(3 April 2008 1:00 pm)

MUMBAI: Essel Group's Digital Media Convergence Ltd (DMCL) has launched an entertainment portal - mypopkorn.com.

"This is the 109th launch from Zee stable in 15 years. We have always been in the forefront of entertainment technology and we leave no stone unturned when it comes to our viewers," said Essel Group chairman Subhash Chandra. "We have initiatives like Dish TV and HITS (Headend-In-The Sky). Having introduced innovative measures in the field of entertainment, an entertainment portal is an obvious next step for us."

Mypopkorn is a video-driven portal that offers an interactive multimedia content in the form of webisodes (encapsulated TV episode on the web) of television shows from across India's top channels, latest Bollywood and Hollywood promos, movie clips as well as current national and international news. It also offers Web 2.0 utilities like blogging, personalization and social networking possibilities.

Chandra also stated that this website will offer talent from the country to showcase their work on the portal with MyStage section for which portal will give royalty also. However, when asked about issues related to slow speed and low bandwidth, Chandra said, "We are trying to make the site fast accessible with simultaneous rendering of videos, but can't help about the speed related issue."

The website can be integrated across multiple devices allowing users to access it on things like ipods, mobile phones etc. Registered users can avail of special benefits and privileges making the site completely participative in nature.

DMCL CEO Ishwar Jha said, "The portal has been launched keeping the popularity and demand of Indian content globally. We are trying to meet with these demands through myPOPKORN.com."

Mypopkorn.com has tied up with broadcasters such as Star India and Sony Entertainment Television apart from Zee Network for showcasing their television content on the web to make it available to an international audience.