3 Techies Banter #3TB Bingepods

Listen up, you Illuminati, Opus Dei, Freemasons, and Skull & Bones Society; there's a new secret society in town. The Order of 37 was founded by eccentric mathematicians tired of mainstream numbers getting all the glory. Pi, Fibonacci, Mersenne and the Catalan numbers were such show-offs. But 37? It was the unsung hero of the number world. 

Members, known as "Threesevenians, believed that one of their own discovered that 37 was not just a number but a portal to another dimension – a dimension where pi ends and where the square root of two is a nice, neat whole number. To access this, one must write the number 37 precisely 37 times while standing on one leg and humming the theme from "We Are the Champions".

If this is thought-provoking, you are at the right place. Listen on.

Tech has a "pacing problem" (believe us - this is an accepted term 😎). Innovation is fast outpacing the ability of laws and regulations to keep up. Regulators are trying to govern Hogwarts with rules written for a Muggle school. Good luck stopping magical mischief with detention and a dress code.

Balancing benefits/risks, ethical considerations, determining liability and lack of expertise are just some of the considerations in play. "To regulate or not to regulate" is the constant dilemma. Or should we just let the market decide?

So who better than Rahul Matthan, a partner at Trilegal and one of the country's foremost technology lawyers, to walk us all through this nuanced world.

Join our delightful conversation on any platform of your choosing (not regulated 😉).

Sujith Nair, the WhatsApp-averse, badminton-loving chief mover and shaker of Beckn, gave us a peek into what the world's first e-commerce protocol is all about.

Imagine if Colgate wanted to sell a lot of toothpaste, would it open separate exclusive stores on every street? NO! Instead, it ensures its products are available in all stores where people come to shop, and not just toothpaste.

Similarly, Beckn is a way for an online business to make its products and services available on other stores (popular daily-use consumer apps) instead of setting up its own store (its own consumer app) and waiting for customers to come in droves!

In fact, we like it so much, we are carrying Beckn use cases as our episode artwork (instead of our normal groovy cover art) to spread the word in our own little way.

So, is it an app? Is it an aggregator? Is it a platform? No. It is a Super Capability - decentralised and open. 

So listen, learn and use.

History is filled with protracted, drawn-out conflicts, but did you know about a war that could have been missed during a coffee break? It started at 9:00 AM and was over by brunch, proving that even wars can have a tight schedule!

Switching gears from fleeting wars to eternal edibles, let’s talk about honey’s impressive shelf-life. This sweet treat has been found in ancient tombs and is still as good as new after thousands of years. So, why doesn't honey spoil? The plot thickens.

The human fascination with the number 3 runs deep. Trimurti, Trinity, movie trilogies, states of matter, pigs, musketeers, witches of Macbeth - the list is endless. It gives us a sense of stability that 1 and 2 cannot (legs on a stool 😎). Hopefully, we will not see World War 3.

Listen On...

Imagine the Indian fintech industry as a Bollywood dance sequence. It begins in the early 2000s, with a few enthusiastic background dancers, mainly startups like Paytm and ItzCash, shaking to the primitive rhythms of dial-up internet. The choreography was less "smooth moonwalk" and more "clunky robot dance," but the spirit? Unmatchable!

As the beat of technology quickened, so did the steps. By the 2010s, the stage was ablaze with newcomers, each adding their own flair to the routine—swiping, tapping, and clicking their way into the hearts of millions. Mobile wallets, digital banking, and e-commerce platforms pirouetted around the traditional banking giants, who were still trying to tie their shoelaces and join the routine.

Today, the Indian fintech dance floor is crowded. It's a vibrant, chaotic medley—part traditional garba, part trendy hip-hop, and entirely enthralling.

In this episode, Navin Surya, ex-MD and CEO of ItzCash joins us to help us understand the fintech medley of motion.

From a beer-drenched London street to the simple joy of a flying disc and finally to the click of a mouse that bought "Ten Summoner’s Tales," history, it seems, prefers its tales served with a side of whimsical. And we have a rhyme to match.

In London's streets, the beer did flow,A flood of ale from long ago.The vats did burst, the town did weep,In hops and barley drowned so deep.

Then Yale, where pie tins took to flight,Became the Frisbee's birthright.A simple toss, a joyful cheer,From tin to disc, the path was clear.

Online, a transaction bold,Dan Kohn's CD of Sting was sold.Through NetMarket's digital door,A new era began to soar.

Laugh along with us in this edition of our Shorts.