When Shammi Kapoor Asked ‘Netizens’ Back Then To Stop Being H*rny, Was One Of The Very First Users Of Internet In India
Shammi Kapoor has appeared in a variety of Bollywood films back in the day and the list includes classics like Teesri Manzil and Junglee, amongst others.
Did You Know Shammi Kapoor Was One Of The Pioneers Of Internet In India? Deets Inside(Photo Credit–wikimedia)
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Shammi Kapoor is one of the most celebrated actors of the film industry who has played a huge role in bringing up Bollywood to where it is today. The actor has always been much-loved amongst the masses not only for his authentic acting skills but also for his sweet and lovable personality. However, did you know that this Kapoor even had a key role to play in the internet movement at a time when most people were utterly unaware of what the internet even is.
For the unversed, Shammi Kapoor has appeared in a variety of Bollywood films back in the day and the list includes classics like Teesri Manzil and Junglee, amongst others. He was last seen playing a small yet key role in the Ranbir Kapoor starrer Rockstar before passing away in 2011 and the movie is considered one of the cult classics even today.
Not many people are aware that apart from being one of the most celebrated actors of India, Shammi Kapoor was also a pioneer of the internet in the country. Kanakasabapathy Pandyan, who was also a huge part of the revolution, had previously mentioned the whole story according to a report by Mint and this fact was also recently highlighted by a Twitter user.
“He (Shammi Kapoor) was the founder & chairman of the Internet Users Club of India. I can’t wrap my head around how someone like Shammi Kapoor was in the thick of the internet movement in India?”, the thread said.
#TIL that Shammi Kapoor was one of the first users of the Internet in India
He was the founder & chairman of the Internet Users Club of India. I can't wrap my head around how someone like Shammi Kapoor was in the thick of the internet movement in India?
I found this dead website https://t.co/dRGGDDIxFH on the Internet Archive. It was one of the first domains with a ".co.in" TLD.
It was owned by this guy: Miheer Mafatlal and it hosted the IUCI webpage. As tech people stereotypes go, he sure does look the part. pic.twitter.com/hhWkORsaAE
“I found this dead website https://mafatlal.co.in on the Internet Archive. It was one of the first domains with a “.co.in” TLD. It was owned by this guy: Miheer Mafatlal and it hosted the IUCI webpage. As tech people stereotypes go, he sure does look the part.”
This is how one of India's first independent and private websites looked like.
The elaborate email sent by the members of IUCI even mentions how rightfully they dealt with trolls and hate comments at that time. Shammi Kapoor and others had a plan to expose any and everyone who was behaving inappropriately on TalkCity and threatened to shame them publicly on a forum called ‘Page of Shame’ if they were caught. The mail also made it clear that there will be no exceptions to the rule.
The same tweet pointed out how the internet had to be made a safer place and hence an email was written ‘asking Indians in way too many words to basically be less h*rny on “CityTalk” – an IRC server from that time.’
Shammi Kapoor and his internet club were also the self-proclaimed gatekeepers of the Indian internet culture.
For instance, check this email sent by Shammi Kapoor, asking Indians in way too many words to basically be less horny on "CityTalk" – an IRC server from that time. pic.twitter.com/UnetySugSx
It was also highlighted how Shammi Kapoor had a web page of his own and was a blogger even before it was a thing. He had a great vision and it is so fascinating to live it years later.
I'm still fascinated by how Shammi Kapoor, of all people, was at the helm of all of this. He had a cute personal website too. According to him, he learnt all the coding and designing himself.
Tbh, this has more character and creativity than some of the personal websites of today pic.twitter.com/PchEbsBQte
He was into writing online as well and this was even before "blog" was even a term. Read this wild excerpt from a very random post about Librans being very accident-prone (??) pic.twitter.com/OIBE0FMIyA
