The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 18

B4-The Post, Tuesday, February 2, 1982 Closed-Circuit TV Debate Brewing ALASKA UNITY CRUISE June 26 July 8, 1982 Call Weekdays 964-6800 Bob Michals STRAIT your children staying up to watch the adult movies, all you have to do is give us a call and we can disconnect your service on that channel for the night." With new advances in subscription television technology, signal strength has been significantly improved, he said, and within the last year ON TV points to subscribers it has in Belle Glade as evidence it can reach almost everyone in Palm Beach County. The cost, however, is not cheap. Because of th need for a special signal amplifier at the signal's northernmost boundaries, the basic installation that costs $49.95 in Dade and Broward counties costs $80 or $90 up here, plus the cost of an external antenna if none exists. When you start weighing that against the cost of individual tickets over the course of several years, though, it can start looking like a bargain. our new collection of mix 1n match features split skirts, pants, shorts and lops all color coordinated in only using three.

The A channel is our basic movie service, the channel is adult (movies) only which 70 percent of our customers presently subscribe to and is our pay-per-view channel for special one-time events. "All of them can be individually programmed. For instance, if you're going out of the house for the night and you don't want the baby-sitter and Ir rsJ nav7. red, khaki arid olive. A 1 sizes 6-14.

priced $26436. FASHION DRESSES AJWlfiTfiS ing friends over to enjoy a specific show. Our studies showed the average home audience for the fight was around 10 and four or five for the concert." In both instances, said Rishell, ON TV literally broke even financially on their exclusive telecasts save for the good will and subsequent subscription applications they enjoyed. For the present, he added, all such events are viewed in much the same manner and it won't be until ON TV's membership increases substantially from its present 38,000 that the company will be able to realize a substantial profit from charging each household $10-J15 for tuning in a big fight or concert. "There are a lot of different ways to package these things, but the risks vs.

the capital gains are minimal. I feel very strongly that the Holmes-Cooney fight (scheduled for March 15 with 65 percent of ON TV's subscribers expected to tune in at $15 per home) may be the last big arena event for quite some time, and that's only because its promoter insisted on such outlets. Rishell also said a viable halfway point might be through closed-circuit telecasts to small lounges, which HORIZON BLINDS FACTORY OUTLET Verticals and Mini-Blinds fl 500FF I MORE THAN 110 'm Beach 5r or. 1 JTi.oP' 'J-0OV OK, you can turn off those bright lights and put away the rubber hoses. I admit it, I watched the Leonard-Hearns fight last September in the plush comfort of a West Palm Beach lounge that had pirated the closed-circuit signal.

And I loved every minute! of it. Several hundred other wildly cheering patrons felt the same way. When I confessed this fact to Paul Rishell, vice presidentgeneral manager for ON TV, the Fort Lauderdale-based subscription television service that reluctantly made it all possible, I felt a lot better. Rishell said I'd never get him to admit it on the record, but also wouldn't deny that ON TV expected such transgressions of viewership and quietly wrote them off as "good will" when a substantial number of lounge patrons that night around South Florida decided they liked what they saw so much they subsequently signed up as legitimate home subscribers. Rishell said ON TV currently is taking three Miami-based lounge owners who pirated that fight to court.

"We had agents present who actually witnessed the unauthorized broadcasts," said Rishell. Yet one can't help but wonder whether the trio represents test cases for future stringent crackdowns or merely token enforcement of the promoter's copyright clauses to keep him off the back of ON TV. At the root of all this confusion is an exploding technology that seems to be advancing faster than eager entrepreneurs can find ways to capitalize on. Boxing promoters first started seeing the potential of closed-circuit broadcasts in the early 1970s long before home pay-per-view was ever at issue 1 and as a result they are understandably miffed at their newly emergent 'competition. I Following the Leonard-Hearns 'spectacular, several South Florida fight promoters who backed large -auditorium telecasts (and generally took a financial beating) were not shy about pointing a finger at ON TV as the reason they did so poorly at the Rishell said he can appreciate their problem, but as far as he's concerned, the face of closed-circuit big event telecasting is changing and its future lies not in auditoriums, but in the intimate confines of private living rooms and, yes, even small lounge settings.

According to concert promoter Jon Stoll of Fantasma Productions in West Palm Beach, such nightclub closed-circuit viewings just might be the ticket for Broadway shows or some of the super groups like Led Zeppelin, the Who and the Rolling Stones, who normally only go on tour once every three or four years. The reason is overhead. "The production and traveling costs for some of these people is astronomical," said Stoll, "and bands are looking for alternatives that will allow them to put on one show and have it broad- -cast simultaneously around the country. Televisionradio simulcasts are out because you can't control the radio portion from being picked up free, so closed-circuits seem the way to go." "I'm a believer that closed-circuit has a place in entertainment, but it may not be the one it's held in the past," said Rishell. "The problem, as I see it, is basically with the fight promoters who insist upon guaranteeing amount of dollars per viewer as opposed to a fixed amount for broadcast rights.

In other words, those who charge $20 a ticket can tell a promoter they'll guarantee him 55 percent of their gate. "I've been through two of these experiences (the Leonard-Hearns fight and a December live broadcast of the Rolling Stones from Chicago) and I know it's a social event, but I think what's going to happen is more and more people are going to opt for hav- 1 GREEN could offer a similar living room atmosphere with the addition of food and drink service. Such installations could be accomplished on a per-event schedule with the equipment being removed after the telecast. If there's a problem at all with that, said Rishell, it's that it tends to cut out the present middlemen entirely, unless they act as booking agents for the subscription service. Where the lounges are currently having a problem with legally televising events is in the wording of the contracts ON TV signs with promoters stating it's "a private home service, not a public service," said Rishell.

If the fine print can be worked out, the technology currently exists for computer-controlled signal access to specific addresses. As things now stand, said Rishell, "Each account has a decoder and a computerized address. When we send a signal, we know who's using it. Our equipment has the capability of sending on four levels, but at present we're Main Floor Downtown West Palm Beach. Pam Beach Mall.

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