Regional language content startups which typically cater to gig economy workers, daily wage earners, housewives and students, are amplifying their outreach about the Covid-19 virus pandemic in a bid to control misinformation.
Josh Talks, Vokal, Lokal, NoticeBoard, Youth Ki Awaaz, DailyHunt, and Trell among others are making and sourcing content from authentic, verified sources, and partnering with local bodies and health agencies to ensure accuracy.
In a bid to step up the reach, startups including scooter sharing platform Bounce, social commerce site Meesho, Sheroes, and e-pharmacy firm 1Mg are also cross-sharing relevant videos and audio messages on their respective platform.
“Most people have woken up to the gravity of the problem now,” said Vishal Gahlaut, co-founder and CEO of Noticeboard, a platform for frontline staff.
These initiatives are expected to intensify further this week. For instance, Josh Talks has added advisories in eight regional languages to all its videos and started a special series featuring doctors and medical professionals to share fact-based advice dubbed across languages to raise awareness. “On our community pages, we are discussing and dispelling rumours and misinformation,” said Supriya Paul, cofounder, Josh Talks.
Local news platform Lokal, too, is pushing awareness content by making videos that raise awareness, doing shows to flag fake news, and increasing moderator screening guidelines. “We are also working with local administration at the district level for quick distribution of information, and sharing emergency contact numbers,” said Jani Pasha, cofounder, Lokal.
Others like Youth Ki Awaaz have sent out community advisories via emails, Facebook Messenger, and communities on Telegram and Instagram.
“The idea is to reach as many young people as possible, and help contain the panic and fear and deal with this outbreak with caution and better understanding,” said Anshul Tewari, founder, Youth Ki Awaaz, a user-generated youth media platform on social justice issues.
Peer-to-peer knowledge-sharing company Vokal is getting experts to answer questions and the community to generate opinions on the platform. “Getting deeper on the importance of social distancing and what it actually means is missing,” said Aprameya Radhakrishna, founder, and CEO, Vokal.
This is largely due to the absence of credible deep content production in regional languages, the founders told ET. This is further fuelled by unverified posts across social media channels which people end up trusting, endorsing and believing.
(Video courtesy: Vokal)
According to a survey conducted by Josh Talks exclusively for ET across six languages and 45,000 respondents replying in Hindi, Telugu, and Punjabi, only 10% people were aware of the actual cause and effect of the virus. Even though social media channels apps like TikTok, Facebook, Google, and DailyHunt are flagging users to explore credible links and putting out advisories in local languages, more needs to be done.
“Curating for India is particularly hard for global companies since our local languages have many nuances which take time to develop into scalable technology,” said a top executive of a social media company.
(Video courtesy: Noticeboard)
Some businesses, however, are more aggressive about the problem. “For those searching for content relating to coronavirus, we have introduced in-app features, notifications and safety measures specifically designed to elevate credible and accurate information from trusted sources,” said a TikTok spokesperson.
In fact, India’s startups, including companies like Flipkart, Swiggy, Ola, MyGate, 1mg, and others have been actively pushing out content to their frontline workforce to educate them on the virus. Flipkart, for instance, has organized awareness sessions across all its facilities while Ola, Swiggy, and Zomato have issued advisories, and MyGate, 1mg, Urban Company among others have also actively sought to educate their customers.
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