Stealth Mode On

Facebook launches self-deleting Snapchat-like feature ‘Secret Conversations’, In order to de-stabilize Snapchat’s growing popularity, Facebook has launched a trial version of Snapchat like messaging option which will release by September. Facebook had failed to acquire Snapchat three years ago for an estimated sum of $3 billion, and since then there has been an unending rivalry between the two social media platforms. » Smriti Irani launched a new social media campaign “Selfie-with-Handloom” on 1st August. The Union Textile Minister hopes to boost textile sales by encouraging people to click a selfie with handloom made products and sharing it on social media. The campaign will culminate in the Prime Minister’s constituency Varanasi – home to millions of weavers, on August 7, the National Handloom Day. » GOI has restarted drafting the blueprint for the controversial ‘National Encryption Policy’. The Ministry of Electronics and IT had recently asked leading industry associations for their opinions and inputs for a “robust and secure” encryption policy. These associations include names like Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) and Internet Service Providers Association of India (ISPAI). For a consistent approach on encryption, synced with technology, a detailed discussion of associations and GOI’s expert committee will be held soon. Read full story here.

The Unicorns’ Dream Run

Celebrating the success of the show ‘Unicorn – chasing the start-up dream’, NDTV is all set to launch the first edition of ‘Unicorn Start-up Awards’. Powered by Vestige and Indigo Nation, the award will aim to honor the most credible dream-chasers who are going to change the way India does business. With a stellar jury panel including R Chandrashekhar, and Raman Roy, among others, the awards will be presented for different categories on July 29th at the Taj Palace, New Delhi. » Emergency!!! Need to call the police? – Just tweet @callup100. Yes, you read it right. UP Police, on their way to getting social savvy, has planned to use Twitter for emergency services. Citizens will be able to upload complaints, pictures, videos and documents on Twitter. The response time for this service has been fixed at 10-15 minutes. The police will also be able to record all the calls and information digitally to be used in further investigation. Read more. » Verizon Communication has geared up to buy Yahoo Inc’s core business for $ 4.83 billion. With a market capital of about $228 billion, Verizon will acquire Yahoo’s web assets and a logical blueprint for folding them into its emerging digital business, which includes AOL properties acquired by them last year. Shares of Verizon rose 1.3% to $56.10 and the Yahoo stock was up 1.4% to $39.38 on Friday. See more.

The Old & New

“Nurture the Old (Print) and Nourish the New (Digital)” is the theme for the 10th Annual INMA South Asia Conference, which is going to be held in New Delhi on August 30-31, 2016. The International News Media Association (INMA) is the world’s leading provider of global best practices for news media companies looking to grow revenue, audience, and brand amid profound market change. This year’s conference will focus on the two most important dynamics of the media industry i.e. Print and Digital. » The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has announced the recipients of the 26th edition of its International Press Freedom Awards. With Malini Subramaniam, an Indian freelance journalist who reports on human rights abuses, three other journalists will be felicitated with this award on November 22, 2016, at the Waldorf-Astoria, New York City. » Ogechi Ekeanyanwu, Yemisi Akinbobola & Paul Bradshaw earned nominations for CNN African Journalist of the Year Awards, 2016 for their report “How Nigerian young footballers are trafficked, abused, abroad” in Premium Times. The 38 finalists were selected from 14 nations for the event to culminate in Johannesburg, South Africa in October 2016. See more. » ABC News, having 8.6 million followers on its Facebook Page, has partnered with the social media giant to use their latest feature ‘Facebook Live’ to deliver around-the-clock live coverage of the 2016 Republican and Democratic national conventions. See more.

New Skies New Airwaves

Club FM 99.6 from Mathrubhumi has expanded its reach outside India with its transmission in Dubai, which went live on Monday, 11th July at 9:09 AM Dubai time. Club FM, which started broadcasting on December 14, 2007 in Thrissur, later expanded in Kannur, Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram. The Dubai station is its 5th station. Read programming details for the foreign transmission here. » YuppTV Bazaar, online marketplace from YuppTV, has joined hands with Silly Monks to strengthen its content production. As a creative agency, Silly Monks has established a strong foothold in the content production domain with their premium regional content. Expanding the entertainment catalogue on YuppTV Bazaar, this alliance will also provide users with access to new Hindi, Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam content. » Lokmat Connect, an Experiential Marketing division of the Lokmat Group, in association with Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund launched awareness camps across 5 locations in Maharashtra as part of the ‘Jaanoge tabhi toh Maanoge campaign – a National Investor Education and Awareness Initiative’. Aimed at reaching out to over 2000 people in Maharashtra, this campaign will spread financial literacy in the state. See more. » YouTube is in talks with a few broadcasters including ESPN, ABC, and CBS for providing their TV service online without payment of any cable subscription. Likely to be launched mid next year, this online streaming service will be called ‘Unplugged’.

CAC’s Crackdown

As part of China government’s campaign against fake news and rumors, it has banned online media from publishing unverified content. According to a notice issued by the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC), news websites must approve content before publishing them and they are prohibited from fabricating stories or distorting facts. The CAC has punished some major websites which have fabricated stories this year, including sina.com, ifeng.com, 163.com and the site run by one of the country’s biggest Internet companies, Tencent. » As per new orders passed by the Mumbai chief metropolitan magistrate’s office on May 13th, any publisher in Mumbai filing a declaration for a new publication will have to furnish “character certificates” issued by the police. An official from the Press Declaration Section of the CMM’s office said the practice, already in force in Thane and Pune, has been introduced to sift out dubious applications. Read full article here. » The Prem Bhatia Memorial Trust (PBMT) is going to present the 13th edition of its annual award for Reporting on Environmental Issues. Nominations for the same can be filed latest by July 10, 2016. An independent jury will finalize the winner by third week of July and the award will be presented at India International Centre on 11th August. See more.

‘Responsibly Digital’

Social Media Day, celebrated on June 30th, turns 7 this Thursday. It was launched by Mashable in 2010 to recognize and celebrate social media’s impact on global communication. Exploring the theme ‘Responsibly Digital’, Ahmedabad is going to host the celebrations in India for fourth time in a row. Presented by Shivalik group, this year’s ‘Social Media Day’ will be hosted at Novotel Hotel. See full story here. » On the 77th birth anniversary of the iconic music maestro R D Burman, award-winning senior entertainment journalist and author Chaitanya Padukone launched his latest book “R.D.BurMania -Panchamemoirs”. Padukone, who shared a close bond with R D Burman had started his career with an interview of Burman. Read more here.  » Mumbai welcomed a new retro music station ‘Redtro 106.Chaar’ on June 23. Under the banner of Red FM network, which has geographical presence across 48 cities in India, this is the first radio station with the newly-acquired Phase III license. Redtro 106.Chaar with the tagline ‘Phir Bajao’ seeks to give a modern twist to the classic retro and focus on the music of the 90s. » Congratulations to Rajiv Mishra for joining ETV, TV 18 as Group Business Head. Having more than 22 years of experience, Mishra was previously associated with Samsung as Vice President and Head – Media, Corporate Communications, CSR and Spokesperson. He has also worked with various media organizations like Hindustan Times Group, Star TV, Zee TV, Reliance Infocomm Limited, TV Asia of USA, News 24 (BAG Films and Media), and India News, among others.

Panama Probe Celebrated

The Panama Papers probe has been awarded with the Data Journalism Award 2016 for Investigation of the Year at the Global Editors Network (GEN) summit in Vienna on Thursday, 16th June. A collaborative work of more than 100 media organizations including The Indian Express, the Panama Papers exposed the inner workings of the secretive offshore financial system in Panama. Accepting the award on behalf of ICIJ, data journalist Cécile Schilis-Gallego paid tribute to the global team of reporters and the source of the Panama Papers data. » Celebrating the 15th death anniversary of Moturi Hanumantha Rao, Founder-Editor of Prajasakti, the newspaper presented awards to its journalists in Anantapur on Saturday, 18th June. V Gopi, Staff Reporter bagged VR Bomma Reddy Memorial Best Journalist award for the year 2016 while senior journalist Dasari Alwar Swamy was chosen for the Moturi Hanumantha Rao Memorial Best Journalist award and Dandapani was selected for Best Rural Reporter award. » Today, on the morning of second International Yoga Day, PM Narendra Modi urged people to embrace yoga for better physical and mental health. Modi oversaw some 30,000 yoga enthusiasts in Chandigarh’s Capitol Complex performing deep breathing and stretching exercises before joining them. Over 96,000 people had registered themselves to take part in the event. » With an aim to facilitate loans to financially weak students wishing to pursue higher studies in the national capital after passing their Class XII examination, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal launched an online portal on Monday. Students will not be required to furnish any collaterals or margin money in the scheme, which will be universal in nature, regardless of the student’s background. See more.

Tech Giant Goes Social

Making it the biggest acquisition of the year, tech giant Microsoft announced its acquisition of professional social platform, LinkedIn. In an all cash deal Microsoft will pay LinkedIn a sum of $26.2 billion at $196 per share. Jeff Weiner will continue to be the CEO of LinkedIn and will report to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. The acquisition is still subject to approval by LinkedIn shareholders and regulators and hence is expected to close by the end of the year. » Congratulations to Dr. Prakash M Swamy, a senior Indian-American journalist and former United Nations Correspondent, for being awarded with the highest award of Lifetime Achievement by Rotary International. The award was presented in Chennai on 11th June, by Dr. A Surya Prakash, Chairman of Prasar Bharti – New Delhi. » The Press Institute of India (PII), Chennai, and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), New Delhi, have joined hands to organize a competition for the three best articles and photographs on a humanitarian subject. The article or photograph should have been published in an Indian national or regional newspaper or magazine between April 2015 and March 2016 and can be in English or in any Indian language. Entries can be submitted latest by 15 September 2016 and the results will be announced by November 2016. See more.

WCD’s Women Scribes’ Workshop

The Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD) in association with PIB and MIB is going to kickstart the first ever “All India Women Journalists’ Workshop” today at Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi. This will bring together around 250 journalists from 30 States/UTs across the country representing 120 media organizations, on a single platform. The ministry will also exhibit two of its biggest initiatives: Beti Bachao – Beti Padhao and children helpline – Childline. » CNN-News18 has announced the 10th edition of its ‘Indian of the Year’ award. Celebrating the achievements of iconic Indians who have made a significant contribution to our society in 2015, the award will be presented in New Delhi on 9th June, 2016. » Considering the rise in digital content consumption, UCWeb, part of the Alibaba group, launched ‘UC News’ in India on Monday. The platform brings together news content from over 20 featured channels, including news, cricket, technology, entertainment, movies, and lifestyle. It tracks and matches the trending keywords on Facebook and Twitter to decide on trending topics for user recommendations. See the full story here. » Adding transparency in the government affairs with the help of Digital India campaign, Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar flagged off two mobile vans on Monday. Carrying the slogan, “Mili Meri Pragati Ko Raftar”, the vans will cover 21 districts of the state and will pass through the rural areas across the state, disseminating information regarding e-Governance schemes through audio visual tools, including publicity material, speeches and street plays.

TOI’s Health Icons

The Times of India, in association with Canyons Club presented the first edition of Health Icon awards on Sunday, May 29th, in Dehradun. With an aim to honor success stories of doctors from Uttarakhand, who have contributed significantly in the realm of wellness in the society, CM Harish Rawat felicitated almost 70 doctors with this award. » Women’s Welfare Society, an NGO, recently started a community radio station ‘Nammuru Banuli’ in Belagavi, Karnataka. Satish L. Jarkiholi, Minister for Small Scale Industries and district in-charge, inaugurated the station and said that it could play an important role in spreading awareness on various issues like literacy, health, women and child development and agricultural practices, provide weather information and cultural programmes to villagers. The Nammuru Banuli CRS will go on air at 90.8MHz from 7AM to 8AM and from 7PM to 8PM every day. » China opened a teaching and research centre for socialist journalism on May 29th, to train personnel for its expanding official media. The centre, a joint project between Tsinghua University and Fudan University facilitates the implementation of news reporting instructions issued by the central authorities.