Comcast subscribers will be able to watch series such as HBO's "Entourage" on their computers by the end of the year without paying a dime extra. Comcast will be the first cable TV operator to unlock online access to a slate of valuable cable programs. CEO Brian Roberts showed off the new service at the Web 2.0 Summit this week, likening it to "video on demand on steroids." Access will be carefully guarded: subscribers can initially watch shows and movies only on their home computers after being verified by Comcast. The online viewing will be restricted to those …

For newspapers, it increasingly looks like local is golden. A new National Newspaper Association survey found that 81% of respondents read a local weekly paper each week, and those readers spend an average of 40 minutes with the paper. About three-quarters say they read "most or all of" the publication. The NNA survey, co-sponsored by the Missouri School of Journalism, surveyed 500 adults. Researchers also found that readers, on average, share their paper with 2.36 others and nearly 40% keep their community newspaper more than a week. Almost half say there are days they read the newspaper as much …

Chrysler is putting its media assignment into review. The automaker spent $840 million in domestic measured media last year, per Nielsen. Spending totaled $270 million this year through August. Sources say the client has preliminarily reached out to the incumbent agency PHD as well as Carat and Universal McCann. Carat has previous experience in the category, having handled the Hyundai/Kia account. It isn't clear if UM's BMW win earlier this year would create a conflict and prevent the agency from going after Chrysler.

Playboy is cutting its rate base a whopping 38% percent. Starting with the January 2010 issue, the iconic magazine's rate base will drop to 1.5 million from 2.6 million. Playboy also will combine its January and February issues after doing the same with its July and August issues this summer. Playboy Enterprises' new CEO Scott Flanders has pledged big changes at the magazine. The company has hinted at the possibility of even more rate base cuts, along with a sale or other major changes to the print edition. Like other mass-circ magazines, Playboy has whittled its …

If you ever thought "The Perfect Storm" was the perfect movie for the Weather Channel, you finally would be right. The channel will start showing movies for the first time in its 27-year history -- and the first film is The Perfect Storm." The movie about a horrific storm off the New England coast will air on Oct. 30, the 18th anniversary of the storm. It begins a four-week period in which the network will try various Friday night movies. The idea is to tap films that are weather-themed or have plots in which weather plays a …

Fox Atomic, News Corp.'s recently shuttered studio, is being rebranded to become Fox Digital Studios, a unit aimed at branded programming. Roger Mincheff, former CEO of digital marketing agency Spacedog Media, is the unit's new senior VP. Mincheff is a bit of an unorthodox hire, having worked primarily on comic books in his 11 years at Spacedog, where he integrated Mazda, Universal Music, Qantas Airways and Harley-Davidson into content. He says using actual brands enhances a story's credibility. "If you're going to tell a hip-hop story or a basketball story, you can't do it without brands, because brands make …

Stephen Adler, who has been editor-in-chief of BusinessWeek for more than four years, will resign in December. On Oct. 13, BusinessWeek's announced it was being sold to Bloomberg and the sale should be completed in early December. Adler's resignation gives Bloomberg's chief content officer, Norman Pearlstine, the opportunity to hand pick his own candidate for the top editorial job. Adler and Pearlstine were once colleagues at The Wall Street Journal. It is rare that the top editor of a magazine that is acquired stays on in that role. When Adler was recruited to BusinessWeek in late 2004, …

The Washington Post made a mistake when it hired Marcus Brauchli to be its executive editor. Brauchli came into the Post job a little more than a year ago after being managing editor of The Wall Street Journal, where he worked in the shadow of Rupert Murdoch. A few months ago the Post was revealed to be planning a series of off-the-record salons that offered corporate underwriters access to the paper's journalists. At the time Brauchli and publisher Katharine Weymouth claimed they didn't know that the events were conceived to violate the Post's ethics guidelines. But now …

Meetings began yesterday between the top management of BusinessWeek and Bloomberg to determine what's ahead for the magazine and its new cross-platform opportunities. "We plan to make it more of a global business weekly," says Norman Pearlstine, chief content officer of Bloomberg and the new chairman of BusinessWeek. Bloomberg and BusinessWeek have bureaus in the same cities, so each one will now be combined, Pearlstine notes. Between now and Dec. 1, when the deal is expected to close, "we have a ton of work to do," he says. On the table is whether to increase BusinessWeek's rate …

General Electric and Vivendi are nearing a deal for GE to buy Vivendi's 20% stake in NBC Universal. Agreement would lead to a potential deal that could give Comcast control of NBC Universal, eventually ushering GE out of the entertainment business. Comcast and GE are in the middle of due diligence, say insiders. If Vivendi and GE can agree on a price, a deal for Comcast to take over NBC Universal could come next month. As of yesterday, GE and Vivendi were said to be about $500 million apart. Both News Corp. and Liberty Media have mulled their own …