Anyone watching Al Gore's t.v. channel

[lynch03]

As of now it's 50 minutes old, just turned it on. It's channel 366 on my direct t.v.

check this to see what channel it is or if it's available for you http://www.current.tv/ (click , get current at bottom)

Seems like just a collage of random stuff right now.

[skids]

1. That's their format...

It's for the MTV generation. But thankfully, paced a little slower than MTV at 3-4 minutes per peice.

See their FAQ on the webpage.

[Zhade]

2. Yeah, actually, I was here at work when it launched on DirecTV...

...and I had to troubleshoot when a problem happened a minute into launch - if anyone saw the slide go up or down, that was me, fixin' a problem.

So far, meh. What's with the "no shows" thing? Not a smart idea, IMHO. To be honest, i don't know what kind of channel this is supposed to be, exactly. I watched it for an hour after the outage, and STILL don't know!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

5. Yeah, when I volunteered at a radio station in Portland, I had lots of

conversations with various radio pros, and they talked about the importance of having listeners have some idea of what to expect when they tune in. Even a so-called "eclectic" station probably will not program Gregorian chants or polkas.

I found this new station tiring to watch because it jumped all over the place, with topics switching back and forth with not even a stream-of-consciousness connection. It went from hang gliding to suicide in Japan to a puff piece about a band to Deepak Chopra giving vague advice to vague questions and a segment about egg donors.

If they're going to do eclectic, they should make the pieces have at least some psychological connection. There's a radio announcer on Oregon Public Broadcasting who has a weekend night eclectic music program, and he will start out with (and I'm making up these examples, but the actual programming is like this) Brazilian song about Carnival followed by a New Orleans song about Mardi Gras to a Dixieland jazz piece to a bebop piece with a similar title to a solo jazz piece by the trumpeter in that ensemble to a Baroque trumpet piece to a Baroque chorale piece.

If the programmers on Current could manage something like that, give the pieces at least some underlying connection, they'd have a more watchable product.

But I'm still mad about NWI.

[laststeamtrain]

6. Steve Cantor- great music programmer. Great voice.

[Zhade]

24. Personal prediction: if this remains the format, Current TV will fail.

I say that with all the authority a decade of broadcast operations experience carries (which is to say, not much :P ).

[earthboundmisfit]

3. Looks like it's gonna be cool, and check out the Job Opportunities

at their site - What a kickass job it'd be to work with something like this! Congrats to Current!:toast:

[fleabert]

4. i tried to find a channel- the link on their site basically gathered my

info and told me nothing.

unless I am stupid and can't figure out how to use it. (doubtful, but not impossible)

[Sapphire Blue]

8. It did the same thing to me... didn't want to accept my email address

... kept telling me to fill it in when I had already done so... again & again. :shrug:

I called Comcast a couple of weeks ago... the rep didn't know anything about Current, though I had read that some Comcast markets would be carrying it. Satellite isn't an option, as I can't get a signal. Oh well, sounds like I'm not missing much.

[lynch03]

7. can someone tell me what NWI is and what happened to it??

[Lydia Leftcoast]

9. Newsworld International actually was the best source of news on TV

It ran mostly Canadian content, along with foreign news broadcasts that varied from year to year. Most recently, they had NHK, Britain's ITV, and Germany's Deutsche Welle.

It was the liberal channel that everyone wanted, and I plugged it constantly, but no, you were all convinced that Al Gore was going to found a liberal channel.

It was the only channel I could stand to watch during the invasion of Iraq, with news from inside the U.S., the U.K., and in Iraq, and commentators from a wide variety of viewpoints.

It was started by the Canadian Broadcasting Company, sold to a private group about five years ago, and then to Al Gore's consortium. It went off the air just a few hours ago to be replaced by whatever Current is. The announcers said they got over a thousand messages from sad viewers ranging from the Bahamas to Hawaii.

[lynch03]

10. THAT FUCKING BLOWS

I would have chosen a liberal news network over whatever the hell this is any day, what was Gore thinking NWI seems really good and it seemed as though it *HAD* much potential. ( I'm just going by what people are saying but have no reason to doubt them, I see lots of people mourning about NWI)

This network doesent' seem like it will accomplish anything. Did low ratings or anything factor into the change, why would they decide to suddenly dump it, or did they just want to follow through with their own vision. THAT DOES SUCK, we've been begging for a news network, I wish I knew about this before, did it even air in the U.S.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

11. Yes, it aired in the U.S. on digital cable

and the format stayed pretty much the same after the CBC sold it.

I saw it in both Portland (Comcast) and Minneapolis (Time-Warner).

[Jackson4Gore]

12. Nope

A liberal station would be DOA. Gore knows what he is doing. It is for 18-35 year olds. So if you don't fall in that category, you probablly won't get it.

[lynch03]

13. uhh well obviously NWI did have a quite respectable audience

and was liberal, and was good, at least from what I'm getting here.

[Zhade]

26. I just turned 30. I "get" it, it's just not very interesting.

It feels very forced, very haphazard in content (and while I understand the attempt to mock podcasting, even to the extent of calling the featurettes 'pods', I find it a poor choice for a network format), and like it's trying waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too hard to be 'hip' and 'cool'.

I watched it last night, and I can tell you this: I have zero interest whatsoever in short-form videos about bridge-jumpers, egg donors, Baptist preachers, or maudlin public service announcments about suicide in Japan.

I guess I really don't know why this is thought to be interesting and fresh. It's nothing really new, except in the more liberal attitude, but I just don't see myself tuning it regularly.

I'll happily wait to see if it becomes more relevant and interesting. I suppose part of the problem is that I wish they'd stuck with the original idea of a news network, instead of this potluck format. We'll see how it turns out.

[dissent1977]

30. I think a liberal station would be very successful

Just look at the success of Farenheit 9/11, there is a huge potential market out there for media from a leftist perspective. If FOX News can succeed so can a progressive network. Don't listen to people on the right who say otherwise, most of them also said that no one would want to see Farenheit 9/11.

That being said, I realize that is not the kind of network Al Gore is trying to make. We will have to wait for IWT News (http://iwtnews.com/) before we can get a true progressive news network.

[NYCGirl]

20. Yes, NWI had very low ratings and was losing money. NT

[BlueEyedSon]

15. Sad that Direct canned them, they have plenty of spare channels....

[Lydia Leftcoast]

16. DirectTV didn't can NWI

Al Gore did. :grr:

[BlueEyedSon]

17. Why did he need to buy a channel to transform?

couldn't he just start one from scatch? It's not like he kept anything....

[Lydia Leftcoast]

18. Or get rid of one of those loathesome shopping channels

or fundie channels, not the best news channel that was already on TV.

[NYCGirl]

19. Because the channel already had a fair amount of distribution, and

they were on sale CHEAP — NWI had been leaking money for a long time.

[Zhade]

27. Thank you, LL. You are correct, my company did not ditch NWI.

We had no control over the decision whatsoever.

[Zhade]

25. The Canadian parts of NWI were great.

I watched the channel constantly here at work during the run-up to the war and well beyond. I got kind of tired of their increasing reliance on CBS news pieces, though, which we all know simply don't cover the whole truth.

There was a lot of shoddy reporting during the U.S.-backed coup in Haiti, for example - full of demonization and not much information. It's about then that I stopped watching NWI.

But I fully agree with the Canadian bits - I really appreciated that content, and the foreign broadcasts.

This new channel is NOT worth the loss of NWI, at least at this point. I'll cross my fingers, but I'm thinking "major re-vamping of entire lineup (confusing with no regular series to hook viewers), personalities (kind of forced and trying way too hard to be hip), and content (you described the problem very well)" before it becomes worth paying much attention to, and before it sees any real success.

YMMV.

[wli]

14. I never had the option of getting NWI, this isn't in my lineup either

Hurrah for cable monopolies. Or something.

[bluedog]

21. I watched a bit this morning.I don't like it!

I've seen no news.from the US or the World.all I seen was a bunch of teens.singing...an "egg" donor issue........no..don't think I can stay with this format.

[NYCGirl]

22. As far as I can tell, there is no "news" per se. NT

[KharmaTrain]

23. Looks Like Projects From A Film Class

I, too will miss NWI. It showed newscasts from other countries (CSPAN does it only occasionally) and didn't give the corporate media spin. I enjoyed watching "The National" when that was on. Hopefully CBC can get another, better organized and funded channel going.

Last night I tried watching this channel for a couple hours. Maybe I'm not "hip" or into the cutsey set and delivery, but I don't expect to watch much of Current. It reminds me of class projects from a film class...which is well and good as I believe the Indie Media needs outlets to grow and sophisticate, but it has little interest other than that.

It looks like there is some financial advertising behind it. At least at the start. Let's see how things go after a couple weeks/months...and see if that support is still there. I suspect there's going to be a lot of changes with this channel and format.

[Sewsojm]

28. I already miss NWI,

This is very disappointing, Current sucks so far!

[bluedog]

29. it really sucks

I am not teenager or young adult.I'm mid 50's and this network does not appeal to me.........its like watching a reality show.....naw.........I miss the old old network already!

[Jackson4Gore]

31. Get over it

As I said, if you are not the targeted age, you won't get it. If you want a liberal station, go start one. You will see it's not that easy.

[parasim]

32. I asked my 22yr old son what he thought of it.

I'll avoid giving my opinion about the show to avoid being flamed because I'm not in the demographic, but I asked my very progressive-minded son to just watch it and tell me what he thought. I didn't give him any of my thoughts because I didn't want to influence his opinion.

here's his review:

1) it's boring
2) the look is outdated
3) I feel like the talking heads on the show are talking down to me. Seems very condescending.
4) I probably won't be watching it.

:shrug:

I'm just sayin'...

[Zhade]

33. See post #26.

NT!