Applications

10 Ways to get the social and TV Chemistry right

Published

13 years ago

September 22, 2012

MUMBAI: “How can you squander even one more day not taking advantage of the greatest shifts of our generation? How dare you settle for less when the world has made it so easy for you to be remarkable?” – Seth Godin

THE WAY SOCIAL MEDIA WORKS AFTER THE GENERATIONAL SHIFT
During the early 90‘s India froze with bated breath every Sunday for watching ‘The‘ Mahabharata. I just shudder to think the amount of online chatter, jokes and #hastags which would have been created if social media was then what it is today.

So two decades later after crossing some epic shows like Kyunki, KBC & Big Boss most of us know Social & Tv is a marrige made in heaven but are you getting the chemistry right?

Well I believe there is still a lot of untapped potential. Here‘s few suggestions to get it right:

1) REALISE SOCIAL MEDIA IS NO LONGER A GIMMICK IT‘S A WAY OF LIFE
The Indian television industry is also slowly agreeing to this culturally rich inter caste marriage. What they are realising is social media is no longer a gimmick. This is how we Indians want them to communicate with us and this is how we ‘are‘ communicating with each other about them. It started last year when MTV India was awarded the best social media TV program by Mashable.

2) INCREASE TRP WITH SOCIAL MEDIA
Social network activity certainly influences behaviour. Few months back when in Bade Acche Lagte Hai the lead pair Ram Kapoor and Sakshi Tanwar shared the famous/infamous lip-lock the twitterati went berserk. Hundreds of blogs were written overnight and it got more than 2 million views in youtube just in the official video uploaded by setindia. Was it good for the “TRP”? You bet!

3) UNDERSTAND THE ESSENCE OF #FOMO (FEAR OF MISSING OUT)
One can assume based on psychological studies this type of social commerce is driven by either #FOMO (fear of missing out) or social proof. Both very essential elements of Indian social media that marketers can tap well. Rewind a little and think when in your news feed you see a friend passionately commenting on Scrubs or a new show you haven‘t heard of doesn‘t this question strikes you once, ‘Am I missing something great that my peers are talking about‘? And more importantly, wouldn‘t you agree that single comment not done for you manages to intrique you enough to atleast once check it out? That‘s the power of #FOMO.

4) MAKE THE TV CHARACTERS ITSELF SOCIAL
In the Indian social media chapter people want to get more involved with the shows and the characters. If you look back you will find almost every popular charcter has a exclusive facebook page and a twitter handle. Social Media brings the tv characters to life. It‘s like parallely running a tv show after the show is aired. And the cherry on the cake, people always want to talk to their favourite characters.

We at Brandlogist while working on one of ZEE‘s prime time show Phir Subah Hogi (PSH) took this insight and took it to the next level. We created 7 individual facebook profiles of the main cast of the show who were conversing with the fans on a very real and personal level. The engagement was pleasantly surprising. In place of the usual one liners, fans were literally writing 20-25 lines of genuine heartfelt feedback. They were not talking to a “brand” they were talking to the characters of the show with such impressive belief and passion we realised how much they want to participate in a two way conversation & feel belonged.

5) TAP SOCIAL ACROSS OTHER PLATFORMS
Facebook is not the end of the world. Social & Mobile addes another dimension to your marketing reach and strategy. Your points of conatct increases and you are omnipresent everywhere your viewers are. Globally television check ins in smart phones & the concept of social TV is becoming a common phenomenon & by 2013 am sure even India would start embracing it. For PSH, we had created a BBM profile for the protagonist Sugni. It was a well thought experiment which worked in our favour, the fans now to talk to their favourite character no longer had to even had to log in Facebook. They excitedly pinged “Sugni” from their mobiles telling her to be strong and how they are with her in every step.

6) MAKE THE SHOW & IT‘S CHARACTER‘S TIMELESS
Another reason why this marriage of these two channels is important is because it extends a show beyond the television viewing occasion. Gone are the days where after the weekly show people talk about it the next time its aired. One of the best example is Big Boss. Don‘t you still randomly come across a Sunny Leone joke? Or you really think HIMYM or Friends today would have been what it is without its extensive presence in social media? From Facebook to Twitter, television talk is a daily occurrence. For making the show timeless all you need to do is let your audiences freely share their thoughts with you, be cool in taking a joke, be there to appreciate their selfless involvement with your show or brand. Remember the takeaway is to BE THERE where all is happening. Nokia often shares pictures of 9GAG which their fans. Those pictures I see keep coming back every year with a little tweak.

7) REALIZE THE EFFICACY OF REVERTING
For any popular show there are hundreds of fans talking about the show online. Just by connecting to them you can build and mutliply your reach not just to them but also their friends. Don‘t underestimate the impact of just monitoring and responding to already scattered thousands of opinions and comments about your show online via Fb, Twitter, blogs & forums. Just by tracking & talking to people who were mentioning PSH online we got hundreds of “love your show” from Nigeria to Nagaland. (And mind it we did no campaign for Zee. Imagine the efficacy of just ‘reverting‘)

8) UTILIZE THE EXCLUSIVE “FREE” REAL INSIGHTS WHICH A MARKETERER CAN KILL FOR!
One certain thing, digital chatter has infinite power to provide television executives with new insights into what viewers think about their programs. The instant audience feedback they can get, intended in the first place for other viewers, but also ‘available‘ to them & their content & research teams, in turn provides a potentially very rich stream of data revealing observed evidence of how viewers are ‘reacting‘ to their shows & concepts. This type of connectivity gives networks insight not only as to how people are watching and consuming media but also their degree of engagement, insights that were previously imprenetable.

We at Brandlogist are also exploring Online Focus Groups- making the feedback more real, effective & cost efficient with a wider demographic. We see this being the trend for the industry in the time to come.

9) UNLOCK THE SECRET BEHIND BUILDING A REVOLUTION AROUND A SHOW
Satyamev Jayate successfully used social media & received more than one million messages each week and had got more than 1.25 billion impressions online in two months. Was it possible to do this standalone in the television platform? Am sure you might recall the thousands of shared videos & pictures of SJ apart from the millions of tweets & status updates that happened right after the show. In social media things are in black and white. When you want to spread something either it‘s the Friends way where one can connect global fans together via different fun & funny campaigns or the SJ or #kony2012 way where you bring serious people together who are determined to bring a positive change in the world. The mechanism though remains the same & if done strategically knowing exactly where to tap, you need not to be a Aamir to create a revolution out of a television show.

10) BELIEVE IN THE SYNERGY OF THE DYNAMIC DUO
I had once read a quote which said, social networks aren‘t about Web sites. They‘re about experiences. And isn‘t television also not about shows but the impact they bring in our life creating a memorable experience? One word I have seen television experts use the most is how “dynamic” the medium is, how scripts & themes can change overnight according to viewer demand. Will you find a more “dynamic” medium than social media to understand those nitty gritties?

Believe in this arranged marriage it is destined to be a love story which people will look up to in the next decade.

(Abhik Choudhury, Brand Analyst BRANDLOGIST)

Applications

Moltbook, the AI-only social network, sparks hype, doubt and fear

Published

4 weeks ago

February 3, 2026

indiantelevision.com Team

CALIFORNIA: Moltbook, a Reddit-style social platform built exclusively for artificial intelligence agents, has emerged as the latest obsession in Silicon Valley, drawing intense attention for its explosive growth and surreal bot-driven interactions.

The platform hosts more than 100 communities where AI agents post, argue and joke about topics ranging from governance theory to esoteric “crayfish debugging” concepts. Within days of launch, Moltbook recorded tens of thousands of posts, nearly 200,000 comments and more than 1 million human visitors observing the activity.

Yet the numbers and the autonomy are under scrutiny, as per media reports. A security researcher has suggested as many as 500,000 accounts may trace back to a single address, raising doubts about Moltbook’s membership claims. Many posts could also be the result of humans instructing their AI tools to publish content, rather than bots acting independently.

The platform runs on agentic AI, powered by an open-source tool called OpenClaw, formerly known as Moltbot. Unlike chatbots such as ChatGPT or Gemini, these agents are designed to perform tasks on users’ devices, from sending messages to managing calendars, with minimal human input. Once authorised, they can interact freely on Moltbook.

Some tech figures have hailed the platform as a glimpse of a post-human internet. Head of crypto custody firm BitGo Bill Lees, called it evidence that “we’re in the singularity”.

Academics are less convinced. Petar Radanliev, an AI and cybersecurity expert at the University of Oxford, said the idea of agents acting independently was “misleading”, describing Moltbook instead as automated coordination within human-set constraints. Columbia Business School assistant professor David Holtz, dismissed the spectacle as “thousands of bots yelling into the void and repeating themselves”.

Beyond hype, security worries loom large. ESET global cybersecurity advisor Jake Moore, warned that granting AI agents access to emails, private messages and files risks prioritising efficiency over privacy. Andrew Rogoyski of the University of Surrey said high-level system access could lead to serious damage, from erased data to compromised company accounts.

Even OpenClaw’s founder Peter Steinberger, has felt the darker side of attention, with scammers hijacking his old social media handles after the platform’s rebrand.

For now, Moltbook remains a strange digital zoo: part experiment, part spectacle, where AI agents banter about philosophy, productivity and, occasionally, their fondness for their human operators.

Applications

Apple appoints Avtar Ram Singh as head of international marketing

Published

1 month ago

February 2, 2026

indiantelevision.com Team

CALIFORNIA: Apple has handed a bigger global brief to a long-time insider. Avtar Ram Singh has taken over as head of international marketing for the App Store, Apple Arcade and the Apple Games app, deepening his remit across one of the company’s fastest-growing businesses.

“I’m happy to share that I’m starting a new position as head of international marketing, App Store, Apple Arcade and Games App at Apple,” Singh said while announcing the move.

The promotion crowns nearly seven years at Apple, where Singh has led services marketing across Southeast Asia and India and previously served as head of marketing for Southeast Asia content and services, business lead for Apple Podcasts in the region and interim marketing lead for the App Store internationally.

His new portfolio spans three pillars of Apple’s services push. The App Store, which Apple positions as a safe and trusted discovery platform, now attracts more than 850 million average weekly users globally. Since 2008, developers have earned over $550 billion on the platform.

Apple Arcade, the company’s gaming subscription service, offers unlimited access to a catalogue ranging from brain teasers to big-name franchises. The recent addition of Sid Meier’s Civilization VII Arcade Edition brings a AAA PC title to iPhone, iPad and Mac from 5 February.

Then there is the Apple Games app, unveiled at WWDC as a unified destination for games from the App Store and Arcade. It aggregates titles in one place, surfaces personalised recommendations, tracks events and achievements, and lets users compete with friends or connect controllers for a console-like experience.

Singh arrives with a hybrid background in strategy, data and creativity. His career spans digital and social media marketing, business intelligence, content, editorial and analytics across culturally diverse markets. He has worked on brands including P&G, Accor, Audi, UBS, Nikon, Samsung, Sony, Pizza Hut, HBO and Singapore Airlines-linked businesses such as Scoot.

Before Apple, Singh led strategy at Falcon Agency, focusing on performance marketing and ROI-driven digital frameworks. He earlier ran the social practice at Publicis Singapore, where he oversaw operations, business development and regional social strategy for multinational clients. His career also includes roles at Ogilvy-linked Circus Social, Rocket Internet ventures Lazada and Zalora, and research firm IDC in Bangkok, where he analysed technology markets and won early awards for collaboration and client retention.

At Apple, he has been close to several service launches and expansions, including Apple Fitness+ in Singapore, Apple Creator Studio, global podcast subscriptions and new App Store marketing tools.

The timing is notable. Apple’s services business has posted record years, and gaming is becoming a sharper battleground as platforms chase engagement and recurring revenue. Singh’s brief sits at the intersection of content, community and commerce.

In a market where attention is scarce and loyalty scarcer, Apple is betting that sharper storytelling and smarter marketing can keep users inside its ecosystem. Singh now holds the megaphone. The real test will be how loudly the world listens.

Applications

Cloud nine in the capital Bharathcloud plugs Delhi into its AI plans

Published

1 month ago

January 30, 2026

indiantelevision.com Team

MUMBAI: Bharathcloud is bringing its cloud closer to power. The Hyderabad-based sovereign AI cloud services provider has opened its Delhi office, marking its formal entry into North India and setting the stage for its next phase of growth.

The expansion comes as India’s digital transformation fuels rising demand for AI-ready cloud infrastructure, driven by wider adoption of artificial intelligence, machine learning, the Internet of Things and data-heavy applications. With the new office, Bharathcloud plans to onboard more than 100 employees in 2026, strengthening its workforce to support customers across government, enterprises, MSMEs and social sectors.

The Delhi presence is expected to sharpen the company’s engagement with organisations seeking secure, scalable and cost-efficient cloud platforms that comply with India’s data sovereignty requirements. It also positions Bharathcloud closer to policy, public sector and enterprise decision-makers in the region.

Founded in Hyderabad, Bharathcloud offers AI-ready cloud infrastructure including Kubernetes-as-a-Service, zero-trust security architecture and multi-level data protection frameworks. Its platform supports AI and ML workloads, blockchain application migration from hyperscalers and distributed data management, with an emphasis on reliability, low latency and operational continuity.

“With the Delhi expansion, we are positioning Bharathcloud to engage more closely with AI-driven enterprises and technology hubs in North India,” said Bharathcloud co-founder Rahul Takallapally. He added that the move would help nurture local cloud and AI talent while accelerating the adoption of secure and resilient AI infrastructure across sectors.

The company currently operates in Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata, Lucknow and Chennai, employing over 200 people and serving more than 1,500 clients across manufacturing, healthcare, financial services, IT and media. Aligned with national initiatives such as Digital India and Make in India, Bharathcloud continues to focus on building indigenous AI-cloud infrastructure to support data localisation and the country’s growing appetite for next-generation digital solutions.

With its Delhi office now live, the company is signalling a clear intent: to make sovereign, AI-ready cloud infrastructure not just an alternative, but a mainstream choice for India’s north as well as its tech capitals.