An Interaction with the CEO of Stockezy.com

Here is an interesting and not so polite conversation with the CEO of STockezy.com, a social investing site.

On Mon, Nov 8, 2010 at 5:30 AM, I wrote:

Sir I recently participated in your event alpha seeker. At the end of the game our team Alpha_seeker_171 was declared as winner according to the cumulative points gathered. However in due course of time we slipped to 2nd position without the game being played. I don't know and don't want to know how it happened but just for suggestion that when a game of share market is being played we apply our strategy after looking at our competitors points and then set our target prices. And so if any miscalculation is there then it should be corrected immediately after the days play ends.
Also if your system was so weak that it could not handle just around 300 participants than its better first check the loopholes and then organize any game further. Because it hurts the sentiments of the participants. I hope you will look after this matter.

He Replied..

Mr. Mayank Kumar

Thank you for writing to us.

We had not declared the winners on Friday as we were back-checking the system. The winners were only declared on Monday. The teams in question here both belong to IIM Ranchi, and I would have appreciated if you would have asked about the changes to either the stockezy-team or the fellow-team about what changed and not brand it as miscalculation.

We understand the business of investing and the stock market, hence we are running the company and the website. Let me take time to explain you the same.

The system handles 1 million users a month, 300,000 stock recommendations. This is the ONLY automated system in India and the world which analyzes and rates picks every 2 minutes. So I do not approve of you questioning the integrity of the system. I am not sure why you are using words like miscalculation and loop holes without knowing or asking what actually happened.

I am not sure how familiar you are with technology, but not going in to the details, I will let you know what happened. There were no loopholes or miscalculations. The data we get from the exchange is delayed by 15 minutes. Which means NSE will not give us tick by tick data. NSE provides snapshots of data to us. For one of the picks of your colleagues team, the snapshot was incorrect from the exchange. He was diligent enough to ask a question and we rectified it. We gave ourselves 2 days after the competition to precisely check the results.

Many other competitions you participate in do not allow/agree to changes and you never know that such a thing as snapshot data exists. How BSE and NSE snapshot data is only known to people who are in the business of transacting with the exchanges on a daily basis.

You are visibly disappointed and you should be as your sentiments are hurt. But I do not think this gives you the liberty to talk-down stockezy.com or question the integrity of the system. A polite email outlining your grievances would have served much better, than the one you sent.

Good Luck for the future.

To be able to received the cash prize please send in the photo-IDs of the team participants.

Best Regards,

Tushar Makhija

CEO,

Stockezy.com

I wrote back:

Sorry sir if you feel my last mail was offensive.
But all I wanted to say that the "incorrect data" that you recieved which caused all this misunderstanding should be rechecked during the game itself. So that it does not affect the game. Because if I am competing with the top team then I constantly watch my competitor's score and then set my target prices to overtake it. Which is exactly what my team did during the competition and we were successful in our strategy. But at the end we found their score was increased by 100 points which was authentically claimed. So for us it was like being mislead by their current score which now after knowing the cause I understand that was no one's mistake. Also I am not blaming the top standing team because they deserved it.
On Friday my team had the highest total sum and so it was on the top position so I thought the game is over and we are on the top.
Regarding the technology I admit I was very much critical on my comments but I understand very much how these systems operate. What I didn't know was that the data from NSE was not continuous and now I can perfectly imagine what might had happened.

I again, feel apologetic for my last mail and hope you to consider it. I appreciate the stockezy.com team's effort in bringing such games which provide opportunity to youngsters like us to participate.

Thank you..

With Regards,
Mayank Kumar
(IIM Ranchi)

Finally in a note of reconciliation

Hi Mayank,

We understand your point and for the next round the additional checks and barriers would be in place to deduct such anomalies.

The biggest question mark is the data from NSE. Unfortunately they do now own up to the errors in the snapshot.

Thanks for understanding our point of view. Do send us your photo-ID so we can go ahead and process the prize money and get the cheque delivered to you.

Best regards,

Tushar

How To Make Money.

A few days ago I read in a local newspaper that a man escaped away taking money from many persons in the name of doubling the amount in four months. I wonder they still need to execute such fraudulent deeds to earn… Money!!!How about making money within the dimensions of law without investing much, but applying some skills in your domain and that too in our own country. I know I shouldn’t be the one writing this but all I did is an analysis.
Basically I am a Computer Science Engineer turned management student. Now trust me these IT people are making the whole world fool by using an awesome technology called SOFTWARE. I assert to those suffering from programmophobia that programming is one of the easiest thing you would like to do, so just don’t try to avoid it. Because you will make fool of yourself by doing so. You should know that IT companies pay starting from 20k just for doing some rubbish or data entry works, because they charge much more only for that from their clients who have no idea about making software. Take the Economists, they have redundantly stated and applied the same theory in different chapters and named it as a new derivative. Oh…how can I forget these Finance people who have stolen my peace and gifted me some sleepless nights added with few nightmares? I don’t know why they need to do the same entries two three times in different awful methods. In my opinion they themselves make the problem big and then look for the solution. And now when I discussed these subjects, why to leave out Mathematics. A great mathematician once said “absolute mathematics is absolute mind”. I think I made my point.
Bollywood is producing around four hundred movies a year. So they must be making good money in this industry. All you have to do is to show a social issue and insert some colloquial slang. I think that’s the success story of “Peepli Live”. Yes this is the changing trend and now big film stars can be easily seen in advertisement industry or promos or in reality shows. I think Akshay Kumar should be the only exception seen equal number of times in both ads and movies per year (Correct me if I am wrong). If I suggest, moviemakers should sign cricketers for their movies and they will make enough money from the shows before the real review comes in the market. Remind you that these fans of celebrities are very sensitive about their likes and dislikes so if one day you come up with a pair of shoe and say I watched Katrina Kaif while wearing these they may even ask of it. So if you are smart then you can put it on an auction. These TV serials, I have never seen a happy moment in any family serial and they call it as “Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki”. Any way they are making good TRP rating so no comments. But I still wonder how the” Saas Bahu” serial could end?
Our country contributes about one sixth of the world population and the infra is not sufficient to fulfill the demand. Take for example Engg. Colleges vs Engg. aspirants. I won’t be surprised if after some years apartments are constructed for engineering colleges, each flat for one college. And that’s a good idea, good for aspirants as they have not to wander searching for colleges and good for companies as they’ll access a student hub in one place. Well management colleges are not far behind and soon they’ll also catch up the race as the new institutes name have a suffix “Technology and Management” instead of just “Technology”. I hope the population growth rate doesn’t let the new IITs and IIMs to be a threat to these institutes.
Now you must be expecting me to give comments on IPL. Yes I feel very sorry for Lalit Modi; I think he is a great initiator and a perfect executer. Even Tharoor will agree with me. The franchisees should be aware of these issues now as they can be next. I mean make money but don’t get addicted to it. Even the media people should be cautious as the public have now something called ”Metamedia” in the form of movies like “Peepli Live” and “Paa”.
Oh..Its time to stop rattling on and doing some money making activity. Now let me go as the new IT boom is about to arrive and I may get a chance to prepare market reports for that as now market reporting companies are also charging Rs 1,60,000 for a report. Or maybe I get a chance to supply some essential commodity for commonwealth games…ssshhhh don’t tell anybody that is also a very money promising area.

How To Make Money....

I Love My Country...?

A student from Tripura says "We were better off before independence than after". For clarification, he is not an underprivileged tribal but a student studying in one of the premiere institute established and sponsored by the government post independence. A reserved Non Creamy layer other backward caste student criticizes the recruitment policy of government institutions. A public society complains for they are getting only twenty two hour electricity supply that too interrupted. And to mention Sharad pawar wants to partially shift his burden to someone from his party only.

Well, it was a short excerpt of what I see in my daily life. So I will stop discussing these topics because it may never let me complete my first blog. On the eve of the Independence Day which I celebrate every year and thank the revolutionary freedom fighters for providing me the glory to look the world at its eyes. Yes I love my country India, The country which is expected to replicate the biggest economies like US, UK …in the future as nearest as 2050; the country listed among the few nuclear powers; the country which holds a crucial position in reducing global warming, no doubt the biggest threat to the presence of life; and yes the country which is going to host the commonwealth games despite exploring the corruption at the highest level. All of these facts have one thing in common, ”biggest”, and that makes me feel proud that I am not inferior to anyone in this earth. So I am grateful to all those who contributed to achieve me this glorious status. Oh, I forgot ….the boy from Tripura I just mentioned, had some complains but I think that’s their problem and they are responsible for their story. Also why should he complain??He is getting all the facilities a privileged student gets. And yes I am justified in throwing stones on that NC OBC student, Sharad pawar and off course Suresh kalmadi the perpetrator of commonwealth games corruption. So in my perspective everything is going great and you can’t expect everybody to be happy or get everything he desires. Yeah, that’s the point I want to make, I cannot get everything I want so why do I expect to fulfill all my desires.

But I am little bit confused what to do? If I don’t think about the tripuris how can I discover that they are not getting their fundamental rights of life in their native land? That they are ruled by people mostly from Bangladesh who have infiltrated country which as much theirs as it is mine. Should I make the NC OBC student realize that there is a student outside somewhere who has cracked tougher nuts than you in his life and is still struggling to get a chance? And why shouldn’t I enjoy the show if something wrong happens during the commonwealth games and the officials are sued? Yes, I should, because I have been doing this for a long period. And besides, I am not the perfect person to look after these issues. I have my own career goal which has nothing to do with these issues. What I am capable is to criticize everyone when I get a chance. I criticize when the MNS creates violence against Biharis, when Indian Hockey team doesn’t qualifies for the Olympics, when government cannot provide justice to the Bhopal gas tragedy victims, When there is an attack by naxalites on Indian railways, when Taj hotel is taken as hostage by the terrorists, when a big fraud is caught in a big software firm like SATYAM, and when Ravindra Jadeja plays from Indian cricket team despite of a continuous pathetic performance. Because it’s in my nature and this is what I do to entertain myself and call myself a part of the emerging youth population which is socially responsible, highly productive in corporate and which shares most of its idea on twitter, facebook etc. Why should I be like the one who buys books for a young watch man who is eager to study and used to solve sums from the newspaper? Why shouldn’t I complain that he is not doing his duty and that a dog entered in my hostel premises due to his negligence? I already have struggled enough in my life so it’s time for me to enjoy the privileges and entertain myself and my near ones. After all I am also an Indian and I also love my country as much as the others do. I am a proud Indian and every year Independence Day reminds me this and I say Jai Hind as a greeting for my country people. I don't think my country needs anything more from me.And even if if I should do more, I simply won't because I follow live and let live principle and that is the secret of success in my country.