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.
From Jim Metrock: "Don’t Mess With Texas" is the bold unofficial motto of the great state of Texas. Obligation shared a booth with the Center for Commercial-Free Public Education at the Texas Association of School Boards convention this past weekend. We distributed a wealth of information about Channel One to school board members and...
Read More »
Channel One’s web site is instructing children on how to tattoo themselves. These tattoos are not permanent, but they are not readily removable either. You will have to go to their web site to read for yourself. Channel One is encouraging children to apply these dark stain henna tattoos by suggesting that their mothers will be angry. Hey,...
Read More »
Hold on to your hat … and your child. Channel One is getting back into the chat room business. Jim Metrock, president of Obligation, said, “There is no need for this company to entice schoolchildren into their chat rooms. Chat rooms are the first things parents block if they are concerned about Internet safety. Channel One’s record on...
Read More »
Pizitz Middle School is in Vestavia Hills, AL, a suburb of Birmingham. Vestavia Hills is a very well-to-do school system – by Alabama standards. The one middle school and the high school both have had Channel One since mid-1991. The school board agreed to the superintendent’s recommendation to enter into a contract with Channel One without any apparent financial...
Read More »
From Jim Metrock: He was the man Henry Kravis picked to run K-III Communications in 1994. (K-III changed their name to PRIMEDIA in 1997.) William Reilly never could get people excited about this “Macmillan” (publishing house) clone. Now he has to fall on his sword. He announced his “early retirement” yesterday. I suspect more heads will roll over...
Read More »
For months, Channel One tried to stop the U.S. Senate from looking into its unseemly presence in America’s schools, but it happened and Channel One was embarrassed. Now there is great speculation that an executive shake-up or a new PR campaign may happen soon. I will soon make my prediction on what will happen. (As if I know...
Read More »
Obligation, Inc. – Channel One is Bad News for Kids A U.S. Senate Hearing on Channel One Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions May 20, 1999 The Hearing that Channel One spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to stop, happened on Thursday, May 20, 1999. We will publish the spoken testimony and the...
Read More »
Children are asked for their name, home address, phone number and age by Channel One advertiser. Channel One is running this banner ad on their web site. Channel One has guts. You have to give them that. During the week that the U.S. Senate held its second hearing on Channel One, Channel One brought...
Read More »
WIDTH=”450″ BORDER=”1″ align=”center” CELLPADDING=”0″ CELLSPACING=”2″> ALIGN=”BOTTOM” BORDER=”0″ NATURALSIZEFLAG=”3″> Ralph Nader, Pat Ellis, Jim Metrock, and Phyllis Schafly at the May 20, 1999 U.S. Senate hearing on Channel One. Mr. Nader and Mrs. Schafly testified against Channel One at the hearing and Mrs. Ellis and Mr. Metrock of Obligation submitted written testimony. The hearing clearly exposed Channel...
Read More »
