Daily Marauder

BROADCAST/CABLE

Jeff Bewkes is facing a tough market in his first days as CEO of Time Warner, admits the company’s own Blogging Stocks. However, “this wasn’t his fault since the stock market was so crummy. Wall Street is talking positively about a turnaround at Time Warner.” (http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2008/01/03/jeff-bewkes-first-day-as-time-warner-ceo-negated-by-market 1/3)

Jay Leno’s late-night show on NBC, produced without writers, won more viewers than David Letterman’s scripted show on CBS Wednesday night following two months of reruns. Also: The Writers Guild of America says Leno violated union strike rules by writing his own jokes. (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=atTumkXjvyMY 1/3, http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aKknZ0ohmmlc 1/3)

TVGuide.com is looking to help television fans endure the ongoing Hollywood writers strike by packaging full-length episodes of TV series within a new channel, dubbed the Strike Survival Guide. The new channel will pull content from 55 broadcast, cable and video Web sites. (http://www.adweek.com/aw/iq_interactive/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003691310 1/3)

For the first time, commercial-free Disney Channel beat all the ad-supported cable networks in primetime in 2007, averaging 2.694 million total viewers. Disney Channel, boosted by “High School Musical 2,” delivered more average viewers than any other first-place network in cable TV history. (http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117978395.html?categoryid=1275&cs=1 1/3)

Nickelodeon says it has no plans to pull the February debut of the fourth season of “Zoey 101,” despite the controversial real-life pregnancy of its 16-year-old star, Jamie Lynn Spears. Episodes of the show continue to average 2 million viewers since news of Spears’s pregnancy. (http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6516799.html 1/3)

NOTE: This is in opposition to yesterday’s post citing the UK Sun as a source.

Fresh off his victory in the Iowa caucuses, presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., will help BET kick off a series of political interviews Tuesday titled “What’s In It for Us?” The second installment of the series comes Jan. 15, when BET interviews Obama opponent New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. (Multichannel News 1/3)

Premium movie channel, Starz InBlack will begin a new hour-long live concert series, Hip Hop: Raw & Uncut starting tonight at 10p. Shot live in South Beach Miami the concert series will spotlight current and up-and-coming hip hop artists.

ABC and Harpo Productions revealed the cast for the new competition series Oprah’s Big Give debuting March 2 at 9p. Hosting will be Nate Berkus, interior designer and frequent contributor to The Oprah Winfrey Show and O, The Oprah Magazine. Judges will include chef and philanthropist Jamie Oliver, NFL player and Boys & Girls Club Hall of Famer Tony Gonzalez and wife of Chris Rock and charity founder Malaak Compton-Rock.

News Corp.’s fledgling Fox Business Network averaged 8,000 viewers in its first eight weeks on the air. Rival CNBC, in the same period, averaged 265,000 viewers. “That’s not very good,” says SNL Kagan analyst Derek Baine. “That doesn’t sound very exciting to me.” (http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-fri_phil_0104jan04,0,7781538.column 1/4)

NBC Universal will be the first-ever “pure content company” to present at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. NBC is also the official broadcast partner, with two studios for live broadcasts that will attract stars like Brian Williams and Donny Deutsch. (http://www.webpronews.com/blogtalk/2008/01/03/nbc-universals-pure-content-company-at-ces 1/3)

CBS is taking over the business operations of its college sports cable network, CSTV, which it bought in 2005, with the aim of creating a business model similar to Disney’s ABC and ESPN networks. The move will allow CBS to sell advertising across multiple platforms, including the Internet. (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=ayeLwEOTnkDs 1/3)

Despite the increasing popularity of online video and on-demand services, DVR penetration in U.S. television households will continue to expand, nearly doubling over the next five years, according to a new report from market-analysis firm JupiterResearch. ContentAgenda.com (1/3)

After falling 35% last year, shares of Comcast are already off an additional 5% so far in 2008 — and the year is only a few days old. The U.S. cable giant will see “competitive threats to its business intensify in 2008,” according to Pali Research analyst Richard Greenfield. (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/features/columns/street_talk/e3i5d4ee6c1f9636327f5f9896f09b168c3 1/4)