straive on S Anand

My Overcrowded Talk Daydream

Tue, 16 Jun 2026 18:39:40 +0530

I daydream a lot.

One recurring daydream is where I’m a speaker, but the event is so packed with people that I’m not able to enter the hall.
The organizers call me, worried, asking where I am. I tell them “I’m outside. I’m not able to get in!”
They apologize profusely. “We’ll get you in,” they say. They move out a few people, control the crowd, and manage to get me in.

In fact, I had this daydream again just yesterday as I was walking back from dinner.

Today, that daydream came true! (Kind of.)

Straive runs a monthly series, “AI Conversations with Anand”, on Google Meet. I joined, couldn’t share my screen, and tried reloading.

When I did, I got a message saying that the meeting was full (only 250 people allowed), and that I couldn’t join!

It played out almost exactly like the daydream. Kathleen messaged me.
I replied: “Maximum number of people reached. I can’t join! 🙂”
She replied: “OMG. Let me kick someone 🙂”

She controlled the crowd and managed to get me in.

Daydream unlocked!

PS: I had Claude write a version of the same story with a brief prompt - to test how close it is to my writing style. Short answer: close, but it’s not my style.

Got kicked out of my own talk today.

It was the monthly Straive AI Conversations session, the internal one where I share whatever I’ve been doing with AI over the last month. Google Meet. Kathleen was hosting.

For the first time, more than 250 people showed up. Neither of us knew Google Meet caps at 250.

So as the room filled, Meet started doing what it does at the limit: someone has to leave for someone to join. I got bumped out of my own session. I tried to rejoin. Couldn’t. The room was full. Of people who came to hear me.

For years I’ve had this slightly embarrassing fantasy. That one day I’d be so popular my talk would overflow, and I’d be turned away at the door of my own event for lack of space. I never thought it would actually happen. It did. The universe granted the wish exactly as written, then immediately revoked my speaking rights to make room for the crowd.

I sat there staring at the “you’ve been removed” screen, briefly the most popular person who was not allowed into his own talk.

Kathleen sorted it out. I got back in. The session went on. But for a few minutes I was living the dream, locked outside, while 250 colleagues waited inside for a speaker who couldn’t get past the bouncer.

A few things I’m filing away:

Google Meet stops at 250. Check this before you outgrow it.

The host should probably not also be the one most likely to get evicted.

Be specific with your fantasies. I wished to be turned away for popularity. I did not specify that I shouldn’t be the one turned away.

Maybe popularity has a hard limit, and it’s 250.

Even the guest WiFi is so secure

Fri, 18 Apr 2025 08:09:26 +0000

We take security very seriously at Straive. We set high standards – not just for ourselves, but our guests, too.

Here’s the unofficial policy guide for visitors to Straive Singapore, exemplified by the sites blocked on our guest WiFi network.

Please avoid childishness. No emojis. No emojikitchen.com, gitmoji.dev
Write your own code. Avoid AI. No cursor.com, cline.bot, glideapps.com
Avoid code entirely, if possible. No marimo.app, motherduck.com, firebase.studio, posthog.com
No presentations either, please. No marp.app, revealjs
Stay organized. Avoid crutches. No dynalist.io, focusmate.com, opennote.me
You should already be fit, physically & mentally. No freedomfromdiabetes.org, artofliving.online
We prefer real, not digital, shopping. No fairprice.com
Fake data is not encouraged. No jsonplaceholder.typicode.com, placehold.co
Please spell out URLs in full. No bit.ly, t.co
Learning is for wimps. No maven.com, study.iitm.ac.in

In fact, we’re so secure, we block our own sites. No learnovate.straive.com, policies.straive.com, myapps.straive.com.

Note: I tested this with my blockedhistory script on the Straive Guest Wifi and compared it with my mobile data connection.

I’ll verify what these sites are before writing, since several aren’t obvious. Let me check the ones I’m less sure about.Context7 is an MCP server for AI coding. Let me check the genuinely obscure ones.Now the obscure/local ones I genuinely don’t know.moddedbear is an indie dev’s personal blog. Let me check a few more for good thematic clusters.chr.so is ambiguous, so I’ll skip it. Let me confirm a couple more for flavor.Here’s the addendum, matching the deadpan style of the original:

Addendum (June 2025)

We continue to take security very seriously at Straive. A year on, our standards have only risen. As of June 2026, our guest network has blocked:

Curiosity is a liability. Don’t read about AI - especially from the people building it. No deepmind.google, blog.google, hacks.mozilla.org, cloudwars.com
AI was already banned. Giving it skills and tools is treasonous. No agentskills.io, skill.md, modelcontextprotocol.io, context7.com, factory.ai
Use your own face and your own voice. No stand-ins. No synthesia.io, aistudios.com, speaktor.com
Learning is for wimps. Learning over beer, doubly so. No nerdnite.com, bangalore.nerdnite.com, mumbai.nerdnite.com
One reality is plenty. We will not fund your escape from it. No vrchat.com, hello.vrchat.com
Your terminal should be a punishment, not a joy. No ghostty.org. And no hobbyists to pick up better habits from. No moddedbear.com
Idle chatter is bad. Measuring your idle chatter is worse. No discord.com, twitter.com, analytics.twitter.com
You’re already fit (see above), so you needn’t track anyone else’s stats either. No sports-reference.com
And resist temptation: you do not need a new phone, however tasteful. No sg.nothing.tech

Father of the bride

Wed, 01 Nov 2023 14:55:01 +0000

In 2012, I started Gramener with half a dozen friends.

This week, we were acquired by Straive, a part of Barings Private Equity Asia.

How do you feel?

I feel like the father of the bride. Gramener was registered on 26 Feb. A day before my daughter’s birthday. I’ve spent more time with Gramener than my daughter. That makes Gramener my elder child. Who’s moving into a new household. Along with me. (I feel like சகலகலா சம்மந்தி.)

I feel grateful. I’m not good at business. But when my cousin remarked, “Anand, you’re now giving a livelihood to over 250 people!” I was stunned. My co-founders, colleagues and clients built a thriving business and put me (of all people) as CEO in the middle of it. How do I even go about saying “Thanks”?

It feels like joining college. New people. Larger group. New ways of working and learning. Lots of topics to explore. Exciting and scary.

What was it like?

Fundraising was rocky.
We started in 2019. COVID struck. We paused.
We resumed in 2021. Russia invaded Ukraine. We paused.
We resumed in 2023. The Israel - Hamas war started. Luckily, the deal was nearly done.
I’m grateful Naveen ran the entire process like clockwork, taking all the stress. I’m the happy free-rider, as usual.

Starting up was not that rocky.
We’re many. With half a dozen co-founders, there are enough shoulders to cry on. That counts.
We’re steady. We didn’t know how to blitz-scale, but we knew not to blitz-fail. Survival counts for a lot.
We’re lucky. This is basically the “I have no idea why we succeeded” category. Serendipity counts for a lot, too.
Ganes, Mayank, Naveen, Ram, Ravi, Vengatesh – yeah, it was fun. Not every day. But most of the time. It was fun.

What will you do?

I’m part of Straive’s data, analytics & AI business.

Straive extracts and analyzes all kinds of data. Financial. Legal. Research. Education. Pharmaceutical. There’s a fair bit of converting unstructured data to structured. Exactly the kind of thing I love doing.

So, I’ll be doing what I’ve been doing the last decade – extracting insights from even more data and telling better stories from those.

I joined Gramener as “Chief Data Scientist”. Now I’m debating “Data Storyteller”, “Data Detective”, “Data Psychologist”, and a few other evil titles.

Wish me luck!

Comments

Bhanu 1 Nov 2023 8:44 pm: Congrats on the acquisition, Anand! We will look for your contributions under the moniker “Nefarious Root Node”.
Matt 4 Nov 2023 6:00 pm: Anand, all the best for your future endevaours. I am sure you would contribute well in Straive. So would Gramener still exist with its brand or from today it is Straive?
My Year in 2023 - S Anand 31 Dec 2023 8:38 pm (pingback): […] Straive acquiring Gramener. […]