COMPANY NEWS;TCI AND NEWS CORP. IN TV SPORTS VENTURE
Date: 10 May 1996
As part of its deal to create a joint venture in global sports programming, the News Corporation will sell a 7.5 percent interest in Star TV, its satellite-delivered cable programming platform in Asia, to two entities controlled by Tele-Communications Inc. of Englewood, Colo. Tele-Communications said that in exchange for the Star TV stake, Liberty Media and Tele-Communications International, the acquiring organizations, would give sports broadcasting rights to the new venture. Star TV is an attempt to bring cable directly to homes in Asia but losses are running about $90 million a year. The News Corporation has said it would contribute about $350 million to the venture.
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Safir, Angered by Article, Bars Reporter From Office
Date: 10 May 1996
By Clifford Krauss
Clifford Krauss
Police Commissioner Howard Safir barred a Daily News reporter from attending a briefing for journalists assigned to police headquarters yesterday, explaining that it was his right to invite whomever he wanted into his offices. When the reporter, John G. Marzulli, 34, tried to attend the briefing, he was blocked from entering Mr. Safir's offices by Marilyn Mode, the Deputy Police Commissioner for Public Information.
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ABC Joins Others TV Time
Date: 09 May 1996
By Lawrie Mifflin
Lawrie Mifflin
ABC joined its network brethren yesterday in offering free television time to the major Presidential candidates, announcing that it would invite them to appear on a live one-hour special in prime time, during the last week before the election. The candidates would discuss issues without interruption from journalists or "any third party," ABC said.
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Release the Clinton Videotape
Date: 10 May 1996
President Clinton testified by videotape yesterday in a Federal court in Little Rock, denying accusations of impropriety by the chief witness produced by the Whitewater special prosecutor. The White House opposes release of the tape, saying it contains nothing new and would be used by political opponents. The trial judge, seeing no rush, says he will consider the journalists' applications in about two weeks. But the principle that trials are public events is too important to take second place to the President's political convenience or the judge's leisurely pace. Citizen access to material admitted into evidence is a right long recognized under the First Amendment and the American judicial tradition. The written transcript now available is helpful but insufficient. The news organizations seeking the videotape are right.
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THE MEDIA BUSINESS: ADVERTISING -- ADDENDA;Bill Communications Acquires a Show
Date: 09 May 1996
By Andrea Adelson
Andrea Adelson
Bill Communications, part of VNU, has acquired the annual Premium Incentive Show from the Miller Freeman unit of United News and Media P.L.C. in San Francisco. Terms were not disclosed. The 61st annual show, which will be managed by Miller Freeman, is being held through today at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in Manhattan. John Wickersham, president of Bill in New York, said Bill's management would begin with the 62d annual show, which is scheduled for the Javits Center on May 6-8, 1997. Bill has named two executives as co-directors of the 1997 show: Peter Edmunds, 51, executive publisher and product development director at Incentive magazine in New York, and Jim Bracken, 61, president of the Billcom Expo and Conference Group in Sterling, Va.
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CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK;The Hands That Feed Defective Sound Bites
Date: 09 May 1996
By Walter Goodman
Walter Goodman
The next time politicians indulge in the no-risk pastime of charging television with turning public issues into sound bites, they might take a moment to reflect on the effects of instant images, especially when used by themselves. In a picture op last week of the vetoing of a bill that would have limited the sums plaintiffs could win in faulty-product lawsuits, President Clinton brought on three people who had been hurt by defective products. Earlier, the bill's proponents, Senator Bob Dole and Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, staged a made-for-camera appearance of a girl who might be denied a needed medical device because of its maker's fear of a lawsuit. (Is there a central casting office in the capital that rents out victims, tots extra?)
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THE AD CAMPAIGN;The Republicans Strike Back
Date: 09 May 1996
By James Bennet
James Bennet
This is a new 30-second commercial that the Republican National Committee plans to begin televising nationwide on CNN and in select local markets today. PRODUCER: New Century Media Group
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What Do Angry Women Want?
Date: 10 May 1996
By Mary Beth Cahill
Mary Cahill
Faced with the prospect of a mass desertion by female voters in the fall, some Republicans have acknowledged the gender gap and are trying to do something about it, including softening the hard-right anti-abortion language in the party platform. Not even a wholesale revision of that plank seems likely to help. According to the latest New York Times/CBS Poll, President Clinton currently leads Senator Bob Dole among women by a whopping 18 points.
Democrats may well be feeling complacent. But that would be a mistake. There is a critical bloc of women -- angry, working class and focused on economic issues -- who may aid the Republican cause, as they did in 1994, simply by deciding not to vote.
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