January 6, 2003
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PROGRAMMING
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BRIEFS
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LIFETIME WINS RATINGS RACE FOR SECOND-STRAIGHT YEAR Lifetime finished 2002 with a 2.0 Nielsen Media Research rating for households in prime time, the...
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Can Oxygen Sell Viewers Hooked On ?Talk Sex??
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Sex always attracts a crowd, but it might not always sell, at least not on commercial cable. You might be surprised to learn that the most-watched original...
BY JON LAFAYETTE
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Coming Up
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OH, BROTHER! DISNEY TRIES ?WISH? FOR BOYS Disney Channel, the home of all things Lizzie McGuire, has had great success with tween girls....
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When Viewers Talk, Scripps Listens
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In a third floor office at the company's Knoxville, Tenn., headquarters, ten Scripps Networks' staffers do something fairly radical in the world of television:...
BY JON LAFAYETTE
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DIGITAL PIPELINE
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Breaking the Waves
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Wave Systems' WaveExpress unit has rolled out the News, a premium service for broadband Internet users featuring video from AP Digital, a division of...
BY ANTHONY CRUPI
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BRIEFS
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TIVO'S SECRET 30-SECOND SKIP BUTTON REVEALED It's the button that gives networks and advertisers the heebie jeebies, and the prime reason why ReplayTV...
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FBI NABS TEEN DIRECTV HACKER
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The Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested a Russian college student last week for allegedly sending stolen information about DirecTV access cards...
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Plug-and-Play: ?A Good First Step?
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For years they bickered like Ralph and Alice Kramden, although the arguments were never all that amusing and no one was ever threatened by the prospect...
BY ANTHONY CRUPI
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MEET THE SYSTEM
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Changing Tunes In Music City USA
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Nashville has moved far past the loopy, droopy country music capital portrayed in Robert Altman's classic film of the same name. Just as country music...
BY STACI D. KRAMER
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COLUMNS
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So the Democrats want to start their own cable news channel to compete with Fox. Good luck.
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Direct from The New York Times, the trade paper of the Democrat left, comes news that said party is scouring the nation for someone ? anyone ?...
BY W. F. GLOEDE
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General
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ADELPHIA GETS ITS MAN
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Adelphia Communications will name former AT&T Broadband chief William Schleyer as its new CEO. The announcement is expected as early as this week. Reached...
BY ANDREA FIGLER
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BRIEFS
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DIVERSITY REQUESTS JAM FCC'S INBOX The FCC's Thursday midnight deadline for comments on media ownership limits saw a deluge of responses from the creative...
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CABLE CONNECTIONS
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ABC FAMILY CHANNEL Kerry Holmwood to VP-production and programming. AOL TIME WARNER William B. Grogan Jr. to SVP-marketing, global marketing solutions...
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Cable Nets Step Up to Reality
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Cable networks are ready to air new episodes of some of their biggest shows in January, but they'll be facing intense competition from well-hyped midseason...
BY JON LAFAYETTE
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COMPETITION GETS RELATIVE
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One of the drivers in regulators' perception of high cable prices is its value relative to satellite. A snapshot of basic digital tier pricing shows...
BY JONATHAN BLUM, KAGAN
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Critics to Get a Peek At Cable's New Shows
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Britney Spears choreographing a battle for Braveheart? A psychic counselor leading criminal investigators to a missing dead body? While these scenarios...
BY ANDREA FIGLER
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FREE CASH GETS DISCRETE
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It's good news that an analyst of Richard Bilotti's stature is promoting MSO stocks. Bilotti uses an interesting valuation called ?discretionary...
BY JONATHAN BLUM, KAGAN
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Late Breaking News
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Holanda Bolts Charter for Patriot As Charter Communications awaits the names of those being laid off and the results of a federal grand jury investigation...
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Morgan Stanley Analyst Plugs 2003 Cable Values
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Will cable stocks finally get some respect this year? Commenting to The New York Times last week, Morgan Stanley analyst Richard Bilotti predicted that...
BY MAVIS SCANLON
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Rates Up, Subscribers Down
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The Federal Communications Commission Ninth Annual Report on Video Competition, released New Year's Eve, confirms that cable rate hikes were much higher...
BY ALICIA MUNDY, K. C. NEEL AND STACI D. KRAMER
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Ratings
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| Top 40 Basic Cable Ad-Supported ProgramsWeek of December 23-29 2002 |
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Retrans Hangover for Small Ops
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MSOs stuck to one New Year's resolution ? to resolve retransmission consent agreements that expired Dec. 31 ? but smaller operators aren't...
BY SHIRLEY BRADY
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RSNs: A HARD MARKET TO BREAK
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MSOs and team owners are smart to look at the regional sports business. We estimated total RSN revenue hit $1.8 billion for 2002, up by about 11% from...
BY JONATHAN BLUM, KAGAN
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SPORTS NETS Get Closer to Home
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Brushing aside the notion that bigger is better when it comes to regional sports networks, several large cable operators and team owners are betting...
BY STACI D. KRAMER
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Time Warner and Fox Cable Spar Over Sports Net Rates
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Time Warner Cable and Fox Cable Networks are ringing in the new year with a public dispute over high double-digit rate increases that has left roughly...
BY STACI D. KRAMER
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TNT Promo Has NBA All-Star Tie-in
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In an effort to make the most out of its exclusive broadcasting rights to the NBA All-Star game Feb. 9, TNT plans to run a new promotion through Jan....
BY ANDREA FIGLER
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Vermont Operator Balks at Hike, Shuts Out New England Sports Net
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New England Sports Network lost an affiliate last week after Duncan Cable TV, which serves approximately 1,100 customers in Wilmington, Vt., dropped...
BY K. C. NEEL
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