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http://www.thecharlottepost.com 8C Cfjarlottc ^osit THURSDAY, JANUARY 22, 2004 STRICTLY BUSINESS TV One targets black viewers By Krissah Williams WASHINGTON POST It is eight days to airtime for TV One, a new cable channel aimed at Afiican Americans. The editor sit ting in a darkened room full of tele vision monitors has raced all day assembling a seven-minute promo tional video TV One LLC will use to try to persuade the cable compa ny in Chicago and New York to carry the channel. The editor hits play. The screen in this Washington production house flickers, lighting up the editor’s face, as soul music crooner A1 Green starts to sweat and moan the words to “Love and Happiness.” The screen fades to rhythm-and-blues queen Patti LaBelle winking at the camera, while the title of her new show, “Living it Up With Patti LaBelle,” floats beside her. It ends with a black-and-white scene: An actor playing civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. stands behind a podium preaching passionately. TV One President Johnathan Rodgers nods. “I’m impressed,” he says, before ripping the promotion al video apart. Green’s segment is too long; move the King piece; end with the network’s upbeat jingle, he tells the editor. Then it is on to the next thing. It has been like this for the entire fre netic year leading up to the chan nel’s launch today in the homes of 2.2 million cable customers in Washington and six other cities. TV One is a direct competitor to Black Entertainment Television, the first big cable television chan nel aimed at black viewers. It aims,’ though, to be- different - to eschew sejQ/^ hip-hop videos for more tradi tional TV fare such as sitcoms and talk shows. There is a lot riding on the channel, and not just culturally - Radio One Inc., the nation’s largest black-owned radio compa ny, which is based in Prince George’s Coimty, has staked a lot of its cash and its reputation on this new channel being a winner. Chapter One for TV One TV One’s story began two winters ago, when Radio One Chairman Alfred C. Liggins III phoned Rodgers at Silver Spring’s Discovery Communications Inc., where he was president of its U.S. networks, including the Discovery Channel, TLC (formerly The Learning Channel) and Animal Planet. The brash Liggins, then 38, introduced himself to Rodgers, 58. “I want to start this [black] cable network,” Rodgers recalls him say ing, “and I was talking to [Grammy-award-winning musi cian] Quincy Jones. He says there’s only one brother who can do it: Johnathan Rodgers.” The two men met at Rodgers’s Cleveland Park home and found they had a lot in common, includ ing the area. Liggins was having a home built in the Northwest Washington neighborhood. Rodgers is a man whose serious demeanor camouflages a dry wit. He is a broadcast industry veteran who worked for 20 years at CBS as a reporter and producer before going over to Discovery. Rodgers told Liggins that the idea of an African American cable channel had been nagging at him for years. He had worked in televi sion for three decades, but no chan nel reflected his tastes. Liggins, on the other hand, is a numbers guy who led Radio One’s pubHc offering in 1999; he saw a lucrative busi ness in what seemed a relatively uncrowded market. Soon after that first meeting, Rodgers quit Discovery and began working as an unpaid consultant to Liggins. Later Liggins flew to Philadelphia for a meeting with Amy Banse, executive vice presi dent of programming investments for Comcast Corp., the nation’s largest cable company. Banse, who is trying to Increase Comcast’s pro- See NEW/7C THH ei^ACK cot.L.ecie giuarte»ly BEYONCi^S DAD FtSrS MATTHEW KNOWLES BUILDS MUSIC EMPIHE BASKiimLraEvih^ BVQ ALL-AMERICA TEAMS I r ■jj H/mPTOKALUM WANDASYMS PHOTO/BVQ American Online is negotiating to buy BlackVoices.com from Tribune Corp. AOL is eyeing more than 800,000 BVQ members, but BVQ magazine (above) is not in negotiations. America Online, Tribune Corp. in negotiations for BlackVoices website Purchase could boost strategy for Africaria.com By Ken Smikle TARGET MARKET NEWS The nation’s leading Internet service provider, America Online, is in negotiations to purchase BlackVoices.com from the Web site’s owner. Tribune Co. A deal could be announced before the end of January. BlackVoices, one of the nation’s most visited black Web sites, has been seeking an investor to prevent the shutting down of operations of the 8-year-old company. Earlier efforts to form a merger with Vanguarde Media ended when the magazine publisher abruptly filed for bankruptcy. The Tribime Co. had planned to simply shut down the wholly-owned division at the end of last year but delayed action when AOL, a divi sion of limeWamer, expressed interest. Though BlackVoices.com remains an active Web site, most of the employees have already been laid off or have taken a hiatus until the company’s future is decided. The Tribime is attempting to find positions for some staffers ■ within its newspaper business. According to industry sources familiar with the discussions, America Onfine is interested in acquiring BlackVoices’ assets, which include its membership list of 830,000 names and advertising contracts. It is not known if the company’s magazine, the quarterly BVQ, will be part of the purchase, or what its future will be if it’s not. Presumably, BlackVoices’ assets could be used to boost AOL’s Black Focus service, which was launched in May of last year, or be combined with Africana.com, another See AMERICA/7C Backlash brews as white-collar jobs move By Rachel Konrad THE ASSOCIATED PRESS SAN JOSE, Calif -- Executives from Silicon VaUey to Wall Street are adamant that shift ing white-coUar jobs from the United States to developing countries is good business, but a backlash is brewing. Indiana’s state government canceled a $15 million contract with an Indian consulting firm in November. And eight states voted on bills last year that would ban the use of tax payer money on contracts with foreign work ers. Though none of those measures passed, the states and several others are expected to consider similar bills this year. Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry says he would require overseas call centers to disclose their location — the New Economy version of the “made in America” label. The Massachusetts senator said he would n’t ban outsourcing, but would provide tax credits to companies that maintain U.S. fac tories and “close every single loophole that gives companies incentives to move jobs abroad.” Outsourcing critics say Americans have been complacent about the loss of technology jobs to overseas workers since the trend began in the late 1990s. But with elections in both the United States and India, they believe 2004 could be a turning point. “Politicians can’t outsource the vote,” said Scott Kirwin, foimder of the Wilmington, Del.- based lobbying group Information Technology Professionals Association of America, which compiles data from nearly 100 anti-outsourc ing Web sites. Kirwin, who launched ITPAA after a large investment bank asked him to train the Indian worker who then replaced him, says said only broad consumer revolt win reverse the trend. “In the 1980s, many people boycotted com panies that did business with the apartheid regime in South AfHca,” Kirwin said. “Many of those same people have more money today and don’t like doing business with companies from countries that work against us political ly, like France, or economically, like India and China. Consumer activism is an important part of putting the brakes on the outsourcing movement.” After his software development job was ter minated in 2002, Florida’s Mike Emmons decided to run for Congress on an anti-out sourcing agenda. His meager campaign funds come mostly from unemployed programmers who visit his Web site, OutsourceCongress.org. He is trying to get on the ballot for the Democratic primary this summer. “This is hitting medical transcribers, finan cial analysts, radiologists, everyone,” said Emmons, 41. “If you work at a desk, beware — See BACKLASH/7C It’s Hummer vs. Jeep in SUV sweepstakes Hummer H2 By Michael Ellis REUTERS DETROIT - A long-simmering dispute between the beefy sport utility brands Hummer and Jeep has heated up with one-upmanship claims and accusations of copied designs. The mud-slinging between the off-road SUV brands began nearly three years ago when DaimleiGhiysler AG’s Jeep claimed the about-to-be laimched Hummer H2 from General Motors Cotp. copied its grille. That battle ended when a judge allowed the H2 to go into produc tion, but now the war has moved from the courtroom to television commercials, the printed page and the auto shew floor. At stake is one of the fastest- Jeep growing and most profitable seg ments of the market. With sales of the Hummer H2 far above forecasts since it was launched 19 months ago, and GM making plans to expand the brand. Hummer is making a serious run at Jeep’s claim to be the premier American off-road SUV The latest spat began when Jeep took a shot at Hummer with a recent TV ad that claims Jeeps are better in the mud. The commercial shows several kids in Jeep pedal cars slogging through an obstacle course, while a yellow Hummer-like SUV, labeled “Imitator,” gets stuck in the muck. A boy in the Hummer look-a-fike can only shake his head when a girl says; “If it’s not Trail-Rated, it’s not a Jeep 4x4.” The ad recalls a Hummer spot, set to the song “Happy Jack” by rock group The Who, in which a boy vrins a soapbox derby with a Hummer-like car by outsmarting his opponents and driving off-road. Chrysler spokesman Jason Vines said the Jeep ad is “good-natured fun,” and it^s common for competi tors to knock other products in com mercials. He was more irritated with sug gestions that Jeep has copied Hummer. Earlier this month, Jeep took the wraps off a concept SUV, the large and bojty Jeep Rescue, that bears a strong resemblance to the Hummer H2. Like the H2, the Rescue has round headlights, a slotted grille and exposed hinges around its four doors. Both vehicles also sit high for easy ground clearance in rocky ter rain. “Who’s zooming who?” ‘You know how this business is, you show something and it’s copied,” Hummer General Manager Mike DiGiovanni, stand ing amid the Hummer exhibit at the Detroit auto show, told Reuters. “My reference point is this auto show with all the, as the media calls it, the Hummer wannabes.” ‘Who’s zooming who here? Who’s copying who?,” Chrysler’s Vines said, noting that Jeep has been around for 60 years. ‘1 personally don’t think it’s a copy.” Indeed, the Rescue also shares similarities with its smaller cousin, the Jeep Wrangler. Both the Jeep and the Hummer trace their roots to military vehicles, where function dictates form, and to the same com pany. Jeep’s former owner American Motors created AM General in 1971 to build military vehicles, and eventually the Humvee truck. Looks aside, Chrysler group mar keting chief Joe Eberhardt ques tioned the ruggedness of the Hummer H2 in January when he said in an interview with Automotive News that the SUV wouldn’t be able to negotiate the Rubicon Trail, an off-road route in California that is the traditional test of every Jeep. Hummer’s DiGiovanni said he would send a letter and documen tation to Automotive News chal lenging Eberhardt’s assertion. This is quite a bit of bluster for two brands that don’t directly com pete against each other yet. Prices for the Hummer H2 start at about $50,000, far above any Jeep. But that win change next year when Hummer laimches the small er H3, which will be priced starting in the $30,000 range, competing directly vrith the new Jeep Grand Cherokee, which will debut at the New York Auto Show in April.
The Charlotte Post (Charlotte, N.C.)
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