The blog
Tag Archives: Life
Working at an Early-Stage Startup in Sri Lanka
All the first employees of our new venture Vgo came from corporate backgrounds. None of them had worked at a startup before. The entire Vesess team, on the other hand, had never worked at anything other than a startup: for every one of us, Vesess has been the first and only place of work. There was clearly a culture gap to be bridged.
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Sunara Begum—A Journey of Ascension
Spending one month on an Island surrounded by the great ocean, I saw that the people really are a piece of that constant flow; they in turn seem to embody a great sense of fluidity within the very temperament of their soul. A reflection of this dimension is what their spirit conjures. One could really feel the convergence, a unique meeting point of diverse peoples, traditions, languages and customs all forming what we know as Sri Lanka.
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Warrantless Wiretapping Legal in Sri Lanka
If you are being investigated for a “computer crime” in Sri Lanka, a police officer can—without a warrant, at his discretion—seize your computer data and intercept and collect your communications (“wiretap”). There is no specific authority to authorise or oversee such wiretaps beyond the investigating police officer. While the technical details about wiretaps might be murky, the law itself is quite clear: all of this appears in the Computer Crime Act, No. 24 of 2007.
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Coca-Cola and Sri Lankan Water Stories
The old water stories and myths of Sri Lanka arose from a culture that had a symbiotic relationship with the rivers and lakes. The new stories that we create reflect the modern dynamics of this old relationship. Now we transact. It’s all very businesslike. Give me water, and take my oil while you’re at it.
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Coca-Cola’s Oil Spill and Sri Lanka’s Impotence
Few things are so cliche as an oil spill by a large multinational corporation in a third-world country. Except, perhaps, when that country is yours. When that oil is in the very water that you drink. When, one morning, you open the tap and smell diesel.
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JVP’s Brand Crisis: Communist Red vs. Sexy Crimson
At its heart, JVP is a Marxist-Leninist communist movement. Its loyal voter base is red hot, not crimson cool. As with most political campaigns, their 2015 rebranding was mainly targeting the undecideds, who seemed to be supportive of them, but didn’t convert that support into votes come election time.
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Art for Engineers—Jayalath Manorathna
What is art? How did it come to be? What is its purpose? Is art only for the sake of entertainment, or is it for human development as well? These are some of the questions we can ask in order to better understand the role played by art in shaping our lives.
Read ArticleMeeting Asia
Last week Sameera and I attended the RedDot Ruby Conference in Singapore. As a microcosm of Asia, Singapore is a wonderful place to get to know people from all parts of the continent and beyond. We were pleasantly surprised to see the large Ruby community in Singapore.
Read ArticleThe Bees Are Here
Last weekend I was visited by bees. It was raining heavily, and a few of them were gathered around a flowerpot at home, searching for nectar. I was hopeful, and when I checked after the rain, they had indeed set up home in a place I designed for them, fifteen months ago. The long wait is finally over.
Read ArticleLaid-back and Passionate
An island mentality and Buddhist undertones in culture has made Sri Lankans a rather unmaterialistic lot in general. There are outliers, especially given increased Westernisation, but a notion of 'satisfactory living' is still clearly noticeable. Visitors from more driven and competitive places find this both irritating and inspiring.
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