Washington Post 2004 Annual Report Download - page 33

The circulation of The Gazette Newspapers is limited to Montgomery, Prince George's and Frederick Counties and parts of
Carroll County, Maryland. The Gazette Newspapers compete with many other advertising vehicles available in their
service areas, including The Potomac and Bethesda/Chevy Chase Almanacs, The Western Montgomery Bulletin, The
Bowie Blade-News, The West County News
and The Laurel Leader, weekly controlled-circulation community newspapers,
The Montgomery Sentinel, a weekly paid-circulation community newspaper, The Prince George's Sentinel, a weekly
controlled-circulation community newspaper (which also has a weekly paid-circulation edition), and The Frederick News-
Post
and Carroll County Times, daily paid-circulation community newspapers. The Southern Maryland Newspapers
circulate in southern Prince George's County and in Charles, Calvert and St. Mary's Counties, Maryland, where they also
compete with many other advertising vehicles available in their service areas, including the Calvert County Independent
and St. Mary's Today, weekly paid-circulation community newspapers.
In October 2004 Clarity Media Group, a company associated with Denver businessman and billionaire Philip Anschutz,
bought the The Montgomery, Prince George's and Northern Virginia Journals, three community newspapers with a
combination of paid and free circulation that had been published in suburban Washington, D.C. for many years by a local
company. In early February 2005, Clarity Media Group relaunched The Journal newspapers as The Examiner, a free
newspaper which is being published six days a week in northern Virginia, suburban Maryland and Washington, D.C.
zoned editions, each of which contains national and international as well as local news. The Company believes the three
editions of The Examiner are currently being distributed primarily by zip-code targeted home delivery in their respective
service areas. The Examiner will compete in varying degrees with The Gazette Newspapers, Express and The Washington
Post,
although the Company is unable to predict how significant a competitive factor The Examiner will ultimately prove to
be.
The advertising periodicals published by Greater Washington Publishing compete both with many other forms of advertising
available in their distribution area as well as with various other free-circulation advertising periodicals.
El Tiempo Latino competes with other Spanish-language advertising media available in the Washington, D.C. area,
including several other Spanish-language newspapers.
The Company's television stations compete for audiences and advertising revenues with television and radio stations and
cable television systems serving the same or nearby areas, with direct broadcast satellite (""DBS'') services, and to a
lesser degree with other video programming providers and with other media such as newspapers and magazines. Cable
television systems operate in substantially all of the areas served by the Company's television stations where they compete
for television viewers by importing out-of-market television signals and by distributing pay-cable, advertiser-supported and
other programming that is originated for cable systems. In addition, DBS services provide nationwide distribution of
television programming (including in some cases pay-per-view programming and programming packages unique to DBS)
using small receiving dishes and digital transmission technologies. In 1999 Congress passed the Satellite Home Viewer
Improvement Act, which gives DBS operators the ability to distribute the signals of local television stations to subscribers in
the stations' local market area (""local-into-local'' service), although since 2000 DBS operators have been required to
obtain the consent of each local television station included in such a service. The analog signal of each of the Company's
television stations is currently being distributed locally by DBS providers DirecTV and EchoStar. Under an FCC rule
implementing provisions of this Act, since 2002 DBS operators have been required to carry the analog signals of all full-
power television stations that request such carriage in the markets in which the DBS operators have chosen to offer local-
into-local service. The FCC has also adopted rules that require certain program-exclusivity rules applicable to cable
television to be applied to DBS operators. In addition, the Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act and subsequent
legislation continued restrictions on the transmission of distant network stations by DBS operators. Thus DBS operators
generally are prohibited from delivering the signals of distant network stations to subscribers who can receive the analog
signal of the network's local affiliate. Several lawsuits were filed beginning in 1996 in which plaintiffs (including all four
major broadcast networks and network-affiliated stations including one of the Company's Florida stations) alleged that
certain DBS operators had not been complying with the prohibition on delivering network signals to households that can
receive the analog signal of the local network affiliate over the air. The plaintiffs entered into a settlement with DBS
operator DirecTV, under which it agreed to discontinue distant-network service to certain subscribers and alter the method
by which it determines eligibility for this service. Litigation against DBS operator EchoStar is continuing. In addition to the
matters discussed above, the Company's television stations may also become subject to increased competition from low-
power television stations, wireless cable services, satellite master antenna systems (which can carry pay-cable and similar
program material) and prerecorded video programming.
Cable television systems operate in a highly competitive environment. In addition to competing with the direct reception of
television broadcast signals by the viewer's own antenna, such systems (like existing television stations) are subject to
competition from various other forms of television program delivery. In particular, DBS services (which are discussed in
2004 FORM 10-K 17