Aaahhh … relieved !! Had been meaning to respond to the responses for some time, and now have done it as England get into a commanding position in the finals of the T20 against Australia .. !!

Many among you have felt that I may have been edgy about the media. No !! Not at all. Just that its such a recurring phenomenon with them, I felt it may be proper to tell them so. There is acknowledgment as well, when ever I have felt that there is something that needs to be read with care. So all in all a sense of fair play.

The cricket continues and with it continuous Tv viewing and with it because of the repeat advertisements a sense of beginning to start humming the jingles that accompany the advertisements. Strange ! Guess there is some method in the great marketing philosophy behind these campaigns. Or that Nazi philosophy, Goebbelian in nature, of repeating till you actually start believing it. Works in most cases. In movies too. The effort put in to get the viewer to be anxious enough to come to the theatre on the opening or to inform the public at large of the success of a particular product. Marketing … the desired strategy for all occasions in todays world.

I see the generation of today relying desperately on managers that bring PR and marketing to the forefront of all acts. And I wonder, it was never there in our time. We relied on the merit of our endeavor and we felt, and still do, that if there was value in our work, it would create value in revenue, or just value. But now, unless you drill it in that the material is good no one believes you, irrespective of what its merit may be. The danger of course being that even inferior material goes past the post as superior.

These are perceptions. But in a world of marketing abundance perception is generating all that needs to be done. And there is an acceptance amongst all that if they have got the perception right, that is all that is desired. Perception runs ability, excellence, success and many more such attributes. In todays world, that is all that is desired. Not so in the world of the days gone by, perhaps … perhaps … debatable but … perhaps all the same …

Love for now ..

Amitabh Bachchan