Entertainment
Yash Chopra award for Aasha Bhosle, is 5th recipient
Mumbai, Jan 27 (IANS) Bollywood playback doyenne Asha Bhosle will be given the ‘Yash Chopra Memorial Award’, the jury announced on here Saturday.
She will be the fifth winner of the award. Previous recipients are Asha Bhosale’s elder sister Lata Mangeshkar, Amitabh Bachchan, Rekha and Shah Rukh Khan.
Evergreen Asha Bhosle has been giving playback in Hindi films for nearly seven decades, earning her an entry into the Guinness World Records for recording over 11,000 songs in 20 different languages.
The jury comprising late filmmaker Yash Chopra’s wife Pamela Chopra, filmmaker Boney Kapoor, singer Alka Yagnik, actress Padmini Kohlapure, director Madhur Bhandarkar, script writer Honey Irani, and Anu and Shashi Ranjan came together for a press conference to announce the winner.
“This is a very prestigious award. It is given to the (one of the) pillars of our industry. This is the 5th year and the jury decided it is high time we acknowledge Ashaji’s contribution to the Indian cinema,” said Alka Yagnik.
Bonney Kapoor, who has been closely associated with Asha Bhosle, said: “My association with Ashaji has been since childhood — she sang songs for my father’s films, for my films. Besides, we have always had very good relations. I think it is befitting that she receives this prestigious award.”
The award will be presented to Asha Bhosle on February 16.
The award has been instituted by the TSR Foundation of T. Subbarami Reddy in memory of producer-director Yash Chopra, who died in 2012.
–IANS
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Entertainment
Casino Days Reveal Internal Data on Most Popular Smartphones
International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.
The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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