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Technology Stocks : C-Cube -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: let who wrote (26271)	12/7/1997 3:27:00 PM
From: John Rieman	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 50808

Dell and related news was big. Nickelodean goes multicasting. Digital channels filling up fast................................... multichannel.com Nicks Joins Rush to Digital By LINDA MOSS After more than a year of development, Nickelodeon has decided to spin off a package of three to five digital networks aimed at kids, anchored by a educational service and possibly including channels for comedy, game shows and "'tweens," sources said last week. At this point Nickelodeon and its parent, MTV Networks Inc., are seeking to launch the digital children's package in late 1998, sources close to the situation said. Nickelodeon officials couldn't be reached for comment last week. The digital flagship would be Noggin, an educational network that Nickelodeon originally planned to launch as a commercial-free analog channel. Noggin will be aimed at children 2-to-15 years old, with a heavy emphasis on programming for preschoolers, these sources said. Nickelodeon has had great success with its "Nick Jr." block, which is aimed at preschoolers. At last year's Western Show, officials from MTVN and Nickelodeon began talking to cable operators about Noggin. Since that time, they decided to move Noggin to a digital platform, because of the lack of analog capacity, according to sources familiar with the network. Nickelodeon is looking at several other genres for digital. It is considering packaging comedy programming from Nick, both live action and animation, for one digital network, sources said. And a Nickelodeon kids game show network could combine game shows and sports-oriented programming from the analog service. Nick is also looking at creating a digital network that would target "'tweens," the older end of the network's demographic, 9- to 12-year-olds, sources said. Nick will be expanding into digital at a time when the inventory of kids programming is exploding. Discovery Communications Inc. already has a children's network, Discovery Kids, which is part of its package of four digital networks. And Walt Disney Co. plans to launch four digital networks, including one aimed at kids. Like Nick, Disney a year ago was planning to launch an analog educational kids network, which was to be called ABZ back then. And adding even more competition to the kids arena, the very aggressive Fox Kids Worldwide Inc., a partnership of News Corp. and Saban Entertainment Inc., next year will transform The Family Channel into a kids network by day. Nickelodeon isn't the only MTVN service going digital. Late last month, MTV: Music Television unveiled its plans to next year launch "The Suite from MTV and VH1," seven digital music networks representing diverse formats. To program its digital networks, Nickelodeon will mainly repackage its existing programming and do some acquisitions. It may also do a limited amount of original programming for the digitial tier, sources said. Programmers are looking for inexpensive ways to program digital networks, which will have limited penetration at first and won't have enough distributition to attract advertisers. That's why they're repackaging shows from their analog services for digital. For example, Lifetime Television next year will launch a movie network, aimed at analog and digital, that will carry its made-for-TV movies and miniseries. MTVN officials at this week's Western Show in Anaheim, Calif., are expected to concentrate on pitching "The Suite" to operators. The big push on Nickelodeon's digital package probably won't start until early next year, sources said.