advertising

After a long slide, advertising revenues at Viacom’s media network turned positive, but the operating income at the networks slipped in the quarter and the company’s overall earnings were also lower because of lower movie box office results and viewer home video titles.

Second-quarter net earnings fell 18% to $478 million, or 96 cents a share, from $585 million or $1.07 a year ago. The earnings were slightly better than Wall Street expectations.

Revenue fell 6% to $3.1 billion.

After more than six years of kicking the tires on the concept, Comcast has finally decided to take addressable TV advertising to all its markets through a deal with technology firm Invidi Technologies.

According to a source familiar with the project, Comcast is aiming to have the Invidi system deployed across its U.S. footprint by the end of 2014. Such systems let pay TV providers deliver separate spots to individual households based on geographic and demographic data -- to show, say, diaper or baby-formula ads only to homes with young families.

New York — Consumers are already well down the road of watching video content on a range of connected devices -- and ad agencies have not had the luxury of waiting until single-source measures spanning TV, the Web and mobile are broadly available, said John Nitti, president of activation for media buyer Zenith.

NEW YORK — Can the Hopper, Dish Network’s ad-skipping set-top box, be a non-issue for advertisers? Perhaps unsurprisingly, Dish director of advertising sales Adam S. Gaynor thinks so.

Speaking at the Broadcasting & Cable/Multichannel News Advanced Advertising event here on Wednesday, Gaynor defended the technology. “I don’t think Dish has created the ability to skip over commercials,” he said. “I think it was something that’s been around for a long time, now it’s just easier for consumers.”

Rentrak reached a multiyear contract with Viamedia, an independent advertising representative firm catering to the cable industry, which will use the research company’s TV Essentials measurement service as part of its sales process.