How much Klout do you have?
Is there a way to measure your influence on social media sites? People have forever been confused about what exactly makes one important online and where they rank. Is it traffic or engagement? What is the actual standard for success online? In September 2009, a small San Francisco-based start up with 40 employees stated that they had the answer to all of this. Their answer was Klout. Klout essentially claims to be the standard of gauging how much influence a person has in the world of social media by aggregating their Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and other footprints to come up with a score for influence. Yes, there are tons of social ...
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Who tops Pakistan news on social media?
The need to be ‘social’ online is shaping up to be a new rat race for clicks, comments and user engagement among local news media outlets. With an estimated 20 million Pakistanis online and over six million on Facebook, the ability to convert these numbers into tangible, easy-to-measure consumers of news content is, even at this early stage, a new measure of success. Currently media groups are focused on growth and expansion of their user bases (via their sites or social media channels), experimenting with forms of content and content sharing mechanisms and for some, the first phases of trying to ...
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The Hunger Games: Stimulate your mind
If the best games stimulate the mind and the body, then The Hunger Games belongs near the top of the pile. Adapted from a novel bearing the same name by Suzanne Collins, this first installment in a trilogy is a superb dramatic action film, which engages the grey matter on various levels, thanks to its rich depth in characterisation, as well as a subtle multi-layered narrative. Set in a dystopian future in North America, things start with 16-year-old Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence), who feeds her little sister Primrose (Willow Shields), and her widowed mother (Paula Malcomson), ...
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10 things I noticed on my first day at work
The first day of work can be full of excitement… before you get to the office. It’s like the first day of school; you can’t contain your excitement but when you enter the premises you are already dying to leave! I’ve listed the 10 things I noticed on my first day of work. Here goes: 1. The blank look on the HR guy’s face when you arrive at the office - the same guy who interviewed you and begged you to accept the package . No one knows where you are supposed to sit, how you’ll enter the building or if you’ll need a laptop to work ...
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Kony 2012: What Uganda didn’t need
Sixty seven million views inside just five days is a clear indication of a video gone viral. Such is the power of social media today that Ugandan rebel Joseph Kony has now taken over not only the minds of Ugandan children, but the homepages of millions of people abroad. Chances are that you have already gone through the 30-minute long video, but if you somehow have managed to avoid those posts, memes, tweets or messages, here’s a summary - Joseph Kony is one of the World’s most wanted war criminals. - He has been accused of capturing, training and equipping thousands of ...
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10 things nosy ‘Pak’ers love to ask
Do you ever get riled up by busybodies asking annoying questions to ‘place’ people in their social world? Well, here are some conveniently snappy answers we wish we could respond with (you might even get away with some of them if you did; sarcasm is often lost on the unwitting). 1. Have you found anyone eligible yet? Yes (enter Mashallah), I have won the marriage lottery! She/he is, Mashallah, loaded and divorced only thrice. 2. Who is your father? He is Mian/Chaudhry (enter name) and owns (enter name of mill/bank). 3. What does your husband do? See answer number 2 please. 4. What village are you from? It doesn’t matter if you have never seen ...
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Buying a DSLR doesn’t make you a photographer
Don’t do it. I’m not asking you to not jump off a cliff (though you shouldn’t do that either). I’m asking you to not commit the most heinous crime in the history of photography. Don’t buy a Digital Single-Lens Reflex camera (DSLR). In a new trend, that is spreading like wildfire around Pakistan, almost everyone is ditching their old Sony Cybershots for state of the art cameras with the ability to zoom in perfectly on their ex-girlfriend’s facial hair. This is all in a bid to capture the same moments you normally would – except in higher resolution. But is there really a point? ...
Read Full PostBeyond riots: How social media helped London
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past week, or fasting in Ramazan has really gotten you down, you are probably well aware of the rioting going on in London, and are familiar with some of the sorrowful tales of death and destruction that have come out of the still ongoing disturbance. Triggered by the police killing of a 29 year old English man of color, the riots have been intense enough to stun the world, with English law breakers having taken full advantage of the chaos. As this map reveals, the criminal activities have spread across England with ...
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Doctor se Rishta: A modest proposal
Recently a friend posted a Facebook link that read: “Gift-find for the single South Asian women on Facebook.” Falling into all the above categories – South Asian, female, and single – I felt obliged to follow his instructions, which led me to an online matrimonial service. Great, I thought. Just what the free world needs: another run-of-the-mill, Shaadi.com spin-off promising compatibility in the form of a mutual love for puppies, aloo ke parathay and Bollywood. But, after giving the website a proper look-see, I realised I had miscalculated. This was not your typical vanilla, hackneyed online dating site. No, this website came with ...
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The Capital Vulture: The hills have eyes
Sociology majors ought to consider doing their dissertations on behavioural patterns indigenous to Pakistanis. One of these genetic predispositions is a constant irritation to those on the receiving end. In fact, this applies to the entire Indian subcontinent really. As a collective, we suffer from an acute staring problem; it can make life awkward to the point when you start developing social disorders (me) or bloated egos (so many girls in the city). Uff, it’s because some of us are fair, hardy, har, har. I’ve grown up in Islamabad and the unabashed staring is something I’ll never get used to. I think ...
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