THE FCC has approved a dual must carry regulation. Cable operators will be required to carry both digital and analog channels of certain local stations for three years following the shutdown of the analog TV signal, which occurs on February 17, 2009. The regulation is considerably less onerous than Chairman Kevin Martin’s push for perpetual must carry.
TV ADS SALES fell 2.4% in the first half of 2007. Network TV dropped 3.6%, and local TV was down 5.4%. Cable TV advertising, however, was up 2.8%. The overall decline was caused by some of the top advertisers reducing spending. General Motors cut back by over 25%.
NICKELODEON‘s “iCarly” showed early signs of success for its unique mix of plotted story-lines and user-generated content. During its premiere on September 8th, the show drew 3.5 million viewers. Online, TurboNick fed 721,000 streams of the show during the opening weekend, and kids uploaded over 2,000 videos to the iCarly.com site.
NEWS CORP. will continue to offer its shows on iTunes, according to President and COO Peter Chernin. During an interview on Tuesday, just days after NBC Universal decided not to renew its iTunes contract, Chernin spoke positively of News Corp.’s relationship with Apple. However, he made it clear that pricing is a concern, saying “…we’re the ones who should determine what the fair price for our product is, not Apple.”
VIACOM will merge iFilm.com into Spike.com, in an attempt to consolidate content tailored to young men. iFilm was acquired in 2005, before YouTube took the web by storm, and was once a top destination for online video. The new site will offer Spike programming, as well as content from Comedy Central and MTV.
YAHOO will announce a deal with BEBO to sell a majority of the social-networking site’s display advertising. Bebo is the top networking site in England. Working together, the two companies expect to reach 75 percent of the UK’s online audience.