Abki Baar, Technology Apaar

When you sit down to write a post on the very day election results in the world's largest democracy are announced, it is hard not to be touched by the surge in people's mood.

But that's just about how much I'm going to give it leeway for. Like Kejriwal would have said (or should have said): Miles to go before we sweep.

While we have seen and heard a lot of I-told-you-so's, cries of wolf and not-fairs in the past few days (ever since the upswing for Modi/BJP appeared on the horizon), there is so much work to do that any victory parade is not only premature but uncalled for.

It is hight time the conversation moved to setting things right: the sooner, the better. And time it moved from the prolonged kerfuffles on caste, religion and laddoos to a well-reasoned discourse on nation-building, mess-clearing and forward-moving.

The key pillars of such a conversation, in my opinion, are legislative, industrial, technological and environmental—which, if taken cohesively together, will lead to a rise in India's stature and improvement in its human development index.

In the tech aspect, which is our concern here, there have been several lost opportunities in the past 10-15 years. To give but one hint, we celebrated the year of broadband several years back, but are we a broadband nation yet?

Sure, we have done really well in software exports and the BPO sector, but as a consumer and “owner” of technology, we are way, way behind others.

Thankfully, things are at a stage where they can take off big time—and if the new decision makers in government would just give them a nudge, it would help.

Already, India is said to be the No. 2 market for Facebook in terms of user base. Over 40 million smartphones were sold in the country in 2013—a three-fold annual increase. And around 250 million Indians use the Internet.

And yet there is no IT manufacturing to boast of. Much of the apps and content used here are either developed elsewhere or their IP is owned by firms abroad. Most of the young IT graduates entering or working in the industry are “code mules” rather than cutting-edge programmers, creative types or risk-takers.

To put it straight, even if tritely, the ICT scenario in India is not developing holistically.

For some initial years of its growth and recognition on the world stage, it might have been all right for India to follow a lopsided or opportunistic model. But for India to stake the claim as a true IT power,  the ICT story needs to be accelerated as a whole. What the government must do is press the pedal and shift the gear.

Files to go before we tweet.

Is Twitter Losing Its Chirp?

The problem with Twitter is not just financial numbers; it is not generating enough user interest

Microblogging site Twitter recently announced its results for the first quarter of 2014. Soon after, its stock took a beating of about 11%, even though its topline grew to $250.5 million compared to $114.3 million in the year-ago quarter. It also added 3 million active users compared to just 1 million in Q1 of 2013.

The financial reasons for the thumbs-down by Wall Street are obvious: despite growth in revenue and users, losses widened from $27 million in the year-ago quarter to over $132 million in the recent one.

But even otherwise, there have been signs of trouble for the social media biggie for some time. Apparently, its efforts to cast itself more and more in the image of Facebook (by improving profiles, adding features such as Twitter Cards and Nearby, etc) are not getting it enough traction.

There are other reasons as well. At one point, breaking news was touted as a big pull, but now Facebook and YouTube seem to be ahead in the game. Pew Research, for instance, is said to have found that only 8% of Twitter's entire user base (it has over 240 million active monthly users) uses it to stay updated with news. This is against 30% for Facebook and 10% for YouTube.

Another weakness, say critics, is that Twitter is not generating as much interest in markets outside the US as other social giants.

While sites like Facebook, YouTube and even LinkedIn are capturing the imagination (and engagement) of people worldwide, Twitter continues to be seen as a niche vehicle with limited utility (how much can you pack in 140 characters or less, for example). Twitter has certainly caught the fancy of celebrities, politicians and others who like to broadcast their views to their fawning hordes—but the average Joe or Jane is still keeping their distance.

There is another silly thing happening in the dark corners of Twitter: I have come across several Twitter profiles that appear robotic, superhuman, idiotic or a mix of all. A typical such profile reads: 23 tweets, 19,265 followers, 20,897 following (with weird handles I would rather not name). Besides, there are millions who created a profile out of curiosity but then went into a deep slumber.

Some of them do wake up once in a while to tweet something sleepy. (What I find more annoying is when even these folks get followers in triple digits!) Frankly, to me these tweeters, their tweets and followers look like the T-equivalent of click frauds.

Not that other social media sites are free of fakes and inactives, but the situation seems acute with Twitter.

Will the bird get its chirp back next season?