Out of Race

No doubt there is a race going on among all the news channels nowadays. Every one wants to be ahead of all others, not only in bringing news to people, but also bringing experts and expert reviews. As soon as something happens, there are 'experts' on TV, talking live and on phone on the topic.

But the print media is a quite different. Probably in being good, and more responsible, they do things slowly. I first felt so when I was checking websites of various news channels and newspapers yesterday. As Times of India website was showing 6 blasts, DNA showed 9, whereas Aaj tak and IBN were showing 13 and 17 blasts' news respectively.

Today, when I thought I could read some comments by the best of India's journalists/authors on two days' continuous blasts, I was disappointed to see that Times of India had nothing on blasts by any of them and the entire editorial page, 'All that matters', in their lingo. Then I checked Hindustan Times and DNA, and found that there were no articles on blasts in any of their editorial pages.

It was like coverage of the previous 5 days of the week took away the 6th and 7th days. But the obvious fact is that these authors give their opinions days before these editions come out and nobody tried to change them.

On one hand it's good because had the case been otherwise, there would be only Ahmedabad all over the pages. But then, it's striking that when on one hand everybody is talking about bomb blasts, but these newspaper experts seem to be talking of an altogether different world.

Don't you think they need to speed up a bit?

And now, Knol

What if Google owned the Wikipedia? Well, now it seems that Google is trying to something of that sort as it has started its new service called Knol, the unit of knowledge. (name trying to remind you of mol/mole of science, I think)

Though being a Wikipedia isn't easy. That too when its a commercial company like Google. I mean, of course there are companies that are much more into money but Wiki is a complete charity so a competition should hardly exist between the two.

For now, the only things I understood are that Knol will have authors who could write on topics as they wish and they can also get ad revenues through adsense for ads on their Knols.

This is supposed to create competition but I expect more of confusion and chaos. So let's see how does this new thing works. I hope Google people get good result for using their Knols of knowledge.

My Name on TV

19th May, around 10 AM. It was the SRK vs ICC story running on Times Now, a channel I haven't seen much and is not on my list of favorites. But as I was surfing channels, I liked a story, started watching it, and soon made an opinion.

Pretty normal.

And then I decided to send my opinion through SMS at the number they were displaying.

Quite rare.

Soon I sent a message to 58888. (I didn't read the number actually on TV, I remember the 8888 from the days I used to read The ToI and know that we've to add 5 to all such numbers now) The message read, 'Cricket never had franchises. And now that it has, the owners should be allowed to boost their teams' morale in the way they like.', followed by my name and city.

I waited for a few minutes (thus seeing Times Now for the longest time ever, more than half an hour) and saw the ticker running which read, 'I see nothing wrong in SRK sitting in the dug out. He has the right to support his team. Harshit, Najibabad.'

Thus, I saw my own name on the TV (for the first time of course) with a different opinion than I had stated, an opinion that was being given under some other name sometime earlier.

Thankfully they had not flicked my opinion to the other side of the question and my opinion shown there was at least supporting the same cause as mine. Still, I got some truth of the news channels and once again felt that blogs are the best medium to express oneself since TV can twist the opinions of even existing-nowhere people like me.

Deepak Chaurasia in Dhoom 4??

Yash Raj Films is all set to sign Deepak Chaurasia for his next Dhoom for which the cast is not yet decided. This step is taken by the YRF after watching Deepak's performance in the special act played on Aaj tak in a budget special program. Deepak had played a kisaan from Bhaarat in a debate going on between India and Bhaarat.

Shocked?

Well, you must be knowing this is not truth but just a spoof. But do you think we shall be really shocked if we come across such a news one day? I do not think I will be much surprised.

True. News channels today do everything. Acting and hype-making. Animation and advertisement. Almost everything except news.

Fortunately, I have been from the school that is run by the Times of India Group and once got a chance to listen to Shri Sahu Ramesh Chandra Jain, who was the former president of our college and a renowned media person. He was of the view that news should not be mixed with views. He was in favor of strictly giving news where a person was to be given news and put one's own views separate from the news so that the news remains unbiased and people are able to analyze the news on their own too.

But today, news is not just being mixed with views, but the news channels have become full-fledged drama channels, covering reality shows, daily soaps from channels and their own part-horror shows and hype-creating news.

Even DD, that was considered a plain news channel, mostly the papas' choice, now tries to run the race of today's news and sometimes acts foolish. One day i came through a story made on movies or something in which I was unable to listen the voice of the guy speaking there because of the background music that was playing Om Shanti Om.

Believe me, I am really tired of these news channels. Even at home when dad says, "yaar news sunwa de kuchh", now I say, "kya karoge dad, news channel pe besure logon ke gaane sunne se achcha hai aap bhi MTV ke gaane hi sun lo.."