The advertising guru Christopher Whittle created Channel One News in 1989. Whittle sold his idea to schools as a way for students to learn about current events. He sold his idea to advertisers as an effective way to get commercials in front of a captive audience of young people.
Whittle Communications (1989-1994) Whittle had to sell his very profitable Channel One company to pay off debtors.
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PRIMEDIA (1994-2007) K-III Communications, later to be known as Primedia, bought Channel One for a song. The price tag was an incredibly low $300 million because Whittle had to get rid of the company fast. The price for Channel One got even lower when K-III Communications discovered Whittle owed $240 million was a steal. PRIMEDIA owned Channel One when it’s profitability began to plunge in 2000.
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Alloy Media+Marketing (2007-2010) Alloy acquires the assets of Channel One for no cash outlay. Channel One has a net worth of $Zero. Channel One came within weeks of closing before Alloy rescued them.
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ZelnickMedia (2010-May 13, 2014) ZelnickMedia, famous for their ultraviolent Grand Theft Auto video games, buys Alloy and agrees to take Channel One along with the profitability parts of Alloy. Even a stink bomb of a company like ZelnickMedia couldn’t stomach Channel One for long.
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Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (May 13, 2014-present) Before Linda Zecher was canned by her board for making bad decisions, she made the bold move to acquire the pariah of public education: Channel One News. Her plans to repackage Channel One News as a digital player in the lucrative education market was a colossal failure. Houghton pushed a subscription model of Channel One, but schools balked. As the 2016-17 school year comes to an end, Houghton has to be considering either a total shutdown of their controversial Channel One unit or palming it off on a company that will agree to acquire the company’s remaining assets and liabilities.
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