USA network founder heads reality cable

LOS ANGELES -- Veteran television executive Kay Koplovitz will help steer a new cable channel focusing on the reality TV genre.\nKoplovitz was named chairman of the board of directors for Reality Central, which was announced last spring and is set to launch in mid-2004.\n"I think the industry is looking for fresh ideas, and I think reality programming has really worked its way into the vernacular of pop culture," Koplovitz said Tuesday. "To create a home base for it is very exciting."\nShe founded USA Network and was chairman and chief executive officer of USA Networks, which included Sci-Fi Channel and USA Networks International.\nIn October, Koplovitz co-founded The Director's Council, a national search firm focused on sourcing and placing independent candidates, drawn primarily from women and minorities, on corporate boards.\n"Kay's joining the board of Reality Central is a real breakthrough for our company," Blake Mycoskie, Reality Central's chief operating officer, said in a statement Tuesday.\nThe channel is being developed by Mycoskie, a businessman who competed on CBS's "The Amazing Race," and Larry Namer, a founder of E! Entertainment Television. Namer is Reality Central's president and CEO.\nKoplovitz will set strategy, raise capital and form international partnerships for Reality Central, they said.\nThe challenges of launching Reality Central are those faced by any channel in today's crowded cable environment, she said: getting cable operators to distribute it and gaining viewer attention.\nBut as with Sci-Fi Channel, Koplovitz said, Reality Central has the advantage of drawing on a "hard-core following." The reality genre is a durable one and not a fad, she said.\nReruns of domestic and imported series will represent half of the new channel's programming, Mycoskie and Namer said when announcing the venture in April.\nThe rest of the lineup will be behind-the-scenes looks at the shows and contestants, "all those things that feed the fan appetite," Namer said at the time.\nPrize winners from various reality shows were the first investors in the channel.\nReality Central expects it will reach a minimum of 3 million homes when it starts and could reach 30 million homes within two years, Namer said in April.