Dialog to foray into DVB-T

Dialog has announced that it will foray into DVB-T and is presently awaiting licenses to commence the venture. This was disclosed in an interview published on the "Daily News" issue today.

It is highly likely that the launch or the license issue of Dialog DVB-T transmissions may coincide with the Broadcasting Exhibition & Conference to be held in June.

The launch of DVB-T will certainly revolutionize the broadcasting industry in Sri Lanka and this will become a platform which television stations can use to go digital.

Daily News (May 30th 2008) - Dialog TV to break even in four years.

Zone Reality to cease Asia Pacific transmissions

Zone Reality has informed all pay television operators in the Asia Pacific Region that they will be ceasing transmissions with effect from June 30th. Zone Reality formerly known as Reality TV was rebranded two years ago and has not been able to make a significant impact in this region. Most of their programming was picked off other broadcasters such as BBC, Discovery, etc. The main focus of this channel is on reality shows/documentaries and the channel did manage to telecast good programming. This channel spurred the US based Fox Group to launch a channel called "Fox Reality".

The main reason for the channel to cease transmission is the fact that it is not commercially viable since the channel is also commercial free. Many viewers in this region will certainly miss Zone Reality which had created a niche audience among viewers in Sri Lanka and the rest of the region. One of the major drawbacks of this channel was that some of the programming was quite old unlike Zone Reality UK. Many of us certainly will miss this channel and hopefully they make a return to this region with even more dynamic programming.

Zone Reality was available in Sri Lanka solely via Dialog TV and mainly concentrated distributing their signals in this region using DTH operators.

New Sinhala Radio channel on test

The latest Sinhala Language radio station is testing on 94.5FM. According to reports this channel is being operated by Power House the same people who run Derana Television.

We wish the management all the best as they prepare for the launch of this radio station which has not been named as yet. The only sad thing is that all these people opt to start an analog radio station instead of venturing into digital broadcasting.

We hope that after the Digital Broadcasting Conference & Exhibition later on this year we will have suitable plan to convert all these stations to digital since we are running out of frequencies for any new radio stations. This frequency crunch as resulted in the delay of new frequencies for Sun FM & Sha FM.

Zee Cafe to premiere "Survivor: Fiji"

Pay television channel Zee Cafe is premiering "Survivor: Fiji" from Tuesday May 13th at 10pm. This series replaces "Teminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles" which ended its first season last week.

However the upcoming Survivor is a disappointment since Fiji was before "Survivor: China". Instead of telecasting the newer "Survivor: Micronesia" they have reverted to an older season. The reasons for this are baffling and Zee Cafe which was boasting of a plan to telecast shows on par with US broadcasters seems to be only concerned with telecasting only one season on par with the US broadcasters.

We hope that the Zee will reconsider and telecast the latest season instead of going backwards through the seasons.

Zee Cafe : Survivor Fiji

"BBC World" becomes "BBC World News"

International News broadcaster "BBC World" has been rebranded as "BBC World News", this is along with changes to their on screen view and also the addition of a continuous news crawler.

The changes took place a few days ago. In addition to delivering news via conventional television media, BBC is also looking at platforms such as mobiles & the internet.

This will enable BBC to take on news networks such as CNN who have already established a presence on the internet and mobile platforms.

"Fox News" now on test

Channel One MTV is now testing "Fox News" during the morning hours. The date for the official launch is not known as yet, however we believe that it is not that far away. Initially broadcasts will be limited to a few hours and will be increased gradually.

There is a chance that Channel One will start broadcasting 24hours a day using "Fox News" and will adopt a format similar to ETV & Art TV.

Udayam TV goes on air

The newest television channel Udayam TV operated by Rupavahini has gone on air targeting the Northern & Eastern provinces.

The channel is supposed to create awareness on the security and development activities carried out by the government.

Many are of the view that this channel along with Vasantham FM was launched to promote government propaganda targeting the Eastern provincial council elections.

Link : Udayan TV channel launched