Cable Television

For decades, public access programming on cable television has provided a virtually free forum for community activists and aspiring entertainers, for preening star wannabes as well as serious-minded political watchdogs. But in Los Angeles and across California that forum began crumbling last week, a development that advocates say will strip ordinary citizens of a valuable 1st Amendment platform.

Seen one network, seen 'em all? A big problem is brewing for TV programmers, especially on cable: Too many of them are running shows that resemble the same stuff everyone else is doing. You may say, "Yes, and next you'll break the story of the invention of the cathode-ray tube." Isn't chasing somebody else's hits just the normal behavioral pattern of television executives? Maybe, but look at Sunday nights this spring. E!

Skip E. Lowe was on his way back from the TV studio Wednesday when he learned that his 30-year-old public access show may not fade to black in Los Angeles after all. Across town, City Council members were struggling to keep the plug from being pulled on Los Angeles' public access TV network. New cable company franchise rules threaten to cut off the city's four channels reserved for public, educational and governmental uses.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California has sued Los Alamitos, saying city officials censored programming on a public-access cable TV channel. The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in federal court in Santa Ana, says City Council members violated the 1st Amendment by canceling reruns of two politically oriented shows on LATV-3, a Time-Warner cable channel in Los Alamitos and Rossmoor. Los Alamitos officials disputed the allegations.

Rupert Murdoch has proved naysayers wrong more than once -- and could be in a position to do so again. The News Corp. chairman on Thursday announced the long-awaited launch of a business channel that will compete with CNBC for the small but lucrative audience interested in financial news. The Fox Business Channel, in the works for at least two years, will be overseen by Roger Ailes, the hard-charging Fox executive who helped shape CNBC more than a decade ago.

Verizon Communications Inc. won approval Thursday from state regulators to sell TV service in as many as 45 Southern California cities. The approval by the Public Utilities Commission was the first under the state's new video franchising law, which stripped local governments of their jurisdiction over applications to provide pay-TV service and gave it to the PUC. Verizon plans to disclose in a few weeks which cities it will serve first, said Timothy J.

Robert Jacobson, president and chief executive of In Demand, met with baseball executives Friday to discuss a possible deal for cable to carry the Extra Innings out-of-market pay television package, according to a spokeswoman for In Demand. The meeting came one day after Jacobson said conditions set by baseball made it impossible for the In Demand service to offer the package. A key issue is the Baseball Channel, to be launched in 2009.

Moorpark became the second city this week to demand that Time Warner Cable Inc. comply with customer service standards -- and the first to threaten a fine of as much as $25,000 or more. Exercising its waning local control on the cable TV industry, the City Council late Wednesday initiated a procedure that could result in fines next month for the company's prolonged difficulty in merging pay TV and Internet systems.

One of the nation's largest cable TV networks is suing Walt Disney Co. to force it to end the downloading of such movies as "Cars" and "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest." Starz Entertainment, which owns the Starz and Encore channels, is asking a federal judge in Los Angeles to prevent Disney from selling movies through downloading services such as iTunes during the same period when Starz has the right to show them.

Baseball fans hoping lawmakers would charge in from the bullpen and save their ability to watch out-of-market games didn't get much relief Tuesday. Senators spent two hours urging Major League Baseball and TV executives not to let the Extra Innings pay package land exclusively on DirecTV's satellite system. But despite congressional brush-back pitches -- warnings of legislation and even the oft-repeated threat to review baseball's anti-trust exemption -- MLB President Bob DuPuy didn't flinch.