Category: Technology

MUMBAI: BBC Worldwide Channels may have decided to retreat two of its channels, CBeebies and BBC Entertainment, from India but in Poland it is expanding the distribution of these channels.

The BBC channel portfolio consisting of BBC Entertainment, BBC Lifestyle, BBC Knowledge and CBeebies will be available on DTH platform Cyfrowy Polsat in Poland later this month.

The inclusion of the BBC channels on the Cyfrowy Polsat platform will mean that the BBC‘s thematic channels are available on all major DTH platforms, cable and IPTV providers in Poland, growing the reach of the channel portfolio to an increasing number of Polish households.

The exact date of launch and package for the SD channels will be revealed in due course. They will join BBC HD which has been available on the platform in the Extra HD package since 1 February 2012.

As part of this new agreement, the responsibility for advertising sales for the BBC channel portfolio will also move to Polsat Media sales from 1 January 2013.

BBC Worldwide Channels senior VP, GM Europe, Middle East and Africa Ian McDonough said, “I am thrilled to announce our new agreement with Cyfrowy Polsat which will see the launch of our full channel portfolio to the platform. With the opening of a local office in Warsaw and a dedicated team on the ground lead by Jacek Koskowski, we are confident that we can provide the very best exclusive and original programming from the UK and are uniquely positioned to provide global TV moments to our growing Polish audience. I am also pleased to announce our partnership with Polsat Media who will represent us in selling advertising on our channels to the Polish market.”

Cyfrowy Polsat president Dominik Libicki said, “I look forward to each new opportunity to enrich our offering and provide our subscribers with attractive television content. The four themed channels will be accompanied by BBC HD which our subscribers have had access to since February this year. I believe that the audience will appreciate the content from a World renowned broadcaster such as the BBC”

Highlights for the channels over the coming months include:

Top Gear‘s Richard Hammond returns to BBC Knowledge in November with the exclusive second series of Crash Course where the presenter exits the driver‘s seat and leaves his comfort zone, trading monstrous machines for the most daring and distinctive jobs. Richard will also host Top Gear: 50 Years of James Bond Cars featuring cars from the iconic series of British films this November, exclusively to the channel.

On BBC Entertainment, the hit global TV format Come Dine With Me returns with even more drama, cookery mishaps and conflict as contestants battle it out to be crowned the UK‘s ultimate dinner party host. There are more tears of joy and dramatic home transformations as Ty Pennington and his team of experts change homes and lives in Extreme Makeover Home Edition.

UK Chef Nigella Lawson comes to BBC Lifestyle in the New Year with Nigellissima – a new series inspired by her love of Italy and Italian cuisine, and 10 Years Younger New Zealand transforms and revives people who look somewhat older than their years through an extensive makeover process.

Little learners can also look forward to a new series of ‘Baby Jake‘ as he sets off once more to enchanting imaginary worlds and more musical treats from Zingzillas on CBeebies.
The BBC thematic channels are also available in Poland via n and Cyfra + platforms in addition to UPC Polska, Vectra and other cable operators.

NEW DELHI: The Allahabad High Court‘s Lucknow branch has directed the Department of Information Technology and Department of Technology to ensure that websites like Google, Twitter, Facebook and Yahoo fully comply with Rules 3 and 11 of the Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules, 2011.

The bench of Justice Uma Nath Singh and Justice V K Dixit issued the direction on a petition by IPS officer Amitabh Thakur and social activist Nutan Thakur.

Rule 3 requires web service providers to specify the matters which cannot be uploaded or transmitted through them, while Rule 11 makes it incumbent on them to publish the names of their grievance officers and their contact details on their website.

The petitioners had earlier filed a petition in the same matter and on 9 May 2012, Justice Devi Prasad Singh and Justice Saeed Uz-zaman Siddiqui had ordered for complete compliance of the two rules. The petitioners filed this second petition because the earlier order was not being adhered to by the web service providers.

MUMBAI: Sports broadcaster ESPN Star Sports has threatened to stop signals to Zee Group-owned DTH operator Dish TV for failing to renew its agreement.

ESPN Software India, the India subsidiary of ESS, had on Monday issued a public notice saying that Dish TV subscribers will stop receiving ESPN, Star Sports and Star Cricket 21 days from the notice if the operator fails to renew agreement.

“This is to inform subscribers of Dish TV India that ESPN, Star Sports and Star Cricket services are liable for de-activation after expiry of 21 days due to non-signing of agreement, illegal provisioning/retransmission of services and breach of applicable regulations including reporting requirements,” the notice read.
 
ESS will be the home of all the cricketing for next six months beginning with India-England followed India-Pakistan and India-Australia.

MUMBAI: Bharti Airtel‘s direct-to-home (DTH) television arm Airtel digital TV has swung back into operating profit after posting a loss in the fiscal-first quarter, while its net subscriber addition in the second quarter dropped substantially.

Airtel digital had slipped into operating loss in the first quarter as it made net addition of 172,000 subscribers, after four straight quarters of operating profit. In the second quarter this year, its net subscriber addition was 55,000.

Airtel digital‘s operating profit in the second quarter was Rs 33 million against operating loss of Rs 23 million in the previous quarter. The operating profit in the second quarter was, however, down 72 per cent from Rs 116 million a year earlier.

The company also narrowed its net loss in the second quarter to Rs 2.42 billion from Rs 2.19 billion a quarter earlier. Its net loss in the second quarter of previous year was Rs 1.55 billion.

The company‘s revenue grew 7.67 per cent to Rs 3.93 billion in the second quarter from Rs 3.65 billion in the preceding quarter. On year-on-year basis, the company‘s revenues grew 26 per cent from Rs 3.13 billion.

The company‘s total subscriber base grew one per cent to 7.45 million from 7.4 million at the end of the first quarter. The subscriber base is up 12.7 per cent from 6.61 million a year earlier.

Airtel digital‘s average revenue per use (ARPU) rose 6 per cent to Rs 177 in the second quarter from Rs 166. Its monthly churn in subscriber base in the second quarter rose to 1.9 per cent from 1.7 per cent in the previous quarter.

The DTH service provider says it is the first company in India to provide real integration of all the three screens — television, mobile and computer — enabling its customers to record their favourite TV programmes through mobile and web. Airtel digital offers a total of 304 channels including 15 HD channels and 5 interactive services.

The company‘s capital expenditure almost halved to Rs 1.63 billion from Rs 3.24 billion in the first quarter. Its capex in the first quarter was 37 per cent lower than Rs 2.61 billion a year earlier.

As on 30 September, Airtel digital‘s cumulative investments were Rs 37.87 billion.

MUMBAI: Chinese Internet television company Youku Tudou has signed an agreement with Sony Pictures Television (SPT) to bring more than 300 new and classic Sony Pictures titles to the Youku Premium platform.

The five-year Sony Pictures Television deal comes on the heels of previous Youku Tudou agreements with WB, DreamWorks, Paramount, Twentieth Century Fox, Disney, NBC Universal, and Lionsgate, rounding out the company‘s offerings to include licensed content from all major Hollywood studios.

300 Sony Pictures titles will become available for paid on-demand viewing over the duration of the agreement, including classic titles like Groundhog Day, Bram Stoker‘s Dracula, and Sense and Sensibility, as well as such critically acclaimed titles as The Fisher King and Across the Universe. Sony Pictures Television will also make newer films available including, Men in Black 3, The Amazing Spider-Man, and 21 Jump Street.

Youku updated its Youku Premium subscription system on August 23 to offer subscribers ad-free access to all videos on Youku‘s platform, plus 50 per cent off on-demand film and TV viewing through Youku Premium.

The VIP membership tier additionally offers unlimited viewing of films covered by monthly subscription licensing agreements. More than 3,000 film titles, including around 450 titles from major Hollywood studios, will be available for viewing by the end of 2012.

Youku Tudou VP movie operations and corporate development Huilong Zhu said,”We‘re delighted to be working with Sony Pictures Television to enrich our film library. Since launching Youku Premium in 2010, Youku Tudou has been committed to building the best platform for viewers and copyright holders alike, and our strong working relationships with all eight major Hollywood studios allow us to offer our viewers a wealth of licensed content.

Subscriber growth for Youku Premium has exceeded our expectations, and we see it as a sign that Chinese audiences are willing and eager to pay for quality content. By providing a wide range of payment and subscription options, Youku Tudou has made it as simple as possible for them to do so.”

After first experimenting with paid viewing for a live broadcast of comedian Guo Degang‘s show in August 2009, Youku debuted Youku Premium (http://yuanxian.youku.com) in beta in late 2010, offering ad-free, high-resolution premium content on a paid on-demand and subscription-based basis.

China‘s first premium video platform, Youku Premium has approximately two million paid users. Youku Premium combines compelling content offerings from Chinese and international rights-holders with a number of quick, easy payment options, while offering rights-holders a range of options for making content available, including paid on-demand viewing, free ad-supported viewing, or viewing through paid subscriptions.

MUMBAI: Rediff.com India Limited, India‘s leading online provider of news, information, communication, entertainment and shopping services, has launched its Realtime News App for Microsoft‘s latest operating system, Windows 8.

The launch marks the company‘s continued efforts to innovate the delivery of information to users across multiple devices and technology platforms, and extend its leadership in the online news marketplace.

Rediff‘s Realtime News App now brings India as it happens to the new generation of touch screen devices and laptops powered by the Windows 8 operating system. The user interface conforms to the Metro UX style of the Windows 8 platform, thus enabling a seamless experience while browsing the app for news.

With the latest headlines and top stories visible at a glance, users now have a better sense of what is happening at that moment across 30,000 Indian and International publications. Users can simply swipe and touch their surface tablets or enjoy the desktop version of the app.

The top stories are presented in an image-rich, tiled view organized into six categories of Top News, World News, Entertainment, Business, Cricket and Sports. Choosing a category tile takes the user to the top stories in that category. The top stories are consolidated by clustering all the available news articles in that category. Selecting a story takes the user to the full article on the original news source.

Additionally, readers can share articles with their family, friends and colleagues using the Windows 8 Share charm, without leaving the application they are currently using. Windows 8 live tile notifications keep the user updated with the latest headlines that are being published, even when the app is not fired up. The app conforms to the snapped view of Windows 8 thus enabling the user to follow news while doing other things on the device.

Rediff.com India Chairman and CEO Ajit Balakrishnan stated, “We believe the large scale adoption of broadband on PC and mobile devices in India is imminent and we continue to focus on our vision and strategy of positioning Rediff for the anticipated explosion of growth. The development of our applications, specifically for the Realtime News service, is a deliberate step in that direction.”

MUMBAI: SNL Kagan has updated its industry retransmission fee projections and now expects that US TV station owners‘ retransmission fee revenues could reach $5.50 billion by 2017 and eclipse $6 billion by 2018, versus the $2.36 billion projected for 2012 .

These projections are higher than those in the November 2011 forecast, when the company had projected that retrans fees would reach $4.86 billion by 2017. The increased projections are due to the success of a wider range of TV station owners in securing sequentially higher retrans fees from multichannel operators over the last year of negotiated deals.

By 2015 that $4.28 billion approaches 10 per cent of the total $43.0 billion that multichannel operators are projected to pay in affiliate fees to basic cable and regional sports networks. SNL Kagan analysis indicates that by 2018, the projected $6.05 billion of retrans revenues would be approximately 23 per cent of the expected $26.2 billion in TV station ad revenues.

SNL Kagan projects that by 2018 the average fee paid per TV station will be slightly less than $1.00, while each multichannel subscriber will be responsible for aggregate retrans fee revenue of $4.86 per sub per month.

For all five major broadcast networks combined in 2015, multichannel providers are expected to pay $3.49 per month, or an average retrans fee of 74 cents per TV station per month, which is significantly below the $6.37 per sub per month that multichannel providers are projected to pay for ESPN, $1.50/sub/month for TNT or the $1.49 sub/month for NFL Network.

SNL Kagan is a resource for financial intelligence in the media and communications sector, including the broadcasting, cable, entertainment, motion picture, telecom, wireless, satellite, publishing and new media industries.

MUMBAI: Fox Movies Premium (FMP), Star Chinese Movies (SCM) and Hong Kong platform now TV have joined forces to bring to viewers a better premium movie channel experience through the introduction of a new and exclusive Play service.

now TV customers will be able to access the Fox Movies Play and SCM Play platform through the now Player website (nowplayer.now.com) and a “now ID” to catch up with their favourite content on FMP and SCM anytime, anywhere.

Bringing FMP & SCM Wherever They Go Online: With the Fox Movies Play and SCM Play services, now TV subscribers who subscribe to FMP and SCM, will have free online access to watch FMP and SCM premium content a day after its screening on the channel. Now, no matter where viewers are – whether at home or on-the-go – they will be able to watch their favourite programmes, including Hollywood and Chinese blockbusters and concerts, on the online now Player.

Fox International Channels VP territory head Hong Kong Rajesh Sheshadri said, “FMP and SCM‘s viewer-centric approach strives to keep viewers ahead of the entertainment curve by offering leading content and first-and-exclusive rights along with features and services that enhance the premium TV experience. We are pleased to partner with now TV for the introduction of Fox Movies Play and SCM Play service, so that viewers can watch their favorite programmes anytime, anywhere.”

PCCW senior VP of TV, media Mamie Leung said, “Being the largest pay-TV operator in Hong Kong, now TV is committed to bringing the best viewing experience to our customers. Through now Player, viewers already can enjoy a variety of now TV‘s self-produced channels, including news, entertainment and sports content on multi-screens. The addition of exclusive Fox Movies Play and SCM Play further enhances the exciting content lineup of now Player.”

Enhancing the Home Watching Experience with HD & SVOD:
In addition to the new Play service, FMP, SCM and now TV has further enhanced the viewing experience by providing High Definition channels and Subscription Video-on-Demand (SVOD) services via now Select. This means that viewers can be assured of the best visual quality of FMP and SCM programmes at home.

Providing Access to Hollywood Like No One Else:
As Hong Kong is one of the top destinations in Asia for all things Hollywood, now TV viewers of FMP will continue to get access to their beloved blockbusters as well as the hottest series, live UFC fights and special events, concerts and award-winning documentaries.

Giving viewers Chinese content: SCM will continue to offer viewers Chinese blockbuster movies, live events, concerts and award-winning documentaries they have come to expect from the channel.

MUMBAI: Colors has launched a Bigg Boss application on Android and IOS platforms enabling viewers 24×7 Live access into the Bigg Boss House.

The initiative comes within two weeks from the launch of the offline activity – Bigg Boss Tours that gave viewers a paid tour of the Bigg Boss House.

With the Bigg Boss app, Colors aims to reach out to the tech savvy, entertainment seeking viewers.

The application, developed by InTime Media, offers features that include Live updates, Quiz and polls, unseen videos from the BiggBoss house and option to post on Facebook and Twitter.

The application also provides viewers a chance to vote for their favourite contestant.

Colors digital head Vivek Shrivastava said, “We have launched this app to satiate the voyeuristic needs of the viewer and increase interactivity, giving audiences access to every movement in the house while away at a click of a button.”

“After the success of the Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa app, we are looking at upping the interaction level with the audiences with newer features with the Bigg Boss App that will keep them hooked to the show,”Shrivastava added.

This application will also be launched internationally. However it will be a paid application.

MUMBAI: GTPL-owned Kolkata Cable and Broadband Pariseva Ltd (KCBPL) has given its cable TV consumers in Kolkata 45 days time to decide on the television channel packages they would want to subscribe to after the switchover to digital cable TV.

KCBPL, in which Gujarat Telelink Private Ltd (GTPL) owns 51 per cent stake, will announce its channel packages and their prices shortly. The MSO is giving subscribers a 45-day preview of 400 plus digital channels and services at the same price that they are paying now for analogue cable TV.

The channels offered by the MSO include 20 HD and radio channels through its Cisco set-top boxes (STBs). GTPL KCBPL is also planning to offer 10 exclusive international channels across genres like adventure, action, and lifestyle.

GTPL KCBPL board member Sumit Bose said the idea behind the preview offer is to allow customers to make up their mind what kind of packages they want to choose.

“We believe in offering value to our customers and hence we have introduced an exclusive preview offer facilitating our customers to select their choice of channels and services from a wide array of offerings,” Bose said.

After the 45-day preview period, GTPL KCBPL subscribers will have to choose from the channel packages that the MSO will announce.

The MSO says the offer is a way of facilitating digitisation in Kolkata which has gone through a lot of uncertainty on digitisation implementation. The MSO is also targeting lower income groups with Cisco Zapper STB targeted at low ARPU customers to be launched in the later part of this month.

He also said that there is a lot of churn happening in the Eastern metropolis due to the lack of preparedness of other MSOs.

“We are well stocked with Cisco STBs. We have almost finished seeding boxes on our network and are thus in a position to attract local cable operators (LCOs) from competing MSOs who are short of STBs to join our network,” Bose said.

Bose said GTPL KCBPL has upgraded its head-end to provide 400 channels which in two-three weeks time will get upgraded to 450 channels and subsequently to 500 channels as recommended by Trai.