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DirecTV Cuts Exclusive NCAA Deal
DirecTV will be mad for college basketball for the rest of the decade. The top DBS company cut a multiyear deal to exclusively carry the NCAA Mega March Madness out-of-market men's college-basketball tournament as part of a broader deal with CBS that also included increased DirecTV distribution of CBS-owned college-sports cable network CSTV.
DirecTV will move CSTV to its Total Choice Plus tier from its sports tier, boosting the channel's DirecTV reach to 8 million subscribers from 2 million.
DirecTV -- which has offered the NCAA March Madness out-of-market package since 1999 -- will sell subs up to 37 tournament games, as well as interactive enhancement features, for a suggested retail price of $69.
DirecTV is also close to cutting a deal with Major League Baseball for exclusive rights to the leagues Extra Innings out-of-market package, which costs subs $170 annually, according to The New York Times. The company already has exclusive rights to the popular NFL Sunday Ticket game package.
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Sinclair Pact Covers All TW Subs
Time Warner Cable’s new retransmission-consent deal with Sinclair Broadcast Group covers all of its subscribers in markets that carry Sinclair TV-station signals, not just those where Time Warner acquired systems from now-bankrupt Adelphia Communications.
Time Warner said Monday that it will carry the analog and digital signals of 35 TV stations owned or operated by the broadcaster in 22 markets for the next three years.
The cable operator and Sinclair finalized a new retransmission-consent pact Friday just hours before an extension of their old agreement was set to expire.
The new retransmission-consent deal expires Dec. 31, 2009. The deal covers 6 million Time Warner subscribers in systems that carry local Sinclair-owned TV stations.
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Iowa Broadcasters Back Sinclair
The head of the Iowa Broadcasters Association said Monday that Sinclair Broadcast Group should be allowed to demand cash for cable carriage from Mediacom Communications without interference by regulators.
“In our view, there is no valid reason for any arm of the government to become involved in the Sinclair-Mediacom matter,” IBA president Steve Martinson said in a three-page letter to the entire Iowa congressional delegation.
On Jan. 6, Sinclair pulled 22 local TV stations from Mediacom, impacting 700,000 subscribers. Without success, Mediacom has sought help from Congress, the courts and the Federal Communications Commission.
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Adult Swim Goes Live-Action
Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim late-night service will try its hand at live-action content with the Feb. 11 debut of two new original series.
Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job, a 15-minute sketch-comedy show created by Tom Goes to the Mayor creators Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim, will feature short films, parodies, animations, pranks and musical numbers, according to the network.
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NESN Launches Reality Sports Show
New England Sports Network’s new reality show, Sox Appeal, will prove that “there is more than one way to score at a baseball game.”
The regional sports network teamed up with Emmy Award-winning Scout Productions (Queer Eye for the Straight Guy) on Sox Appeal, which “follows a series of three two-inning-long blind dates that take place over the course of eight televised Red Sox games.” During the seventh-inning stretch, the “Hero” dater must decide who to invite to share the seat next to them for the rest of the game.
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Sky Angel Fare Flies North via IPTV
Canadian Internet-protocol-TV provider ShifTV will add 30 TV and radio channels of Christian and family programming to its lineup following a deal with direct-broadcast satellite provider Sky Angel.
Among the networks included in the pact: Sky Angel's exclusive kids and teens channel, KTV; 24-hour Christian-music-video channel TVU; Trinity Broadcasting Network's flagship channel, JCTV youth network, Smile of a Child children's network, The Church Channel and TBN Enlace Spanish network; Safe TV; Familyland; Faith TV; and Angel One.
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WE Books 'Tents' Sponsors
GM's Saturn division and Maybelline New York will advertise during WE tv’s original series, Under the Tents.
Under the Tents “provides an inside look at the season’s hottest fashion trends from the designer collections that are unveiled during Fashion Week twice a year in [New York] in September and February,” the network said in a prepared statement.
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TiVo Renews Lexus Deal
Lexus signed an upfront-advertising commitment with TiVo.
The automaker renewed its agreement to use the digital-video-recorder vendor’s interactive and targeted advertising solutions, including the Gold Star Sponsorship on TiVo Central, program placement, Product Watch and the Lexus Car Configuration Tool.
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NFL Network Ramps Bowl Coverage
NFL Network will present more than 100 hours of Super Bowl-related programming, including 55 hours of live coverage and more than 60 HD hours.
The National Football League’s cable service said highlights will include every NFL-related press conference live, including: team arrivals; player availability; head-coach press conferences; Hall of Fame announcement; commissioner Roger Goodell’s first Super Bowl press conference; the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year award; special performances by Prince and Cirque de Soleil; and sponsor award conferences.
NFL Network will also air five hours of live coverage on Media Day Tuesday, Jan. 30, along with a live three-and-a-half-hour pregame show on Super Bowl Sunday from Dolphin Stadium in Miami and a two-hour postgame show.
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DirecTV Extends ClientLogic Pact
DirecTV signed a multiyear contract extension with ClientLogic, which has been providing customer-service and technical-support outsourcing for the nation’s largest direct-broadcast satellite operator since 2004.
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Cox Expands ESPN Distribution
ESPN2 HD is now available to Cox Communications subscribers nationwide, and more than 1 million of the MSO’s customers now have access to ESPNU, under terms of an agreement between the sports programmer and the operator, announced Monday.
ESPNU is already available on Cox systems including New England; Phoenix; Hampton Roads, Va.; Wichita, Kan.; Las Vegas; and Oklahoma City.
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Cross-Media X for ESPN
ESPN said it’ll run the Winter X Games 11 Jan. 25-28 from on every ESPN platform. Its Web coverage includes more videos and it’ll also run podcasts on ESPN.com
Highlights from current and past Winter X Games will also be available via ESPN Video On Demand.
And broadband service ESPN360 (broadband.espn.go.com) will present 10.5 hours of live broadband coverage of multiple events, “featuring distinctive ‘follow-cam’ perspectives from a ski-bound cameraman on the event course and event audio directly from the courses on the slopes of Aspen,” the network said.
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Canada’s Cogeco Deploys Ciena Gear
Cogeco Cable, which has operations in Canada and Portugal, deployed Ciena’s CN 4200 FlexSelect Advanced Services Platform as part of migrating its network infrastructure from synchronous optical network (SONET) to Ethernet.
Ciena said the deal is its first with a Canadian MSO.
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C-COR Debuts Three-Input RF Amp
C-COR is introducing what it claimed is the industry’s first three-input radio-frequency amplifier. Called the GAMP3, the device is a 1-gigahertz forward-path RF amplifier with one broadcast and two narrowcast ports. That lets an operator save space and cut cabling complexity by combining broadcast with targeted services like video-on-demand or switched-digital video into one amplifier, said Bill Dawson, vice president of access strategy at C-COR.
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SCTE Hires Former Verizon Exec
The Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers hired Debra A. Swann as vice president of marketing and business development.
Swann worked for almost 30 years at Verizon Communications and its predecessor companies before accepting an early retirement package from Verizon in 2004. In her final position at the telco, she served as president of Verizon TeleProducts, its telecommunications-equipment-sales subsidiary.
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Higham to Lead IT at C-COR
Jack Higham was named vice president of information technology at IT-equipment and services provider C-COR.
Based in the company’s corporate headquarters in State College, Pa., he will be responsible for expanding the capabilities of the company’s network, computer services and information systems, including C-COR’s Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system.
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Nick Jr. Buys Gabba Gabba! Hey
Preschool proponent Nick Jr. picked up 20 episodes of new original half-hour series Yo Gabba Gabba!, which is scheduled for a fall debut.
The magazine-style show, produced by The Magic Store and W!LDBRAIN, will use music and song to highlight life lessons and universal experiences for the preschool set.
Production is expected to begin on the series -- which will be hosted by DJ Lance Rock (Lance Robertson) -- in April in Orange County, Calif. The show will feature puppet characters Muno the red Cyclops, Foofa the pink flower bubble, Brobee the little green one, Toodee the blue cat-dragon and Plex the robot, who will sing, play and dance upon hearing the phrase, "Yo Gabba Gabba!"
“Yo Gabba Gabba! puts the funk in preschool,” Nickelodeon Preschool executive vice president and executive creative director Brown Johnson said in a prepared statement.
Nick Jr.: Gabba Gabba! Hey
Preschool proponent Nick Jr. picked up 20 episodes of new original half-hour series Yo Gabba Gabba!, which is scheduled for a fall debut.
The magazine-style show, produced by The Magic Store and W!LDBRAIN, will use music and song to highlight life lessons and universal experiences for the preschool set.
Production is expected to begin on the series -- which will be hosted by DJ Lance Rock (Lance Robertson) -- in April in Orange County, Calif. The show will feature puppet characters Muno the red Cyclops, Foofa the pink flower bubble, Brobee the little green one, Toodee the blue cat-dragon and Plex the robot, who will sing, play and dance upon hearing the phrase, "Yo Gabba Gabba!"
“Yo Gabba Gabba! puts the funk in preschool,” Nickelodeon Preschool executive vice president and executive creative director Brown Johnson said in a prepared statement.
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Gemstar Wins Ruling vs. Yuen
Gemstar-TV Guide International said Monday that arbitrators overseeing its dispute with former chairman and CEO Henry Yuen ruled in its favor and awarded the company a $93.6 million judgment.
The arbitrators ruled that Gemstar-TV Guide “properly terminated” Yuen in April 2003 because he had “breached representations and warranties made to the company” in connection with a November 2002 management and corporate restructuring, the company said.
Yuen is not entitled to any of the approximately $30.9 million set aside by the company as restricted cash for payment to him in connection with the restructuring, in which he was removed from the positions of chairman and CEO, the arbitrators said.
In addition, Gemstar-TV Guide was awarded a judgment of approximately $93.6 million, including $80.6 million in damages. Gemstar-TV Guide is also entitled to an additional judgment for its attorneys' fees and costs against Yuen.
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HBO Sues EchoStar for License Fees
HBO filed a lawsuit against EchoStar seeking $90 million in what the network says it is owed in programming fees, the improper calculation of licensing fees and accrued interest payments.
The premium service filed suit against the nation’s No. 2 satellite provider earlier this month seeking $50 million from the late payment of license fees and interest dating back to 2001, plus another $40 million stemming from the underpayment and miscalculation of fees.
The parties have been out of contract since the end of 2006
‘’We’re not going to elaborate off the lawsuit. We believe it speaks for itself,” said an HBO spokesman. “EchoStar owes us a substantial amount of money and we’d like to get paid.’’
EchoStar contends that the legal dispute stems from a program access complaint its Dish Network was forced to file on Nov. 15 with the Federal Communication Commission against HBO, sister company of Time Warner Cable. “The same group also recently shut off Court TV after we asked for non-discriminatory pricing, a cornerstone of program access protection,’’ the company said in a statement. “Only now has HBO brought suit in retaliation for us filing a complaint with the FCC.’’
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