The BBC has over the years used its coverage of the 6 Nations rugby union tournament as a testing ground for new television technologies and on March 8 will mark a first by presenting the match between England and Scotland in 3D. The Calcutta Cup game will be shown in 3D stereoscopic high definition on a big screen to an invited audience at the Riverside Studios in Hammersmith, west London.

What is the secret of successfully sparking social networking on your Web site? Give ‘em something to talk about, and get it to them fast, says Joe Inzerillo, SVP, Multimedia and Distribution, MLB.com. At MLB.com that means slashing the turnaround time between when conversation-provoking plays happen and when they’re available on the various MLB.com platforms for fan scrutiny.

It’s only been three weeks but Avid Technology’s Kirk Arnold, executive vice president and general manager of the company’s professional video business unit, is promising a new attitude and focus on the professional video market that should have customers concerned that Avid has lost its way in terms of client support and company focus more confident in the company’s direction. “Over the past 15 years I’ve spend a lot of time in the general manager role at businesses going through a transformation and I have a passion for working at companies that were once great and helping them return to greatness,” says Arnold.

Canal+ is using the latest graphics manipulation technology for greater analysis and punditry of its coverage of French Ligue1, European Champions League and English Premier League football. The broadcaster has become the first French channel to install Red Bee Media's Piero 3D graphics system with the new "moveable player" feature, which allows presenters and experts to simply put their fingers on the image of a footballer and move it to another position on the pitch.

Motor Racing Network (MRN) Radio relocated and built all new audio studios and edit suites, which were up and running just in time for the February kickoff to the NASCAR season at the Daytona 500. MRN moved from Daytona, FL to Concord, NC, a suburb of NASCAR’s hub in Charlotte. In fact, the facility is built in what was once Darryl Waltrip’s race shop. Nice touch.

When NASCAR wants to get up-close and personal, it does so in a big way. Starting this season, Fox Sports has combined a camera and microphone in a stainless steel-and-brass container and buried four of them below each of the corners of the racetrack. The visual effect is stunning, with the camera angled so viewers can see the vehicles coming and, in some cases, rolling right over them. But when you add the audio component, the result is over the top.

Watching sports in high-definition is impressive, especially professional football’s defining game - the Super Bowl. The sharp, crystal clear picture essentially gives viewers front row seats to the action, letting them take in the game as if they were actually there. Even more impressive is watching the high-definition, slow-motion instant replay of a bone-crushing tackle, or the gracefulness of a wide-receiver making a gravity-defying catch. However, effectively recording such action for a high-definition broadcast, especially at Super Bowl XLII, is easier said than done.

The University of Oregon, School of Journalism and Communications, has installed a Broadcast Pix Slate 1000 switcher. System integrator Advanced Broadcast Solutions (ABS) worked with Broadcast Pix and the University to set up the Slate 1000 in the school’s television studio at the Chambers Electronic Media Center. That is where students enrolled in the Electronic Media program attend production classes and produce a daily five minute newscast as well as a weekly live half hour news program called, "Oregon News." The live newscast airs locally on area cable systems.

CBS and ProElite, Inc., a Los Angeles-based entertainment and media company that produces world class mixed martial arts (MMA) events, have signed a multi-year agreement that will bring one of the fastest growing spectator sports to a major broadcast television network for the first time.

The Sony BVM-L Series of LCD master monitors is going big time, literally, with the new BVM-L420, a 42-inch display (viewable area measured diagonally). The display’s larger size and design enhancements meet the needs of sports broadcasters and others that require critical monitoring such as in program and preview monitoring in broadcast master control rooms or in OB trucks. The new monitor is also well-suited for use high-end post production, telecine, color grading and digital intermediate work.

Sports graphics professionals will now be able to bridge graphics and video workflows via Vizrt Quattro, a new character generator that enables an operator to create fully animated graphics containing multiple videos from a single desktop interface.Viz Quattro was developed as an extension to Vizrt’s Viz Content Pilot content management and Viz Trio character generator to access Vizrt’s Media Asset Management solutions.

Wohler hits NAB with the new three-RU Touch-it Digital, offering multichannel video monitoring functionality via dual seven-inch high-resolution color LCD displays. The left monitor is a touch screen that displays from four to 16 thumbnail images. When one of these images is touched, that video source appears on the right monitor at full size and its HD/SD-SDI source signal is sent to an unbalanced output and to a VGA output for monitoring on an external display. Another version, Touch-it Hear-it, allows operators to interface visually with an IP-based intercom system.

Show Partners, a provider of broadcast television production, crewing, and design services will return to Las Vegas for the fourth straight year of production and show operations for the 2008 NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship.

TBS announced the first two months of its new baseball “Sunday MLB on TBS” schedule for the 2008 season.

PANORAMAdtv, the video products division of Wohler Technologies Inc., released the HDMon-90WS, the latest addition to Wohler's HDMon family of HD color video monitor displays. The 9-inch HDMon-90WS is a production-grade monitor that accepts dual HD/SD-SDI inputs, as well as analog component and composite signals, DVI signals, RGBHV video, and CGI images, serving as an ideal solution for users requiring high-quality viewing of both HD and SD images.

WASP3D will be participating in the forthcoming CABSAT, Dubai. As the HD technology continues to lead the broadcasting revolution for a few years; WASP3D will showcase its HD ready 3D graphics solution for application in newsroom graphics, live sports, financial graphics, Live Events & Elections, and Virtual sets. Few of the key highlights of the product are 3D text with character based effects, cloth effect with deformation forces (wind, gravity), easy to use drag and drop feature and media asset management module, to name a few.

NBC Sports has partnered with Crisp Wireless, a company that powers mobile businesses for media and entertainment brands, to build, manage and monetize their mobile website.

ESPN2 will air eleven Major League Lacrosse (MLL) games this season, all of which will be broadcast in high-definition.

DNF Controls has rolled out the SW2X1-GPI card for the company's SW2X1 electronic A/B switch. The GPI card enables easy switching of both GPIs and RS-422 signals, serving as a versatile replacement for mechanical A/B boxes and patch bays in applications including on-air automation, backup control, and emergency switching between primary and secondary control systems.