I came across a post about Blaugust 2026 (via Zachary Kai)just before I started writing this post. Belghast, who wrote the Tales of the Aggronaut, started Blaugust in 2014. He passed away this year in July.
A Discord community that runs Blaugust has decided to still go ahead with Blaugust this year despite his passing. Since I wrote a post yesterday, I thought I could keep going through August.
26 July 2026
This was a day after a week of Jantar Mantar protests, India’s Minister of Education, Dharmendra Pradhan had resigned. Gen Z which had been vilified had led protests in their own way and had got the kudos of many people. It had also made Instagram the platform for protests and for the place to consume news.
I always feel queasy about hosting content on these social media apps and building your business around this. But, it seems to be working for a few of these folks.
I ended the day watching two wonderful episodes of Shut Up Ya Kunal where he interviews Ramchandra Guha and Jerry Pinto.
I also got a call from the Hospital saying that my follow-up appointment had been postponed to Wednesday. This would continue for two more days.
27 July 2026
Former ISRO Chairman Madhavan Nair spoke to Chethan Kumar of Times of India about scientists working in important scientific projects at ISRO leaving to work in the private sector.
This old interview reminded me of my old web surfing days. D V Sridharan used to write on a website called Good News India before working on this project called pointReturn which he talks about in the video. I remembered this after reading a Weekly Note by Abhinav Sarkar. He had a photo of a windmill atop the note that reminded me of the windmill Sridharan had put up at pointReturn.
I was so surprised that I could connect a blog post I saw on this day to a post that I read in 2007 or 2008. I used to type in the url manually and visit the website.
I went through the websites of Cory Doctrow, Derek Sivers, Dave Winer, Doc Searls, and many others over the next few days. Google Reader broke that habit and ever since I have depended on some form of a RSS reader to read blogs.
28 July 2026
I got another call from the Hospital postponing my surgeon’s appointment to Thursday.
I loved watching all the psychological tricks in customer service and advertising discussed in this episode with Rory Sutherland.
One of the videos that resonated a lot and that the YouTube algorithm surfaced this video was made after the CAA-NRC protests six years ago.
I watched this video of William Darlymple at Kerala Literature Festival 2026 where he released the Malayalam version of his book, The Golden Road and also presented many of his points that are expanded on in the book.
29 July 2026
I discovered the work of Dominic Hart, an Australian YouTuber from his videos on using a pocket notebook. But, two videos I loved watching are on his building a shed in his parents’ backyard and his moving into an office space in the city.
We watched the Malayalam movie Chinna Chinna Aasai.
I watched a nice interview with Kunal Kamra, which talked about how his family members reacted to his various controversies and run-ins with the police.
This video is a nice introduction to the concept of social arbitrage investing. They use only social media signals (mostly TikTok and Instagram) to make investment decisions. I think it works in American markets because they depend on the efficiency of stock markets to weed out fundamental and technical issues. He says he is bullish about future investment in Amazon.
30 July 2026
The discourse around the 20 July 2026 protests at Jantar Mantar began to turn with people blaming Gen Z for using unparliamentary language against the Prime Minister and various organs of the ruling dispensation finding protestors who had used such language and getting them to apologise on camera. Nothing much has changed for the apologisers despite the apology.
Two of my favourite YouTubers, Ali Abdaal and Matt D’Avella did a mutual interview podcast. They spoke about their respective YouTube journeys, parenthood, and the differing paths they both took after launching YouTube courses.
31 July 2026
I went to the Hospital despite the Doctor not planning to turn up and got my stitches removed. I have to follow-up with the Surgeon on Tuesday (4 August) for care instructions.
In the evening I had almost reached Part Two of the Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson. The long waiting time at the Hospital was great to catch up on a lot of this reading. I signed up for Brandon Sanderson’s newsletter. I was impressed about how he transparently talks about the books he is writing and the progress he has made in each book.
Cory Doctrow also does this. I had picked up his book to read as well.
I have listened to Arz Kiya Hai as a background music for different Instagram and YouTube short videos but watched the original video for the first time on this day.
Bridges in Pune were going underwater as water was released from Khadakwasla Dam. As I said on X and on Mastodon, Pune must build bridges that raise themselves up when the flood waters in the Mutha rise.
I spent the rest of the day asleep and did not work.
01 August 2026
I was considering how I write my posts here.
I would usually write posts like this on my link blog that I keep on Tumblr. I usually just post links on Tumblr and then give context for myself using the tags. In the post that I wrote on this blog, I ended up giving context. Tumblr is great for this. It is also a great place to expand on text, if you think that is necessary.
Tumblr is owned by Automattic, the company that runs WordPress.com. I wanted to reduce the points of failure and try another blogging service, like micro.blog.
I have not decided yet but it is something on my mind this week.
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