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'A-Team,' 'Kojak' get new life on NBC sites

By Reuters
Story last modified Wed Feb 20 05:48:12 PST 2008

NBC Universal said Tuesday it will stream full episodes of old TV shows, including The A-Team and Kojak, on its Web sites. Beginning this month, the shows will be available on NBC.com and on network-owned niche sites SciFi.com, ChillerTV and SleuthChannel.com. The NBC.com additions are A-Team, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Miami Vice, Buck Rogers, Emergency, Night Gallery, and the original Battlestar Galactica.

Buck Rogers and Battlestar Galactica also will be available on SciFi.com, along with Tek War and Night Gallery. Hitchcock, Swamp Thing, Tremors, Cro, and Night Gallery will be featured on ChillerTV.com. And SleuthChannel.com will present the Telly Savalas-starring Kojak, Miami Vice, A-Team, Night Gallery, and Simon & Simon. The content also will be available on Hulu, the online-video joint venture that NBC Universal launched with News Corp. last year. Through Hulu, the shows will be syndicated to Yahoo, News Corp.'s MySpace.com, MSN, Comcast, Time Warner's AOL, and other Web destinations.

Many (all?) of these are also available to Netflix subscribers to watch online free. I hope this deal doesn't alter that feature, I use it almost daily. Watching Alfred Hitchcock Presents every night the past week.

Yeah, but it costs money to be a Netflix subscriber, does it not?

Yes, and my concern was that it would go away for me, a paying Netflix subscriber, if NBC/Universal chooses a licensee to distribute their online content. I like having everything in one place, in one format. Even if the other one is free for all, it's still more convenient for me on Netflix. I certainly don't want anyone to HAVE to pay to watch this stuff though, don't get me wrong. It's probably a whole different business model anyway.

I'm envisioning a new series ... a bald reporter with a lollipop who investigates the supernatural ... KOLJAK.

Or maybe MADJAK?

How about a series about a lollipop-sucking starship engineer who is a serial killer in his spare time...call it Redjac.