The session was dedicated towards showcasing the best practices in terms of how local entertainment are reaching out through the digital content and medium and how ICT and content can facilitate promotion and sustenance of entertainment & inclusion with larger attention on local ecosystem. The session also tried to showcase best practices in areas facilitating empowerment of the differently abled population, women, tribal communities, minorities through digital content and media. Mr. Jonathan Bill, SVP Business Development & Innovation – Vodafone India limited, chaired the session. The juror expert and moderator for the session was Mr. Bikas Kumar Singh, Head-Corporate Affairs – Lenovo India Pvt. ltd.

The session began with the presentation by Enable India. The presenter started by explaining as to how the visual imparity of his brother-in-law inspired him to develop Enable India. Their main aim is ensuring economic independence and dignity of people with serious physical disability. To demonstrate the problems which may be associated with the employment of physically disabled people, he took example of Ghausia with severe physical disability. How can one convince anybody to give such a person work? You can’t plead or beg in front of them because that is not dignity. The presenter shared that it is here that Enable India steps in. They train such people and create a pool of talented professionals. They focus on developing right skills and attitude in these people and thus companies in spite of their disabilities have no problem in hiring them. For this we need to create awareness among corporates which is done by showing them videos. These videos showcase as to how inability to control anger and anxiety are true disabilities. Using a range of innovative ICT practices they impart these people with right skills and thus ensure their great future.

The next presenter Mr. Samir Sanghavi was from Crafts of Gujarat. This is an initiative by Department of Arts in Gujarat. He explained two hypothetical situations: in the first one, an artisan has a hard time in negotiating a deal with the middle man who will then sell her craft at a real high price later. In the second scenario, the artisans receives a message from the Govt. that a US based company is ready to purchase her crafts at much better prices. The second scenario is an indication of the impact that Crafts of Gujarat website is trying to undertake. Further, the presenter played a video to demonstrate how the process works. There is very transparent process followed. The website is multi-purpose in the sense that it also tries to create awareness about the varied type of art forms that exist in the state of Gujarat. As many as 50 types of traditional handicrafts are being showcased and details info has been given about them. Not only this, information about famous cities in Gujarat is also there. By linking the artisans directly to the buyers of their products, this initiative is set to make a huge impact on local communities.

Third presentation was from National Informatics Centre on the project Web CMS by Dr. R N Behera. One of the recent challenges a country faces is preparing its citizens and Government for globalization and information and communication revolution. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) plays a pivotal role for instituting effective e-Governance, which essentially bridges the gap between government and citizenry. The non-uniformity of the district level govt. websites continuously distorts this vision. Thus using ICT, Orissa state govt. did a pilot project on standardization of district level websites. This project has three essential parts: first the Citizen’s view. The District Portal has been built from the user’s or citizen’s perspective, rather than from the perspective of the government. The citizen may visit the District Portal, rather than a number of websites for composite information such as birth certificate, election commission etc. Second part is a Web CMS A comprehensive web based Content Management System (CMS) is designed based on the content architecture of the National Portal of India. And the third part is Moderation i.e. any party can enter the content but it is not published until it is moderated. This is an innovative initiative by the govt. to serve citizens.

Next presentation was by Kanwal Deep Kaur from Vodafone on their product Mobile Box Office. India is a Bollywood or movies oriented nation and the proof for this is the presence of large number of theatre in the country. These theaters are present in even in the remotest of the areas. Vodafone seeks to cash on this craziness for movies by bringing them on the mobile platform. This is done with the help of its partner company, Vuclip.com. Vuclip compresses the content of the movies, i.e. videos into very small data sizes, depending upon the handset you are operating. They have a large collection of clips and videos of movies, across a variety of genres. It essentially is entertainment on move, but for value of money. As already said they have about 1500+ movies across genres and languages. As the estimates go, they are going at rate of 50% per month since 15 months of their inception. With the facility of guided search and IVR this is a product to watch out for.

The last presentation was from Mr. Tej Pandey from Mobiotics about their project TV Buddy. At the time when whole internet industry is experiencing change, diverse platforms are coming up and social media sites are sprouting up like mushrooms, the television industry find itself at crossroads. In short the TV industry is ready to make huge disruption in the market. As content is becoming more interactive and sources of content consumption are increasing, content promotion schemes are also getting more personalized and specific. The presenter explained that TV Buddy is a platform where big players of the TV ecosystem, namely content generators, advertisers and final viewers can interact. It is cloud based system with an application like outlay. Benefits that consumers derive are connecting with the users of similar content, engagement, and social sharing of their experience. Content generators can also interact with the users about their needs and deliver more relevant content. The presenter concluded the presentation by sharing that the platform enables the advertisers to get to know about their viewing habits of the consumer and monetize.