Salon.com > time warner

I was a political astroturfer

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 10:00:00 +0000

“There’s a movement building, and it’s spreading like wildfire,” announced Rafe Lieber of Citizens for Access to the Arts at a rally on the steps of Brooklyn Borough Hall early in January. With politicians, celebrities, a brass band and a screaming crowd, any passerby would conclude that some popular uprising was in the works.

Speaker after speaker, including City Council members and even Brooklyn-native actress Rosie Perez, gave impassioned speeches about the importance of providing access to art to young people, leading the crowds in chants of, “We’re not gonna stop!” “Fuel our dreams!” "We're coming for you!" and, most frequently, “Save Ovation!”

The participants were decrying the decision of Time Warner Cable to deny the arts network Ovation TV to poor and minority viewers. Cheering along with them, I suddenly heard a cell phone ring. The woman behind me, a fellow protester, answered, saying, “Can you call me back? I’m at work.”

While I had considered the rally more of a quick buck than work, her statement wasn’t technically wrong. Like me, many of the rally’s participants had arrived via the same November Craigslist ad for “TV Press Rally Extras.” A week before the rally, we received an email from Warren Cohn, an employee of the power lawyers David Schwartz and Bradley Gerstman’s lobbying firm Gotham Government Relations. In part, it read:

Time Warner in talks with Meredith Corporation over joint venture

Thu, 14 Feb 2013 14:05:00 +0000

Meredith Corporation, whose publishing arm owns lifestyle magazines like Better Homes and Gardens and Fitness, is currently in talks with Time Warner over the procurement of several of its magazine titles, including Real Simple, People and Style Magazines.

Although Reuters earlier reported that the deal might take place in the form of a sale, with Meredith buying a substantial number of titles from Time Warner, The Times' DealBook blog points out that Time Warner's publishing arm is currently valued at around twice that of Meredith's, rendering that scenario unlikely. Instead, according to DealBook, the two media monoliths may be considering a joint venture. The Times explains:

Time Warner drops Current after Al Jazeera deal

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 15:57:00 +0000

Al Jazeera this week purchased Al Gore's cable network Current TV in what the New York Times' Brian Stelter called "a coming of age moment" for the Qatar-funded network in the United States. By buying Current, Al Jazeera seemed set to establish itself in the U.S. after struggling for years to gain purchase in unreceptive markets outside of New York and Washington.

However, hours after the estimated $500 million deal was made, Time Warner Cable announced that it would no longer carry the Current channel, and thus Al Jazeera's new channel Al Jazeera America would not be distributed by the cable provider. Although the Current deal will still bring Al Jazeera into around 40 million American homes, the Time Warner move constituted a considerable blow for the globally respected network -- Time Warner Cable reaches 12 million homes.

As HuffPo's Michael Calderone reported: