Enron Access

The demise of Enron Corp. isn't exactly bad news for the cable industry.

Enron, a utility that transformed itself into a commodities-trading powerhouse before going bankrupt, ventured into the broadband market by setting up a bandwidth-trading subsidiary. But that unit ran into problems when it could not assure clients that services flowing over the networks would reach end users — particularly the customers of cable companies.

Despite Enron's reputation for favoring government deregulation, the Houston-based company turned to the Federal Communications Commission and demanded access to cable facilities for unaffiliated providers of interactive-television service. The FCC is still studying the issue.

Although Enron stayed out of the FCC's debate over requiring cable operators to provide access to unaffiliated Internet service providers, the company appeared headed in the direction of favoring mandatory access when it hired Greg Simon as a lobbyist.

Simon, a former top aide to Vice President Al Gore, headed the coalition that failed to convince Congress and the FCC to impose open-access mandates on cable. Confusing things even more is the role of Wendy L. Gramm, an Enron board member and wife of retiring Sen. Phil Gramm (R-Texas).

In her capacity as director of the Regulatory Studies Program at George Mason University, Gramm submitted a paper to the FCC in November 2000 urging the agency to resist calls for requiring cable operators to carry unaffiliated ISPs.

Touting Tolerance

Starz Encore Group LLC isn't the only media company trying to promote ethnic acceptance in the Sept. 11 aftermath. National Geographic Channel has now produced a public-service announcement urging Americans to show peace and tolerance toward Middle Easterners and Muslims.

Noting that the National Geographic Society lost two staffers in the Pentagon plane crash, senior vice president of brand management Lorraine Snebold said, "We wanted to do something to help unite our community, especially as it pertained to Arab- and Muslim-Americans."

The spot opens with the metaphor of a road, illustrating the journey toward compassion and understanding, according to executives from Nat Geo and production shop Edgeworx. The road's computer-generated yellow centerline is then animated to connect a series of vignettes showing Arab-Americans of different faiths, before turning into National Geographic's famous yellow border.

Nat Geo senior producer Paul Miller, who directed the PSA, and Caleb Cooks, the executive producer at Edgeworx, used real people from Miller's melting-pot neighborhood, Ditmas Park in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Repurposing Goes Backstage

We've heard a lot about repurposing on the small screen. But it's going on behind the scenes too.

New York's public broadcast-TV station, WNET, last month unveiled its new all-digital production facilities on West 33rd Street in Manhattan, which includes a recording room and two adjacent audio post-production and editing suites.

WNET and production house Cool Beans are partners in the post-production site. WNET technology vice president Ken Devine said that these facilities, when not being used by WNET for its own programming — including an upcoming weekly Bill Moyers series and four yearly "pledge drives" — will be leased to outside commercial and programming producers by Cool Beans creative director/partner Peter Fish.

Comsat? Rules

At the end of the year, The McLaughlin Group, a syndicated TV program of Washington talking heads, offers up a menu of winners and losers across the spectrum of politics and finance here and abroad. The panel of journalists is pretty sharp when it comes to politics but less so when it comes to business, as the following exchange on Dec. 28 between host John McLaughlin and Washington Times
columnist Tony Blankley demonstrated:

McLaughlin: We've got to move right along. Okay, capitalist of the year?

Blankley: Brian Roberts, president of Comsat, who turned a small company into the largest cable company when he took over AT&T's cable company. He's now one of the big players in the world.

McLaughlin: Well-stated.

Soccer Snafus

The Wire can only hope that Major League Soccer's relationship with ESPN and ABC over the next five years goes more smoothly than the conference call it held last week to announce a TV deal that includes the pro soccer circuit and three World Cup competitions through 2006.

During the Jan. 2 announcement with MLS commissioner Don Garber, ESPN senior vice president and GM, programming Mark Shapiro and ABC Sports senior vice president of programming Loren Matthews, the conference call cut off, disconnecting all the participants.

Upon reconnecting, the remaining editors and reporters were forced again to randomly announce their names and affiliations, a process that elicited both groans and snickers from those who made their way back to the call, only to find Matthews absent and off to attend Rose Bowl duties.

After fielding some questions, one Wire reporter's query was interrupted by music from another session, causing him to punt on this fútbol fiasco.

Spokesmen for MLS and ESPN said ConferenceCall.com had overbooked, causing the glitches.

Twin Towers Aftermath

Unlike producers of new movies and first-run television shows, VH1 Classic isn't editing out World Trade Center images from its video oldies.

That VH1 digi-net last week ran Madonna's "Papa Don't Preach" music video, which shows the Twin Towers in the background, and last month ran Blondie's video for "Heart of Glass," which featured the Twin Towers in its opening and closing scenes.

(One big exception in moviedom: director Cameron Crowe kept WTC background shots in Paramount Pictures' current film, Vanilla Sky.)