About 400 publishers, editors, journalists and experts from 74 countries are meeting in Washington, D.C., to tackle the global problem of getting younger people to read newspapers. The World Young Reader Conference, the seventh put on by the World Association of Newspapers (WAN), includes large U.S. concerns. "What they're going to be looking at is sharing information about what works in different places," says Jim Abbott, vice president of the NAA Foundation. The conference is apt to underline how far ahead newspapers in Europe and Latin America are of their U.S. counterparts when it comes to attracting young …

Canadian regulators will consider allowing USA Network to enter the market there. That's after the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission received an application from cable behemoth Shaw Communications to sponsor the U.S. cable TV network's possible migration to digital cable. In the tightly regulated Canadian TV market, entry to foreign TV services is granted only when they do not compete directly with existing channels. Shaw says that USA Network does not go head-to-head with any Canadian pay or specialty operation, and the CRTC requests that Canadian broadcasters or other parties wishing to take issue with that should file …

NABET-CWA, a union representing about 2,500 technicians, camera operators, news writers and others at ABC, has suspended talks with the broadcaster, due to concerns over job security and pension. The union and ABC had been meeting for weeks to work out a new contract to replace the one that expires March 31. "The union bargaining committee's review of ABC's proposals found nothing but company attacks on the seniority system, attacks on the pension plan, despite the plan being financially healthy, attacks on jurisdiction of work and attacks on a multitude of other work rules and conditions," says NABET-CWA …

WPP Group has bought a piece of Media Rights Capital, a company that brings money and partners to create content for a variety of media like TV, the Internet and cellphones. "Essentially, Media Rights custom builds content from scratch," says one insider. The company pulls talent, distributors and producers and determines the most suitable media platform, along with providing financing. WPP, along with investment bank Goldman Sachs & Co. and AT&T, has put $400 million in MRC that will be used for content production. The ad agency group's interest is both financial and practical. "We do this to have …

Traditional advertising has a big role in getting consumers to search for merchandise on the Internet, according to research from the Retail Advertising and Marketing Association and BIGresearch. About half say they take their cues from TV, magazine and newspaper ads to decide when and where to shop online. By order of preference, 47% said they turned to magazine ads, followed by TV commercials and newspaper ads at 43% each. In-store promotions moved 27%, and when it cones to coupons, far more women than men used them for online guidance, at 42% of women and only 29% of …

The head of a fringe group claims that as many as 80% of the V-chip ratings nets give to their programming are wrong. At least that what Tim Winter, president of the Parent's Television Council, said as part of a speech at the Association of National Advertisers' Forum in New York. He says the inaccurate ratings are documented by a study his organization had conducted. In addition, they represent a "fraud by many of the broadcasters and the networks ... they rate (the programs) inaccurately and that way, the V-chip doesn't block the programming." Further: "You're …

CBS is pulling a younger audience for the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament ratings through the first seven telecasts were up 14% among men 18-24 and men 18-34, according to Nielsen Media Research. That runs against a generally down trend as total household ratings for "March Madness" have slipped 6% to a 6.2 with total viewers off 300,000 or 3% percent per telecast. Most of that decline is coming in the 25-54 age demo. Heading into Thursday's "Sweet 16," ratings among men 18-24 averaged a 4.2, compared to a 3.7 last year, while among men 18-34, they are a 4.9, …

Sci-Fi has picked up nine more episodes in season four of "Battlestar Galactica," which will bring the new season count from 13 to 22. That will also include a two-hour event slated for the fourth quarter of this year, just prior to a release on DVD. The show has won a Peabody Award and, in addition, has been honored by the American Film Institute as one of their top 10 television programs for two years in a row. But the pick-up of the cult favorite could worry some viewers, as there is speculation that if Sci Fi were …

Not long after NBC did it, ABC News will air four editions of "World News" with a single sponsor next month. The move will add five more minutes of news on each broadcast. Reporter Bill Weir will be traveling for a special series on the single-sponsor days and will visit Kiribati to cover the effects of global warming, as well as to Zambia to examine efforts to reduce infant and maternal mortality. On Dec, 4, NBC's "Nightly News" was solely sponsored by Philips Electronics, adding six minutes of news. The ABC versions will air on Friday nights in …

Major League Baseball president and COO Bob DuPuy charges that IN Demand's offer to match DirecTV's $700 million, seven-year carriage rights deal is "not responsive" to MLB's terms. The league says the offer "fails short of all the material conditions." But IN Demand president Robert Jacobson disagrees: "Our offer was fully responsive to Major League Baseball's requirements and public statements." While both sides are vague as to the points of the deal, insiders say IN Demand will match the dollar amount to carry the MLB Extra Innings package of out-of-market games and launch the MLB Channel. But …