SHOW BUSINESS: Test for Toll TV

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After seven years of often bitter debate, the Federal Communications Commission said last week that it will "consider" applications from any television station that wants to take a try at pay-as-you-see TV. FCC opened the door to all the many pay-TV systems now being developed instead of okaying only one or two, as telecasters had expected. Each system thus will scramble to sign up stations for its service and to corner the limited supply of performing talent and first-run movies. This may pinch the viewer; since his set can be adjusted to receive only one pay system, it will be blacked out of the good shows on the other systems. The sweaty competition will also spur attempts by the established free TV networks to muscle out the pay-TV upstarts. Yet some of its most ardent opponents were pleased that pay TV will be put to a three-year test. Said American Broadcasting Co.'s Vice President Sterling C. ("Red"') Quinlan: "I hope pay-TV falls right on its rump. I really do not know if it's any good, but it has got to be tried."

Static. Many FCC commissioners predict privately that not enough of the public will pay for toll TV to make it practical. Although the FCC's decision will help resolve the issue, it will also set up many hurdles for pay-TV proponents.

Each station that wants to try pay TV will have to petition FCC for permission. Furthermore, the commission will not entertain any applications until after March 1. Thus it skillfully tossed the problem to Congress, many of whose members oppose pay TV because powerful pressure groups, e.g., unions and veterans' organizations, have protested that it will be an added expense on family budgets. Congress could effectively discourage pay TV by setting up rigid standards for performance. Arkansas Democrat Oren Harris said that his House Commerce Committee will investigate, and Brooklyn Democrat Emanuel Celler has authored a bill to make pay TV illegal.

The powerful TV networks will wage the strongest campaign against the pay system. So will their admen and the moviehouse operators, who stand to lose business. They argue that pay TV will drain the free networks of talent, penalize the majority in favor of the minority that would be able to pay for a better show. Cracked CBS President Frank Stanton: "Television could not long remain half free and half fee."

Scramble. The problems are compounded because only one of the many experimental pay systems is likely to survive, and stations that bet on a loser will suffer. New systems are coming out all the time. Solomon Sagall, a founder of Britain's TV-pioneering Scophony, Ltd., last week filed to patent a system that will send a clear picture but add sound only when a subscriber flicks a switch. Says Sagall: "The picture teases you to buy."

Nevertheless, the race centers on three major companies: Manhattan's Skiatron Electronics and Television Corp., Los Angeles' International Telemeter Corp. (88% owned by Paramount Pictures), Chicago's Zenith Radio Corp.. which pioneered toll TV in 1947. All three transmit scrambled TV pictures, and the viewer decodes them by dropping coins into a box affixed to the set or by slipping a billing card into a slot on the set.