May 2008

Television continues to dominate the media usage habits of Americans, topping the Internet, magazines, newspapers, and radio on a number of important measures, according to new results of a Nielsen Media Research survey commissioned by TVB. Results include: 1) Significantly more adults named broadcast television as their primary news source (39.6% name broadcast TV, 19.0% name cable new networks, 13.1 name the Internet, 11.3% name newspapers, 11.1% name radio, and 5.7% name public television). 2) Broadcast television is adults’ first source for local weather, traffic or sports, with 52.7% of adults citing broadcast TV, over 22.5% for the Internet, 9.9% for cable news networks, 6.4% for radio, 3.8% for newspapers, and 4.8% for public TV. 3) When asked to cite which medium was the most involved in their community, 57.8% say broadcast television,as opposed to 24.0% for newspapers, 6.6% for radio, 5.4% for cable news networks, 5.1% for public television, and 1.1% for the Internet. 4) 38.1% of adults 25-54 said they had visited a local broadcast TV station Web site in the past 30 days. 5) 37.7% of station Web site visitors said they had viewed video content while on the site.
http://www.tvnewsday.com/articles/2008/05/07/daily.15/

Rupert Murdoch: “no, I don’t think Cablevision will prevail; just be patient for a couple days.” Several weeks ago it appeared that News Corporation had a tentative deal to buy Newsday, based on Long Island, for about $580 million, but two other bidders have come forward. Mortimer B. Zuckerman, the owner of The Daily News, matched Murdoch’s offer, while Cablevision, the Long Island cable operator that also owns Madison Square Garden and the New York Knicks and Rangers, was a late entrant but upped the ante to $650 million. Murdoch has set his sights on Newsday because he sees it as a way to eliminate losses at The New York Post, a News Corporation property that loses an estimated $50 million a year. By combining Newsday and The Post, the company believes it could earn about $50 million a year in profit. urdoch said Wednesday that the company was taking separate steps to stem losses at The Post. He said the paper would raise its cover price within the next two weeks to 50 cents, from a quarter. Other initiatives could save the paper roughly $20 million a year, Murdoch said. Raising the price is risky, given that last year an increase to 50 cents was quickly reversed as sales suffered. The LA Times also reports that News Corp. executives worked Wednesday to bolster investor confidence for MySpace, the online social network it won praise for buying in 2005 but lately has attracted concern from Wall Street.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/08/business/media/08news.html?ref=todaysp...
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Sirius Satellite Radio (SIRI) Chief Executive Mel Karmazin is willing to play ball with the government on possible conditions placed on his planned merger with XM Satellite Radio. He has said he'll hold prices steady, for example, to allay concerns the deal would hurt consumers in the pocketbook. But Karmazin may cry foul over a slew of other restrictions that the Federal Communications Commission is under growing pressure to impose before it gives a green light to the proposed combination. Legislators want the FCC to force XM and Sirius to allow their satellite radio service on all manner of consumer electronics -- not just the devices made by manufacturers that have exclusive licensing agreements. The upshot would be devices that carry satellite radio alongside HD radio, Internet stations, and other competing sources of music. FCC officials are also being lobbied to require XM and Sirius to give up some of their channels for use by public radio or minority-owned broadcasters. The tougher the restrictions imposed by the government, the harder it will be for the companies to eke out the cost savings and revenue increases of as much as $6 billion that analysts estimate the deal will provide. Also, on May 6, Senior House Commerce Committee member Bobby Rush (D-IL) wrote FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, disavowing a letter about the XM/Sirius merger he had co-signed to Martin only the day before. In the original letter, on which Rep Rush teamed with Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-NY), they had "fully supported" the voluntary commitment of XM and Sirius to carve out eight channels, four apiece, for minority owners. Rep Rush says that he and Rep Towns had a "miscommunication," and that while he certainly advocates setting aside channels for minority ownership -- both he and Towns are African American -- he says eight channels aren't nearly enough.
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2008/tc2008057_605379....

[Commentary] Typical broadband speeds in the United States are barely in the top 15 globally, trailing such technological hotbeds as Luxembourg and Norway. DSL and cable modem services are unavailable in many rural areas, leading to far lower broadband use in the country than the city. And even in the city, consumers often have only two choices of provider -- the dominant local phone company or the local cable monopoly. On Wednesday, prospects brightened for a new national broadband service that would increase competition, drive innovation and improve service. Slumping telco Sprint Nextel, which holds a trove of valuable airwaves, announced that it was joining forces with Intel, Google and several other companies to build a broadband network based on WiMax, a long-range version of the popular WiFi technology. With Sprint and Clearwire combining their airwaves, and their partners ponying up $3.2 billion, the venture probably has what it takes to field a WiMax offering across a large swath of the country. If it lives up to its potential, it will be a true alternative to today's broadband duopoly -- and a mobile one at that. With some luck, it might even speed other wireless phone companies to upgrade their networks and join the scrum.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-ed-sprint8-2008may08...
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