"We have had several male couples and lesbian couples come to our program from our competitors' program because they said they didn't feel comfortable there," Dr. Pang said.
"Third, isn't it time for us to update our 'report card,' the way we keep score on the ratings — our seasonal measurement — to reflect that we and our competitors program year round and have for years?
It ranked them by which are judged to be the most vulnerable to members' switching to competitors' programs.
Normally, classical music groups try to avoid duplicating competitors' programming, but this year early-music groups are lining up to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Monteverdi's Vespro Della Beata Vergine (Vespers of the Blessed Virgin).
The competitors, most prominently Microsoft, have released new versions of their messaging programs that can communicate with AOL's users, only to have the security team at the company's headquarters in Dulles, Va., track the unique signals of competitors' programs and block their users.
Microsoft became the blob that ate the PC software industry by folding versions of competitors' programs into Windows and Office.
On Sunday, Fox News host Chris Wallace called attention to Romney's absence from "Fox News Sunday" and his competitors' programs.
Brian Stelter of The New York Times noted that her appearance was unusual, as anchors from rival networks—in Couric's case, CBS do not typically make cameos on their competitors' programs.
In the end, the risk to Microsoft may not be that it will be forced to pay fines as large as the 497 million euros, or $613 million, being sought by the European Commission, or even to distribute a competitor's program, as it was reported to have agreed to do in ultimately unsuccessful settlement talks with the commission.
