Its no more a Breaking News that #BJP won the #2014LokSabha elections by a huge majority .. dissapointment for #Congress .. depressed #RaGa .. but What a win for #BJP .. What a win for #NaMo .. and What a win for the #SocialMedia ..
Just to get the context of the post clear , can you remember how active were you on Facebook during the previous general elections in 2009 ? Alright i believe you were quite active on Facebook even then and probably also on Orkut ( you still remember Orkut, right ?) .. but hey !! were your parents on these social media sites back then ?? Come on , that cant be a 'big yes' . But now they are!! In the last five years the trend has changed . Facebook and Twitter have become more powerful with more and more people starting to actively use these sites. You need a scale to weigh their power ? Just recall an incident in the past not so long ago when a girl was put behind bars for a post on fb with her friend who liked her post. Such is the power of social media and 'Power' and 'Politics' are so closely knit that it was impossible for our Indian Politics to stay away from the social media. In fact how much social media can affect Politics can be measured by its impact on the 2014 general Elections.
Never before did we have such an interface which could give us each and every update of the political parties and their icons. It was almost like people were ready with their # tag and @ tag combinations to type in their post, closely observing each and every move of #NaMo or #RaGa. For some people these posts and tweets used to be news , while others who were familiar with the news just added their opinions in the comments. In fact long before the election results were announced, people had already chosen their leader on fb when they hit more likes than comments on a likes vs comments (#NaMo vs #RaGa) post.
'India believes' that the famous interview by #ArGo of #RaGa was a crucial point and a decider in 2014 elections. Well .. what about the twitter and facebook flood that followed the interview? Seeing posts about it again and again only helped us to get our concepts clear. And didn't the parties themselves take this social media craze to their advantage and start spreading posts about their oponents . The battle was fought equally on the campaigns + rallies and on Twitter + facebook. As a matter of fact on 2009 only one political leader had a twitter account and this time .. well tough to think of a name who is still to enter the Twitter world.
Having said all that, didn't we benefit from the social media? We had to vote for some candidate and we did vote (of course not all of us voted and fb posts didn't fail to highlight the celeb names who missed voting) but with much deeper knowledge about the candidate and party whom we think can take up the responsibilities of the nation. Of course not all that was projected was true - some posts were fake , some made no sense , but the remaining were enough to give us a better picture of the scenario. But any idea who benefited from these social media floods the most ?? Yeah you got it right ! Its The Facebooks and The Twitters and The Googles. In fact it seems facebook had started preparing their site for 2014 India elections since last year ( ever wondered why the new 'Trending' panel was added to Facebook). And didn't we at times or most of the time refer to facebook and twitter for the headlines ??
But how does it bother you if these sites earned money during the elections , if your favorite candidate won and your favorite party came to power. Oh but ya .. if the winning candidate was not your favorite .. cut short on your 'Chota Bheem' episodes, start tweeting and posting , get familiar with the # and @ , for next time it will be tougher with smarter social networking sites and more people into these sites .
Just to get the context of the post clear , can you remember how active were you on Facebook during the previous general elections in 2009 ? Alright i believe you were quite active on Facebook even then and probably also on Orkut ( you still remember Orkut, right ?) .. but hey !! were your parents on these social media sites back then ?? Come on , that cant be a 'big yes' . But now they are!! In the last five years the trend has changed . Facebook and Twitter have become more powerful with more and more people starting to actively use these sites. You need a scale to weigh their power ? Just recall an incident in the past not so long ago when a girl was put behind bars for a post on fb with her friend who liked her post. Such is the power of social media and 'Power' and 'Politics' are so closely knit that it was impossible for our Indian Politics to stay away from the social media. In fact how much social media can affect Politics can be measured by its impact on the 2014 general Elections.
Never before did we have such an interface which could give us each and every update of the political parties and their icons. It was almost like people were ready with their # tag and @ tag combinations to type in their post, closely observing each and every move of #NaMo or #RaGa. For some people these posts and tweets used to be news , while others who were familiar with the news just added their opinions in the comments. In fact long before the election results were announced, people had already chosen their leader on fb when they hit more likes than comments on a likes vs comments (#NaMo vs #RaGa) post.
'India believes' that the famous interview by #ArGo of #RaGa was a crucial point and a decider in 2014 elections. Well .. what about the twitter and facebook flood that followed the interview? Seeing posts about it again and again only helped us to get our concepts clear. And didn't the parties themselves take this social media craze to their advantage and start spreading posts about their oponents . The battle was fought equally on the campaigns + rallies and on Twitter + facebook. As a matter of fact on 2009 only one political leader had a twitter account and this time .. well tough to think of a name who is still to enter the Twitter world.
Having said all that, didn't we benefit from the social media? We had to vote for some candidate and we did vote (of course not all of us voted and fb posts didn't fail to highlight the celeb names who missed voting) but with much deeper knowledge about the candidate and party whom we think can take up the responsibilities of the nation. Of course not all that was projected was true - some posts were fake , some made no sense , but the remaining were enough to give us a better picture of the scenario. But any idea who benefited from these social media floods the most ?? Yeah you got it right ! Its The Facebooks and The Twitters and The Googles. In fact it seems facebook had started preparing their site for 2014 India elections since last year ( ever wondered why the new 'Trending' panel was added to Facebook). And didn't we at times or most of the time refer to facebook and twitter for the headlines ??
But how does it bother you if these sites earned money during the elections , if your favorite candidate won and your favorite party came to power. Oh but ya .. if the winning candidate was not your favorite .. cut short on your 'Chota Bheem' episodes, start tweeting and posting , get familiar with the # and @ , for next time it will be tougher with smarter social networking sites and more people into these sites .
Good one. Enjoyed reading the last para.
ReplyDeleteA superlike :)
ReplyDeletethanks sayanti :)
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