The Bane of Media

My Dad believed the newspaper paper especially the English ones might just be the tool that differentiated the intellectuals with others. I remember him reading it end to end from time know to me. I probably was too young until later part of 1980s to attempt reading, if at all it was the fortnightly magazine “The frontline” which had some awesome snaps of military tankers to airforce flights. I vaguely remember Rajiv Gandhi was in the helm and was in very many pages as well. Newspapers then wanted to lure the younger ones, “the young world”, something that my Dad thought I could read and understand. I dreaded those Saturday newspapers forcing me to read the four pages of the kids section. 

As weeks passed by I just about managed few articles in it but was overwhelmed by some of the stories of extraordinary talent. Yes there was comparison, well know to our generation, some survived the comparison and rose to the occasion the rest fell away only to realise they were equally good at a later point in their life and there were the third kind hiding behind the comparison and trying hard to hold on between the intellectual, the talented and the wealthy. Probably I was the third kind. 

In shot - the early day news papers or let me put that as print media, did support in this sort of comparison. Well, there could have been hundred’s of pros to it but somewhere hiding behind was that little con probably negligible. In the name of motivation there was that flip side pulling the rest down to say you are not up to the mark. 

It was the emergence of TV that had pushed the print media to explore avenues like the kids section. When I thought TV had revolutionised media with live visuals, somehow print media stayed and stayed for a long time. Visual media slowly emerged from the movies in the theatre to a new form called television. Television broadcast opened up avenue which started from just one national channel to regional ones. News, the regional one around 7:00 PM was a sensation and then followed by the English one. Some iconic news readers who graced the news room and we were glued to it. Apart from it the sensation was around Sunday evening movies. The regional ones played the movies of iconic actors of the eighties. 

It was taboo at my house for any Sunday evening movies but a friend of mine and their family were all eyes for the Sunday evening movie time. He would invariably enact MGRs climax fight with Nambiyar when we met the following day. The villein conspiring to bring down the hero sounded something like toppling the Hero’s bull-a-kart by pulling off one of the pegs holding the wheels and expecting him to get injured and die. But with fortune favouring the brave, the Hero escapes and the climax fight begins with my friend enacting it.

Radio from time know was News and songs with intricate details on producers to singers, newspaper and magazines were in parallel jotting down detailed news and interesting articles trying to expand its audience base. Advertisements started find its place in media and the numbers kept increasing. Television gave a different dimension to consuming information for many an audience. News, movies, advertisements and serials made it into the Indian homes with ease. 

Cable TV with an array of audience choice channels added on to the information consumption. Still in school, an hour’s bus journey, lots to talk about with friends, more topics found its way into our conversation. One of those days, a friend of mine who boarded the bus in the next stop after mine was not in his elements and he quickly adjusted into the already cramped three seater with 3 of us already in it. Visibly hiding from the people boarding from his place, and avoided eye contact with any. We were inquisitive with his odd behaviour, he slowly opened up and we laughed our guts out.

My friend’s family owned the cable network in their area with the big dish on top of their house. On that particular evening or should I say night, he tried to explore a little more on the Channels and ended up with a Malayalam channel that aired a movie slightly more on the glamor side. Little did he know that the same was relayed to the rest of them as well and that had caught like wild fire. An embarrassing situation, did bring some giggles from people around and only blushes to spare for him. 

In short - information did empower people and made them no longer ignorant but it came with a pitfall. The uncurated content also took away the innocence.

Internet was the buzz word, with my first e-mail id I was all excited to see where this was heading to. Computers, mobile phones, different kind of storage devices revolutionised college lives. Thanks to the phase of technology growth, a bounty of opportunities opened up in the job market.   The world was getting smaller, an account in Orkut meant you were one of those early into social media. Before I could hardly realise, social media had taken off in a big way and the amount of information, overwhelmed is certainly an understatement.

In short - opportunities were a plenty but little did we realise that ours privacy was at stake. 

Movies of all sort, Articles of all sort information from age know to man until the second you are reading and beyond, information was either fed or automatically collected and can be accessed by anyone quite literally in the finger tips. Few of these information had a Midas touch to it and tends the world over and fortunes are made over night. 

Yes, data is the new business, research scholars and the B-schools are behind the science of tending. World of internet curates information for my consumption via suggestions, promotions and my browsing history. This new business of information has not only caught the interest of business men but also the media houses and politicians. 

All of a sudden the information that is spread the most has become the truth. ‘Truth is not the one you hear, its not the one you see but the one that you throughly investigate’ is an old saying and was a value that was once taught. Not only the truth but all values passed down by our ancestors are down the drain.

With all the information that the different media provides. Unfortunately there is hardly any content that are really true, it is either half baked or just too popular to be true. These information are quite literally thrown to the dogs. Like an old saying “every dog has its day”, it is somebody’s day to popularise, also called “trends” in the new virtual world. Information reaches to nuke and corner of the world and finds itself in the hands of people who can’t handle it. These information are then wrapped as different avatars, movie, serials, memes, articles and what not. All of it with once own knack of convincing their audience.     

In short, social media has simply thrown these baseless information which has now turned out to be influencers. Unprecedented amount of delude and bias only leading to hatred, crime and the brutal ones. 

Inspite of all the pros that his wealth of information has put forth for each one of us, the cons have strangled the fundamental human values. Hope this generation would slow down someday and hold on to some of the rich heritage and values that this world had offered us and transcend it to the next generation.

Irony is this goes on social media as well...