A residents‘ association in Mumbai is fighting against the irregular price structure of the cablewallahs. All the residents of a particular area in Mumbai have joined hands to form an association which is refusing to pay exorbitant charges to the cable ops. The local cable operator had hiked cable charges from Rs 80 per month to Rs 125 per month. The association has been demanding an universal pricing structure.
Similar incidents have been reported all over the country where the customer is hassled by the harsh and unfair pricing structure of cable ops. This indicates the growing discontent among the customers who are often held at gunpoint by cable ops who suddenly switch off channels when they deem fit. Complaints have been flowing in from various directions. Cable operators show advertisements on their local cable channel which occupies more than half of the screen and often movies and programmes are stretched to never ending duration which irritates viewers. During cricket matches and other live events, some cable ops insert scrolling advertisements which violate copyright regulations.

Another disturbing practice of the cable operators is under disclosure of c&s homes (cable & satellite). The ratio of disclosure is around thirty percent. This results in heavy losses for satellite channels who tend to hike the subscription rates.

The cable operators and the general customers should be prepared for higher rates as the forthcoming era would be of paid channels. Since the satellite channels offer high quality programmes and due to increasing costs, the subscription rates will always tend to be high.

Discovery Communications‘ Managing Director Kiran Karnik, said at a recent conference, "The people should now prepare themselves for higher cable rates if they are want quality programming. The days of free-to-air channels will soon be over. The market should now mature."

Sri Adhikari Brothers Television Network Ltd (SABTNL) has signed a joint venture agreement for animation software with the US based ETIAM EMedia Inc which is an information technology solutions company. As per the contract, the JV company will set up state-of-the-art studios to develop animation graphics, animated cartoons and animated feature films along with providing 2D and 3D technology and digital imaging for content and film production.
The company is negotiating with various studios in US and Canada to provide animation software for the studio. Sri Adhikari Brothers‘ forthcoming television channel Sabe TV will benefit from the studio as it will get animation content for it.

SABTNL will own 26% stake in the venture while the rest will be held by ETIAM EMedia and private investors and is expecting a revenue generation of $5-10 million in a couple of months from this project.

The Advertising Club Bombay unleashed on 31 March, the Abby 2000 awards for excellence in creative advertising which attracted 4,109 entries. Oglivy & Mather (O&M) swept the awards ceremony with 48 points.

It walked away with 32 gold and silver Abbies, including the Campaign of the Century for its advertising work on spreading the chocolate eating habit amongst Indian adults for Cadbury. No other agency came even near the halfway mark of O&M‘s tally but those that put up some sort of fight include Contract Advertising (14 points) and Mudra Communications (seven points).

O&M and Enterprise Nexus bagged Gold Abbies for Castrol Scootex 2T and The Times of India (One man‘s burden) campaigns respectively in the ‘Consumer Products‘ section of the Cinema/TV category. The Silver Abby in the same category was awarded to O&M and HTA for Pond‘s Blackhead Removal Strips (Lady Bug) and Pepsi (Yeh Dil Mange More) campaigns respectively.