Guess Who Is The Latest Bollywood Blogger? Salman Khan aka The Shirtless Wonder…
By Kamla Bhatt • May 28th, 2008Category: Books, Movies, Music, Televison, Bollywood, Bombay/Mumbai, India, People
Guess who is the latest Bollywood blogger? Salman Khan aka the “Shirtless Wonder.” He started blogging recently at DusKadum.
All of a sudden it seems like blogging is quite the rage in Bollywood and I wonder who is helping or advising these Bollywood starts on their social media strategy? I am curious to know why instead of titles for their blog posts these actors are using numbers….seems a little colorless and bland way of writing.
I wonder how long Salman will continue to blog? Is this a passing interest? Salman appears to be in a time crunch already and thus far has managed to write 5 very short posts. Now, why has he started blogging? There are a bunch of reasons and one of them is based on some kind of survey that showed that “direct interaction with the common people” would be a good thing. Here is how he describes it:
“Even the simplest of the questions reveal glimpses of the mysterious Indian temperament. However, the greatest temptation to the show was direct interaction with common people.We stars thrive on adulation and love of the common people and yet we get few chances of meeting them. It’s really a thrilling experience to meet common people. These are the people who elect politicians and create stars. They are also guided by their instincts. Probably this common factor, of instinct, has created tremendous emotional rapport between my fans and me. My contemporaries are highly educated & accomplished people and are very articulate. I am a simpleton in comparison. I know masses love me for what I am and I need not project an image for establishing any rapport with them”
Naturally, after reading the above paragraph I had a bunch of questions like any other “common man” or common person would. I wonder what this “mysterious Indian temperament is all about?” I wish he had expanded on that point. Also, who are these highly educated and accomplished people that are his contemporaries? (ShahRukh Khan and Karan Johar or is he referring to Amitabh Bachchan, who appears to have become a full-time blogger.) It was amusing to see how he labeled himself as a “simpleton.”
Clearly, Salman’s motives for blogging are very different when compared to Shekhar Kapur, Amitabh Bachchan, Aamir Khan or Rahul Khanna, who wrote some really wonderful posts in Intent Blog about 3 years ago. What a pity that Rahul Khanna gave up blogging.
I am wondering when Shah Rukh Khan or Karan Johar will jump into the Web 2.0 bandwagon. When they do I suspect it will be a fully-integrated approach that includes blog, twitter, friendfeed, facebook etc. We got a glimpse of it in the way the Om Shanti Om folks used Wikipedia and YouTube. I guess it will be a matter of time when we see something from the Khan and Karan camp.
In the meantime here is a big welcome to Bollywood bloggers.
Technorati Tags: bollywood bloggers,salman khan,amitabh bachchan,aamir khan,shahrukh khan,karan johar,bollywood,people
I can believe Amitabh’s blog is genuine.
I am not wiling to believe some of these stars can actually write.
They can’t even talk unless the dialogues are written for them.
Mercifully they can at least read.
It’s taken them quite a while to realize the possibilities in this medium and they want to exploit it.
I forsee new star bloggers entering the fray and they will use ghost writers.
They will tell their hired writers their thoughts and leave it to these wordsmiths to do the rest.
Do I see a new job opportunity for me in my retired life?
What retirement Vishwanath? You are running a biz!
But, yes I think you would make an excellent writer for one of the big celebrity bloggers…keep your eyes open…you never know
Best of luck!
kamla
[...] Bhatt wonders on her blog how Salman Khan gets time to write posts on his latest blog. She rightly mentions that Bollywood [...]
Blush! Blush!!
Thanks for the compliment.
You know what?
Back in the late sixties, as a student at BITS Pilani, I was the ghost speech writer for the students contesting the Student Union elections.
All the candidates who mouthed my written speeches during those five years actually won!
Ah! Ha! The truth finally emerges…so you clearly have not lost your ability to write …and I think you should write for a celebrity. Maybe Hema Malani? Have you thought of that
best of luck!
Kamla
well lets all give him a big welcome to the blog-o-sphere.
Sure, let us all welcome Mr. Salman Khan to the wonderful world of blogs. Welcome aboard!
Thanks for reminding us…we had forgotten our manners
Cheers!
kamla
I am amazed that his blog actually has meaningful text instead of one big “DUHHH” in caps. Instead of blogging he could start using twit – the next gen blogging platform for twits. Cruel? maybe, but nowhere near as cruel as having to watch one of his movies.
Rishi great suggestion about migrating to Twitter…I think Salman Khan will do a great job with that micro-blogging tool. C’mon his movies are not all that bad..I quite enjoy watching them and he does have a sense of humor. How can you *NOT* watch his dance moves? Here is Silicon Valley you should see how many college kids are crazy about the way he dances
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
kamla
Well well…I’m finally trying twitter – so far I’m not sure what interesting things I can do with it, but I remain hopeful