Bringing power to the masses and concepts like WISDOM OF THE CROWDS is something that are buzzwords of Web2.0. Brands globally can take a leaf out of the current Viral Campaign going on in the USA. I am not referring to the Superbowl or the latest Pepsi or Coke signup of the latest pinup. Nor am I referring to any NBA star. One is amazed by the latest viral campaign going on there – Barack Obama’s Election campaign.

A hitherto unknown – not from a famous regal family, no deep American roots to talk about, no brandishing of the brave Vietnam returned veteran possible; not the right amount of melanin pigmentation to boot…could not be a better case for an archetypal underdog as far as traits and characteristics go.

Among other things, Obama has fully embraced Web2.0 in achieving his Big American Dream with a fully functional website embracing interactivity tools.

• personalization thru customized sections for each supporter on MyBo.
• Creating of groups within the regions near to supporters
• Enabling supporters to form own fund raising groups and tracking its progress
• Donations by supporters accepted online
• Online Store to buy BO merchandise
• Social Media presence-the BO group on Facebook has 1.5 million supporters enrolled!!
• Groups on all the other leading networks
  Myspace, linkedIn, Twitter, Eventful, Blackplanet,Faithbase, Eons, Glee, MyBatanga, AsianAve

All these efforts can be noticed in one brilliant online innovation -a fantastic means to improve stickiness of the supporter to his website.
After making his/her donation online, every donator to the BO Campaign gets into a Thank You WebPage. But that by itself is not the innovation. Instead of a simple vanilla Thank You Page, the Donator is greeted by a truly inspirational BO Video titled YES WE CAN !!

The video features celebrities and the common man in a brilliant 4 minute “YES WE CAN Video on that last page.
This Video leaves such a good lingering feeling in the donator – making him a stauncher supporter than ever before.

This is truly worthy of being emulated by brands and marketers too.
I am no republican lover or democrat basher or vice versa. Nor am I a colonial iconoclast extolling everything that is occidental in its origin.

India, the largest democracy, also does have its firstgen political leaders to showcase to the world. But then, do these firstgen leaders evoke the needed confidence or embrace the needed technology to reach out to the 200 million sized Indian Middle Classes?

Do they strike a chord with the middle class folks like me with their transparency and accessibility?
What I would love to see happening is for my dear politicians in our 61st year of independence to attempt to do a fractional something of the above BO campaign.

I am not expecting any of the seasoned, wizened ( in habit if not age) leaders of Bharat Mahaan to contemplate changing their colors, hues and shades. But am hoping for the new brigade of their scions, sons, daughters, nephews, nieces and other political successors to bring about this change in habit through better transparency.

Will any of our nexgen leaders fresh from their educations abroad learn and emulate this – say any of the young turks among the NEXGEN Gandhis, Yadavs, Singhs, Raos, Reddys, Pandeys, Nairs, Chettys, Patnaiks, Alvas, Shariefs, Mahmoods or Thomases – lead the way to a brighter, clearer skyscape in this terrain of Web2.0 .

YES WE CAN – or is it HUM HONGE KAAMYAAAB

A look at the message sent to BO donators says it all:

About a year back iridium Interactive launched NASSCOM EMERGE blog for NASSCOM, a platform for SMEs to interact and share their thougts and ideas with each other and the organization. Nasscom Emerge recently celebrated its first birthday, completing a very successful and fruitful year overcoming a lot of opposition, resistance and hiccups. Read on to know more about the journey and what they have to say about Iridium.

August 3, 2007 is the day that the NASSCOM EMERGE blog first made an appearance in the Internet space, opening up a new platform for NASSCOM’s SME members to interact with each other and the organization.

It was a year ago, when overcoming significant internal opposition and initial hiccups, that the blog went live and received its very first hit. Not everyone was convinced about the relevance of the platform and even more circumspect about the kind of feedback it would generate about NASSCOM. However, the concerns were set aside as we were keen to share with our members the kind of exciting work we were doing within the “Emerging Companies” space. We wanted to keep them regularly updated about our activities and encourage them to share in their outcomes.
The idea was to reach out to our membership and gain vital feedback about the initiatives we had launched and how we can improve upon. While a step in this direction had already been made with our website, www.nasscom.in was inadequate and did not facilitate a two-way communication between NASSCOM and our members.
The blog was also an effort to create a platform for industry leaders to share their insights and experiences, to talk about what had worked for them and what had not and advise startups and entrepreneurs about how to leverage Best Practices to build success stories.
Having completed a year, we are delighted to share with you that the blog is an unmitigated hit. It has generated considerable excitement among our members and is being actively used by them to stay in touch with other companies and voice their opinions on a host of issues impacting SMEs. Leading industry practitioners have been interacting with other bloggers through this medium and guiding them about how they can achieve their goals. In less than a year, almost 153 opinions and articles have been posted on the site, with more than 223 comments in 21 categories, with atleast two to three updates going live every week. Over 30 people have been regularly contributing very valuable content to the blog and kick starting debate and discussion on contentious issues. The blog has been generating considerable traffic, with 65,000 page views every month.
The good news is that we are extending the frontiers of the blog even further. Besides providing a detailed view of events that are organized for Emerging Companies by NASSCOM, we have even begun posting video recordings of activities on the blog, so that viewers can get a first hand look and feel of the event. A major pat on NASSCOM’s back is the visibility that the blog is gaining within the market. Recently, India’s leading national business daily, The Economic Times carried an article on the blog and highlighted its unique features.
It’s been a great year and we can now look forward to even more exciting initiatives on the EMERGE community and the Web2.0 initiatives. Once again, we’d like to thank to all the contributors and our web partner –
iridium Interactive who have supported us in pursuing our objective to reach out to the membership community. We look forward to your continuous support and your best wishes for the future!
Warm regards,
Avinash Raghava
NASSCOM EMERGE Blog admin

Circa 1972
Bollywood has given us many scientific discoveries and hypotheses.
Good old fiery villain, Ajit, arguably had some amazing patent pending TORTURE TECHNIQUES up his villainous sleeve:

“JAAAANI – Voltage Badaaao-Currrrent Badaaao..Uska Resistance Kum Ho Jaayega”….
Even better technique:
“Usko Liquid Oxygen mein bundh kardo…..Liquid usko Jeeene Naheen Dega; Oxygen Usko marne Naheen Dega”

Circa 2008
In the light of this amazing history , the embracing of the new wave technologies by Bollywood is not surprising.
The active blogging by Big B and Small A are known to all.
The current activities being executed before the launch of a Bollywood film “PHOONK” by RGV is another fantastic case in point…..
This can be a case study of how to build the curiosity and community cascading effect for a brand.
Small but sure steps taken by RGV:

• Writing in his own blog for the rationale to make such a film – ( a scary spooky film)
• The Film Website ( www.phoonk.in) – designed and ready on the websphere well before the launch of the film
• The Website has teasers, picture galleries, videos of the film in the making.
• Smartly, the website also has features for trade enquiries like distribution, music rights etc
• Groups have been set up on Facebook and Orkut.. Highly active members are already building the buzz thru these groups.
• The website also has links to the Groups prominently placed on the homepage too. Fantastic idea to drive membership and awareness for the new groups.

RGV has even posted a challenge – asking anyone to watch the film alone in an empty theatre. Even before the launch of the film, a buzz has been created for the challenge- with many among the bold and beautiful coming forward to watch the film alone !!

I am no diehard fan of RGV – but would surely doff my hat to him for the smart manner of embracing the web medium to reach the audiences smartly.

Notwithstanding what FRIDAY has instore at the box office, RGV sure does pack a few spooky punches.

Guys, world is buzzing with Social networking, RSS, podcastings etc etc ….Here is one quick example taking u thorugh the world of social networking .

Enjoy it !!!!!

Technology is one part of the story, the difficult part is the shift in working and thought processes of the industries that have worked in a specific manner.

One repeated theme often heard in most forums is that to succeed on the Web it is necessary to give up control. This is often delivered as a revelation, even though this is something that the child of today’s world knows. The audience even gasps on hearing this!

However, sectors and industries that are used to control don’t like to give it up. Old media is like that. Even in this day and age, its struggle with control issues continues. Old media knows the relationship with its audience has changed, but it is still not quite sure how to deal with it. Facebook also has a group called End of Control to discuss the issues that arise as control shifts from media companies to consumers.

I guess change takes a while to sink in. For instance,, the digital divisions of newspapers, magazines, and other broadcast media would be part of the new media industry but are also part of the management of the old media!. Straddling the two ends of the spectrum would be the task of a trapeze artist.

This new media team would realize that to engage an audience online, you have to let them comment, vote, editorialize, and even select what stories get highlighted. But the old school prevails wherein, the editorial is highly controlled.

The new media team knows it all. But there is a difference between knowing something, and being able to do something about it—in this case changing your own ingrained habits and convincing colleagues (many whom grew up in the old broadcast era) to do the same.
It is all obviously true – but the mind does not let us accept the hard realities and makes us cling to the old rules of the game.

On the one hand, there are the traditional ways and means of monetizing edit content – that prevail the world over….in the old media.This monetizing is by advertising revenues in the form of CPM, columncm, FPC, IBC, FBC, gatefolds, FPS, ear panels etc.

At the other end of the spectrum, User Generated Content would imply reader comments, Twitters, and blog posts linking to the mainstream stories of the media outlet. This Long-Tail comments and blog posts at this end of the spectrum would run Long-Tail ads from AdSense and other ad networks with CPC, CPA, CPL methods of monetizing the content.

The jury is still out on how this all pans out – the breaking down of the traditional walls, the paradigm shifts, the marching of the user brigade.

Punarbhava is a Pali word for “renewed becoming”. It refers to the process of rebirth after death and is synonymous with samsara. Rebirth in Buddhism does not mean reincarnation, in the sense of an eternal, separate soul transferring to a new body. Rather it is the continuation of the psyche with its conditioning and habits. Each rebirth is a new life.

Punarbhava is an excellent example of the efficient use of ICT and the web medium for the betterment of the differently-abled. The aim of Punarbhava is to create and run a comprehensive Internet Portal, which collects specialized information and useful services for all the people involved in the disability issue as an information database, sources of daily updated news and media for the development of the disability and rehabilitation sector in India. – added Pratap T. P., Chief Marketing Officer, iridium Interactive.

There will be an array of resources like films documentaries, list of publications and institutions for users to download a repository of books in text, audio and multimedia mode. Not only that in schools where computer based printing system is available the text in language script or Braille script can be printed locally. Users could also access a complete database on NGOs working in the field of disability in India and network with sponsors for financing projects for the welfare of the disabled” – added Manish Kumar, Practice Head, iridium Interactive.

The user can view and even download all government orders, laws, circulars related to disability and disability certificate form. Not just this, the disabled-friendly texts in audio, video and multimedia mode will be cataloged and stored in web format for easy download.Besides, a dedicated section will be available for information on professional personnel and students being trained as specialists to deal with disability related issues. Currently there are 30000 such professionals in the country and an estimated 5,000 persons register themselves for fresh training every year. A closed user group would be launched to unite them and other stakeholders. iridium Interactive has been actively involved in ensuring web accessibility and inclusion of the differently abled – and this was the main reason for leading organisations like Media Lab Asia & Rehabilitation Council of India (RCI) to have selected iridium Interactive for this important assignment. It is a chance through the power of the Internet to unite on a global scale and influence matters in local, regional and international attitudes and thinking” – said Sriram Bharatam, CEO, iridium Interactive.

iridium Interactive would like to thank Prateek, Dr.Sangeetha, Dr. Sanyal (Dean Academics) and one of the senior Alumni- MDI Alumni president Mr. Aunrag Batra (CEO- exchange4media.com). Without their support and confidence in iridium Interactive team, it would not have been possible to meet the project deadline. MDI Alumni site was launched on “National Alumni Meet ‘08” and the sheer joy of rejoining the MDI Alumni through this site was quite overwhelming. Comments: It has already started giving positive responses in terms of getting certain referrals..!!

The concept behind this NASSCOM IT Innovation award aims to persuade and support innovative solutions and recognize the team of people who make the innovation possible. The nation-wide search for these companies unveiled a wide range of budding enterprising companies as well as the giant companies that are making their marks in national and international market. These companies have carved a niche for themselves using breakthrough technological products and novel market initiatives.

iridium Interactive™ is proud to be anointed as one among the top 100 IT innovative companies in India.

This recognition of our efforts and initiatives – is added testimony to the confidence reposed by leading organizations across India, Europe & North America in our ability to deliver immense business value.

NASSCOM, is the premier trade body and ‘voice’ of the Indian IT-BPO industry.NASSCOM is a global trade body with over 1200 members, of which over 250 are global companies from the US, UK, EU, Japan and China. NASSCOM’s member companies are in the business of software development, software services, software products, IT-enabled/BPO services and e-commerce. NASSCOM has been the strongest proponent of global free trade in India.

NASSCOM was set up in 1988 to facilitate business and trade in software and services and to encourage advancement of research in software technology. It is a not-for-profit organization, registered under the Indian Societies Act, 1860.

Currently, NASSCOM is headquartered in New Delhi, India with regional offices in the cities of Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Pune and Kolkata

The website is an interactive platform built on the action scripting technology, where it also provides access to people to view their dreams taking shape through photographs and videos of the selected suggestions being implemented in Moolchand.

The website is powered by iridium Interactive, which specializes in offering unique user centric e-commerce solutions varying from Strategy and Design to Technology and Marketing.“In conceptualizing this initiative, we threw out all our previous practices and decided to play it straight and keep it simple”, said Mr. Manish Kumar (manish@iridium Interactive.com), Practice Head, iridium Interactive Ltd. He further added – “It was a pleasure interacting with Moolchand; their brief was clear and goals direct.”“We look forward to redefining healthcare by creating the world’s first ever dream hospital. Moolchand is inviting public opinion where every desire, every aspiration, every suggestion will be heard to create the hospital that anyone has dreamt of”, says Vibhu Talwar, COO, Moolchand Medcity.care, integrity and affordable prices.

About MoolchandAs one of India’s foremost names in healthcare, Moolchand has been setting standards for the past half century. Located in the heart of the capital, the plans are to develop Moolchand Medcity as Asia’s largest single site multi specialty hospital complex (6 specialties, 1000 + beds).Moolchand has a half-century-old tradition of caring healthcare. As one of India’s foremost names in healthcare, Moolchand has been setting standards for the past half century. Moolchand aspires to be your lifelong health care partner by delivering your health care wish list: superb physicians, cutting-edge technology, compassionate