Al Jazeera International

Have just seen the short promo for Al Jazeera International on Hotbird (11.034 V 27500 3/4)... it's in 16:9 and if the music isn't composed by David Lowe it should have been.

Edit: It's also on Astra2 11.681 V 27500 3/4 and is labelled AJI on a Sky Digibox.

The FEC is actually 2/3 on a Sky box.

Thank you

AJI is actually running in HD I believe - so it was expected to be in 16:9 SD over here.

And the end of the music is VERY BBC David Lowe...

Has AJI got US distribution yet?

When/if it does wonder what Fox News will have to say.

They've got carriage on Dish apparently, but are struggling with cable
http://www.friendsofaljazeera.org/node/550

Interesting the presenters featured in the barker - a lot of familiar faces as expected :

Veronica Pedrosa in Kuala Lumpur
Felicity Barr and Stephen Cole in London
Rageh Omaar, Riz Khan, Shahnaz Pakravan and Sir David Frost in Current Affairs

and...

Liquid News' Julie MacDonald in Doha.

That's quite a CNN/BBC/ITN heavy mix.

It'll be interesting to see what the editorial and technical standards are.

If it is glossy AND editorially independent, but with a different perspective, it could be interesting.

Carriage in the US will be an issue though - the US media/government engine really has persuaded a lot of americans it is run by terrorists...

I think the name 'Al Jazeera' will put off a few people. Maybe abbrieviating it to "AJN" or "AJI".

Lauren Taylor is also featured in the trail, she is on a mobile.

Is that in the same way that your name puts me off you?

Ah - didn't recognise her.

Quite a decent line-up, at least for a UK audience who have seen World and CNN! (i.e. business travellers) If it is well resourced, and doesn't make any editorial mistakes of a major nature - and there is no reason to believe it will - it could be interesting.

Does anyone know when AJI is launching, and what number will it be on the Sky EPG?