SONY TO LAUNCH TWO CABLE CHANNELS

Sony Pictures plans to use its vast movie library to launch two new movie channels in October in the U.S. — one high-definition channel that the studio would own and operate on its own and another, a horror-movie channel named FearNet, that it will jointly own with Lionsgate and Comcast. (Fearnet is currently available online and as a video-on-demand channel.) In an interview with today’s (Wednesday) Los Angeles Times, SNL Kagan TV analyst Derek Baine observed that unlike other media conglomerates, Sony has previously not developed a cable channel in the U.S. “Perhaps they are doing this because the market to sell movies to broadcast and cable networks has been so bad,” he said.