November 23, 1998 (Birmingham, AL) Obligation, Inc., a local media watchdog group has joined several nationally known organizations and individuals in signing a letter asking for Congressional hearings on the in-school TV marketing program called Channel One. Jim Metrock, Obligation’s president said, "When you have Ralph Nader and Eagle Forum’s Phyllis Schlafly on the...
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Does your school still have Channel One News?
Learn how to unplug
Houghton Mifflin/Channel One News
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.
Local Group Signs Letter Asking For Congressional Hearings On Controversial Channel One Program
Schools Tell Children To See “Meet Joe Black”
Schools, with Channel One’s help, told our kids again what movie to see this weekend. This time it was PG-13 "Meet Joe Black". "Schools endorse the products they make children watch during school," said Jim Metrock, Obligation president. "Any school board member or superintendent who thinks the school doesn’t endorse the products pushed on...
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Channel One Schools Give Seal of Approval To WB Network’s DL-Rated “Felicity”
No TV network ought to be advertised in a school. No specific TV show ought to be encouraged and endorsed by a school system. If a superintendent was forced to pick one broadcast network to advertise to his or her students, it certainly would not be the WB Network. Yet, the historically insensitive Channel...
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Channel One Schools Endorse Adam Sandler’s Newest Movie
Touchstone Pictures’ “The Waterboy” Several ads ran for this Disney adult-comedy. The PG-13 was slapped on this film because of offensive adult language and crude sexual humor. A scene from the commercial Channel One ran for kids, shows the “Waterboy” knocking down a teacher in a classroom after the teacher makes the...
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Channel One Violates Contract Terms By Extending Show 1 1/2 Minutes – Also Channel One Exceeds Two-Minute Ad Limit
The new administration at Channel One is apparently disregarding the contract terms concerning the amount of advertising and the total length of the Channel One program. The contract says that the show will be 12 minutes long and the ads will be no more than two minutes of that twelve. Channel One News is now routinely 13 minutes and...
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Letter From Judge McGuire To Paul Folkemer
October 17, 1998 – Letter From Judge McGuire To Paul Folkemer This letter from Judge McGuire to Paul Folkemer, Channel One, was OCR scanned onto our web site. Any typos are from the scanning process. Judge McGuire sent a 27-page complaint about the indecent content on “Dawson’s Creek” to the FCC this spring. We will post...
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Alabama Schools Urge Students to See Latest Eddie Murphy Movie; Channel One Ad For Movie Literally “Distasteful”
Channel One advertised Eddie Murphy’s latest movie called “Holy Man.” Like many of Murphy’s movies he pushes the limits of good taste. This school-endorsed movie has plenty of problems. One reviewer had this to say about Channel One’s latest “Movie of the Week”: “And despite its PG rating, “Holy Man” features what has become Murphy’s trademark of...
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Channel One Successfully Delivers Children To “Dawson’s Creek” And WB Network
The ratings are in and Channel One has something to brag about to future potential advertisers. They teamed up with the WB Network to help sponsor a contest that would assure a big child audience for the sex-saturated series “Dawson’s Creek.” Channel One ran ads urging children to see the season premiere entitled “The Morning After”. According to Electronic...
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Dawson’s Creek
Channel One Pushes Sexually-Charged Show on Children Channel One and Dawson’s Creek What was Channel One thinking about when they ran seven ads, in September, for “Dawson’s Creek” to children as young as 11? Channel One even put the full authority of their “special relationship” with our kids behind a contest that encouraged children to watch the premiere episode (rated...
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Channel One Promotes the Sexually Charged “Dawson’s Creek” To Schoolchildren
“Channel One is spitting into the face of parents and children. On “Dawson’s Creek”, last spring, a 15-year-old character on the show had sex with his teacher. The content of the show is saturated with sex talk. This is the creation of the director of the vulgar and obscenely-violent ‘Scream’ movies,” said Jim Metrock,...
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