ITV

Tag: English

  • Santa Claus Is Coming to Town!

    Santa Claus Is Coming to Town!

    MUMBAI: Christmas traditions are practiced in many different ways. For some, it’s reading Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” or Clement Clarke Moore’s “The Night Before Christmas”. While others enjoy watching “The Nutcracker” ballet or “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” on television.

    Yet, others maybe prefer tracking Santa’s Christmas Eve journey, compliments of the North American Aerospace Command, Verizon and the rest of the NORAD Tracks Santa team. For the 11th consecutive year Verizon employees will again join more than 1,250 Christmas Eve volunteers – including military personnel, their families and friends, and other corporate contributors – in answering calls and e-mails to the NORAD Tracks Santa hotline and operations center.

    To enable children around the world track Santa’s progress, Verizon is providing the toll-free hotline – 1877-HI-NORAD (1-877-446-6723). The hotline will be in operation from 4:00 a.m. on Dec. 24 until 3:00 a.m. (Mountain Standard Time) on Dec. 25. (Callers outside North America can reach the hotline by dialing the local Colorado Springs number at 719-556-5211 using the applicable country code. International calling charges may apply.)

    In addition, Verizon is providing call-handling technology, as well as its 4G LTE wireless network to help volunteers respond to e-mails and track Santa’s progress online.

    Beginning at 12:01 a.m. MST on Dec. 24, children can visit the NORAD Tracks Santa website to see real-time information, including radar maps and streaming “SantaCam” video. Information will be available in English, French, Spanish, German, Italian, Japanese, Brazilian Portuguese, and Chinese.

    Also starting on Dec. 24, children can send an e-mail to noradtrackssanta@outlook.com to find Santa’s whereabouts. For children (and adults) who are more tech savvy, a free downloadable NORAD Tracks Santa mobile app (iOS, Android, Windows) is available. Santa can also be tracked via Facebook, Google+, Twitter (@noradsanta) and YouTube.

    “The holiday season is a powerful reminder of the importance of giving back,” said Michael Maiorana, senior vice president of public sector markets, Verizon Enterprise Solutions. “For over a decade, Verizon has been a part of the NORAD Tracks Santa team, donating a range of services that brings Santa alive to children around the globe by enabling them to speak with Santa’s helpers and track his travels online and via their mobile devices. This is a part of our Christmas tradition.”

    In 2012, more than 114,000 phone calls and nearly 7,000 e-mails were received and answered. The NORAD Tracks Santa website had over 22.3 million unique visitors from 235 countries and territories during December 2012.

    NORAD, the binational U.S.-Canadian military organization responsible for defending the aerospace of both countries, has tracked Santa for the past 58 years. The NORAD Tracks Santa tradition began in 1955 after a misprinted advertisement directed children to call the Continental Air Defense Command (NORAD’s predecessor organization) instead of a retailer’s special Santa hotline.

  • Big RTL Thrill presents Driven to extremes

    Big RTL Thrill presents Driven to extremes

    MUMBAI: To set adrenaline rushing of its target audience, Big RTL Thrill, a male entertainment destination on television, this December will be premiering Driven to Extremes.

     

    The three-part programme, available in dual feeds of Hindi and English, will be aired on the 1, 8 and 15 of December and will see Hollywood celebrities like Tom Hardy, Henry Cavill and Adrien Brody along with a motor sport professional, pitting two specially-built vehicles against three of the most difficult roads on earth.

     

    The company said in a statement, “We are extremely pleased to bring Driven to Extremes to the Indian audiences. This show has been critically acclaimed the world over and also has a great fan following, owing the participating celebrities. With the adventurous premise, high drama and excitement quotient, Driven to Extremes comprises of all the aspects that male viewers look for in a great TV show and we are confident that it will resonate well with our audiences and advertisers alike.”

  • Big RTL Thrill to telecast I Am Bruce Lee

    Big RTL Thrill to telecast I Am Bruce Lee

    MUMBAI: Big RTL Thrill, is all set to pay tribute to Bruce Lee on his 73rd birth anniversary. The channel which caters mainly to the male audience will telecast I Am Bruce Lee exclusively for its Indian audiences. The documentary which chronicles the action-packed life of the martial arts hero will be aired on 27 November at 10:00 pm.

     

    The channel which is available in dual feeds of Hindi and English, through this offering, gives an opportunity to all the martial art enthusiasts to have an insight into the master’s life who has justified each role with perfection from being a martial art expert, and founder of Jeet Dune Do to a son, husband and legendary icon.

     

    Across the world, I Am Bruce Lee is a well applauded documentary–cum- biopic about the greatest phenomena of martial arts, Bruce Lee. The documentary not only showcases the master’s excellence but will also focus on his personal life through the lens of his family, friends etc. The biopic is an interesting mixture of the master’s personal and professional stories. It includes footage featuring Bruce Lee’s students from the past, co-actors and everybody closely involved with his life. 

  • MCOF seminar aims to educate LMOs

    MCOF seminar aims to educate LMOs

    MUMBAI: Constituted just over a year ago to protect cable operators and safeguard their business, the Maharashtra Cable Operators’ Federation (MCOF), today organised its first business and education seminar in Mumbai.

     

    Held in Hindi and English,around 400 Last Mile Operators (LMOs) travelled from neighbouring states like Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Goa and Karnataka for it.

     

    The first session was to educate LMOs about the importance of customer care and enhancing the quality of service. Vishwamangal Education CEO Suman Keluskar who deals in soft skills highlighted the need for LMOs to be well groomed as well as train their subordinates to be the same to make customers feel good.
    Suman Keluskar, Vynsley Fernandes and Tony D’Silva spoke about customer care, global trends in cable TV and the upcoming HITS technology respectively

     

    “The reason why customers welcome a Pizza Hut boy is because he is nice to them,” she said, stressing that customers today were ready to pay for good service but for that to happen, LMOs needed to know the opportunities available to them as well as what customers were demanding. “Innovate in your production. Use the internet to advance yourself,” she said.

     

    Session two discussed how while LMOs across the globe have learnt to monetise their business, back home, it continues to be a loss-making one. Addressing the session, Castle Media director Vynsley Fernandes, started off by describing how developed countries such as the US, UK and Taiwan had faced the same issues that India is currently facing. But the cable ops dealt with them through innovation and have today grown to last mile digital system providers.

     

    “From the time the Gulf War happened and everybody wanted to watch TV, things are much different now. Multi-screen viewing is what is happening now,” he said.
    Citing the example of the US, where operators have increased their revenues despite a drop in the number of TV homes, and are expecting the ARPU to go up to $40 from $21 currently in the next five years, Fernandes reasoned this was because they had adapted to using TV along with the Internet and were offering viewers a multi-screen experience.

     

    He pointed out that concepts like Hybrid Broadband TV, second screen, catch up TV, time shift TV, TV on mobile etc. had already penetrated the US markets and helped cable operators exponentially.

     

    “Think long term as to whether you can monetise your product. Whenever you are investing in a technology, what is its future road map?” he urged, saying that the only challenge would come from OTT services such as Netflix and Hulu where movies and channels will go directly on the Internet without the need for an MSO or LMO. However, he was quick to add that this hasn’t met with much success in India, yet.

    While advertisers are approaching LMOs to target specific demographics on TV, the STBs taken up by LMOs are not so advanced, Fernandes said. Pointing out that in the US, LMOs provide a posse of services including entertainment, home monitoring, automation comfort, energy management and wellness assisted living, in India too, “an LMO should be the one-stop digital services’ stop for customers,” he concluded.

     

    Drawing upon his experience in broadcast and DTH to present his project on Headends in the Sky (HITS), former Sun TV CEO Tony D’Silva said this was a good prospect for LMOs to think about.

     

    D’Silva said that most consumers watch not more than 12 to 15 channels and so, it was necessary to create such packages and device-shifting technologies for the future.

     

    “You are at the threshold of a game change. Our main threat is the DTH players and we need to be above them and have a robust system,” he said, stressing that HITS was a much better option for LMOs than taking signals from MSOs. Under HITS, the agreements are directly with broadcasters, there are no carriage fees, and it would yield higher revenue (Rs 108) as compared to dealing with an MSO (Rs 59.5) or even independently (Rs 85).

     

    “The biggest cable company in the world today is Comcast. 17 million out of Comcast’s 22 million subscribers get supply services from HITS and Comcast gives its customers all the benefits that Fernandes spoke about,” said D’Silva, urging LMOs to adopt HITS through which they could choose and demand things as well as insert local channels, the revenue from which would be completely theirs.

     

    A local cable operator from Goregaon, Bernadette Dsouza, said: “I have come for the seminar to know about new opportunities as well as how to save my business from MSOs’ domination.”

    The good news is MCOF plans to hold such seminars in other states as well in the coming months.

  • Amish’s SHIVA TRILOGY crosses 2 million copies in print and gross retail sales of Rs. 50 crores

    Amish’s SHIVA TRILOGY crosses 2 million copies in print and gross retail sales of Rs. 50 crores

    MUMBAI:  The Shiva Trilogy, written by Amish, is a compelling, fictional tale of a Tibetan tribal called Shiva, whose adventures nearly 4000 years ago, morphed into the mythical legends of the Hindu God Shiva. The Shiva Trilogy (The Immortals of Meluha, The Secret of the Nagas & The Oath of the Vayuputras) has more than 2 million copies in print with gross retail sales of over Rs 50 crores, making it the fastest selling book series in the history of Indian publishing.

     

    Over the last few months, The Oath of the Vayuputras, The Immortals of Meluha and The Secret of the Nagas have remained at the top in the A C Nielsen bestseller list in India, one of the rare occasions where one author’s books dominate the national bestseller lists so completely!

     

    Published by Westland Ltd, the books have been released across the Indian subcontinent in various languages, including English, Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Telugu, Bengali, Assamese. It has also been released in the Indonesian language, Bahasa Indonesia. They will also be released very soon in other languages like Tamil.

     

    Additionally, Jo Fletcher Books (an imprint of Quercus Books) have bought the English language rights outside of the Indian sub-continent and has published the first book, The Immortals of Meluha, in the UK in January 2013. The book will be released in the US in Summer 2014. The book is also due for release in Vietnam soon.

     

    The Shiva Trilogy has attracted a wide and devoted audience since its publication, with publishing gurus calling it a genre-creating book series. It has also received positive reviews from various eminent personalities. Spiritual guru, Deepak Chopra, complimented the books saying, ‘Amish’s mythical imagination mines the past and taps into the possibilities of the future. His book series, archetypal and stirring, unfold the deepest recesses of the soul as well as our collective consciousness.’ Renowned Film Director, Shekhar Kapur, called Amish ‘India’s first literary popstar’, while celebrated author Anil Dharker called him ‘a literary phenomenon’.

     

    Many marketing innovations have also been attempted for the Shiva Trilogy. For the 1st book, The Immortals of Meluha, the first chapter had been printed and distributed, free of cost, as a sampler. A trailer film had also been made and uploaded on YouTube, probably for the first time in the history of Indian publishing. For the 2nd book, The Secret of the Nagas, a professional film-quality trailer film had been made and showcased in cinemas, once again for the first time in Indian publishing history. The string of innovations has continued in the marketing of the 3rd book of the trilogy, The Oath of the Vayuputras. For the first time in Indian publishing, an original soundtrack album has been created for a book series called ‘Vayuputras: the soundtrack of the Shiva Trilogy books’. For the festive season a box set of the Shiva Trilogy books is being released as a special hardbound edition for gifting.

     

    Giving the life of music to the soul of the words, all the 10 songs in the album have been originally created out of various sections of the 3 books of the Shiva Trilogy. Top-notch musical artistes like Taufiq Qureshi, Sonu Nigam, Palash Sen & Bickram Ghosh have contributed their talent to this album. A professional, world-class music video has also been produced which is being telecast in various music channels.

  • The Hunger Games: Catching Fire gets India release date as 29 November

    The Hunger Games: Catching Fire gets India release date as 29 November

    MUMBAI: This November, Universal Pictures will bring The Hunger Games: Catching Fire to India as it gets a date set for 29th. Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Liam Hemsworth and Josh Hutcherson, the dark adventure is the sequel to the first one – The Hunger Games.

     

    The movie directed by Francis Lawrence will be released in four languages – English, Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. This movie follows the characters’ life post the first movie. After they have returned home from the Annual Hunger Games they have to leave their family and close friends. Now the Capitol is preparing for the next edition of the games.

     

    The movie will release only one week post the worldwide launch which is on 22 November. The first movie became a blockbuster hit worldwide and the third and fourth in the series are already in the making, slated for releasing in the next two years.

  • Techzone and Aircel launch Re 1 store

    Techzone and Aircel launch Re 1 store

    MUMBAI: After Techzone’s alliance with Aircel for Re 1 video store four months back, the encouraging response has prompted the launch of another promising platform – Aircel’s Re 1 store!  Powered by Techzone as their technology and platform partner, Aircel has enhanced its offerings for their users by opening the exciting Re 1 store that includes downloading videos, full tracks, images and games just for Re 1.

     

    Techzone not only offers its vast library of more than 10,000 pieces of content across multiple categories in more than 12 languages to this store but has also powered the VAS platform for Aircel. Consumers can access this latest value added service on mobile via WAP or GPRS/2G/3G and download the same on mobile handset at just Re1 per content. The social media savvy youth can also share their content preference on Facebook and Twitter along with referring the same to their friends.

     

    The content at store for Re 1 covers over 12 languages including English, Hindu, Marathi, Gujarati, Assamese, Bhojpuri, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam amongst others. This new VAS would let the consumers download the videos across 8 genres including bollywood, Hollywood, reality shows, lifestyle, music, regional, comedy and more from a vast collection of 10,000+ videos. Along with the latest music, Techzone also offers their aficionados retro music too.

     

    To engage more customers, the Re 1 store will have ‘Goodies Section’ and Premium section where the customers can collect points on every download and later redeem those points for recharge, movie tickets and much more and Premium section will offer high on value combo offers wherein a user can avail packs for Rs 10 or for Rs 25 and enjoy different services. Users can also book mark by downloading the icon on the handset where the icon would direct them to the WAP page directly, thus making the process simpler. This service is aimed at introducing more Aircel customers to the mobile internet experience. The charges for browsing the portal is as per the data plans opted by the users.

     

    Explaining the expansion of their VAS offering, Techzone MD Naveen Bhandari said, “Increased usage of smart phones and internet penetration in the Tier II & Tier III cities, has led the VAS industry to grow leaps and bounds resulting us to provide innovative services to the customers. With approximately more than a billion subscribers in India there is a strong potential market for expansion in terms of services. Sticking to our pull based strategy our content team is constantly making an effort to add plethora of new services and features so as to reach out to those billion consumers. The VAS market, though currently facing turbulence for a short term, is likely to see an upward surge and grow by 15-20 per cent by the end of 2013. This growth is majorly due to cheaper handsets and growing digital space and we are expecting positive response for our services.”

  • GSAT signs new capacity on SES satellites NSS-11 and SES-9

    GSAT signs new capacity on SES satellites NSS-11 and SES-9

    MUMBAI: SES has announced that the Philippine direct-to-home (DTH) satellite TV provider Global Satellite (GSAT) has contracted its fourth transponder on NSS-11, cementing SES’ orbital position of 108.2 degrees east as one of Asia’s leading video neighbourhoods.

    The multi-year deal will see the transfer of current capacity usage by GSAT from NSS-11 to SES-9, currently scheduled for launch in 2015. When launched, SES-9 will be the largest SES satellite dedicated to the Asia-Pacific region. The new spacecraft will be providing expansion capacity for DTH, enterprise, mobility and government services across the region.

    GSAT, the satellite division of First United Broadcasting Corp (FUBC), launched its DTH service in 2008 on the NSS-11 Ku-band satellite, providing subscribers with access to an improved mix of international programmes including English, Mandarin, Korean, Tagalog, Japanese and Spanish channels. With this additional capacity, GSAT will be offering 12 high definition (HD) channels and 47 standard definition (SD) channels to more than 200,000 subscribers across the Philippine archipelago.

    FUBC president and CEO Philip J. Chien said, “Our ability to offer highly reliable DTH satellite TV to our growing base of subscribers in the Philippines is largely due to the comprehensive footprints of NSS-11, and, from 2015, SES-9. We are confident that SES’ expertise will enable us to grow in our market and increase both the quality and quantity of channels in our pay-TV offerings.”

    SES Asia-Pacific and the Middle East sr. VP commercial Deepak Mathur said, “We are delighted to confirm that GSAT, our long-term customer on NSS-11, will become a key anchor customer on SES-9. At SES, we are investing in new satellites to make sure that our customers enjoy business continuity, as well as delivering vital capacity to support their growth in some of the most dynamic media markets in the world.”

  • White House Down to be released in India in English, Hindi and Tamil

    White House Down to be released in India in English, Hindi and Tamil

    NEW DELHI: White House Down, being distributed by Sony Pictures Entertainment, is slated for release in India in English, Hindi and Tamil.

    Directed by Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, Godzilla, The Day After Tomorrow, 2012) the film will be released on 19 July in the country.

    The action thriller stars Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jason Clarke, Richard Jenkins and James Woods 

    In Columbia Pictures‘ White House Down, capitol policeman John Cale (Channing Tatum) has just been denied his dream job with the secret service of protecting President James Sawyer (Jamie Foxx). Not wanting to let down his little girl with the news, he takes her on a tour of the White House, when the complex is overtaken by a heavily armed paramilitary group. Now, with the nation‘s government falling into chaos and time running out, it is up to Cale to save the president, his daughter, and the country.

    A spokesperson for Sony Pictures Entertainment said this release will followed by The Smurfs 2 (3D) on 2 August and Elysium on 23 August.

  • Yash Raj Films enters into foreign collaboration for English film

    Yash Raj Films enters into foreign collaboration for English film

    NEW DELHI: Yash Raj Films is entering into a foreign collaboration to make a film that is a screen adaptation of a 2012 novel about an actress who has always been considered among the most beautiful in the world.

    Producer Uday Chopra and Grace of Monaco writer Arash Amel have come together to produce a screen adaptation of the novel "Seducing Ingrid Bergman".

    YRF Entertainment has picked up the Chris Greenhalgh novel which dramatises the real-life affair between legendary Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman and war photographer Robert Capa.

    Amel and Chopra worked together on Olivier Dahan directedGrace of Monaco, a film being released later this year by The Weinstein Company.

    Chopra – who has already made a mark in films like ‘Mohabbatein‘ and ‘Mere Yaar ki shaadi hai‘ – said, "I believe that Amel, who also wrote ‘Grace of Monaco‘, is the perfect writer to bring this story to life and I am very excited to have YRF Entertainment bring it to the world."

    The script is nearing completion and other details will soon be revealed as and when the director and cast are locked. YRF Entertainment‘s head of development & production Jonathan Reiman will be the executive producer.