Bangalore: Lalu, the management guru, is now Lalu, the blogger. The Union Railway Minister has launched his own corner in cyberspace, where one can read his views on current ‘hot topics’; listen to audio recordings and exchange comments with him.Last week Lalu Prasad popped up on MyPopkorn, a new Indian
interactive video ‘infotainment’ portal ( www.mypopkorn.com) launched by Digital Media Convergence Ltd (DMCL), an initiative of the Essel group.
In his opening blog, Mr. Prasad shares his personal take on the Gujjar issue.
His views are in posted in English, but you can click to hear his comments in Hindi. Since then, dozens of readers have uploaded their own views and contributions, in both languages. Most of them are addressed to Mr. Prasad in his capacity as Railway Minister and his blog has subtly morphed into a page where lay Indians directly address their grievances and reactions to him.
It remains to be seen how interactive the Lalu blog becomes... but clearly he is not about to rest on the laurels he reaped for his earthy take on ‘desi’ management that is already transforming the fuddy duddy image of the railways.
In the days since it went online, MyPopkorn has been getting 2 lakh visitors a day, for its eclectic video content which ranges from clips on a Vijay Mallya party to advice on breast cancer for women. Viewers have posted video to counter Mr. Prasad’s views on the Gujjar crisis — so the site seems to be even-handed when it comes to such content.
But its core attraction for many viewers might be the TV “Webisodes” which encapsulate the typically 30 minute episodes of popular TV serials from Sony, Star, Zee and other sources into 3-minute clips.
DMCL CEO Eashwar Jha told The Hindu that it has already acquired some 18,000 hours of video content for reprocessing.
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