Stringer, who left CBS a year ago to head up a telephone company joint venture into interactive broadcasting, was the fourth guest lecturer of 1995-96 Distinguished Speakers Series. Stringer spoke Thursday, April 25 at the Center for the Arts Mainstage.

Tele-TV, the upstart company Stringer now heads, is at the cutting edge of what may well be the next communications revolution: Video-on-Demand programming. "Say you like British Mysteries on A&E on Tuesday evenings as I do," explained the 54-year-old, Oxford-educated Welshman. "you could use our 'black box' to set your tele to receive it whenever is most convenient for you; say, Thursday at 10 p.m."

Tele-TV has invested more than $1 billion in an entirely new system of communications distribution, even though it doesn't yet have a single customer, Stringer explained. The company, when fully operational, will offer microwave digital transmission of between 120 and 150 channels in competition with traditional Cable companies. "That's been the one constant among my careers; I've always competed against cable," Stringer observed.

Last week's merger of NYNEX and Bell Atlantic, the two largest "baby Bells," has made Stringer's new joint venture "less joint." Tele-TV had been formed by the CEOs of NYNEX, Bell Atlantic and Pacific Telesis. "I'll have one less boss, which should make things even easier," said Stringer.

The telephone companies, Stringer explained, have a strategic advantage in this competition over cable: Power. "If the power goes out, copper phone lines still carry their own power. That's why you don't lose phone service. But, you can lose cable service." Eventually, the digital signals could be carried over standard copper telephone lines.

A year ago, just before CBS was sold to Westinghouse, Stringer left after 30 years with the network. Stringer explains that he took the Tele-TV job after his agent and friend Michael Ovitz and the CEOs of the three phone companies involved in the joint venture "ganged up on me in a hotel room." Ovitz was the Hollywood mega-agent who negotiated the deal with Stringer that brought David Letterman from NBC to CBS.

Stringer's leadership brought CBS from last place to first in the all-important network ratings. Landing Letterman was one of his major coups at CBS. Although the comedian gets his share of ribbing over his $14 million salary, Stringer confesses, the network made $100 million on his "Late Show" during its first year. "I'd say that's a pretty good return on investment."

Stringer remains a television enthusiast and, he concedes, the major networks aren't going away anytime soon. However, he agrees with critics who contend network programming is, at best, mediocre. "It was different when I first started. This business was producing episodes for $25,000 each. Today, one episode of Roseanne can cost $2 million," he observed.

"Everyone in Hollywood has earnest intentions of producing good television," Stringer told a news conference Thursday afternoon. "But they also must get a 30 share. That leads to a lot of formula producing and follow-the-leader. You get a 'Friends' and it's a big hit, so all of a sudden there are 15 'Friends' knockoffs on TV."

Network television hasn't cornered the market on mediocrity either, Stringer said. Cable channels are forced to play items repeatedly to cover the demand at different times of day. "That's why you can have an 80-channel-plus cable system yet still sit there with your remote surfing at 9 p.m. and conclude there is nothing on television."

And, Stringer took strong exception with last week's TV-Free campaign in schools around the country. "It is simply a myth that all TV is bad and that passive entertainment is somehow wrong," he said. Moderation in television, as in all things, is fine, says Stringer. "By all means, read a book. But when kids today give up television, what is that for? What, so they should play a video game?"

Born in Wales and educated at Oxford, Stringer recalled "I arrived here early in 1965, got a job in May and you drafted me in July." Stringer served a one-year tour of duty in Vietnam and points out, "When I left, we were still winning."

After returning from southeast Asia, Stringer began as a researcher in the news department of CBS, writing for Walter Cronkite and other network correspondents. He rose through the ranks of the news division, as a writer, director and producer, before becoming CBS CEO in 1988.

Poking fun at the '60s, Stringer chided, "It was a time when the information highway was Route 66, a chip was still a potato and the internet was some intramural basketball league, Michael Jackson had his original face and Bob Dole was considered too old to run for president.

"But my favorite vision of the '60s," he continued, "is picturing Bill Gates coming home from his first day of junior high and asking, 'Mommy, what's a nerd?"