EchoStar Offers Enhanced Broadcast Network Packages

EchoStar Communications and its DISH Network unveiled a new twist for its broadcast network programming packages in an effort to overcome continuing troubles at PrimeTime 24, an outside company that was delivering satellite signals of broadcast networks to EchoStar and DirecTV.

The service will still be limited, however. The Satellite Home Viewer Act enables EchoStar to offer non-local network feeds to households in areas unserved by broadcast networks. Households are considered "unserved" if they cannot receive a "Grade B" intensity local network feed via a conventional rooftop antenna. Customers also are eligible if they haven't subscribed to cable television within 90 days before the date they subscribe to non-local network feeds.

New customers will be pre-qualified by zip code. If they don't qualify, EchoStar said it will offer an off-air antenna solution.

The two broadcast packages unveiled Monday are called DISHNETS East and DISHNETS West. Along with the package name changes, the current ABC, CBS, and FOX broadcast network affiliate signals will be replaced by broadcast network affiliate signals from New York and Los Angeles.

DISHNETS East (New York feeds) include WABC, WCBS, WNBC and FOX-WNYW. DISHNETS West (Los Angeles feeds) has KABC, KCBS, KNBC, FOX-KTTV. Both packages also come with a national PBS feeds.

Monthly subscription package prices for DISHNETS East and DISHNETS West will stay the same at $4.99 each or $7.99 for both. They will sell along with our five network Superstations package at a cost of $9.99 for all three packages.

PrimeTime 24 faces legal challenges launched by local affiliates in Miami, Raleigh and elsewhere over its delivery of national network signals to satellite customers. The Miami case has led to an injunction forcing PrimeTime 24 to cut service to ineligible customers. EchoStar is not directly involved in PrimeTime 24's woes.

Chinese Official Criticizes Ongoing Satellite/Technology Flap

Allegations that China used commercial satellite launching services to obtain military secrets has cost U.S. satellite makers $1 billion in business, a senior Chinese aerospace executive said Monday.

And if the allegations from lawmakers persist, future cooperation between Chinese and U.S. aerospace companies could be threatened, said Zhang Xinxia, president of China Great Wall Industry Corp., the state-run satellite launching company.

Zhang spoke out as Great Wall and European aerospace executives celebrated China's first successful launch of a European-made satellite. SinoSat-1 was placed into orbit Saturday by a Long March 3B rocket, the same rocket at the center of the controversy with the United States.

"The U.S. side should not make an issue out of this because it will harm our cooperation," Zhang said at a news conference.

An earlier version of the Long March carrying a U.S.-made satellite exploded shortly after takeoff on Feb. 15, 1996. The Justice Department and Congress are investigating whether U.S. companies - Loral and Hughes Electronics - took part in an independent review of the crash and passed on information that helped China improve its ballistic missiles.

Zhang said the allegations were unworthy of the attention they were getting in Washington.

CD Radio Signs Up World Radio Network

CD Radio entered into an agreement with World Radio Network Limited to carry the broadcaster's 24-hour service.

Under terms of the agreement, CD Radio will make World Radio Network, which presents English language news and public affairs programming from the world's leading broadcast organizations, available to all subscribers of its satellite-to-car broadcast service scheduled for launch next year. In addition, the companies have agreed to develop a second service for exclusive broadcast on CD Radio.

Based in London, World Radio Network has listeners in more than 50 countries. World Radio Network features regularly scheduled programming from over two dozen broadcasters around the globe.

TECHNOLOGY:

• DES Code Used By C-Band And PrimeStar Gets Cracked -- The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has won RSA Laboratory's "DES Challenge II" contest with its EFF DES Cracker, which defeated the Data Encryption Standard algorithm.

  The VideoCipher II+ system used by C-Band programmers and the DigiCipher system used by PrimeStar both use the DES code for encryption.

  "To prove the insecurity of DES, EFF built the first unclassified hardware for cracking messages encoded with it," EFF said in a press release. "It took the machine less than three days to complete the challenge, shattering the previous record of 39 days set by a massive network of tens of thousands of computers."

  The DES Cracker is a machine that can read information encrypted with DES by finding the key that was used to encrypt that data. The design of the EFF DES Cracker consists of an ordinary personal computer connected to a large array of custom chips.