Media, traditional and digital, has become integral part of our lives. More than 500 years with newspapers, 100 years with radio, 70 years with Television, less than 20 years of Internet and 15 years of mobile, and mobile is not yet a media. Today, we switch among all media seamlessly and even overlap one with another. We begin our day with newspaper as a habit, we find romance with radio in our car while we pretend to relax with TV in the evening but only as long as mobile allows us.

Newspapers evolved as a mass media because information was premium and there was curiosity for other part of the globe. Radio and TV accelerated growth to information market and added entertainment to it. Traditional media could thrive because it was subsidized by advertisement and advertisement was welcomed because it was information we needed.

Till 1990's we knew more global problems than solutions. We grew more on intellect and remained more upset on emotional level, because traditional media did not offer equally large platform to communicate and explore solutions for the problems it exposed us with. At collective level, it did raise general awareness but in the process at individual level, it did raise the bar of global negativity. We could argue, debate and agree to disagree, but life was better either 20 years back or would be lot more simpler and evolved after 20 years as we learn to integrate with interactive digital media using web and mobile. In fact we would not know the difference between web and mobile in the years to come.

Internet began where traditional media left us high and dry when Sabeer Bhatia brought email to add communication and interactivity to the media and this is where media became personal rather than mass media. Business model perfected by newspapers, where they subsidized subscription cost and inserted advertisements were very well scaled over to Radio and TV. However scalability of this business model as well as assumption that broadcasting of information was still a need began to end when Google made information available at a click. Brand managers linearly applied banner advertisement in same manner as they applied hoardings on highways. Basic premise of advertising is ability to reach masses to spread the information about a product and services and as information became commodity with digital media, there was a need to evolve advertising into marketing. A concept, which so far, our CXOs have successfully forgotten to take note of. They failed to understand that it is different media, different age, different consumer mindset and it is all together different game.

In last 20 years, we have made more mistakes with Internet & mobile. Businesses have so far looked at Internet and mobile as necessary evil, while consumers were enthusiastically adopting it. Connected communities, mobile generation and advent of Google turned the whole market upside down as markets became global and consumers began to interact with strangers on social networking and blogging sites and in the process consumer turned active than passive. Consumers using digital devices wanted to reach to logical end in decision making on products and services for which they needed all information placed in front of them on a click rather than being pushed through banner ads, thoughtfully designed by media planners on the promise of Yahoo's and MSN claiming to know the soul of the consumer.

What we did with Internet 1.0 so far was good but if we do not evolve, we would go wrong. E commerce was a big need for western markets for simple reason to enhance the life of people further and cut distribution cost but far bigger market have been for E- services specially in Eastern markets like India. Skype, Google, Naukri.com, Shaadi.com are examples of rise of E- services but for last generation of Internet. For E-services to take off, businesses needed to transform their mindset from internal processes driven approach to customer centric approach by integrating consumers to boardroom.

This has potential to change the landscape of politics and businesses in coming years. It was either traditional media or politics, which connected with such large audiences if at all we call that connected community. For the first time, as businesses are becoming global, it is possible to connect and serve huge masses in personalized form using web and mobile and if E- services are combined as value added services on the top of it, that is where we will see technology transforming life of common man at grass root level and businesses would have far more influence over our life than politics and traditional media has ever created. Imagine power in hands of people like Sunil Mittal and Arun Sarin vs. Bush or any other prime minister where they can reach masses on a single click effortlessly powered by E services. E-governance would face resistance beyond a point in every country as politics across the globe would resist transparency and it would evolve in the form of E- services run by private enterprises converging consumers into judiciary system which will further add to diminishing influence of government in our life. Hence next generation of mass media would be centered around E- services making such players as media companies of the future carrying out evolution of human life.

This is what we have tried combining in all our media properties so far in our own humble way. End to end processes to connect consumers with brands with complete workflow and time and event based status in public domain. It carries wisdom for brands to in-source media and carries respite to consumers that if brands fail to see wisdom, their investment is protected. One such example of our work is consumer grievances portal launched on 5th April, 2008 called www.whitelibra.com where brands have unique marketing and customer care possibilities at fraction of the their existing advertising budget.