Tci

The City Council delayed action last night on a bill to create a cable franchise that would provide services in the Inner Harbor area, after Baltimore's primary cable provider raised concerns about competition.Flight Systems Cablevision asked the council for a cable franchise that would bring Internet and other data services through expanded cable lines to the Inner Harbor. But the legislation lacked support from the majority of council members, so Council President Lawrence A. Bell III postponed action on the bill.

CLEARWATER, Fla. -- Home Shopping Network Inc. is expected to name former Fox network chief Barry Diller chairman as early as next week, according to a person close to the company.The appointment is part of a plan by Tele-Communications Inc. President John Malone to improve profits at the No. 2 home-shopping channel, which has lagged behind QVC Inc. in recent years. TCI, the nation's largest cable company, is a major investor in Home Shopping Network.A more profitable HSN would provide Mr. Diller -- who ran QVC until last year -- with the cash he needs to turn his small television network, Silver King Communications Inc., into a major broadcaster, analysts said.

Officials of Westinghouse Broadcasting, the parent company of Home Team Sports, are expected to mount a last-gasp effort to keep Orioles broadcasts amid signs that the team's telecasts will be controlled by a new venture.Westinghouse, one of the nation's largest broadcasting conglomerates, is expected to make a counteroffer to the Orioles this week in response to a proposal from Fox and TCI, the nation's largest cable operator.However, sources within the local broadcasting community indicate that the Fox/TCI deal with the Orioles is completed and not likely to be overturned by Westinghouse's efforts.

Television viewers in parts of Baltimore were shut out for most of the crucial fourth game of last night's World Series between the New York Yankees and Atlanta Braves because of technical problems at cable-provider TCI Communications.For eight innings, customers in postal ZIP codes 21201, 21202 and 21223 in downtown and Southwest Baltimore were without cable service. A little after 11 p.m. -- with the Yankees ahead by three runs after a Jim Leyritz home run in the bottom of the eighth inning -- service was finally restored.

The folks at TCI cable say they did it for your own good -- even if you think otherwise.They know a lot of their customers were caught off guard when Baltimore's cable TV lineup was shuffled Dec. 1 -- especially after TCI had announced it would happen Nov. 1. And they know that a lot of people are still having trouble finding their favorite programs."

IN THE WAKE of the AT&T-TCI $31.7 billion merger deal, AT&T's stock has dropped as investors worry about the costs the telephone giant will incur to upgrade TCI's cable systems and uncertainty over whether those costs can reasonably be charged to consumers. Is this a good deal? Will the merger go through?Jeffrey KaganTelecom industry analyst, Kagan Telecom Associates, AtlantaFirst of all, the merger will happen. It is what AT&T needed to do. But it is a question of what will happen if the stock keeps dropping.

At first glance, the proposed merger of Bell Atlantic Corp. and Tele-Communications Inc. looks like a megamonopoly exceeding the greediest robber baron's dreams.On the one hand, there's a cash-rich regional telephone monopoly with annual revenues exceeding $12.5 billion. On the other, the nation's largest cable television operator, a $3.5 billion company that touches everything from home shopping to CNN.Together, they'd be worth an estimated $60 billion. And that's not counting a possible share in Paramount Communications Inc., a Hollywood studio that TCI has been pursuing through its alliance with Barry Diller's QVC Network Inc.So what happens to competition?

TCI Communications of Baltimore, the city's often-criticized cable television operator, has added three popular channels to its standard lineup, and this time it isn't increasing rates to do so.The Sci-Fi Channel, the History Channel and Turner Classic Movies will be included in TCI's "extended basic" service plan starting June 1, the company said yesterday.To add the History Channel, the company will cut the Inspirational Channel and Trinity Broadcast to 12 hours each on a single channel.

WASHINGTON -- Raymond W. Smith, chief executive of Bell Atlantic Corp., made a pilgrimage to Capitol Hill yesterday, bearing a $15 billion offering to appease the Senate's antitrust gods.That is the amount the new Bell Atlantic would spend over the next five years on a national information infrastructure as a result of his company's planned merger with Tele-Communications Inc., Mr. Smith told members of the Senate's antitrust subcommittee.Thousands of linemen, programmers and splicers would be needed as the company upgraded its network so that TCI could provide phone service and Bell Atlantic could deliver video over its phone lines.

The Orioles and Home Team Sports have reached agreement on a contract for the Bethesda-based regional sports channel to continue to carry the team's games for the next 10 seasons.The deal was announced yesterday after attorneys for the Orioles decided that HTS had matched an offer made by Fox and Tele-Communications Inc., which would have created a new channel.After receiving notification of the decision, officials for the Fox/TCI venture announced that they would sue the Orioles, as well as the Washington Bullets and Capitals, who spurned a Fox/TCI offer last week for HTS, for breach of contract.