Koo versus Twitter - How's it going

Indian brands in Social Media - Koo versus Twitter

Koo versus Twitter - How's it going

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• The Story: India's home-grown micro-blogging portal Koo is expecting to surpass Twitter's 25 million-strong user base in India this year. This claim was made by co-founder Mayank Bidawatka.
• Key points: The Koo app had touched 20 million downloads in India by the end of 2021. It is available in 10 languages, including English. This year they claim to cover all of India's 22 official languages. The company's headquarters is in the southern city of Bangalore, a tech hub.

1. Koo, which caters primarily to non-English users in India, launched in early 2020. It expanded to Nigeria in 2021 when the country suspended Twitter.
2. It now wants to reach 100 million users by the end of 2022. Bidawatka founded Koo along with Aparmeya Radhakrishna.
3. Radhakrishna is an angel investor and entrepreneur whose ride-sharing business TaxiForSure was acquired by the Indian company Ola for $200m (£147m) in 2015.
4. The two also run Vokal, a knowledge-sharing platform in Indian languages.

• Row between the Indian government and Twitter: PM Modi's government asked the platform to block allegedly incendiary accounts. Twitter complied initially and then restored them, citing "insufficient justification". Twitter follows standards of free speech prevalent in the US, which may be significantly higher than that in India. The face-off continued as the government threatened legal action against the company's employees in India. This was in addition to an ongoing dispute over new digital rules that sparked concerns about free speech and privacy.

1. WhatsApp sued the government, saying the rules would force it to violate privacy protections.
2. Irked by Twitter's defiance and alleged failure to comply with digital rules, a flurry of cabinet ministers and lawmakers from the BJP migrated to Koo overnight.
3. Mr Modi, who has a huge following on Twitter, has stayed put.

• Challenges: Koo, on the other hand, is accused of amplifying government propaganda and letting anti-Muslim hate speech go unchecked. Its guidelines explicitly prohibit hate speech and discriminatory or offensive content but with "koos" (its version of tweets) being generated every second, moderation is hard. It is perhaps not even being attempted rigorously. The app's requirement for authentication via a mobile phone number to register will also pose a challenge.

• Opportunities: Koo's distinctive focus on building a product for non-English speakers makes it a compelling product. It gives people the ability to 'koo' in multiple languages at once, and on one screen.

1. Bollywood actors - who usually communicate with their fans in English on social media - make use of this feature to reach wider audiences across multiple languages.
2. Koo currently competes with ShareChat in India, a far bigger rival in terms of its user base. As it scales up across Indian languages, it will be doubling its headcount to 500 people.
3. Bidawatka plans to take the platform to countries outside India where English is not the dominant language.
4. South East Asia is exciting because of the large population and under-penetration of existing platforms.
5. English is spoken by only 20% of the world - 80% of the world does not.

• Summary: There is no lack of TV channels, or Radio stations, or Outdoor and Print Media in India. These customary media may witness a reduction in their reach in near future. The scope of social media in India will keep on benefitting from the innovative, financial and social changes.
• EXAM QUESTIONS: (1) Explain the role of social media in governance issues, and the challenge it poses. (2) Critically examine the role and scope of the social media platforms in local languages. (3) Can India ever make its own Google? Explain.

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