Tribune Sees 2009 Cash at $500 Million, Topping Prior Estimate

By Greg Bensinger

Business Week

gbensinger1@bloomberg.net

Jan. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Tribune Co., the publisher of the Los Angeles Times and Baltimore Sun, said it is likely to report 2009 operating cash flow of $500 million, that's double what Tribune had estimated coming into the year. Tribune had upgraded expectations in November, estimating end of the year cash flow at $400 million two months ago.

Improved results from the broadcast and publishing units during the fourth quarter helped boost the Chicago-based company’s cash flow, according to a memo sent to employees by Chief Executive Officer Randy Michaels and Chief Operating Officer Gerry Spector.

"We're still going through the numbers, but thanks to a stronger than expected performance by both the Broadcasting and Publishing Groups in the fourth quarter, it appears we will finish the year with close to $500 million in operating cash flow," the memo said. "Given that we started the year like most media companies, feeling as though we would be fighting for our very survival, this is truly a remarkable achievement."The two thanked employees for their hard work, and keeping expenses low -- but warned that tight times will continue: "We'll still have to keep our expenses in check and be as efficient as possible, but we're optimistic about where we're headed. It’s unclear whether these trends will continue, so we’ll have to work even faster in 2010,” Michaels and Spector said in the memo.

The company has been doing a number of things to keep expenses down, including selling 95 percent of the Chicago Cubs and the iconic Wrigley Field for about $845 million to the Ricketts family in August.

Earlier this month, the Tribune’s LA Times cut 80 jobs as it closed an Orange County printing plant. In addition, the paper said it would shrink the width of the newspaper to 44 inches from 48 inches. In November, the Tribune suspended its Associated Press news feed across its dailies to see if it could do without the wire service

Tribune filed for bankruptcy protection in December 2008, one year after a group led by billionaire Sam Zell took the company private in a deal that saddled it with about $13 billion in debt. The company, also owner of the Chicago Tribune, may emerge from bankruptcy by the end of March, Zell has said.

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Tribune Creditors Continue To Challenge Reorg Plan

President Obama, Remember Who Your Friends Are

http://www.truthout.org/president-obama-remember-who-your-friends-are56226
Staff Editorial, t r u t h o u t

In the wake of a crushing Democratic defeat in the Massachusetts Senate race, we find ourselves faced with the one-year anniversary of a spirit-changing day in the history of the United States, the inauguration of President Barack Obama. This odd confluence of events provides an opening for a very timely warning: It is time to remember who your friends are, Mr. President.

Your friends are not the suits on Wall Street, the same ones who fooled Timothy Geithner for years. Your friends are not the timid centrists, who Rahm Emanuel coddles. Your friends are not the giants of the mortgage industry, who fought you tooth and nail to keep the foreclosure crisis out of the courts. Your friend is not George W. Bush, whose crimes you continue to conceal.

Your friends are the progressives across this country, who, when you asked for their faith and inspired them with beautiful words, placed you on their shoulders and carried you to a historic victory.

The progressive movement needs results - we're too smart to be placated and spun. We're too cynical - and too determined - to compromise. And, soon, we'll be too jaded to believe that Democrats are anything but limp windsocks, pointing whichever way the wind blows.

Some have already walked away, according to a recent Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll, which states that 45 percent of Democrats are not likely to vote in the 2010 election.

We know that, in your heart, you're one of us. Your heart is the element you seem to have forgotten, the element we miss. You used to wear it on your sleeve; we could hear it pounding in your chest when you spoke.

We heard your heart during your 2002 speech at a Chicago antiwar rally, when you called out the "arm-chair, weekend warriors" in Washington for keeping our soldiers engaged in a "dumb war, a rash war." We heard your heart during your 2004 keynote speech at the Democratic Convention, when you said of the American people, "They know we can do better." We heard it beating loud and clear on New Hampshire Primary Night, when you spoke of true progress, saying, "Whether we are rich or poor; black or white; Latino or Asian; whether we hail from Iowa or New Hampshire, Nevada or South Carolina, we are ready to take this country in a fundamentally new direction."

And upon your inauguration, one year ago today, we dared to believe you when you said, "The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history.

"The right wing thrives on vitriol, hate and divisiveness. When the bile they spew goes unchallenged, their disease infects the people around them. They will not lie down, Mr. President. You are going to have to put them down - with true progressive action, not the frail rhetoric of appeasement.

No one has ever proclaimed a die-hard commitment to centrism. No one has ever held a rally to support bipartisanship. Those are Washington DC catchphrases that mean nothing, serving only as a fog for professional politicians huddling together inside the beltway, too timid and too immersed in campaign logic to stand for anything.

Your job is not to get re-elected in 2012, Mr. President. Your job is to fight tomorrow and then fight the next day. If you're constantly looking up at the scoreboard, worrying about the outcome, you're going to trip over your own laces. Watch the shot clock instead, and fire up three-pointers like you know they're going to sink every time. Get in your opponents' faces and make them work for every single point.

You have a choice now, Mr. President. With your help, 2010 could usher in a host of substantive policy changes: better health care access for millions of Americans, a strategic path to peace in Iraq and Afghanistan and a resounding series of Democratic victories in the midterm elections.

However, if you stand aside and fail to challenge every shot, 2010 could give way to a fractured, crumbling Democratic Party - and the re-emergence of a vicious, feudal corporatism.Choose our better history.

Truthout's Mission

Truthout works to broaden and diversify the political discussion by introducing independent voices and focusing on undercovered issues and unconventional thinking. Harnessing the ever-expanding power of the Internet, we work to spread reliable information, peaceful thought and progressive ideas throughout the world. We are devoted to the principles of equality, democracy, human rights, accountability and social justice. We believe ardently in the power of free speech, and understand that democratic journalism can make the world a better place for all of us.

http://www.truthout.org/

Healthcare Reform Bill "Compromises"

Hi All,

I'm sorry, but to me these health care reform bill "compromises", offered as a panacea to labor by the White House, look to me like putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound.

The "exchanges" look a lot like yet another unfunded federal mandate laid on the states, which will result in 50 different approaches ranging from great options to no option at all.

The New York Times reported that "Union officials seem pretty sure that collective bargaining units of all sizes will be included in the exchanges in 2017." I may be cynical but "pretty sure" is a hell of a weak hook to try to hang your hat on with an issue this important.

* State & municipal employees, including those not in unions, are part of the collective bargaining exemption until 2018 Okay, what happens in 2018?

* Thresholds for the excise tax are raised for both individuals and families. Thresholds went up $400 for individuals and $1,000 for families, not much to cheer about here. It would be better to have the tax be based on overall compensation, say tax benefits for those who earn over $200,000 per year.

* Dental & Vision plans do not count towards the excise tax threshold after 2015. That basically saves every American from losing their dental & vision coverage from their employer, as this is likely where companies would have first looked to save money on the coverage. Again, this is true for everyone, not just union members. Okay, but, vision and dental are insurance extras that are not very large components of medical plans and many employers don't even include them, yet another band-aid in my opinion.

*"Starting in 2017, employees covered by collective bargaining agreements at all levels will be able to participate in the exchanges." That's all well and good, but if the burden for setting up and running the exchanges is put on the states this will create chaos, with 50 different deals.

We need to take a much harder line here. We need a well defined, national public option if there is going to be a tax on employer plans. Otherwise, all we've done is shifted much of the financial liability for health care from corporate employers to working Americans.

If we don't hold our Democratic Party leaders' feet to the fire on the health care bill and follow up with a hard line on labor law reform, including making sure EFCA is passed asap, we will be dealing with a lot more Republicans after the next election.

Bob D

As Shrinking Newsrooms Use Upstarts’ Content, Vetting Questions Arise

By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA

The New York Times

News comes from more and more outlets, about which readers know less and less. Publishers and broadcasters have always called on freelance journalists. But a generation ago, if they used material from another organization, it was usually limited to a handful of large, well-known and respected ones like The Associated Press or Reuters. With established newsrooms shrinking, a raft of smaller news outlets have cropped up in the last few years, selling or simply giving news reports to the traditional media — groups like ProPublica, Global Post, Politico and Kaiser Health News.

“There are more pressures than ever to acquire content from outside sources, and there are going to be even more going forward,” said Alan D. Mutter, a media consultant and former newspaper editor who blogs about the news business. That means that despite declining resources, newsrooms, he said, “have to get better at due diligence in terms of who this provider is,” and at explaining it to their audiences.

Some of these issues came to a head recently, when The Washington Post published an article from a newly formed news organization, The Fiscal Times, about the debate over federal spending without disclosing that the group’s financial backer is Peter G. Peterson, who has an abiding interest in the issue and ties to experts cited in the article. The Post later acknowledged that it should have disclosed the connections, and its ombudsman, Andrew Alexander, found fault with the article — though not with the underlying relationship with The Fiscal Times.

But there have been more extreme lapses, including television news programs’ broadcasting so-called reports that were produced by outsiders on one side of a particular issue.

In the best-known case, in 2004, the Bush administration produced a video that looked like a news report in support of its proposed changes to Medicare, and dozens of stations around the country included it in their newscasts.

Several media analysts and executives said they do not yet see this outsourcing of articles in newspapers as producing anything like that kind of lapse — the major content suppliers are staffed by experienced journalists and so far have a good track record — but the risk is real. Inevitably, they said, there will be groups or individuals with particular slants offering to fill the reporting gaps for traditional news organizations — and the more of them there are, the harder it will be to perceive their agendas.

“There are going to be some newsrooms, I can guarantee you, they’re going to get garbage and they’re going to print it,” said Kelly McBride, ethics group leader at the Poynter Institute, a school for journalists in St. Petersburg, Fla.

For consumers, it becomes that much harder to gauge the credibility of reporting, “and it’s not as clear what the agendas are,” said Ann Marie Lipinski, former editor of The Chicago Tribune. “There has to be total transparency.”

(The New York Times has printed the work of ProPublica and the Chicago News Cooperative, another new organization, and it recently put one of its neighborhood blogs, covering parts of Brooklyn, in the hands of the staff and students of the Graduate School of Journalism of the City University of New York.)

Experts say that when many people have a hand in financing and running a news outlet, there is less danger of an agenda creeping into coverage than when there is a single dominant supporter or owner, like Mr. Peterson. Both Mr. Peterson and The Fiscal Times say that he has no involvement in the group’s journalistic work.

Similar questions have been raised, though not as pointedly, about the Allbritton family, owners of Politico, and Herbert and Marion Sandler, who gave the bulk of the money supporting ProPublica.

What no one can predict is whether the coming years will produce a rush by wealthy individuals or groups to create their own newsrooms — with or without specific biases — to reach consumers either directly or by placing their work with publishers and broadcasters.

But none of the risks posed by outsourcing is entirely new. As for using less-than-objective work from outside sources, “there are a lot of newspapers that essentially take press releases and put them in the paper,” Mr. Mutter said.

For generations, owners who have little or no need to answer to shareholders have famously used their newspapers to pursue their political aims — most famously, the early 20th-century press barons like William Randolph Hearst, Robert R. McCormick and Harrison Gray Otis. In fact, more diffuse corporate ownership did not become the norm until the late 20th century.
“We went through a corporate era, and with more media fragmentation, maybe we’re going back to a stage when individual owners are really more in charge,” said Philip S. Balboni, president and chief executive of Global Post.

For an established news organization, “there is, of course, a greater danger when you outsource than when it is fully within your control,” he said, and it will become more important than ever “to be very careful about who you use and to monitor the content that you use.”

A version of this article appeared in print on January 18, 2010, on page B6 of the New York edition of The New York Times.

Click here to enjoy the convenience of home delivery of The Times for less than $1 a day.

Related:

Special Interests Write 'News' (Miami Herald)Ed Wasserman: More and more journalism is being produced by people who are financially dependent on shadowy offstage entities. The result is a potent new challenge to traditional safeguards against conflict of interest, which, it's becoming increasingly obvious, are either too weak, too harsh or flat-out misdirected.

Issues of Background Sourcing Come Up in Game Change (WaPo)Howard Kurtz: The technique in Game Change -- omniscient narrative -- is hardly new, and Mark Halperin and John Heilemann are veteran scribes who have known their political sources for years. But didn't they have a responsibility to ask the former candidates for comment?

From: "mediabistro.com" newsfeed@mediabistro.com

A Labor Breakfast Forum

"Working Without Laws: Employment and Labor Law Violations in New York City"

Friday January 29th, 2010

8:30am to 10:15am at

The CUNY Murphy Institute

25 West 43rd Street, 18th Floor, NYC

Updated: Labor Leaders Describe Excise-Tax Deal

Updated: Labor Leaders Describe Excise-Tax Deal

By STEVEN GREENHOUSE

Facing intense pressure from organized labor, the Obama administration has agreed to major changes in the proposed tax on high-priced employer-sponsored health benefits.

One change, according to labor leaders involved in the negotiations, is that workers covered by collective bargaining agreements, as well as state and local employees, will be exempted from the tax until 2018.

“We tried to figure out how to have a health plan that was accessible and affordable and that made a difference for working families in this country,” said Anna Burger, chairwoman of the Change to Win labor coalition. The new compromises, she added, help to “make sure that workers who have good health care will be able to continue having good health care” without having their costs or taxes raised.

Richard L. Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, also provided additional details in a conference call with reporters this afternoon:

The Senate bill would have imposed a 40 percent tax on the amount of policies for individuals above $8,500 and family plans above $23,000. The new threshold for the tax would be $24,000 for families and $8,900 for individuals.

The threshold would be increased each year by the amount of the rise in the Consumer Price Index plus 1 percent — that’s the same rate of indexation called for in the Senate bill.

The formula will be adjusted for inflation from 2010 to 2013. The initial inflation threshold period will be adjusted upward if inflation increases above current assumptions.

For high risk professions, the threshold would increase to $27,000.

There would also be adjustments creating higher thresholds for employee groups whose health premiums are higher because the groups contain a disproportionate percentage of older workers and women. Those two groups tends to have higher health premiums than other workers. There would also be adjustments for those living in high-cost states.

As of 2015, dental and vision costs would not be counted toward the threshold.

Collective bargaining plans were to have been excluded from the exchange.

Starting in 2017, collective bargaining agreements at all levels will be able to participate in the exchanges.

The Congressional Budget Office has projected that the excise tax, as included in the Senate bill, would raise $149 billion over 10 years. Mr. Trumka estimated that the new changes would reduce that figure by about $60 billion.

“We’re hoping all the cost containment in [the bill] will start to ratchet down on health care costs,” said Mr. Trumka. “If it does that, then hopefully no American will bump up against the excise tax.”

According to Mr. Trumka, administration officials reached the agreement with labor leaders early Thursday morning after 15 consecutive hours of talks in the Executive Office Building.

By exempting labor unions from the tax until 2018, the administration could greatly reduce resistance to the tax from an important part of the Democratic base.

Unions asked for a delay in being covered by the tax so that they would have time to negotiate for their workers to achieve health savings and have cheaper health plans before 2018.

“This is good for all working Americans, not just union people,” said Mr. Trumka of the proposed changes. “This makes this bill more fair for them. The labor movement has been fighting for health reform for 60 years. We’re not about to let the naysayers stop us from getting there.”

“The president and his entire staff has worked with us on this,” he added. “He’s proven to be a friend of working people on this. I believe in the election of 2010 and 2012, we will be able to motivate not just our members but working people, because this bill will bring health care to working people and bring costs down.”

One of the biggest differences between the House and Senate versions of the legislation is how they would pay for the nearly $1 trillion, 10-year cost. The excise tax is the biggest new revenue-raiser in the Senate bill. The House bill would impose an income surtax on individuals earning more than $500,000 and couples earning more than $1 million.

The House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and the majority leader, Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland, said on Thursday that the final version of major health care legislation will be posted on the Internet for 72 hours before the House votes on the measure.

Thanks to the Internet, the public has had the opportunity to get a detailed look at the health care legislation throughout the legislative process. Of course, having access to the legislative text and being able to make sense of it are two different issues.

White House and Congressional leaders are trying to negotiate the final differences between the House and Senate versions of the legislation. An overall deal could come together within the next few days.

Doomed Deals Spark Tug-of-Wars Between Creditors: Ann Woolner

Commentary by Ann Woolner, Bloomberg - Business Week

Jan. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Those who years ago bought Tribune Co. bonds now are hurling nasty claims at the so-deserving Sam Zell, the real estate magnate whose takeover loaded the storied newspaper company with so much debt that it fell into bankruptcy.

Longtime bondholders accuse Zell of borrowing more than the company was worth to make the deal, thus jeopardizing their stakes in what had been until then a solvent company.

The resulting leveraged buyout “was a virtually no-money- down LBO,” as bondholder attorney David Rosner said in court last month.

We know from the mortgage meltdown the danger of no-money- down loans.

So now Tribune bondholders are pitted against the banks and hedge funds that enabled the doomed deal by loaning the money. The question is who gets what ownership interest in the company when it comes out of bankruptcy.

As with the multitude of Ponzi schemes hidden during good times and exposed by the recession, so it is with leveraged buyouts. When the market and the economy were bubbling up, no price seemed reckless.

Now it falls to bankruptcy judges to sort out the rubble. Tribune Co. isn’t the only bankruptcy case prompting accusations of so-called fraudulent transfer. That is bankruptcy slang used when an insolvent company gives away more than it gets in return, or when that sort of fiscal carelessness drives the company into insolvency.

Leveraged Takeovers

At least three other companies went through heavily leveraged takeovers that seemed to have helped land them in bankruptcy court and left previously confident creditors fighting with newcomer lenders. Bondholders aren’t the least bit happy.

A Florida bankruptcy judge in October declared homebuilder Tousa Inc. fraudulently transferred assets when it bailed out an affiliate six months before filing for reorganization. The creditors’ committee has sued Tousa’s directors over it.

In Nevada, creditors for casino operator Station Casinos Inc. are asking a judge to let it sue directors, alleging the company’s 2007 leveraged buyout left it with $1.7 billion in new debt that catapulted the casino operator into bankruptcy.

Likewise, creditors are suing in Manhattan over the 2007 leveraged buyout of Houston-based Lyondell Chemical Co., claiming that was partly a fraudulent transfer, too.

Debt-Ridden Unit

When entrepreneur Leonid Blavatnik used a debt-ridden unit of his Access Industries Holdings LLC to buy the chemical producer, “Every dollar of the $22 billion used to acquire Lyondell was borrowed money,” the creditors committee said in court papers.

Within a year, the merged company was in bankruptcy court. Lyondell’s creditors are suing the major banks and hedge funds that put the deal together.

Of all those deals gone bad, the one that grabs my gut is that of the Tribune Co. I’m a journalist with a deep need and soft heart for newspapers. I fret daily about what will become of them and the rest of us if they fail.

Newspapers were in sufficient trouble without Zell coming along and pulling down some of the country’s best-known papers, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune and the Baltimore Sun, all owned by Tribune.

Now the company, which also owns a score of broadcast outlets, might actually make money if it could ever get out of bankruptcy court and settle its debts.

Rightful Demand

What is holding up reorganization is the bondholders’ rightful demand for an independent investigation of the buyout. They have asked the bankruptcy judge to appoint an examiner to look into their claims of fraudulent transfer.

If the bondholders prove the LBO was a fraudulent transfer of assets, board members could be held liable for approving it. The banks that made the defective loans could lose their security interests and their claims against the operating companies, which amount to billions of dollars.

They can’t blame Tribune’s problems on the sudden crash of the economy. That the deal was doomed from the start wasn’t only entirely predictable, it was widely predicted.

Zell, who once called himself a “grave dancer” for happily jumping into companies others found moribund, told the Associated Press in 2007 that he was obviously more optimistic about newspapers than others. At the time he was putting together the Tribune deal as revenue was dropping.

‘Human Wrecking Ball’

Since then, he has been called a “human wrecking ball” for the toll his cost-cutting wreaked on his debt-laden newspapers. So said a Los Angeles-based columnist in a Washington Post op-ed piece.

Asked this week on CNBC when his company will come out of bankruptcy, Zell called it “reasonable to assume that it will come out probably in the first half of this year.” It could happen within the first quarter if negotiations with creditors “go easier.”

At the moment, they aren’t going easy. If his enablers in the merger would acknowledge the debt they owe to the bondholders who preceded them, then things might go a little smoother.
Click on “Send Comment” in sidebar display to send a letter to the editor.

--With assistance from Bill Rochelle in New York. Editors: Jim Rubin, Steven Gittelson.
To contact the writer of this column: Ann Woolner in Atlanta at +1-404-507-1314 or awoolner@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this column: James Greiff at +1-212-617-5801 or jgreiff@bloomberg.net.

Online College Planned for Union Workers

By STEVEN GREENHOUSE

The New York Times

The A.F.L.-C.I.O., the main umbrella group for the nation’s labor unions, announced on Thursday that it was joining with the National Labor College and the Princeton Review to create an online college for the federation’s 11.5 million members and their families.

The new college, tentatively named the College for Working Families, will seek to “expand job opportunities for its members by providing education and retraining in a way that’s affordable and accessible,” the founders said.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, who chairs the National Labor College Board of Trustees, also announced the selection of The Princeton Review Inc. and its subsidiary, Penn Foster Education Group, as the college’s partners to create the College for Working Families.

AFL-CIO President Trumka said:

"Expanding good jobs is a top priority for the AFL-CIO and to achieve this, workers’ skills and knowledge must match the role of employers in a changing job market. This new online education venture demonstrates our strong commitment to playing a significant role in ensuring that quality education for America’s workers and their families remains affordable and accessible."

The college will be the first and only accredited degree-granting online institution devoted exclusively to educating union members. It plans to begin offering courses this fall, including ones on criminal justice, education, business and allied health sciences.

“We’re working on a survey to send out to the A.F.L.-C.I.O.’s members to find out what they’d be interested in,” said William Scheuerman, president of the National Labor College, a 41-year-old college for union members based in Silver Spring, Md.

He said the online college would charge $100 to $150 a credit, competitive with community colleges and far cheaper than most four-year colleges and for-profit schools.

Mr. Scheuerman said the labor college selected the Princeton Review and its Penn Foster subsidiary as partners because of their expertise in distance learning.

In 1890, Penn Foster, based in Scranton, Pa., first provided correspondence courses by mail on safety to coal miners. Penn Foster provides online courses to 220,000 students, and a large part of its operations are unionized.

Michael Perik, president of the Princeton Review, said the College for Working Families would emphasize remedial learning and retention far more than for-profit online colleges do.

“We enter this venture with the strong belief that not enough attention has been paid to student remediation and retention,” Mr. Perik said. “If you’re a 30-year-old worker who is going back to school, you might have to relearn a number of high school-type programs. If you’re going to succeed in an allied health care job, you might need to relearn some of your middle school mathematics to succeed.”

He said the A.F.L.-C.I.O. wanted to focus on student retention. “If have you have a two-year program and can keep students through the first six months, the difference in terms of their likelihood to succeed is exponential,” Mr. Perik said.

Mr. Scheuerman said workers whose labor unions were not in the A.F.L.-C.I.O., like members of the Teamsters and service employees’ unions, could also take courses in the new college. He said they would probably have to pay a premium above what A.F.L.-C.I.O. members pay.

Mr. Scheuerman said the online college would first offer bachelor’s degrees and would ultimately also offer associate’s and master’s degrees.

About the National Labor College

Established as a training center by the AFL-CIO in 1969 to strengthen union member education and organizing skills, the National Labor College is the nation’s only accredited higher education institution devoted exclusively to educating union members, leaders and staff.

The NLC became a degree-granting college in 1997 and in March 2004 gained accreditation from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education.

With a 47-acre campus located in Silver Spring, Maryland, a new 72,000 square-foot state- of-the-art academic and conference center, and hotel quality residence halls, the College is well equipped to provide the classroom, meeting spaces and superb dining services, which have become our trademark. And the College has been the venue for an increasing number of national and international conferences on organizing, labor rights, civil rights, health care and pension benefits among other areas.

The NLC is also the home of the ”National Workers Memorial” erected on campus to honor the memory of workers killed or fatally injured on the job, or in service to the labor movement.
Since its founding, more than 200,000 union officers and members have taken one or more of our union skills courses and over 1,100 BA degrees in labor studies have been granted.

Recipients include international union presidents and officers, local union officials and stewards and workers from virtually every national and international union.

National Labor College
Academic Services
10000 New Hampshire Ave.
Silver Spring, MD 20903
Phone: (301) 431-6400
Fax: (301) 628-0160 Toll Free: 1-800-462-4237

http://www.nlc.edu/

People.com Newspaper Guild Employees Claim Win in Labor Case

-By Lucia Moses
Media Week

An arbitrator has ordered Time Inc. to honor an earlier agreement that employees covered by The Newspaper Guild of New York shall not be forced to work for the company’s Web sites, according to the Guild.

The Guild had accused People of violating a 2007 agreement with the publishing giant stating that work for the Web sites be voluntary. The agreement also called for Guild employees’ workload to be adjusted accordingly if they worked for the Web sites.

The case centered on People’s L.A. bureau, which has about 20 Guild-covered staffers. The union believed conditions were the worst there. In a split decision, the arbitrator ruled that staffers, who aren’t paid overtime, can’t be compensated for extra time they put into the Web site.

Local Guild representative Bob Townsend said he was “thrilled” with the ruling, even though staffers wouldn’t be awarded back pay. “I think it’s very clear now that the staff knows the ground rules and that management knows that they’re going to have to follow the ground rules,” he said.

This all came about after editors at Time Inc.-owned Fortune and Time told their staffs that they would be required to work for the dot-com operations, and that part of their compensation would be based on that work.

The argument started in September 2008 when a People staff member e-mailed management asking whether dot-com work was mandatory. Management said yes, then wrote back again:"They're not mandatory, per se, but they're not optional either."

The guild representing Time Inc. staffers filed a complaint, covered in November 2009, citing not just increased responsibilities but increased workload as a reason why having staffers double-dip is a problem.

As of today, the dot-com work at People et al is voluntary.

Time to Re-think the Senate's Health Care Reform Bill

Associated Press writers Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar and Erica Werner reported today that
there has been an outpouring of complaints from labor leaders angry over President Barack Obama's support for a tax on high-cost health insurance plans. The 40 percent levy would fall on employer health plans worth more than $8,500 for an individual or $23,000 for a family.

Zalvador and Werner reported that while President Obama terms the high-cost health insurance plans "Cadillac" plans, union leaders say many working-class Americans who have negotiated good benefits in exchange for lesser pay would be hurt.

The "Cadillac" tax is a cornerstone of the Senate bill's approach to controlling costs. Government analysts estimate the pain could be widely felt, with the tax hitting 22 percent of insured workers in 2019.

The idea is to nudge people into equally comprehensive, but cheaper, coverage. The problem is that, with no public option available in the Senate's version of the health care reform bill, the only choice for coverage will be State sponsored purchasing pools, but there is concern that states governed by Republicans may opt not to create them and some Democratic states may have trouble meeting yet another unfunded federal mandate.

The insurance industry supports the Senate approach.

If this version passes, employees will be angry because many gave up wage increases for employer sponsored health insurance that is now taxable.

Many healthy employees will opt out of the taxable employer plans and may or may not be able to get coverage from "purchasing pools", which their State may or may not choose to set up.

Many of the employees that remain in the employer sponsored health plans will be those with medical concerns. This creates what insurance companies call "adverse selection", which will cause the insurance companies to raise premiums substantially, forcing many employers to drop their health plans altogether.

AFL-CIO president, Richard Trumka warned "disillusioned union members might just not show up to vote if they fail to come up with a health bill labor likes". Trumka said labor groups prefer the approach in the House bill, which raises income taxes on the wealthy to pay for expanded health insurance coverage.

Harold A. Schaitberger, president of the International Association of Firefighters, commented "The president's support for the excise tax is a huge disappointment and cannot be ignored," he said in a statement. "If President Obama continues to support it and signs a bill that includes the excise tax on workers, we will hold him accountable."

Passing the Senate version of the bill will not only offend the union members and other progressive Democrats, but will anger the vast majority of working Democrats. Disappointed Democrats will just stay home on election day, causing catastrophic election defeats for Democratic party candidates similar to those in the 1994 elections.

President Obama and the Democratic Party leadership need to re-think this legislation and come up with a health care reform plan that does not add to the already substantial tax burden of working Americans, expands comprehensive health coverage to all Americans, and curbs the power of the big insurance and pharmaceutical companies. This is a huge, complicated challenge. The Democratic Party and the American people will be better served if we take the time to do it right. - BD

January 12, 2010: Clusterf#@k to the Poor House - Wall Street Bonuses

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Clusterf#@k to the Poor House - Wall Street Bonuses
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Companies that American taxpayers had to bail out with billions of dollars use that money to reward their employees with bonuses.

Interesting Management view of union organizing campaigns

Interesting Management view of union organizing campaigns, they really don't like us trade unionists very much.

Projections- Winning Results: Successful Union Free Strategies

After watching their Powerpoint presentation I wrote the following response:

If you want to keep the union out of your business:

1) Treat your employees like partners not peons. Your employees are not an expense, but your most valuable asset. They need to know that you feel that way.

2) Prove it! Provide excellent wages, benefits, profit participation, and merit based bonuses to ALL employees, not just the select few.

3) Provide ongoing training and clear career paths to engage your employees. Develop loyalty, low turnover, low absentee rates, and high productivity by being loyal to your employees. If you are enrolled in their success, they will be enrolled in yours.

4) Ask your employees for their input. middle management needs to be in relationship with the workers so that when upper management wants a result, the middle manager can ask the employees what they need to create that result.

Only respect, communication, and inclusion will keep your shop union free.

If you can't do those things, then someone like me will show up with organizing cards and help you do the right thing through collective bargaining.

TV Stocks Soar In 2009

38% of broadcast engineers have been laid off around the country in 2009. TV stations are automating production studio control rooms, consolidating master control rooms to giant server farms, using LNS and one-man-bands to cut ENG crews, all to eliminate even more engineering positions.

At the same time broadcast company stock prices, despite claims of massive loss of advertizing revenue, have had dramatic increases in 2009.

At NewsCorp, the stock price jumped 66.18%

Disney's stock rose 42.13%

CBS stock is up 71%

Of the four major networks only GE, parent of NBC showed a stock price drop in 2009, the share price falling - 6.6%.

Employees at all these companies have endured layoffs, wage freezes, and benefit reductions, while executives recieve big bonuses and the stock price soars.

BD

See the article from Radio/TV Business Report below for details.

What a difference a year makes! The advertising recession dragged radio and television stocks down in 2008, with what turned out to be the bottom of the trough coming in late November of ’08. 2009 did not bring a quick recovery from the recession, but as soon as Wall Street got the scent of a recovery, advertising-dependent stocks surged.

If you look at the graphs below, you will see that stock price recovery beginning in late summer and building to a powerful rally in Q4. The TVBR Television Index closed out its second year of existence by surging to an all-time high on the next to last day of 2009, then slipping back only slight to close the year with a gain of 414.8%.

Television stock performance 2009

Television 12/31/08 12/31/09 2009 2009
Company Close Close Net Chg Pct Chg

Nexstar 0.51 4.05 3.54 694.12%
SBS 0.10 0.78 0.68 680.00%
Television Index 26.04 134.08 108.04 414.84%
Media General 1.75 7.84 6.09 348.00%
LIN Television 1.09 4.46 3.37 309.17%
Gray (common) 0.40 1.50 1.10 275.00%
Belo 1.56 5.44 3.88 248.72%
Scripps 2.21 6.96 4.75 214.93%
Gray, Cl. A 0.58 1.50 0.92 158.62%
Entravision 1.56 3.40 1.84 117.95%
Google 307.65 619.98 312.33 101.52%
Saga* 6.60 12.54 5.94 90.00%
Gannett 8.00 14.85 6.85 85.63%
Meredith 17.12 30.85 13.73 80.20%
CBS Cl. B 8.19 14.05 5.86 71.55%
CBS Cl. A 8.24 14.07 5.83 70.75%
News Corp. 9.58 15.92 6.34 66.18%
Journal 2.45 3.89 1.44 58.78%
McGraw-Hill 23.19 33.51 10.32 44.50%
Disney 22.69 32.25 9.56 42.13%
Sinclair 3.10 4.03 0.93 30.00%
ACME 0.40 0.50 0.10 25.00%
Wash. Post 390.25 439.60 49.35 12.65%
Time Warner** 30.18 29.14 -1.04 -3.45%
General Elec. 16.20 15.13 -1.07 -6.60%
Fisher 20.64 16.25 -4.39 -21.27%
Young 0.03 0.0 -0.02 -66.67%

*adjusted for 1 for 4 reverse split 1/28

**adjusted for 1 for 3 reverse split 3/27

The long-awaited advertising recovery is finally showing signs of having begun, which is good news for many broadcasters, not the least of which is CC Media Holdings, the private equity-backed parent company of Clear Channel Communications.

It spent much of 2009 in financial wheeling and dealing to avoid any technical default under its credit agreements which could have landed it in the clutches of vulture capital funds who are bent on seeing it have to file Chapter 11 so they can grab assets on the cheap from their investments in deeply discounted Clear Channel debt.

In the most recent chapter of that drama, a Clear Channel Outdoor subsidiary sold $2.5 billion of new bonds and helped its parent company spruce up its balance sheet. At the same time, Clear Channel Radio reported that December revenues were pacing up from a year ago, so it appears the recovery is real and the vultures will have to go away hungry.

– Jack Messmer

http://www.rbr.com/features/intel_briefs/19790.html

Justice Dept. To Scrutinize Comcast-NBC Deal

The potential merger between Comcast and NBC Universal will be under the regulatory microscope of the Justice Department.

The U.S. Department of Justice confirmed Wednesday that it would be the agency to spearhead a review of the $30 billion deal that would give Comcast majority ownership of NBC, Universal Studios, and a host of cable TV franchises. The antitrust portion of the review could have gone to the Department of Justice or FTC. At least one watchdog hailed the DOJ decision.

According to Reuters, DOJ’s main area of concern is likely to be assuring that NBCU programming will remain available to Comcast’s MVPD competitors. Others are concerned that Comcast will wield too much internet programming power.

Free Press executive director Josh Silver said, "A Comcast/NBC merger would create a media behemoth with too much power in too few hands. It is a good sign that the Justice Department was given the green light for the review. The DOJ’s antitrust division now has a chance to make a clean break from the inactivity of recent years and tackle this merger with the urgency it deserves."

Silver lauded the presence of Christine Varney at DOJ as head of the antitrust division. A former FTC employee, she is on record as being wary of vertical integration.Silver quoted her words from a 1995 speech, when she said, "Vertical acquisitions can be anticompetitive. Vertical mergers can create or raise entry barriers that lead to higher prices or lower quality or innovation for consumers.... Vertical mergers can, in certain instances, increase those barriers to entry even more, raising costs and reducing innovation and quality for consumers."

Both the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission typically look into mergers that involve potential antitrust issues, but DOJ is taking the lead on this one. Ultimately, the Federal Communications Commission will also need to examine the deal.

First revealed last October, the merger would create a joint venture 51 percent owned by Comcast and 49 percent by NBC parent company General Electric. Comcast would pay GE about $6.5 billion in cash upfront. A special option would allow GE to eventually sell off pieces of its stake in the new venture to Comcast over a period of seven years.

Comcast is already the nation's largest cable provider with 23.8 million cable TV customers. The company also owns a few select cable channels, including E! Entertainment and two sports channels--the Golf Channel and Versus. If the NBCU deal is consummated, Comcast will also claim ownership of not just NBC and Universal Studios, but also an array of popular cable networks, including CNBC, MSNBC, Bravo, USA, SyFy, and Oxygen. NBCU also has a minority share in Hulu, while Comcast has Fancast, its own video streaming site.

Since the merger would turn Comcast into both a provider and distributor of news and entertainment, the DOJ has reason for concern. One hot button issue has been Comcast's treatment of cable channels outside its ownership.

On Wednesday, the Tennis Channel filled a complaint with the FCC accusing Comcast of giving preferential treatment to Comcast-owned sports networks. Comcast's Golf and Versus channels are free as part of a basic cable subscription, while the Tennis Channel is only available through a premium sports package that costs $5 to $8 extra per month, thereby hitting a smaller number of subscribers.

The National Football League also fought a lengthy battle with Comcast over the same issue. The two sides finally came to peace last May after Comcast agreed to move the NFL Network from its premium sports package to a less pricey digital package that would reach more customers.
GE said had it no comment on the DOJ's investigation, while Comcast failed to respond to a request from CNET.

Originally posted at Digital Media



Comcast, NBC Heads Expected At Senate Deal Hearing

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The heads of Comcast Corp and NBC Universal have been asked to appear at a Senate committee hearing later this month to discuss a deal pending between the two companies, a spokeswoman said on Monday.

Comcast Chairman Brian Roberts and NBC Universal President Jeff Zucker are expected to appear at the hearing held by the Senate's antitrust subcommittee, which will probably take place in late January, said Dawn Schueller, a spokeswoman for Sen. Herb Kohl.
"It will consider implications of the merger for consumers and the cost that they'll pay for cable," said Schueller.

Other witnesses will likely include a representative of a consumer group and a spokesman for a rival company, she said. Neither has been identified.

Antitrust experts have said that Comcast Corp's NBC Universal deal faces a long and intense regulatory review that will likely end in approval only after the cable giant agrees to give rivals access to NBCU's television shows and movies.

Reporting by Diane Bartz; Editing by Richard Chang
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6034GZ20100104

FCC Broadcast Finance Panels Set For January 12, 2010 Meeting

MEDIA BUREAU ANNOUNCES PANELISTS AND AGENDA FOR MEDIA OWNERSHIP WORKSHOP ON FINANCIAL AND MARKETPLACE ISSUES

(MB DOCKET NO. 09-182)

Washington, D.C.: The Media Bureau today announced the panelists and agenda for its January 12, 2010 media ownership workshop, to be held in the Commission Meeting Room from 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. The workshop will focus on the current financial and economic conditions and marketplace factors affecting the media industry and how the Commission should take these into account as it conducts its 2010 quadrennial review process.

Agenda and Panelists:

9:00 a.m. Welcome and Introductory Remarks

9:15 a.m. Financial Issues Facing Larger Markets/Large Broadcasters

Brandon Burgess, ION Media Networks
James Cotter, Sun Trust Bank
Brian Rich, Catalyst Investors
Marci Ryvicker, Wells Fargo

11:00 a.m. Financial Issues Facing Smaller Markets/Small Broadcasters

Susan Patrick, Patrick Communications
Maria De Leon, KXTD Gaytan Broadcasting Media, LLC
Rick Peters, Bluewater Broadcasting
Terry Jones, Syncom Funds

1:00 p.m. Adjournment

Additional panelists may appear.

The forum will be open to the public. Audio/video coverage will be broadcast live over the Internet from the FCC Live web page at https://webmail.fcc.gov/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.fcc.gov/live. Questions can be submitted in person or via email to 2010quadrennial@fcc.gov throughout the course of the workshop.

Open captioning will be provided. Other reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities are available upon request. Include a description of the accommodation you will need. Also include a way we can contact you if we need more information. Last-minute
requests will be accepted, but may not be possible to fill.

Send an e-mail to fcc504@fcc.gov or call the Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau at 202-418-0530 (voice), 202-418-0432 (tty).

For further information, contact Mania Baghdadi or Amy Brett, Industry Analysis Division, Media Bureau (202) 418-2330. Media Bureau press contact: Janice Wise (202) 418-8165.

-FCC-

Why We Pay Union Dues

Some time back, I received a question from one of my IBEW Local 1212 Brothers at WPIX regarding why we pay union dues, when the non-union guy editing in the edit room next to his did not.

Wow, where to begin?

First, while shared jurisdiction allows WPIX to hire both represented and non-represented editors, we, as IBEW members, are paid substantially more than the non-union editor. This is true at the IATSE and NABET shops as well.

The union provides shop stewards to help with workplace issues offering the strength of collective bargaining and the grievance/arbitration process for larger problem resolution.

Grievances filed and moving towards arbitration regarding how WPIX manages shared jurisdiction should end in a positive result for our members. This process is not available to non-represented employees.

The union raises the baseline wages, benefits, and working conditions for members through collective bargaining.That non-union engineer is paid better because union rates bring up non-union rates to discourage organizing.

The union is only as valuable and useful as the commitment of it's membership. IATSE Local 1 meetings get hundreds of members attending, IBEW meetings get less than a dozen most of the time, then we wonder why the situation is where it is. We must strive to do better.

The fellow who asked the question is one of our best and brightest. Engineers like him are the ones with the wherewithal to facilitate the changes we need to make our union strong and responsive to our members. He, and others like him, are key players in our efforts.

We finally have some good people at the International and the IBEW Local 1212 hall. We have opened a dialog with NABET and IATSE through the New York Broadcast Trades Council for our mutual benefit. Give the leadership some feedback and support, and we'll all get even more value for our union dues.

Our industry is shrinking. Consolidation, automation, LNS, and changing business models in broadcasting will continue to cause staff reductions.

We need to think outside the box, organize every non-management employee that does not have union representation at every TV station and production company. We need to organize the workers at the new server farms where the networks will be running multiple master control rooms. We need to organize in all new media.

To do this, we must promulgate a contract that is freelancer friendly, with good wages and easily reached benefit thresholds.

We must also support those members that will be leaving the broadcast industry for new endeavors. Career counciling and coaching needs to be made available through our unions.

Woody Allen said "98% of success is showing up". Our people have to start showing up, not just to work, but to union meetings. The challenges we face require everyone's help, not just the usual suspects.

I have always been a trade unionist and believe that we are indeed our brother's keepers. There is no limit to what can be accomplished by workers standing together against the short sightedness and greed of big corporations.

Remember what Benjamin Franklin said to the members of the First Continental Congress:"We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately."

Fraternally,

Bob D

Robert R. Daraio
Recording Secretary
New York Broadcast Trades Council
45 Hunter Street
Ossining, N.Y. 10562-4612
914-944-9626 home
914-774-2646 cell
bdaraio@yahoo.com

Cablevision To Cut Newsday's Pay, Vacations

By KEITH J. KELLY
The New York Post

Newsday's 1,100 unionized workers are fuming at a proposal by owner Cablevision to slash their pay by an average of 10 percent, lop off a week's vacation and impose a longer work week under a new three-year contract.

"It was like a cold slap to the face," said one Newsday journalist shortly after hearing about the new proposal. "There has been almost immediate outrage."

The cuts are part of an effort by Cablevision to wring $8 million in savings out of the Long Island daily, according to one person. The cable operator bought Newsday from Tribune Co. in 2008.

Rank and file workers are expected to vote on the new contracts on Sunday. Current contracts expire between late February and late June, depending on the department. The contract for the 250 people in editorial expires on March 31.

Under Cablevision's proposal, most workers would see their salaries cut 10 percent, though the newspaper's drivers are being asked to take a 15 percent pay cut and to eliminate 15 positions from the 160-person transportation unit.

In addition, all employees' workweek would be extended five hours to 40, and long-term employees who have topped out at five weeks' vacation would lose a week.

"Newsday is not immune to the economic challenges facing the newspaper industry and we have been working closely with our union partners to find solutions to issues impacting our business in order to maintain Newsday as a strong and viable company for the long term," said Newsday spokeswoman Deidra Parrish Williams. "We are pleased that we were able to reach a tentative agreement with the union leadership and hope that it will be ratified."

Michael O'Connor, president of Local 406 of the Graphic Communications International Union, said Cablevision's offer is aimed at saving Newsday around $8 million a year, and that the newspaper lost at least $7 million in 2009.

"I think this is the best we are going to extract from Newsday at this time," said O'Connor. "I know a lot of people are upset, but everyone has to look at their options."

O'Connor said Cablevision originally pushed for a 15 percent pay cut across the board and for more leeway on who it could ax.

He added the offer currently on the table outlines for the first time specific language on severance, proposing that two weeks of pay for each year of work up to 52 weeks.

NBC, Comcast headed to the Hill

The proposed merger of a major television network and a major cable company is going to be dragged over the coals by Kohl – Sen. Herb Kohl (D-WI), Chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights.

A hearing is expected late this month.According to reports, both Brian Roberts of Comcast and Jeff Zucker of NBC Universal are likely to be called to testify.

Other likely witnesses are a consumer watchdog and an executive from a competitor.The Subcommittee is part of the Judiciary Committee, which features seven Democrats v. only three Republicans, headed by Ranking Member Orrin Hatch (R-UT).

According to Reuters, Comcast’s Fancast Xfinity, which is linked to a multi-company project known as TV Everywhere, may also come up at the hearing.RBR-TVBR observation: This is a subcommittee of one of two Senate Committees that could host a session on Comcast/NBCU, the other being Commerce. It has a relevant subcommittee, and there are mirror committees and subcommittees in the House, leaving open the possibility of seven additional hearings. We don’t think there will be that many, but we’re also sure this will be the first, not the last.

Watchdogs Attack TV Everywhere

A coalition of consumer groups and media watchdogs is calling for an antitrust investigation into the TV Everywhere service being touted by several large media groups, chiefly Time Warner Cable and Comcast.One of them, Free Press, put out a report on the matter called “TV Competition Nowhere: How the Cable Industry Is Colluding to Kill Online TV.

”The charge is that the two giant cable/internet ISPs, along with satellite broadcasters and big programmers, are tying a great deal of desirable online programming to an MVPD subscription, thus heading off possible competition from online services, limiting consumer choice and opening up the possibility of building “…on the cable TV model that gouges consumers.”

"This is a textbook antitrust violation," said report author, Free Press advisor and law professor Marvin Ammori. "The old media giants are working together to kill off innovative online competitors and carve up the market for themselves. TV Everywhere is designed to eliminate competition at a pivotal moment in the history of television. The antitrust authorities should not stand by and let the cable cartel crush Internet TV before it gets off the ground.

"Free Press’s Ben Scott sees the internet as a venue that may finally host an effective competitor to cable television, and does not want to see that possibility nipped in the bud. He said, "Internet TV could actually inject much needed competition into a TV market long dominated by cable companies -- this is a valuable opportunity to provide greater innovation for consumers. More competition means lower prices for consumers. The Internet offers the potential for democratizing the TV screen now controlled by a handful of powerful media companies. We urge antitrust authorities to move immediately to promote competition.

"The coalition includes Free Press, Media Access Project, Consumers Union, Consumer Federation of America, New America Foundation's Open Technology Initiative, Public Knowledge, and the Participatory Culture Foundation.

WRITERS GUILD OF AMERICA, EAST’S DIGITAL MEDIA SIGNATORIES TRIPLE IN 2009

WGAE added 22 digital media companies as signatories in 2009 as result of the Guild’s increased emphasis on organizing and Writers Guild 2.0 initiative.

Signings Skyrocket under Writers Guild 2.0 New Media Initiative

NEW YORK CITY – Writers Guild of America, East, AFL-CIO (WGAE) added 22 digital media companies as signatories in 2009. Thirty writers have become guild members as a result of digital media work covered by guild contracts this year. The exponential increase in digital media projects covered by the WGAE is the result of the union’s focus on new organizing.

"The business models, distribution structures, and creative opportunities in digital media are still being developed. The fundamental goal of the Writers Guild 2.0 initiative is to ensure that creators are at the table as decisions are made about these basic issues,” said WGAE Executive Director Lowell Peterson. “The enormous potential of digital media won't mean much if writers and other creators can't make a living, or if they must cede creative control."

Rapid growth in signatories shows that digital media creators feel a strong need for guild representation. Digital media producers say they seek the same benefits in guild membership as any other writer, such as healthcare, credit for their work and a community willing to fight for their rights.

Matt Koff, co-writer of the show “9am Meeting”: “I joined the guild for the same reasons as everyone else: respect, recognition, and Joss Whedon's eternal friendship."

From Don Hooper, writer and owner of Jamtown Films Productions: “I joined the WGA so that I wouldn’t die; out-of-pocket health care, just like my failed attempts at sustaining a Hollywood drug addiction, is just way too expensive.”

Ben Zelevansky of writing team BenandAlex.tv: “Joining the Writers Guild means becoming a part of the larger community of creative professionals. But mostly I just wanted to meet Paddy Chayefsky. Turns out he's been dead for about 30 years. At least now I can write off movie tickets on my taxes.”

Alex Bloom of BenandAlex.tv says he joined the WGAE for legitimacy, “if someone doesn't think what I've written is funny, I can shove my guild card in their face and cackle.”

Dan McNamara, writer/creator of “The Bear, The Cloud and God”: "I got a discount on shoes!" (Members do indeed get an annual discount).

New WGAE signatories announced in the last quarter of 2009 are:

9am Meeting – Award winning animated web series, ny.channel101.com/show.php?show=200

AGBK – A Brooklyn-based production company creating and producing of web series, short films for the web, branded entertainment/web commercials and music videos which have won awards in national and international festivals. AG-BK.com

The Bear, the Cloud and God – Animated web series which has also aired on cable channel G4TV. ny.channel101.com/show.php?show=213

The Battery ’s Down – Live action musical web series featuring cameos from top Broadway stars. Soundtrack records available. thebatterysdown.com

Confirmed Bachelors – Animated web comedy series starring radio star Frank DeCaro, uses 1970's Hanna-Barbera-style animation. www.theconfirmedbachelors.com

Alex Bloom and Ben Zelevansky – Live action and animated web series ranked #16 in the iTunes directory of comedy podcasts. benandalex.tv

Downsized – Live action web series praised by Tubefilter and Visioweb.Tv. Second season will stream on StrikeTV. downsizedthewebseries.com

Duder – Webby award winning live action series with 22 episodes online. duder.com

Gavin Lance – A unique live action take on the comic book genre. gavinlance.com

Guy and Cut Films – Production company specializing in original web series and short films. guyandcut.com/reel.html

Jamtown Films – Production company's work has been official film/pilot selections in New York TV Festival, Big Apple Film Festival, Queens International Film Festival and more. jamtownfilms.com

Respect Films – Production company producing live action web series including psychedelic sci-fi show The Third Age and for NFL Writers Room for ESPN, among others. respectfilms.com

Undead New York – Original animated web series in production.

The Writers Guild of America, East, AFL-CIO, is a labor union representing writers in motion pictures, television, cable, digital media, and broadcast news. The WGAE conducts programs, seminars, and events on issues of interest to, and on behalf of, writers. In addition, it represents writers’ interests on the legislative level.

For more information on the Writers Guild of America, East, visit www.wgaeast.org.
555 W 57th St., NY, NY 10019
(212) 767-7800

Walt Disney's Grandson Facing Gun, Drug Charges

By Pandora Young, FishbowlLA

Patrick Disney Miller, grandson of Walt Disney, is facing some serious prison time. From the Associated Press:

Cops say they found 13 handguns, a rifle, an illegal assault rifle and various drugs at the defendant's Woodland Hills home. Thanks to a 2005 drug conviction in Fresno, Miller is barred from owning guns or ammunition, say prosecutors.

LAPD officers obtained the search warrant after running a background check on Miller when they discovered he had allegedly purchased ammunition, according to the D.A.'s office.

Miller, 42, was taken into custody about 5:30 a.m. Wednesday at his home in Woodland Hills, said Officer Rosario Herrera of the Los Angeles Police Department's Media Relations unit.

Miller was booked for "possession of a firearm by a felon" and selling ammunition, Herrera said. Information on Miller's felony background was not immediately known.

The District Attorney's office filed a felony warrant against Miller on Monday alleging possession of ammunition, said Jane Robison of the DA's office. Investigators served the warrant and arrested Miller.

Miller was be arraigned Van Nuys Superior Court. LAPD officers obtained the search warrant after running a background check on Miller when they discovered he had allegedly purchased ammunition, according to the D.A.'s office.

Miller pleaded not guilty to charges of illegal possession of guns and drugs on Wednesday in a California court and was remanded in custody, authorities said.

He had been freed on a $ 35,000 dollar bail, but at Thursday's arraignment the judge raised the amount to $ 550,000 dollars and Miller was taken into custody. A new hearing was set for February 4.

Miller's mother is Diane Disney Miller, the eldest daughter of the famous and late Walt Disney. She is married to Ronald William Miller and together they have seven children where Patrick Disney Miller is their youngest.

If convicted of all charges, Miller faces more than eight years in state prison.

Time Warner and Fox Reach a Cable Deal

By BRIAN STELTER

The New York Times

The News Corporation and Time Warner Cable struck a deal just in time for the Sugar Bowl.

The two companies said Friday evening that they had agreed on new terms for a contract covering Fox stations in New York, Los Angeles, Orlando and other markets, averting a blackout of the weekend’s college bowl games in millions of homes.

They did not disclose the terms. The deal between the News Corporation and Time Warner caps weeks of sparring over the price that the cable company — and by extension its customers — should pay to watch Fox, ahead of an end-of-the-year contract expiration.

Analysts had expected that the deal would set a new high-water mark for local TV stations that want sizable subscriber fees in exchange for so-called retransmission rights.

In tense negotiations with Time Warner Cable, Fox had demanded about a dollar a subscriber per month, far more than other stations have received. Time Warner Cable thought 30 cents was more reasonable, said people briefed on the talks who insisted on anonymity because the specifics of the talks were confidential.

Most likely, the two companies reached a compromise on the price, but both refused to comment Friday on the figure.

“We’re pleased that, after months of negotiations, we were able to reach a fair agreement with Time Warner Cable — one that recognizes the value of our programming,” said Chase Carey, the president of News Corporation, in a statement.

Time Warner Cable’s president, Glenn Britt, called it a “reasonable deal.”

Meanwhile, customers of another major cable operator, Cablevision, were reminded Friday of what can happen when carriage talks break down. The Food Network and HGTV were unexpectedly removed from Cablevision’s lineups in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut shortly after the stroke of midnight, sending angry customers to their keyboards and phones to demand answers. Cable and satellite operators pay media firms for the right to carry channels, and those fees are reflected in customers’ bills.

Cable operators have historically resisted paying directly for the right to retransmit stations, but they have softened their stance in recent years, and some stations now receive between 10 cents and 40 cents a month per subscriber.

Fox asserted it deserved more. Rupert Murdoch, the News Corporation chairman, has positioned the company as a leader in “creating an economic template for the future.” Every cent represents millions of dollars in monthly revenue.

Analysts say the Fox station group’s aggressive stance could benefit other broadcasters. In a report last month, analysts at UBS said the current dispute was “likely a harbinger of things to come as consumers have more alternatives to cable than ever before,” giving programmers more leverage in negotiations.

The big fee for Fox was part of a larger package of News Corporation channel renewals, which put cable channels like FX at similar risk of vanishing from Time Warner Cable systems, at least temporarily.

Fee negotiations are usually conducted discreetly, and deals are often completed close to their deadlines without viewers ever knowing. But Fox’s clash with Time Warner Cable broke out in public in November when the cable operator started a campaign to hold the line on programmer fee increases.

Some networks, it said on its Web site, “are trying to boost their bottom line by squeezing cable TV viewers like you — and threatening to pull the plug on popular shows if we don’t roll over.”
Networks say the fee increases are a matter of survival — or at least are necessary to keep producing quality programming.

Time Warner Cable representatives traveled to Los Angeles for talks with News Corporation early in the week. Under pressure from the government and from viewers to stave off a blackout, representatives for both sides met in a conference room on the Fox studio lot at 10 a.m. Pacific time on Thursday, and talks continued through Friday evening, said an executive briefed on the talks who was not authorized to speak publicly.

The Fox negotiators had the option to pull the plug after the contract expired early Friday morning, but they decided to keep talking.

On the other side, the Food Network and HGTV outage affected about 3.1 million subscribers in the New York metropolitan area on Friday. The owner of the popular channels, Scripps Networks, says it deserves more cash for them. “The distribution rates Cablevision pays for Food and HGTV are among the lowest in the industry,” said Kenneth W. Lowe, the chief executive of Scripps Networks Interactive.

According to the research firm SNL Kagan, distributors pay about 8 cents on average for Food Network and 13 cents for HGTV. Scripps was believed to be asking for about triple that amount, or roughly 25 cents for Food and 40 cents for HGTV.

Cablevision took a hard line in its own statement Friday, saying that it had “no expectation of carrying” Scripps’s programming again, “given the dramatic changes in their approach to working with distributors to reach television viewers.”

Scripps’s contracts with Time Warner Cable also expired on Dec. 31, but those two companies continued talking into the new year without an interruption in programming.

According to The Washington Post, About 3.1 million subscribers lost access to HGTV and the Food Network on Friday after Scripps pulled its programming while negotiating a new contract with the cable provider.

In a statement late Sunday, Scripps said more than six months of negotiations haven't been able to produce an agreement, and its recent requests for sit-down discussions have been rejected. Scripps said Cablevision currently pays about 25 cents per subscriber for the combined networks, and described the fee increase it's asking for as "fair market rate" for popular networks.

"We regret deeply the interruption of service for Cablevision customers who rely on us for quality programming," the company said.

A version of this article appeared in print on January 2, 2010, on page B1 of the New York edition.

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