Country | Canada |
---|---|
Broadcast area | Nationwide |
Headquarters | Toronto, Ontario |
Programming | |
Picture format | 1080i HDTV (downscaled to letterboxed 480i for the SDTV feed) |
Ownership | |
Owner | Bell Media (branding licensed from NBCUniversal / Comcast) |
History | |
Launched | September 10, 1999 (25 years ago) |
Former names | Star! (1999–2010) |
Links | |
Website | eonline |
E! is a Canadian English language discretionary specialty channel owned by Bell Media. It primarily airs entertainment programming and series relating to celebrities and popular culture.
The network was originally launched in 1999 as Star!, under the ownership of CHUM Limited. In 2010, then-owner CTVglobemedia announced an agreement with Comcast to license the branding and programming of similar U.S. network E!, resulting in its rebranding on November 29, 2010.
The channel was licensed in 1996 by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission and was launched on September 10, 1999 as Star!, which was originally owned by CHUM Limited.
In July 2006, Bell Globemedia (later renamed CTVglobemedia) announced that it would purchase CHUM for an estimated $1.7 billion CAD, including Star!. The sale was subject to CRTC approval and was approved in June 2007 (under the condition that it divest CHUM's Citytv stations), [1] with the transaction completed on June 22, 2007. Following the change in ownership, the channel's entertainment news program Star! Daily was cancelled in defense of CTV's eTalk Daily . [2]
Until 2007, Star! had acquired some of its programming from the similar U.S. cable network E!; in 2007, owner Comcast announced an agreement with Canwest Global, under which it would acquire the Canadian rights to E! programming, and rebrand its broadcast television system CH as a Canadian version of E!. [3] In August 2009, amid Canwest's bankruptcy, the E! system was shut down, and its stations were either divested to new owners, switched to parent network Global, or shut down. [4] [5] During that time, Star's schedule consisted mostly of second-run talk shows and entertainment news shows repeated from CTV and its secondary A system (formerly A-Channel, now CTV Two), including FashionTelevision , The Tonight Show with Jay Leno , The Ellen DeGeneres Show , and TMZ .
In November 2010, CTVglobemedia announced it had signed a multi-year and multi-platform deal with Comcast to return the E! brand back to Canada. Under the agreement, Star! was relaunched as E! on November 29, 2010, returning that network's programming to the schedule. [6] Ownership changed hands again, when on April 1, 2011, Bell Canada gained control of CTVglobemedia, with the merged company becoming known as Bell Media.
While E! is very similar to its American counterpart, it also incorporates reruns of shows that have aired on other Bell Media services (and which often were shot in Canada, allowing them to fulfill Canadian content quotas) including the original iteration of CSI, Reign , Being Human , and Supernatural .
CHUM Limited was a Canadian media company based in Toronto, Ontario in operation from 1945 to 2007. The company was founded in 1945 as York Broadcasters Limited when it launched CHUM-AM 1050 but was acquired by salesman Allan Waters in 1954. CHUM had expanded to and owned 33 radio stations across Canada under its CHUM Radio Network division and also owned other radio stations.
CTV 2 is a Canadian English-language television system owned by the Bell Media subsidiary of BCE Inc. The system consists of four terrestrial owned-and-operated television stations (O&Os) in Ontario, one in British Columbia and two regional cable television channels, one in Atlantic Canada and the other in Alberta.
CKNX-TV was a television station owned by CTVglobemedia which served mid-western Ontario, Canada. It was part of the A television system. The station's offices, studios, and transmission facilities were located at Carling Terrace corner John Street in Wingham. A bureau in Owen Sound closed down in late 2004.
CHRO-TV is a television station licensed to Pembroke, Ontario, Canada, serving the capital city of Ottawa as part of the CTV 2 system. It is owned and operated by Bell Media alongside CTV outlet CJOH-DT. The two stations share studios with Bell's Ottawa radio properties at the Market Media Mall building on George Street in downtown Ottawa's ByWard Market; CHRO-TV's transmitter is located on TV Tower Road near Pembroke. The station operates a digital-only rebroadcaster in Ottawa, CHRO-DT-43, with transmitter in the city's Herbert Corners section.
CP24 is a Canadian English-language specialty news channel owned by Bell Media, a subsidiary of BCE Inc. and operated alongside the Bell-owned CTV Television Network's owned-and-operated television stations CFTO-DT and CKVR-DT. The channel broadcasts from 9 Channel Nine Court in the Toronto borough of Scarborough.
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Oprah Winfrey Network, more commonly shortened to OWN, was a Canadian English language discretionary service channel owned by Corus Entertainment. The network's owner, Corus Entertainment, licensed the OWN brand and its American programming from Warner Bros. Discovery.
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Bravo is a Canadian English-language discretionary specialty channel owned by Rogers Sports & Media, with its name licensed from the U.S cable network owned by Comcast's NBCUniversal. The channel primally airs reality and lifestyle series targeted at 25-to-54-year-old women.
CTV 2 Alberta is a Canadian English language entertainment and former educational television channel in the province of Alberta. Owned by the Bell Media subsidiary of BCE Inc., it operates as a de facto owned-and-operated station of its secondary CTV 2 television system.
BNN Bloomberg is a Canadian English language discretionary specialty channel owned by Bell Media with the name licensed from Bloomberg L.P. It broadcasts programming related to business and financial news and analysis. The channel is headquartered at 299 Queen Street West in Downtown Toronto.
In 2007, significant ownership changes occurred in Canada's broadcast television industry, involving nearly every private English-language network and television system. In addition to the shuffling of network affiliations and mergers involving various networks, several new television stations and rebroadcast transmitters also signed on the air.
The first incarnation of E!, also referred to as E! Entertainment Television, was a Canadian English language privately owned television system that existed from 2001 to 2009 under the ownership of Canwest. At its peak it consisted of eight local television stations located in Quebec, Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia, including five stations owned and operated (O&O) by Canwest and three affiliates owned by Jim Pattison Group.