandon the old policy and encourage couple to have more children. India is poised at a unique moment in history, where it can exploit its demographic advantage to realize its economic goals. According to the government’s population projections, 53.6% of India’s population in 2021 is under the age of 29. More than a quarter of India’s population is 14 years or younger. This young cohort can become extremely productive or unproductive depending on the skill sets it acquires. 

Ability to plan and create resources, and using human capital on one hand while managing environment and sustain humanity is challenge for the population of every country including India. 

 

Tale of Two College Freshmen

 

Scene1: An Esteemed College in the US: A high school graduate arrives on campus and is worried about whether he has taken the right decision to join a college. Indian-American community is very much focused on careers and a college degree is a must in our culture but outside the Asian communities, higher education has posed severe challenging questions. 

Policymakers are grappling with what they say has become an alarming decline in the number of high school graduates willing to invest the time and money for college education.  There is a backlash against higher education which is driving a never-before decline in enrollment. Experts now warn is likely to diminish people’s quality of life and the nation’s economic competitiveness, especially in places where the slide is most severe. As per the Hechinger report, there are 4 million fewer students in college now than there were 10 years ago, a falloff many observers blame on Covid-19, a dip in the number of Americans under 18, and a strong labor market that is driving young people straight into the workforce. But while the pandemic certainly made things worse, the downturn took hold well before it started.   Statistics contradict the argument that recent high school graduates are getting jobs instead of going to college: Workforce participation for 16- to 24-year-olds is lower than it was before Covid hit. The reason is mainly includes widespread and fast-growing skepticism about the value of a degree, impatience with the time it takes to get one, and costs that have finally exceeded many people’s ability or willingness to pay.   

Americans are increasingly dubious about the need to go to college.  They don’t find college education worthy. Students’ parents just don’t value education the way they did in the past. “If you don’t go to college, you’re a bum.” This belief has changed. This is being made only worse by growing unhappiness among recent university and college graduates with the value of the education they received. More than 4 in 10 bachelor’s degree holders under 45 don’t agree that the benefits of their education exceeded the costs. That adds up to a lot of bad reviews passed down to younger siblings and classmates, for whom family and friends are the most trustworthy sources about whether to go to college. Experts say “There’s anti-elitism, anti-institutionalism, a perception that cost is out of control. The problems have been evident for years, but colleges and universities in general have done little to address them. They continue to advertise prices that few consumers actually pay but that discourage many from applying. They bury students in the red tape and make systems confusing for applicants whose parents never went to college. They often fail to make clear connections between academic disciplines and careers or keep up with the demands of the fast-moving labor market.  

But in reality: A degree does, in fact, still pay off. Workers with bachelor’s degrees earn 67% more than people with only high school diplomas, according to a Labor survey.  More than half of “good jobs” — those with certain minimum salary criteria based on age groups — call for bachelor’s degrees.  Yet since the start of the pandemic, the proportion of 14- to 18-year-olds who think education is necessary beyond high school has dropped from 60% to 45%. Even the high school graduates, who plan to go to college, admit to doubts. The pandemic only deepened the fears of students already struggling with self-confidence and being skeptical about college. Also, the number of Americans over 24 who are going for the first time or returning to college has also steadily declined, by 12% in the five years from the spring of 2017 to the just-ended spring semester.  The growing disparities in college-going could widen the fissures already polarizing American society. Experts say: “Places like Los Angeles or D.C. or Chicago, they’re going to continue to draw a lot of college graduates. For places that have a smaller share of college graduates, you’re going to have a more uncertain economic climate and lower wages.” Even before the pandemic, the nation was facing a shortage of more than 9 million college-educated workers over the next decade, affecting nearly every state and costing nearly $1.2 trillion in lost economic output.  This is alarming for the US economy in order to stay competitive globally.  

Scene2: An Esteemed College in India: A student enters after clearing a few competitive exams and paying significant fees and is worried about the future after four years here. His parents are worried as well. India has seen a rise in its skilled population with more and more students showing hireable skills, yet not even half of the total students are employable despite having degrees. As many as 46.2 per of students are employable in 2022 as compared to 45.9 percent in 2021, according to India Skill Report 2022.   Most employable students are BTech or BE degrees. According to the report, as many as 55.15 percent of students who clear BE, and BTech are employable. Only 55.09 percent of the MBA holders are employable. Polytechnic and MCA have the least employable talent with 21.43 percent, and 29.3 percent of graduates being employable. With regard to engineering, there have been serious concerns about the employability of Indian graduates. There are alarming statistics in a NASSCOM report, which estimates that, of the 3 million joining the IT workforce, only twenty-five percent of graduates with engineering backgrounds are employable. The figures are grave in the context of graduates from sciences and humanities, which is less than fifteen percent.   Only 3.84% of graduates are start-up ready and 6.56% are Design job ready and the same trend for other core engineering jobs. There is an urgent need to improve the employability of our engineering graduates. This calls for lateral thinking and out-of-the-box initiatives. This is alarming for the Indian Economy in order to stay competitive globally.  

The US and India who are natural partners should collectively think about the future of these two college freshmen.