Abc

ABC and ESPN will broadcast their fourth straight World Cup next year and will televise all 64 games in high definition. The networks will not decide until after the draw on Dec. 9 how to split the games among ABC, ESPN and ESPN2, they said yesterday. All games of the tournament, which will be played in Germany from June 9 to July 9, will be broadcast live. For the 2002 World Cup, in Japan and South Korea, 58 games were televised live, with the final on ABC, 16 on ESPN and the rest on ESPN2.

And the Nielsen winner is . . . ABC. The ratings-challenged network last week earned its fourth weekly prime-time ratings crown this season, bolstered by the most-watched Academy Awards telecast ever (the highest-rated since 1983) and Barbara Walters' annual pre-Oscar schmoozefest. The Oscarcast was the runaway No. 1 show of the week, while the Walters show finished No. 5. For the week, ABC averaged 15,630,000 viewers, which was inflated by the 55,250,000 viewers who tuned in Monday to the Oscars.

ABC has come up with its own way to count television viewers next season for purposes of compensating advertisers for smaller-than-promised audiences. In the latest network reaction to an unexplained drop in A.C. Nielsen Co. ratings this year, ABC announced Thursday that it will factor previous years' ratings into its formula for so-called make-goods. The networks sell commercial time on the basis of expected audiences, and give advertisers free air time to "make good" for lower ratings.

ABC has redefined what it means to broadcast "live" by instituting a five-second delay for two of its talk shows, Good Morning America and The View, the New York Post reports. The change, which ABC says is permanent, is believed to be a response to pressure by the Federal Communications Commission for broadcasters to clean up their acts after Janet Jackson's Super Bowl breast flash. But ABC rep Felicia Minei Behr would say only that the network was "taking the steps necessary to ensure that what we air best serves our stations and our audience.

It's too bad that ABC is airing its new hour-long production of the Harold Pinter play The Dumb Waiter tonight (Ch. 6, 10 p.m.), when lots of people will be watching Hill Street Blues end its long and noble television career. One presumes that many of the adventurous viewers who have found Hill Street so satisfying might, under other circumstances, have taken a chance on ABC's brave, entertaining experiment. Everything about this Dumb Waiter is interesting. This two-man character study stars John Travolta and Tom Conti, an absurdist odd couple muttering Pinter's monosyllables with Cockney accents.

Following a couple of dismal outings, ABC Wednesday abruptly axed the new Tuesday comedy "Over the Top" and temporarily shelved "Hiller & Diller. " "Over the Top" starred Annie Potts and Tim Curry as a divorced couple living together after a dozen years apart. Since debuting last month, the series, from former "David Letterman" executive producer Robert Morton, has failed to generate a large enough audience to keep it on the air. On Tuesday, it finished fourth in its 8:30 p.m. period.

ABC has canceled the Jason Alexander vehicle Bob Patterson - the second flop featuring a Seinfeld alumnus and ABC's first cancellation of the season. Ratings of the show, featuring Alexander as a motivational speaker, went from mediocre to worse. Moving it to a different night did not help. Michael Richards, another Seinfeld player, starred in his own short-lived NBC comedy last season. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is due to star in an NBC series next year. Lane ailing In the week following an announcement by The Producers that selected choice seats for the hit Broadway musical would be made available for $480, the show's co-star, Nathan Lane, missed every performance after Tuesday.

"Family Matters" (Friday nights at 8:30 on Channel 6) probably will never be nominated for an Emmy. It will rarely introduce a thought-provoking storyline. Once in a while, the show will get a good review. But while most of the new network shows that premiered last fall have faded or died, "Family Matters" has been thriving, luring lots of people to TV sets each Friday night with its sometimes insipid storylines and overbearing sweetness. "Family Matters," a story about the Winslows, a black Chicago family, has won its Friday time slot 17 times in 20 tries, regularly beating out weak competition - the second halves of NBC's "Baywatch" and the latest CBS offering, "The Bradys.

OBVIOUSLY, ALL the good ones aren't taken. Otherwise how would ABC be able to cast another round of contestants for its surprising hit show, "The Bachelor"? And how could the network even think of creating a sort-of Sadie Hawkins version, with one woman and 25 single men, to be titled, of course, "The Bachelorette"? The new edition would follow the same rules as the original, which featured bachelor Alex Michel working his way down from 25 women to one "special someone.

The Trojans are marching into Happy Valley again and ABC-TV will carry the game Sept. 10. Southern California's second consecutive visit to Penn State will be aired on ABC (Channel 6) at 3:30 p.m. The Nittany Lions won last year's game, 21-20. Other highlights of ABC's college football schedule, released yesterday, include the season-opening Kickoff Classic matching West Virginia and Nebraska Aug. 28 at Giants Stadium (2 p.m.); Florida State-Virginia Sept. 3 (3:30 p.m.); Michigan-Ohio State, Nov. 19 (noon)