Fifty years after the British Invasion of  U.S. music via the Beatles and other groups, "a new assault is coming, led by iconic U.K. characters featured on TV shows," writes Kristen Schweitzer. HBO, Showtime, Netflix and Hulu "are among the cable networks and streaming sites commissioning, co-producing and buying rights to expensive new British dramas, meaning Americans will soon be watching U.K.- made shows with everyone from Dracula to Sherlock Holmes." “I’ve never seen the American market so open to new ideas from elsewhere,” John McVay, CEO of U.K. trade group Producers Alliance for Cinema and Television, told …

Sports Illustrated is testing out a new kind of paywall, where potential readers are asked to view their choice of one out of several 30-second video ads to unlock a specific article for a 24-hour period. "The provider is Selectable Media, which has been testing consumers’ willingness to watch video ads for free WiFi, music and games," writes Lucia Moses. "This is its first public test with a major consumer magazine."

The number of magazine launches and closures in the first nine months of 2013 were both down, "in the same double digit range—between about 36% and 38%," according to Mediafinder.com, a database of U.S. and Canadian publications, writes Matthew Flamm. That's 114 launches to 40 closures. "There was one sign of a new trend: the emergence of Kickstarter as a publishing patron," writes Flamm. "Brooklyn-based quarterly magazine Popular Noise put out its first issue after raising $20,000 on the crowdfunding site. Other launches included Rodale's Conrad Magazine, a custom publishing venture with Conrad Hotels & Resorts, and …

Time Warner Cable is buying U.S. fiber optic network provider DukeNet Communications in a deal expected to close the first quarter of the new year. The purchase, made for $600 million in cash is expected to "boost the cable company's business services unit," writes Liana Baker.

Emilio Romano, head of Telemundo, "is leaving the company in the latest shuffle of NBCUniversal executives," writes Bob Fernandez. "A search for Romano's replacement [will] begin immediately," according to a company memo.

YouTube multichannel networks like Awesomeness TV are not "replacing television," the company's founder and chief executive Brian Robbins told the MIPCOM conference in Cannes. "Let's be really clear: people are watching more TV than ever, but we're filling the periods of time that these kids have, because they have these devices." According to writer Stuart Dredge, "Robbins spoke at length about the challenges facing TV networks like Nickelodeon, walking a line between pitching AwesomenessTV as a new production partner for those companies, and as a fearsome new competitor poised to disrupt their businesses."

TV networks are busily touting video-on-demand as a way for viewers to catch up with show episodes this fall season, promoting  VOD online and in social media. "VOD -- which now reaches 60 percent of U.S. television homes through set-top boxes, according to a Nielsen report released last month -- helps build audiences for new and returning TV series," writes Lisa Richwine. "It gives networks a shot at attracting an extra chunk of viewers to shows they did not record or had not heard about."

Tablet magazine subscriptions make up a small part of total subs for most major mags: one reason why Jon Lund fears "the app-based tablet approach to magazines leads straight to oblivion, at least for individual magazine titles....When I nevertheless manage to find the time to open up an iPad magazine, I feel as if I’m holding an outdated media product in my hands."

Chicago Sun-Times parent Wrapports will no longer publish a print, glossy-paper version of Grid, "the weekly business magazine it launched with some fanfare last winter and began inserting into the Sunday Sun-Times," writes Lewis Lazare. The company will "focus for now on Grid online, where it continues to generate content heavily skewed toward a young adult readership."

ESPN is canceling the international versions of its X Games extreme sports competitions "because it could not make money on the events, which feature skateboarding and other sports," writes Liana B. Baker. That move will also mean the network is eliminating "an unspecified number of jobs related to the International X Games, which took place in cities including Barcelona, Munich, Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil and Tignes, France."