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Exhibitions India is a leading organiser of focused international
trade shows and events in the country. Star News was the co-host
for the event.
There is keen competition among various news channels to create
their own identity. The popularity of the channels have increased
tremendously, with new news channels being launched nearly every
month or so. "News channels have even influenced the way politics
and politicians conduct themselves in this country," he observed.
Naqvi noted that the lifestyle and the manner of presentation of
the politicians themselves had undergone a sea change with the advent
of news channels. Political parties have started appointing spokespersons
for television specifically as they have become very image conscious.
According to Naqvi, once KU-band direct-to-home (DTH) television
service comes into being, it will become easier to carry news into
the rural areas.
Earlier, welcoming the delegates, Exhibitions India Pvt Ltd MD
Prem Behl said television has brought communities together as never
before. "With the onset of satellite TV, especially, news TV,
there has been a paradigm shift in the manner in which we receive
and imbibe information," he said.
Behl added, "Today, the total number of channels broadcast
into India has increased to 152, of which, 64 are regional channels,
and the thrust is on or exclusive 24/7 news channels. "Thus,
today, news is big. The news channel market is one of the world’s
most potential and lucrative markets. Behl said, "Indian news
channels are growing by 24 per cent and according to industry estimates,
broadcasting revenues could grow from $1 billion to $2.9 billion
by 2007."
The panel for the opening session included Leitch Asia Ltd MD Karlton
Burn, Gujarat Samachar CMD Shreyan Shah, IndusInd Media and Communications
Ltd vice-chairman Ram T Hingorani and Benchmark Microsystems Pvt
Ltd president Ashish Mukherjee.
Adding that newsroom technology was a very relevant topic today,
Karlton Burn thanked the organizer for allowing him the opportunity
to grace the event. Shreyan Shah added that technology is changing
at lightning speed. Today, news takes hardly 36 minutes to travel
from one part of the country to another. News gathering itself has
acquired the latest technology," he said.
Ram Hingorani mentioned that barring CNBC, all of the news channels
were broadcast free-to-air (FTA). "Today, news gathering has
become elegant, and lots of cosmetics (changes) have come in,"
he noted.
Mukherjee touched on some of the challenges facing newsgathering
and newsrooms today.
According to him, "These include the increasing use of new
devices, possibly modified phones; capturing and preservation of
meta data; the increasing use of IT as an infrastructure - with
more IT methods being used for moving files around; a very high
level of integration among the various segments of the newsroom;
new delivery formats such as MPEG-4 coding, news on demand and subscription
of news; developing new business models to support all of these."
Chairing the first working session on `Newsroom Systems and Installations,’
K M Paul, engineer-in-chief, All India Radio, said that an exclusive
conference on newsrooms and news related matters indicates the significance
of news in our daily life. "News empowers our knowledge. There
are many processes involved in gathering news. The point is that
the entire process has to be shared." In this context, time
is of utmost importance, he said, adding, "The value of news
is inversely related to the amount of time. That is, we need modern
systems and technologies to gather and present news in the minimum
time possible, so as to retain and enhance its value."
Speaking on electronic news production systems (ENPS), Anthony
Prangley of the Associated Press, UK, said: "This is a newsroom
system designed for journalists, by journalists. It includes newsgathering
assignment systems, newswire management and ingest, script creation
and editing, editorial approval and revision, and control of the
broadcasting equipment and archiving." Sahara TV is its first
customer in India.
Prangley added that the Media Object Server (MOS) from Associated
Press could handle a high volume of news traffic and support multiple
newsrooms. It facilitates dragging and dropping stories across running
orders as well. The latest version, the ENPS-4, integrates Web and
WAP, is MOS compatible, supports browser favourites as well as embedded
clips and graphics.
Touching on digital newsroom and server technologies, Dave Chawner,
director of applications engineering, Leitch Asia Ltd., said that
a major trend is the shift to storing on videodisc instead of tapes.
He highlighted that the key requirements for newsrooms include
multichannel ingest from satellite; ENG and tape sources; rapid
access for viewing new content; quick cut-edit for breaking news;
craft editing for ‘sensitive’ content and effects; immediate availability
for studio playout; remote content access; and content tracking.
He said the server environment offered a multi-user environment,
allowed content sharing and direct, on-server editing, as well as
low-res proxy versions. It also allowed file transfer to and from
remote locations.
Introducing the Leitch environment, Chawner said: "All users
have equal shared access to content. We offer a shared storage environment."
Leitch’s shared storage technology, the RAIDSoft patented SAN management,
he added, "is now finding its true strength."
According to published reports, Sahara Samay Rashtriya, the 24-hour
news channel of the Sahara India Group, has invested over Rs. 2000
million in what is considered as Asia’s largest digital newsroom.
It has tied up with five international technology vendors - Leitch
Inc., Associated Press ENPS, Omnibus Systems, UK, IBM and Shaf Broadcast
for its newsroom located at Noida, on the outskirts of Delhi.
Some other eminent national and international speakers at the conference
included Timothy O’Brien, Partner, Media and Entertainment Industry,
IBM Global Services, Asia Pacific, Japan); Siddharth Bolurker, 3D
product specialist, Softimage Canada; Vynsley Fernandes, director
- Operations, Star News; Rahul Nehra of EuropeStar Limited; R. S.
Chauhan, vice- president-Engineering & Operations, Sahara India
TV Network; Ashok Bharti, country manager, Inmarsat Limited; Ajay
Pal Singh, vice-president, Beehive Systems Ltd; YP Singh, vice president
Technical, Zee News; S. Venkataraman, zonal manager (North), Emerson
Network Power; Sonal Srivastava of RB Comtec and Sadanand Patil,
South-Asia business manager, video business unit, Tektronix (India)
Limited.
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