|
Television
With No Borders / We Preserve The Moment /
TVI Magazine is not responsible for the content of
external InterNet sites
FISHRGAME
_____________
Feature
Stories -
012005-01
PEOPLE IMAGES
CONVERGE WITH BUSINESS
2005
-----Call them
"Desperate Moguls," as in desperate to polish their
legacies in Hollywood before it's too
late.
-----Ex-agent Michael
Ovitz spent the latter part of 2004 on a Delaware
witness stand, attempting to restore a reputation
damaged eight years ago while serving as president
of Walt Disney Co. Disney Chief Executive Michael
Eisner, meanwhile, tried for much of the year to
solidify his standing after angry shareholders
demanded his exit come sooner than
Tomorrowland.
-----Nor were they the
only ones in Hollywood who found their images in
need of a little buffing, given the lowlights of
the last 12
months:
-----Makes
those Pepsi ads look like a bargain
…
-----The FCC's proposed
$550,000 indecency fine against CBS for Janet
Jackson's breast-baring incident at the Super Bowl
halftime show works out to $183,333.33 for every
second of
exposure.
---_Sounds
more like Cheap Trick
-----
After Avril Lavigne's record
label paid a Nashville radio station to play the
pop rocker's "Don't Tell Me" as an advertisement,
it aired 18 times one Sunday morning, sometimes as
frequently as 11 minutes apart, and pushed its way
up the Billboard
charts.
-----That
guy in 'Terminator' was unavailable
-----
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger
named his "Twins" co-star Danny DeVito to the
California Film
Commission.
-----Maybe
he was just practicing to be a script doctor
-----
The Writers Guild of
America, West, had three presidents in less than
three months, including one who resigned after
making unsubstantiated claims that he once served
as a top-secret military intelligence officer and
had played college football under another
name.
-----But
gift wrapping was free
…
-----Items
Ovitz asked to be reimbursed for included $53 in
Disney baby apparel for actor Tom Cruise; $65 for
Disney clothing and a pen for Oprah Winfrey; and
$68 in videos for David Letterman's
birthday.
-----The
goal was to find WMDs (Weapons of Monetary
Destruction)
…
-----Court
papers in a lawsuit over whether Ovitz should have
been paid a hefty severance package showed Disney
christened a top-secret evaluation of his spending
habits as "Project MSO," after his
initials.
-----But
what about the tens of millions who feel like they
already know too much?
…
-----In
announcing a new talk show starring convicted felon
Martha Stewart, producer Mark Burnett said her
legal troubles had generated interest among
"millions more who want to know more about
Martha."
-----Imagine
if she'd had twins
…
-----Mindy
Herman, the former head of E! Networks, reimbursed
the cable channel nearly $8,000 after underlings
complained that company funds were used to pay for
her baby
shower.
-----They
can gather in the backyard for an Incredible
barbecue
…
-----After
his company broke off talks with partner Walt
Disney, Pixar Animation Studios Inc. Chairman Steve
Jobs said every studio chief in Hollywood would
"love to come to my house for
dinner."
-----It's
for people -- people who need help voting
…
-----On
her website, Barbra Streisand provided a link to
the 31st Annual People's Choice Awards to vote for
Michael Moore's President Bush-bashing documentary
"Fahrenheit 9/11" for "Favorite
Movie."
-----Imitation
is the sincerest form of surgery
…
-----The
producers of a transgender reality series called
"Sex Change" sued the makers of a rival reality
show called "He's a Lady," saying they had stolen
their
idea.
-----With questions like
these, he could be forgiven for giving the cold
shoulder
…
-----Eisner, in an
appearance on "Larry King Live," was asked by a
caller about the myth that Walt Disney is
cryogenically
frozen.
-----He
still gets only one bag of peanuts
…
-----In
a Securities and Exchange Commission filing,
DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc. said Chief Executive
Jeffrey Katzenberg would "be entitled to
industry-customary perks as are normally made
available to entertainment industry studio chiefs,"
including not having to fly
commercial.
-----If
he could be thawed, we'd just ask him
…
-----Federal
Communications Commission Chairman Michael K.
Powell wondered "if Walt Disney would be proud"
after the company's ABC network promoted the show
"Desperate Housewives" by staging a racy locker
room romp between actress Nicollette Sheridan and
Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Terrell
Owens.
-----Of course, if Trump
were on "CSI," the autopsy would show he's
heartless
…
-----Donald Trump said
that if CBS Chief Executive Leslie Moonves was a
contestant on his reality show "The Apprentice,"
"he would have been fired by the third
episode."
-----Help
wanted: senior vice president, mail delivery
…
-----A
judge ruled that Universal Studios and
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. forfeited more than $25
million because they could not produce postal
receipts proving that they met a deadline to apply
for royalties for use of their films by cable and
satellite
providers.
-----Why
Eisner will always remember the Daily Oklahoman's
film critic
…
-----A
sampling of headlines from reviews of Disney's "The
Alamo": Don't Bother Remembering New Version of
Alamo (the Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tenn.);
You Probably Won't Remember This Alamo (Utah
Statesman); You Won't Remember This Alamo For Very
Long (Charleston Gazette); This Alamo Not Worth
Remembering (Orange County Register); Don't Bother
Remembering This Alamo (St. Louis Post-Dispatch);
Forget This Alamo (Los Angeles Times); Finally a
Movie Worth Remembering About the Alamo (the Daily
Oklahoman).
///
Center
Page /
NEWS
CONVERGENCE
TIMELINE: Top Stories To
Start The Week With: 122004-52
NEWS
CONVERGENCE
January
2, 2005 / WAR ON Gasoline
PRICES
-----California gasoline
prices dropped to their lowest level since
February, according to a weekly survey released
Monday by the U.S. Energy Information
Administration.
-----The statewide
average cost of self-serve regular fell 3.9 cents
over seven days to $2.01 a
gallon.
-----Although an
increasing number of stations are offering regular
at $1.99 a gallon or lower, the averages for Los
Angeles, San Francisco and the state as a whole
haven't been below $2 since Feb. 16, government
figures showed. The new average is 41.5 cents
higher than last
year
-----Nationwide, the
average fell 2.4 cents to $1.791 a gallon, 31.3
cents above year-earlier
levels.
-----A sell-off in
oil-related commodities Monday in New York trading
gave way later in the week. On Wednesday, oil
prices jumped $1.87 a barrel to $43.64, after car
bombs exploded in Saudia Arabia's capital and the
U.S. government reported another drop in
heating-fuel stockpiles for the winter. On
Thursday, a barrel of light crude settled at
$43.45. Oil markets were closed Friday.
Sales of
Existing Homes Surge to Record
High
-----Sales of previously
owned homes in the U.S. climbed to a record high in
November as low interest rates and a rising economy
kept pulling buyers into the
market.
-----Existing-home sales
rose 13.2% from a year earlier to a 6.94-million
annual rate, the National Assn. of Realtors
reported. The previous high was 6.92 million in
June. Buyers paid more too: The median price rose
10.4% to
$188,200.
-----November sales in
the West increased 16.6%, the most of any region.
Every region showed gains year over year, although
sales in the Northeast slipped 1.3% from October to
November.
-----Several factors are
keeping the market bubbling, including low mortgage
rates.
-----New housing units
in California as measured by building permits
issued totaled 17,460 for November, up 2.5% from
October and 31.4% from November 2003, the
California Building Industry Assn. said. California
housing starts will total 210,000 units this year,
up 7.3% from 2003, the association said.
Wet Seal to
Shutter 150 Stores, Cut
Jobs
-----Wet Seal Inc. said
that it would close about 150 stores and eliminate
about 2,000
jobs.
-----The retailer, based
in Foothill Ranch, was "finalizing the details" and
not prepared to disclose which of its 463 Wet Seal
stores would be shuttered, spokeswoman Helen
Rotherham said. The company has hired a liquidator
to manage inventory as stores are closed, a process
that should be completed by the end of
February.
-----There are 58 Wet
Seal stores in California. The company employs
6,656 people
nationwide.
-----Wet Seal's interim
chief executive, Joseph Deckop, said that the
decision was difficult but was necessary to reduce
costs and allow the retailer to focus on its
strongest stores as it implements a new
merchandising
strategy.
-----Analysts had been
waiting to learn how many stores and jobs Wet Seal
-- which has posted nine straight quarters of
losses -- would shed.
U.S.
Investigation of Chiron
Advances
-----The Justice
Department has interviewed several mid-level
employees of Chiron Corp.'s flu vaccine operations,
a source said, indicating that the federal probe of
the Emeryville, Calif., company was moving
ahead.
-----Investigators have
talked in recent weeks with fewer than a dozen
employees of Chiron's vaccine business, which is
based in Britain, but interviews with other
executives are planned, the source
said.
-----A spokeswoman for
the U.S. attorney's office in New York declined to
comment. Robert Bennett, an attorney who represents
Chiron, couldn't be
reached.
-----Chiron came under
scrutiny in October after British regulators shut
its factory in Liverpool. British authorities said
they found manufacturing lapses and bacterial
contamination, and the closure prevented Chiron
from shipping its flu shots to the
U.S.
-----Chiron said in
mid-October that federal prosecutors in New York
had subpoenaed documents related to the company's
Fluvirin flu vaccine and its Liverpool
factory.
Bid for Video
Rental Firm May Turn
Hostile
-----Blockbuster Inc.,
the largest U.S. video rental retailer, said it
would launch a $700-million hostile bid for
Hollywood Entertainment Corp. if it continued to
refuse to
negotiate.
-----Blockbuster said it
would give the board until mid-January to respond
to the bid Blockbuster made in November to buy
Hollywood Entertainment shares for $11.50
apiece.
-----The Blockbuster bid
bests the $10.25-a-share offer by buyout firm
Leonard Green Partners and Hollywood
Entertainment's chairman, Mark Wattles. Another
suitor, Movie Gallery Inc., has made an offer to
buy Hollywood Entertainment's more than 1,900 video
stores and 600 game stores for an undisclosed
amount.
-----If the Blockbuster
offer is accepted, the company would pay $700
million in cash and assume $300 million in debt.
Blockbuster executives said that if Hollywood
Entertainment's board let them examine its its
financial records, they might raise their
bid.
-----Neither Hollywood
Entertainment nor Leonard Green Partners returned
calls.
Microsoft to
Curtail Its Passport
Service
-----Microsoft Corp. is
abandoning one of its most contentious attempts to
dominate the Internet after rival technology
companies banded together in opposition and
consumers failed to embrace the
effort.
-----The world's biggest
software company said that it would stop trying to
persuade websites to use its Passport service,
which stores consumers' credit card and other
information as they surf from place to
place.
-----The acknowledgment
came after EBay Inc. posted a notice on its site,
saying it would stop using Passport in late January
and rely on its own
service.
-----Passport probably
drew few new customers to Microsoft products. But
it was initially seen as strategically important
because it could have helped the company put itself
in the middle of most electronic
transactions.
-----With more than 200
million users, Passport will continue to be the
method for logging on to some Microsoft-owned
services, such as e-mail system Hotmail.
Hormel Buys
Maker of Dodger
Dogs
-----Hormel Foods Corp.,
maker of Spam, said it had purchased Vernon-based
Clougherty Packing Co., producers of Dodger Dogs
and Farmer John brand meats, for $186 million in
cash.
-----The marriage of
pork-product purveyors is expected to help Austin,
Minn.-based Hormel meet production needs and
strengthen its presence in California and the
Southwest, particularly among the region's growing
Latino population, Hormel executives
said.
-----The Clougherty
Packing management team and its workforce of about
1,800 -- including 300 workers on hog farms in
Central California, Arizona and Wyoming -- are
expected to
stay.
-----"We're happy as
heck," said Joe Clougherty, president of his
family's namesake
company.
-----Privately held
Clougherty Packing doesn't disclose financial
results, but Hormel executives said Clougherty's
revenue was expected to be about $420 million in
2004.
-----Quick to quell any
concerns, Clougherty added that the Dodger Dog, the
extra-long hot dog named for the baseball team,
would "in no way change."
Retailers'
Performance Still Up in the
Air
-----Holiday retail
sales are getting mixed
reviews.
-----According to one
estimate released Monday, credit card purchases
through Christmas Eve were 8.1% ahead of last year.
That "would indicate … a strong holiday
season," said Michael McNamara, director of
research for MasterCard Advisors, which released
the
report.
-----An industry trade
group stuck with its reckoning that sales would
rise 4.5% over last year. "It's going to be an
average holiday season," said a National Retail
Federation
spokesman.
-----And the
International Council of Shopping Centers figured
there would be a mere 2.5% to 3% gain in same-store
sales.
-----A report issued
late Monday by Visa USA showed sales on Visa cards
in the week ended Dec. 26 grew 32% to $25.4 billion
from the prior year. But there's no telling how
much was due to an overall increase in the use of
Visa
cards
-----For now, the
industry waits to see how quickly consumers will
turn gift cards into purchases.
ByLines:
Editors Note
Donald
Trump
Bylines
TVI
Magazine ONLINE / IS YOUR INDUSTRY WEB SITE Ready
for the future?
-----
TVI
Magazine introduces here a new marketing forum for
the international television industry: a dynamic
online service on its YES90 and tvinews.net web
sites. TVI Magazine will now effectively serve the
new marketing needs of all entertainment companies
with a tool that offers almost instantaneous
promotion updates. Company promotional material
that appears on TVI Magazine's Web site can be
hyperlinked with the company's own URL. TVI
Magazine can also link the ads to a special Web
page for the advertiser and then link that page to
the advertiser's URL.
-----
To
ensure that visitors find their way to promotion
information and product updates, TVI Magazine is
listing TVI Magazine Online on more than 250 of the
world's most popular search engines and electronic
directories.
-----
Online
ad space can be purchased in monthly increments
(with a one-month minimum). At renewal time,
advertisers can change their ad and/or move it to
another space if one is available. The TVI Magazine
Web site will indicate the total number of hits on
the home page per month and per day, enabling
advertisers to monitor their reach and billings
regularly.
-----
TVI
Magazine has two key pages for ad placement: the
index page (home page) and the main page (main page
of articles). Less expensive ad space is available
on article pages. Advertisers can provide the
artwork and/or logo, either by submitting the file
electronically or via an existing graphic on the
Web that TVI Magazine's online team can
grab.
-----
Most
ads can be posted on the TVI Magazine site within a
few hours. However, in the event that any graphic
manipulation is required, one must allow more time
before the ad is posted, usually two to seven
business days for a static banner and up to 10
business days for an animated banner ad.
-----It
just goes to show you, says Troy about the TV and
Film industry -- "NOTHING IN THIS WORLD IS
PERMANENT" . . . so follow the
money -
- and
take some advice from a dinner-time chat with
"Stonehead" --
Disappointments Are Great! Follow
the Money . . . the Internet and the Smart- Daaf
Boys.
///
Return
ˆ
To
Top
Respectfully
Submitted
Josie
Cory
Publisher/Editor
TVI Magazine
TVI
Magazine, tviNews.net, Associated Press, Reuters,
BBC, LA Times, NY Times, VRA's D-Diaries, Press
Releases, They Said It Tracking Model, and
SmartSearch were used in compiling and ascertaining
this Yes90 news report.
©2004-2006. Copyright. All
rights reserved by: TVI Publications, VRA TelePlay
Pictures and Big Six Media Entertainments. Tel/Fax:
323 462.1099.
LookRadio.com
-
Do
it with movies, slide shows and
music!
-----
Smart90's
24-hour, 365 days-a-year Broadband S90tv
WebMagic
web page is the simplest way to add the WebMagic to
your existing web pages. It's an Exciting New Way
to Advertise.
-----
Advertise
Now on Smart90.com and utilize S90tv's Web Magic on
your own domain. Email
your insertion order and advertising copy or banner
requests to the attention of: Advertising Marketing
Director at
look@smart90.com™.
- -----To
get you started today, you can attach to your
Email, your logo, slides, transparencies,
illustrations, photographs or other computer
graphics. The materials will be forwarded directly
to our art department.-
- -----
Advertising
material must be received by the 10th of every
month to be included in the following scheduled
print magazine issue. In regards to our daily
tviNews.net edition, your banner, logo, web movie,
slide show or 60x500 animated banner, that is to be
headlined at the top of our featured news page, as
a linkonad or smartkudoad,
can be Emailed to us at your convenience.
- -----
Or
better yet, tell us where to go to fetch the
information -- this way it will be much quicker to
get you up and running. For Ad rates please click
on: TVI
Advertising Rates.
Please
read: "How
Do We Do Business?
We Preserve The
Moment
Returnˆ
To Top
|
