Al-Jazeera Buys Current TV

03 Jan, 2013

Al-Jazeera, the pan-Arab news channel which has struggled to win space on American cable television, has acquired Current TV, the channel founded by Al Gore and business partner Joel Hyatt.

Gore and Hyatt, who created the channel in 2005, confirmed the sale in a statement on Wednesday. The terms were undisclosed.

The deal gives Al-Jazeera a bridgehead into the US market: Current TV, although struggling in the ratings, is widely distributed on US cable providers. Al-Jazeera will close Current TV and replace it with a new network, Al-Jazeera America. Gore will become a member of the new network’s advisory board.

“Current Media was built based on a few key goals: To give voice to those who are not typically heard; to speak truth to power; to provide independent and diverse points of view; and to tell the stories that no one else is telling,” Gore and Hyatt said.

“Al-Jazeera has the same goals and, like Current, believes that facts and truth lead to a better understanding of the world around us.”

The acquisition could extend Al-Jazeera’s reach beyond a few large US metropolitan areas, where some people can watch Al-Jazeera English.

The network’s managing director, Tony Burman, in 2010 blamed a “very aggressive hostility” from the Bush administration for reluctance among cable and satellite companies to show the network.

Al-Jazeera has attracted respect for its ability to build a serious news product in a short time. But there may be a culture clash at the network. Dave Marash, a former ABC Nightline reporter who worked for Al-Jazeera in Washington, said he left the network in 2008 in part because he sensed an anti-American bias there.

Current, meanwhile, began as a groundbreaking effort to promote user-generated content, but has settled into a more conventional format of political talk television with a liberal bent. Gore worked on-air as an analyst during its recent election night coverage.

Former New York governor Elliot Spitzer, former Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm and Cenk Uygur are currently its lead personalities. Current signed Keith Olbermann to be its top host in 2011 but his tenure lasted less than a year before it ended in bad blood on both sides.

Current has largely been outflanked by MSNBC in its effort to be a liberal alternative to the leading cable news network, Fox News Channel.

It hired former CNN Washington bureau chief David Bohrman in 2011 to be its president. Bohrman has pushed the network to innovate technologically, with election night coverage that emphasised social media conversation.

Current is expected to post $114m in revenue in 2013, according to research firm SNL Kagan. The firm pegged the network’s cash flow at nearly $24m a year.

While it has battled low viewership, it is now distributed in about 60m of the 100m homes in the United States with cable or satellite service.

The Guardian

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