ITV

Tag: science

  • Cactus celebrates the forgotten women in the field of science and technology

    Cactus celebrates the forgotten women in the field of science and technology

    Mumbai: A science communications and technology company, Cactus Communications, launched a new campaign, “#WomenWhoChangedTheWorld,” to celebrate and bring back the forgotten tales of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) back into the spotlight.

    This year-long campaign started on 8 March 2022, featuring 52 inspiring women across the globe, with one story being highlighted every week of the year through Cactus social media handles.

    The campaign features inspirational Anna Mani (the weather woman of India), Alice Ball (an African American chemist who developed the “Ball Method”), Katherine Johnson (one of the first black American mathematicians to ever work at NASA), Rosalind Franklin (a British chemist and x-ray crystallographer), and many others, and celebrates their contributions and the life-changing scientific discoveries made by them.

    Through this campaign, the company has quietly unveiled a hard-hitting reality that highlights the under-representation and disparity in STEM caused by deep-rooted social norms, stigma, discrimination, and biases against women. Cactus is determined, as the voice of science and technology, to amplify the stories of these under-represented heroes who made an unforgettable contribution to the science and technology space, leaving a legacy for many to follow but not receiving their due credit.

    Cactus CEO and co-founder Abhishek Goel said, “Women have always played a key role in where we see science and technology today. However, very few can name these trailblazers, which is tragic. We at CACTUS, feel responsible for bringing the stories of these women to spotlight through our #WomenWhoChangedTheWorld campaign.”

    A key creator for the campaign, Cactus creative director Saurabh Doke said, “Women have historically played a key role in the advancement of science and technology that has been long overlooked. This campaign is a tribute to all the unsung heroes who have not only contributed to but also defined the world we live in today. This heartwarming and thought-provoking campaign recognises the significant role women have played and advocates that we celebrate them throughout the year and not just on one day. Cactus aims to spread the much-needed awareness of women’s contributions to the world of science and technology and relay valuable information about them through this campaign.”

  • Ajit Pai to serve second term at FCC

    MUMBAI: US president Donald Trump has nominated Indian-American Ajit Pai for serving another term at Federal Communications Commission.  Trump had designated Pai, who was previously the FCC commissioner, as FCC’s acting chairman soon after becoming the US president. 

    On being nominated, Pai said, “I am deeply honored to have been nominated by President Trump to serve a second term on the Federal Communications Commission.  If I am fortunate to be confirmed by the Senate, I will continue to work with my colleagues to connect all Americans with digital opportunity, foster innovation, protect consumers, promote public safety, and make the FCC more open and transparent to the American people.” 

    Before joining FCC, Pai was a Partner at Jenner & Block, LLP, from 2011 until 2012, and Deputy General Counsel, Associate General Counsel, and Special Advisor to the General Counsel at the FCC from 2007 until 2011. The son of immigrants from India, Pai grew up in Parsons, Kansas. 

    “There is a real and growing digital divide in America. In wealthier, metropolitan areas, 4G LTE is ubiquitous, and gigabit fixed service is expanding. But, many rural areas are being left behind,” Pai said in his testimony before the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. 

    Also Read:

    TRAI & FCC sign LoI on accelerating broadband deployment & aligning spectrum policy

  • DSport, Discovery’s expansion into under-served areas beyond factual

    DSport, Discovery’s expansion into under-served areas beyond factual

    MUMBAI: After dividing its offering into two verticals- female & family entertainment product and real world entertainment product- Discovery Networks has now entered the sports genre with its latest offering. Priced at Rs 12.6 on reference interconnect offer (RIO), and Rs 32 for the  high-definition version, DSport provides access to unmatched live sporting action from around the world. With an aim to provide 4000+ hours of live content annually, DSport will air international sports properties ranging from horse racing to football, motorsports, rugby and cycling. Targeted at the passionate community of sports lovers, the channel will offer a daily dose of 10+ hours of live content for viewers across the country.

    The channel went live on 6 February and reached about 35 million households.

    In this fast evolving digital space where more and more digital platforms are providing live coverage of several sports events, Discovery Networks, in the current scenario, does not see owning a digital platform as the best profitable business in India. Though, it is entering the digital space with its remarkable IPs which they are licensing across multiple digital Over-The-Top (OTT) platforms.

    “The only thing we are not entering right now as is our own platform because I don’t think the economics of it are suitable for every broadcaster. Going on hypothesis, I think that owning a digital platform might not be the best profitable business in India because the consumer acquisition cost is very high and the retention rates of the platforms are very low. It’s the easiest thing to launch a technological platform with content offering but acquiring people to sign in on the platform is a high end cost. 80 per cent of the subscribers are out of the platform in a month. They have no stickiness to the platform. So, we will create remarkable IPs like we have for sports and then decide whether to sign exclusive deals with the existing platforms or to distribute it across a range of digital platforms. Whatever makes the best financial sense. Our push for digital is very aggressive,” said Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific senior vice president and general manager Karan Bajaj.

    He further added, “I think that we should possess content that is so remarkable that every network wants to own it, which is much more profitable business rather than owning your own platform. We are acquiring linear and digital rights for every property. We are creating digital brands with digital native players which we will be licensing through multiple platforms. My objective is to serve the digital consumers; the consumers who are looking at things digitally. And launching a digital platform is subscale for us.”

    Former MD of ESPN Star and former CEO of Dish TV India R.C. Venkateish will be working closely with DSport especially in areas related to content acquisition for the channel.

    The channel will be a part of the sports tier via a subscription model on both DTH and cable in both HD and SD. It has already partnered with Hathway and bunch of other cable platforms and are in talks with several DTH players. “The channel will be distributed in the same way as our other channels,” added Bajaj.  

    Bajaj also opined that the channel has received very strong response from the advertisers. In its initial phase, the channel does not plan to have any advertisements to hit the scale and distribution for a lucrative business of its advertisers.  

    The network is marketing the channel thoughtfully. It is promoting the channel community wise rather than massively. “It is best to target specific communities to market the channel rather than doing one or two big promotional activities,” added Bajaj.  

    DSport redefines sports coverage in India with a wide repertoire of exciting properties from across the world of sports. These will initially include:

    ·  Horse Racing: exclusive rights to telecast daily live racing from the best of UK and Irish tracks totaling over 7000 races/ year

    ·  Football: Brazilian League, Chinese Super League, Portuguese League, Major League Soccer (USA)

    ·  Golf: British Open (The Open Championship), US Open, PGA Championship, LPGA

    ·  Motorsports: NASCAR, FIA World Rallycross Championship

    ·  Rugby: 6 Nations Rugby

    · Cycling: Tour de France (a property of Eurosport)

    DSport is in advanced negotiations for selected high quality cricket events to add to the above-mentioned portfolio.

    The other channels of the network, Discovery, Science, Turbo, Animal Planet, TLC, ID, Kids, will perceive a complete change in its look and feel starting with Discovery channel by June end followed by the rest. It plans to have 200 hours of original localized content not limited to infotainment but diversifying into other genres like crime, adventure, automation, etc. The key focus, apart from localisation and number of hours, will be on the nature of storytelling.

    Also Read:

    Discovery’s D-Sport goes live today

  • Dabur India extends Honitus brand with ‘Hot Sip’

    Dabur India extends Honitus brand with ‘Hot Sip’

    MUMBAI: Moving forward on its mission to present the benefits of Ayurveda in modern-day formats, Dabur India has extended its Honitus brand with the launch of Dabur Honitus Hot Sip, a powder to make Ayurvedic ‘Kadha’ especially designed to help fight cough & cold. Enriched with the goodness of 15 powerful unique Ayurvedic herbs such as Shunthi, Kantakari, Kulanjana & Tulsi, combined with honey to provide effective natural formulation for effective relief from cough, cold and sore throat, Honitus Hot Sip comes in two ready-to-use formats – a tea-stick and a sachet.

    Backed with the traditional Ayurvedic knowledge of medicinal Kadha preparation, Dabur Honitus Hot Sip is easy to use – Just stir the tea stick or the contents of the sachet in either warm water, tea or milk, and experience the goodness of Ayurveda Kadha. Dabur Honitus Hot Sip sachet is priced at Rs. 10, while the stick format is priced at Rs. 95 for a box of five sticks.

    Dabur India Marketing Head-OTC Ganapathy Subramaniam said: “This marks a first for Dabur and for the Ayurvedic and healthcare industry in India. Indian consumers have always sworn by the health benefits of Ayurvedic Kadha, and with Dabur Honitus Hot Sip we are now offering a effective alternative to fight cough and cold, that is convenient, time saving and packed with the goodness of Ayurvedic herbs.”

  • Dabur India extends Honitus brand with ‘Hot Sip’

    Dabur India extends Honitus brand with ‘Hot Sip’

    MUMBAI: Moving forward on its mission to present the benefits of Ayurveda in modern-day formats, Dabur India has extended its Honitus brand with the launch of Dabur Honitus Hot Sip, a powder to make Ayurvedic ‘Kadha’ especially designed to help fight cough & cold. Enriched with the goodness of 15 powerful unique Ayurvedic herbs such as Shunthi, Kantakari, Kulanjana & Tulsi, combined with honey to provide effective natural formulation for effective relief from cough, cold and sore throat, Honitus Hot Sip comes in two ready-to-use formats – a tea-stick and a sachet.

    Backed with the traditional Ayurvedic knowledge of medicinal Kadha preparation, Dabur Honitus Hot Sip is easy to use – Just stir the tea stick or the contents of the sachet in either warm water, tea or milk, and experience the goodness of Ayurveda Kadha. Dabur Honitus Hot Sip sachet is priced at Rs. 10, while the stick format is priced at Rs. 95 for a box of five sticks.

    Dabur India Marketing Head-OTC Ganapathy Subramaniam said: “This marks a first for Dabur and for the Ayurvedic and healthcare industry in India. Indian consumers have always sworn by the health benefits of Ayurvedic Kadha, and with Dabur Honitus Hot Sip we are now offering a effective alternative to fight cough and cold, that is convenient, time saving and packed with the goodness of Ayurvedic herbs.”

  • Star Movies Select HD to air ‘I Origins’

    Star Movies Select HD to air ‘I Origins’

    MUMBAI: Star Movies Select HD is all set to air the science fiction drama I Origins on 19 December, 2015 at 9 pm.

     

    The drama will be an exploration of the end of science and the picking up of spirituality. The film is produced by Mike Cahill, Hunter Gray and Alex Orlovsky.

     

    I Origins narrates the story of Dr. Ian Gray played by Michael Pitt, a molecular biologist studying the evolution of the eye. He finds his work permeating his life after a brief encounter with a young woman enacted by Astrid Berg?s-Frisbey who slips away from him. As his research continues years later with his lab partner Karen played by Brit Marling, they make a stunning scientific discovery that has far reaching implications and complicates both his scientific and spiritual beliefs. Traveling half way around the world, he risks everything he has ever known to validate his theory.

     

    The movie also stars Steven Yeun and Archie Panjabi, The movie starts as a love story and then morphs into a thriller, propelled always by the push and pull of faith and logic, with tragedy shifting world views over time.

     

    The movie has also bagged the best feature length film award at the Festival Internacional de Cinema Fant?stic de Catalunya, bringing home a revenue of $475,591.

  • Australia Network set to launch on DD Direct+

    Australia Network set to launch on DD Direct+

    MUMBAI: DD Direct+ consumers, starting November, will have an added network to their channel list. Following a recent agreement between ABC International and Doordarshan, Australia Network is all set to launch on DD Direct+.  

     

    Australia Network is a 24/7 entertainment and news channel offering viewers a mix of content from around Australia and the region covering news, sport, science, education, arts, children’s programming, drama and English language learning.  The channel is available in 45 countries across the Asia and Pacific region.

     

    To mark the launch of the new service, the ABC’s agenda-setting panel discussion programme, Q&A, wasl broadcast live from Delhi on Monday 18 November.  Q & A’s host, Tony Jones, led a high profile panel which included India’s Minister of State for Human Resource Development Shashi Tharoor; former Australian cricketer Stuart MacGill;  Australian-born Bollywood star Pallavi Sharda; outspoken conservative commentator Swapan Dasgupta; Tehelka editor Shoma Chaudhury and award-winning TV host and journalist Karan Thapar.  The panel discussed issues of mutual interest to both countries in front of an audience comprising both Indians and Australians.

     

    ABC International is also set to launch a new website for India, AustraliaPlus.com/India – the new digital home of the best of Australian content covering arts and culture, business, education, health, lifestyle, news and current affairs, science, sports, technology and travel.  The website will offer content in both English and Hindi as well as will have an Indian news feed from Doordashan.  The website’s launch closely follows the introduction of ABC International’s Chinese mobile phone app into the China market last month.

     

    “As 2013 nears an end, we are seeing an enormous growth in the sharing of content between India and Australia through a number of channels,” said ABC International CEO Lynley Marshall.

     

    Marshall said the initiatives reflected the growing demand for more information about contemporary Australian life, the growing connections in business, education and tourism and the people to people links.

     

    DD Direct+ CEO Jawhar Sircar said, “We really look forward to having ABC hosted on our DD Direct+ as it helps Indians to understand and appreciate Australia and its culture in a far better manner, and with more depth than at present.”

     

    “We also look forward to ABC assisting and guiding us in telling Australian audiences more about India, its people, and its culture,” he added.

     

    Australia Network is also available in key metropolitan markets across the Indian sub-continent via a number of regional cable and satellite television operators.

  • Nate Silver and ESPN to reboot FiveThirtyEight.com as a data-driven news site

    Nate Silver and ESPN to reboot FiveThirtyEight.com as a data-driven news site

    MUMBAI: Statistician Nate Silver rose to prominence by accurately forecasting the results of the 2008 presidential election as an independent blogger and the 2012 presidency as a writer at The New York Times. But on Friday, Silver moved over to ESPN.

     

    In the next couple months, Silver will be relaunching his website, FiveThirtyEight.com, as an ESPN backed publication. The new FiveThirtyEight will be a standalone website that uses a data to tell stories and make predictions on sports, politics, economics, culture, science, and technology, ESPN said in a statement. Silver will run the new site as editor-in-chief, overseeing a team of writers and editors.

     

    ESPN took a similar approach back in 2010 when it launched Grantland, a website run by sports writer Bill Simmons that brings a long-form journalism approach to sports and culture. Silver will also serve as an occasional political analyst for ABC News which, like ESPN, is owned by The Walt Disney Company.

  • bbcnews.com to hold mobile photo contest for South Asia

    bbcnews.com to hold mobile photo contest for South Asia

    MUMBAI: BBC News website has launched its first Mobile Photo Contest for South Asia.

    Themed My Changing World’, the contest will be open till 31 March 2007, with prizes to be won every week. Details of the contest are available on bbcnews.com/contest.

    BBC News Interactive head Steve Herrmann said, “The pictures we receive every day from our audience are changing the way we report the world. This contest is specifically for our South Asian audience. We think this will be a good way to engage with younger audiences across the region, and hope it will be fun to take part in.”

    The contest invites mobile photos from people across South Asia, and offers participants a chance to win BBC merchandise every week. This is in addition to prizes such as an iPod Video, Digital Camera, and Worldspace radio at the end of the contest. Every week, the website will feature some of the best and most interesting picture entries.

    The BBC News website offers a selection of news, entertainment, business, science, technology, and sport news.

    The BBC News website claims to receive over 900 million page impressions every month, and has around 40 million unique users a month.

  • PBS Kids to air ‘Franny’s Feet’ with Spanish track in US

    PBS Kids to air ‘Franny’s Feet’ with Spanish track in US

    MUMBAI: Pre-school series Franny’s Feet will now be available on PBS Kids with a Spanish language track beginning 7 October. Thirteen/WNET and Decode Entertainment have brought the weekly series for four- to seven-year-old children to television in markets across the United States. 

    Viewers will also be able to access the Spanish-language track or DVS (descriptive video service for the visually impaired) using the Secondary Audio Program (SAP), informs an official release.

    The PBS Kids broadcast of Franny’s Feet is produced by Decode Entertainment in association with Thirteen/WNET. Decode has also produced additional content to accompany the PBS Kids broadcast. The new segments, in which Franny prompts audience participation, are highly interactive and build young viewers’ understanding of educational content explored in the episode. The PBS Kids version of Franny’s Feet also includes new sing-along music videos. 

    The fun continues online, where kids can join Franny on adventures around the world-from Africa to South America, to the South Pole — and all kinds of places in between at www.pbskids.org, adds the release.

    Franny’s magical adventures transport her to places around the world, where she meets new friends and tries to help them solve problems, sharing her feelings, fears and advice with the audience along the way. In every episode, while helping her grandpa in his shoe repair shop, Franny slips on a pair of shoes and says “Where will my feet take me today…?” From there, the adventures are limitless. Global awareness, science and vocabulary development are woven together with storytelling for a seamless, entertaining and interdisciplinary learning experience.