Hello, Slippers! Welcome to The Third Slip—the weekly newsletter that keeps on going based on a very simple premise: If the picture of a nondescript egg can be the most liked thing on the internet, maybe we have a chance too. What’s it got that we haven’t? We appear hard-boiled but have a really fragile exterior and even though we aim to hit the bullseye, we’re often scrambling to put something decent together. I think this metaphor has stretched way too much, and before people beat the egg, omelette this intro end abruptly lest we get a shell-lacking. That’s all yolks!

This is issue 96. 96, of course, was the year of the first cricket world cup in India—you remember the innocent time when Jayasuriya had a spring in his bat, and Indian fans threw bottles at our own over-achieving team. In solidarity with that semi-final in Eden Gardens we’re putting up an issue that’s bottle-throwing worthy. Let’s start with the news…

What’s happening in India?

Fillip Kotler: The World’s Best Prime Minister™ was this week given the world’s first ‘Philip Kotler Presidential award’ for outstanding leadership. And while everyone looked askance at what seemed to be a publicity stunt, marketing guru Kotler himself tweeted in admiration of Mr Modi sending left-leaning liberals into jiggles of jealousy. The committee though did confirm there was no jury or specific criteria etc, which is a great tribute to the unparalleled leadership style that has done away with unnecessary roadblocks like due process. More power.

Sedition second edition: The Delhi police this week filed a charge sheet for sedition against Kanhaiya Kumar and others for “slogan shouting” in 2016. You’d think that’s ridiculous in itself, but then the court asked the police “bro, what are you even doing” so it looks like the comedy is set to continue for a while longer. Full disclosure: when we were in college, and occasionally attended classes mid-sleep, the profs always used to charge us with ‘sedation’ as well.

“All this politics and all is nonsense yeah, for real well-being you should turn to religion”—your aunty, possibly…

Nun of it matters: Remember the brave nuns who came out to protest in solidarity with their counterpart who had filed a rape case against a powerful Bishop? True to form, their convent has asked them to move out and transferred them. Putting the convent in convenient.

“All this religion and all is nonsense yeah, for real well-being you should turn to sports”—us, all the time…

Kerfuffle with Karan: Two stupid young cricketers who have been given no sensitisation training or media guidelines by the BCCI went on a show run by a morally unscrupulous sensation profiteer and blurted bullshit. The BCCI, true to form, thought it was time to act and decided to suspend the players for two matches as punishment, but their legal firm said: “Bro, your code of conduct has nothing on this, maybe look at yourself in the mirror perhaps?”. So, the geniuses decided to suspend the two cricketers pending enquiry which means they may lose as much as six months of cricket with the Supreme Court now being involved. Stupid is as stupid does.

Around the World

No deal Ordeal: Gosh, where do we begin? After finally getting the EU to agree on a Brexit deal, her parliament rejected it and almost rejected her. Now the UK has close to 2 months to come out with another plan else it’ll be the geopolitical equivalent of yanking a pen drive out without “ejecting” first.

Half-Truth + Half-Grump = Trump: Your weekly This Is A Superpower™ Update—The US’ new Trump-appointed attorney-general is reassuring everyone he’s not going to derail the Russia investigation, but will ignore the ethics committee. Which is sort of like you saying you won’t eat chips, but just end up eating a fried whole potato and drink a bottle of oil. The investigation itself has more twists and turns than an Imagica ride: Buzzfeed reported that Trump instructed his ex-lawyer to lie (very bad!), but – and this is against the tide – Mueller doesn’t seem to think so. Meanwhile, anti-Trump activists took to the streets giving away fake print copies of the Washington Post envisaging Trump leaving office. Also, since the country is going to the dogs anyway: There’s a teacher’s strike, and the Army published a big study of the Iraq War criticizing senior officers and all. Baghdad mein jawaan lad rahe hain…

Razor-sharp wit: “How dare you make an ad men need to be better?”—Men who need to be better. Aptly, Gillette is a product that’s historically made men look in the mirror (heh) (quiet self-high five).

Basher Bashar: Trump said that ISIS was defeated in Syria and started pulling troops out. One month later—you guessed it—terror strike by ISIS. Russia (who supports Syria in this complicated battle) is quite thrilled at all this, suggesting to his bro Bashar al-Assad (Syria’s president and the evilest man alive) to occupy the territory left vacant by the US. Facepalm.

Putting the error in terrorism: Somali extremist group al-Shabaab killed 21 in a luxury hotel during a 20-hour hostage in Nairobi, including a tech CEO who survived 9/11 and was doing development work there. The group claimed the attack “was a response to President Trump’s declaration of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.” Not that there is an excuse for terrorism, but we think it’s worth a shot to reduce terrorism by impeaching Trump (oh wait, his replacement wants to kill gays).

Hiber-nation: Yup, the US government is still shut down because Trump wants his wall, and thousands are working without pay. The brighter stories are Canada’s air traffic controllers sending their Yankee counterparts pizza, and TSA agents blasting protest music through airport PSAs. And while there is a crisis at the border, it’s a humanitarian one thanks to Trump.

Tech

Conspicuous consumption: There’s a theory that Facebook started the #10YearChallenge meme to train its AI on age-change recognition. Despite basic common sense and even Facebook denying it (for once!). Basically, people will buy any conspiracy theory with the word Facebook in it. So, you criticise a platform that helps disseminate fake news while creating fake news. The cup of irony is overflowing.

Poll dance: But something positive Facebook is doing is ensuring several safeguards for political advertising in countries going to the polls in 2019. Good thing that we don’t have anything to worry about since India has ethical… Never mind. FB’s also removed loads of pages trying to spread misinformation. Yes, they originated in Russia.

Tech it with a pinch of salt: Who needs Black Mirror when you have these glorious technologies – from Google’s innocuous auto-complete to gene editing – available to us right now in 2019?

Putting the lace in lazy: Back To The Future fans, here’s what you’ve been waiting for: Nike’s self-lacing shoes. Take that, all of you who claim lace-tying superiority!

You have the right to remain silent: Why does this exist? A box set of covers of John Cage’s infamous track which is 4’33” of complete silence. What. Covers. Of silence.

LinkedOut

• Cheteshwar Pujara has finally made it to his rightful place in India’s batting pantheon and our hearts. Here’s the best piece you’ll read about him by someone who’s seen the making of.
• The sheen of glorious tech is over, and we’re increasingly being warned by some sane voices who aren’t married to the stock market. Perhaps that’s why big firms are considering hiring anthropologists and humanities majors.
• Here’s a hilarious article talking about how the US will hope that Trump is actually a Russian agent—because the alternative (that they elevated an idiot) is too embarrassing. Aw.
• A profile of the most powerful man in Silicon Valley. Not Zuck, not Musk, not Pichai. But that Softbank dude.
• A lovely interview with Simon Sundararaj, the last Indian footballer to score a goal at the Olympics. For some reason, this piece has not found a publisher – here’s your chance if you are one.

That’s it for this week. If you’d like to get in touch with us outside of this newsletter, you can find us on social media. But if you really like us, subscribe to this newsletter. And send us your favourite Facebook conspiracy theories. To start us off, we’ll set the ball rolling with one —the ‘record-breaking egg’ was actually conceived by Facebook to see what profiles are most likely to want to subvert the existing celebrity-hierarchy by throwing their weight behind a nothing post, and sell this data to Cambridge Analytica for more insidiously targeted election advertising. Until next week, may all the conspiracy theories in your head vanish when you finally meet the truth in its home.

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