• Disney Rules Summer Primetime
• Earthlink Slashes 900 Jobs
• Martin Backs TAC in Comcast Dispute
• Comcast Touts Big 10 Slate
• Celebs Take Over TCM
• Maya Angelou Keynotes WICT
• Verizon Offers Lifetime DSL Plan

• Sundance Takes Flight On Virgin
• MTV Orders ‘The Paper’
• Bigband Reduces CMTS Team

• Camaro Scores Top Product Placement

Disney Rules Summer Primetime
Like most movie musicals, High School Musical 2 had a very happy ending -- for Disney Channel this summer. The network, buoyed by the cable-record-shattering sequel to High School Musical, won the primetime summer ratings race, according to Nielsen Media Research data released Tuesday. Disney Channel averaged a 2.5 household rating this summer, up 9% from last summer’s 2.3, placing it No. 1 among basic-cable networks in primetime. Disney notched the largest summertime audience in primetime for any cable network, averaging 3.1 million viewers. That bested the previous record-holders, USA and TNT in 2006 and 2005, respectively, by 7%. TBS was fourth for summer 2007 with a 1.4 rating, flat versus the corresponding year-earlier period. Lifetime Television and Fox News Channel were tied for fifth, with each garnering a 1.3 rating this summer. Lifetime was down 13%, while FNC was flat. click to read more...
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Earthlink Slashes 900 Jobs
Internet service provider EarthLink is eliminating 900 jobs, about half its total work force, and will close four offices in a bid to save between $25 million and $35 million this year. EarthLink -- whose cable partners include Time Warner Cable, Bright House Networks and Comcast -- said it will close its Orlando, Fla., Knoxville, Tenn., Harrisburg, Pa., and San Francisco offices and “substantially reduce” its presence in Pasadena, Calif., and Atlanta. click to read more...
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Martin Backs TAC in Comcast Dispute
Washington – Under a ruling endorsed by Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin, The America Channel would be designated a regional sports network qualified to obtain carriage from Comcast through arbitration, two FCC officials said Tuesday. Martin’s proposal would reject a Comcast petition for declaratory ruling, which accused TAC of gaming the agency’s 2006 Adelphia merger order that included some network carriage protections for RSNs unaffiliated with either Comcast or Time Warner. click to read more...
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Comcast Touts Big 10 Slate
Comcast wants football fans in its markets to know it will air plenty of games even if it doesn’t add the new Big Ten Network, which launches Friday. The nation’s largest cable operator -- with systems in Big Ten states Michigan, Illinois and Indiana -- posted a schedule on Comcast.com/sports of Big Ten contests slated to air on a variety of broadcast and cable networks this season. click to read more...
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Celebs Take Over TCM
TCM’s Guest Programmer series, which regularly airs one night each month, is taking over all of November, with 29 celebrities programming 29 nights that they will co-host with Robert Osborne. Among the star-studded list of celebrities sitting down with Osborne to present their favorite films will be Whoopi Goldberg on Nov. 1; Donald Trump on Nov. 3; Danny DeVito on Nov. 10; Matt Groening on Nov. 14; Tracy Ullman on Nov. 17; Alec Baldwin on Nov. 20; Kermit the Frog on Nov. 21; Harvey Fierstein on Nov. 26 and Martha Stewart on Nov. 30. click to read more...
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Maya Angelou Keynotes WICT
Poet Maya Angelou and Xerox chairman and CEO Anne Mulcahy will deliver bookend keynote speeches at the WICT Leadership Conference in March. click to read more...
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Verizon Offers Lifetime DSL Plan
Verizon Communications is trying to drive up DSL subscriptions with a limited-time offer that gives customers who sign up for a two-year contract the same monthly fee for as long as they continue to subscribe to Verizon Internet service. Under the “lifetime” price plan, which Verizon is offering until Oct. 31, customers who sign up online for the 768 kilobit-per-second service are guaranteed a lifetime price of $14.99 per month. Customers opting for the 3 megabit-per-second service are guaranteed a lifetime price of $27.99. click to read more...
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Sundance Takes Flight On Virgin
For an in-flight TV offering, airline startup Virgin America has done a deal with Sundance Channel, which includes a sneak peek at programming before it debuts on the network. The agreement, network officials said, creates a custom in-flight “channel,” and also provides a host of bold content for Virgin America’s Inflight Entertainment System, Red. click to read more...
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MTV Orders ‘The Paper’
MTV has given the go-ahead for a new show chronicling the lives of student working on a high school newspaper in Weston, Fla. Produced by the award-winning MTV News and Docs unit, The Paper is scheduled to commence an eight-episode run in the first quarter of 2008, according to network officials. click to read more...
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Bigband Reduces CMTS Team
BigBand Networks has “slightly reduced” the size of the cable-modem termination system development team based in the United States, while hiring about the same number of employees in China to support ongoing maintenance of existing CMTS products. click to read more...
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