If you haven't heard of Govind Tiwari yet, you can't be a Net junkie. He's a Twitter celebrity who has brought joy to millions since yesterday. Today, he has been the subject of several articles. His claim to fame: A blog that stands out for its tackiness.
No one in the media seems to have caught Govind Tiwari in flesh and blood yet. If they had, he would have made it to the TV channels as well. Is he real at all? We don't know. First Post believes he could be the creation of a smart, search-engine savvy blogger somewhere.
Many are saying whoever created the blog could have made Rs 15 lakh in just a day, thanks to the traffic frenzy that even crashed Photobucket, the site hosting his pictures. I don't believe he has, but then, social media experts have their own estimates.
Nishad Ramachandran writes in First Post: "To me Govind Tiwari is truly a well worked experiment in Transmedia story telling. Perhaps the best we have seen from India, or done by an Indian somewhere. Create a well worked character. Build in some quirks and traits that get talked about. Use every media channel uniquely to further the story."
But not everyone is so appreciative. "Govind Tiwari's sudden rise to fame goes to show that in the online world it doesn't necessarily take quality content to get noticed," says an unsentimental IBN Live.
The Internet provides us with an instant platform, and we can try our hand at blogging, tweeting, designing, even movie-making. Publishing and shooting films would have called for a lot of money even 10 years ago. Editors and directors wouldn't have deigned to talk to you if you were a novice. That has changed: the Net isn't editorially controlled. A small-town boy with oil in his hair can self-publish as easily as a city-slicker flashing an iPad at a cafe. Govind Tiwari represents the Bunty-and-Babli face of aspiration. He is the cow-belt innocent trying, or so we think, to be a dude.
So why is everyone on Twitter rushing to see his page? What thoughts go through our heads when we see the blinking young man?
* We are smarter: All of us who visit his gaudy page come out feeling superior, if not supercilious. He has created a blog that's so basic, with so little text, that all of us feel we can do better. He doesn't say 'fraands' or anything that invites the immediate contempt of the English-educated class, but he is unabashed in what he likes. And what he likes is beneath us. We wouldn't be on a blog like this for anything in the world.
* We have better taste: If you are the Bangalore sort, and got married in the presence of a video photographer your family hired from the neighbourhood studio, there's a good chance you've featured in scenes similar to what you see in Govind Tiwari's videos. Yet, on Twitter and Facebook, we somehow feel we are in the company of people with taste and refinement. That helps us join the mock celebration of the Govind Tiwaris of the world.
* We listen to better music: For his videos and home page, Govind Tiwari uses cheap-sounding instrumental versions of Hindi film songs, besides songs from private albums that only Delhi cab drivers supposedly play without embarrassment. We are reassured that we know better when it comes to music, even if we only listen to Sheela ki jawani and Dinga chaka dinga chaka. By the way, Govind Tiwari could grow up to Sheela ki jawani... he links out to a chipmunk version of the hit.
* We are better off: The reason for all-round self-congratulation could be many: we are not as mofussil as Govind Tiwari, we wear more fashionable clothes, we don't look so foolishly earnest, our home pages don't look so silly, and so on and so forth.
Govind Tiwari, for those of us looking at him from the voyeuristic side of the mirror, is a wannabe. And it's us he wants to be.
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