You can count on Hong Kong Cable Television to keep expanding the range of viewing options available to its subscribers. It already carries BBC, CNN and many others that add to the flavour of Hong Kong, international city in Asia.
Now Cable TV is taking advantage of some of its new digital capacity. Six adult channels become available from 6am this Thursday. They include Channel Blue from South Korea, Paradise TV with Japanese adult game shows, Future TV with Japanese adult sport (adult sport?) content and Playboy TV.
Cable TV spokesman Garmen Chan said the new channels were being launched as part of the broadcaster's 'tiering initiative' - subscribers can take any single channel for HK$60 per month or HK$168 for all.
Parents need not worry about exposing their children to this fascinating but adult content: there will be set-top box security codes to ensure parents retain viewing control.
Cable TV also screens all its adult material carefully before broadcasting it, putting mosaic patterns over close up shots of some body parts and excessive violence. 'Breasts are OK, but close-ups of private parts are taboo,' Mr Chan says.
Mr Chan is one of several Cable TV staffers tasked with watching hours of uncut adult material from around the world. In the company's Standards and Practices Department, offending material is identified and later edited out. Mr Garmen said: 'It is one of my many duties. It is becoming increasingly obnoxious.'
Office dining: As Hong Kong companies cut budgets for such essentials as business lunches, the Landmark's new Deli at Trattoria has taken a bold step: it has hired two full-time delivery staff to bring its high-quality-at-a-reasonable-price savouries and sandwiches directly to office customers in Central.
