Publish Asia 2010 concludes
successfully in Kuala Lumpur
- India shines winning six awards at
the ninth annual Asia Media Awards 2010
- Mint and The Week conferred gold, while Hindustan,
The Times of India and India Today bring in bronze awards
- The World Press Trends 2010 puts India on
top among the five largest markets for newspapers
P
resenting new ideas, concepts and best practices from across the world, Publish Asia 2010 (Aug 03-05) concluded successfully in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) showing how to drive media growth in the post recession era. The event provided the opportunities to explore innovations in the printing plant, the newsroom and the sales department apart from showcasing original ventures for creating new revenue streams, through three targeted concurrent conferences including CEO Conference, Newsroom Summit Asia, and Printing Summit Asia; four learning workshops on iPad for newspapers, Implementing newsroom 3.0, Crossmedia advertising, and Cost control in production; along with an exhibition of the latest products and services from suppliers to the media industry. During the launch of the World Press Trends 2010 at the opening of Publish Asia 2010, Christoph Riess, CEO of WAN-IFRA, announced that the Asian newspaper industry continues to enjoy significant growth. While circulation increased by one percent in 2009 and more than 13 percent over five years, the number of daily titles in Asia rose 2.7 percent in the past year. As per the report, the five largest markets for newspapers include: India, with 110 million copies sold daily, China, with 109 million sold daily, Japan (50 million), United States (46 million), and Germany (20 million). Sixty-seven of the world’s 100 largest daily newspapers are Asian.
With aim to promote the highest publishing standards in Asia and the Middle-East, WAN-IFRA presented the winners of the 9th Asia Media Awards in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on the sidelines of Publish Asia 2010. Hundreds of newspapers and magazines from these regions have taken part in the competition in the past nine years. The number of entries competing this year for these awards and the outstanding quality of some winning entries demonstrates that the vibrant Asian newspaper industry is eager to achieve publishing excellence in the fields of printing quality, design, infographics and photography.
In Best in Print Award, Berita Harian from Singapore Press Holdings Ltd (weekday circulation below 150,000), MINT from HT Media Limited (circulation between 150,000 and 499,000), Apple Daily from Apple Daily Publication Development Limited (circulation over 500,000) were gold winners. While Hindustan from HT Media Limited (circulation between 150,000 and 499,000) and The Times of India from Bennett, Coleman & Co, Ltd (circulation over 500,000) were presented bronze award awards. These awards were held jointly with WAN-IFRA’s International Colour Quality Club, focusing to show the ability of newspapers to print consistently high quality according to international standards (ISO 12647).
In Best in Design Award, presented to entries whose overall design, originality and content have achieved levels of excellence deserving recognition, three publications received gold awards under two categories: Bangkok Post from Post Publishing Company Ltd was awarded for newspaper overall design; while Storm from E-Quill Media Pte Ltd, and Imagine from Sesame Seeds Creatives Inc were honoured for magazine overall design. India Today from Living Media India Ltd won bronze award for magazine overall design. Kompas Daily from PT Kompas Media Nusantara under newspaper front page design; and The Week from Malayala Manorama Co Ltd under magazine cover design category were also presented gold awards.
In Best in Infographics Award, Gulf News from Al Nisr Publishing, under newspaper infographics category; and South China Morning Post from South China Morning Post Publishers LTD, under Magazine Infographics category were given gold, recognizing excellence in design, usefulness and clarity of information conveyed in both breaking news and nonbreaking news in newspaper infographics.
In Special Coverage Award, the gold winners were Gulf News from Al Nisr Publishing, under newspaper special section; and The Week from Malayala Manorama Co Ltd under magazine special issue. These awards recognize newspaper’s special sections/ magazine’s special issues that demonstrate high standards of content, originality to explore a topic or issue of significance, overall design and photography.
While in Best in Photojournalism Award, the gold awards were given to Muhamed Fathil Bin Asri of The New Straits Times Press (MALAYSIA) for news photography, Abhijit Nandi (Some Kind of Wonderful) of Asian Geographic Magazines for feature photography, and KY Cheng of South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd for sports photography. This award recognizes the photographer’s visual creativity (originality of perception and treatment), ability to expand knowledge or understanding of an issue through an effective use of the medium and technical skills.
The WAN-IFRA Asia Media Awards jury panel included this year nine outstanding personalities from the print media industry, including Anandaramakrishnan Srinivasan, research engineer, WAN-IFRASouth Asia, India; Cecile Coutureau, art director, Le Monde Magazine, France; Cheong Yip Seng, newspaper consultant and the former editor-in-chief for English and Malay newspapers of Singapore Press Holdings, Singapore; Karl Gude, professor of visual communication at Michigan State University and the former director of information graphics at Newsweek magazine, USA; Douglas Okasaki, regional director of the Society of News Design for Middle East & Africa, Dubai; Markus Rupper, the CEO of ZMG - Zeitungs Marketing GmbH &Co KG, the German Newspaper Marketing Society, Germany; PN Balji, director of the Asia Journalism Fellowship, Singapore; Roberto Fuenzalida, executive director of ATDL (Latin America Newspapers Technical Association), Argentina; and Ronnie Poon, vice president - prepress and commercial printing, SPH, Singapore.
On the occasion, the launch of Asian Digital Media Awards was also announced during the gala dinner. This new WAN-IFRA competition, fully focused on digital media, will feature former Asia Media Awards categories introduced in recent years, such as Best in Online Media or Best in Cross Media, as well as new categories such as mobile media, online content, ereader/tablet and social media. The call for entries will close on September 30. The Asian Digital Media Awards ceremony will take place in conjunction with the Digital Media Asia 2010 conference on November 24 in Singapore.
