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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 23, 1989)
WEATHER: INDEX Monday, mostly sunny and warmer, high near 80, southwest winds 5 to 10 miles per hour. News Digest... .2 Mostly dear Monday night, low of 45 to 50. Edltorial.4 Tuesday, mostly sunny and warmer, high near Sports.7 80 Wednesday, chance of thundershowers, Arts & Entertainment.11 warm, high of 70 and low in low-50s. Thursday Classifieds.15 and Friday, highs in 60s and lows in mid-40s. Vol. 89 No. 40 [Nebraska football |pay-per-vie\v offer Hends up profitless •y Jana reaersen Bfcnior Reporter lthough charging fans to watch Nebraska football on jjll cable TV hasn’t been profit |fcle this year for area cable compa • flies, a representative from Ca Blevision said the local company jiants to continue providing the serv t “We’d still like to do it,” Ca blevision general manager Dick Bates said. “We went into it knowing the first year would be a losing propo sition.” Bates said Cablcvision needed to sell at least 1,900 pay-per-view three game packages to break even. The jhree-game package included Nc |raska against Missouri, Oklahoma . HState and Oklahoma. K % HI 11H i I • M \ J & 4" ‘People will sup port live pay-per view, not tape de lay.’ —Kohler | j^j§§. | g§ | ||g gjj| Cablevision sold about 400 pack ages, he said. He attributed this year’s poor re sponse to a lack of information about pay-per-view television and the poor selection of games available. h Because NCAA sanctions prohibit live broadcasts of Oklahoma State and Oklahoma football games, two of the three games in the pay-per-view package only could be broadcast tape delayed. Bates said. That means those games can’t be replayed until after 10:30 p.m., he 4$said, long after most fans know the , Results of the game. Mike Kohler, communications ||pnanagcr for Cox Cable in Omaha, ^ J$aid Cox Cable decided not to air EjgSaturday’s game against Oklahoma 5iatc because only about 50 subscrib e;s oracrca pay-per-view tor the game. About 2,700 Cox Cable subscrib ers ordered pay-per-view for the live broadcast of the game against Mis souri, Kohler said. “That clearly indicates one thing,” he said. “People will support live pay-per-view, not tape delay.” Because Cox Cable focuses its pay-per-view promotions on individ ual broadcasts, he said, only 100 to 150 multiple-game packages were ordered, aJIowing the company to cancel Saturday’s broadcast with few complaints. After the game was can celed, he said, the cable company offered single-game refunds for package subscribers. The game was canceled because the company would not have made a profit from airing it, he said. Unlike other pay-per-view agree mnnlc h/Kata (Ka aaUI a • ••viaau »» ikvi V H»V VMi/«V VV/ilipUHJ shares subscription profits with the company providing the broadcast, Kohler said, the NU football pay-per view agreement requires the com pany to pay programming costs up front before collecting revenue from subscribers. When not many subscribe, he said, it’s not profitable for the cable com pany to pay the up-front costs. Bales said that in addition to offer ing three-game packages, Ca blevision also sells the games indi vidually. He said only 17 individuals or dered pay-per-view for Saturday’s Oklahoma State game. But because there was a larger number of package orders, he said, Cablevision decided to air the game anyway. Unlike last week’s broadcast, Bates said Cablevision didn’t have any problems Saturday night with bars showing the broadcast illegally. He said violations probably were lower because of last week’s ‘ ‘crack down” on offenders and because the game wasn’t live. The game’s late starting time also meant that the bars probably closed before it was over, he said. UNL Anthropologist gets involved By Pat Dinslage Staff Reporter nobert Hitchcock takes on the world --‘60s style. “In some senses, an thropologists are political mili tant-type people,” Hitchcock says. “A lot of anthropologists don’t like the perspective I outline. They feel we should not be involved in change, just study the process. “I person ally think that that’s a naive . . . impossible position, because just by your very presence, you’re having an impact on that society,” he says. Hitchcock., a visiting assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Ncbraska-Lincoln, radiates intensity and enthusiasm. He starts softly, slowly, outlining his main points. He is soft-spoken, even when most excited. He focuses his gaze on his listener and makes one understand why the Bantu-stands in Africa arc the same as the Native American reservations here in America, and why neither system wonts. “It’s taking a group of people on the basis of their ethnic affili ation, and assigning them a desig nated piece of land, depriving them of the rights they would have otherwise at the national level,” he says. Hitchcock specializes in the field of development anthropol ogy, a subdiscipline of cultural anthropology. “I’m a lot more active in politi cal issues than most anthropolo gists. I’m a lot more outspoken,” he says. “There are certain elements, whether the South African govern ment, or the American govern ment, or other governments, that may not like the political positions I take,” Hitchcock says. Although he has never person ally felt at risk in his fieldwork, there have been times when he could have been imprisoned for his political views. One such time was William Lauar/Daily Nebraskan Robert Hitchcock, professor of development anthro pology, specializes in African culture. Pictured are bushman throwing sticks used for hunting and wooden carvings from West Africa. when he visited the African coun try of Somalia this summer, he says. ‘‘I wasn’t very happy about seeing food diverted to the use of the military, for example,” he says. ‘‘And I made that known. The government was not very happy with that position. Had I not been about to leave, I suppose I could have been detained for that position.” See HITCHCOCK on 6 Joke computer message slows 1 homework in Nebraska Union | oy jerry uucniner 9h Senior Reporter A Halloween computer virus message m that appeared on computer screens I ajL in the user room of the Nebraska I Union late T hursday night and Friday mom K ing was a prank and not a real virus, a University of Nebraska-Lincoln official w said. Gerald Kutish, associate director of the I UNL Computing Resource Center, said I someone replaced the start-up file that nor I mally welcomes users to the Macintosh I computer system with a message that read, I “Beware of the Halloween virus.” Kutish said the prankster also drew a 8 moon, cat, pumpkin, bunny rabbit and tree I stump that appeared with the phony virus IK message. Besides replacing the start-up message, I the prankster also removed the file that I allows documents to be printed, he said. Ail of UNL’s computer software pro ■ grams contain checks for viruses that warn ?[ the user if viral penetration has occurred, he ■ said. Kutish said he was notified Friday mom IWIII. Computing Resource Center workers immediately responded and corrected the problem that morning, he said, v Kutish said he doesn’t know who pulled the Halloween prank, but said he has alerted computer consultants in all of UNL’s user rooms to be alert for other such problems. “The point is that unauended labs are vulnerable to this sort of mischief,” Kutish said. Mary Nell Westbrook, a senior news editorial major, said she and about five others were in the union user room when the message first appeared Thursday evening. “That was a good-looking screen tor whoever did it,” she said. “It was kind of v*mav« Westbrook said no computer consultants were in the room at the time, and nobody could be reached at the computing center to examine the computers. The prank prevented her and other stu dents from printing their work, Westbrook said. Kutish said the Halloween prankster is not the first to engage in such “malicious” See PRANK on 3 Crowd cheers and jeers speeding 17th-St. drivers By Lisa Donovan Senior Editor About 100 people cheered and jeered for 2 1/2 hours Sunday night as Lincoln Police offi cers stopped speeding motorists on 17th Street between R and Vine streets. According to Sgt. Dave Hamly, 82 viola tions were issued between 4:30 and 7 p.m. as onlookers stood on the northeast side of Cather Hall applauding the police’s efforts. Eight officers set up a radar detection unit, complete with a scoreboard-type screen flash ing the cars’ speeds, just outside Lot G, a parking area north of Cather-Pound-Neihardt Residence Complex. The detection unit was connected to a radar gun that clocked ihc speed and fed the informa tion into the display screen. Hamly said display units usually attract crowds. “I think a lot of it has to do with the display that goes up -- people can actually sec the speeds we’re clocking,” he said. Although the detectors with display units have been used in this area three limes before, this is the first time they’ve used the MPH K15 model radar. Sgt. Tom Towle said the crowd applauded and cheered every time a speeder was pulled over. “And then we’d miss a few and they’d kinda boo that we didn’t get them,” he said. Hamly said he wasn’t surprised by the pub lic support. 4 ‘They ’ve always gotten into the idea of it - there were even people who had gotten tickets (Sunday) that were in the crowd.” Towle said this stretch of road has a reDuta lion for low compliance with the 25 mile-per hour speed limit ‘ ‘This stretch of road is a concern because of the pedestrian (traffic),” Towle said. The radar ‘‘is an educational tool to motor ists and others,” Towle said, ”... to watch their speed. A lot of people don’t realize how fast they’re going.” But Towle said most violators took their punishment “pretty well.” “We do this to get everybody to think about speed and think about what area of town they’re in,” he said.