Karthik S | beastoftraal.com

Offline meeting and handwriting

January 8, 2021January 8, 2021 by Karthik S

Before March 2020, I had Skype on my Mac, but hardly ever used it. I used to use Zoom for work calls between 2016/17 and 2018 because one of my clients at Ogilvy (IBM) used to have conference calls via Zoom. I…

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Pepsi, Coca-Cola, Thums Up, Patanjali

January 7, 2021January 7, 2021 by Karthik S

All the 3 big Cola brands in India—Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and Thums Up—released new TVCs in December 2020. Pepsi – December 17, 2020, by Wunderman Thompson. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Pepsi India (@pepsiindia) Coca-Cola – December 24, 2020,…

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Kumar Mangalam Birla’s social media trial-run

January 6, 2021January 6, 2021 by Karthik S

Kumar Mangalam Birla is one of the few billionaire industrialists in India who is yet to join any social media platform officially. He doesn’t even have a LinkedIn profile (not that he needs one anyway), so forget Twitter or Instagram. But his…

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Vijay, Vijay Sethupathi, Master and Apple

January 5, 2021January 6, 2021 by Karthik S

This post contains some spoilers about certain films like Knives Out, Vikram Vedha, Petta, Dhoom, etc. Back in July 2020, I had written about brands’ attempt to control how their products are showcased in movies, TV shows, and pop culture, in general….

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Colgate and Dabur join Idhayam in pulling Indians to oil pulling!

January 4, 2021January 4, 2021 by Karthik S

Back in the mid-2000s, the Tamil Nadu-based Gingelly Oil brand Idhayam unleashed an extensive multimedia campaign for something relatively unknown till then – Oil Pulling. Oil pulling, a procedure mentioned in the Ayurvedic text Charaka Samhita under names like Kavala or Gandusha,…

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My top posts in 2020

December 31, 2020December 31, 2020 by Karthik S

A customary annual round-up! This is also the only time I seriously look at the post views using Google Analytics. Looking back, WordPress informs me that I have written 256 posts in 2020. My usual target is 1 post per weekday and…

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A slice of Indian history on a board game!

December 25, 2020December 25, 2020 by Karthik S

I stumbled upon the ‘Bharata 600 BC’ board game through an article in the Hindu Metroplus day-before-yesterday. The game is pricey, at Rs. 3,800, but beyond the price I was astounded by the detailing and design of the game! The first thing…

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