MxMIndia

Tag: Covid-19

  • In all, there are 12 categories of awards covering written and broadcast stories published in Calendar 2019 in the print, web and television medium

    RedInk Awards extends deadline to March 31, 2020

    By A Correspondent

     

    The RedInk Awards has extended the last date for entries to 31st March 2020. Mumbai Press Club has also taken into consideration the Covid-19 outbreak for this further extension.

     

    Journalists with a great broadcast, web or print story are invited to send in their work early in order to be well in time. For the first time in its nine years, the RedInk Awards have been opened up to foreign correspondents writing on India.

     

    To identify the best stories, and raise the bar for the selection process, the Mumbai Press Club has made a special appeal to editors of print and broadcast networks to identify, and nominate their best stories in Calendar 2019.

     

    In all, there are 12 categories of awards covering written and broadcast stories published in Calendar 2019 in the print, web and television medium.

     

     

  • Is there an opportunity out there for media companies given the Covid-19 virus? Yet again, we thought it would be wise to ask Dr Bhaskar Das for his words of wisdom. Read on for his views…

    Das ka Dum with Dr Bhaskar Das: Since people need to stay indoors for their entertainment, the Covid-19 crisis may be a godsent for TV channels and OTT players. How would you think can news media make use of this opportunity?

    Bhaskar Das
    Bhaskar Das

    Is there an opportunity out there for media companies given the Covid-19 virus? Yet again, we thought it would be wise to ask Dr Bhaskar Das for his words of wisdom. Read on for his views…

     

    If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar.

     

    Q. Since people need to stay indoors for their entertainment, the Covid-19 crisis may be a godsent for TV channels and OTT players. How would you think can news media make use of this opportunity?

     

    A. The answer to the first part of the question is not yes and know. While staying at home for health reasons might force people to resort to media-led escapisms, but an undercurrent of future uncertainty would evoke spendthriftness in us. Then the instinct of conserving resources might be a dominant thought.

     

    In volatile times, any prediction is a hazardous guess. The behaviour would differ by individuals/ families and social  cohorts. So I can’t generalise. So far as news is concerned, anyway most of them are free to air. But news now would be very critical as people try to counter anxiety with enlightenment offered through reliable information. It’s pejorative to consider a monumental human crisis to be considered as an opportunity to leverage. All of us have a responsibility to society. Topline gains are incidental to any business enterprises mission, however critical it is.

     

     

  • 'News' and 'information' about the latest virus spreads so fast and free, that it is impossible to sift fact from lies, writes Ranjona Banerji

    Free, Fast & Factless

     

    By Ranjona Banerji

     

    My Whatsapp this morning is full of the most wondrous information thanks to the coronavirus, Covid 19. It ranges from blowing a hairdryer up your nose to kill the virus to 119 people quarantined in a brothel in Spain to residents in an apartment block in self-isolation in Italy all singing the songs of the Tamil composer Illiaraja. I think the brothel thing is true or maybe not!

    Plus all those endless bits of advice: don’t touch milk bags, elevator buttons, newspapers (I think some news sites and new channels are responsible for this one!), car doors after you have washed them and more. The virus can exist between contact for five hours, six hours, seven hours, nine hours. Sneezes are dangerous. Sneezes are not. The virus is the same as flu. The virus is not.

    In India, we have our own obsessions with excreta, unlike the western world which is paranoid about running out of loo paper. So various BJP leaders have declaimed that cow urine and cow dung can cure the virus. And one former editor and journalist declared on Twitter that faecal microbiota transplant should not be scoffed at by ‘Lutyens minds” as a presumable defence for the cow dung cure.

    The trouble is that none of these claims come with any substantiation and that they spread panic and hope just the same. What should the average person do? Believe all of it? None of it? “News” and “information” about the latest virus spreads so fast and free, that it is impossible to sift fact from lies. I believed the one about footballer Christiano Ronaldo paying for all medical treatment in Portugal until the kind people of Twitter quickly told me it was fake.

    The battle against fake news is not new but it has never been more important. Because never has fake news been as dangerous. The World Health Organisation has declared Covid 19 a pandemic. (I just get all my info from the WHO site now.) What we do know is that governments across the world are not ready. Bombastic claims by world leaders are not being adequately challenged by the media, which itself suffers from an information overload.

    However, there is no doubt that even with the overload, traditional and mainstream media are not doing enough to dispel the rumours. A small example is the travel advisory which the Ministry of Health put out. It said that no “passengers” will be allowed into India from March 18 and airlines should inform passengers of this from the first port of departure. Now does this mean only visitors or does it mean passengers including those returning home?

    Journalists seemed more confused than anyone else because when I asked the question, I got both answers from other journalists!

    Latest reports – from doctors – tell us that India is not doing enough testing. But several news stories informed us that India was the best because the virus had not spread. Prime Minister Modi announced that India had started testing at airports in mid-January itself and that is why numbers in India are low. This was a blatant lie. But was Mr Modi questioned by the media? Several government claims have been fed to the public – including various “cures” and preventives from the Ayush ministry – without any supporting evidence or questioning. The public has been left to fend for itself.

    This headless chicken response is not limited to the Indian media. The British media for instance has not done enough, for my money, to combat the Boris Johnson government’s “herd immunity” idea as a preventive. Like the Indian media, the onus has been put on experts writing on the opinion pages to set the record straight. You and I both know that opinion pages are the least read in any paper. What happened to good old reportage to the set the foundation on which opinion can be raised?

    The media’s negligence is criminal. I know that initial days of any crises are difficult. But that excuse works only for the first couple of days. After that, if you haven’t got your act together, you are no better than some idiot on Whatsapp spreading another sort of virus.

     

    Ranjona Banerji is a senior journalist and commentator. She is also Consulting Editor, MxMIndia. Her views here are personal

     

     

  • Welcome to an all-new work week. There is much fear in the air about the Covid-19 virus and how it will impact the media and marketing services ecosystem. Since we’ve not experienced anything like this ever before, we thought it would be wise to ask Dr Bhaskar Das for his words of wisdom. Read on for his views…

    Das ka Dum with Dr Bhaskar Das: How should we be reacting to the ever-changing world given the impact of  the Covid-19 virus on the economy and the media and marketing services sector?

    Welcome to an all-new work week. There is much fear in the air about the Covid-19 virus and how it will impact the media and marketing services ecosystem. Since we’ve not experienced anything like this ever before, we thought it would be wise to ask Dr Bhaskar Das for his words of wisdom. Read on for his views…

     

    If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar.

     

    Q. The Covid-19 virus seems to be having a devastating impact on our economy and naturally the media and marketing services sector. How should we be reacting to this ever-changing and dynamic world?

     

    A. It seems we are confronted with the worst kind of medi-eco crisis. The world is looking like a small global village where if one village (read individual) sneezes, others catch a cold. In my lifetime, I have not been exposed to the economic side effects of a pandemic. Inspite of being an incorrigible optimist, I get a Spiderman sense of a mega-recession. We are all connected today both in terms of intra- and inter-country or sector. So the domino effect on each sector or country could be unfathomable. Reverse globalisation has ushered in to protect citizens. It can have disastrous consequences on multiple sectors, would result in job loss etc etc. The response strategy to this scenario can’t be loosening of  fiscal and monetary policy to stimulate demand.

     

    Also, would global health care system tackle the enormous burden of keeping its citizens santised from pandemic? Can social distancing and vibrant  commerce can live together? Actually it’s very scary to even contemplate.  But I don’t want to take a dystopian view of the new normal. I pray that the gloom gets over soon. I feel something good would come out of this crisis too.

     

     

  • On the whole, it does not promise to be an exciting year for media and advertising in India, writes Indrani Sen

    Just how much Covid-19 impact AdEx in 2020?

     

    By Indrani Sen

     

    Today, it is difficult to make any guess on when our country and the world at large will be free from the deadly attack of Covid-19. The UN Conference on Trade and Development estimated it may wipe off $1 trillion from the global economy in 2020. It is too early to estimate the effect of the pandemic on Indian economy and business and the consequences of the same on media and advertising industry.

     

    Our economy has been slowing down from last year and now various manufacturing industries are facing a forced halt in production due to lack of supply of parts and ingredients which are usually imported from China. Recently, we have been witnessing a fluctuating Sensex in a jittery stock market which is unlikely to recover soon.

     

    On March 12, the Indian government suspended issuing tourist visas till April 15 and on the next day BCCI postponed IPL 2020 till April 15. What miracle are we expecting to happen in next 30 days? Experts in healthcare have declared that this 30 days window is the most crucial period for India to control the spread of Covid-19 and stop it from getting into the third stage of community transmission, though some of them feel that community transmission of Covid-19 is inevitable (https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/healthcare/biotech/healthcare/community-transmission-of-covid-19-is-inevitable-icmr/articleshow/74621197.cms).

     

    In other words, by end-March/ early-April, we will know if we have been able to contain the progress of Covid-19 and escape from getting into the dreaded stage three of community transmission. If we fail to contain the disease in stage two of local transmission, then the current restrictions may be extended beyond April 15 till we are able to curb the growth of Covid-19. Considering that from January 30 when the first case of Coronavirus was reported in Kerala, it took 40 days for 50 cases to be detected in India and then in the next six days the number climbed from 50 to 108 cases spreading across the country, the virus is an active growth phase in our country.

     

    What will be the fall out of Covid-19 on media spending by Indian advertisers? The industry sectors/ organisations whose production will be affected may start reducing their ad spend to mitigate economic losses. The sectors/ organisations who are dependent on Chinese supply chain, may also find their sales taking a dip as consumers are not likely to spend less and save more in the current situation of uncertainty. Some industries like travel, tourism and hospitality are already in severe loss and are unlikely to spend on advertising during the first half of 2020. Events have also taken a hit and are not likely to recover before the festive season. A lot of money rides on IPL and if BCCI is forced to cancel the tournament due to Covid-19, it will be a great loss of revenue for traditional as well as digital media.

     

    As severe to moderate restrictions are imposed by different state governments on their citizens, they have started avoiding shopping in crowded malls and markets and are utilizing online shopping for purchasing daily necessities and other goods. Advertisers who would like to reach out to their consumers during the next six to eight weeks can ride on this wave of online shopping. E-commerce is likely to get a boost as people also try to avoid cash transactions in brick and mortar outlets.

     

    With closure of schools and colleges in various states, there is bound to be an increase in content consumption across traditional media and digital media at home. It will be interesting to analyse the readership and viewership data for this period to assess if traditional media were able to get a share of the consumers forced to stay at home. Many organisations who have adopted digital technology are asking their employees to work from home which in turn can boost the other uses of internet for entertainment e.g. engagements with OTT platforms and other digital media.  However, given the current scenario of consumer spends across various categories of goods and services, it is unlikely that such consumer engagements will attract higher investment in digital advertising.

     

    The two other media which are going to be affected are cinema and outdoor. As state governments close down malls and cinema halls to prevent spread of Covid-19, cinema will not only loose the ticket sales money, but also advertising revenue. Due to travel restrictions, social distancing and forced staying at home, the traffic on the roads, stations, airports etc. will be less having a negative impact on OOH advertising.

     

    As a combined effect of all the above factors, it will not be surprising if the growth rate of AdEx drops from two digits (10.4% as per Pitch Madison Media Outlook 2020) to single digit in 2020. On the whole, 2020 does not promise to be an exciting year for media and advertising in India.

     

     

  • It was the word “pandemic” that galvanised the world, writes Ranjona Banerji

    Ranjona Banerji: Covid-19: After the foolhardy nonchalance comes the panic

    By Ranjona Banerji

     

    It took one heartfelt speech by Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director general, to make the world sit up and take the coronavirus named Covid-19 seriously. That’s governments, businesses, organisations, the media, the public. Groups at the forefront were obviously struggling. It was the word “pandemic” that galvanised the world.

    https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/03/covid-19-controllable-pandemic-200312163146232.html

    But between the first news trickling in from China and Tedros’s declaration, lies the shadow. The first excuse would be that people have cried wolf so many times that Covid-19, which didn’t even have a name until recently, was just seen as one more overreaction and one more those viruses which were bad but not world class destroyers.

    Well, after the foolhardy nonchalance comes the panic. And through all this, we did not see the world’s media investigate the virus, report on governmental action and inaction and dissect the measures taken to contain it.

    I must excuse from this analysis TV channels like India’s Times Now. They ran a story on the night of March 12, which was advertised like this: “By limiting the number of fatalities to 74 with no casualties in a country of 1.3 billion people, has the @narendramodi Government been successful so far in its fight against Corona?” Because this is just plain adoration and in playground terms (when I was little at least) “sucking up”. Fate is a nasty creature as the Greeks warned us centuries ago and India announced its first fatality after this ad went up.

    This article by The Economist analyses the progress of the disease and reactions to it.

    “Few of today’s political leaders have ever faced anything like a pandemic and its economic fallout—though some are evoking the financial crisis of 2007-09 (see article). As they belatedly realise that health systems will buckle and deaths mount, leaders are at last coming to terms with the fact that they will have to weather the storm. Three factors will determine how they cope: their attitude to uncertainty; the structure and competence of their health systems; and, above all, whether they are trusted.

    “The uncertainty has many sources. One is that SARS-CoV-2 and the disease it causes, covid-19, are not fully understood (see article). Another is over the status of the pandemic. In each region or country it tends to proliferate rapidly undetected. By the time testing detects cases in one place it will be spreading in many others, as it was in Italy, Iran and South Korea. By the time governments shut schools and ban crowds they may be too late.”

    https://www.economist.com/leaders/2020/03/12/the-politics-of-pandemics?cid1=cust/ednew/n/bl/n/2020/03/12n/owned/n/n/nwl/n/n/AP/425736/n

    In India, inordinate attention was paid to the nonsense put out by proponents of the “cow dung and cow urine cures all” brigade, without adequate debunking. Not to mention various suggestions of useless preventives from the Ayush ministry. Close analyses of hospitals across India and the arrangements made to deal with a fast-spreading disease were missing. The fallout of this on the travel and tourism industry were ignored. Popular columnists put out ignorant and potentially dangerous personal views like India’s general filth made us immune to passing viruses. Was this an elliptical hint at the failure of Modi’s Clean India Mission? Hmm.

    Because the general preoccupation of the government was the toppling of the Madhya Pradesh government, the media focus lay there as well. The world was a foreign place far away and we presumably live outside it. How many important and self-important journalists questioned the Modi government’s concentration on Madhya Pradesh while a pandemic loomed over the world?

    Even when the government announced its various steps of stopping travellers coming in and enforced quarantine just after the WHO declaration, there was confusion. No one was sure of what the new regulations entailed. The constant stream of fake news on social media platforms added to the panic. What role did the media play in clearing the confusion, if any?

    As the world shuts down, India’s Union health minister is all sanguine: Given our general capacity to deal with medical crises, how much to believe, who knows?

    https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/we-have-built-a-lot-of-capacity-to-combat-covid-19-harsh-vardhan/articleshow/74531172.cms

     

    Ranjona Banerji is a senior journalist and commentator. She is also Consulting Editor, MxMIndia. Her views here are personal

     

  • It should not be a decision governed by advertisers, franchises or players, writes Shailesh Kapoor

    Given Covid-19, must the IPL show still go on?

     

     

    An update: BCCI has announced the postponement of IPL 2020 to April 15, 2020. This column was written much before the announcement was made.

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    The twelfth edition of IPL is scheduled for kick off 10 days from today, i.e., on March 23, 2020. In the wake of the escalating Covid-19 situation across the world, ‘non-essential’ travel and community gatherings are being restricted, both by the administration and the private sector. Sporting events tick both these boxes. They are non-essential, and they involve community gatherings in stadia. And it’s only natural that they should be considered for postponement.

     

    While several sporting events have been canceled or postponed over the last two weeks, the big news came in yesterday with the suspension of NBA, after player Rudy Gobert tested positive. Gobert incidentally mocked the Covid-19 situation by touching the mikes at a presser, just two days before he was diagnosed.

     

    Should IPL go on, then? Till about a week ago, BCCI was cautious, but keen on going ahead with the league anyway. But much has changed since then. The ‘best-case’ scenario of BCCI today stands at an IPL played in empty stadia, to eliminate the community-gathering risk. Television and digital media are the revenue drivers for IPL, and while empty stadia may take some of the zing away, the economics of the big-ticket event will be impacted only marginally.

     

    However, one could question the desperation to go ahead with the tournament at any cost. IPL is clearly non-essential, and the marathon length of the event would mean that players and officials are exposed to multiple people during the course of the league. Over the last few days, high-profile cases ranging from heads of state to ministers to actors have emerged from across the globe. In no uncertain measure, it tells us that public life puts you to more risk than an average citizen. Sportspersons fall in this category, and there’s the additional complication of overseas players, who may have traveled to different countries in the lead up to IPL.

     

    But a lot of cricket is going on worldwide. Among that, India is playing South Africa at home, where the remaining two matches will be held to empty stadia. The Ranji Trophy final is being played too, even as I write this. The veterans’ tournament, promoting road safety, was called off yesterday after five days of cricket. But in general, cricket across the world seems somewhat immune to the hazard at hand. Then why should IPL take all the blame?

     

    But that’s how IPL’s imagery is. There’s an intrinsic association between IPL and greed, built as a public perception over the years. Because there’s so much money involved, all IPL-related decisions can come across as material and insensitive.

     

    The players, especially the young talent, would really want to play. They may not get this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity again. But this should not be a decision governed by advertisers, franchises or players. It should be based on larger considerations of a situation that’s evolving rapidly with each passing day.

     

    IPL can surely wait another year (it’s impossible to reschedule it later in the year given the cricket calendar). And BCCI could be fighting many perception battles, with the media and the administration, if they decide to stick to the schedule.