Quick notes: Startup rankings, Erdogan's jihad...

• Macaulay's children: India slipping further down the global startup hub rankings
  Rank Region
  1    Silicon Valley
  2    New York
  3    London
  4    Beijing
  5    Boston
  6    Tel Aviv
  7    Berlin
  8    Shanghai
  9    Los Angeles
  10  Seattle
  11  Paris
  12  Singapore
  13  Austin
  14  Stockholm
  15  Vancouver
  16  Toronto
  17  Sydney
  18  Chicago
  19  Amsterdam
  20  Bengaluru



• Indian Army's lack of direction: First invest in human beings – not platforms. As every growing economy has realised it is the soldier, not the machine that wins wars. First they need to get rid of the sahayak system, and over the top perks enjoyed by the officer core, including golf courses and golf carts. Then they need to start investing in serious body armour, and rifles for soldiers, while selling their many priceless properties that they don’t need.



• Our next East India Company: E-commerce in India is growing faster than other Asian countries. Amazon gains a firm footing against homegrown rival Flipkart.



• Erdogan's jihad: When Turkey’s armed forces finally seized control of the Kurdish enclave of Afrin in northern Syria, it was presented as a victory by “Islam’s last army” in a holy war.



• In Erdogan's crosshairs: Kurdish rebels withdraw from Iraq's Sinjar



• Hafiz Kazi: Indian behind deadly vehicle crash at Travis Air Force Base



• #deletefacebook: How to dump Facebook… or at least put it in the dog house for a while