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Home Front: Culture Wars
Al Jazeera Acquires Current TV
2013-01-03
Al Jazeera on Wednesday completed a deal to take over Current TV, the low-rated cable channel that was founded by Al Gore and his business partners seven years ago.
Emphasis on 'low-rated', as in 'nobody's watching'...
Current will provide the pan-Arab news giant with something it has sought for years: a pathway into American living rooms. Current is available in about 60 million of the 100 million homes in the United States with cable or satellite service.
'Available' does not translate into 'viewed'...
Rather than simply use Current to distribute its English-language channel, called Al Jazeera English and based in Doha, Qatar, Al Jazeera will create a new channel, called Al Jazeera America, based in New York.
It will cater to the progressive left and to jihadis, but I repeat myself...
Roughly 60 percent of the programming will be produced in the United States, while the remaining 40 percent will come from Al Jazeera English.
Oh boy: original programming! That's something different from CurrentTV...
Al Jazeera may absorb some Current TV staff members.
And you won't notice the difference...
But Current's schedule of shows will most likely be dissolved in the spring.
And you won't notice the difference...
"Al Jazeera is planning to invest significantly in building 'Al Jazeera America,' a network focused on international news for the American audience," the Current chief executive Joel Hyatt said in an e-mail to staffers on Wednesday evening. Referring to Mr. Gore, he said, "Al and I will both serve on the advisory board of Al Jazeera America, and we look forward to helping build an important news network."
Just like Current TV, by gum. This means of course that Al-Jizz is doomed, but if we can snatch some of Qatar's cash it'll be to the good. Wonder if we could set up a Rantburg channel?
The plan will bring Al Jazeera, which is financed by the government of Qatar, into closer competition with CNN and other news channels in the United States.
'Competition' has a different meaning in English than in Arabic...
I dunno if they can compete with CNN. Those Arabs are pretty shy about oral sex on national teevee.
For Al Jazeera, the acquisition is a coming-of-age moment. A decade ago, the Arabic-language channel was reviled by American politicians for showing video tapes and messages from al Qaeda members and sympathizers. Now it is acquiring an American channel.

"They really want to be able to compete for American viewers, and they have to find some way to get on," said Philip Seib, the director of the center on public diplomacy at the University of Southern California and the author of "The Al Jazeera Effect."
They're going to find it hard to get left of CNN...
Mr. Seib said access to Americans is important both for economic reasons, for the channel's advertisers, and for "the journalistic legitimacy of their venture."
Something Current TV didn't worry itself over...
To date, the country's cable and satellite distributors have been reluctant to carry Al Jazeera English. It is available in just a handful of cities, including New York and Washington. To change that, Al Jazeera has lobbied distributors, called for a letter-writing campaign by supporters and promoted its widely praised coverage of the Arab Spring.

Acquiring Current TV, and thus its distribution deals across the country, solves this dilemma for Al Jazeera, at least partially.
Until distributors dump them...
Current is hard to find on many cable lineups, and some analysts say it's at risk of being dropped by some companies because of low ratings, but it would give Al Jazeera a foothold on the country's cable and satellite service lineups. Then Al Jazeera could revamp the channel and promote it as a new American-based news source.
They might even give Fox competition for 'fair and balanced' news...
Representatives for Current TV and Al Jazeera did not immediately respond to requests for comment. There was no immediate word about the sale price.
How many goats?
Current was conceived in 2005 after Mr. Gore and another co-founder, Joel Hyatt, bought the small cable news channel Newsworld International. Current's owners, along with Mr. Gore and Mr. Hyatt, include several venture capital firms and two major distributors, Comcast and DirecTV. After several years of constant suck in obscurity showing viewer-submitted videos and documentaries,
Always a ratings winner...
Current tacked to the left in 2011 with the hiring of MSNBC's Keith 'Raving Lunatic' Olbermann.
At which point their ratings declined...
A year later, Mr. Olbermann was fired,
Keif forgot that you can only stage a temper tantrum in the TV news biz when you have viewers...
but a liberal minded channel made in his image remained.
Talk about a legacy. Keif is gone but the failure lives on...
The channel now simulcasts liberal radio shows in the morning
Radio shows? I thought they were a TV channel...
and features news-talk shows in the evening by Joy Behar, Eliot Spitzer, Jennifer Granholm and others.
Both viewers are going to be so upset when Al-Jizz changes the programming. If they notice...
None of the shows have drawn significant audiences. On a typical night in 2012, about 42,000 people were watching the channel, according to Nielsen.
"And that's just in the USA!"
Mr. Spitzer quipped to a reporter from Mediabistro last month, "Nobody's watching, but I'm having a great time."
It does make you wonder what the business model is...
At the end of October, Current confirmed that it was considering killing selling itself.
Smart business guys, Hyatt and Gore. Usually you do an IPO when things are going good...
Mr. Hyatt said in a statement at the time, "Current has been approached many times by media companies interested in acquiring our company. This year alone, we have had three inquiries. As a consequence, we thought it might be useful to engage expertise to help us evaluate our strategic options."
They should have sold before the end of 2012, the tax losses would have been worth more...
The New York Times Company mulled a bid for the channel, but decided not to do so.
Oh the possibilities...
They're already tanking...
In recent months, uncertainty has plagued the staff of Current,
Wondering if 99 weeks of unemployment will be long enough to get the stench off their resumes...
which is based in San Francisco. Mr. Spitzer, the 8 p.m. host, remarked that someone needed to buy the channel. Ms. Granholm, the 9 p.m. host, renewed her contract for just three months.
"I can't do more than three months! I'm looking at a good position in the food service industry! Does this net make my hair look fat?"
Plans for new programming at other hours have stalled. After the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn., the channel replayed the gun documentary "Bowling for Columbine" dozens of times.
Based on the number of viewers, Michael Moore made a buck ninety-nine in royalties...
Al Jazeera intends to open new bureaus across the United States to support the American programming. The news operation currently has bureaus in New York, Washington, Los Angeles, Miami, and Chicago.
Posted by:Steve White

#16  Beavis' link is comedic gold:
the decision to go with the Middle Easter outlet came, in part, because, “al-Jazeera was founded with the same goals we had for Current.”

And then we have the tax consequences of this:
Gore was reportedly eager to complete the deal by Dec. 31 in order to avoid higher tax rates that took effect on Jan. 1. Unfortunately for Gore, the deal wasnÂ’t signed until Wednesday, however.

Given his ecstacy at Comrade Barack's election, I am shocked, SHOCKED that this "fat cat" would try to pay less than his "fair share" of taxes!

Al Gore, you didn't build that! Of course you haven't built anything, but that's another topic.
Posted by: Frozen Al   2013-01-03 19:25  

#15  As Instapundit says

AL JAZEERA BUYS CURRENT TV. “Mr. Gore and his partners were eager to complete the deal by Dec. 31, lest it be subject to higher tax rates that took effect on Jan. 1.”

ThatÂ’s Irony #1. Irony #2 is Al Gore walking away with $100 million in dirty oil money. Well, it would be ironic if it werenÂ’t so predictable. AlÂ’s a whore, basically. Gore, I mean. Not Jazeera.
Posted by: tipper   2013-01-03 19:14  

#14  Al Jazeera did not disclose the purchase price, but people with direct knowledge of the deal pegged it at around $500 million, indicating a $100 million payout for Mr. Gore, who owned 20 percent of Current

Al-Jizz now has an audience of one or two viewers with this purchase. This is a bigger rip off than Al Gore selling a bunch of gullible academics on global warming.
Posted by: JohnQC   2013-01-03 17:20  

#13  That money will be welcome as an endowment for the high energy costs of Gore's humble green mansion in Tennessee.
Posted by: Alaska Paul   2013-01-03 15:57  

#12  Never thought of it that way but I think Iblis has the angle there. Even if we can't be certain it is true it certainly Dan Rather true.
Posted by: rjschwarz   2013-01-03 15:06  

#11  Payoff for support ME oil by opposing western energy development.
Posted by: Iblis   2013-01-03 14:40  

#10  $100,000,000 should purchase a few months supply of ...."happy endings" SPA visits.
Posted by: Besoeker   2013-01-03 12:17  

#9  Going to be?
Posted by: lotp   2013-01-03 11:59  

#8  Gore is going to be insufferable once he cashes his $100,000,000 check.
Posted by: Beau   2013-01-03 11:21  

#7  Seeing as Gore made a fortune off carbon credits I always figured he knew this channel would flop and he was just trying to suck in Soros (or other money that wouldnt care about prophet). Guess Soros had enough channels.
Posted by: Rjschwarz   2013-01-03 09:19  

#6  They rebuffed Glenn Beck and The Blaze to sell to Al Jazeera
Posted by: Beavis   2013-01-03 08:31  

#5  I've seen it on the Roku; agree with lord garth. I suspect the Arabic version is substantially nastier, but the English version is actually pretty decent.
Posted by: Glenmore   2013-01-03 08:29  

#4  I've seen Al Jazeera English while in Israel.

It seems less anti-American and anti Israel than MSNBC or the BBC - certainly less sneering. The impression I got was that it was a lot like CNN but with less glitz and with fewer blond women.
Posted by: lord garth   2013-01-03 07:29  

#3  But Current's schedule of shows will most likely be dissolved in the spring.
If I'm a gal talking head, I'd be so out of there right now. In Arab world dissolved means dissolved, if you catch muh drift.
Posted by: Shipman   2013-01-03 05:58  

#2  Time Warner Cable appears to be dropping Current TV, which will linit the growth opportunities of the Al Jazeera venture, if true.
Posted by: trailing wife   2013-01-03 05:52  

#1  Fits right in with RT taking up more and more of "Free Speech TV"s broadcast day.
Amy Goodman and RT - like mixing Mao and Putin.
Posted by: Water Modem   2013-01-03 03:59  

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