Entertaining, witty but clearly false, fake blogs are being used for everything from fun and spoofs, to consumer marketing and profit. KASMIN FERNANDES meets the true replicas

He took the cricket world by storm during the second season of the Indian Premier League, a year before he revealed his true identity on a news channel last Saturday. At the peak of his blog's popularity, self-proclaimed Fake IPL Player Anupam Mukherji had 150,000 visitors, each of whom spent 15 minutes on the blog.


Blogging sensation Fake IPL Player aka Anupam Mukherji revealed his
true identity to a news channel on August 28. Fake IPL Player was a
humorous anonymous blog purporting to be from an insider within the
Kolkata Knight Riders' camp, providing inside gossip about the team.
It hit headlines soon after its launch, and even won Mukherji a book
deal with HarperCollins. Illustration/Jishu

According to digital marketing firm Pinstorm, this added up to about 37,000 hours spent on the blog in one day (April 26), putting it up there with actor Aamir Khan's blog.

The idea for the wildly successful flog (fake blog) flashed in Bengaluru-based software engineer Mukherji's mind, late one night in the week leading up to IPL.

"I thought about how interesting it would be if an IPL insider was giving out stories. I discussed the idea with a friend over GTalk, and we developed the persona of a fringe player in a controversial team (Kolkata Knight Riders), giving out juicy tidbits. And voila! Fake IPL Player was born," says Mukherji in an email interview to Sunday Mid Day.

The cult of a flog
The response was unbelievable. "It spread like a forest fire. I had never experienced the viral impact first-hand. People were talking and tweeting about it, putting the link up on their Facebook status updates and blogs," recalls Mukherji. A book deal wasn't far away.

In March 2010, HarperCollins released his book, The Gamechangers -- written anonymously, of course -- to coincide with the third season of IPL. It was loosely based on the contents of his blog. The book describes the power play and machinations behind the scenes of 'megabucks' cricket. Funnily, the central plot is the chase to unmask a treacherous anonymous blogger who is upsetting the IPL!

"After the blog was put to rest (in March), I used the opportunity to start my writing career. I contacted a couple of publishers through my FIP email address," says Mukherji.

Both responded positively. Eventually, I signed up with HarperCollins because I seemed to share a mental connect with the editor," says Mukherji, who plans to make a career as a writer.u00a0

There's no money, honey
But flogs, even for successful bloggers, aren't exactly money-spinners. Mukherji's inspiration The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs changed the world blog order, way back in 2006. But its writer, Newsweek columnist Dan Lyons, didn't reap rich rewards. "For two years, I was obsessed with trying to turn the blog into a business. I posted 10 or 20 items a day to my site, rarely taking a break. I blogged from cabs, using my BlackBerry. I rationalised this insane behaviour by telling myself that at the end of this rainbow I would find a huge pot of gold.

But reality kept interfering with this fantasy," Lyons wrote to Sunday Mid Day. His first epiphany occurred in August 2007, when The New York Times ran a story revealing his identity, which until then he had kept secret.
On that day more than 500,000 people hit the site FakeSteve.net -- by far the biggest day he had ever had -- and through Google AdSense, he earned about a hundred bucks. Over the course of that entire month, in which his site was visited by 1.5 million people, he earned a total of $1,039.81 (Rs 48,548.73). Soon after this, Lyons struck an advertising deal that paid better wages.

"But I never made enough to quit my day job. I walked away feeling burned out and weighing 20 pounds more than when I started," says Lyons, who confesses to a sneaking suspicion that "while blogs can do many wonderful things, generating huge amounts of money isn't one of them."

New marketing channel
While Lyons and Mukherji created fake personal blogs, companies abroad are using flogs to inspire viral marketing or create an Internet meme that generates traffic and interest in a product.

Businesses frequently misrepresent themselves as consumers in today's consumer-comment driven society. With people choosing everything from toothpaste to home purchases based on consumer feedback, controlling the message has become more important than ever.

One notorious example of such identity cloaking, resulting in a fake blog, was exposed when Edelman, an international public relations firm, created a fake blog in 2006 called Walmarting Across America. It was purportedly written by two Wal-Mart 'enthusiasts' who decided to journey across the US in an RV (recreational vehicle), blogging about the experience as they visited Wal-Marts along the way. While two people actually did travel across the US in an RV, the publicity stunt was revealed to be paid for by Wal-Mart.

In the past, Sony has created a fake 'All I Want for Christmas' blog about a boy who only wanted a PS3 for Christmas. McDonald's created a blog called '4Railways' where 'someone' wrote about their desire to get all four railway cards in the McDonald's monopoly game.

Fake tweeple shock Bollywood
A few days ago, actor Shah Rukh Khan's wife and producer Gauri Khan was shocked to learn that an impersonator was posting tweets in her name, under a fake handle. Upset at the fraudster, her director friend Karan Johar decided to approach Twitter to block the fake. In the past, Twitter fakes have put Twitter-friendly actors Shahid Kapur, Preity Zinta, Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone in a tizzy. Kapur was shocked to learn that the impersonator was posting news about the 28 year-old actor, including the release date of his forthcoming films, and also posted a thank-you note when he was voted Asia's sexiest vegetarian. The updates were so convincing that the account managed to attract over 4,000 followers.

Whether the motivation is fun or profit, fake blogs and Twitter handles are territories best treaded carefully.

Trend forecast
Fake IPL player Anupam Mukherji says that in future, 'fake' blogs will be viewed as satire rather than be taken as seriously as Fake IPL Player was. "Even FIP was supposed to be satirical, never intended to be taken so seriously. More such blogs will come up given that a lot of unknown people in India are good writers with a sense of humour. But, they will all be viewed as satire, fiction rather than fact," he says.

Other paths that the flog is likely to take:
Legal action: The majority of monetary penalties will come from the networks.
Compliance changes: A few mentions of "not actual person" but "paid endorser", "results not typical", would make do.
Credit card and merchant accounts: In a double whammy for the consumer, once you give permission to a company to charge you, it is a lot harder to get them to stop charging you.
Right sizing: Industries like this that grow too fast without any structure must collapse, and then rebuild. That's not necessarily a bad thing, though. Those in it for the right reasons (relatively speaking) will continue to do fine.

The handbook

How to spot a fake Twitter account
1. If the handle is a mixed up spelling of an actor's name that appears to be the name but isn't (for example, DipikaPadukone or Aksh@yKumar) it is almost certainly a fake.
2. If the Twitter account is not linked on the official website of the actor. There is a huge ring of fake Twitter accounts that actually create fake MySpace pages just to link to the fake Twitters.
3. If the Twitter account only links to press photos of themselves and never any personal photos.
4. If the Twitter profile discusses their personal relationships when those relationships are currently big news (for example, if a Kristen Stewart account says 'I am not dating Robert Pattinson').
5. If the Twitter account links to other handles that are obviously fake. Twitter-fakes will make a huge network of poser accounts and have them 'talk' to each other, to make them appear real.
6. If the Twitter talks back to their haters or other posers. Celebrities get rants so often that they usually don't reply.
7. If the account links to things that purport to get you free ringtones or more Twitter followers, they are either fake or hacked.
8. If the account ever links you ads, with no content.

Top fake blog hall of fame
The Secret Journal of Rakesh Jhunjhunwala (rakeshjhunjhunwala.in)
Even if you don't know who Rakesh Jhunjhunwala isu00a0-- the most famous stock market investor in Indiau00a0-- the posts on this anonymous blog will have you in splits. The latest one is an "interview" between Suresh Kalmadi, Jhunjhunwala and the "common man" about the Common Wealth Games.

The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs (FakeSteve.net)
Highly entertaining and witty, this blog written by Newsweek columnist Dan Lyons became a tech industry phenomenon. After it launched in 2006, it quickly became a must-read for anyone intrigued by Apple and its mercurial founder. Lyons played up some of the well-known traits of Jobs and Apple, such as the company's obsession with secrecy, to great comic effect. But he also wrote withering posts about other tech companies from Jobs' point of view, putting in motion a frantic guessing game.

Darth Vader on Twitter (@darthvader)
Get the latest news from Star Wars villain Darth Vader on his Twitter page. Vader logs on regularly and makes hilarious fake comments from his galactic empire. His humour is highly popular among his 2,01,322 followers.

Tom Cruise blog (TomCruiseBlog.blogspot.com)
The blog is so popular that you can also read it in other languages (French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish). You'll find hilarious news and quotes, like the only thing he and Katie had in common at first was that they both loved Tom Cruise.

Newsgroper (.com)
Has celebrity spoof blogs of everyone from Hollywood actors Angelina Jolie and Samuel L Jackson to world leaders Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin to the notorious Osama Bin Laden.

Primetime with Jiminy Glick (ComedyCentral.com/shows/primetime_glick)
Hollywood actor Martin Short's hilarious spoof on a talk show host is sarcastic and acerbic. You'll find guest appearances from people like actor Alec Baldwin, Jon Stewart, Mel Brooks, Ben Stiller and Kathie Lee Gifford. There is even a fake bio for the character Martin Short plays.