Entertainment
‘Birdman’ shines at Oscar awards
Los Angeles: At the 87th Academy Awards there was no show by the Indian movie. However, “Birdman” clinched key honours and was nominated in nine categories, picked up four honours – Best Picture, Best Director (Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu), Best Writing (Original Screenplay) and Best Cinematography.
Another big winner was “The Grand Budapest Hotel”, which tied with “Birdman” for four awards. The Wes Anderson-directorial won Costume Design, Makeup and Hairstyling, Music (Original Score)and Production Design.
One of the season’s favourites – “Boyhood” – could manage just one Oscar for Patricia Arquette. She secured the Best Supporting Actress award – and delivered a fitting acceptance speech, demanding equal pay for women. In response, veteran actress Meryl Streep stood up and cheered at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre.
“The Imitation Game” went back home with only one award for Graham Moore’s adapted screenplay. Even “American Sniper” managed just one win – sound editing.
It was Eddie Redmayne’s victory for his performance as Stephen Hawking in “The Theory Of Everything” which turned out to be a highlight at the Oscars ceremony. Calling himself “one very very lucky man”, he dedicated the award to the film crew and his wife, the Hawking family and to “everyone around the world suffering from ALS”.
The best actress title went to Julianne Moore for her portrayal of a woman diagnosed with early onset dementia in “Still Alice”.
J.K. Simmons won best supporting actor for his role as a tyrannical music teacher in
“Whiplash”, which also won for editing and sound mixing at the event, hosted by Neil Patrick Harris.
“Selma”, which depicts the US civil rights struggle, won the best original song for “Glory”. John Legend and Common took to the stage to perform the number during the ceremony. While accepting the award, Legend said voting-right restrictions and incarceration rates for black menshowed that there was continuing need for action.
“The struggle for justice is right now,” he said, reports guardian.co.uk.
Among the documentary features, it was Laura Poitras’s “Citizenfour”, on Edward Snowden, which received the golden statuette.
Poland’s “Ida” walked away with the accolades in the foreign language film category, to which Indian movie “Liar’s Dice” failed to make a cut even as a nomination.
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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