Planet Green: Discovery Channel To Launch Environmental Network

The New York Times:

Can the environment make for entertaining TV? Discovery Communications is about to find out.

On Wednesday, Discovery will introduce Planet Green, a new cable brand promoted as the first 24-hour channel dedicated to eco-friendly living. It is the highest-profile cable channel introduction of the year, and an equally risky one. By wrapping itself in the planet, Discovery is betting that "eco-tainment" will appeal to viewers.

Planet Green will replace the Discovery Home Channel in more than 50 million homes. Eyeing the public's increased interest in environmental issues, Discovery is confident that it can attract more viewers with green-themed programming.

"This is an eco-tainment channel," said Eileen O'Neill, the general manager of Planet Green. "It's a lifestyle and entertainment channel that's designed to activate people in the green space."

It is also intended to engage advertisers, many of whom have green-themed marketing messages to share with viewers.

Read the whole story: The New York Times

Comments

[ibsteve2u]

An "environmental" channel is almost a "gimme", I'd think. Given soaring energy costs and the ripple effect across our (and the globe's) economy, an awful lot of Americans will watch simply because being "green" saves you money.

And that is something that more and more Americans will just have to accept. After all, it isn't like the people who put America into this quandary are suddenly going to have a change of heart, and we'll all wake up singing: "Happy Days are Here Again!".

lollll...heck, they can't....Clinton's decision to permit the corporations to dictate trade policy was a one-way street, because Clinton was too stupid or too greedy or something [maybe he's an alien who hates humans?] to avoid exporting our energy consumption model.

Nothing short of a wholesale replacement for our current energy consumption model or an unprecedented loss of life on the planet - far surpassing anything previously seen in humanity's wars or the various plagues that have afflicted us - can deter what is coming.

Sigh...I knew we were screwed way back when I compared Detroit's "But we need to make trucks and SUVs for the profit margin!" argument ever since the '70s to everything else that is man-made or even grown...it is almost a fact of life that the higher the profit margin associated with a product, the more energy that it uses either in its manufacture or its use.

Welcome to the the new century of economic feudalism...