Television digest with electronic reports (Jan-Dec 1952)

3 Sponsors and agencies may or may not rise in opposition. At one time. Zenith claimed advertising would never support stations. Proved pathetically wrong, company no w says boxoffice TV and sponsored TV can live side by side. Politics won't be kept out of this fracas, of course. Congress will be subject to more than usual pulling and hauling. Ex-Sen. William Benton, whose Muzak organization once almost got pay-as-you-listen radio through FCC, hooks subscription TV onto his endorsement of educational TV — as a rider. He and Zenith say that people will pay for education via fee-TV, but that claim apparently hasn't yet made much impression on educators themselves. New stations in well-served vhf markets, particularly uhf stations, undoubtedly will be subject to lots of proselytizing, since they face major task of attracting audiences. Old stations, virtually all profitable, haven't evinced much interest yet. A couple of exceptions may be KTLA, Los Angeles, owned by a subscription proponent (Paramount's Telemeter), and WOR-TV, New York, which is working very closely with another (Skiatron). * * * $ There are still only 4 major names in the subscription field: (1) Phonevision. When first proposed, Zenith's system required telephone in home, and subscriber was to be billed by phone company. After several years of sniping by competitors. Zenith now says it can use virtually any technique. From publicity standpoint. Zenith is far and away most successful — its president E.F. McDonald having learned at an early age how to garner publicity by provoking rest of the manufacturing and broadcasting industry. (2) Telemeter. Owned 50% by Paramount Pictures, this system may scon be actually operating without need or benefit of the FCC clergy — through an ingenious adaptation of community antenna system. Company plans shortly to feed system in Palm Springs, Cal., with movies, etc. from local theatre. This requires no FCC permission since it's all closed circuit. Telemeter's pictures are unscrambled when coins are fed to box beside receiver. (3) Subscriber-Vision. Owned by Arthur Levey's Skiatron Electronics & TV Corp. , system has been tested technically over WOR-TV, will soon be tested to determine public reaction and acceptance. Company is now negotiating with Smith, Kline & French pharmaceutical house and WOR-TV with object of experimenting with telecasts of surgery to be viewed only by some 10,000 New York doctors. Such experiments would, of course, be subject to FCC approval. Company also reports that sports organizations are interested, that it will report to NCAA convention next month. (4) RCA has reported it has a system, said nothing more. In the absence of details, one can merely assume that if there's something important at stake RCA will be in thick of the fight. And you may be sure others will get into the act when hearing comes. EMERGENCE OF COLOR TV STILL SPECULATIVE: "’Alien will color come up again?" — meaning "When will FCC consider approving compatible color?" — continues to be a common industry guessing game. And nobody, not even FCC, knows the answer. When Commission authorized CBS system, it enunciated an "open door" policy towards compatible color, saying it would consider such system whenever industry was able to meet certain criteria. CBS system then dropped by wayside, and the industry redoubled its efforts to perfect compatible system to point FCC would be prepared to consider it. Has that point been reached? Or is it about to be? It's probably not far off. Commission hasn't been falling over itself to start formal proceedings aimed at adoption of system. It has been waiting for the industry to come forward with finished product. All-industry National Television System Committee, which now includes even CBS, has worked steadily to that end. But is the industry ready? Not even all NTSC members agree. Some say more field testing is needed. Others claim new system is ripe. Much depends on FCC, its workload and its inclinations. At the moment. Commission seems to consider color and subscription TV (see above) to rate high priority when theatre-TV hearing ends. It's presumed NTSC will bring system to Commission, yet there's always the