English Entertainment
Trendz TV brings special shows with new year theme
MUMBAI: Zee’s fashion and style channel Trendz TV is all set to welcome the new year with new programming initiatives. Apart from launching a new show in the primetime band, the channel has a one hour special show meant to popularize Indian fashion with the viewers.
The one hour special show Style India 2k5, anchored by noted hair stylist Sapna Malhotra, will bring the viewers a sneak peek into the world of fashion for the whole of next year. The episode, done on a budget of Rs. 4,00,000, will give fashion forecasts from the best in the industry.
Showcasing interviews from designers, stylists, make-up experts and hair stylists from across the country, the programme covers several aspects like cut and line, colours, fabric and textures, the embroidery, the overall feel, the latest trend for the kind of eye and lip make-up, what kind of hair dos, what similarities and differences will be there between Indian and Western fashion and so on. Style India 2k5 will air on 30 December at 10 pm with a repeat on 31 December at 7 pm.
Trendz business head Ajay Trigunayat says in a company release, “For long, western fashion has been the staple of fashion watchers in the country. Style India 2K5 will change that perception by showcasing designers, stylists & fashion experts from India, as they give their views on the fashion scene. All this will be done in a realistic manner – in salons or studios for the viewers to relate to what they see on television.”
A 13-part series Full Frontal Fashion Top Ten will debut on 28 December at 10:30 pm. The countdown show is anchored by Rebecca Budig who counts down the top ten looks, tips or trends in an array of categories. The categories are Classic Looks, Accessories, Sexiest Looks, Beauty Secrets, Slimming Looks, Ways to Style Your Man, Swimsuit Looks, Fashion Icons, Wedding Looks, Designer Style Secrets, Looks for Less, Fashion Faux Pas and Best Dressed.
Full Frontal Fashion has some of the biggest names in the fashion world commenting on the top ten picks. These names include commentators from Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Glamour, Lucky, In Style, US Weekly, Barneys, Bergdorf Goodman, Target, The Gap and many well-known designers and celebrities, informs an official release.
“A show like Full Frontal Fashion Top Ten will be a complete fashion bible to the conscious viewer who wants to be informed of all the latest trends & styles,” says Trigunayat.
In addition, Full Frontal Fashion is full of fabulous insider style tips and viewers will walk away feeling that they are totally in the fashion know. Viewers will learn how to avoid fashion faux pas or create a great wardrobe on a tight budget. Full Frontal Fashion is dedicated to keeping up-to-date on what’s hot – and what’s not – and giving viewers tips and ideas on how to keep in step with the ever-changing world of fashion, adds the release.
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.
