Technology drives the new opportunities
Specialised media defines the core strengths of a society and the country.
India is still borrowing from the West. For ideas, why even full-scale print magazines.
Print media is facing challenges from the Internet media. The days we take the media as just printed newspapers and magazines. Those days are gone.
Also, the every idea of media freedom. Now, media is both an ideal and an industry.One the one side we see the media being controlled and curbed by corporate entry.
In India itself we see big takeovers by corporate houses the big TV channels.Thus, ordinary citizens’ voices, viewpoints are drowned by the big industry interests.
Why, even the Prime Ministers and powerful leaders don’t like to interact with the media, no interviews are granted nor any reasons given. Democracy to that extent is stifled.
As a business and an industry it is the new media, the Internet-based new devices and gadgets that are pervasive in the media space. Google, Face book and other social media, twitter, mobile devices rule the day.
The BBC of course scored high. There was also the reported speech of the latest director or head of the DD. In India we have had so many government -controlled government companies. One such remaining entity is of course the DD.
The government’s attempt to reform the public broadcasting, from the days of V.B.Keskar, the Nehru minister in charge of the radio is known.
Today, where are we?
Now, under Mr.Narendra Modi we seem to be getting ready to take on the new Prime Minister’s penchant for razzle-dazzle and display of a showmanship in its making!
The private media. It not strictly private, not owned by small people but by big corporate is about to display its own muscle.
The corporate control of the Indian media, both print and the TV is not yet a fully reported story.
In India we have already the syndrome, a national syndrome, to praise those in power and underplay those who lost power.
In spite of this syndrome we have an established mindset.
So, we see not a balanced reporting and exposure but a biased one of continuing to praise one party and its sycophants and also giving very biased reporting in the regional media.
So, our politics and public is also very one-sided.
Now, coming to specialised media, like the ones dedicated to say, agriculture and education and other spheres like environment and even science, it looks that is a lost cause!
There are also no in-depth edit page articles anymore.
It looks the best period in Indian writing and reporting was in the 1930s, 40s and 50s and afterwards we find the whole scene changed.
With the coming of the regional politics dominated by film personalities the whole gamut of reporting, the emergence of the TV news channels the whole atmosphere changed. Not for the good?
Yes, we are constrained to say so.
There is now the new threat of the online media. The very existence of the print media magazines and newspapers is under serious threat. The famous take-over of the prestigious Washington Post by the Amazon billionaire founder had shaken the faith of the media world totally. Jeffrey P.Bezos has to make the print version viable.
What did he do?
He has now come out with the idea of putting the Post through his Kindle sales!
Yes, he has come out with many new insights. He says that there is a cognitive overhead; the praise is Bezos’s own!
The number of decisions readers have to make before they get what they want is a new growing problem.
This principle was the driving force behind Amazon’s one click buying decision! It is one of the Amazon’s guiding ideas for a new app being introduced that will deliver the Washington Post to some of the Amazon Kindle tablet owners for free.
It is the first formal collaboration between the two companies, the Washington Post company and Bezos, own Amazon.
The new app. with pre-loaded stories, pictures and even advertisements was designed with close collaboration with Bezos. This is announced by an India tech brain, the technology officer with Amazon, his name being, Shailesh Prakash.
Anyway, the point here is that India is also now embarking on its foreign reach mission. Mr.Narednra Modi is on the offensive so to say to take India to world audiences.
His digital India plan also fits well with his technology expansion into diverse areas. Our Indian media is also facing serious challenges.
One, the credibility gap. India is not seen as a nation of very independent media practitioners. There is every challenge to the independent media.
Yet, as we have been experiencing in our own limited, small scale manner, there is also great deal of opportunities to integrate the print and online media reach.
Our agri portal, www.agricultureinformation.com, is now the world’s largest portain in this specialised segment.
Online subscriptions are the only way to reach out a wider audience. New and innovative tools are coming up.
E-commerce opportunities are also opening up.
Online audience is also growing fast.
Our farmer’s information delivery model, farmer’s exchange, is a promising business model and there is scope for unlimited experiments to take out the audience reach to a more global scale.
It is one thing for any media to win credibility. This would be our core pursuit.
It is another thing to grow in an exponential manner to bigger market. This we are already experiencing growing our subscription drive online. There is much promise on the horizon.
Every day is a day of opportunity and innovation. That is the media industry’s popularity even in times of disruptive technologies. Anyway, media industry is a very exciting field. It shapes the minds and kindles new thoughts for new business ventures.