iWorld
Playground returns after season two success
Mumbai: Following the substantial success of Playground Two which garnered more than 100mn reach, 80 min time spent per viewer and 125k peak concurrence, Rusk Media, a leading full stack Gen-Z first digital entertainment company is back with a brand new gaming IP – the Playground Exhibition Cup (PGEC) 2023 powered by Duolingo.
The pioneering tournament will bring together six of India’s biggest content creators including Ajey Nagar (CarryMinati), Ashish Chanchlani, Tanmay Singh (Scout), Harsh Beniwal, Nischay Malhan (Triggered Insaan), and Naman Mathur (Mortal), with the aim of transforming the competitive gaming landscape in India.
The PGEC 2023 marks the grand opening of Playground’s highly anticipated annual programming and will pave the way for the exhilarating ‘Playground eSports League’ followed by the exciting ‘Playground Season 3’. The PGEC 2023 promises to be a thrilling journey that will unite gaming enthusiasts through its electrifying, nail-biting action and showcase the best gaming talent in the industry.
Through its groundbreaking approach of forging entertainment with gaming, Playground has established its position as one of the most prominent IPs in the gaming world.
Playground in association with its partnering sponsors bagged two awards at ABBY’s 2023 including a silver for the ‘Most Innovative Use of Gaming’ in association with KFC and a bronze for ‘Innovative Use of Branded Content’ in association with charged by Thums Up. It also won the ‘Best Digital Strategy’ at EMVIES 2023 for KFC, and ‘Best Use of Social Media for Content Marketing’ at SAMMIE 2022, Best Digital Marketing Campaign for a web original’ at ScreenXX 2022.
“We are thrilled to announce the Playground Exhibition Cup 2023 which is an effort to redefine competitive gaming tournaments in the country. Through the Playground IPs, we have constantly strived to tap into the Gen-Z audience by pushing the boundaries of entertainment and merging it with gaming to provide a memorable experience of the highest quality. However, with PGEC 2023 we have crafted an innovative tournament that will cater to the hardcore gaming demographic of the country and propel competitive gaming to unprecedented heights,” said Rusk Media CEO Mayank Yadav.
The PGEC will feature a total of six teams with five of these teams hailing from the prestigious Playground 2 (PG2), including:
The Dare Dragons are mentored by CarryMinati and captained by Jay Khatri
The AAA Werewolves were led by Triggered Insaan and captained by Vanshaj Singh
The Power Phoenixes are commanded by Harsh Beniwal and captained by Harshit Kashyap (Kanary)
The OP Unicorns are guided by Scout and captained by Harshit (Gunshot)
The KO Krakens, spearheaded by Ashish Chanchlani and captained by Nikhil (Bloodline)
Joining them will be the dynamic raging centaurs who will be mentored by Mortal and captained by Raviraj (Sunlord).
The tournament boasts an impressive prize pool of up to Rs 25 lakhs with the player MVP prize money amounting to Rs five lakhs, while the winning team and runners-up are awarded Rs ten lakhs and Rs five lakhs, respectively.
The tournament is powered by Duolingo and the overall experience will be enhanced by its exclusive Grooming partner Bombay Shaving Company, its Travel partner EaseMyTrip and its voting partner Rumble.
Fans will be treated to an immersive gaming experience with the tournament being streamed live on Playground’s channel on Youtube from 9 – 25 June at 6:30 pm every Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
iWorld
WhatsApp may soon let users to pick who sees their status updates
The messaging giant is borrowing a page from Instagram’s playbook as it pushes to give users finer control over their social circles.
CALIFORNIA: WhatsApp is quietly working on a feature that could make its Status function considerably smarter and considerably more private.
According to reports from beta tracking platforms, the app is testing a tool called Status lists, which would allow users to create named groups such as close friends, family and colleagues, and control precisely which group sees each update. It is a meaningful step up from the platform’s current blunt instruments, which offer only three options: share with all contacts, exclude specific people, or manually select individuals each time.
The new feature draws an obvious comparison with Instagram’s Close Friends function, and the resemblance is unlikely to be accidental. Both platforms sit within Meta’s family, and the company has been nudging them toward a common logic of audience segmentation for some time.
The move also fits neatly into WhatsApp’s broader privacy push. The platform has been rolling out enhanced chat protections and is exploring the introduction of usernames, which would allow users to connect without exchanging phone numbers. Status lists extend that philosophy from messaging into broadcasting.
Meanwhile, Status itself has been evolving well beyond its origins as a simple photo-and-text slideshow. The feature now supports music stickers, collages, longer videos and interactive elements, pushing it closer to the social-media-style story format pioneered by Snapchat and refined by Instagram. In that context, finer audience controls are not merely a privacy feature. They are a precondition for people sharing more.
The feature remains in development and has not been confirmed for release. WhatsApp routinely tests tools that are later modified or quietly shelved. But the direction of travel is clear: the app wants Status to be a destination, not an afterthought. Letting users decide exactly who is in the audience is how it gets there.
