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This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

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Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#41

Post by JPKab »

selmnoo wrote: post #2

This is the ad: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHGDN9-oFJE - be sure to have subtitles on (unless you understand Hindi). One interesting observation about the ad: the search results that the girl deems to be good and informative are almost all Wikipedia hits. It's actually pretty similar to my situation: Google is basically a better Wikipedia searching tool than what Wikipedia provides.

Hindi or Urdu? Haha... I always find the "language vs dialect" thing very interesting. The distinction when it comes to Hindi and Urdu is totally political.

Two of my old buddies, one an Indian, the other a Pakistani, could completely understand each other, yet both insisted that they spoke different languages (Punjabi/Hindi and Urdu respectively)

Another friend of mind, who left Pakistan as a 10 year old, always just shook his head with a smile and said "Dude, that's like a guy from Alabama saying someone from England speaks a different language."

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#42

Post by comrh »

selmnoo wrote: post #20
staunch wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Google is basically just a better X searching tool than X provides, where X is most every web site on earth.

I didn't want to go to far on an off-topic tangent, but basically what I was getting at was that I increasingly seem to be interested in a very limited number of sites -- that is, mostly, sites that I already know of and recognize. I use Reddit search more when I'm doing exploratory searching hoping to land on a site I've never been before, because it serves me already vetted/reviewed sites. In this way, Google is no…

Interesting you would mention Reddit search because I find the opposite, that Reddit's search functionality is lacking and Google will often find it easier (could definitely be bias though).

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#43

Post by thrownaway2424 »

Yes I was suitably manipulated. Good job, mass emotional manipulation team!

But I am surprised they showed people searching for flight status and weather. Google Now is supposed to already know you're going to Delhi and just show you the weather there without you asking. Same for the flight status.

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#44

Post by baldfat »

InclinedPlane wrote: post #21
capex wrote: post #7

Behind the division of the sub-continent lies a great debate, that of Jinnah vs Gandhi. Was it the true aspiration of the people to get divided geographically while getting independence from British rule? It seems the divide happened because of some ideology driven people (Iqbal) who convinced other leaders (Jinnah) to pursue it. Today, this is a raging battle in Pakistan, did Pakistan ever need to be an independent…

Pakistan is a pretty screwed up country in a great many ways, and much of their problems are due to Islam having such a central role in the identify of the country. I think they have the capacity to get past their problems but they have as difficult a problem ahead of them as does Iraq, Syria, or Lebanon. On a meta-level it's fascinating how the vast majority of countries in the world still tend to be mono-ethnic "na…

well that anti-Islam rant might work IF there was no Islamic nation that wasn't peaceful.

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#46

Post by rodgerd »

InclinedPlane wrote: post #21
capex wrote: post #7

Behind the division of the sub-continent lies a great debate, that of Jinnah vs Gandhi. Was it the true aspiration of the people to get divided geographically while getting independence from British rule? It seems the divide happened because of some ideology driven people (Iqbal) who convinced other leaders (Jinnah) to pursue it. Today, this is a raging battle in Pakistan, did Pakistan ever need to be an independent…

Pakistan is a pretty screwed up country in a great many ways, and much of their problems are due to Islam having such a central role in the identify of the country. I think they have the capacity to get past their problems but they have as difficult a problem ahead of them as does Iraq, Syria, or Lebanon. On a meta-level it's fascinating how the vast majority of countries in the world still tend to be mono-ethnic "na…

> and much of their problems are due Islam having such a central role in the identify of the country.

Not really. The East Pakistan/West Pakistan war (which resulted in an independant Bangladesh) was between Muslim groups with little religious difference, but huge language, class, and cultral bigotry, with the Urdu-speaking West Pakistani-dominated millitary having a significant role.

Islam was pretty irrelevant. And my impression is that much of the harshest religious conflict in India itself owes plenty to Hindu extremists.

(From my POV the biggest problem in Pakistan is that a minority of usually millitary-backed elites remain in power, no matter how corrupt or awful they are, because they attract US support so long as they pretended to battle Communism during the Cold War, and now radical Islam. But actual Pakistanis or real experts on Pakistani politics may wish to correct me.)

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#47

Post by primelens »

piyush_soni wrote: post #24
devnetfx wrote: post #3

This is a beautiful ad and will make you emotional. As a person of Indian background I was able to relate to it easily but I wonder what others think of it? Are you able to feel the strong emotions based on reading subtitles or does language hamper the feelings and it loses its impact. Kudos to the team involved in this and thanks for posting this.

At least for me, the background song (from renowned singer and lyricist 'Piyush Mishra') adds a LOT in making me emotional - which they didn't translate. So I decided to add a rough translation for the same in the comments, but thanks to new Google+ integration - only junk is at the top on Youtube now. Here's it again (translation of only the BG song), timed for those who are interested: 0:59 : Those narrow streets o…

Yes, the song is beautiful as well - thanks for translating it, although it's hard to do justice to the original.

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#48

Post by sjtgraham »

This ad makes me tear up every time and the music is what takes it over the edge for me. The ad is scored so beautifully, the melodies and arrangements are incredible. Even though I can't understand what the singer is saying, I can definitely feel the emotions in his voice.

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#49

Post by shadowfiend »

devnetfx wrote: post #3

This is a beautiful ad and will make you emotional. As a person of Indian background I was able to relate to it easily but I wonder what others think of it? Are you able to feel the strong emotions based on reading subtitles or does language hamper the feelings and it loses its impact. Kudos to the team involved in this and thanks for posting this.

It was absolutely beautiful, and I watched it without subtitles. The searches are in English, and there is an intro on the page that gives you enough information to let the images and the music do the talking.

Re: This Google ad has moved people to tears across India and Pakistan

#50

Post by 77ko »

anigbrowl wrote: post #12
capex wrote: post #7

Behind the division of the sub-continent lies a great debate, that of Jinnah vs Gandhi. Was it the true aspiration of the people to get divided geographically while getting independence from British rule? It seems the divide happened because of some ideology driven people (Iqbal) who convinced other leaders (Jinnah) to pursue it. Today, this is a raging battle in Pakistan, did Pakistan ever need to be an independent…

For those interested in history, Freedom at Midnight is a great documentary book on the liberation and subsequent partition of India: http://www.amazon.com/Freedom-at-Midnight-Dominique-Lapierre... It's a sad fact that the departure of the British Empire from various colonial possessions frequently resulted in a power vacuum followed by deep internal conflicts which remain problematic today - Ireland, Israel, and Ind…

I had a very different take on this book - instead of copy pasting, I'll just point you to my review here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/627096724
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