Category: Software

MUMBAI: UK pubcaster The BBC and software major Microsoft have signed a nonexclusive memorandum of understanding (MoU).

This will define the framework within which the companies can explore opportunities for the delivery and consumption of BBC content and the evolution of next-generation broadcasting.

BBC DG Mark Thompson and BBC director of new media and technology Ashley Highfield met Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates to officially sign the memorandum of understanding and discuss the BBC‘s digital strategy. This includes plans for its online archive, for a radically re-invented Web site in the Web 2.0 world — a second generation of Internet-based services — and for ways to share its online content in the future.

Thompson said, “We are currently witnessing unprecedented rates of change in technology and audience expectations. To ensure that the BBC is able to embrace the creative challenges of the digital future, we need to forge strategic partnerships with technology companies and distributors for the benefit of licence payers.”

Gates says, “Microsoft‘s strength is in driving digital innovation, and our vision is to open up rich, new consumer experiences that allow people to enjoy digital content anytime, anywhere and on any device.”

“This vision fits squarely with the BBC‘s charter to lead the industry in delivering content that is compelling and accessible. I‘m delighted that we‘re taking this important step, and I look forward to working together to develop new models for content delivery and consumption.”

Highfield said, “Microsoft is not just a key supplier to the BBC, it is also a key gateway to audiences that the BBC needs to reach through Web services it runs like MSN and Windows Live(TM) Messenger, and hardware such as Xbox and the Windows Media Center. The BBC needs to work with all players in this space to make sure our programmes and content are enjoyed by the widest possible audience, without always having to come to bbc.co.uk to find it. The learnings from our US visit will very much inform our thinking on the BBC‘s creative future.”

The MoU aims to identify areas of common interest between the BBC and Microsoft on which a strategic alliance could be developed. Areas of potential investigation and collaboration include search and navigation, distribution, and content enablement. Any actual procurements of new technology, or launch of new services by the BBC, would be subject to appropriate regulatory approval

MUMBAI: MSN, a leader in delivering compelling entertainment to Indian consumers, anounced a multiyear global content distribution agreement with Control Room, the No 1 provider of live digital entertainment and the producers of Live 8.

The partnership will see MSN as the exclusive online worldwide destination for Control Room’s live music programming, via live and on-demand streaming.

Officially launching in the UK on 2 October, the agreement means that nearly 465 million visitors to MSN worldwide, including millions of fans in India will have access to an exclusive performance from John Legend.

The multiple-award-winning singer, songwriter and pianist’s live Royal Albert Hall performance will be available at http://msn.co.in/johnlegend from 16.00 GMT. Additional artists already scheduled to appear on MSN through the relationship with Control Room include Rod Stewart from the Nokia Theater in NYC and John Mayer from Webster Hall in NYC.

The partnership will further allow visitors to MSN video ongoing access to live concerts from the most popular, top-selling musical artists as well as today’s most talked-about breakthrough acts.

“With the video content market surging as it has been in the last year since Live 8, we have proven that there is a robust market for a company like ours to change the way live entertainment is consumed, now and in the future,” said CEO of Control Room Kevin Wall.

“With MSN, we have found a global partner that sees the value and profit in providing our rich and cutting-edge live entertainment content to its consumers worldwide,”added Wall.

General Manager for the MSN Network Greg Nelson said,”With this collaboration, artists now have an extremely valuable, cohesive, global marketing and promotion avenue to reach and connect with fans worldwide, while in turn it creates another key access point for consumers to get high-quality content from the musicians they love.”

With this agreement in place, MSN and Control Room will embark upon a deep, exclusive content collaboration, combining Control Room’s expertise in creating and delivering live music events for cross-media distribution with the feature-rich video programming of MSN and its global reach and branded entertainment appeal to advertisers.

Further, through this agreement, Microsoft Corp. may stream Control Room shows to other platforms, including Xbox Live, MSN Messenger, Microsoft Windows Media Player and Windows XP Media Center Edition.

The Control Room team will leverage its deep and broad experiences, relationships and skills accrued while creating and digitally distributing more than 59 shows in the past year to deliver high-quality live music programming to MSN. Control Room maintains the same seasoned management team, many of whom worked on the now historic Live 8, and also continues content distribution relationships with television, radio, theatrical and retail partners worldwide

MUMBAI: The Barcelona based entertainment production and distribution company, Neptuno Films and the Spanish based Portal Latino, a subsidiary of Sociedad Digital de Autores y Editores SDAE, have joined forces to greenlight a new IPTV kids channel in Spain named El Gato Feliz (Happy Cat).

The channel will be launched on 28 September, 2006 and will reach subscribers of Orange for their telephony, internet and IPTV new television services in Spain.

Neptuno Films has set up a division to handle all the editorial content and programming supply both from its animated programming and international acquisitions.

The company line up will include some of the international hits of Neptuno, a variety of new animated movies as well as his portfolio of existing series and international co-productions.

SDAE‘s Director of Broadcast Strategy Sydney Borjas said, “We are thrilled to be working with such a passionate team at Neptuno. They have brought to us a unique opportunity to reach quality children‘s programming through their marketing efforts. We look forward to building a strong long term co-operation via our new common endeavours.”

Sociedad Digital de Autores y Editores is a subsidiary of the performing rights society SGAE, Sociedad General de Autores de Espa?a. Among the responsibilities, the company will put together all technical aspects related to transfer of the content to Orange broadcast operation.

Orange is expanding the operations as the second major telephone operator in the Spanish market and IPTV content is a key area in order to attract a potential audience looking for new and innovative broadcast alternatives.

MUMBAI: United Film Organizers (UFO) Moviez a pioneer in digital cinema and with 400 theatres across 14 cities in India having its installations, has plans to increase the figure to 500 by Diwali.

UFO moviez has tied up with producer Sajid Nadiadwala for his forthcoming film Jaan-e-mann for brand building promotion and to create awareness about digital cinema.

“Our association with Jaan-e-mann is a joint promotional and brand building exercise. UFO will showcase the film in its 400 theatres across India and Jaan-e-mann will carry the branding of UFO in their print and optical media,” said UFO Moviez vice chairman and director Raaja Kanwar at a media briefing yesterday.

UFO executive director and CEO Sanjay Gaikwad added, “By the time the film releases in Diwali, we will achieve our target of 500 theatres. And as per UFOs‘ roll out plan we are to achieve a target of 1000 theatres by March 2007 and 2000 by March 2008.”

With an objective to revolutionise the distribution and exhibition system in cinema, UFO was officially launched in November 2005 and within less than a years time, plans a foray into the international market.

This initiative has been taken by UFO after acquiring the rights to Mpeg 4 Digital Cinema Solutions from DG2L Technologies Pvt Ltd.

“The response that we have got from India is helping us to take this leap in the international market, say Middle East and European nations, where Bollywood films are popular. And with Mpeg 4 digital cinema solutions, the task will become easy. This technology will provide greater flexibility, effieciency and cost savings,” added Gaikwad.

Digital screening of films through the technology offered by UFO not only reduces the cost of prints but also helps the distributors and exhibitors, who have to pay a nominal amount for acquiring the print of the film and showing it in theatres.

“The distributer pays Rs 250 for a single print and the exhibitor pays Rs 275 for the same as compared to the Analog print for which they have to spend something between Rs 16,000 – Rs 17,000. Moreover, the server in the UFO system installed at the theatre can store upto 15 films, which gives flexibility to the exhibitors to play different films at different times of the day,” said Gaikwad.

This technology is proving beneficial for the distributors and exhibitors in B and C cities where films would hit the theaters two-three weeks after its release, which would in return hamper the box office collection. But with digital cinema installations in these cities, audience are getting to see the films in the very first week of its release.

UFO Moviez had recently announced that it will invest Rs 1.5 billion in the next three years to digitise 1,000 movie halls of Chennai-based Pyramid Saimira Theatres Ltd. As per a tie-up agreement between the two companies, UFO Moviez would provide end-to-end digital cinema solutions for these 1,000 theatres.

MUMBAI: Bharti Airtel, mobile services provider has announced the appointment of Atul Bindal as joint president – Airtel Broadband and Telephone Services and has appointed Deepak Srivastava as chief operating officer, Airtel Broadband and Telephone Services, North region.

Bindal will report to Bharti Airtel president Manoj Kohli and will be a member on the Airtel Management Board (AMB), and chair the Broadband and Telephone Services Management Board (BTMB). Srivastava will in turn report to Bindal.

Bindal, in his new role will focus on taking Bharti Airtel‘s Broadband and Telephone services division to new heights with increased town rollouts and introduction of new technologies. He will be supported by Rajiv Sharma (CEO-NCR), Deepak Srivastava (COO-North), Prem Pradeep (CEO-South Central), Deepak Khanna (CEO-West and MPCG), Randeep Narang (COO-MPCG), informs an official release.

Prior to this, Bindal was the executive director – South for Mobile Services at Bharti Airtel. He has also had a stint as the Group chief marketing officer and director – Mobile Services at Bharti Airtel for over one and half years.

Bharti Airtel president Manoj Kohli said, “I am delighted to
announce the appointment of Atul as the Joint President of our Broadband and Telephone services. Atul, with his strategic business sense and people management skills will lead a set of highly talented and competent leaders to take Bharti Airtel‘s Broadband and Telephone Services division to the next level of excellence in Broadband services in 92 towns.”

Deepak Srivastava on the other hand, was the chief operating officer, Mobile Services, Bihar and Jharkhand. He joined Bharti Airtel in 2004.

“Deepak Srivastava has successfully led the Bihar and Jharkhand market to leadership and I am confident that in his new assignment, he will continue to set new standards and scale new heights in North Airtel Broadband and Telephone Services,” added Kohli.

MUMBAI: StarHub, which claims to be Singapore’s largest pay-TV operator, will launch five more channels on 2 October 2006. They are National Geographic Wild, Sky News, Channel [V] International, Fox Crime and Boomerang.

They will be added to the Family Plus digital group at no extra cost.

National Geographic Wild will air documentaries entirely focussed on the animal kingdom and the worlds they inhabit. From the most remote environments, the forbidding depths of our oceans, to the protected parks in our backyards.

National Geographic Wild uses cinematography and spellbinding storytelling to take viewers on unforgettable journeys into the wild world and to experience the best, most intimate encounters with wildlife ever seen on television.

Channel [V] International features music videos and singers, reality and infotainment shows. Viewers can catch VJs such as Sarah, Maya, Dominic and Joey on this channel. It has shows such as Remote Control, Popparazzi, Arcade and The Ticket.

Fox Crime is dedicated to crime, investigation and mystery. It is the ultimate channel where viewers will find all shadows of crime and investigation stories.

Sky News is a news channel from the UK. Boomerang features animated entertainment, drawing from content of Hanna-Barbera, Warner Brothers and MGM. Boomerang will not only provide another choice for kids content under the Cartoon Network banner, but also nostalgic moments for parents who wish to catch the legends of cartoon history such as Flintstones, Looney Tunes, Scooby Doo, Wacky Races, The Jetsons and Top Cat.

StarHub VP, cable TV services Patrick Lim says, “StarHub is constantly working towards providing better products and services, and creating more value to our customers, and we are very excited with all that we have in store for our cable TV customers, in particular those on the digital platform.

“We hope that this addition of five quality channels to Family Plus, coupled with other new offerings to be rolled out on 2 October, will encourage those who have yet to enjoy StarHub Digital Cable to sign up and join the fun, and also provide more incentive to our analogue customers to make the switch to the digital platform so that they too can enjoy these great benefits.”

MUMBAI: UK pubcaster the BBC‘s commercial arm BBC Worldwide and BBC World are partnering with online retail giant Amazon.com in the US to provide nearly 400 hours of content for Amazon Unbox- a new digital video download service.

BBC programming spanning genres including comedy, drama, science fiction, documentaries and news will be available to download to rent, with numerous titles making their US digital premiere.

Customers will be easily directed to BBC content through various routes. In addition to being able to seek BBC content using the Amazon Unbox search engine on the home page, various BBC links will also be featured on the home page to take customers directly to dedicated BBC pages.

BBC Worldwide VP, programme management and digital media, Americas Beth Clearfield, says, “We are confident that Amazon customers will enjoy discovering new BBC programs as well as finding their favorites via this new technology, and will be enthralled by the breadth of BBC programming now accessible to them on Amazon Unbox.

“We continue to explore different avenues to share our content with an expanding audience, and are delighted to participate with Amazon.com in the launch of this exciting new platform.”

BBC Worldwide director digital media, Simon Danker says, “We are thrilled to be part of this service and the growth of BBC Worldwide‘s Digital Media business is a key part of the company‘s overall strategy. Following this deal, we‘ll be working with partners globally to maximise our presence in this arena.”

Key titles from BBC Worldwide making a digital premiere in the US include shows like Little Britain, Keeping Up Appearances, League of Gentlemen and Yes, Minister. There wil also be Jane Austen period dramas Emma, Mansfield Park and Jane Eyre as well as documentary series Blue Planet, Life of Birds and Walking with Dinosaurs. There will also be drama series such as House of Cards and Miss Marple.

Other titles include Ripping Yarns and Shakespeare with Macbeth, A Midsummer‘s Night Dream and Romeo & Juliet plus BBC titles from Independents such as Coupling (Hartswood Films), Ballykissangel (BallyKea/World Productions)and In The Footsteps of Alexander The Great (Maya Vision).

MUMBAI: The global television trade event Mipcom has announced the nominations for the second annual Mobile TV Screenings & Awards. 23 nominations and 10 special mentions will be presented during MIPCOM and the winners will be announced in a special screenings and awards Ceremony to be held in the Palais des Festivals, Cannes on 11 October, 2006.

Sponsored by Orange, Ericsson and the Korean Broadcasting Commission, the Mobile Screenings & Awards 2006 brought in a record number of 290 entries from 34 countries. This marks a 30 per cent increase in submissions from 2005.

For the second year running the competition recognises innovation and creativity in new mobile entertainment concepts and formats especially related to audiovisual TV and Film content.

Reed Midem’s Television Division director Paul Johnson says, “Mobile TV represents a growing opportunity for the audiovisual content industry. Mipcom is proud to take an active role in promoting the development of made-for-mobile content and facilitating commercial transactions on a global level for both TV and film.”

The Pre-selection Jury head and president of London based Any Screen Productions Ferhan Cook says, “The competition has attracted an even wider variety of genres, and new approaches from both existing well known entertainment companies as well as new ones.

“It is clear that the world’s creative community is hard at work, innovating new formats for the mobile medium.”

The 23 nominated entries are to be screened and judged by the Mobile TV Awards Jury at Mipcom from each of the following five categories: Best Original Made-for-Mobile Film or Video Content; Best Repurposed Content from Existing Film or TV Property; Best Made-for-Mobile TV Channel; Best Format for Interactive Mobile TV and Best Mobile format for User-Generated Content.

In addition to these five categories, there will also be The Orange Grand Prize for Innovation and a special recognition mention for the Best Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) projects.

The Mobile TV Screenings & Awards are a part of the Mobile TV focus on 11 October 2006. Included in the programme are a number of conferences focusing on the distribution, marketing and creation of audiovisual mobile content; including keynote addresses by Orange CEO Sanjiv Ahuja and ESPN president, and ABC Sports co-Chairman George Bodenheimer.

The nominees in various categories are:

Category 1:
Best Original Made-for-Mobile Film or Video Content (8 projects)

Category 2:
Best Repurposed Content from existing Film or TV Property

Category 3:
Best Made-for-Mobile TV Channel

Category 4:
Best Format for Interactive Mobile TV

Category 5:
Best Mobile Format for User-Generated Content

Category 6:

Mobile Awards Special Mention

Category 7:

Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) Special Mention

MUMBAI: US media firm Discovery Communications has expanded its expansion of its collection of world-class content on Google Earth.

It has added over 150 video segments for destinations around the globe. A pilot partner for Google Earth’s new showcase of multimedia overlays, the Discovery Networks World Tour; can be accessed through the Featured Content checkbox in the Google Earth sidebar. This expansion follows the April announcement of Discovery being the first provider to bring video content to Google Earth.

Google Earth is a satellite imagery-based mapping product that combines 3D buildings and terrain with mapping capability and Google search. Over the past year, there have been more than 10 million unique Google Earth downloads from around the world.

Discovery senior executive VP for strategy and development Don Baer, says, “As promised, Discovery has continued to populate the world with engaging video to help Google Earth users explore the wonders of our planet. Discovery is dedicated to growing its showcase on Google Earth, giving virtual globetrekkers a journey of infinite proportions.”

The initial collection included companion video for 10 of America’s most popular national parks,including Yellowstone, Mount Rushmore and Dinosaur National Park. Drawing from its rich stable of programming and to enhance viewers‘ experience with its TV brands, Discovery has expanded the offering to include 48 world landmarks, national parks, American and European cities, and African location.

Google Earth users will find videos on everything from the design process used to create the face of George Washington on Mount Rushmore and how to make authentic Belgian chocolate, to the history of China’s Terra Cotta soldiers and why fire is one of the most important natural forces in Yellowstone Park’s ecosystem.

Users can access the video elements by clicking on Discovery’s globe icon, shown at destination sites where Discovery video content is available. An interactive broadband player hosted by Discovery launches into a selection of rich and compelling two- to four-minute videos. Destinations include the following:

• National Parks and Landmarks — Representing the natural diversity of the United States,videos are available for Glacier National Park, Yellowstone, the Everglades, Point Reyes National Seashore, Niagara Falls, Mt. Rushmore, Alaska National Parks, Arches and Canyonlands National Parks, Santa Monica Mountains National Park, Carlsbad Caverns and Dinosaur National Park.

• US Cities — From the Lincoln Memorial to the Golden Gate Bridge, users can explore the history, architecture and food of some of America’s favorite cities; Atlanta, Boston,Chicago, Denver, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco and Seattle.

• European Cities — Users can discover cathedrals, museums and neighborhoods while learning about the history, people and cultures of Europe’s greatest cities and regions: Amalfi Coast, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Bavaria, Berlin, Brussels, Dublin, Edinburgh,Florence, Interlaken, Lisbon, London, Madrid, Naples, Paris, Rome and Zurich.

• Africa — Unlocking the majesty of the world’s most diverse continent, users can learn about Ghana on a virtual tour with its president, uncover the ruins of a once great empire in Zimbabwe or get a glimpse inside King Tut’s famous crypt.

• World Landmarks — Spanning thousands of years and hundreds of cultures, the human race has created astounding feats of architecture, engineering and beauty. Users can marvel at the majesty of some of the world’s greatest wonders, including the Taj Mahal in India, the Great Wall and Terra Cotta Army in China, El Tajin in Mexico, the Great Pyramids in Egypt and the Shrine of Itsukushima in Japan.

• Coming Soon — Special features based on the upcoming global series Discovery Atlas. This is an HD project, offering video for 35 different locations in China, Brazil, Italy and Australia, the first of 30 countries in the multiyear programming franchise.