iWorld
Five US broadcasters form news streaming venture NewsON
MUMBAI: Five major broadcast television stations namely The ABC Owned Television Station Group, Cox Media Group, Hearst Television, Media General and Raycom Media have formed a new venture called NewsON.
NewsON (www.NewsON.us) will provide live and same-day local TV newscasts on demand from leading stations around the country to consumers’ mobile and selected connected TV devices.
The free, advertising-supported NewsON service, which is expected to launch to the public in the fall of this year, will be delivered through apps available for download from mobile and connected TV app stores. NewsON will enable users to watch live and on-demand newscasts from their local markets or from any of the 112 participating news stations, in 84 viewing markets across the country, whose owners have already contracted to deliver their news streams through NewsON. These include stations in eight of the Top 10 U.S. TV markets and 17 of the top 25.
Multiple stations will be available through NewsON in 21 markets, giving viewers the opportunity to “change channels” as they wish. The number of participating TV stations is expected to grow in the months ahead as additional broadcast TV station groups activate their streams into NewsON.
Leading this new venture is Louis Gump, who has signed on as NewsON’s chief executive officer. Gump presided earlier in his career over benchmark-setting mobile businesses for The Weather Company and CNN, before becoming CEO of mobile media and advertising company LSN Mobile. Gump has also served in various capacities within industry organizations including the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and Online Publishers Association (OPA), and he served for more than a decade on the board of the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA). He will be based in Atlanta where NewsON will scale up its organization.
“The sheer amount of live news coverage – from TV stations around the country – that has been assembled for delivery through NewsON’s apps is unprecedented. Americans place a great deal of trust in their local news teams, who are typically the first informers from the local scene of the biggest news developments around the country. NewsON will bring instant access to live local news to a generation of viewers accustomed to using mobile and connected TV platforms to stay informed,” Gump said.
“And this is just the start,” Gump noted. “We’ll welcome the participation of other TV station owners, as this service only gets better with each additional station.”
A recent study underscores local TV’s leading role as a news source. According to the March 2015 report “Local News in a Digital Age” by the Pew Research Center, local TV stations remain the dominant source of news for Americans in markets both big and small. The appetite for local and neighborhood news, the staple of TV station newscast coverage, is up to twice the appetite for national and international news, the study found.
eNews
Paisabazaar launches Credit Premier League 2.0
Nationwide campaign rewards highest credit scores with Rs 1 lakh top prize.
MUMBAI: When credit scores become a national league, even your CIBIL report starts feeling like it’s playing in the IPL and Paisabazaar has just kicked off the second season. Paisabazaar, India’s leading marketplace for financial products and the country’s largest free credit score platform, has announced the return of the Credit Premier League (CPL) 2.0, a fun, nationwide initiative to recognise and reward individuals with the highest credit scores.
Building on the success of the first edition, CPL 2.0 introduces higher rewards and broader participation. The individual(s) with the highest credit score in the country will win Rs 1 lakh, while state champions will each receive Rs 10,000. Additionally, all participants from the winning state, the one with the highest average credit score will also be rewarded.
All winnings will be credited directly to winners’ PB Wallet, allowing them to pay credit card bills, recharge mobiles, or settle utility bills seamlessly on the Paisabazaar platform.
Paisabazaar CEO Santosh Agarwal said the campaign aims to make credit awareness more engaging and mainstream. “With CPL, we are bringing together engagement, gamification and rewards to make conversations around credit scores more mainstream,” he noted. “Our focus remains on building a financially aware and credit-healthy Bharat.”
The first edition of CPL saw over 5.5 million participants, with the highest individual score touching 861. Delhi recorded the highest average credit score of 746.
Consumers can participate simply by checking their free credit score on the Paisabazaar platform or app. The CPL leaderboard and rankings will be available exclusively on the Paisabazaar App.
In a country where financial dreams are serious business, Paisabazaar has found a smart way to turn credit scores into an exciting game – because when your financial health gets rewarded, everyone wants to play.
