started my career in journalism things
were very different we were 10 years
past the Gulf War one year past 9/11 in
India we were seeing the dawn of a brand
new president APJ Abdul Kalam breaking
cultural religious and more importantly
communal barriers we also saw the Delhi
Metro coming I had to pinch myself to
believe that this was back in 2002
journalism of course was a very very
different field there were literally no
jobs
television happened to be in that small
era that had just begun
post do darshan we were talking about
the cable television and possibly having
more than one single program to watch on
television and a channel which we could
switch with a remote these were very
exciting times at least that’s what I
thought when I stepped into journalism
the one thing that was missing back then
is the one thing that we spend most of
our time on today it was the mobile
phone perhaps now the touch phone the
phone that run everything from our basic
phone calls to the electricity in our
homes and in any single way can
transform our knowledge base from zero
to a hundred plus the powerful device
rather tiny that changed the face of
journalism as we see it today and
perhaps it could even just be scratching
the surface from what we might see
journalism in less than five or ten
years for me this was transformational
because having seen journalism at the
cusp of change from struggling to sit
together as a family watch a single
program together as
an hour of the day to have things on
demand on swipe I’m to be able to see
content from tiny to large at my
personal time was phenomenal the choice
was now mine and the content and
whatever was built was mine we can
clearly thank a lot of people whether it
was Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg for
creating versatility in what we do and
how we do with that mobile phone but I
think it’s been tremendous to see the
power of what it did to communication
and more importantly how it redefined
the idea of news every single day I meet
people animated with the idea of how
news is transforming in India perhaps a
step away from that pole at a word to
say what is news in today’s world it’s
gone from being something that was
somewhat clearly defined in India from
newspapers radios television to a
whatsapp message to a messenger picture
to an Instagram post to simply a hashtag
that’s how news has transformed we have
seen clips coming to us on whatsapp and
very soon later we find them on
television we see the fire and the
ability of it to spread from what is
social media or anything else that’s
captured on your phone from an app to
anything else to become mainstream news
headline that eventually goes from TV to
the next morning’s newspaper headline I
think in many ways it makes it a very
fascinating story about what’s going on
and at the same time it puts that huge
spotlight and says this is news and it’s
no longer about what I as an editor of a
channel is going to say what is defining
news today it is you as consumers of
news who are going to interpret what is
news to you and what is used to the
person sitting next to you and I think
that’s where a lot of
very interesting space lies it’s neither
black nor white I would even say it’s
not even great it has many colors like
the color band on television and you are
constantly interpreting where are we
going to take this piece of news to the
next level the idea are watching a
single screen went to a second screen
and I think now we are probably
multitasking while watching to the
extent that we might be on four
different apps at that point discussing
that very news piece through those apps
even while it happens on television or
might be sitting on a newspaper or might
be a conversation in your drawing-room
at this point in my life I realized that
I have to get up and get going from
being a television person with somebody
who would deep dive into digital and I
must say I didn’t think it would be that
that that challenging the learning curve
was steep and to me there is nothing as
infectious and addictive as the idea of
changing your ability to learn what you
learn and expanding the scope of that
learning curve perhaps being a student
of journalism all my life and
experiencing how journalism itself is
coming to a brand new shape a brand new
discussion to the extent that had got me
right here on stage and so I started
looking at she the people dot TV as my
debut venture in journalism and why did
I stop that there are many reasons
besides the very basic fit which was the
format of digital for me there were two
very compelling reasons it had the idea
of women at the center and numbers that
were surprisingly disappointing about
the way we interpreted women in the
country
we are what 1.3 billion people at least
half of this population is women we’re
talking of over 300 million people on
the internet of which we are looking at
nearly 60 million women coming online
and doing transactions we’re talking
about women being a very very very
important part of the economy yet we
grew up in a world
which said women are niched and I would
ask them why don’t I switch that if half
the population is women and they are
niche that law takes who are men and I
think for a lot of people that planted
the idea in the head and say this woman
is truly making sense women need to be
up there with the economy and the change
the figures out there are tremendous in
India alone we are saying that if we are
today in a single-digit growth we are
talking about 12 to 13 percent GDP
growth add women to the dialogue to the
works and get them to do work whether
it’s work from home work using digital
social media or actually just head to
the offices so the opportunity for me
was tremendous and I decided to pick my
tool and my tool was going to be digital
to actually increase strong
conversations powerful conversations and
see how women in India of contributing
to its very very inherent idea of
building the nation with that came the
idea and the power of storytelling I
think a lot of brand manager students
professors everyone present here
wouldn’t deny that today the power of
telling the story of whatever you’re
involved is with is going to be the one
reason why you’re going to be able to
succeed with the idea that you have the
power of the idea today is pretty much
as important as the power of
storytelling around your idea which is
why when we started to see the people TV
we featured more than 30,000 women
talking about real stories real women
real stories not just the ten women that
you all see every single time in the
same different magnet same or different
magazine year after year knowing that
people around you have true stories true
inspiration and are fighting every
single day to actually make their
careers make a change make impact such
an idea that hadn’t existed in India
till today and still does
list we haven’t been able to put enough
spotlight to fix some of the challenging
gender issues that we currently see and
might see till what’s the last figure I
heard two thousand three hundred and
seventy three is possibly by when we
have a gender equal world so you can
imagine the challenge is a long one and
we have centuries to go to make that
correction having said that I’ll take a
step back towards the idea of what
digital really does a platform
particularly when one looks at women
it’s transformational to the extent that
it makes women who are uneducated
illiterate actually become capable
overnight we have been going from
villages to urban India talking about
the power of how women are using digital
to transform their lives I met a young
woman who created an entire business of
flour jewelry from a corner of Salem in
Tamil Nadu to 25 different stations in
India where she’s selling through retail
and the use of social media and it’s
amazing to see how the power of
connectivity that has come through
through such stories she is now
collaborating with women in Africa she
is collaborating with women in the
United States and then there are those
who are finding research in other parts
of the world another layer of this
entire journey came through when I
noticed how women across the world
especially in emerging markets are able
to make use of tools technical
understanding information media
relationships collaboration and
cooperation simply by the use of social
media and to me that again was a hugely
powerful tool on she the people today we
are running an amazing series of women
of Africa and it actually
collaboratively tells you journeys
inspirations of how women in Africa and
India are finding common causes breaking
new ground and are able to share so much
more information and
psv go as a part of my experience in she
the people and what we created with it
over the last two years one of them came
across pretty pretty well to me that as
you create a digital brand you’re gonna
have tremendous amount of information on
hand and that would include the ability
to splice and understand data in terms
of what your consumers are watching and
more importantly what they present for
brands and that takes me back to
complete the psyche in the fact that
when we look at news as a nebulous world
today it’s coming across as one which is
challenged because there’s so much
information so much content and there’s
news and there’s no distinction in any
of these and part of the problem as well
as the opportunity is the fact that a
lot of this data is challenging brands
today to understand whether they are
truly reaching out to the right customer
whether this data is actually speaking
back at them and more importantly are
they in the race for simply numbers or
searching for what could be a larger
purpose lifting themselves from being a
brand in the band or a brand wagon one
who are actually understanding consumers
in a deeper way is it better to have 500
people who truly understand your brand
and are loyal and are interactive with
it
than 500-thousand who might have touched
and go touched and gone and I think
that’s really where we are seeing a
transformation in how and what we
consume and the power of the
communication that I’ve been talking
about part of this piece is what you
consume how true is it how fake is it
and how many times in a day do you ask
yourself is this for real
am i confused is there a reason for me
to question this forward is this forward
actually you know accurate how can I do
a fact check so that takes me to the
point that today we are going to remain
in a flux with what is real and what is
fake
I think fake news in the last five years
has become a very offs used free
in our lives both as we question as well
as as we consume there’s a very
interesting comment made by a man called
Robert Park who was one of the founders
of Chicago school of sociology who said
the idea of fake news is so human that
is humanly impossible to say that this
news in this context in this part of the
world is fake and the same news in
another part of the world could well be
real or like I often say that one
person’s troll could be another person’s
fact-checker and I think that really has
the essence of how how the universe of
news is going to remain a bit led by
confusions and kiosks I’m giving you
opportunities to understand what is the
light behind that particular source or
the light behind that particular news
piece that brings me to the point that
today as we go ahead we will face a huge
crisis of credibility as news gatherers
as information broadcasters VG casters
and more importantly journalists were
trying to put together sense in the
information and communication that they
see and to me that is both fascinating
and scary because it puts the power of
understanding in your hands not in the
gift the hands of the giver or the
gatherer or the presenter of news that
at same time offers an opportunity that
if you do want to be real and if you do
want to understand news you need to
chase the knowledge the ideas the
technology and tools that are creating
that news in a very very very big way
there are three things to look at number
one what is the accuracy of that news is
it fake is it real how can you yourself
come out there and empower yourself with
tools and understand how to gauge the
quality of that piece of content that
you’re reading to in their hand the rest
of the world
I think vanity is on the rise the world
who thing the fact that people want to
hear and see themselves much more
I suppose the success of Instagram and
Facebook has a lot to do with that and
many others such platforms are emerging
where you are constantly hearing your
own self so we don’t have the problem of
echo chambers the problem of having too
many of very few filters
I think the second piece to this is the
fact that there is an algorithm in every
one of us today that is the one that we
can control but the ones around us are
the ones that we just can’t control
which is why it’s very important to
realize that part of what we hear and
part of what comes through then that
echo chamber is the fact that algorithms
are driving a great deal of what may
seem like unbiased biased news and
number three is the fact that there is a
complete lack of cultural authority over
the knowledge around us over our
surroundings because we are so tunnel
eyes towards watching what’s going on in
social media as well as what’s being
thrown at us by algorithms that to an
extent we’ve forgotten our basics we
don’t scratch the surface we don’t
question why is this news coming to me
why I must question it how can I
question it the tools are all there but
today journalism as a whole news
gathering as a part to it are definitely
having a crisis of confidence on one end
but a huge opportunity the other I think
for that to come around and turn into a
win-win story
the answers will lie with us with you
and not necessarily with those who are
out there digi casting or broadcasting
with those who are out there to consume
pick gather knowledge and find sense in
this entire sort of chaotic world that
we live in with that I’d like to thank
you for having me here to speak about
communication and on the TEDx @vm you all the best thanks so much