I24

But a lot of these channels are being subsidised by national governments to fly the flag for various countries. I don't suppose Al Jazeera for instance makes a penny in profit - but it suits the Qatari government.

Commercial realities aren't an issue.

Is this channel being broadcast on the FTA Satellite platform or will it be viewed as a Pay-Tv Channel?



The promo video does look to have a very American way about it in which it is presented to the public. The website is not beefed up yet as it is still in the early stages; but it has a professional look to it.

However; we do have too many news channels to watch today. Is it justified to have an additional one at the moment?

Really? That video looks awful, why is it 16:9 in a 4:3 frame, why does the aspect ratio of the pictures vary wildly (and wrongly) looks like something some put together with a free after effects template and no idea what they are doing to me!

I'm somewhat surprised that they chose French rather than Spanish as their third language. After all, Spanish is spoken far more widely in more countries -- both in terms of total speakers and as a native language. Perhaps it's the geographical distribution of French, which is spoken widely in parts of Africa, that made the difference.

I think the decision to have a French service is based largely on the fact it is backed by Isaeli-French media tycoon Patrick Drahi.

To be honest all of the major languages spoken in the world are now at 'news channel saturation point' - including Spanish.

International news channels have become the new proxy-front line. Countries used to fire weapons at each other. They now use TV news.

I guess it's great for pres lovers like us and there's a little less bloodshed!

Here's a glimpse of the newsroom. It's VERY France24. You can see at least 2 studios.

http://www.haaretz.com/polopoly_fs/1.532095.1372235880!/image/2349077637.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_640/2349077637.jpg

i looks so small, and the 3 languages are stuck inside a circular bubble... if i could base it on the studios, i'd rather watch RT or DW (though I'm not sure if the English, German, Spanish, and Arabic languages are sharing newsroom)...

I don't like the look of that newsroom as the design looks very cheap & lazy. The bubble shape gives me an impression of looking like flying saucers rather than proper newsrooms.

I wonder how much money has being spent so far building that up.

Goodness, a COUNTDOWN has just appeared on the top right corner of the promo frequency, indicating we have just under 21 hours until launch time! That would mean launch is at 6pm UK time!

According to THIS article, the launch is indeed scheduled for 1700 GMT tomorrow (6:00 P.M. BST, 7:00 P.M. CET). According to the article, I24 will be available from the start to 300 million households in Europe, Africa, and Asia.



Indeed. I didn't realize that he is the largest single owner of Numericable, the huge French cable operator. Distribution on Numericable's systems (in France, Belgium, and Luxembourg) should give the channel an important head start in French-speaking parts of Europe.

I've looked through the distribution list. Unfortunately, it's not going to be available yet on the Sky platform. Because of their connections to French media there is a LOT of carriage in the Fracnophone markets. They're going to need to get deals signed for the Anglophone markets asap or we could end up seeing the English broadcasts scaled back or even cut.

Apparently, the channel will be available free-to-air (on several satellites).