E-Paper
New numbers show India’s Net economy is red hot
In a nation of one billion people, India’s online population is only around 40 million, if one views it as a fraction of the country’s overall headcount. But when you realise that this number is about twice the overall population of Australia, it might make sense to look at its potential in a different way, writes N Madhavan.
In a nation of one billion people, India’s online population is only around 40 million, if one views it as a fraction of the country’s overall headcount. But when you realise that this number is about twice the overall population of Australia, it might make sense to look at its potential in a different way.
A meeting with an interesting Internet entrepreneur and new data on online news consumption gave me a clear idea that the digital economic potential is as real as the digital divide.
While television channels are mushrooming on direct-to-home (DTH) platforms like Tata Sky and Airtel Digital, giving viewers a tremendous range to choose from, and newspaper sites are full of event listings and lifestyle news, one site, Buzzintown.com has carved a niche in online videos as well as event/lifestyle based content.
Dr. Amitabh Saran, a computer science PhD with a flair for consumer content, co-founded the site, which has original content on travel, theatre, music etc with the idea of increasing ticket bookings. The site also hosts an online video show. Saran says it is not a me-too site and has moderated user content with editorial intervention. It already has 1.5 million registered users and 10 million page views per month.
“I am not talking about desert safari or Kerala backwaters,” Saran says casually to underline that the key aspect is that content must have relevance and originality.
Last week, international Internet audience measurement agency comScore said that India’s online news consumers aged 15 and above had grown 37 per cent this year to nearly 16 million, representing about 44 per cent of the online population. The agency says India is the seventh largest Internet market in the world and one of the fastest growing. While Yahoo News tops the list of news site favourites among Indians, Indian groups like Hindustan Times figure in the top 10 – but have to compete with the likes of New York Times, which stands at the second spot.
It is clear that both the Indian online market and competition are red hot. Innovative Internet channels like DTH-based Web services (which is already taking off) and Tata Indicom’s Walky (which offers an Internet-enabled telephone device for Rs. 1,400) are only going to hasten the penetration levels.
