Mr Allen set a target of generating more than half the company’s

Mr Allen set a target of generating more than half the company’s profits from activities other than advertising revenues from ITV1, its main channel, by 2010.Launching vodcasts, and podcasts (which provide only audio content) is one potential new revenue stream. ITV1 will launch its first vodcast – a podcast that provides video as well as audio – tomorrow when it offers Melvyn Bragg’s South Bank Show for free over the internet. The broadcaster, which has endured a torrid year, wants to test demand for watching television on MP3 players such as iPods.
Viewers will be able to download and store each programme of the new series of the flagship arts show, which started last Sunday, from the itv website.No adverts will be screened on the vodcast version, but ITV hopes to attract more users to its website and its online adverts. If the show proves popular among vodcasters, ITV will consider ways of running adverts on future vodcasts of other programmes.ITV has seen advertising revenues tumble as viewing figures fell over the past year. Former chief executive Charles Allen last month bowed to mounting pressure when he announced he was stepping down.ITV is looking to generate more profits from its interactive and new media operations.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday urged world religious leaders to show “responsibility and restraint” to avoid what he called “extremes” in relations between faiths. Benedict looked relaxed when he greeted the pilgrims who were standing in pouring rain in the palace courtyard. He smiled and said he hoped it would be better weather on Wednesday for his general audience when he planned to recount more of his pilgrimage to the faithful. Metal-detecting wands were waved across visitors heightened Vatican security measures employed since the Sept 11, 2001, terror attacks. But in a sign of even more security following the furor over the remarks, some pilgrims were patted down by Italian police, and some metal-tipped umbrellas and bottles of liquid were confiscated from faithful waiting to enter the courtyard. Police sharpshooters kept watch from a city hall balcony on the square and other officers, dressed like tourists, filmed the crowd with video cameras.

Italy’s interior minister insisted that the tensions over Benedict’s remarks among Muslims wouldn’t result in any significant security worries. “I don’t believe that for Italy it’s a concern that will rise,” Giuliano Amato told Italian state radio. Amato noted that suspected terrorist cells, under surveillance in Italy, were considered to have their potential terrorist interest aimed “outside of Italy.” The interior ministry includes state police and civilian intelligence services In the West Bank, two churches were set afire early Sunday. In the town of Tulkarem, a 170-year-old stone church was torched and its interior was destroyed, local Christian officials said.

In Tubas, a small church was attacked with firebombs and partially burned, Christians said Neither church is Catholic, the officials said. Muslims hurled firebombs and opened fire at five churches in the West Bank and Gaza Strip on Saturday. After the Vatican statement Saturday, senior Indian Muslim clerics asked their supporters to call off planned protests. But Jordanian Muslims said that was not enough and called on the pope to personally apologize for his remarks. Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono described the pope’s reference at the university as “unwise and inappropriate,” the Kompas daily reported. Anger in Turkey also cast some doubt on whether Benedict would travel there as planned in November in what would be his first trip to a Muslim nation. But Turkey’s foreign minister said Sunday that the pope was still expected to visit.