| Title | Advocates for Commercial-Free Schools Cheer as Channel One Signs Off | |
| Date | Monday July 09 2018, @06:28AM | |
| Author | martyb | |
| Topic | ||
| from the captive-audience-no-more dept. | ||
Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood reports via Common Dreams
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has announced the end of its Channel One News broadcasts in school classrooms, and child advocates are bidding them a less-than-fond farewell. For 28 years, Channel One compelled students to watch a 12-minute newscast that includes two minutes of commercials. Each year, schools with Channel One lost the equivalent of a full week of school to the broadcasts, and a full day of instructional time to the commercials alone.
[...]Launched in 1989 by marketing executive Chris Whittle, Channel One lured schools with the promise of free classroom televisions. But the cost of this "free" equipment was high. Schools with Channel One were required to show the broadcast, including two minutes of student-targeted commercials, on 90% of school days. Former Channel One President Joel Babbit once boasted, "The advertiser gets kids who cannot go to the bathroom, cannot change the station, who cannot listen to their mother yell in the background, who cannot be playing Nintendo."
Channel One's business model was controversial from the start. Advocates from across the political spectrum, from Ralph Nader to Phyllis Schlafly, decried Channel One's exploitation of a captive student audience. Research showed that the "news" on Channel One was often fluff pieces about pop culture, that Channel One cost American taxpayers nearly $2 billion per year, and that kids in low-income school districts were more likely to be forced to watch the commercialized broadcasts.
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printed from SoylentNews, Advocates for Commercial-Free Schools Cheer as Channel One Signs Off on 2024-04-23 22:06:14