Monster Media 1996 #15/Monster Media Number 15 (Monster Media)(July 1996).ISO/ham/tsn.zip/TSN0519.TXT

Text File | 1996-05-25 | 13KB | 248 lines

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TELE-satellit
EUROPE'S SATELLITE MAGAZINE
International Satellite Broadcasting News
Number 99, Week ending 19 May 1996
By Martyn Williams
News Desk : Internet [e-mail]  or CompuServe CIS:martynw
(c) TELE-satellit Magazine


GALAXY SATELLITE READIED FOR LAUNCH
  CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida, USA (TS) -- A McDonnell Douglas Delta II
rocket will launch the Galaxy IX satellite for Hughes Communications,
on Wednesday, May 22, this week from Cape Canaveral Air Station.
  The launch window opens at 8:36 p.m. and closes at 9:37 p.m. EDT. On
the Internet's World Wide Web you can follow news at
http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/elv/DOCS/next_up.htm and for the latest. TV
coverage is scheduled to be carried on Galaxy 4, transponder 11 from
7:30pm EDT to 10:30pm EDT (2330 - 0230 UTC). In the case of a delay to
the 23rd, coverage will be on Brasilsat A1, transponder 4.


BRITISH TELECOM AND BSKYB IN DIGITAL ALLIANCE - REPORT
  LONDON, England (TS) -- Weekend editions of the Financial Times have
reported that British Telecom and British Sky Broadcasting are in
advanced negotiations to promote digital broadcasting in the UK.
  The interest of BT is in interactive services, said the newspaper,
which would require the use of telephone lines, and that means money
to BT, to create a channel back to BSkyB.


RUSSIAN SOYUZ LAUNCH FAILS, US SATELLITE LOST
  MOSCOW, Russia (Sat-ND) -- Under normal circumstances, nobody would
have taken notice of the Russian-American satellite project SPIN-2
that should have started today. But circumstances couldn't be called
normal anymore when ground control lost contact with the Soyuz-U
booster and the KOSMOS satellite six minutes into the flight. Experts
from the launch site in Baikonur, Kazakhstan, blamed a gust of wind
that had ripped off some of the rocket's ceramic coating.
  It's pretty clear that the satellite is lost, even though it just
should have been put into an 250 to 300 km orbit around the earth.
It's also known that the KOSMOS bird should have stayed there for 45
days to take high-resolution photographs of the earth's surface.
  There are contradicting reports on what territories were involved,
although the United States seem to have been the main target. Russia's
Sovinformsputnik signed a contract with a company called US Aerial
Images last summer, but that obviously was just a part of the mission.
  According to the Russian news ageny ITAR-TASS, the KOSMOS satellite
was due to "make photos of three million square kilometers of the
Earth's surface on orders from American firms, companies and private
persons." This comes more or less close to the DIY spy satellite deals
recently revealed by TELE-satellite.


TCI OPTIMISTIC ON MERGER PROSPECTS
  WASHINGTON, DC, USA (DFA) -- Despite objections by the Federal Trade
Commission about the merge of  Time Warner Inc. and Turner
Broadcasting System Inc., Tele- Communications Inc. Chairman John
Malone said Wednesday he believes it's only a matter of time before
the deal is approved.
  "The people involved have enough flexibility to make the deal happen
and enough backbone to fight the government," Malone said. Malone was
not specific about what he would do to insure that the deal went
through. Tele-Communications Inc., one of the largest cable system
operators in the country, is a major stockholder in Turner. "I think
we can satisfy the FTC's concerns that we're not going to take control
of Time Warner," he said, "but we're not going to be a passive
investor." (LA Times via Shoptalk)


TBS REPRIMANDED OVER AUM VIDEO SCANDAL
  TOKYO, Japan (TS) -- One of Japan's major national commercial TV
networks, Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS), was reprimanded by the
Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications over a scandal involving Aum
Shinrikyo, the Japanese cult involved in the subway Sarin gas attack
in Tokyo last year.
  TBS producers showed an interview with a lawyer working against the
cult, Sakamoto, to officials from Aum before it was aired. As a result
of complaints from Aum the video, which was severely critical of Aum,
was not aired. Aum members kidnapped Sakamoto, his wife and child,
several days later and murdered them soon after.
  An internal TBS investigation originally found it had done no wrong
and the video was not shown although a subsequent investigation showed
it had indeed showed the video. TBS president Sunahara was summoned by
MPT minister Hino today and presented personally with the reprimand.
  It states TBS has broken public trust. TBS will cancel the "Space-J"
documentary program and the afternoon "Super Wide" magazine show,
whose producers were those involved in the video scandal. The
broadcaster must review programming policies and review measures taken
to ensure safety of interviewees.
  Several weeks ago many of those responsible for the showing of the
video were fired and the TBS president resigned. In addition, TBS says
it will demonstrate its regret by not airing any late night local
programming from May 20 to 24th. The measure will cut the main late
night evening news, "News 23" from its usual end time of 0020 to 2350.


NICK TO LAUNCH IN SOUTH AMERICA
  NEW YORK, New York, USA (DFA) -- Viacom Inc. said this week that its
Nickelodeon children's television  unit is planning to launch a
24-hour channel in Latin America. The channel would use Spanish and
Portuguese-language programs acquired form Toronto-based Nelvana
Enterprises Inc. The shows would be transmitted via PanAmSat from
Miami. Financial terms have not been disclosed. (Wall Street Journal
via Shoptalk)


QVC UK TO BREAK EVEN, MORE INTERNATIONAL CHANNELS PLANNED
  LONDON, England (TS) -- Home shopping channel QVC will break even
this year according to the Dow Jones news service quoting president
Douglas Briggs. Revenue this year is expected to reach $90 million to
$95 million and more than $120 million next year.
  With the success of its first international service, the broadcaster
is now looking at launching to consumers in Germany and Japan said the
report.


INTELSAT ENDS TRAFFIC MEETING
  WASHINGTON, DC, USA (TS) -- Intelsat's annual Global Traffic Meeting
was concluded on Friday, 10 May 1996 after a four day run that was
attended by more than 1,500 delegates representing more than 300
companies from 157 countries.  This made it one of the world's largest
gatherings of international communications customers ever.  Last
year's meeting was attended by over 1,100 delegates.
  During the meeting, international communications users discussed
their satellite traffic plans for 1997 and beyond. The information is
critical for Intelsat's own system planning goals said the
organization. A key Intelsat objective is to ensure that customers
have access to satellite capacity when and where they need it anywhere
around the world according to Intelsat.
  Among new technologies on display was bandwidth-on-demand via a TDMA
product. This is a dynamic bandwidth allocation system with a highly
flexible interface for applications such as voice, video, data, and
multimedia sevices and was demonstrated across Intelsat 705.
  Also demonstrated was thin-route telephony via Demand Assigned
Multiple Access (DAMA) network, which showed that DAMA can be used by
scattered and/or mobile users in rural communities where there is no
wired infrastructure.
  ATM transmission was also demonstrated using Ku-band capacity over
the Intelsat 705 satellite and a 2.4 m VSAT antenna. The demonstration
was conducted in cooperation with COMSAT World Systems and showed
several business applications such as desktop video-conferencing,
Internet/World Wide Web and MPEG-2 video.


JAPAN CONSIDERING SPY SATELLITE
  TOKYO, Japan (SAT-ND) -- Japan is interested in possessing its own
spy satellites, as Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto told reporters.
However, he also stated that this was "a question of cost
performance". In 1969, Japan's parliament banned the use of space for
military purposes.
  Following recent discussion on the subject, Japan's NEC Corp
estimated the cost of a national reconnaissance satellite at US$2
billion. Besides, it would take eight years before it was operational.
A study by the defence ministry came to the conclusion that a system
consisting of five to seven satellites could cost up to US$10 billion.
Its main purpose will most likely be tracking military units,
facilities and weapons in North Korea. The project might also give
Japan's launcher H2 a lift. (Sat-ND)


IN BRIEF
-- Australia's Sky Channel says it will begin broadcasting horse
racing across Asia via the Asiasat 2 satellite. The new service, which
begins Monday 20th, will be subscription based and broadcast for 12
hours per day.
-- European Business News, otherwise known as EBN, has launched a home
on the World Wide Web. Check out http://www.ebn.co.uk/ .
-- Since Wednesday ESPN has been broadcast on PAS-4, 68.5 degrees
East, in the B-MAC system on 3.862 GHz, horizontal.
-- The international war crimes Tribunal in the Hague is available
across Europe via Satellite. Check Eutelsat II-F3, 16 degrees East, on
11.638 GHz, horizontal between 1000 and 1800 CEST on weekdays. Sound
is: Croat, 6.60/7.02/7.56; English 7.20; French 7.38. (Norbert
Schlammer via Sat-ND)
-- Veronica Nieuwsradio has checked out of Astra, hardly a surprise
seeing the station will close soon because of poor audience figures.
On 7,74/7,92 you can now hear an unidentified non-stop music channel.

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CREDITS,

Reports in TELE-satellit news are from our worldwide network of
reporters and sources. In particular we would like to thank :

Curt Swinehart for keeping us up to date with all parts of the
satellite industry.

Don Fitzpatrick of DFA in San Francisco for providing permission to
reproduce articles from Shoptalk, the TV news industry's daily news
and information magazine.

OMRI material was reprinted with permission of the Open Media Research
Institute, a nonprofit organization with research offices in Prague,
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write to: [e-mail]

Reproduction in part of Jonathan's Space Report was maded possible by
kind permission of Jonathan McDowell. To read the full edition see
http://hea-www.harvard.edu/QEDT/jcm/space/jsr/jsr.html or
ftp://sao-ftp.harvard.edu/pub/jcm/space/news/news.*

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about international broadcasting. Radio Sweden has presented this
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month. http://www.sr.se/rs