December 2009

In contrast to Comcast and NBC, which see great thing ahead for cable networks, TiVo CEO Tom Rogers -- who used to run cable channels at NBC -- says he sees "a train wreck coming for the broadcast and cable industry on the advertising front." The reason: paying attention to 30-second ads that interrupt shows "is not the way people elect to watch television" when they have a digital video recorder. As you might expect, Rogers told Wall Street analysts on Monday that he has a solution: Companies can advertise on TiVo, and make ad campaigns more effective by tapping the massive amount of data that the DVR pioneer collects to show what people watch as well as what they buy.

The pitched battle over whether radio broadcasters should compensate performers for airing their recordings is set to extend well into 2010, government and industry sources said, because congressionally brokered negotiations have so far failed to result in a breakthrough. At issue is an exemption in copyright law that shelters radio stations from paying royalties to artists for playing their songs on AM and FM radio stations. Groups such as the Recording Industry Association of America and Music First Coalition contend stations should pay for music that attracts listeners and advertisers. Broadcasters counter that musicians benefit considerably from the free promotion they receive when their songs are played on the radio and note they already pay royalties to composers and songwriters.

The government health IT community is on schedule to release a raft of health IT policies over the next few months that aim to substantially remake the healthcare delivery system, according to a summary of impending business published by the Department of Health and Human Services. HHS outlined a timetable for the regulations, ranging from milestones for standards and certification to rules governing electronic inserts for drug products. According to the agenda, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services may start making Medicare incentive payments to hospitals under the federal health IT stimulus plan on Oct. 1, 2010, the first day of the 2011 federal fiscal year; physicians who qualify will have to wait until Jan. 1, 2011. In addition to some of the more well-known health IT rules promised under the HITECH Act, including a proposed rule defining meaningful use of health IT expected this month.

Digital media business models are improving for big, traditional media companies as they learn to adapt, but they are still nowhere near the golden days of analog media, and may never be again, Jeff Zucker, CEO of NBC Universal said Monday during an annual briefing to Wall Street analysts and journalists. "I think we're making progress," Zucker said during Monday's session of UBS' Media Week conference in New York, amending what was perhaps his most famous quote of the past couple of years: that new digital media models are converting "analog dollars into digital dimes" for companies like NBC U.