Tele-Communications Inc.
"South Park" became immediately one of the most popular shows on cable television, averaging consistently between 3.5 and 5.5 million viewers. The Denver-based Tele-Communications Inc., the largest cable operator in the U.S. at the time, had just dropped Comedy Central, but when "South Park" debuted, Denver newspapers and radio stations heavily criticized the operator for not carrying the hit show of the two local filmmakers—Parker and Stone. Doug Herzog, Comedy Central's president at the time, said that the public "went nuts" as the network received about ten million new subscriptions through Tele-Communications Inc. alone, "which at that time was unheard of."