Programmer

One week into the fall TV season, a strange and unsettling mood is creeping over network programmers. It's called optimism. Dark clouds still linger over the broadcast industry, but surprisingly strong numbers for such new shows as ABC's comedy "Modern Family" and CBS' "NCIS: Los Angeles" and "The Good Wife" have executives hoping that their long-beleaguered prime-time schedules are finally on the rebound. "Despite all the naysayers, it seems like we still have a viable business here," CBS scheduling chief Kelly Kahl said in an interview Friday.

A battle royal is brewing in the least likely of places. Four shows with established audiences -- "Dollhouse," "Ugly Betty," "Medium" and "Southland" -- will face off Fridays at 9 p.m. this fall. Could the night where shows go to die reemerge as a day for appointment television? Last year, when Fox decided to launch "Dollhouse" on Fridays, panic set in among fans of series creator Joss Whedon. "It's 'Firefly' all over again!" wrote one worried observer on the website Whedonesque.

Working quickly to promote from within, the Sundance Institute on Tuesday named veteran festival programmer John Cooper the new director of the Sundance Film Festival. The announcement came just three weeks after Geoffrey Gilmore left the post to become chief creative officer for Robert De Niro's media company, Tribeca Enterprises. Cooper, who has worked in various capacities at Sundance for the last 20 festivals, became its lead film programmer in 2002.

There was punk aplenty at Saturday's opening show of KROQ-FM's two-night Almost Acoustic Christmas bill at Gibson Amphitheatre. The lineup was dominated by the 200 mph music, from headliner the Offspring down through Chicago's Rise Against and Southern California's own AFI and Slightly Stoopid.

MTV Films honcho Loretha Jones and veteran Black Entertainment Television executive Stephen Hill will share the title of president of programming for BET, the network said Thursday. Both Jones and Hill will report to BET Chairman and Chief Executive Debra L. Lee. The appointments are effective immediately. The two succeed former President of Entertainment Reginald Hudlin, who left BET in September after three years. Jones, who was executive vice president of MTV Films and a former creative partner of filmmaker Robert Townsend, will oversee original programming, news, development, planning and acquisitions, while Hill, who was previously executive vice president of music programming and talent for the network, will oversee all music programming and specials.

Joseph Weizenbaum, a computer programmer who invented the natural-language-understanding program known as ELIZA and later grew skeptical of artificial intelligence, has died, his family said Thursday. He was 85. Weizenbaum died March 5 of complications from stomach cancer at the home of his daughter in Groeben, Germany, outside Berlin, said Miriam Weizenbaum, one of his four daughters.

The two business partners boarded the 23-foot sailboat in Dana Point on Saturday evening, authorities said, supposedly heading to San Clemente Island to seal a lucrative deal with a mysterious government agency. When the beat-up boat returned to shore in Long Beach on Tuesday, only one of the partners was on board.

Maram frets that she's fat. Tony says men don't care how they look. Shahd thinks nose jobs are fine. It may sound like usual talk-show blather until you consider that the three commentators are preteen children. And something far more unusual for Israeli television: They are Arabs.

JOEY is executive chef at New York's tony Cafe des Artistes. Josh is a former Marine with a couple of years of culinary training. Julia works at a Waffle House. Five years ago, if these contestants from "Top Chef," "The Next Food Network Star" and "Hell's Kitchen," respectively, wanted to get ahead in their chosen field, they would have labored hard, got to work on time, maybe brown-nosed a bit. Also, cooking -- they maybe would have gotten better at cooking. No more.