Freeview capacity

24/7 space available on Mux C
https://www.arqiva.com/news/company/freeview-sd-digital-terrestrial-television-dtt-slot-available/

What’s Freeview missing?

Perhaps this time the shopping and religion channels, facing cost savings, might not be able to afford it.

Perhaps Eden from UKTV
Sky Sports News

Would be nice to have an international news channel like CNN.

I'd have thought it would most likely be snapped up by a channel currently using COM7, which I think is/was due to close in the not too distant future.
(Edited to correct to COM7 instead of COM5.)

Can’t see SSN returning. Yes CNN would be terrific, given how pedestrian Sky News can often be on US stories (the Capitol siege for example).

This is great news for Freeview, and I can imagine many people going after the slot (24/7 after all!)

I wouldn't be surprised if the winning channel is placed on LCN24 (outside of Scotland) to fill the gap, or if BBC move BBC FOUR to 24 nationwide, and the new service gets the LCN9 slot, which would be very hotly contested if so.

Most likely will possibly be a news, religion or shopping channel, and while I wouldn't really see myself watching the latter 2, a news channel would be a welcome addition.

I would like a channel like CNN, Euronews, Sky Sports News, Eden, or even some pay channels like Comedy Central.

Overall, very exciting news!

I very much doubt anything on a COM mux would be handed a single digit LCN

I wonder if Eden from UKTV and Sky Sports News are going to become free to air TV channels, if they end up on that free space

The likelihood of seeing Comedy Central become a free-TV station is a bit of a fantasy in my eyes. Yes, it's free to air in some territories like the Netherlands and also on 24/7, but I can't see it happening. But it'd be a bit ironic if Channel 5 ends up launching a channel called "5 Shake" in similar terms to their neighbours down under.

Would much rather see measures in place to convert a mux and hence channels into HD than yet another low quality 24/7 SD stream squeezed into a mix to be filled by a channel which will probably offer little value to the viewer.

I would've thought shopping channels would have benefitted from the pandemic, surely? The high street shut, being locked-in in front of the TV and the ability to phone in orders for people unwilling to use the internet surely would have seen them do well?

I can't see it being specifically for Mux C on that page, from what I can see the slot is either on Mux C or D. I think whenever we've seen these slots being advertised in the recent past they've ended up going to +1s or something equally boring. Any interesting channels that join Freeview always seem to find a way through some other, more complicated route like buying out an existing service etc.

Comedy Central is really poor now to be honest. Their daytime schedule at the moment seems to consist of Friends and nothing but Friends, plus one episode each of those famous comedy shows Baywatch and The A-Team. Gold may love Only Fools and Horses just as much, but at least their schedule has some variety to it.

Not just Comedy Central like that though. Who remembers the varied schedules of channels during the analogue (and early digital) days, and the repetitive screenings of the same few shows we instead get now?