ITV

Category: News Broadcasting

  • Al Jazeera International lines-up weekly sports magazine ‘Sportsworld’

    Al Jazeera International lines-up weekly sports magazine ‘Sportsworld’

    MUMBAI: Doha based – Al Jazeera International, yet to launch 24-hour English-language news and current affairs channel has revealed their line-up of sports presenters and also the sports offering.

    The channel’s weekly magazine programme Sportsworld will also take viewers behind the scenes of some of these major sporting events. The team will interview not only the leading stars but also the unsung personalities – adhering to the channel’s aim of giving our viewers a 360 degree perspective on what is happening in the world of sport, both professional and amateur.

    Al Jazeera International’ sport head Stuart Young, has assembled a team of experienced reporters and presenters, whose diversity and own areas of expertise complement each other: Carrie Brown formerly of Eurosport; Brendan Connor formerly of CBC Canada; Imran Garda formerly of South Africa’s Supersport channel; Joanna Gasiorowska who joins the channel from ITV’s Evening News; Dara McIntosh formerly of ESPN and NBC in the USA; Rahul Pathak from the UK’s Five News as well as Andrew Richardson formerly of Five News in the UK.

    Young says, “I am delighted to have such a group of individuals whose breadth of knowledge, depth of experience and all-round strengths will take us to the forefront of sports reporting.”

    “Together, we will work to bring viewers around the globe the latest from the world of sport. From countries often overlooked, on sports often under-reported, we hope to inform and enlighten as well as entertain and excite,” he continued.

    In keeping with the channel’s fresh approach, the sports coverage will be a mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar, the expected and the surprising, which includes the football leagues in Europe and South America, the tennis grand slam events, the golf majors, cricket test matches, rugby internationals, Formula 1 and MotoGP, North American sports, athletics, boxing, cycling, sailing and winter sports.

  • Time Warner plans job cuts at AOL

    Time Warner plans job cuts at AOL

    MUMBAI: Time Warner Inc. is planning to cut about 1,300 jobs at its AOL internet unit. This is in line with the company’s plans to reduce costs by $1 billion.

    AOL will close its call centre in Florida and will eliminate jobs in its other call centres located in Ogden, Utah and Tucson. It will be cutting 780 jobs in Jacksonville. The Tucson call center will eliminate 300 jobs and Ogden will cut down 125.

    Two years ago, Time Warner CEO Richard Parsons had decided to cut costs of the organisation. Accordingly, AOL cut its workforce by 700 people in the fourth quarter. It also eliminated 400 jobs in other divisions, including its publishing outfit.

  • Zee Sports to telecast Qatar Telecom German Open 2006

    Zee Sports to telecast Qatar Telecom German Open 2006

    MUMBAI: Zee Sports will telecast the WTA Qatar Telecom German Open live. This Tier I $ 1.3 million, tournament will be played from 8 May to 14 May, 2006 on the grounds of LTTC, Rot-Weiss.

    The quarter final matches will be played on 12 May, from 3 pm onwards. Semi Final matches will be held on 13 May and the matches will begin at 4:30 pm. The final will be played on 14 May at 5:30 pm.

    The eight top seeded players, including world number one Amelie Mauresmo, defending champion Justine Henin-Hardenne, last year’s finalist Nadia Petrova and Germany’s top player Anna-Lena Grönefeld, will start competing in this tournament.Some of the other women tennis stars competing will be Justine Henin Hardenne of Belgium , Nadia Petrova and Elena Dementiva of Russia will also be participating in this tournament, states an official release.

    Zee Sports’ presenter Tina Sharma along with Indian Tennis star Ankita Bhambri will present the preview and review show of each of the match. SportsCafe, Zee Sports daily news program will present the highlights and analysis of the best moments of the matches, the release adds.

  • Ahead of deadline, 41 TV channels apply for downlinking in India

    Ahead of deadline, 41 TV channels apply for downlinking in India

    NEW DELHI: Talk about cutting it close. With just a day remaining (10 May 5:00 pm to be exact) for the deadline to adhere to downlink norms, 41 television channels have applied for registration in India.

    “Around 40 channels have submitted their applications for registration in India,” the Press Trust of India quoted an an official in the Information and Broadcasting Ministry as saying.
    PTI quoted the I&B official as saying that the channels seeking registration include the Star Group, Sony, Zee, Discovery, Anil Planet, Cartoon Network, CNN, Pogo, MTV, Channel V, Toon Disney, Hallmark, HBO, Ten Sports, Channel News Asia and Times Now

    Those yet to send in their applications include Fashion TV, ESPN-Star Sports and BBC, the report adds.

    Speaking to Indiantelevision.com on the matter yesterday, a BBC spokesperson had said, ”BBC World is aware of the timetable set out by the Indian government for completion of all formalities of registration under the new down linking guidelines issued on 11 November 2005. In compliance with the timetable, BBC World has prepared its application and will submit the same within the 10 May deadline set.”

    The government, meanwhile, clarified that all those channels that have applied for landing rights on or before 11 May 2006 could continue to be carried on cable networks till the channels’ are denied the right.

    “A cable operator may continue to carry or include in his cable service any television broadcast or channel, which has made an application for registration to the central government on or before the date of commencement of the notification, for a period of six months from the date of such commencement or till such registration has been granted or refused, whichever is earlier,” a government statement posted on the site of I&B
    ministry said.

    The statement also said that amendments to the Cable Television Network Rules 1994 and DTH guidelines will be notified separately and issued on 11 May 2006.

    Those channels that had been granted permission for uplinking from India before 2 December 2005 shall be treated as “registered” television channels and can be carried or included in the cable service. The full list is available under Codes & Guidelines section at mib.nic.in.

    Yesterday, a senior government official had admitted to Indiantelevision.com that the number of applicants seeking landing rights in the country is still “very low” compared to doubts and queries being raised. “This is surprising
    considering the deadline is 10 May,” the official added.

    The government issued an ultimatum last week that those channels not fulfilling all the downlink criteria by 10 May 2006 would be denied landing rights.

    The I&B ministry also posted on its website communications sent to the Indian Broadcasting Foundation, Star Group, Time Warner and a lawyer. The missive made it clear that the deadline of 10 May stays.

    The lobbying against the downlink norms as a whole and partly is understandable. The moment a television company sets up a permanent establishment (PE) in India, as per downlink norms, its tax liabilities in India would go up drastically. Rather, more the revenues collected in India, higher would be the tax component.

    Recently, Economic Times reiterated this fact in a report also. “After unveiling the downlinking policy for satellite television channels, the government is set to re-examine the tax treatment of revenues earned by foreign TV channels (FTCs). These companies earn advertising revenues from ad agencies, sponsors, and subscription revenues from cable operators.

    “The task force on emerging issues in non-resident taxation, constituted by the finance ministry, is understood to have made an attempt to bring greater clarity and certainty in the tax treatment of FTCs. This, in turn, may enable India to get a larger share of the pie. Going by the recommendations,
    FTCs will be liable to pay tax in India if they have a permanent
    establishment (PE) here. Alternatively, a dependent agent who has the authority to conclude contracts, also constitutes a PE,” the newspaper said.

    Before 2001, foreign TV channels used to pay taxes on a presumptive basis on their advertisement revenues earned in India, which ranged between 35-40 per cent.

  • Time Warner Telecom delivers data, internet and voice solutions to Inoveris

    Time Warner Telecom delivers data, internet and voice solutions to Inoveris

    MUMBAI: Time Warner Telecom Inc. has installed a full suite of voice and data communications services for Inoveris, LLC of Dublin, Ohio. The product-to-market solutions provider is using these services to support mission-critical software applications, operational efficiency initiatives and business growth.

    “These new services allow us to streamline our business internally so that we can support more business and enhance employee productivity,” says Inoveris director for Dublin, Roy Gilliam. “By turning up high-capacity metro Ethernet and centralizing our production data center into a resilient collocation facility, we are able to integrate our workflow infrastructure so our three locations — Ohio, Utah and Canada — work together as one. This gives us the 24 by 7 availability our operations require.”

    Time Warner Telecom is delivering a wide range of services to Inoveris to support its nationwide communications network. These services include 10 Mbps of Ethernet Internet service capability and 100 Mbps metro Ethernet connecting the Columbus collocation site and the Dublin-based headquarters. Local and long distance voice services as well as long-haul DS-1 and Internet connectivity to Inoveris in Orem, Utah, are also provided by Time Warner Telecom, states an official release.

    “We rely heavily on our extranet to communicate with and process manufacturing and distribution orders from our customers,” says Inoveris network manager Jonathan O’Connor. “From a revenue and reputation standpoint, we simply had to go with a provider that met our high uptime criteria. The customer service we’ve received from Time Warner Telecom far exceeds any we’ve seen from other providers and that played a key role in our decision.”

    “Infrastructure consolidation has become a strategy for businesses to cut costs, increase efficiencies and improve employee productivity,” says Time Warner Telecom VP and GM for Columbus, Brad Thien. “Our end-to-end solutions offer the voice, data and collocation services that make these goals possible. Our highly reliable fiber-based services are particularly important to businesses like Inoveris, where downtime of any kind can affect their efficiencies.”

  • Balaji Telefilms Q4 net at Rs 155 million

    Balaji Telefilms Q4 net at Rs 155 million

    MUMBAI: Balaji Telefilms has posted a net profit of Rs 155.03 million for the quarter ended 31 March 2006 as compared to Rs 96.47 million a year ago.

    The total income has increased to Rs 781.40 million, up from Rs 568.44 million during this period.

    For the entire fiscal, the company has posted a net profit of Rs 596.428 million as against Rs 412.962 million for the year ended 31 March 2005.

    Total income for the year was Rs 2.9 billion, up from Rs 2.01 billion a year ago.

    The board of directors has recommended a full and final dividend of Rs 3 per share (150 per cent on par value of Rs 2 per share), subject to the approval of members at the ensuing annual general meeting.

    Balaji Telefilms chief financial officer V Devarajan has put in his papers, the company said. Sandeep Jain will take over as the CFO of the company.

  • 694 mn people use internet worldwide: Survey

    694 mn people use internet worldwide: Survey

    MUMBAI: A total of 694 million people, age 15+, used the internet worldwide from all locations in March 2006, representing 14 per cent of the world’s total population within this age group.

    These findings were delivered by the US-based comScore Networks, which looked at countries that comprise 99 per cent of the global internet population.

    The company also announced the launch of comScore World Metrix, which provides an estimate of global online audience size and behavior.

    comScore World Metrix includes measurement of the major Asian countries, including China, Japan, India and Korea, which represent nearly 25 per cent of the total worldwide online population (or 168.1 million users), and which, in the aggregate, are 11 per cent larger than the U.S. (152 million users).

    “Today, the online audience in the U.S. represents less than a quarter of Internet users across the globe, versus ten years ago when it accounted for two-thirds of the global audience,” said comScore Media Metrix president and CEO Peter Daboll. “This is a sea change of enormous proportion, and comScore is pleased to be able to provide measurement to aid the world’s largest marketers in understanding how the world uses the Internet.”

    MSN International vice president of sales Chris Dobson said, “Previously, MSN has attempted to harmonize disparate sources of data to get a global view. The fact that comScore World Metrix data are produced with a consistent methodology worldwide will make a significant difference, enabling us to analyze what is happening globally and truly understand consumer online behavior.”

    “This is a significant step forward for the industry and timed perfectly as the importance of markets outside the US grows, especially rapidly developing countries like China and India, which up to now have not enjoyed such insight,” he added.

    Top 15 Online Populations by Country, Among Visitors Age 15+*March 2006
    Total Worldwide – All Locations
    Unique Visitors (000)
    Source: comScore World Metrix
    Unique Visitors
    (000)
    Worldwide Total 694,260
    China
    74,727
    India 16,713

    comScore also issued a preview of the top fifteen media properties worldwide, with MSN- Microsoft Sites topping the list with 538.6 million global users, followed by Google (495.8 million users), and Yahoo! (480.2 million users). Yahoo! Sites however, led all global properties in page views with 137.2 billion page views during March, followed by Google (108.7 billion page views), and MSN- Microsoft Sites (96.2 billion page views). comScore will officially release World Metrix statistics with the issuance of May data in June.

    “While the ‘big three’ properties remain consistent among worldwide and U.S. audiences, Wikipedia has emerged as a site that continues to increase in popularity, both globally and in the U.S. Wikipedia’s popularity demonstrates the global power of the Web to unite and provide information across countries and languages, but the full extent of its global appeal is only measurable through this new worldwide measurement,” Daboll added.

  • Warner Bros. associates with BitTorrent to distribute movies, TV shows

    Warner Bros. associates with BitTorrent to distribute movies, TV shows

    MUMBAI: Warner Bros. will distribute its films and television shows over the internet using peer-to-peer technology developed by BitTorrent. The studio will also sell permanent copies of films and TV shows online that can be burned to a backup DVD, although the copy will only play on the computer used to download the film and not on standard DVD players.

    The company is planning to kick off the new initiative within six months and the service could be priced as low as $1. According to BitTorrent, movies will be sold for about the price of buying a DVD.

    “If we can convert 5, 10, 15 per cent of the peer-to-peer users that have been obtaining our product from illegitimate sources to becoming legitimate buyers of our product, that has the potential of a huge impact on our industry and our economics,” Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group president Kevin Tsujihara has been quoted in media reports as saying.

    BitTorrent uses a technique called “file swarming” to distribute large files. Rather than download a single large file from one central computer, BitTorrent assembles files from separate bits of data downloaded from other computer users across the Internet.

  • Weston launches DTH ready TV ‘SAT 20’

    Weston launches DTH ready TV ‘SAT 20’

    MUMBAI: Consumer electronics company Weston has launched SAT-20, a Direct to Home (DTH) ready colour television targeted at millions of Indian households having no cable or satellite connection.

    SAT 20 is a 51 cm TV having an inbuilt satellite receiver can help a consumer view free to air 37 TV Channels including 17 Doordarshan Channels and 17 Radio channels including two FM channels. SAT 20 is priced at Rs 7790. It carries two-year warranty and has 256 programme and also a child lock facility.

    The product is available across the length and Breadth of the country through Weston’s strong 1700 dealer network. It is targeted at remote hill areas, rural India, defense establishments, remote schools and other educational institutes, states an official release.

    “SAT 20 is a relief from cable bills .The advantage of this CTV is that even at the remotest of the corners in the country a customer will have the advantage of accessing his/her favorite channels available on the free to air channels. A initiative which will keep the masses in tune with the latest programming in this World,” says Weston MD Sunil Vachani.

    “Weston’s SAT 20 TV incorporates a DTH decoder with television hardware & developed a common software to enable the control of normal television and DTH function with the same remote and does not need a separate set top box,” adds Weston VP Marketing Sunil Sethi.

    “SAT 20 is yet another innovation from Weston that is aimed specifically towards millions of consumers in India who do not have access to cable and satellite networks, particularly in the non-metro and remote areas. Known for its technology innovation, Weston has developed this technology at its own R&D facility,” says Sethi.

  • Zee Cafe presents new reality show ‘The Cut’

    Zee Cafe presents new reality show ‘The Cut’

    MUMBAI: In addition to a host of reality TV series, Zee’s 24-hour English entertainment channel Zee Cafe announced the launch of a new reality show The Cut. It will be hosted by style icon Tommy Hilfiger and will hit Indian television on Friday 12 May at 9 pm.

    The first episode of the series will be presented commercial free and thus the title, The Cut – Uncut. Episodes span for an hour and will feature celebrity guests such as Jennifer Lopez, designer Karl Lagerfeld and Jamie-Lynn DiScala.

    The Cut features sixteen contestants competing for an opportunity to design their own collection under the Tommy Hilfiger label, earning a package worth $250,000. To accquire this, contestants must complete a series of tasks that showcase their design and business skills to prove their metal in the world of fashion.

    Zee Cafe showcases sitcoms, comedies, dramas, soaps, underworld masterpieces & blockbuster programmes. Other shows on the channel include Friends, Sopranos, America’s Next Top Model, ER, After Hours, Orange County and E! News.