TV News Roundup: Week of August 5, 2013

Renewals, upfront sales and TV broadcast wars make up this week's TV Roundup for the week of July 28, 2013.

MONDAY:

• J-Lo back on AMERICAN IDOL:
  It sounds as if the star will be back as a Judge for the 2014 edition of AMERICAN IDOL.
• From EARL to JENNIFER:
  Jamie Pressly (MY NAME IS EARL) has sign on for the TV Land pilot JENNIFER FALLS. The sitcom is about a career woman, and mom, losing her high paying job and moving back with her mother.
• The new Dr. Who?:
  BBC reveled that Peter Capaldi will be the new DR. Who, starting with the Christmas Episode, later this year.

TUESDAY:

• Social TV activity can sometimes influence ratings:
  Neilsen has analysed TV ratings and tweets for a couple hundred programs. It showed that about half the shows had large twitter activity. But it is unclear if the ratings drive the social activity or does social activity pump the ratings. If you follow the daily posting of Social TV Activity on this site, you will see that a high rated show like THE BIG BANG THEORY can drive far less activity than a low rated show like THE VAMPIRE DIARIES, which struggles in the ratings. 
• Pay TV continues to lose subscribers:
  Pay TV (Cable) lost about 380,000 customers during the second quarter (April - June) of this year. This continues a trend that has seen over 911,000 pay TV customers leaving the services. That is a jump of 216% from the previous year.

WEDNESDAY:

• CBS picks up sic-fi series for 2014:
  CBS has ordered the science fiction series EXTANT straight to series for the summer of 2014. the series is from Steven Spielburg and Amblin Television. 
• FOX Sports 1 scores major golf package:
  The new FOX Sports 1 cable network out bid NBC/Golf Channel and ESPN for the right of the USA Open Golf Tournament. Coverage for the even will begin in 2015.
• Those Ducks can act:
  Willie and Si Robertson, of DUCK DYNASTY, will be in the seasonpremiere of ABC's LAST MAN STANDING, Sept. 20.

THURSDAY:

• Aereo expanding into more markets:
  Aereo announced that it will be expanding its service intoMiami (Sept. 2), Houston (Sept. 16) and Dallas (Sept. 23). [LINK]
• Another season for AMERICAN BIBLE CHALLENGE:
  GSN announced that it has renewed the Jeff Foxworthy game show AMERICAN BIBLE CHALLENGE for a third season.

FRIDAY:

• SYFY sequel set for July 2014:
  The sensation that is SHAKNADO will have its follow up movie ready for SYFY to air in July, 2014.