What's age got to do with it?

In the afternoon today, I got a full primer on PlayStation from Neo(age 6)(who lectures me regularly on mobile and video games, thinks am way behind on the learning curve...) and then a lil later my father(age 65) wanted me to help him install skype!! My younger brother is quite a blogger and a web 2.0 expert!! Quite a digital savvy family balanced only by the combined tech-unsavviness of my mother and mil:-)

As the Internet turns 40, our one preoccupation that all technology products and services will only have the youth as early adopters, practitioners and evangelists will be put to test regularly...Just when I was mulling over these thoughts over a crazily busy fortnite, my planner buddy Meraj sent me this NYT link - Who’s Driving Twitter’s Popularity? Not Teens. Worth a read and some reflection...

Archiving some nuggets from the article..

1. Surprisingly(actually not so surprisingly, if you pause to reflect) many teens in the US(do we have data for India as well?) are not that heavy users of twitter. As one of them says - "I just think it’s weird and I don’t feel like everyone needs to know what I’m doing every second of my life". Well am not teen by a wide margin but have similar thoughts about twitter...

2. Though teenagers fueled the early growth of social networks, today they account for just 14% of MySpace’s users and only 9% of Facebook’s. As the Web grows up, so do its users. The notion that children are essential to a new technology’s success is now proving to be largely a myth.

3. Adults have driven the growth of many perennially popular Web services. YouTube attracted young adults and then senior citizens before teenagers piled on. Blogger’s early user base was adults and LinkedIn has built a successful social network with professionals as its target.

If I look around at my digital habits and behaviour and many of my friends, the digital adoption curve doesn't always co-relate to our age in some simple linear fashion...On the other hand, India will be different because we are crazily young in age and outlook(as far as statistics go).

On another note, this reminds me of my interview with Javed Akhtar in Bombay when he brushed aside all this fanatical obsession of marketers with youth - "Aap logon ne youth ko hauaa bana rakha hai. Youth ko yeh chahiye, youth ko woh chahiye. Arrey saheb, youth ko toh khud he nahin pata ki usko kya chahiye:-)"

Burrowing in the Book : Talking Films

After a week of mild depression(triggered more by 24X7 TV news, screeching Barkha, over-bearing Arnab and high-strung Rajdeep than the terror attack itself), like the rest of the city I have got back to work in almost full steam. Both at the day job and in my role as the week-end writer:-)

On my book front - All the googled information in the world is of no use, unless one is able to crystallise an argument. And that's a bloody difficult task, especially if you have to do it over 200 pages!!

Moreover, am struggling to find meaningful articles on Bollywood. Either frivolous actor interviews/ film reviews float on the internet or there are these academics who dwell upon such arcane themes around Bollywood with so much academic mumbo-jumbo that's it's of no real help!!

Within such constraints, one voice that has guided me in the past and continues to do so now is that of Javed(Akhtar) saheb...Right from his book Talking Films - Conversations on Indian Cinema compiled by Guru Dutt's niece - Nasreen Munni Kabir to his many interviews, Javed saab shares his nuggets on Bollywood...If only I could get some quality time with him and soon...

Stumbled upon this interview of at Glamsham.com. This one's okay...with a few worth a bookmark comments!

1.Are you convinced about remaking films like SHOLAY and DON? Please don't be politically correct just because Farhan has remade DON.
Let me tell you the backdrop of the original DON. That will help you get your answer. DON suffered despite an interesting script since it was made on a shoestring budget. Producer Nariman Ali could, somehow, complete the film. The remaking was justified as the film deserved it. As for SHOLAY, I don't think there is any scope or need for improvisation in the film. There is nothing new or original that one can add to the film. It's all there.

2.When are you directing a film?
Writing is an addiction and once you get addicted to it; it is very difficult to concentrate in other things. It makes you lazy and no job seems more interesting than writing. Often I think I will do this and that but ultimately land up with my pen and paper. I am too lazy to make films.

3.There is always a critical comparison between your and Gulzar's poetry. Would you like to comment on this?
I respect Gulzarsaab a lot. He is a true icon. So it will be unfair to comment on his poetry. But I can talk of my art form. I have always aimed at making poetry understandable even to a person who does not have the remotest idea of the art. If I can't communicate my lines to people what's the use of making it public? Some poets don't realize that. They go on writing abstract poetry and say they don't care if people understand them or not. Ambiguity forbids simple expression. This is definitely not my genre.

4.After spending over 30 years as a lyrics writer I am sure words reside at your pen-tip. Isn't it?
Now-a-days I don't have to try hard to fit in the words to the music. But that doesn't mean that I don't have to do my homework regularly. I have my own set of vocabulary that needs to be upgraded every day.

You can read some nice excerpts from the book Talking Films here...

Sunday, The Book and Javed Saheb's Angst

It has been a very busy and hard working Sunday. I am now in week 4 of writing my book - broadly around the theme - 'New Marketing learns from Bollywood'...

Writing a book does demand a very different level of conviction and attention. I thought my 2 years of blogging would be discipline enough but the book is a totally different monster...

Just managed to browse through the papers. Read this view-point piece on 'Terrorism and the Muslim community' by Javed Akhtar...

The problem of our times is that the best and the most learned and talented are silo-ing themselves from the real India - the angry, festering with violence(mostly engineered) India. So a departure from the normal rants on media and advertising...

Javed Saheb's angst ridden voice on 'Terrorism and the Muslim' in this DNA piece here made me restless...

1.'Muslims only get toothless commissions’ - Whenever they are killed, raped or burnt alive or their property destroyed, all they get is a commission which sits on the case for years, and ultimately gives a report. It may indict some people, but the report eventually finds its way into the dustbin.

2. You don’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure that the VHP and Bajrang Dal are behind the church attacks in Orissa and Mangalore, but somehow this is not discussed. After all, this is also terrorism.

3. I recently heard a TV anchor ask someone if it was time for the Muslim community to do some introspection. This is a loaded question, even if it was not intended that way. It suggests that the Muslim community is, in fact, responsible for the various acts of terrorism its members have been accused of. Would you say that since the Bajrang Dal is burning churches, the Hindu community should do some introspection? I won’t ever say that because I don’t believe that the Hindu community as a whole should have to bear the responsibility for the actions of some of its members.

4. In our country, ‘Terrorist’ seems to be a word reserved exclusively for Muslims. Those indulging in unrest from the border of Nepal to Andhra Pradesh are naxalites; in the Northeast they are insurgents. And in the case of the Bajrang Dal and VHP, they are ‘social activists’.

Couldn't agree with you more Javed Saheb. But we need many more angry poets and angry common men/ women in this country...

Javed Saheb Ki Baatein

This is my second post in the past few months on/about Javed Akhtar. I am kinda enamoured by the man. Amidst all the mediocrity that floats in Bollywood he still manages to pen down beautiful lyrics, share great thoughts and imbue a poets sensibility to all things around.

In fact some time back when I took an Incubates session, I put Javed Saheb in my top 5 planners list outside of advertising!!

Over the week-end read an interview of his. Two of his comments are worth noting from the interview.

Q. What's the flip side of being a judge?
JA. When somebody with great hope comes to me with very little capability, I feel very awkward to break that illusion. On one hand you are irritated by this person's high opinions, but, on the other hand, you feel bad. Is it right to break their illusion and make them unhappy for the rest of their lives is one question I grapple with. In hindsight, I think that's the right thing to do though it makes me very uncomfortable.

It's a dilemma one often faces in work life as well...But it's tough to take a call and pass judgement. Many years back, one of my early bosses advised me to give up planning as he felt I was not good enough. Luckily, it just made a small dent in my pride/ego. I stuck to my conviction:-)

Q. What are the challenges involved in writing for a period film like Jodha Akbar?
JA. - You have to understand the ethos of any story whether it's set in the modern time or the past.

- I try to understand the wavelength of a film, its temperament and ethos, the intellectual and social level of its characters, and then try to bring the right vocabulary to the songs.

I love the way he approaches his lyrics. His nuanced understanding, depth of research never fails to impress me. If you can lay your hands on do pick up Javed Akhtar's Talking Films - his conversations about Indian cinema. I think it's the best 'branding book by an Indian'!

In case you are interested you could have a dekko at my Oct 16 post - Branding Gyan from Javed Akhtar!

Picture courtesy www.bbc.co.uk