360AM: Cablevision Rewinds Network DVR Suit
360AM — Morning news briefing for Tuesday, Apr. 10 (Updated: 8pm ET)
Cablevision is appealing a federal court ruling on Mar. 22 that prohibited its remote-storage DVR plan. The company is also seeking an expedited review of the case. Last month, Judge Denny Chin of the New York District court in Manhattan sided with studios and TV networks suing the operator for its planned service by upholding a copyright lawsuit filed by Fox, CBS Paramount, Disney/ABC, NBC Universal and Time Warner. Cablevision’s appeal argues that its RS-DVR "is permissible under current copyright law … [and offers] significant benefits to consumers, including lower costs and faster deployment." [Release | Variety | Hollywood Reporter | Bloomberg | AP]
• PROGRAMMING
A&E‘s Dog the Bounty Hunter returns tonight; Duane "Dog" Chapman discusses Andrew Luster case with the New York Post. Other cable network premieres tonight: MTV begins the final season of Punk’d and Scarred, which the New York Observer writes is based on unpaid unknowns discovered breaking limbs on YouTube. Also, Roseanne Barr hosts Nick at Nite‘s Funniest Mom in America 3.
ABC to air Fast Cars and Superstars: Gillette Young Guns Celebrity Race, a competition series starting June 7 about NASCAR drivers sponsored by Gillette, which is producing the show with @Radical Media (whose other TV work includes VOD channel DriverTV and AMC‘s Mad Men series). Other marketers are looking at both sponsoring and creating TV shows. [USA Today]
Bravo orders Take My Ex, a Henny Youngman-esque reality series, ahead of its upfront preview tomorrow in New York [Hollywood Reporter]. New York Post critic Linda Stasi calls Bravo’s next reality series, tomorrow’s Shear Genius, a "dis-tress call."
CNN signed ING Direct and GlaxoSmithKline to sponsor week-long tribute to Larry King‘s 50 years in broadcasting, which kicks off Monday.
Discovery layoffs yesterday covered widely today, including in Variety.
E! launched Yo on E!, a live daily call-in talk show on Sirius hosted by Miami DJ Michael Yo. [Release]
Food Network brings back The Next Food Network Star on-air talent search June 3. [Release]
Fox News Channel‘s Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld (which starts at 2am) is profiled in today’s New York Times. FNC’s Democratic debate planned for Sept. 23 in Detroit lost two more candidates yesterday when Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton indicated they won’t participate, joining John Edwards’s boycott. [AP] Bill Hemmer scooped his former colleagues at CNN this week by breaking the British soldiers’ return story. [Cincinnati Post]
Fox Soccer Channel nabbed English-language TV rights to United Soccer League games, including select Friday night First Division matches and all USL championship games through ’09. The deal includes broadband and mobile rights.
Baseball overload leads to FSN Plus2, an overflow channel for FSN‘s FSN Plus overflow channel. [San Jose Mercury News] However, not all markets have room to add FSN’s extra channels. [Midland Daily News, MI]
HBO offers Spike Lee’s post-Katrina doc free to schools through a Rockefeller Foundation grant. [Release] Sunday night’s (April 8) return of The Sopranos notched 7.7 million viewers, down from the 9.5 million viewers for the Mar. 12 premiere of the first half of this final season. About 3.8 million viewers stuck around or tuned in for Sunday night’s return of Entourage. Besides it being Easter Sunday, HBO prefers to add its On Demand viewing figures from the week following a premiere as a more accurate picture of how a series’ premiere performed.
In Demand recovers from MLB-induced Extra Innings’ exhaustion to announce two new pay-per-view events: Carmen Electra’s Naked Women’s Wrestling League, which premieres tomorrow night, and Fat Joe Live at the House of Blues, a concert that premieres June 8.
MSNBC and CBS joint two-week suspension of Don Imus starting Monday prompts Rutgers women’s basketball team to arrange in-person apology "in the near future" with the disgraced talk show host [Bloomberg | AP]. Sen. John McCain supported Imus today, saying "I’m a great believer in redemption." [AP]
MTV Networks taps Yahoo‘s "Panama" as exclusive sponsored search and contextual ad partner across its websites—and not just because it was a Van Halen song. [Release]
NBC will air Al Gore’s Live Earth concert on 7/7/07 with simulcast online at LiveEarth.MSN.com. [Release]
NFL Network involved in lawsuit filed by family of John Facenda, the deceased NFL Films’ narrator whose audio was used in an hour-long infomercial touting the Madden 2006 videogame. [Bloomberg]
Si TV taps Soapbox Mobile for wireless marketing. [Release]
Sundance Channel plugs Donald Trump et al with Comb-Over: The Movie, airing Monday Apr. 16.
Versus announced its NHL schedule of up to 52 playoff games as well as the first two games of the Stanley Cup Final; playoffs begin tomorrow. Its nightly highlights recap will be available on VOD the morning after while its broadband channel, The Player, will feature highlights and a fantasy game. The NHL’s website has launched NHL Connect, a network of celeb bloggers including Islanders fan Christie Brinkley commenting on the playoffs.
VH1 adds another Brady—Maureen "Marcia" McCormick—to its celebreality ranks with debut of Celebrity Fit Club 5 on Apr. 22. [NWI Times]
• COMPANY NEWS
Comcast opens a call center in Colorado Springs. Comcast CEO Brian Roberts’ brother-in-law Anthony Clifton, who once worked in finance for the company, is shopping his Philadelphia Weekly magazine to prospective buyers. [Philadephia City Paper]
Amp’d Mobile (whose investors include MTV) almost doubled its subscribers in the 1st quarter. [Release]
Apple TV ads broke yesterday; click here for version on Google Video.
DirecTV‘s HD expansion boosts vendor Radyne Corp. with $6.7 million in orders. [Release]
Ensequence completed its $40 million Series C funding round. The interactive TV company powers Major League Baseball’s MLB.tv Mosaic and video apps for Disney, MTV, Nick, TV Guide among others. [Release]
Entropic Communications acquired RF Magic. [Release]
Facebook founder, 22 year-old Mark Zuckerman, profiled in Fast Company.
GE Commercial Finance adds entertainment to its media and communications business. [Release]
MySpace launches Trailer Park, a screening room for upcoming movie trailers from Lionsgate and others.
Widevine supports open digital rights management ("the Switzerland of DRM") for Adobe Flash videos, preventing copying to protect content owners and their online advertisers. [Release | NewTeeVee]
• IN OTHER NEWS
Former FCC chairman Reed Hundt joins group venture capitalists and tech investors vying for rights in radio spectrum auction. [San Jose Business Journal]
TV hucksters scam an estimated $20 million from DirecTV and Dish Network viewers with rigged art auctions. [SF Chronicle]
One of Canada’s largest pension funds is in talks with other investors tomount a $45 billion takeover bid for the parent company of Bell Canada in what would be the largest buyout in history. [New York Times]
Los Angeles Times scribe discovers TiVo‘s 30-second skip button and TV joy. [LA Times]
Gamers rejoice: Halo 3 hits Xbox Live on May 13 [Release] as big media companies look to videogames to lure younger audiences [CNN Money].
U.S. officials filed two new piracy complaints against China at the World Trade Organization over copyright policy and restrictions on the sale of American movies, music and books. [AP]
MarthaStewart.com relaunches today with video, community features and other good things.
