Your 6 year old will soon be sharing his/her life experiences online through social networking. Well for those re-reading the previous statement, a word of caution. It will happen soon!

Social networking websites like FaceBook, LinkedIn and Twitter already have a user-base of almost a billion people online. Most of these users belong to the age-group of 13-35 years. But this could all change with another Social networking website targeting the children between the age of 6-12 years. Enter Togetherville, a social networking website meant for children belonging to the above mentioned age group.  Legally, children who are considered to be too young under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act cannot join Facebook. But all this seems to change with the launch of Togetherville, co-founded by Mandeep Singh Dhillon . It is a site that is specifically designed to suit the social networking needs of children!

Social networking needs of children. 10 years ago, nobody would’ve even thought of coining this term and here we are at the verge of watching 6-7 year old kids sharing their life and sounds with their peers. The security aspect of such sites, when especially related to kids, is always under the microscope. In this case it is the parents or trusted adults who would be doing all the social networking activities on the behalf of the kids and therefore security concerns would be minimized. Togetherville is linked to Facebook and therefore any parent possessing a FaceBook account would be able to create their child’s account on Togetherville.

But the marketers will surely be smacking their lips to this new opportunity for social media optimization to target this unexplored high-potential market. Successful capture of this segment of the population would open up many windows of opportunities for brands for internet marketing. They would be enabled to target this population for online marketing in a much better manner, just like bigger websites like FaceBook and LinkedIn are doing presently.

Between all this, one issue is sure to raise eyebrows through the web-space – Do children really require social networking? Wasn’t there a huge hue and cry when Children and the time they spent on computers became a hot topic for debate all over the world? Highly involving activities like online gaming have already given parents sleepless nights about the lack of physical activity that their children get. And now with this social networking website for kids, the fears of children getting addicted to the internet will become even more pronounced.

Drawbacks or not, social networking for kids will soon be a reality. Boom for some and bane for the others.

A fusion of the Desi and the Videshi is what they are calling it. Some are crying out aloud about the huge European influence in its form and structure while others still are calling it an expression, a stamp of us as an economic superpower and its announcement to the world. We are talking about the New Rupee symbol that has captured the imagination of a billion Indians and the excitement does not seem to get dimmer in the near future.

The rapture involving the unveiling of the New Rupee symbol is pretty justified, given that it took us this long to come up with something that should’ve been done and dusted with, long ago. Developed nations unwillingly embrace India as one of the fastest developing countries in the world, so for our Currency Symbol to take this form is an expression of solidarity in itself. The amalgamation of the traditional deep rooted Sanskrit with the new age English alphabet (Sanskrit Ra and the English R) makes it a perfectly bilingual artwork that certainly envelops the feel of this 21^st century India. An India that has no bounds and developments are taking place in every nook and corner of the nation. No wonder we aren’t surprised that the whole nation stood up, noticed, understood and applauded this magnum opus of a creation by Udaya Kumar, a lecturer in design at the Indian Institute of Technology in Guwahati.

The best part about this whole news is the initiative taken by the government to involve the people in the creation of a symbol which would represent the psyche and the face of the new emerging India. The process to select the perfect representation of our currency was spread over months of ideation and screening and then culminated in the selection of Udaya Kumar’s creation.

We, as Indians stand at the threshold of a titanic shift in the world economy. Where earlier the American Dollar, the European Pound and the Chinese Yen dominated the global economy-scape, the new rupee symbol is surely destined to shine the brightest or so is the hope.

Amid the celebration of the grandeur of this new rupee symbol, it also faces tough criticism from many people. Michael Johnson, a director at the award-winning London-based design consultancy, Johnson Banks said,” The new symbol fitted with other currency signs but lacked imagination”. I think it’s a B or B plus. Most currency symbols follow an established route now ‑ E for euro, Y for yen, now R for rupee. You could argue that a dynamic emerging economy could have gone for something more unusual and got away with it ‑ I think in the end conservative voices prevailed.”

The Twitter world too was abuzz with mixed reactions. Tweeted one krishashok,” OMG. It’s colonial hangover again(sic).” Whereas known photographer Atul Kasbekar opined,” I think the new symbol for the Indian Rupee is fantastic! Kudos to the design team.” Bollywood Superstar Amitabh Bachchan shared similar views as he tweeted,” And the rupee symbol is fantastic .. !! Our own identity !! GO INDIA !!!”

Colonial hangover or not, the new Rupee symbol certainly once again makes the world stand and take notice of the potential that India holds in its people and its minds; something that could shape the future of the world. The road map has already been laid.

P.S – The New Rupee Symbol (Font) can be downloaded for usage on your computer. Simply logon to http://blog.foradian.com/ and install the new Rupee font on your computer.

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