Channel One News is a youth marketing company whose main purpose is to get advertising to a captive audience of impressionable schoolchildren. The company loans a school TV equipment in exchange for the school’s contractual pledge to show students a daily, 12-minute, hyper-commercial, TV program called Channel One News. Students lose one hour a week of schools time, which equates to one lost week of instructional time (32 hours) per year. No educational organization endorses the use of Channel One News.
Channel One has fallen on very hard times. Once they claimed over 8 million students were under contract. Since 1997 they have continued to lose schools and now they claim “nearly five million” students and the true figure is probably lower.
In May 2014, publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt acquired Channel One from ZelnickMedia the makers of the ultra-violent Grand Thief Auto video game series. Houghton Mifflin did not disclose the purchase price.
At the end of 2014 most of Channel One’s full-paying advertisers have abandoned the program.
It’s August 11 and the Channel One News crew hasn’t shown up for work. All across the country students are filing into their classrooms. Some students have been already been in school for a week or more. Channel One would normally be pushing their advertising on kids by this date, but as we have...
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Dr. Paul Folkemer calls himself the "child advocate at Channel One News." From Jim Metrock: It’s August 2 and Channel One is still advertising a prescription drug on its web site. (It appears the BenzaClin ads are gone, but the Differin ads are still there.) Obligation joined with the Campaign for a Commercial-Free...
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News Release from Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood and Obligation July 30, 2008 Contact: Josh Golin (617.278.4172; jgolin@jbcc.harvard.edu) Jim Metrock (205.822.0080; jmetrock@obligation.org) For Immediate Release Advocates to Channel One: Stop Marketing Prescription Drugs to Children Advocates for children are demanding that Alloy Media and Marketing immediately remove ads for prescription drugs from its Channel...
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It appears that Channel One has dropped The Summer Show. We suspect a mercy killing. This short, 2-minute video was their feeble attempt to update kids on news stories over the summer. There is no link or mention of The Summer Show on Channelone.com’s homepage or on their "News" page. This is interesting since...
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Everything is slow and lazy at Channel One News this summer. Hannah Van Winkle and her Channel One Summer Show are still missing. Channel One’s feeble attempt to use Ms. Van Winkle to update young people on currents throughout the summer has been a complete disaster – just like last summer. Instead of...
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Above is a snapshot we took of Channelone.com’s homepage on July 21, 2008. The banner ad at the top and the ad to the right are ads for two different PRESCRIPTION DRUGS. Pitching prescription drugs to teens and preteens marks a new and potentially dangerous turn for Channel One News. Although Channel One...
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Respondents Were Open to Certain Promotions, Especially if Directed at Adults By Beth Snyder Bulik Published: June 25, 2008 YORK, Pa. (AdAge.com) — When it comes to advertising in and around schools, marketers should consider skipping children altogether and going straight to the top: mom. Programs like General Mills’ Box Tops for Education...
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Last year Channel One tried "The Summer Show" and the results were ugly. CLICK HERE. Now, Hannah Van Winkle is the face of the NEW and IMPROVED "Summer Show." Ms. Van Winkle is a new Channel One employee. In a terrible career move she left NBC for C1 – yipes! Hannah is the host...
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During a recent conference call with investment analysts, Alloy’s CEO Matt Diamond stated that 75% of Channel One’s "about 6 million" student audience watched Channel One News each day. That begs the question: what planet is Matt Diamond from? Mr. Diamond has probably never graced the doorway of a classroom that has a...
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In 2006, Lego told Obligation that they would not be advertising on Channel One News. They have been true to their word up until this past month. Lego has been advertising a video game based on the new Indiana Jones movie. They wanted to build interest in the product before its June 3 debut....
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