February 2012Bringing women out of the kitchen, to the open worldIt’s a regional magazine for women that has grown and changed with the times. It has a huge readership, but more than that it enjoys an extraordinary rapport with readers, so much so that it has over the years become a sounding board, a reference point for all things related to women and more. Significantly, the magazine does not employ one reporter; 70 per cent of the content is reader-generated. There is no mention of cinema, very little of television, and politics only if it concerns or affects women. Indeed, even today, empowering women is the raison d’etre, getting them exposed to the work and social environment. And, yes, credibility ranks right at the top. In its 32nd year, Mangayar Malar has just launched a Braille edition. Sashi Nair reports In the Braille edition of Mangayar Malar, all the pages from the print edition do not appear. Between 80 and 100 pages from the print edition are selected by AICB. Every printed page means three pages in the Braille edition (it is sponsored by the Marga Schulze Foundation, Germany). It is quite an expensive roposition. AICB has its own press (in Delhi) and is a world leader in Braille print. The text (content) is onverted in Chennai and the printing is done in Delhi. “That’s the arrangement. A nominal subscription – about Rs 120 a year – is charged since AICB doesn’t want copies to be offered free. I hear that subscriptions have now crossed the 500-mark. We have had tremendous support from readers for the venture. Click for more details ...Improved productivity in newspaper pressesA 60-year-old newspaper has adapted and moved with the times, and moved quickly. Its Web site attracts more than two million unique visitors and more than 190 million page views a month; its iPhone, iPod and iPad applications have recorded a substantial number of downloads and page views, with various apps being made available on the Android platform as well. All run and managed by a small team that is highly focused on delivering value to users as well as clients, and it has paid off well. Manoj Mathew In today’s highly competitive print market, newspaper printers are under pressure to shorten turnaround production time for editorial conveniences, reduce costs and still maintain quality. Advertisers and readers have come to expect high quality. Therefore, the key is to quicken turnaround time. To help printers accelerate plant production throughput, Total Production Maintenance (TPM) is necessary. TPM is based on a series of common-sense measurement, operational and continuous improvement systems used in most industries throughout the world. It aims to optimise and maintain the graphic arts technical system by identifying and systematically eliminating spoilage, waste and productivity interruptions. Maintenance – Cost or Investment?
Click for more details ...Dinamalar launches new Android tablet appDinamalar.com, a Web site that attracts more than two million unique visitors and more than 190 million page views a month, has released a new Android tablet app to meet the increasing demands from its global readers. The enhanced Android app promises to offer users a more “optimised and dynamic reading experience”. The exclusive app for Android tablets is the latest to join the basket of apps that were introduced by Dinamalar since last year. Dinamalar was the first Tamil newspaper to launch the iPhone and iPod touch apps in June 2011, and the first to launch the iPad app in September that year. The recently launched Android platform, which runs on a free operating system, has picked up very quickly. In two months, the apps registered about 30000 downloads, comparatively much faster than the numbers notched up by the iPhone apps. While the Android application for mobiles launched in September last year functioned seamlessly even in tablets, Dinamalar decided to create an exclusive Android tablet app to effectively use the potential of a bigger screen and to provide a richer user experience. Dinamalar has also enhanced its Android mobile application with its latest update. The improved mobile app now allows readers to enjoy an enhanced interface that facilitates superior user-experience, says the company release. Even the application for tablets has been specifically designed to be more interactive and user-centric as it consists of a slew of interesting sections that will enable Dinamalar’s readers to quickly skim through the news from around the world. From special sections that cover news from across a wide spectrum of areas to features meant to entertain and inform, the Android tablet app has been built to let the publication’s audience to stay up-to-date, at a finger touch. Click for more details ...Colour gamut reduction in a coldset processFor technical staff in a printing press, conversations about colour quality and attempts to raise the bar are commonplace. Echoing his thoughts on the subject while addressing delegates at the WAN-IFRA 2011 Conference in Chennai, Manfred Werfel, deputy CEO and executive director, Competence Centre, Newspaper Production, WAN-IFRA, said that the final output had a lot to do with paper, ink quality and an understanding of the printing process. “Colour quality is always determined by the underlying basics of the printing process. If you use a particular printing process you have to respect the restrictions and determinations,” he said, adding, “Firstly we have to remind ourselves that paper is made from natural resources, it’s a natural product. Sometimes, when we think of ink on paper we think of a simple process – paper, a layer, and an ink layer on top, which creates the picture.” Sashi Nair reports
Click for more details ...‘If it’s honest news, objective views… go for it’Once upon a time, radio was ‘new media’. When black-and-white television arrived, it brought a whole new experience in communication. The advent of colour television rooted viewers to the drawing rooms in many Indian homes. When CNN beamed the Gulf War live in 1991, it heralded a new dawn in terms of television viewing experience. And then, of course, the Internet changed human habits like never before. Yet, the newspaper continues to hold out. At a seminar on new media in Kolkata, some pertinent points affecting news dissemination were made: there is a cost involved to effective news gathering, there has been a steady breakdown in professional standards, the institution of the editor has been destroyed, and speak the truth at all times. Sashi Nair reports
“If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys,” Kumar stressed, pointing out that there was a cost involved in providing credible, worthwhile information. “You are paying peanuts, therefore you are getting monkeys,” he emphasised again, going on the explain: “You’ve had a monkey in the form of the Nira Radia affair, and monkeys in various forms and sizes. Unless the citizenry decides to engage itself with the process of dissemination – and I don’t mean each one of you being a citizen journalist, you’d be falling over each other… Click for more details ...Making the transition from print to onlineShoma A. Chatterji With massive changes in the media environment and its technologies, understanding the nature of news journalism is one of the most urgent tasks we face in defining the public interest today. The implications are serious, not just for the future of news, but also for the practice of democracy within an ethical ambience. The massive changes in the media environment and in its technologies brought about changes in the very character of journalism per se? How does a journalist who has been prolific, professional and successful in the print media make the transition from print to on-line journalism without surrendering the former with equal professionalism, success and credibility? Technological, economic and social changes have reconfigured journalism and the impact of the transformations for a vibrant democracy in a digital age. Senior journalists encounter the problem of learning, imbibing and approaching their profession all over again when they enter the online media. The cultural, geographical, financial and political borders have pushed the borders to turn global with the transition from print to online media even if the language remains English. Readership has become universal and is no longer trapped within the confined spaces of local and regional journalism. Click for more details ...The question of free expressionS. Muthiah Does free speech mean the freedom of the wild ass? It would appear that many commentators tend to think so to judge by the outpourings over the Salman Rushdie affair. But the fact is that freedom of expression faces legal curtailment in several parts of the world in particular circumstances. In India, the Constitution permits proscription of published material if it feels that such material can disturb the peace. Such proscription entails not only banning the proscribed material from public view but also readings from it or the publishing of excerpts from it. Such bans can, of course, be challenged in courts and a successful litigant can have the ban lifted. But so long as the ban remains in place, it needs to be respected like any other law of the land. Rushdie’s Satanic Verses is, rightly or wrongly, banned in India by the Central Government, fearing that certain passages in it would hurt, and might even provoke, the Muslim community. So long as the ban is in place, neither can the book be sold nor can readings or quotation of passages from it be done in public without the alleged offenders being prosecuted. Yes, freedom of speech has been curbed in this instance, but it can be challenged in court, if so desired; it cannot, however, be said that those calling for Rushdie’s head or, at the very least, a ban on his visit to India are a curb on free speech. What they are guilty of is preventing by threats the entry of a person who has every right to enter India being a registered Person of Indian Origin with no criminal record or charges against him. And such threatening stances are what should be of concern to the authorities as well as those who sought Rushdie’s presence in India. (Incidentally, he has visited Madras a couple of times in recent years – after the fatwa was lifted – and no one was bestirred by the visits!) Click for more details ...
|
 |
||
Mangayar Malar released its Braille edition on January 4 this year, to coincide with the 203rd birth anniversary of Louis Braille. The first copy was released in Delhi. In Chennai, the occasion was marked by a small release function. Even before the release about 350 subscriptions had come in. It was the Delhi-based All India Confederation of the Blind (AICB) that approached Bharatan Publications (publishers of the magazine) through its southern regional office in Chennai. On
behalf of AICB, Muthuselvi, its representative, contacted Lakshmi Natarajan, managing director, Bharathan Publications, and editor, Mangayar Malar, saying it had come up with a proposal to have in the Braille edition four or five regional magazines in India. From among Tamil magazines, Mangayar Malar was selected. A lot of background work in terms of reader research was conducted by Muthuselvi and her team before selecting Mangayar Malar and the other magazines.
While an average newspaper page is about 70 microns thick, the ink film is only one micron thick. Werfel showed some pictures – diagonal cuts through the paper – to demonstrate that ink on paper was not as simple as it looked. There was the paper layer, a coating (as in many printing processes), and the ink film on top. Dwelling on the implications of colour gamut reduction through ink dry-back, he asked the audience how much ink was needed per copy, for a 48-page broadsheet, full colour? “We need 5 grams, or 0.104167 gram a page,” he pointed out. Publishers use different quality of paper, such as light-weight coated paper, the lowest quality level of coated paper. An enlarged picture Werfel showed indicated that not all of the ink stays on top of the coating, but penetrates below through holes in the paper. 
Pick up on things that interest you so that your understanding of what happens is focused rather than diffused by an overload of information.” That was Ravindra Kumar, editor and managing director, The Statesman, addressing students of the Surendranath College for Women, who formed the bulk of the packed audience at the inaugural of a seminar in Kolkata in January titled ‘Journalism in the age of New Media’. Picking up on thoughts shared earlier (by the other speakers), Kumar, the chief guest, having been in the journalism for more than three decades, said that if he were in their shoes today he would be hugely confused (because of the media explosion). 
