For a while now, the news-tweet has been mightier than the sword. Or, staying within the 21st century metaphor, mightier than the drone. Punched into an invisible digital cloud, the cyber-word pings on your iPad, pops in your Galaxy, glides into your Blackberry, burrows into your desktop.
Once upon a time, in the pre-digital age, news would just happen, and someone would report it. You would receive it passively and mute your instinctive response and move on, not knowing how your friends or adversaries – or strangers – had reacted to it, if at all.
News then was an exciting but inert event. Today, news is a hyper-active, multi-point phenomenon, with you at its epicentre. You read, write, bounce, redirect, navigate, pick, choose, reject, reinforce, tweet, facebook and firstpost it … Yes, you Firstpost it. For over a decade, Network18 has been wedded to News and The Web. Long after our peers succumbed to the dotcom bust, Web18 continued investing, logging up losses but doggedly staying the course. The fruits of that stubbornness are now rather sweet, as Web18 is the largest and fastest growing Indian internet operation. And Firstpost is its newest, most vibrant offspring. Enjoy it. Enrich it. You are part of Firstpost. Make Firstpost your first port of call every day.
Raghav Bahl is the Founder and Editor Network18.
