Game Show

Imagine you own the corner hardware store and wake up to discover major supermarkets are all suddenly making a big deal about carrying hardware. "New and improved hardware!" "Biggest selection ever!" "Hardware like you've never seen it before!" Such would seem to be the fate of the Game Show Network, an unobtrusive cable channel available in a little more than a quarter of the 100 million U.S. homes that have television.

Adam Davis will not throw a pitch for The Master's College baseball team until the season begins in February, but the freshman from Visalia already has proven he is a money player. Last week, Davis won $2,000, a $1,150 necklace, a food processor and an iron as a contestant on the television game show "The Price Is Right." Davis was randomly selected from a studio audience that included a group of 40 Master's students.

Dick Clark Productions Inc., Burbank, says it will produce a new game show for Fox Television Network called "Greed," described as a question and answer format show related to pop culture. The company produces television programs for cable and broadcast networks, live events, meetings and marketing programs for corporations.

A former deputy sheriff who became the biggest winner in the history of NBC's "Super Password" game show was sentenced Monday to five years in prison for staging an elaborate hoax in which he faked his wife's death to collect on a $100,000 insurance policy. Kerry Dee Ketchum, labeled by prosecutors as a con artist who unleashed "a virtual tornado of deception" before his arrest in Los Angeles, was also ordered to pay restitution to the insurance company.

Art Fleming, the original host of television's "Jeopardy!," died at home Tuesday of pancreatic cancer. He was 70. Fleming was found to have the disease just two weeks ago, said his lawyer, Steve Hurm. "We're all stunned," said Merv Griffin, creator of "Jeopardy!" and now its executive producer. "He was a great fellow. Art was the first 11 years of the success of 'Jeopardy!'

"I want my MTV royalties," says a 39-year-old man who claims in a federal lawsuit that the music television network stole his copyrighted idea for a rock 'n' roll game show. Mark Winik, who runs a printing supply company, is suing MTV and its parent company, Viacom Inc., over the network's 3-year-old game show "Remote Control" and a show that debuted this year called "Turn It Up." The lawsuit, filed this week in U.S.

If contestants on TV game shows can win cash and prizes, why not offer the same incentive to game show players on the Web? That's the idea behind IWin.com, an Internet game show site that's launching today. Founded by software developer Fred Krueger and former E! Entertainment Television marketing veteran Dale Hopkins, Santa Monica-based IWin.com is betting that the lure of prizes--such as the chance to be a roadie for a KISS concert--will keep Web surfers glued to the site.

A million-dollar cash prize? Any game show producer can hand out one of those. How about a trip into space? That's what a Russian TV station, Channel One, will offer after paying millions of dollars to reserve a spot with the cash-strapped Russian space agency, BBC News reports. The winner will get a seat on a flight to the International Space Station late next year. The only requirements will be that the contestants are in good health and can speak English. -- Lee Margulies