ITV

Category: Specials

  • 2nd most significant year in broadcast media history

    2nd most significant year in broadcast media history

    The media space has always been explosive over the past years but this year, in my opinion, has been the second most significant year in the history of media (since the launch of cable TV in the early nineties).

    DTH, though having being launched in 2005/06 really became “noisy” and aggressive this year.

    CAS, though with more than just teething troubles, was finally implemented this year.

    Lastly, one also saw launches or impending launches of channels in the general entertainment space and other important categories and therefore creating more networks other than the 3-4 networks that rule currently. Overall, with the launch of channels, change in the viewership habits and DTH & CAS taking off, the industry has been extremely dynamic.

    Of course, the audience still continues to have limited time now that with a crazy set of choices. Moving forward, this will automatically mean that launching a platform or a channel will be the easiest part of the story. Competing well and sustaining the respective businesses will be the biggest challenge in the coming years. I, for one don’t believe that all new entrants are here for the long term so it will be interesting to see how this space pans out in the next five years and what consolidation of businesses take place.

    With regards to HBO, the channel has been growing year on year and is more than a channel …it is a brand that epitomizes quality Hollywood entertainment. We will continue to offer the best in Hollywood entertainment. However, we too, will need to be mindful of the changing viewing “formats” if you like and the plethora of choices that viewers now have and that will form an important part of our game plan for the next few years.

  • The Year in between 2006 and 2008

    The Year in between 2006 and 2008

    Here’s a year that barely was!

    When someone writes the history of 2007 they will find it difficult to find the right catchphrase to define an odd year.

    People, I’m not going to lie when I say that for me it was a True Generation Year because it made me realise that I had made one of the best decisions of my life. I say one because there are other Best Decision Year status years.

    Leaving the comfort zone was the BIG CALL because at the end of the day, no matter what, it’s not called The Comfort Zone for no reason. It’s called the Comfort Zone because that’s what we strive for all our lives. As a student you’re made to realise that if you work hard you’ll get a Good Job and work for a Good Company and Money isn’t everything! So you study hard , work hard and then finally get a job that you think is cool and you get on with the boss and you continue to strive each day to get promoted and earn that little bit more and so on and so on. Then when you get to the Top you realise that that’s Not the Top and the chase continues. It’s a bit like going on a trek and you’re told that the stopping point is just round the corner and you find that its not. There’s another corner to go round and another and another until you’re completely knackered.

    So when you get to the place where you think it’s the Top you could say that it’s the Comfort Zone you’ve always strived for.

    Not a bad place to be. The view is good, the perks aren’t bad, there’s plenty of challenge and yet there’s the Golf routine and the variety of paid-for overseas jaunts and family holidays, at least twice a year. An expense account that most would kill for and so on. A couple of trips in the corporate jet maybe.

    That’s when the fun starts because there are people who’ll tell you that you should really be doing more with your life and get OUT OF THE COMFORT ZONE. As though the Comfort Zone was a place akin to hell and that you could be doing more interesting things with your time and getting more out of life!

    And the strong willed amongst us take that on board and yet dismiss it and stay put and enjoy The Comfort Zone. (Sounds like a good name for a massage parlour or a nightclub).

    The more Daring, Creative, Energetic, Passionate, Fun loving, Mad ones actually take the BiG CaLL and do it. They quit. And take the plunge into the icy waters of ‘doing your own thing’.

    So for me this was the Generation Year that I took the plunge but I’d never have done it without being pushed by Indrani – my much better half – (and that was an earlier BEST DECISION YEAR) who’s said I was a loser if I didn’t do this and asked me time and again how long I would be a slave to someone and do the ‘yes sir yes sir, 3 bags full sir’ routine.

    I would recommend the’ Icy water jump’ to anyone who’s been doing the 3 bags full routine for any length of time and ask them to rekindle the flame of taking risks.

    The transition from being an entrepreneur to a professional entrepreneur is less exciting I think that going from being a prosessional and doing the transition to becoming an entrepreneur.

    Go for it any day. You can’t imagine how boring life has become until you see the light at the end of the tunnel and after about 3 days you don’t actually miss the corporate jet or the expense account or the rest of it.

    It’s a new start and that’s the key to reinvention.

    There’s another reason for me to call this a BIG DECISION YEAR. That’s because I bought my first computer game – since buying the original Nintendo. This time its the Nintendo Wii and I bought it to play tennis which I’m getting better at and I have reached a score of 500, which I’m told is not so hot as I should be up to 1000+. Turns out I’m a very competitive digital athlete. My daughter whips me in boxing but I get her back at tennis – sometimes. She’s 10.

    It’s also been a year for the I phone which I managed to get working quite early on and found a colleague who could transfer all the data from a Nokia to an Apple. Marvelous what the techy guys can do. Really.

    This was a great year by all accounts for yours truly. No complaints, no regrets and no lack of wonderful goal posts to shoot into. A real BIG DECISION YEAR.

  • ‘Any attempt to gag freedom of media in garb of regulation has to be resisted’

    ‘Any attempt to gag freedom of media in garb of regulation has to be resisted’

    Television news industry was faced with a dilemma and consequently a huge challenge in the year 2007 – content. Numerous questions were raised on the kind of news that was aired on various news channels. And in some quarters a sense prevailed that television news must regulate itself, as there is a limit to shabby content.

    Self-regulation in itself is not bad. But any attempt to gag the freedom of media in the garb of regulation has to be resisted. No doubt, every freedom comes with a sense of responsibility. Barring a few aberrations, media in our country has fulfilled its duty with diligence. Hence any attempt at forced regulation will be counter-productive. As such free press has been the foundation stone of our thriving and vibrant democracy.

    No doubt, television news industry has grown at such a frantic pace, that it has created certain pitfalls. All out efforts in the past year were made to grab viewership. In this mad race, at times content was compromised and true journalism took a back seat. Compounding this malady, mushrooming news channels tended to water down the impact of many meaningful news reports.

    To buttress my point, I would talk about “Operation Kalank” (Aaj tak-Tehelka exposé on connivance of state administration in sheltering and helping the riot accused in 2002). In a normal news environment this news report would have shaken the foundation of governance in Ahmedabad and Delhi both. But the shelf live of this haunting exposé was hardly a few days. It did shake up the intelligentsia and society for a while, but it was not the topic of discussion in most drawing rooms after even a week. Not much changed either. Even though our channels kept the issue alive for a few days, the story didn’t really move forward. And this I presume is largely due to a variety of news being aired by a host of channels.

    Not just “Operation Kalank”, there was a good story on another channel, portraying a major scandal in UP. That exposé showed how police in UP has surpassed all levels of corruption. For as little as Rs 3,000, police officers were acting as contract killers and shooting down people in the name of ‘encounters’. This was not an insignificant story. Rather it was a crucial expose showing the depths of corruption within our police force. Had this story appeared a few years ago, it would have made national headlines and would have been the talking point for a long time. But in today’s circumstances, it vanished from the scene within days and couldn’t even attract print media’s attention.

    Mushrooming news channels watering down impact of meaningful news reports
    _____****_____

    This has to be attributed to the overcrowding in the TV news space, which has reduced the audience attention span. There are so many news items being dished out that your interest in something of importance vanishes swiftly. Rather to retain audience interest many a times too many stories are being splashed, so that the audience doesn’t move away.

    This was not the case, when a handful of established papers and news channels were in operation some years ago. For example, the much highlighted Maya Tyagi rape case, was covered extensively two decades ago. But today, such incidents barely make up for sustained coverage. This is the price of viewership/readership being paid by journalism.

    But, there have been instances where TV news coverage has led an issue being brought to its logical conclusion. This was highlighted during Jessica Lal murder case and Rizwan ur Rehman suicide case. Such stories found news space on all networks for months together. Increasingly an impression has gained momentum that news reports pertaining to the urban upper middle class finds more space on TV than rural issues like farmers suicide. This can be explained by the logic of market forces. Television audience is mostly urban and news pertaining to urban middle class has greater retention value. Hence to cater to its core audience, television lays more emphasis on urban stories.

    Talking of the year 2007, I feel, the audience has changed its choice and appeal. Issues like corruption don’t appeal to viewers anymore. Maybe people have accepted it as an integral part of our society. Therefore an exposé featuring corruption doesn’t interest the audience, to a large extent.

    The problem with television is that it has only one screen and can show only one story at a time. While a newspaper may have more than 30-40 pages and it can publish many news items on one page. Also it has a luxury to have theme based pages like, national, international, sports, business, regional, henceforth. The reader has the choice to read or skip items or even an entire page that does not interest him/her. If a reader doesn’t find a news item or even some pages of the newspaper of his/her interest, he/ she may skip the news item or that particular page, but he/she will not change the newspaper only because some stories were not of his/her interest.

  • News Channels: Sensation-fatigue, government’s attitude and regional channels will decide future content

    So, as one captain of the industry says, if the advertisers stay with the credible, then some channels will die out and TAM would have to ask itself serious questions, or “there will be no place for it in the Indian TV news market”.

    Lastly, come to the Content Code. If anyone feels that the government will wait and wait and not act till the news channels give in their draft, slated for this month end (but one never knows), then it would be foolishness.

    This is a precarious position for the ruling UPA and with Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh going the BJP way, it will be even more circumspect in dealing with the media. And yet, it is after all not the parties in power but the bureaucrats who bring out the pending issues in front of successive new ministers and make them do the things they want.

    Many bureaucrats –not necessarily just the ones in Shastri Bhavan – have suffered due to stings and for many of them, controlling content is important. So electoral concerns may have made Prime Minsiter Manmohan Singh ask I&B minister Priyaranjan Dasmunsi to soft pedal for the moment, but the government will ultimately set up the regulator and the code will be in place. At least, that is what Shastri Bhavan insiders have given us to understand.

    In the year to come, content will be shaped by a few things, of which the first will be the government’s attitude to it and that will largely be patterned on how the news channels behave vis-?-vis the government. They can do some serious work on their own Code and the chances are that the government will accept it, just as it had adopted the ASCI code for advertisement. However, if the attitude of the NBA is to play footsie with the government, they could well kill their own chances of governing themselves, which is the best thing one can wish for.

    The second deciding factor would be what some see as fatigue setting in on sensationalism, which even Naqvi has warned about. The channels themselves are running out of sensational ideas that are new and more importantly, that would last, for all the experiments have at last died, and the pace of mortality of newer ideas is increasing.

    The third will be the government’s position on TAM, and it has warned TAM when the CEO failed to turn up for a Parliamentary Committee meeting in Mumbai at the end of this year. If the government – and in all probability it will, because that is a way of controlling content without talking of the much hated Code imposes certain modes of operation and measures TAM must take for rating channels, it will have a direct impact on content.

    Last but not least, and though it will take some time, is the massive oncoming growth of regional channels and their own niche content that would drive the mainstream channels to do a hard rethink.

    For the moment, the proponents of serious journalism are assured, with IBN 7 seeking relief in the fact that they did touch 14 per cent and are doing better business than rival India TV; NDTV seeing market assurance from the fact of its grossing the second tallest figures, and CNN-IBN as well as NDTV going into the diversification drive emphasising that the serious guys are not about to fall by the wayside.

  • News Channels: Sensation-fatigue, government’s attitude and regional channels will decide future content

    For noted media columnist Shailja Bajpai, her wish-list for 2008 includes cleaning up the news channels and getting back to ‘news as news should be. Or as it was in the olden days of print media and just Doordarshan’.

    The latest entrant in the Hindi news genre, Anuradha Prasad – with her News 24 – could perhaps bring some comfort to Bajpai, as Prasad has positioned her channel as one with the aim of “bringing news back to news”. But that will be one Hindi channel anew with that sort of focus from the beginning, whereas the market is in a high state of flux and for sure, eyeball journalism has been getting a better share in the space.

    A few aspects of news channels are quite married into each other and cannot be discussed separately: the growing number of channels in the genre, the issue of ethical journalism, where the advertising is going, the rating system and the government’s Content Code.

    Interestingly, though channels have taken their respective positions (which some differentiate as the ‘perception route’ Vs the ‘numbers route’), there is a lot of cross talk within the channels themselves, and thus it is that we find a Hindi channel editor talking of values of credible journalism and an English channel editor talking of the ‘robustness of Hindi news’.

    It is a melting pot on the boil and the process is not going to crystallise in the next few months, but overall, there is a sense of a lot of soul churning and of the new, just decade-old industry trying to see where it goes and how it survives – and on which formula.

    An analysis of the market share of the derided-by-some sensational (tabloid?) channels shows they have a consistent high rating, and India TV is a case especially in point, where it has become the No. 3 from a much lesser position.

    So where is the market going? Chintamani Rao, CEO, India TV has been consistent: “We are going where the people are going, that is where the market is.” And he cannot be denied this claim because of the consistent rise in the ratings of his channel.

    The other pointer in the same direction is NDTV 24/7 going FTA after the rolling out of Cas in the three metros, as it was a clear indicator that people were staying away from it if it stayed ‘pay’, despite the ‘ideological’ position of sane, serious and credible journalism.

    Hindi news channel NDTV India, despite sliding sharply on the ratings front since last April, has stuck to its ‘credible’ credo and promises to ‘stay the copurse’.

    NDTV Group CEO Narayan Rao, like his surname-sake Chintamani Rao, is consistent in his opposition to what the latter holds as the winning formula. Narayan Rao had told us during his mid-year statement on Hindi news channels: “It is a short term passing phase. In the long term, for any news channel, it is credibility and authenticity that matters. Whatever the situation is, we never opted to go down a certain route. We still have the same philosophy as we had when we conceived the channel.”

    In between comes CNN-IBN and IBN 7, in English and Hindi respectively. The statements from both Rajdeep Sardesai (Editor-in-chief for the group and directly handling CNN-IBN, and Ashutosh, Managing Editor at IBN 7 echo Narayan Rao on the issue of credibility, but are far more eager to experiment with both content and form.

    IBN 7 has brought some of the best exposes through sting journalism but says it is steering firmly away from sensationalism, whatever the cost. Ashutosh says that if it benefits society at large, he is all for stings, but “why should any politician having illicit sex in a state guest house be considered serious journalism, unless this act is coming in the way of his public functioning?”

    At the same time there is an in internal debate on what to show and for how long, and whether the sensational or even trivial has some place as ‘entertaining information and visuals’ punctuating serious news.

    For instance, one channel was showing a half hour repetitive shot of a lion hugging a man from behind the grills of his cage. The side talk at IBN 7 was, this is an interesting shot and people would like to see it, but IBN 7 would perhaps just have a 10 second take on it.

    This is where the moral debate is rooted in business terms: that eyeballs are important, but some say they will not veer a centimetre to get them, and some say a centimetre is OK if we can restrain ourselves to that. The other view is, of course, eyeballs is everything.

  • ‘TRP chasing has done major damage and it is time we took a call on that’

    ‘TRP chasing has done major damage and it is time we took a call on that’

    I will describe this year as one of the lowest points in Indian TV journalism. This has been the year with the most serious crisis of content. And this year has clearly shown how ratings and TRPs can affect content.

    There is a serious need to look at the ratings system. If the ratings system goes on like this, where it is impacting the kind of content that is defining the channel, then it is a bleak future of TV news journalism.

    This has been a particularly bad year, which is why there has been so much hue and cry and there is so much hostility towards TV news channels. The common man is fed up and everyone is saying that there is no news in TV news channels.

    This has been a particularly bad year, which is why there has been so much hue and cry and there is so much hostility towards TV news channels
    _____****_____

    And in the coming year, there is a dire need for all the editors and proprietors to rethink which direction they will take their channels. And if the only factor is ratings, then we should seriously look into the ratings system. A time will soon come when people will lose faith in the news channels.

    And it is this debate that has given the government the alibi to come out with a Content Code so that they can have control over the news channels. We have given the government the entry to come restrict the freedom of expression.

    That’s one thing. About my own channel, we can say that we were bold enough to stand our ground saying, “Whatever rubbish is going on the other channels, let them do it, but we shall not do that.” I won’t say we have been 100 per cent successful, but very, very successful and I am proud that we are probably the only Hindi news channel that can call itself a news channel.

    We provoked ourselves to get news in the right perspective. We have been aggressive and this has given us excellent results, maybe not in terms of ratings, but in terms of perception. We have severely shaken up the political establishment repeatedly.

    We provoked ourselves to get news in the right perspective. We have been aggressive and this has given us excellent results
    _____****_____

    It was our stories on Maharashtra or Uttar Pradesh that has angered the governments and got Mulayam Singh annoyed with us. After he left, we did excellent reporting on the Mayawati government and they were also very angry with us, which I think is a compliment. This showed that we were not targeting any particular government, and this is why our channel was shut thrice in UP.

    The same thing happened with us in Gujarat also, where we had a tough time. Our channel was shut for about a week when we did the story based on Guajrat Riots expose done by Tehelka..

    We have stood firmly on our feet during these difficult times, and even in terms of ratings also, we have improved vastly. When we started last year, we had six points, and in a year, we doubled that and touched 14 per cent market share, so it is not as if people are not watching news channels. And yet, there is a crisis of content in the news industry as a whole.

    The present ratings system is does not define what is a news channel.

    The problem with TV is that if there is anything dramatic happening, whether it is news or not, people have a tendency to watch that. And a few channels have realised that if they have to improve their ratings, then they have to get that kind of content. It is sex that has become very, very important… it is the gory that has become very, very important…

    In fact, I call them low cost reality channels rather than news channels. People go back home after the whole day and want to see what has happened in India or across the world, but what they see is everything other than news.

  • ‘TRP chasing has done major damage and it is time we took a call on that’

    ‘TRP chasing has done major damage and it is time we took a call on that’

    I t is easy to say that only those channels that got low ratings are criticising the ratings system. But no one can deny that many channels are taking a short cut to improve their ratings not by doing news but something other than news and calling themselves news channels.

    In fact, since we managed to jump from six per cent to 14 per cent of the market share (Hindu TV news space), nobody can say that we are criticising because we failed in that growth. But news cannot compete with low cost reality shows.

    I understand that issues like defence policy or India’s nuclear deal may not be easily understandable for everyone. But in the place of these critical issues, there is someone calling himself a news channel and showing a lion hugging a man from inside the cage, and showing this for hours on end, that is not news. It is, of course, an interesting visual and can be shown for 10 or 12 seconds snippet, but how come that becomes the ‘news’?

    I think the time has come when a line has to be drawn as to who are the news channels. Why are the low cost reality channels eating into the genre of the news channels? If that line is not defined, I think the new TV news channels that are coming up are headed for big trouble. This is because people have started having a very low opinion about news channels.

    What is happening is that in this market of reality TV posing as news, the reporter, the editor or serious journalist is becoming irrelevant, because their coverage is not carried. When the fate of the UP government was being decided, one so-called news channel decided to show only crime or something from the glamour world, which was not news at that point in time, though I am not saying the glamour world does not or should not make news.

    So, this year, in these terms, has been extremely bad, and it has crystallised to the situation that people have become hostile to the news channels. It is has been said that some of the stories could have been concocted, and this is partly right, as some of our stringers realise that these are the interesting visuals and will grab eyeballs, so they sometimes do concoct and sometimes they recreate an entire story.

    No one can deny that many channels are taking a short cut to improve their ratings not by doing news but something other than news and calling themselves news channels
    _____****_____

    Unfortunately, this is happening in a year during which TV channels have done some wonderful work. In fact, some great work. It has seriously posed a challenge to the people in power and exposed them, whether you agree on principle about the sting operations or not. But no one has till date raised a finger against the sting on parliamentarians on the cash-for-query issue.

    But despite all this good work, the whole system of TRP chasing has done major damage and it is time we took a call on that so that this entire positive is not overshadowed by that chase.

    So far as business goes, the main issue is what the advertisers feel they should do: whether they should flock to low cost reality channels with higher TRPs or to those which have a better perception in the market. But this year is a defining one in these terms.

    So far as the trend is concerned, we have seen the big advertisers stay with the respectable channels and there is no definite trend to show that channels getting higher TRP are necessarily getting more revenue. These channels that are doing serious news are getting good business, even if they are number four or five in TRP terms.

    If despite the lower ratings these serious news channels are earning enough revenue to do good business, this so far is a critical point.

    But are the low cost reality channels with higher TRPs getting more revenue, or will they do so? This coming year will show that, whether the advertisers take a ‘perception’ route or a ‘rating’s route.

    If the reality channels start getting revenue in proportion to their market share, then there is no future for serious news in the market

    It is time for the agencies to decide whether a good product should be seen on a respectable channel, or on a channel with higher market share but not such a high reputation, and the decisive battle will be on us this year and the coming months will tell us where the market is going.

    But so far as the industry as a whole is concerned, one major positive thing this year is the coming of the News Broadcasters Association.

    It is because of the NBA that we have been able to send a powerful statement to the government that their content code is not acceptable to us, and despite so much of fragmentation and competition between the various news channels this has happened. I think this is great.

  • ‘Any attempt to gag freedom of media in garb of regulation has to be resisted’

    ‘Any attempt to gag freedom of media in garb of regulation has to be resisted’

    But, television viewer has only one option, to change the channel, if he/she doesn’t find the content interesting. Because TV viewers don’t have the option of skipping the news report and watching something else, as they might do with a newspaper. Therefore, at any given time television will have to put the best possible visuals on air. And it has been observed that if the viewer finds the story interesting, he stays on – else he shifts to another channel. So to stay in the rating game a TV channel has to give such content that makes the viewers stick with it.

    Therefore, the point to be noted is that the content on TV is not being controlled by the content maker, i.e, the journalist, but someone else who has the remote control in his hand. Basically the channel surfers, today decides the content and not an avid news watcher.

    Another observation is that news channels behaved like typical Bollywood producers in 2007. That is, if a certain formula was a hit, it was copied and you had a wave of that formula. Likewise in TV news, first came a wave of family drama, matrimonial discord, violence, divorce… People lapped it up. Once the novelty factor was gone, the audience got bored.

    Then came, ghost stories. So one after another channels started showing horror stories. While this content was very short lived, it was also alleged that some of the news reports were concocted. There might be some truth in these allegations, too. Just as it was proved in the Uma Khurana case (where a school teacher from Delhi was made a victim of a fake sting operation). Stories such as these do dent the credibility of the media, but the damage is limited.

    After ghost stories, came the Baba wave. Followed by amazing videos. This was a completely new phenomenon. In these videos, channels showed people doing crazy things. But finally this too seems to be nearing its end.

    Hence I believe that classical news will perhaps never die. Because, it is truly “new”, everyday. It’s unique and touches society. So amazing videos, Baba syndrome, ghost stories are fading in comparison to real news.

    This realisation is both internally generated and induced. Induced, as the government is considering a Broadcast Bill. Yet the handling of the bill raises many questions.

    I have stated earlier – freedom of press comes with some responsibilities. This freedom is critical for nation building. But freedom does not mean anarchy. It is necessary to give deep thought to what impact certain news will have on society. Then why are we opposing the Broadcast Bill? Because when the draft bill was brought out, it became very clear that the government wanted to bring in such a mechanism which can gag the media.

    Amazing videos, Baba syndrome, ghost stories are fading in comparison to real news
    _____****_____

    I strongly feel that self regulation is the need of the hour and to achieve this, we need a truly independent and free media body, with a transparent method of electing its members, which is funded by the media, runs its own independent office, and has some powers to deal with channels that flout guidelines. Currently this responsibility has been undertaken by the News Broadcasters Association, which has brought together editors of all news networks to work on the industry’s content code.

    But one thing is clear. Government can’t gag the media and any ‘regulation mechanism’ which is in the hands of bureaucrats or any such body which is directly or indirectly controlled by the government in any way is not acceptable to us.

    Coming to the issue of the media concentrating on the urban scenario and not doing ‘real’ stories – the rural stories… I do not think this will change vastly. Media will naturally give content that is relevant to the market it addresses. And it is that market which will assess its success or failure. Similarly, the channels will also modify their content as per the market’s needs and response, for instance, it would have been noticed that business content has vanished from most general news channels. While stock market has been hitting the roof, audiences prefer to watch business news channels for this news rather than general news channels. Hence most Hindi news networks did away with their business news bulletins.

    The changed economic reality has tremendously impacted the middle class psyche. Therefore the middle class does not relate to issues that they used to be concerned with a few years ago. So the content mix today cannot be the same as it was a decade ago. The viewer today is different. Plus, we have more than 50 per cent of our population below the age group of 25. Needless to say their taste and psyche is different and this changed reality today dictates the media’s content mix. We found this change quite apparent when Headlines Today showed the wedding of Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachchan. Though it may be termed routine coverage, during these two or three hours, Headlines Today reigned supreme, all other English news channels paled in comparison.

    This changed content mix has dominated Hindi news for a while and we should accept the fact that it is here to stay. Similar will be the scene among English language news channels also, with the growth in audience base. So now we have to cast a new dye for moulding this new content. In today’s world, both technology and market are driving content – just as mobile phones have changed telephony, and sms has changed English.

    As for our channels, it is extremely satisfying that we have retained the number one position despite a virtual dogfight in the TV news market. We are proud to present balanced news content. Though this is a remarkable achievement for Aaj Tak, we are aware of the challenges ahead. A number of new channels coming in the fray and with a growing audience base, it will be our effort to retain our number one position – both in terms of content perfection and market share.

  • Adieu, eventful ’07!

    Adieu, eventful ’07!

    Man, it’s been an eventful year if you have been faithfully stuck to the couch lapping up everything offered on the tube.

    So much happened on the telly, and yet, so little was achieved. There was an average of a new soap every fortnight, an average of a talent hunt every month, and enough of cricket and cinema buzz to get those sticky eyeballs. But if cinema left a Chak De India or a Taare Zameen Par for audiences to ruminate on, TV this year left no equivalent imprint.

    Not many shows experimented, preferring the formula to being the first in
    the fray. So, Star One’s Laughter Challenge spawned a sequel and rival
    channels floated their me-too shows. Gajendra Singh carried his music
    talent format to Star Plus, and had to compete with his own Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenges on Zee for the ratings. Indian Idol had a tired season three,
    and Zee’s extended family of Betiyaan and Bahuraniyan, despite a
    ‘different’ beginning, dissolved into modified versions of Ekta Kapoor’s
    popular soaps elswhere. If anyone, it was Shah Rukh Khan who emerged as the surprise winner of the lot. No one expected Khan to be a patch on the Big B when it came to hosting Kaun Banega Crorepati, but Khan emerged with a style and spontaneity of his own that became endearing as the show progressed through the weeks. When the season ended, one was almost sorry to see him off.

    Well, not everyone stuck to the formula. Smriti Iraani, the actor, turned
    producer with Thodi Si Zameen Thoda Sa Aasman and later Virrudh. Interestingly, although neither show was meant to be a TRP hogger, both had a hard hitting plot, strong performances and made a subtle statement on society. Anurag Basu’s Love Story and Four, both on Sab, too were intended similarly, but somehow missed the mark. Unfortunately, all the experimentation seemed to miss the comedy genre entirely, with Star One finally relying on last year’s Sarabhai vs Sarabhai to bring on the smiles at primetime.

    All the laughter was restricted to stand-up gags offered by Raju Shrivastav (who must have been TV’s top grosser this year) and others of his ilk who appeared with alarming regularity on mainstream channels as well as news channels. Sab’s desperate effort to bring on the laughter each night failed for the umpteenth time, but it keeps trying. News channels, meanwhile, found this year that the best bet to fill up programming is to run repeats of talent hunts and behind-the-scenes goings-on at these shows. Under the garb of ‘entertainment news,’ hours of Hindi news channels continued to be chock full of idols, voices of India and the chhote ustaads all through the day.

    Even as long running soaps continued to run – Saarthi, Kumkum, Kyunki…,
    Kahaani…are examples – a milestone of sorts was reached when the ‘bahu’ of Indian TV (Smriti Iraani for the uninitiated) crossed over into enemy territory as Vrinda on Zee’s Teen Bahuraniyan. Not just that, she came armed with a tulsi plant and a similar agenda – of saving the daughters of
    the family and salvaging the family’s reputation. Ekta’s long shadow on television programming refuses to fade.

    But the year clearly belonged to the genre of the music talent hunt. If you
    had half a voice and wanted to be discovered, TV was waiting for you.
    Whether you knew the lyrics (Bol Baby Bol), were a kid that could sing (Lil
    Champs    , Chhote Ustaad) or were an amateur singer (Indian Idol, Voice of India, Bathroom Singer…) TV was waiting with auditions in remote towns to find you. Of course, even if you were a wellknown composer or playback singer, or even a TV actor with pretensions to singing, but had never had your share of the limelight, you stood an excellent chance of turning into a mini celeb yourself. Ask Vishal – Shekhar, Abhijeet, Ismail Durbar, Alisha, Shiamak Davar and the rest who never had it so good as this year.

    But if anything marred the happiness of the couch potato, it was the unending film promotions that invaded everything on TV – the talent hunts, the soaps and the news and music channels. The marketing of Om Shanti Om and Saawariya on TV reached a screeching crescendo in November, till
    viewers’ ears ached from listening to ‘Dard e Disco’ and watching Ranbir Kapoor drop his towel for the umpteenth time.

    Also irritating was the omnipresence of judge/mentors like Javed Akhtar and Mahesh Bhatt, who judged shows, voiced their opinions on every subject and were probably present at every award show that was aired on TV.

    But couch potato’s vote of the year goes to Rakhi Sawant, who has
    established herself as the queen bee of Indian TV, by hook or by crook. With her antics, her tears and tantrums and her comments, the ‘item girl’ showed us that it was easy to get into primetime, if you knew how to tease the camera and tempt the channels. Lage raho, Rakhi!

  • Radio industry in 2007 – an overview

    Radio industry in 2007 – an overview

    over the past two years the radio industry has moved beyond AIR with private FM stations lapping up the airwaves. The three policy initiatives from the Government — migration to a revenue-sharing regime, allowing foreign direct investment upto 20 per cent and opening up the sector to 91 more cities by issuing 338 licenses’ to private players — have aided this growth tremendously. FM Phase II saw as many as 245 more stations bagging licenses’, most of which went up this year. Phase II has provided a fresh lease of life to the radio industry and has really taken the medium to the next level. Things only look better from here, given the way this has helped new stations to come in, the existing and serious players to organise more and convert radio into a revenue making option.

    Year 2007 for the radio industry was the year of expansion. The radio industry is growing immensely and also doing very well, the number of people listening to radio each day has also increased, hence acknowledging this as the local medium of communication. The recent RAM results that were out recently proved how well the industry is doing. Spends on radio have definitely gone up and radio today, is the most cost-effective medium. Radio is becoming an important part of the advertisers advertising mix. The future will see more advertisers coming on board…

    RAM (radio audience measurement)
    Radio listenership measurement is a critical aspect to the industry, the emphasis being on ‘timely’ measurement and not just dated results that come in over three to six months. The radio category needs to grow to where it deserves and with the RAM coming in, it is a move in the right direction. What is measured is what is bought and RAM has worked extremely well for the radio industry.

    BIG 92.7 FM in 2007
    The year 2007 has been excellent for BIG 92.7 FM; the stations for phase II were rolled out, as we stand as a 42 station strong network today, spread across the length and the breadth of the country. The fastest rollout of stations among all players and making us the biggest radio network in the country. As per figures released BIG 92.7 FM is the No. 1 choice of listeners in Bangalore across all parameters – including reach, share and TARP. In Mumbai, it is the highest reached station, while in Delhi; it is the No. 2 station among 12-34 year old, SEC ABC listeners. BIG 92.7 FM will see expansion of our network in 2008; more stations will be added to our network as Govt. opens up more licenses.

    The numbers are looking very good especially given that BIG 92.7 FM is just about a year old. It reaffirms our positioning and content strategy which has helped the brand stand out in the cluttered environment. With competition heating up among brands, ‘differentiation’ is the key and we have managed to stand out with our ‘listener focused’ positioning of Life Banao as well as our distinct music.

    Next on BIG’s radar –
    ” The goal is to increase the size of radio’s share of the advertising pie from 3 per centto 7 per cent over the next three years.
    ” Consolidate post our launches and ensure sustained leadership in all our stations
    ” Digital integration with radio – more emphasis on our web portal, podcasting, internet driven interactivity etc

    Key landmarks / events:
    Year 2007 has been an eventful year for BIG 92.7 FM, and has certainly lived upto to its brand line of ‘Suno Sunao, Life Banao’.

    A combination of large national properties and hyperlocal content helped us grow rapidly in a sort span of time. BIG 92.7 FM has always believed in innovation in content and marketing. We launched a unique challenge & contest done for the first time ever on radio in association with Hyundai i10 called ‘Chipak Ke Jeeto’ which is the biggest endurance test to be held across key metros wherein the person who touches the car for the longest time walks away with a brand new Hyundai i10 car! The ‘Sabse BIG Diwali’ campaign with ICICI bank credit cards was launched with much fanfare- offered discounts from 9.27 per cent to 92.7 per cent on various products. Tied up various NGOs’ across the country and hosted the ‘Sabse BIG Diwali’ party with the senior citizens.

    The year 2007 also saw BIG 92.7 FM radio partnering for some of the biggest banner movies and TV shows like Ta Ra Rum Pum, Jhoom Baraabar Jhoom, Cash, Saawariya, Nach Baliye 3, Sa Re Ga Ma Pa, Jhoom India, while also entering into a strategic partnership with the Indian Television academy for the ‘ITA 7th Annual Indian Television Academy Awards’. BIG 92.7 FM also roped in the iconic Raju Shrivastav and escalated the humor quotient of the station – BIG RJ Raju Shrivastav provided listeners their daily dose of Raju Shrivastav jokes every morning on the breakfast show across the country.

    We pioneered the coverage of sporting events on radio with the award winning coverage of the PHL, ICC tournament and the T-20 World Cup. For the first time ever, BIG FM brought on radio, eminent personalities like Harsha Bhogle and Shekhar Suman, Kris Srikkanth and Mandira Bedi, which created a new and exciting experience for listeners across the country.

    Speculations for the year 2008
    The Indian radio sector is poised to become a Rs 1,200-crore industry by 2010, according to a study conducted by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry and PricewaterhouseCoopers.

    With the majority of licenses in Phase II going operational by the end of this year, 2008 is going to be a very good year for Radio; the industry will experience dramatic expansion in its listener base leading to significant growth in business. 2008 will be the Tipping Point for the radio industry.

    We hope that news and current affairs will be opened for private radio broadcasters. In the event this does happen, this will lead to a new wave of growth for radio in 2008.

    For BIG 92.7 FM, listeners are going to be witnessing far more exciting and interesting radio activity. Our initiatives will focus on creating more relevant and innovative content for our listeners, tapping into new trends and insights we observe among the youth.

    So stay tuned and Suno Sunao, Life Banao!