Coda
by Staff -- Multichannel News, 4/28/2008 2:00:00 AM
A Giant Show
New York — NFL Network sought to capitalize on a home-field advantage during its upfront presentation to advertisers at Roseland Ballroom last Thursday.
Amidst a replica of the New York Giants locker room, NFL Network brought out the real thing: six members of the Super Bowl XLII champions in person, including Michael Strahan, Osi Umenyiora, Amani Toomer, Brandon Jacobs, Aaron Ross and Steve Smith.
Network talent Rich Eisen, Marshall Faulk, Steve Mariucci, Adam Shefter and Deion Sanders interviewed the players, who were sporting their Big Blue uniforms.
The mike was then turned over to another gridiron giant: NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, who said the league remains committed to NFL Network and the league will “make it work this year or next year.”
What Goodell left unsaid: The distribution and legal battles NFL Network has been encountering and waging, which have left it with significant carriage holes.
— Mike Reynolds
ABC Family Flicks Click
New York — Optimism is paying off for ABC Family, claiming the title of top ad-supported original movie TV franchise for 2007-08 to date.
Not optimism about the upcoming upfront ad-sales auction, though ABC Family president Paul Lee is confident there, too.
This optimism resonates from the Disney-owned cable network’s target audience of “millennials,” ages 14 to 28. Network research finds they are “really much more optimistic than the previous two generations,” Lee said.
Everyone knows young folks multitask and socially network, but the optimistic outlook is what’s really interesting, Lee said. ABC Family responds with “scripted shows that have humor, but a lot of heart and a lot of optimism.” Shows like Greek, Kyle XY and Lincoln Heights.
And with original movies like April 20’s modern fairy-tale Princess, which won its timeslot (8 to 10 p.m.) with 3 million total viewers and ranked second with women ages 18 to 34, women ages 18 to 49 and females ages 12 to 34, Disney ABC Cable Networks Group researchers say. It led the timeslot with teen viewers (494,000/2.0 rating) and female teens (447,000/3.7 rating).
Season to date, ABC Family’s seven movies lead ad-supported cable networks in adults 18-34 (794,000/1.2 rating), adults 18-49 (1.6 million/1.2 rating), women 18-34 (588,000/1.8 rating) and women 18-49 (1.1 million/1.7 rating), Disney says.
ABC Family’s best-ever telecast, the December flick Holiday in Handcuffs, was cable’s top original movie of 2007-08 so far in women 18 to 34 (1.2 million/3.6 rating) and women 18 to 49 (2.2 million/3.4 rating). And it ranked second out of nearly 60 films on ad-supported cable in adults 18 to 34 (1.6 million/2.4 rating) and adults 18 to 49 (3.3 million/2.5 rating), all according to Disney.
Coming up, Lee points to original flicks The Circuit, with Michelle Trachtenberg (premieres Sunday, June 8), a father-daughter story set on the stock-car race circuit; and Picture This, with Ashley Tisdale (Sunday, July 13), about a girl who averts being grounded, and missing a date of a lifetime, partly by using a video phone to outsmart her dad.
“We really get the chance to get great talent in and to do what we think are great romantic comedies,” Lee said.
ABC Family’s annual movie stunt “25 Days of Christmas” this year features (in addition to theatricals) A Miser Brothers Christmas, the sequel to A Year Without a Santa Claus, and Snow 2: Brain Freeze.
| Network (Movies) | Med. Age | HHLD Avg. | HHLD 000s | P2+ 000s | P 18-24 Avg. | P 18-34 000s |
| ABC Family (7) | 34.2 | 2.2 | 2445 | 3749 | 1.2 | 794 |
| Hallmark (8) | 60.8 | 2.2 | 2453 | 3341 | 0.3 | 190 |
| Lifetime (17) | 52.5 | 1.7 | 1947 | 2537 | 0.4 | 298 |
| Sci Fi (19) | 47.0 | 1.4 | 1635 | 2404 | 0.6 | 419 |
| LMN (4) | 51.8 | 1.0 | 1092 | 1489 | 0.2 | 112 |
| Spike TV (1) | 51.2 | 0.9 | 1060 | 1422 | 0.1 | 97 |
| Oxygen (2) | 49.4 | 0.7 | 782 | 1008 | 0.2 | 149 |
— Kent Gibbons
All the Digital Moves
Washington, D.C. — Mediacom Communications and Bresnan Communications will take some of their small rural systems all-digital by the February 2009 digital-TV transition date, in agreements with the Federal Communications Commission that will allow those systems to deploy set-top boxes with integrated security features.
Mediacom will convert 29 systems in Arizona, California, Kentucky and Mississippi, while Bresnan has pledged to eliminate the 63 analog channels in its 625-Megahertz system in Gillette, Wyo. Once those systems are all-digital, all video customers will need a digital set-top to receive programming.
Dish Tests Mobile TV
Englewood, Colo. — Dish Network will test a European mobile TV broadcast technology in the United States this summer with equipment, test tools and training provided by Alcatel-Lucent.
The company will evaluate the Digital Video Broadcasting-Satellite Services to Handhelds (DVB-SH) technology. The trial will take place in Dish’s laboratories in Atlanta from May to August 2008, with the goal of validating “the performance and cost-efficiency of the DVB-SH standard,” Dish said.
Last month the satellite operator won 168 licenses in the Federal Communications Commission’s auction of 700-Megahertz analog TV spectrum. For now, though, Dish isn’t saying whether it is eyeing that spectrum for mobile TV.
— Todd Spangler
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