Not long ago did people rave about Shah Rukh Khan and his ultra genius marketing brain for the way he used Social Media to promote his film Ra.One.  Google + crashed back then and people thought that yes, this is the biggest thing that an Indian personality could do with Social Media. But wait, he had a complete 3 month plan in place for this. His glory was however short-lived as the movie hit the screens soon. People, especially in the south of India, were annoyed with the portrayal of South Indians in the film. This includes me as well. Hell, we do not love curd that much that we would eat noodles with it. Move on buddy. If a stereotype needs to be researched then it sure is not a relevant stereotype.

 

Being tolerant and accommodative in nature, people soon forgot that and dismissed the movie too. But then, there was new wave that stirred the nation. On Nov 16, 2011 Sony Music uploaded a video on their YouTube Channel called ‘Why This Kolaveri Di?’ which happens to be a part of the movie 3 directed by Aishwarya Dhanush (daughter of the legendary actor Rajnikanth). That’s it! The rest is history. Within a week it had over 4 million views on YouTube. A simple song penned with not-so fancy lyrics sees Dhanush (son-in-law of the superstar Rajnikanth) sing a tale of a young guy being let down by his girlfriend. Its simplicity, catchy beats (by debutant Anirudh) and yes, Dhanush’s classic expressions make one fall in love with it.

I remember seeing it on Facebook within a couple of days. I had also shared the video not knowing what it would eventually become. Well, I played the song on loop and fell in love with it. I came to office the next day and shared my opinions. People also got curious. By then, one’s Facebook News Feed was flooded with the links and yes, the numerous parodies (the Kill Bill one being my favourite). Different versions came up – the metal version, the Carnatic version and so on. It dominated Twitter for 3 days. Yes, #kolaveri was trending on Twitter for 3 days.

 

Being a social media specialist, I could not help but wonder who was behind such a spectacular plan! Well, the answer to that was Jack In The Box World Wide. Awesome work! It received an average of 350 tweets an hour, tweeted a representative from the agency. Mind blowing!!

 

Kolaveri still rules YouTube with over 10 million views, over 100,000 likes and 50,000 comments. It’s an anthem that the nation seems to be enjoying. If you look at the statistics of the views you will see that the video is hugely popular in the US, Canada & Australia too. So, yes, I would not be wrong if I say that it has become a global phenomenon!!

 

Well, I hope there are more such things to come. Post that I came across the flash mob video at the CST station in Mumbai that was uploaded on Nov 28,2011. This too seems to be heading towards becoming another viral (may not be of the nature as Kolaveri). People have started sharing it on Facebook over the last 2 days. We will have to wait and what lies next!!!

At the end of all of this, I am just a ‘haffy’ social media junkie!