How social media backfired on Times Now

Whats the buzz about: After the Indian cricket team lost to Australia, an Indian English news channel Times Now began tweeting with #ShamedinSydney. However contrary to the past experiences where we saw the Indian Junta fuming and abusing team India, this time ‘we the people’ showed tremendous support to the men in blue. And it all backfired on Times Now.

What happened next? People quickly realized that Times Now was sensationalizing India’s defeat and was trying to cash in a few hundred thousand mentions which would help it trend on twitter. They obviously knew that Dhoni’s men performed well in this world cup and thanks to them we also reached the semi’s and this was worth a celebration. So when someone at Times Now thought it will be a good idea to fuel ‘the angry Indian’s’ frustration what went wrong? One thing – ‘the angry Indian’ can at ‘times’ be sensitive, sensible and above all ‘argumentative’ as well. All hell broke when the Junta took over Times Now on twitter with #ShameOnTimeNow. There were more than two lakh tweets with this hash tag in 12 hours.

Some of the tweets

 

Some Thoughts: The Indian cricket  fan has always shown his anger when the team looses any match, especially world cup. On any other day the Indian twitterati would have joined the chorus of #ShameInSydney. This time however it was a different story, people showed their love and support for team India and captain Dhoni on social media.

The pressure any player handles is far more than the pressure in the news room. And although team India lost Indians did not loose it by falling in for the social media gimmick Times Now was upto.

Lessons Learnt: Brands have been in the game of predicting and enticing reactions online to increase their share of voice. But like the Share Market there is no formula to get it right. Its a game of trials and errors where we can look back and say ‘yes it worked!’. But when a communication backfires is it all bad for the brand, people are still talking about them, aren’t they? Well time tell us if it still did any good for Times Now. After all as they say – any publicity is good publicity.

Just In: Some people also tired to troll Anushka Sharma, it was again a failed attempt.

 

 

 

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GOSF: Part Deux…Shop till you drop!

Whats the buzz about: Google has launched its second ‘Great Online Shopping Festival’ (GOSF), an online shopping festival which brings some of the biggest e-commerce players in India. Starting today the fest will last for three days (11th Dec 2013 – 13th Dec 2013).

Whats in it for us: GOSF will see participation from over 200 companies like e-commerce websites, travel sites, auto companies, telecom companies, fashion apparels, well-being companies etc. This year interestingly they also have some banking and financial companies like icici and hdfc which will offer discounts on their products. Buyers will be able to find discounts ranging from 20 % to 80%

Some dope on online shopping fests: The concept on online shopping fest originates from the US, the first Monday after thanksgiving is called “Black Monday”. Cyber Monday started in 2005 and was a huge success, it quickly spread to other countries like Australia, Japan, Canada and the U.K. Google launched GOSF last year to promote online shopping in India, it saw participation from e-commerce companies like flipkart, homeshop, indiatimes, makemytrip etc.

Just Asking: With all the great deals and awesome avenues to savings will you still play retail?

News Credit: ndtvgadgets.com

Photo Creadit: gosf.in

21 Years of text messaging – Happy Birthday SMS

SMS turns 21 today, On Dec. 3, 1992, a software architect in the U.K. sent the world’s first text message “Merry Christmas” to a colleague. In the 21 years since its invention, texting emerged as an integral part of our lives, connecting billions of users with each other. However the last two years the SMS volumes have gone down significantly…thanks to apps like Whatsapp and LINE.

SMS invention defined texts of the past two decades.  It also gave birth to what we call “SMS Lingo”.  Before Twitter, it was SMS which had a character limit of 160 characters, the latest mobiles however have done away with this restriction and allow upto 20 pages at a time.

 Some interesting anecdotes

• A British surgeon in 2008 performed a operation on a wounded teenager in Congo which proved life saving. He received step-by-step instructions on how to perform the surgery from a colleague via text message. Interestingly the operation was successful!
• It’s Legal To Divorce Via Text Message in Malaysia

With social media and free texting apps we surely give less importance to paid SMS’s, however, at some point we all have eagerly waited for that SMS from someone special!

 

The Phablet Mania – by Aaditya Kelkar

Exploring the Indian Junta’s obsession over size – of a phone ofcourse!

You see it in offices; meeting rooms, conference rooms, washrooms alike. Its there when you’re travelling; by a local train or by a Porsche. The totally unmissable ‘Phablets’ have taken the world of mobile phones by storm. Be it a Samsung Galaxy S4 or the humbler Micromax Canvas 2, everyone has or atleast aspires to have a phablet sooner than later.

The phone makers are not the one to miss this opportunity. Obscene-sounding screen sizes have now become the order of the day. Surpassing Samsung’s aptly named Mega (both the 5.8 and 6.3 incher) by almost *this* much is Sony’s Xperia Z Ultra which boasts of a 6.4 inch ultraHD screen. (Why didn’t they just blow it up a li’l more & bring us a smaller Xperia Z tablet?)

One of the more important reasons for cheap phone makers to continue selling these phablets than any regular size phone is because of better margins. What companies like Micromax are doing is just that. They buy the worst possible SoC in town, cover it with a 5-inch screen and boom you got yourself a phablet for Rs. 10k. Who cares about build quality & aesthetics?

But what about the biggies, the Samsung’s, the Sony’s and the Nokia’s of the world? Are they falling prey to huge demands from customers or they are the ones to create the demand? If you look at the spec of these phones, all of the phablets are flagships of the particular companies. All of the quad cores & octa cores of the world find a place in those huge phones ONLY. You will find no phone which has a 4 or 4.5 inch screen and an octa core processor. Is this what driving the demand for these oversized beasts Or ‘We are like this only’

Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Article By – Aaditya Kelkar

aaditya.kelkar@live.com

Image Courtesy: http://blog.onswipe.com

Telegram: Time to bid adieu…

Telegram one of the oldest communication services is set to become history.

Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited has declared that it will discontinue its 160 year old telegraph services from July 15 2013.

Telegram introduced India to the world of telecommunications. We now have the second largest telecom network in the world based on the total number of subscribers. We also have one of the lowest call tariffs (South Africa having one the highest call rates). The growing number of internet users and instant messaging services like whatsapp has led to decline in usage of telegram services and it’s time to bid adieu to the oldest communication network in India

* In 1850, the first experimental electric telegraph line was started between Calcutta and Diamond Harbour. In 1851, it was opened for the use of the British East India Company.  Telegram played an important role in ensuring the British victory in India’s First War of Independence, it also played a  strategic role  in helping the British to relay info (almost real time) across large parts of India.

Our generation met telegram only in the movies (remember how many movies had the a Taar Aya hai sequence) and in stories told to us by our grandparents for whom telegram was the main source of quick and urgent communication.

It was the only way to deliver happy and sad news to people – most telegrams  had a messages like child birth, interview call, selection for a job, confirmation of supply orders, ticket booking details and  news of serious illness or death of relatives.

Telegram was the SMS equivalent of the pre-cellphone era with its typical telegram lingo (with acronyms and shorthand’s) and will leave behind hilarious memories of typo errors and mistakes. Blunders like telegram reaching the wrong person/address were common. There used to be multiple meanings derived from a telegram message because of the devilish word limit. A typical telegram used to read like this: FATHER ILL START SOON {STOP} which would be interpreted as “Your Father is ill. You need to leave immediately to see him.” But what would you derive from this: FATHER, YOUR DAUGHTER SUCCESSFUL IN BED {STOP} which should ideally be interpreted as a father’s daughter passed her B.Ed. exams. Before twitter, this was the only communication network with word limit (25 words inclusive of message, receivers name and address senders name and the word STOP – to indicate that the message ends) and the challenge was to keep it short as single every word was charged.  

With the Indian telecom industry transforming into a next gen network (India awaits the launch of 4G services now) telegram will now be remembered only in our history textbooks.

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News Courtesy: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com

* Historic Data:  History textbooks for SSC

Image from http://imagescn.technomuses.ca

Bank employee sleeps on key board, transfers millions!

Yes, you read it right…this is true and has created a lot of buzz on social media today. Most working professional would like a power nap in the afternoon, in this case the employee fell asleep on his keyboard and accidentally transformed a minor transfer into a 222 million euros. The bank realized this mistake shortly after the transfer and corrected the error. Luckily the employee did not loose his job as the court ruled that the plaintiff should be reinstated in his job. Close shave i would say!

Human Error or more scientifically User Error as it is called is the reason for such blunders. Funnier phrases have been derived in relation to Human Computer Interaction blunders like PEBKAC -Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair or PICNIC – Problem In Chair Not In Computer. Most critics and design experts still argue that blunders like these happen due to Human Errors and most of the times the blame is put on the wrong place -design and its failure to take into account human limitations. Millions of dollars are spent every year on Usablity Design analysis and testing to reduce human error in softwares and applications however there is still a long time for technology to advance upto a level when Human Errors will be close to zero.

We live in a Digital world where most of us are in front of the computer all day. We usually do not pay full attention to the computer system while using it. We require a small training on using systems to complete tasks with minimal errors.
This is obviously also not considered by most organizations as a necessary traning. Its time we realise its importance.

Tips: We can learn computer basics to avoid such mistakes, learning keyboard shortcuts and understanding commands is a good way to start.

After thought: How many of us have accidently placed a call when our phone was in our pockets?

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News Credit: http://www.ndtv.com

Image: http://www.berchman.com

Bob Online: Nomoskar, ami Bob Biswas

Who’s Bob Biswas:
The cold blooded contract killer from the movie Kahani, who with his staple,“namoskar. ami bob biswas. ek minute”kills people .The character was played by bengali actor Saswat Chatterji and became popular instantly.

What’s he doing Online:
Bob has found a huge fan base online; he is now a trending topic with a couple of facebook pages (one of which already has more than 6000 likes) and a twitter handle as well. He also has a lot of Fan Art (on the lines of Fight Club) one of which is called bob heads (just like zoozoo’s) doing rounds on these social mediums.

In Future:
You may find more graphics/bob one-liners online as a lot of people are getting inspired by the Fan Art and are coming out with their own version dedicated to this character, we can also expect a graphic novel based on Bob. Some people have approached the film’s director for the same.

To Sum Up:
Sinister characters sure have a lot of fan following online!

Mobile TV: Boom in demand for digital entertainment

Why is mobile TV booming:

Thousands of commuters on the Mumbai local trains now have an entertainment solution onboard. NO.. the railways have not instaled TV in the coaches, they all have a handy idiot box… Mobile TV is here and it has provided one more option to the way Indian’s consume content. Watching videos, streamed TV content and cricket matches on his hand-held device has been a routine and digital entertainment is slowly but surely finding its footing among young Indians. India has good future potential for mobile video streaming services, especially for videos focused on cricket highlights and updates, in addition to film-based content. Handset manufacturers are making moves to tap this opportunity. Smartphones no longer a toy for the rich and can be afforded by a common man as well. MObile service providers have taken steps to tape this potential with cheaper data plans.

What is Mobile TV:
Mobile TV is a technology that allows people to view regular live television content on their mobile phones or other mobile devices (tablet PCs, etc) that they get through traditional cable or pay TV subscriptions at home.

Latest Entrant:
The latest entrant is Zee New Media, which has launched an Over-The-Top TV distribution platform called Ditto TV that delivers Live TV channels and on- demand video content to mobile phones, tablets, laptops, desktops, entertainment boxes and connected TVs. Ditto TV, which has 21 channels, including channels from Multi Screen Media (Sony Entertainment Television), TV Today Network and BBC. Zee plans to offer up to 50 channels in future.