The Gupians Gang!!! – My virtual friend circle on Twitter?

Twitter is one of the most amazing mediums of communication in the world. It is vastly different from Facebook, Orkut and various other social networking websites on the basic premise that it helps to connect to people ranging from Shashi Tharoor to your own classmate. The world is a person’s audience. I won’t go further into Twitter’s uses, importance and all that as many of my blog posts I have dealt with that earlier.

To remind many of my readers I had written a short story on Twitter for a book recently. Though it got rejected due to various reasons, I put it up on my blog for the world at large to read it and give their views / reviews. Needless to say, some of the comments were good, some bad and many didn’t care. The story dealt with the life of four individuals from different walks of life (a mother, a youngster, a singer and a journalist) and how they connect with each other through the medium of Twitter. Though many felt that it was something which couldn’t happen, I knew and had a feeling that this is something which is really possible with Twitter in the future.

The links to the story (In 3 parts) for those who haven’t read it: –

http://aseemrastogi2.wordpress.com/2010/09/14/virtual-rendezvous-part-i/

http://aseemrastogi2.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/virtual-rendezvous-part-ii/

http://aseemrastogi2.wordpress.com/2010/09/18/virtual-rendezvous-part-iii-of-iii/

I have connected to a lot of people such as students, executives, young professionals etc. through Twitter. But until the formation of the “GUPIAN GANG”, I hadn’t ever in my life been part of a virtual friend circle. So what is the “GUPIAN GANG”?

First the members: –

Follow Gupians on Twitter:

Viral Dholakia – LegRj (Entrepreneur / Writer) – The biggest fan of Rajnikant ever and the one who guided me to write on Trakin – Pune’s No 1 technology and business blogs!

Rajeev Srivastava – Rzzev (Working in the fashion industry) – My first friend on Twitter!

Kartik Jain – _stoic_ (Working in the software industry) – The Database Head in a company in Pune, from UP and MP partially both 😉

Lata Singh – TheMasakkali (IT industry) – HR Consultant and the only female in the group

Sanjay Pratyush – sanj_pratyush – Settled in Bangalore

Aseem Rastogi – aseemrastogi2 (MBA student) – That’s me!

Bhavik Shah – TheAngrezJailer (Completed B.Tech) – One of the most funny guys I have come across on Twitter. About to start working.

Chirag Jethmalani – CJethmalani (Founder of squamble.com) 20 | Finance Buff | Blogger | Traveller | Value Investor | In Constant search for Gyan (Waah kya bio hai!

Jinesh – jinesh007 (Student of Animation) – As his bio says! I am a wanderer on this planet

Anmol Chawla – want_beer – A relatively new entrant

The name “GUPIAN GANG” was given by the leader of the group – Viral (Gupians from “Gups” – Guys!). So what does the Gupian Gang do?

The gang came into existence from jokes on Rajnikant with the hashtag #LegendofRajni and then followed with #LuckyAli and then the GupianQuiz #GQ. Now its about wishing each other in the morning / evening / afternoon, asking about daily activities and basically discussing about anything under the sun. We also created a Facebook Fan page for the group: –

http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/The-Gupians-Awesomeness-Redefined/161337623889066

The group is turning into somewhat of a virtual friend circle. And the most interesting part is that all the members are from different backgrounds and are in their early or late 20s.

So where does the Gupian Gang go from here on? Some of my suggestions (You are free to add on!!): –

– Building up opinion on causes / issues which affect us Indians (such as CWG)
– Giving support in terms of retweets for different causes
– Basically becoming a group of friends who support each other, joke around, have fun and also fight and tweet for causes

I know it all sounds too much. Why would anyone want to waste time on Twitter doing this and instead do more meaningful things? But think again. If this really happens, wouldn’t it be something of an example?

All the members who have not read the story, do check out. And tell me. Isn’t this a case of real life mirroring the written word?