Chennai
The Internet is a funny place: here, the fake has more followers than the original. Parody social media accounts are such a hit that the unofficial names are a force to reckon with.
Former president of BCCI N. Srinivasan is not on any social media platform, but ‘Srini Mama’ is legend. And legends, there are quite a few, who, through their humour and sarcasm have earned much fandom -- to such an extent that even Facebook got confused. Remember the curious case of Subramanian Swamy? According to reports, when the BJP leader got offended by the parody account that was spelt as ‘Subramaniam Swamy’ instead of Subramanian Swamy, he complained and the social media giant went ahead and deleted the politician’s original account instead of the parody; Twitter had a field day.
Srini Mama, Trendulkar, Sir Ravindra Jadeja, Unofficial: Subramaniam Swamy are a few names that often has netizens in splits. They are constant — and have something for fans every day. Every FB post of theirs receives thousands of likes, multiple shares and retweets.
The brains behind most of these funny accounts are the unsuspecting guys behind the system with regular jobs who just have the knack to work wonders with memes and those 140 characters. For instance, Srini Mama is a guy in his mid-twenties managing all accounts that go by that name while holding down a day job.
“I am just a cricket enthusiast. I used to run a cricket group and my friends enjoyed my posts. They’d often suggest that I should do something for the larger audience. I created this account in 2013 during the IPL finals between Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings,” he says. The account remained dead for almost a year.
“I started tweeting again after a year, again, during the IPL. I started posting analyses before every match, using the ‘Tanglish’ slang and it seemed to click. And my predictions were coming true and people got curious,” says the social media expert. It was around this time that controversies surrounding the real ‘Srini Mama’ started appearing regularly on TV channels and it only gave mileage to the parody account. People wanted to know his take.
Now Srini Mama has fans of R. Ashwin’s ilk and some of their banter on Twitter are completely hilarious. “It’s through this Twitter account that I got to personally interact with some well-known cricketers.”
In an interview, N Srinivasan was asked about the existence of Srini Mama. He had said that he had heard about this page through friends and some of them read out tweets to him and he found them apt.Not everyone is this lucky. Unofficial: Subramaniam Swamy was at the receiving end of much hate for taking a tough stance against the BJP.
“I started this page two years back. I had been following Mr Subramanian Swamy on both Twitter and Facebook. I was disturbed by the kind of content he puts out. I started by mocking the claims he made. I made some memes that soon got circulated on Twitter and was apparently later seen by Subramanian Swamy. Initially, he said that the page was run by the ‘Italian Mafia’, but he took it seriously when his followers got confused with the parody account. He then threatened legal action,” says the moderator of the page, a 32-year-old IT professional.
Later FB made the same mistake — and deleted his original account. “I guess that’s when people on Twitter and other social media began to take notice. Since then the follower count has been constantly increasing. I wasn’t a political enthusiast until 2011-12, but the poltical scenario got me involved. I am aware that I am tough on the ruling government,” he adds.
This stance of his caught the attention of other political parties. “Yes, a few social media representatives from other political parties had approached me to join and promote them. But I wasn’t interested.I didn’t want to be a puppet of any political party. But yes, I agree that I don’t criticise other parties as much. Also, a few people from media houses inbox their articles to me. And If I find it good, I share them.”
With recognition comes responsibility. These accounts have become a brand of sorts and they are even approached to endorse brands. “I have received calls from brands who have offered to pay Rs 3,000 for a Facebook post and Rs 1,500 for a tweet, which I didn’t accept,” says Srini Mama.
Most of these funny people on social media do what they do just for the fun of it. Local Tea Party, another funny Twitter account with over 13,000 followers, puts down thoughts that are on almost everybody’s mind. With tweets like ‘My biopic will be called ‘Finding Uber’, one could easily relate to them. What started as a blog, translated into a funny account that puts a citizen’s daily woes in a way that is bound to make you laugh. Such accounts are a favourite with media managers. “These are called influencer tweets and social media marketing people contact popular accounts to promote a particular brand and product by asking you to tweet about it. There is a strategy involved and they ask you to put out a certain number of tweets in a day at a particular time. For me, I am on social media whenever I’m free and I cannot stick to strict timings and I stay away from such commitments,” says the brain behind Local Tea Party.
Media managers are on the prowl for such social media brands because a tweet from them reaches thousands of people.“Only two kinds of content rule on Social Media, one is humour, the other is emotion. Perhaps the most effective way of communicating on the Internet is in this manner, i.e. either to make people feel coveted or proud or ashamed or simply make them laugh. The best thing about a parody account is that, no one will take these accounts very seriously, because it doesn’t carry a persona, but partially reflects the real person behind the parody in an inoffensive way. The freedom one has is high because the real identity is kept hidden, in most cases,” says Balaji Vijayaraghavan, a social media expert.
Anonymity is the key as it keeps the fans curious. “If you ask me, I’d be fine if I did not know who the real person behind these parodies was. The moment the original face is out, the value will deteriorate. Being ‘not so serious’ is the RVP behind these accounts. A brand is a stamp of authority, and parodies can never be brands. However, they can behave/pretend to be one for the reason that the clout is relatively high,” says Balaji. They are mostly adored by the good citizens of Twitter — but the Internet can be nasty.
But in Srini Mama’s words, “ Dei pasangala, ungaluke theriyum. Haters gonna hate, but indha mama will rise above the hate.”
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