Update | Tributes paid to 'Uncle Six', the symbol of a generation

Sir Run Run Shaw meant many things to many people, judging from the accolades that flowed in yesterday at a public memorial service in tribute to him.

His passion for show business and for charity was oft-cited, but one visitor, former TVB general manager Stephen Chan Chi-wan, spoke instead of Shaw's humour and the impeccable suits the man always showed up in at executive meetings.

"Sometimes when our discussion had run on for too long, he would ask 'are we done?' because he wanted to take a stroll and have tea," Chan recalled. "I miss him very much."

From the luminaries of the city to the man in the street, hordes of people converged on Shaw Brothers Studios in Tseung Kwan O to remember the man who was in equal measure the father of the local film industry, founder of TVB, a generous philanthropist and a champion of science and education.

Shanghai-born Shaw died at his Hong Kong home on January 7 at the age of 107. He is survived by two sons and two daughters - Vee-ming, Harold, Dorothy and Violet - and by his second wife, Mona Fong Yat-wah, whom he married in 1997. The family did not give the cause of death.

The memorial was held in a brightly decorated hall themed in gold and pink. Earlier, guests had been asked not to wear sombre clothes or black ties, or to send wreaths or bouquets.