Category: Technology

MUMBAI: Digital cinema network UFO Moviez and the Chennai based Pyramid Saimira Theatres Limited (PSTL) have got together for the digitisation of 1000 theatres over the next three years all over India.

UFO Moviez shall be providing end to end digital cinema solutions for the theatres in the Pyramid Saimira chain at a cost of Rs 1.5 billion.

Commenting on the deal, UFO India executive director & CEO Sanjay Gaikwad said, “We anticipate that this tie up with Pyramid group will chart the way for the digital revolution happening in the field of cinema exhibition. A single integrated chain of 1000 digital cinemas all over India will provide producers and distributors a unique opportunity for saturated wide spread release in the week of release itself. Worldwide, there is tremendous excitement about this technology which is being hailed as the next great leap in film distribution and exhibition”.

Elaborating on the agreement, UFO India‘s director Usman Fayaz adds, “Pyramid Saimira has tremendous presence in the southern states and are now looking at expanding to other territories in India. This agreement is indeed a step forward in our future plans of creating a truly global network and becoming the world’s undisputed leaders in digital cinema network.”

States PSTL MD P S Saminathan, “PSTL plans to have 2000 screens under its full operation management spread across 1550 locations by the year 2009-2010. The agreement with UFO enables PSTL to reach this target faster since it frees PSTL capital from Plant & Machinery and enables PSTL to lock in more points of presence faster”.

MUMBAI: To explore the huge potential that the user-generated content offers in an online environment, Yahoo Inc. has associated with the US-based media company Current TV, promoted by former US vice president Al Gore, to create online video programmes.

The service, christened the Yahoo Current Network (video.yahoo.com/currenttv) will launch on 20 September with four channels.

One of the channels named Current Buzz will feature segments related to the news. The other channels will cover travel, sports and cars.

BANGALORE: Leading mobile entertainment company Hungama Mobile and the Dubai-based diversified business enterprise Koohiji Group have formed a business alliance to provide Middle East and North African (Mena) wireless consumers access to a wide range of legitimate entertainment content.

Users will be able to download the latest Bollywood songs from legitimate music and entertainment sources for personal use on their handsets.

As per the agreement, Hungama Mobile has appointed Digital City, a new strategic business unit established by the Koohiji Group, as their exclusive distributor for Bollywood and Indian digital entertainment content.

Describing the alliance as a significant step in the new media era, Hungama Mobile COO Saleem Mobhani said, “The demand for Bollywood and related entertainment content has shot up dramatically over the last couple years, and Hungama Mobile being the world‘s largest distributor of South Asian entertainment content, Mena consumers will have access to over all South Asian digital entertainment content, including content in 14 different languages”.

“We are continually working to forge strategic relationships with key digital entertainment players. We develop and deploy content across the spectrum of Music, Images, Video, Games and Applications for our current relationship with 52 Operators and Partners in over 20 countries such as North America, UK and Europe, South Africa, Australia, Germany, South East Asia etc. and Digital Entities such as iTunes, Napster, Yahoo and others to extend Hungama Mobile‘s presence in new media entertainment globally.” said Ali Hussein, head of Hungama Mobile for Mena.

For Hungama Mobile, the tie up with Koohiji Group follows the recent tie up with the Apple Inc-promoted iTunes, where the music of the Shah Rukh Khan-starrer Don was made available worldwide on the iTunes Music Store.

BANGALORE: According to the joint research by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) and IMRB International, Internet users in India have reached 37 million in the month of September 2006, up from 33 million in March 2006. During the same period the number of “active users” has risen from 21.1 Million in March 2006 to 25 Million in September 2006. “Active User” is an internationally accepted and widely used category to define users who have used the internet at least one in the last 30 days.

The numbers are a result of the largest “offline” survey so far carried out in India to estimate the “ever user” and “active user” categories.? The primary survey for the study was conducted in early 2006 amongst 16,500 households covering 65,000 individuals across 26 major metros and small towns in India, with additional coverage of 10,000 business and 250 cyber caf? owners. The survey did not include rural areas.

According to the findings, youth are the main drivers of internet usage in India . College students and those below the age of 35 are the biggest segment on the Internet. Both these segments have the highest proportion of conversion of “Ever” Users to “Active” users of Internet.

Commenting on the survey Dr. Subho Ray, President, IAMAI says, “Although there is a marginal revision of the earlier IAMAI number for the year, given the rapid growth of internet business and government‘s massive e-Governance programme, it was time to look into the numbers more stringently. This will help better business decisions on part of the industry as well as better resource planning by the government.”

The study estimates that the Internet User base is likely to cross the 40 million mark by March 2007, when the “Ever” User base is likely to hit 42 Million and the Active User base is likely to hit 28 Million. By March 2008, the Ever User base should cross the 50 Million mark. The active user base would reach a staggering figure of 43 million users by the same time.

MUMBAI: China will launch high-definition terrestrial digital TV broadcasts in 2008. A five-year (2006-2010) guideline on cultural development has been published.

Media reports inform that China also aims to replace the existing analog cable television with digital cable television in all the cities in its eastern and central regions and most of those in the western area by 2010.

A report in Xinhua states that China will adopt a terrestrial digital TV broadcast standard – the mandatory broadcast signal for Chinese broadcasters – on 1 August next year. A study by Research and Markets further notes that China plans to stop the transmission of analogue television by 2015. With the rise of DTV, China has established relevant policies to gradually eliminate analogue TV and enter the era of DTV.

Though compared with developed countries, China is lagged far behind in the field of digital TV, yet it made rapid progress in 2005; altogether 4.13 million Chinese subscribed digital TV, increasing by over twofold compared to the previous year. Among them, 3.97million were digital cable digital TV subscribers.

Also, problems can be found in Chinas DTV industry. They are backward standard, difficulties in network consolidation, deficient terminal, immature market, serious shortage of content, deep-rooted receiving habit, want of price system, immature core technology, incomplete DTV industrial chain, need of further probe in business modes and systems. All these factors severely restrict the development of the DTV industry in China.

It can be seen from the development trend that DTV is bound to substitute for analog TV,. However, as to digital pay TV, China is still exploring a suitable operation mode and there is still a long period of time before its maturity. SARFT (The State Administration of Radio Film and Television) of P.R.C. is always vigorously popularizing DTV in China. The Chinese government, along with channel suppliers, channel integrators and cable network operators is zealous about the popularisation of DTV, offering a fairly good and unique circumstance for the development of digital pay TV.

MUMBAI: PVR Cinemas, which runs a chain of multiplexes, is making a strategic foray into smaller towns through digital theatres under the “PVR Talkies” brand. The company plans to invest Rs 2 billion towards this.

The first to come under this plan in the last week of September are theatres in Aurangabad and Latur which are digital ready. The computerised tickets will be priced in the range between Rs 40 and Rs 60.

Aurangabad and Latur will have three screens each and a seating capacity of 1151 and 1148 respectively.

The company plans to have 200 PVR Talkies across 13 states and over 70 cities in the first phase. Says PVR Cinemas chairman and managing director Ajay Bijli, “In 1997, we enhanced the way India went to the movies. Now, in the second stage of our mission, we are taking our enhancement to more and more places in the country. With PVR Talkies, the people‘s cinema has arrived. It is my fervent hope that PVR Talkies will induce people to come back to the big screen and rediscover the true magic of the movies.”

“Pan-India openings will also guarantee larger release made available across different territories leading to nationwide screenings, which will in turn ensure better return on investments for producers, distributors among others. It would also be extremely helpful in curbing piracy,” the company said.

MUMBAI: Cornershop Entertainment has launched an SMS based information service called Info on the Go. Ask 757577 is a service that works on any mobile phone with a text messaging facility.

It claims to be simple and user-friendly, as one can SMS questions to 757577. This service helps extend the virtual boundaries of knowledge and is available to all pre-paid and post-paid mobile users, informs an official release.

Ask757577 is a service that delivers Info on the go. You can now get quick and easy access to restaurants, weather, movie timenigs, emergency services, sports scores, directions, and more. At Ask757577 we are singularly focused on helping users find what they need through ever-changing mobile technologies. Ask757577 promises to be committed to meeting the search challenge of users.

“Innovation in services is key to reaching out to people, we believe in innovating against demand, and there is a strong demand for accurate info based services in the wireless market place” said CornerShop director Chirag Shah. One of the best ways to accomplish this is through the delivery of highly personalized location based services.

CornerShop claims to be the first to launch SMS voting/polling on reality TV in India for shows like Sa Re Ga Ma, Business Baazigar, Zee Cine Awards. The company also powers India‘s first 24 hour live interactive gaming channel ‘PlayTV‘.

MUMBAI: The government‘s CAS rollout plan is steadily unfolding. Further to its earlier order specifying standards of quality of service to be observed by the MSOs / cable operators in CAS notified areas, the sector regulator has directed when the public awareness campaign will kick off.

The games are original concepts and are based on popular themes with titles such as Bollywood Squares, a hilarious take on Hollywood Squares, the American TV show. The other titles include Quick Et, a fast cricket game, Star Gaze, a Bollywood celebrity quiz game, Top the Class, a multi user game that can support over 500 users at any given point, adds the release.

Trai had issued a regulation on 23 August specifying standards of quality of service to be observed by the MSOs/ Cable Operators in CAS notified areas of Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata. This regulation had stated that multi system operators permitted to provide cable services in CAS notified areas would be required to conduct a public awareness campaign from a date to be specified by Trai.

The full text of the general directive is available on Trai‘s website www.trai.gov.in

MUMBAI: Hungama, entertainment portal, content developer and aggregator has launched India‘s first free multi user online gaming portal, www.gaminghungama.com. Hungama is targeting a registered user base of one million in the first year.

The games have a simple and easy to understand gaming interface coupled with a chat window. This allows the user to interact with his opponent as he plays a game, a first among gaming sites. Along with games the site also has the latest reviews of PC, console and mobile games from across the world, the freshest gaming news relayed using RSS feeds, a user forum and a downloads section, informs an official release.

Commenting on the launch of its latest offering in the digital space, Hungama CEO and MD Neeraj Roy said, “It is estimated that, the online gaming market in India is at $30 million, of which mobile gaming and internet based gaming contribute
$8 million each in revenues. It is being expected that by the year 2010 11 the software gaming industry will be $700 million in size and console, mobile and broadband or internet based gaming will each be one third of the pie and through
gaming, hungama we will be ready to meet this ever growing demand.”

“The prime focus of the site is to provide an engaging platform for the gamers across the world and our aim is to become the cle facto gaming portal in India within six months,” says Hungama creative director Carlton D‘Silva.

The games are original concepts and are based on popular themes with titles such as Bollywood Squares, a hilarious take on Hollywood Squares, the American TV show. The other titles include Quick Et, a fast cricket game, Star Gaze, a Bollywood celebrity quiz game, Top the Class, a multi user game that can support over 500 users at any given point, adds the release.

MUMBAI: In a boost for video sharing site youtube music videos from artists like Madonna, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Sean Paul will be legally available on the site.

It has signed a deal with Warner Music Group.

Media reports state that Youtube wil share ad revenue with Warner. A report in The Wall Street Journal further states that YouTube is developing software that automatically identifies copyrighted music and video content uploaded to the site, reported in its online edition. A portion of the revenue from ads placed near the copyrighted material will go to the owner of the copyright. 100 million videos are viewed daily on youtube.

YouTube co-founder and CEO Chad Hurley.has ben quoted saying that in the future it would explore options for sharing online ad revenue with smaller and amateur creators of videos. “But right now we are building tools for record labels, TV networks and movie studios.”

Interestingly this announcement of the tie up comes at a time when the world‘s largest record company, Universal says that it will go after social sites like Youtube and MySpace for infringing copyright. Universal Music CEO Doug Morris has been quoted in reports saying that he believes that sites like youtube owe firms like Universal tens of millions of dollars.