Share Ideas Working Now with TVBR, MBR and SMARTMEDIA, a partnership in tv today.
Ideas Working Now Membership
Welcome to TVBR's Daily Epaper
Volume 24, Issue 120, Jim Carnegie, Editor & Publisher
Wednesday Morning June 20th, 2007

TV News ®

Dan Snyder/RedZone buys Dick Clark Productions
RedZone Capital, the private equity firm co-founded by Redskins owner Dan Snyder, has purchased TV production company Dick Clark Productions Inc. (DCP) for 175 million. Amusement park operator Six Flags Inc. (Snyder is Chairman) took a 40% equity stake in the deal. Snyder becomes chairman of DCP. DCP CEO Allen Shapiro stepped down and will be replaced by Terry Bateman, the former chief marketing officer of the Redskins. DCP last changed hands in 2002 when a group of investors including the Canadian pension fund Capital Communications CDPQ and Mosaic Media Group acquired the company for 140 million.
| Read More... |

TVBR observation: DCP could serve a whole host of functions for Red Zone investments-from monetizing the music library to spot production for Six Flags parks and NVR to feature programs for the 'Skins. But hiring CAA means they want to take DCP to bigger and better things. Remember, last year Red Zone invested in a film production company set up by Tom Cruise. DCP just beefs up the resources and talent. Snyder is a very savvy businessman who's growing a sports, amusement and entertainment empire.

Parents claim they're in charge
According to a new Kaiser Family Foundation report, parents are getting much better at controlling the media experience of their children, including broadcast and online material. However, they still think there is too much sex, violence and coarse language making it into the home. 65% closely monitor their children, compared to only 18% who feel they should take a more active role. And compared to a similar survey conducted in 1998, parental concern about what their children are exposed to has dropped significantly. 51% are currently concerned about inappropriate sexual content, compared to 67% before, with similar drops for violence (46% from 62%) and coarse language (41% from 59%). The study suggests that parental comfort levels could easily be increased by stressing the V-chip and other blocking technology. Only 16% of all parents have used it, and 57% still are unaware that it even exists. But of those who do know about it, 46% have used it, and among the user group, 71% have found it to be "very" useful. The study shows that about half of all parents find ratings to be useful, but most do not understand the abbreviations used for TV programming. About a third say they are very concerned about overexposure to advertising among the preteen set, and another 35% are somewhat concerned. About two-thirds of the parents surveyed would favor some government restriction on programming content during early evening hours.

TVBR observation: It is encouraging that most parents say they are taking an active role in monitoring their own children. We find it even more encouraging that there is a great deal of room for educational programs like the late Jack Valenti's TVBoss initiative to make a real impact. There are numerous paths to explore before going engaging in a fool's errand trying to regulate content in First Amendment territory.


Markey puts the heat on food
Ed Markey (D-MA), chair of the influential House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, was swift with his praise of Kellogg Company when it announced its new dietary standards for marketing to preteen children. Now he's calling on five other large corporations to follow suit. Each of them - Coca-Cola Company, General Mills, Kraft Foods, McDonald's and PepsiCo - got a letter. Markey wants each to at a minimum commit to the same standards announced by Kellogg. Markey said, "While parents and families have an undeniable responsibility to steer their children toward healthy choices, the Institute of Medicine has linked the current unhealthy trend toward poor nutrition and childhood obesity in our country to the prevalence of television advertisements for fast food, junk food, sugared cereals, and other foods wholly lacking in nutritional value. If this trend continues, our children could be the first in generations to enjoy shorter life expectancies than their parents. These companies are some of the world's largest food and beverage marketers, and together they have the power to play a significant role in solving the childhood obesity problem through socially responsible advertising practices. I urge them to follow Kellogg's lead." Markey will use his subcommittee to look into this and other media matters this Friday, 6/22/07, in a session entitled "Images Kids See on the Screen." He said his intent is to "...explore the link between TV advertising and childhood obesity, and whether regulatory or legislative solutions are needed to restrict food marketing on television to combat the serious public health issue of childhood obesity."

TVBR observation: Food companies have been trying to head off legislation. At the same time, effective legislation may be tough to write, even given the second-class citizenship generally conferred on commercial speech by the judiciary. This battle figures to continue for some time. Stay tuned.

Diffusion is the name of the game
No one story broke away from the pack during the week of 6/10-15/07, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism, and 23 different stories appeared on at least one individual medium's list, allowing coverage of the immigration debate to rest atop the overall coverage chart. The issue was driven by cable, but cable's coverage was not over the top at 15%. All five gave it at least 8% of the newshole, making it one of only four stories which universally made top ten lists. Palestinian strife knocked out all individual permutations of the ongoing Iraq saga as the lead Mideast story, but Iraq still was dominant if all the threads are added together. The Paris Hilton story was the biggest from the preceding week to fall off the overall top ten list, but if you guessed that it lived a little longer over on the cable channels, then you're getting used to reading this weekly study. Interestingly, a cable story - the end of HBO series "The Sopranos," made the top ten lists for newspaper and radio but not on cable or network TV.
| Top ten lists here |


Ad flights address immigration battle
The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) Congressional Task Force does not want amnesty granted for what it pegs as "10-20M illegal aliens," and has decided to use radio to pressure selected Democrats into voting against any such legislative proposal. Meanwhile, another group is using TV to go after selected senators on the same issue. FAIR is focusing its effort on Democratic members of Congress representing Iowa, Indiana, Ohio, South Carolina and Florida, and is further asking listners to place a call to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to register their opposition to any amnesty plan. Grassfire.org is taking a more bipartisan approach with its effort, targetting senators on both sides of the aisle if they are part of the coalition supporting amnesty, not to mention President George W. Bush himself. The ad shows pictures of six senators from five states, including Ted Kennedy (D-MA), Harry Reid (D-NV), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Trent Lott (R-MS), Jon Kyl (R-AZ) and John McCain (R-AZ). But the ad is initially scheduled to appear in only four of them, with Kennedy's Massachusetts out of the mix.

Market appears to be
flooded with station inventory

Activity begets activity in the M&A world. With demand so heavy in the sales of the New York Times television group, ABC Radio, some surplus stations at CBS Radio and the ongoing sales of stations by Clear Channel (both radio and its entire TV group), other broadcasters have been drawn into the market. Nexstar put its entire television group up for sale, then a few days later LIN Television did the same. Lincoln Financial Group decided to hand out the for sale sign for Lincoln Financial Media, the former Jefferson-Pilot Communications, consisting of both radio and TV stations. Then, just last week, News Corporation put nine of its Fox O&Os on the auction block. Also, now that Citadel has finished its 2.5 billion bucks acquisition of ABC Radio from Disney, broker Elliot Evers is seeking buyers for the 11 Citadel forced divestitures he holds in trust - and the company has indicated it will also prune some non-core markets from its portfolio. Univision's new owners have indicated that they expect to sell about a half-billion in assets, consisting of its record label operation and non-core radio stations. Oh, and by the way, once shareholders approve the pending buyout at Clear Channel, which now seems likely, it will have to divest some no-longer-grandfathered properties in some larger markets, including New York and LA. What all this station inventory has not done is depress prices. Private equity is backing the principal bidders on every big deal. Multiples remain in double digits for anything in a decent market. It is an interesting cycle, with the new private equity players bidding fiercely, while the publicly traded companies are generally have to stay on the sidelines-except, of course, for those who are in the action on the sell side.


Ad Business Report TM

Upfront update: Life is good
It looks like this year's upfront isn't going to be as "protracted" as some predicted. "Life is good," is how Peggy Green, Zenith President/National Broadcast described the marketplace to us, interrupting one of the many meetings she's having this week. Zenith, OMD, GroupM, Initiative and Magna Global are controlling most of the big inventory deals right now with the broadcast networks. NBC is already about 70% percent done with CPM increases of 5%, boosted with the recent deal with GroupM (6/14/07 TVBR #116). Fox is reportedly the first to completely wrap up primetime deals with the major media agencies, raking in a personal record 1.8 billion in primetime alone (at 8% CPM increases); CBS is well past halfway wrapping primetime with most of the big agencies, with 7-8% CPM increases reported. ABC's Sales Chief Mike Shaw is beginning to do deals, reportedly in the 10% CPM increase range for primetime ad inventory. Talks are only beginning with The CW; budgets are starting to flow in for cable and syndication. For cable, Starcom so far closed a deal with 10 Discovery Networks, incorporating Nielsen's Commercial Minute data.

Monica Gadsby on taking the
reins of SMG Multicultural
and the Hispanic media market

Starcom MediaVest Group recently announced the formation of a new unit tasked with oversight of multicultural communication throughout the SMG network. SMG Multicultural is responsible for guiding innovation in SMG's product, driving total holistic integration across platforms and demographics. With SMG Multicultural comes the simultaneous launch of Forty Two Degrees at MediaVest (MV42), the newest multicultural agency in the network. MV42 is based in New York to work in close alignment with MediaVest, focusing consumer programs on Hispanic, African American, Asian and emerging market strategies. SMG has the longest legacy of anyone in our industry in addressing and valuing diverse populations, starting in 1987 with the formation of what eventually became arguable the most successful multicultural agency of its kind. SMG Multicultural is led by Monica Gadsby, a 20-year veteran in multicultural media and trailblazer in the space. As CEO of SMG Multicultural, Gadsby is at the helm of the country's leading multicultural division, which will be comprised of three separate agencies, including a special division of GM Planworks, a newly named New York office, and multicultural agency Tapestry.
| Read More... |

SMG and Microsoft join to identify, target "ad avoiders"
Microsoft Digital Advertising Solutions and Starcom MediaVest Group jointly sponsored a study focusing on reaching the elusive "Ad Avoider" segment. This study, presented yesterday by SMG and Microsoft Digital Advertising Solutions at the Cannes International Ad Festival, says Ad Avoiders are defined as an elusive segment of 17 to 35-year-olds who hold less than favorable attitudes toward media content designed to influence them. The research determined that there are two different kinds of Avoiders: the Ad Averse and the Ad Ambivalent.
| Read More... |


Media Markets & Money TM
DiPasquale leaning toward KC?
The Clear Channel television group is used to looking to San Antonio TX for its corporate direction, but that is expected to change when Sandy DiPasquale takes over for Providence Equity Partners. And it looks like he'll attempt to supress his frequent flier miles by settling on a central location. The prospective location is said to be Kansas City. According to the Kansas City Star, the 1.255B acquisition of the Clear Channel group will instantly vault the company to the #14 slot on the US television group chart. The report also notes that a name change will be in the works. It was acquired under licensee moniker TV Acquisition LLC, but it is likely to be renamed Newport TV. At this point, Newport's presence in KC would be limited to headquarters - Clear Channel did not have a presence there - but Newport is looking to expand, and a Fox Kansas City O&O, WDAF-TV, has just come on the market.


Washington Media Business Report TM
KITZ fits profile of fined company
The FCC has doubled up on KITZ Radio Inc., licensee of KGTK-AM Olympia WA and KITZ-AM Silverdale WA. It seems that when an FCC field agent visited the stations, the licenses and issues/programs lists were absent from the public file. The result was a 4K fine for both stations, for a total of 8K. KITZ claimed that the fine was in error, because the licenses and lists were available at the station, and were promptly placed in the file after the inspection. However, the issues/program material available upon subsequent re-inspection was undated and were found to be inadequate. In the end, the FCC gave KITZ an 800 dollar discount per station for making an good-faith, if incomplete, effort to rectify the situation, and another 800 dollar discount for a past history of compliance, bringing the individual station assessments down to 2.4K for a 4.8K total.


Internet Media Business Report TM
Internet users in France
spend 13% of online time
streaming videos

comScore released a study of video streaming in France. The study showed that 79% of the French online population (age 15 or older who have accessed the Internet from either a home or a work computer) initiated a video stream in April 2007, compared to 76% in the U.S., 80% in the U.K. and 70% in Germany. The study also reported that the average French streaming video viewer initiated 64 streams in April 2007, compared to 80 streams per streamer in the U.K. and 62 streams per streamer in Germany. By comparison the average streamer in the U.S. initiated 65 streams per streamer in April 2007. In France, streamers allocated 13% of their total time online to viewing streaming video. "With almost 8 out of 10 people initiating a stream in France, video streaming is clearly mainstream, with a user base that is comparable to search, email and shopping," stated Delphine Gatignol, business development manager for comScore France. "What is particularly striking is that French Internet users tend to spend a greater proportion of their total time online viewing streaming video compared to the other countries examined in the study." The study also reported on the most popular streaming sites. Of the 1.28 billion streams that were initiated in France in April 2007, 22% or 285.7 million were initiated at Google Sites (which include YouTube.com). The second most popular streaming site for streams was DAILYMOTION with 249.2 million streams initiated in April 2007. Other popular streaming sites included France Telecom with 23.9 million streams, Iliad/Free.fr sites with 17.6 million streams and Microsoft Sites with 5.3 million streams initiated during April 2007.


Ratings & Research
History Channel's Ice Road Truckers
hauls in the numbers

The History Channel series premiere of Ice Road Truckers, which debuted Sunday night at 10pm, hauled in a record number of viewers, making it the number one original telecast in network history, based on Nielsen's Fast Cable Ratings. The show drove in s the network's #1 telecast of all time in Adults 25-54 and is also its #1 telecast ever in Adults 18-49. The series premiere achieved 3.4 million total viewers, the most ever for an original program on The History Channel. Truckers scored an overall Household Rating of 2.6.

Consumers' state of mind: overcast
BIGresearch's June Consumer Intentions & Actions Survey (CIA) says women are least confident in the economy over the next 6 months followed by consumers with incomes below 50,000. Men are most confident. Shopping trips are being impacted by higher gas prices as 41.9% of consumers say they are taking fewer trips and 40.1% are shopping closer to home. Overall 72.9% of the people think gas prices will be higher by July 4th. 77.8% of consumers who have a student loan think gas prices will increase over this time frame and the average price will be $3.39 a gallon. 39.9% of the respondents believe the stock market accurately reflects the strength of the economy and 60.9% said it doesn't. 32.3% of all women respondents plan on decreasing spending over the next 3 months and 32.9% of consumers with incomes over 50,000 said same. Future purchase intentions for durables such as computers, furniture, appliances, home improvements, TV's, digital cameras, and housing all are up from the previous month (May) indicating consumers may have some pent up spending to do in the 3rd and 4th quarter of the year.

Syndi numbers just Wheel along
Another week, another win for Wheel of Fortune. If only Pat Sajak could duplicate this success with his tiny Maryland radio group. You'd think that #2 Judge Judy would just throw him in jail at some point so she can have the top spot for herself.
| View the Chart |


Stock Talk
Winners on a roll
Television stocks had a healthy Tuesday, with some 80% of the stocks being up. On the down side, Belo took a hit of 34 cents; Gannett was down one dollar.


Stocks

Here's how stocks fared on Tuesday

Company Symbol Close Change Company Symbol Close Change

Acme

ACME

4.95

+0.06

Lincoln Natl.

LNC

72.23

+0.03

Belo

BLC

21.52

-0.34

LIN TV

TVL

19.67

+0.09

CBS CI. B CBS

33.47

+0.08

McGraw-Hill

MHP

71.50

+0.42

CBS CI. A CBSa

33.49

+0.11

Media General

MEG

34.49

+0.17

Clear Channel

CCU

38.30

unch

Meredith

MDP

61.66

-0.11

Disney

DIS

34.76

+0.22

News Corp.

NWS

23.67

+0.05

Emmis

EMMS

9.65

-0.05

Nexstar

NXST

14.33

+0.58

Entravision

EVC

10.67

-0.06

Ion Media

ION

1.44

+0.05

Equity Media EMDA 4.25 unch

Saga Commun.

SGA

10.01

+0.01

Fisher

FSCI

50.65

-0.28

SBS

SBSA

4.55

+0.11

Gannett

GCI

56.22

-1.00

Scripps

SSP

45.13

-0.11

Gen. Electric

GE

39.26

+1.19

Sinclair

SBGI

15.12

unch

Google GOOG

514.31

-0.89

SWMX

SWMX

0.10

+0.01

Gray

GTN

9.78

+0.22

Time Warner

TWX

21.25

+0.36

Gray, C1. A

GTNa

9.80

+0.09

Tribune

TRB

30.30

-0.13

Hearst-Argyle

HTV

24.92

+0.22

Wash. Post

WPO

773.70

+1.70

Journal Comm.

JRN

13.36

+0.03

Young

YBTVA

3.75

+0.09


Bounceback

Send Us Your OpinionsWe want to
hear from you.

This is your column, so send your comments and
a photo to tvnews@rbr.com

On Rock.com Internet
royalty story....

Just a comment, fyi, regarding RBR's story about royalties for internet radio. I read a story quoting Steve Newman from Rock.com where he calculated the cost of internet radio and the new proposed royalities. While he is correct in his math I found it interesting that he is paying so much for his bandwidth (1.2 cents per listener/per hour). This is extremely expensive. I personally own an internet station and we pay 0.0036 per listener/per hour--and that's still on the higher side. Newman is part of the Live365 network which is essentially for hobbyists. If he were with a more reasonably priced service the math would work more in his favor. No one with Live365 can seriously expect to earn profit with their bandwidth costs so high. No big deal, really. Just wanted to let you know. I'm glad to see some reporting on this aspect of new radio in your publication.

Scott Lockwood
Lockwood Media


Below the Fold

Ad Business Report
Upfront update: Life is good
It looks like this year's upfront isn't going to be as "Protracted"...

SMG and Microsoft
Join to identify, target "Ad Avoiders" defined as an elusive segment of 17 to 35-year-olds who...

Taking the reins of SMG
Monica Gadsby of SMG Multicultural and the Hispanic media market...

Media Markets & Money
DiPasquale leaning toward KC
when Sandy DiPasquale takes over KC will be the new HQ...


Stations for Sale

Market your Stations For Sale
in our daily epapers.

Contact
June Barnes
jbarnes@rbr.com




More News Headlines

Journal spins newspapers
Multimedia Journal Communications, which owns and operates newspaper, television and radio interests (all three, in fact, in its headquarters market of Milwaukee), is selling a cluster of newspapers in a pair of deals. Hersam Acorn Community Publishing is getting Journal's New England cluster, which includes 11 community papers, two printing facilities and five local shoppers. Journal had been doing business there as Hometown Publications and Trumbull Printing. The properties are in Vermont and Connecticut. Gannett is the buyer in Ohio, getting the eight weekly shoppers and specialty items operating as Central Ohio Advertiser Network, and the Advantage Press printing operation. In an earlier announcement, Journal noted it was selling Louisiana assets to Target Media. The total for all three transactions is about 30M. Journal says the move will allow it to focus on community publications in Wisconsin and Florida.


TVBR Radar 2007
Television News you won't read any where else. TVBR--First, Accurate, and Independently Owned.

Rockefeller comes out
swinging next week
Tuesday next, 6/26/07 at 10AM, is now on the schedule of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. And the topic is bound to bring out the finest oratory the assembled senators can muster: "Impact of Media Violence on Children." We expect to hear some of the details of the upcoming bill from Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV). The FCC issued a hurried report earlier this past spring on the topic, suggesting that Congress was well within its rights to come up with some kind of legislation restricting violent content on the nation's airwaves.

TVBR observation: We fully expect that anything Rockefeller comes up with will follow the Hollings efforts onto the legislative slag heap. The hearing should provide plenty of entertainment - senators and witnesses will be able to indulge in lurid descriptions of all types of mayhem - but they will not have any credible evidence linking broadcast violence directly to real violence, and lacking that, the Constitution will easily prevail over this misguided effort at playing national nanny.
06/19/07 TVBR #119

TNS lowers its expectations; TV Mixed, Internet Hot, Radio Bleeding
Back in January, TNS Media Intelligence was looking for a 2.6% overall gain in US advertising revenues. It no longer thinks that less-than-lofty goal is attainable, and has lowered its prediction to 1.7%. That will be the result of a scant 1.2% gain for the first half of the year, amplified by a 2.3% pick-up in the second half. Feeling the most pain, red-digit pain, will be spot TV (-5.5%), newspapers (-2.9%), BTB magazines (-1.5%) and radio (-0.3%). Internet is the only significant gainer (16%), but other outlets are predicted to do OK, such as cable network (5.9%), outdoor (4.6%), consumer/Sunday magazines (4.5%), and Hispanic media (3.7%). Expected to experience modest gains are network TV (1.3%) and syndicated TV (1.2%).

TVBR observation: What jumps out at you when you see view the percentages. Ah, Internet at 16%. What does that tell you about where to start taking content.
06/19/07 TVBR #119

Mr. Gonzales, tear down this merger
The proposed merger of DARS companies XM and Sirius found another obscure source of support, from an organization called WIPP. You've heard of it? No? That would be Women Impacting Public Policy, who think the merger would be good for small businesses, women and minorities. The loyal opposition to the merger also found voice, in the form of a letter to AG Alberto Gonzales, FCC Chair Kevin Martin and FTC Chair Deborah Platt Majoras, signed by a bipartisan group of no less than 72 US Representatives.

RBR observation: As one source noted, the list of signatories goes all the way from Dennis Hastert (R-IL) to Dennis Kucinich (D-OH). Although weighted toward the Democratic side of the aisle, key Republicans, in particular actual radio operator Greg Walden (R-OR), contributed their John Hancocks from the Republican side. In all, 47 Democrats and 25 Republicans signed the letter. Note that the group did not say "consider the proposal carefully" or "it faces a high hurdle." The group flatly said the proposal should be denied. The statement can't be much stronger than that.
06/19/07 RBR #119

MG needed fresh TV blood
to avoid red ink
Media General (MG) brought in 75.4M in May, up 2.8% over the results from the same month in 2006. However, the upswing was due to the addition of four new NBC affiliates last summer. Take them out of the equation and the ink was red. A triple low in Tampa was also cited as a particular problem as the Tampa Tribune, WFLA-TV and website TBO.com all experienced difficulties.

TVBR observation: Bottom line and many in TV take this as a lesson of old line not moving to keep up with the new times and we are not talking newspaper St. Pete Times. First, the Tampa Tribune has seen an upper management swinging door more than a slamming screen door in a Florida hurricane. The Trib is so thin that even the birds in a cage don't want it. It boils down to Content and Presentation at the Trib as that is their first of many issues. Their website is not consumer friendly. WFLA is an NBC affiliate and at the mercy of the networks programming but that is only one half of MG's problem as their content, as all TV owners have to take a lesson from Nexstar, - Cut your Retran deals and get your network and local programming HD content on all providers. TVBR note: Technology is waiting for no one and for TV operators to get the most from their programming this fall they will have to cut their deals and get HD programming to all suppliers. Consumers are buying the HD screens and the outside HD antenna just does not cut it. Consumers are searching more for HD content and if you snooze you will lose.
06/18/07 TVBR #118

Legislators Wonder
What makes XM/Sirius so Special
The proponents of the XM/Sirius merger found an expert to support the case for allowing the transaction to go through in the person of Thomas Hazlett, who was once the Chief Economist for the FCC. The National Association of Broadcasters, unsurprisingly, takes exception.
06/18/07 RBR #118


Visit MediaHeadHunters.com

Hard finding that key person
to fill the important position at your organization? Media HeadHunters is the place that key media firms use to get results. See Media HeadHunters and get results with service--Period.

Need assistance
contact Cathy Carnegie

Find Your TV Career

Post Your Companies Job Openings


Other Links

Help Desk

__EMAIL__ :
Having problems with our epapers?
Please send Questions/Concerns to:
Memberships@rbr.com

If you wish to remove your name completely from our database use this link __UNSUB__

TVBR Epaper -- 108 annual
or just 9 a month

©2007 Radio Business Report, Inc. All rights reserved.
Television Business Report -- 2050 Old Bridge Road, Suite B-01, Lake Ridge, VA 22192 -- Phone: 703-492-8191