Business Notes

The finest wines do not age nearly as well as successful television shows. Reruns of American TV hits, along with syndicated sensations like Wheel of Fortune, gross close to $6 billion a year worldwide. That huge market has long been the virtually exclusive preserve not of the networks but of the Hollywood studios that create the shows. The Federal Communications Commission decreed in 1970 that ABC, CBS and NBC, then the largest buyers of programs by far, could not also be major sellers. But more recently, facing profit-sapping competition from cable TV and independent stations, the Big Three lobbied the FCC to change the rules. Last week the FCC gave the networks a piece of the action: they may produce and thus possess up to 40% of TV's prime-time shows. It will take the networks years to reap the rewards of the new ruling. Nonetheless, producers reacted angrily. "We made the best shows the networks ever had," lamented Lee Rich, executive producer of Dallas. "This decision kills the system." Responded NBC's equally dissatisfied general counsel: "We went to the FCC seeking complete repeal."