Filed under: BROADCAST/CABLE | Tags: Barack Obama, Dirty Sexy Money, Knight Rider, Television, Television program, Universal Media Studios, Warner Bros., Warner Bros. Television
ABC announced the fifth season premiere of Lost will open January 21 at 9p with two back-to-back episodes preceded by a Lost recap show airing at 8p. For this new season, Lost can be found on Wednesdays at 9p where Private Practice currently resides, instead of Thursdays at 10p. ABC has not said where Private Practice will relocate, although the network just granted the medical drama a full-season order. ABC is expected to make more changes to its Wednesday primetime schedule as Pushing Daisies at 8p and Dirty Sexy Money at 10p have both underperformed in their time periods thus far this season. (Cynopsis 11/10)
NBC continues to resuscitate the drama Life as the network gave Universal Media Studios approval on the back nine episodes giving the series a full-season order. Recently, Life was moved off of Friday nights to Wednesdays at 9p where last week it averaged a 2.0/5 and 5.9 million viewers among A18-49, doing better than its lead-in show Knight Rider which posted a 1.6/4 and 5.1 million viewers with A18-49. (Cynopsis 11/10)
The CW and Warner Bros. Television halted plans to further develop The Graysons, a put pilot commitment granted in early October about the life of Dick “DJ” Grayson aka Robin before he became Batman’s sidekick, reports Variety. Apparently, Jeff Robinov, President of Warner Bros. Pictures Group decided against the project, even though The CW was hoping it would replace Smallville once that series ends. According to studio executives, Warner Bros. Television has other show replacement options in the works for The CW. (Cynopsis 11/10)
Barack Obama wasn’t the only big winner on Election Night: Cable news channels attracted 79 million viewers Nov. 4, compared with 59 million in 2004, according to Nielsen. CNN was the No. 1 cable net that night, with 13.1 million, just 100,000 viewers behind overall TV winner ABC and a good deal ahead of CBS and its 7.8 million. Advertising Age (11/10)
Despite the fragile economy, Discovery Communications remains optimistic about advertising revenue through the fourth quarter. Late last week, the cable programmer said that ad revenue was up 4.6% year-over-year in the third quarter and that profit was $134 million on overall revenue of $845 million. The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) (11/8)
DirecTV reported slowing subscriber growth during Q3 adding 156,000 net households compared to 240,000 a year earlier when the company’s reselling arrangement with AT&T was still in place. DirecTV’s total subscribers reached 17.32 million overall. U.S. revenues increased 11% to $4.32 billion due to strong Ave. Revenue Per Unit (ARPU) growth and the larger subscriber base as more subscribers took advanced services. (Cynopsis 11/10)
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Filed under: ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA | Tags: Comedy Central, Google, Microsoft, Search, Steve Ballmer, Television, Yahoo, YouTube
ONLINE SERVICES/INTERACTIVE MEDIA
One of the few publicly traded pure-play Web video companies is blinkx
, which trades on the London stock exchange, and just announced its half-year earnings for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2008. The company’s revenues rose 115 percent to $6.4 million for the six month period (although the comparison is only partial—see income statement below). It’s gross profit doubled from $2.2 million to $4.5 million. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/11/10/blinkx-boosts-revenues-115-percent-but-is-still-losing-money 11/10)
Yahoo‘s share price took a beating on Friday closing under $12/share after Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer spurned advances made earlier in the week by Yahoo Chief Executive Jerry Yang. After initially rejecting an offer of $33/share from Microsoft, Yahoo’s CEO made it clear he was now open to an acquisition. Mr. Yang made the comments on the same day Google walked away from its planned search alliance with Yahoo, that was expected to have generated hundreds of millions in new revenue for the company. (Cynopsis 11/10)
Hitwise has NBC as the #1 ad supported broadcast network site for the fourth straight week with Deal or No Deal and Heroes as the top two ranked show sites. NBC’s 30 Rock also cracked the top ten for the first time. Meanwhile SciFi’s Ghost Hunters, which recently launched its own YouTube page, was the #1 ranked TV show website among adult oriented cable networks this past week, followed by Comedy Central’s South Park and The Daily Show. Five of the top 10 cable show sites were politically focused. (Cynopsis 11/10)
Top Visited US Top Visited US Broadcast Network TV Sites (Week ending Nov. 1, 2008)
Rank Network Website Market Share of Visits
1 NBC www.nbc.com 30.65%
2 ABC www.abc.com 25.93%
3 CBS www.cbs.com 20.39%
4 FOX* www.fox.com 14.22%
5 The CW www.cwtv.com 8.38%
6 MNTV www.mynetworktv.com .42%
Source: Custom report from Hitwise, *includes traffic aggregated from stand alone websites americanidol.com, amw.com, familyguy.com, thelot.com and thesimpsons.com.
Top Visited US Broadcast Network TV Show Sites (Week ending Nov. 1, 2008)
Rank Network Website Market Share of Visits
1 NBC Deal or No Deal 7.65%
2 NBC Heroes 5.90%
3 ABC Dancing With The Stars 5.71%
4 FOX America’s Most Wanted 5.40%
5 NBC The Office 4.36%
6 CBS Survivor 3.71%
7 FOX American Idol 3.21%
8 NBC The Biggest Loser 3.08%
9 NBC America’s Toughest Jobs 2.73%
10 NBC 30 Rock 2.56%
Source: Custom report from Hitwise
Top Visited US Cable Network TV Show Sites -Excluding Children’s Programming (Week ending Nov.1, 2008)
Rank Network Website Market Share of Visits
1 SciFi Ghost Hunters 8.85%
2 Comedy Central South Park 7.42%
3 Comedy Central The Daily Show 5.54%
4 Fox News O’Reilly Factor 4.87%
5 Fox News Hannity & Colmes 3.41%
6 BET 106 & Park 3.06%
7 MTV The Hills 2.87%
8 CNN Lou Dobbs Tonight 2.65%
9 MSNBC Countdown with Keith O. 1.99%
10 SciFi Eureka 1.80%
Source: Custom report from Hitwise
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Filed under: WIRELESS | Tags: Android, Apple, Blackberry, Google, iPhone, Mobile phone, Motorola, NPD Group
Last quarter, mobile phone sales in the U.S. dropped 15 percent to 32 million units, according to market research firm NPD Group. But in hard times, the strongest brands also take share. And that is exactly what Apple did. The 6.9 million iPhones it sold last quarter catapulted the $200 device into the top spot among all cell phones, even beating out the much cheaper and still-popular Motorola Razr. (http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2008/11/10/the-iphone-is-now-the-best-selling-phone-in-the-us 11/10)
Nokia’s Vertu unit will issue three more models of its sleek Ferrari-branded handsets, the ultra-high-end line whose designs and materials are inspired by the famous sports car: Vertu puts the same leather and stitching on the phones that are in the cars. “The new Vertu Ascent Ti Ferrari editions are the definitive automotive-inspired handsets — bold, balanced and with the unmistakable character of the Prancing Horse,” said Frank Nuovo, chief of design for Vertu. cellular-news (U.K.) (11/9)
When it comes to charging for mobile apps, payments usually have to go through either the carriers or one of the emerging mobile app platforms such as Apple or Google’s Android. The problem with charging for an iPhone app through iTunes is that Apple takes 30 percent. A startup called Billing Revolution wants to charge about one tenth as much for a seamless, mobile one-click shopping experience. Already available on other phones, Billing Revolution is announcing availability today for iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android apps. (http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2008/11/10/billing-revolution-brings-one-click-payments-to-iphone-blackberry-and-iphone-apps 11/10)
Following American Airlines’ launch of Wi-Fi service on long-haul flights, Delta Air Lines plans to offer “the most extensive Wi-Fi network in the sky” beginning next year. Delta will roll out Aircell’s Gogo Inflight Internet in both first-class and economy cabins on hundreds of aircraft. Air Canada also plans to add the service on U.S. routes starting in the spring. FoxNews.com/LiveScience (11/5)
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Filed under: TECHNOLOGY | Tags: Best Buy, Blu-ray Disc, Chapter 11 Title 11 United States Code, Consumer electronics, Digital Theater System, Dolby TrueHD, Goldman Sachs, Wal-Mart
TECHNOLOGY
Circuit City filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection from its more than 100,000 creditors today, but gave no indication as to the company’s future other than that it expects to continue to operate during the proceedings. The second-largest CE retailer in the U.S. suffered from a tighter credit market, and a downturn in consumer spending on big-ticket items as well as losing market share to rival Best Buy and discounters such as Wal-Mart. The Wall Street Journal (11/10) , Reuters (11/10)
Panasonic is set to become an even bigger giant in consumer electronics agreeing to buy smaller rival Sanyo Electric for a projected $4.5 billion. Sanyo, purchased by Goldman Sachs, Daiwa Securities SMBC and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking in 2006 for $2.5 billion, is valued for its expertise in rechargeable batteries and solar panels – two of the biggest growth areas in the electronics industry. (Cynopsis 11/10)
Pioneer late last week introduced the LX01BD, a home-theater system that features a Profile 1.1 Blu-ray disc player and 1080p resolution. Available in the U.K. this week, the LX01BD is compatible with the latest DTS-HD and Dolby TrueHD surround-sound formats. Electronista (11/7
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