Power Of Communication

They say three apples changed the world: the apple with which Eve seduced Adam, the falling apple which inspired Newton’s theory of gravity and Steve Jobs elegant Apple devices. The year 2011 focused on the power of communication through another fruit, the BlackBerry. The internet and facebook, proved to be major players in the fall of totalitarian regimes in Libya and Egypt, besides making Anna Hazare a house hold name in a matter of weeks at home and ensuring that a song like Kola Veri went viral and had turned even the sober Japanese Prime Minister into a fan, who invited actor turned singer Dhanush for dinner with him and our Prime Minister Manmohan Singh when he visited New Delhi recently. This song has been now sung in many different languages and tongues with tunes made up to suit local needs that it seems to communicate, young people need no language, but just a song sounding good.

People can lament all they want that the world was a better place when Apple and BlackBerry were just fruits. The fact remains that instant communication is here to stay. So this year, let’s use the internet to spread viral messages of happiness, peace and love. Let us use it to keep large extended families bound together. Let us harness the power of the internet to make our friendships stronger. Let us use our i-pads to share beauty and build peace. Remember love alone is recession proof, to condemn the new technologies is like condemning water because we might drown in it. Last year Sai Baba left us, M. F. Hussain left us, Wangari Maathai who recreated the geography of Kenya by planting trees left us, genius Steve Jobs, of the radiant digital innovations left us. But their ideas have left an indelible foot print on time. Let them inspire us to lead our lives this year, so that people want our autographs and not our fingerprints.