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Best Show: Arrested Development

In TelevisionWeek’s semiannual Critics Poll, Fox’s first-year series “Arrested Development” was the first comedy in more than five years to be named the best show on television. NBC’s short-lived adaptation of British import “Coupling” was voted the worst show. Leslie…

Biz Briefs

Vivendi Universal and deposed Chairman and CEO Jean-Marie Messier last week settled fraud charges with the Securities and Exchange Commission, ending an 18-month probe by the agency and resolving a months-long battle between the company and its former leader over…

Coke Pushing the Vanilla Envelope

“American Idol” is a show that inspires its advertisers to create unique and specialized spots to go along with product placements. Here are some of the marketing plans of the show’s major advertisers.Coca-Cola: There will be a new direction in…

Nick Puts Muscle Behind everGirl

When it comes to licensing its brands for consumer products, Nickelodeon has proved that it has the Midas touch, selling $5 billion in goods based on hugely popular Nickelodeon characters such as Dora the Explorer, the “Rugrats” clan and SpongeBob…

Nissan Searching for Media Auditor

Nissan North America is shopping for a media-audit company to keep a close eye on its $966 million in media spending. A decision is expected this month.Steven Wilhite, VP of marketing for the Nissan and Infiniti brands, confirmed the search…

The Insider

She’s been an entertainment correspondent for “Today” for 12 years, and now Jill Rappaport’s career is taking off in a whole new direction. She’s the host of “NBC on Ted,” a 15- to 20-minute entertainment-driven TV package that will be…

Tambor’s Casting a Fortunate Accident

“Arrested Development’s” Jeffrey Tambor, who gives a spirited performance as family patriarch George Bluth Sr., was supposed to appear in only the first episode of the series before his character headed off to prison. To Mitch Hurwitz, the show’s creator…

TV News Notes

MSNBC is expected to announce this week that Deborah Norville, who has anchored King World’s “Inside Edition” since 1995, will host an hour-long weeknight show starting sometime in January. A source familiar with Ms. Norville’s new deal said King World…

USA Sets Aggressive Pace for Q1

As it looks ahead to being swallowed by NBC, USA Network is putting its most aggressive slate of original programming on the air in the first quarter.Despite being one of the first cable networks to offer original programming, USA has…

AP Plans to Make Its Votes Count

When the presidential primaries begin this month, the Associated Press takes over vote-tallying chores for the defunct Voter News Service, the exit poll consortium that previously provided network news divisions with race projections. VNS was funded by the Associated Press,…