It’s been a while since we nitpicked on Times of India here. After all, TOI provides the kicks and sparks to so many Indi-bloggers, yours truly included.

No, I am not going to ridicule their “refresh” idea wherein they attempted writing the stories that could be frontpage material for TOI in year 2025. Few folks I know almost bought that Bangalore-Mysore bullet train story and were so disappointed later on knowing that it was an April-fool like joke. TOI, if you want to talk about 2025, first things first. Hard-copy printed-on-paper news media wont be around then. But I appreciate the creativity here, well done!

TOI also came up with this big survey today on what Bangaloreans feel about Bangalore.

Sample size was 206 people. Assuming Bangalore’s population to be 5 million, 0.004% of the residents opined about the city. Moreover, there was no detailed breakup provided on profile of people surveyed. Well anyway. In there, two things puzzled me.

One question they asked was: how do you compare Bangalore to other metros?. How the hell can a guy answer this unless he/she has been to all those places!? Or did TNS selectively pick 206 travelers?

Another question in there was: What will make Bangalore a global city of class? Good question, no complains there. But the answer graphic had these numbers.
– Better Infrastructure & Safe and Secure Life – 52%
– Better Infrastructure – 27%
– Safe and Secure Life – 17%

I thought 27 plus 17 is 44, not 52. Or is it that two things (infrastructure and safety) put together was a separate possible answer to the question. In that case, what a strange way to structure a survey question!

One meaningless survey with just 206 respondents, and TOI filled up a full page with it. Good show.