English Entertainment
Discovery Travel & Living to air two localised series in 06
BANGALORE: International lifestyle channel Discovery Travel & Living (DTL) is bringing out two series next year which will be localised in India. DTL is also making a five episode series on speed as an element slated to launch by the end of this month.
This was revealed to indiantelevision.com today on the sidelines of a media briefing to kick off a series on revolutionary music that left an indelible mark on the world — Impact: Songs That Changed The World.
We are going to bring out two series next year which are going to be localised for India, made by Indian production houses. Its for the first time that well be seeing a product made and commissioned by Indian producers. Our idea is not just to showcase the world to India, but to showcase India to the world. These series-one food and one travel show- will be broadcast abroad as well as in India said DTL manager corporate communications Rajiv Bakshi.
Additionally, DTL is making a five-episode series on speed as an element, what it means to various people, speed as in used for car racing, super-sonic jets, speed as used by women and women coming into driving, into speed racing. The show is slated to launch by the end of this month, said Bakshi.
Speaking about Impact: Songs That Changed The World, bakshi said the series is celebrating the songs and not the singers per se and 12 songs have been selected. The weekly show kicked off on 12 November on DTL and has been slotted at 8:30 pm. A rerun will air every Saturday at 4:30 pm.
Most of the songs are in demand even today, and songs of singers such as Bob Marley sell more than they did when he was alive. His freedom anthem I Shot the Sheriff , Elvis Presleys Heartbreak Hotel or Aretha Franklins female empowerment mega-hit Respect, these songs represent several indisputable milestones in the history of popular music.
The series includes the following songs in the episodes:
(1) MAYBELLENE, Chuck Berry
(2) HEARTBREAK HOTEL, Elvis Presley
(3) I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND, The Beatles
(4) RESPECT, Aretha Franklin
(5) I SHOT THE SHERIFF, Bob Marley
(6) I WANNA BE SEDATED, The Ramones
(7) STAYIN’ ALIVE, The Bee Gees
(8) DO THEY KNOW IT’S CHRISTMAS?, Band Aid
(9) WALK THIS WAY, Run DMC & Aerosmith
(10) LIKE A VIRGIN, Madonna
(11) SMELLS LIKE TEEN SPIRIT, Nirvana
(12) ANY MAN Of MINE, Shania Twain
People could say that we could have added more songs or some of the songs should not be there, we understand that and we appreciate that, said Bakshi while speaking with Indiantelevision.com.
Other interesting subjects that DTL plans to cover would be the effects of collisions between comets, a two episode series on the Titanic the first episode would cover the building of the ship and the second would show the reasons for its sinking, based on new findings.
Another program that is likely to be telecast – Voyage to Tsunami would be telecast on 26 December , to coincide with the anniversary of the event that devastated a large portion of South East Asia and India.
UK: The aerial is losing its grip. As broadband becomes the default way Britons watch television, the UK is edging towards a decisive, and divisive, question: should Freeview be switched off by 2034? The issue, highlighted in reporting by The Guardian, has exposed deep fault lines over access, affordability and the future of public service broadcasting.
For nearly 25 years, Freeview has delivered free-to-air television from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 to almost every corner of the country. Even now, it remains the UK’s largest TV platform, used in more than 16m homes and on around 10m main household sets. Yet the same broadcasters that built it are now pressing for its closure within eight years.
Their case rests on a structural shift in viewing. Smart TVs, superfast broadband and the Netflix-led streaming boom have pulled audiences online. Advertising economics have followed. By 2034, the number of homes using Freeview as their main TV set is forecast to fall from a peak of almost 12m in 2012 to fewer than 2m, making digital terrestrial television, or DTT, increasingly costly to sustain.
But critics say the rush to switch off risks abandoning those least able, or least willing, to move online.
“I don’t want to be choosing apps and making new accounts,” says Lynette, 80, from Kent. “It is time-consuming and irritating trying to work out where I want to be, to remember the sequence of clicks, with hieroglyphics instead of words. If I make a mistake I have to start again.”
Lynette is among nearly 100,000 people who have signed a “save Freeview” petition launched by campaign group Silver Voices. She fears the government is about to “take [Freeview] away from me and others who either don’t like, can’t afford, or can’t use online versions”.
Official figures underline the fault lines. A report commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport estimates that by 2035, 1.8m homes will still depend on Freeview. Ofcom’s analysis shows those households are more likely to be disabled, older, living alone, female, and based in the north of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Freeview is owned by the public service broadcasters through Everyone TV, which also operates Freesat and the newer streaming platform Freely. After two years of review, DCMS is expected to set out its position soon, drawing on three options proposed by Ofcom: a costly upgrade of Freeview’s ageing technology; maintaining a bare-bones service with only core PSB channels; or a full switch-off during the 2030s.
The broadcasters have rallied behind the third option. They argue that 2034 is the logical cut-off, when transmission contracts with network operator Arqiva expire. By then, they say, the cost of broadcasting to a dwindling audience will far outweigh the returns from TV advertising.
Ofcom agrees a crunch point is approaching. In July, the regulator warned of a “tipping point” within the next few years, after which it will no longer be commercially viable for broadcasters to carry the costs of DTT.
Others see risks beyond economics. Questions remain over whether internet TV can reliably deliver emergency broadcasts, such as the daily Covid updates, in the way that universally available DTT can. The UK radio industry has also warned that an internet-only future for TV could push up distribution costs and force some radio stations off air if PSBs no longer share Arqiva’s mast network.
“It is a political hot potato,” says Dennis Reed, founder of Silver Voices, who says he has “dissociated” his organisation from the government’s stakeholder forum, which he believes is “heavily biased” towards streaming.
The Future TV Taskforce, representing the PSBs, counters that moving online could “close the digital divide once and for all”. “We want to be able to plan to ensure that no one is left behind,” a spokesperson says, adding that rising DTT costs could otherwise mean cuts to programme budgets.
The numbers show the scale of the challenge. Of the 1.8m Freeview-dependent homes projected for 2035, around 1.1m are expected to have broadband but not use it for TV. The remaining 700,000 are forecast to lack a broadband connection altogether.
Veterans of the analogue switch-off, completed in 2012 after 76 years, recall similar fears of “TV blackout chaos”. Around 6 per cent of households were labelled “digital refuseniks”, yet a targeted help scheme and a national campaign, fronted by a robot called Digit Al voiced by Matt Lucas, delivered a largely smooth transition.
This time, the BBC is less keen to foot the bill. Tim Davie, the outgoing director general, has said the corporation should not fund a comparable support programme for a Freeview switch-off.
Research for Sky by Oliver & Ohlbaum suggests that with early awareness campaigns and digital inclusion measures, only about 330,000 households would ultimately need hands-on help ahead of a 2034 shutdown.
Meanwhile, viewing habits continue to fragment. Audience body Barb says 7 per cent of UK households no longer own a TV set, choosing to watch on other devices. In December, YouTube overtook the BBC’s combined channels in total UK viewing across TVs, smartphones and tablets, albeit measured at a minimum of three minutes.
That shift may accelerate. YouTube has recently blocked Barb and its partner Kantar from accessing viewing session data, limiting transparency just as online platforms consolidate power.
“When the government chose British Satellite Broadcasting as the ‘winner’ in satellite TV it was Rupert Murdoch’s Sky instead that came out on top,” says a senior TV executive quoted by The Guardian. “There already is such an outsider ready to be the winner in the transition to internet TV; it is YouTube.”
Freeview’s future now hangs on a familiar British dilemma: modernise fast and risk exclusion, or protect universality and pay the price. Either way, the aerial’s days as king of the living room look numbered.
