Current TV, also known simply as Current, is a progressive
media
company led by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore and
businessman Joel
Hyatt. Comcast owns a
ten percent stake of Current's parent company, Current TV, LLC.
The Current cable
television network went on the air in the US at midnight EDT (4:00 UTC) on the morning of
August 1, 2005. Current TV was launched in South Africa for satellite
subscribers on the TopTV
platform on 1 May 2010.
After the 2000 U.S. presidential election,
Gore and Hyatt wanted to start a conventional cable news network. The plan
evolved into making a viewer-generated channel aimed at an audience demographic
age 18–34.
On May 4, 2004, INdTV Holdings, a
company co-founded by Gore and Joel Hyatt, purchased Canada-based cable news channel NewsWorld International (NWI) from Vivendi
Universal for the express purpose of launching their new network with the
space on some digital cable lineups (and DirecTV) that NWI
had. The new network would not have political leanings, Gore said, but would
serve as an "independent voice" for a target audience of people
between 18 and 34 "who want to learn about the world in a voice they
recognize and a view they recognize as their own."
Other reports said that Gore hoped that the channel
would help change the tide of "consolidation and conglomeratization"
of the media by leading the change to "democratization." The news
network was said to be a combination between CNN, MTV, and blipverts.
In the summer of 2004, Gore and Hyatt announced
their new network, named INdTV, with a series of public recruitment events. The
first of these events was held at the Bambuddha Lounge in San
Francisco's Tenderloin, on August 25.
On April 4, 2005, the former vice president and
business partner Hyatt announced that they had changed the name of the network
from INdTV to Current. The new television network launched in the United States
on August 1, 2005. Currently, Current is available in 60 million homes
nationwide in the U.S.
Glenn Beck's Blaze Media approached the struggling
cable news network last year, the Wall Street Journal reports, but was rebuffed because
"the legacy of who the network goes to is important to us and we are
sensitive to networks not aligned with our point of view."
Instead, Gore went with the Emir of Qatar-funded
Arab news channel Al-Jazeera.
Beck claims that he had a higher bid than Al Jazeera’s but
because of his conservative political background, he was rejected. “He didn’t sell
to the highest bidder,” the host said. “We were not allowed to the table. He
didn’t sell to the highest bidder. He looked for, who do I ideologically align
with.”
Al Jazeera has long been the subject of Beck’s
derision, as he believes it is an “anti-American” network. And so, Beck and his
co-host Stu Burguiere mocked the former Vice President for believing Al Jazeera
to be more closely aligned with his ideology than an American television
company.
Ultimately, Beck concluded, the rejection comes as a
“badge of honor.”
But while Al-Jazeera will now be available in
millions more American homes, it will not be seen on the nation's
second-largest TV operator, Time Warner Cable, as they dropped Current TV
immediately after the sale became final. To watch the FOX News video, click here
"Our agreement with Current has been terminated
and we will no longer be carrying the service. We are removing the service as
quickly as possible," the company said in a statement. Read more:
What's next . . . for this country?
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