Commercial Television (South Arlesbury)

Commercial Television was the first privately-owned television channel in South Arlesbury. It was owned by the Central Newspapers Group. It shut down during the Crystal Night and its frequencies were given over to the SABC-controlled TV2 (now SABC 2).

History

Commercial Television started broadcasting on December 7th, 1964. It was an oddity in continental Eurectipherian television - it was the second commercial channel after Salo's MTV3, both outside the Britannic Isles. The channel emerged as part of the growth of foreign investment driven by oil, one of its shareholders was the Michillian Alpha Television company, who was forbidden from having a television license in its native Michillies due to governmental restrictions being imposed at the time. During its initial four years, Thomson Television International controlled 50% of the shares, alongside 25% belonging to Central Newspapers group, 15% belonging to Alpha and the remaining 10% to the South Arlesburian Oil Company (SAO).

CTV was mostly showing international content. What made CTV able to invest in local content was its advantage by the inclusion of commercial advertising, something ABC Television would adopt in 1965. Calls were made for studio shows featuring national and international broadcasters. Soon, CTV would have a massive advantage over its competitor, by repeatedly surpassing ABC TV's ratings.

By 1978, plans were being made for Commercial Television to upgrade to full-color broadcasting. However, a coup d'état which culminated in the election - and later "destruction" - of South Arlesbury ended the plans altogether. Pro Tect decided to ban all commercial broadcasters and all media was to be controlled under the South Arlesburian Broadcasting Corporation.

Closure

With the effects of the Crystal Night already evident, the transitional government (in preparation for the atrocities it was going to commit on December 1) forcibly announced the closure of both the radio and television assets of CNG, those being Commercial Radio, CFM and CTV. The South Arlesburian press was now limited to just one newspaper, the South Arlesburian Times, under Pro Tect's control.

The last show seen on CTV was Farewell from the Commercial Television Family, a show that started at 21:30 and ran for two hours. CNG's radio and television assets were forced to shut down before midnight. In preparation for the potential carnage, much of Commercial Television's archives were stored at Alpha Television's building in Launceston, including some news reports. The move of these archives to Launceston was beneficial as moving to Plymouth would lead to a potential destruction by Pro Tect forces with the aim of reunifying the Arlesburies.

Many celebrities (some of them killed in the coming days or weeks) performed songs live. At 23:20, the executive general of Commercial Television, Mark Dennis, made an announcement while a choral rendition of Auld Lang Syne was playing. While Mark Dennis thanked everyone for their contribution to CTV's operation over its close-to-16-year run, he said that "Commercial Television will survive, along with Commercial Radio and democracy in our country". Towards the conclusion, at 23:25, he said the now immortal words "Now... we have five minutes left... on behalf of Commercial Television... good night, goodbye and godspeed.", followed by celebrities continuing the procedure, with some being in visible shock due to the status of the channel.

Lastly, as soon as the curtains fell, the CTV logo appeared one final time, accompanied by the words "FAREWELL FROM COMMERCIAL TELEVISION", adapted from its closedown slide of the time. The national anthem was played, in a degraded copy, and lastly at 23:30:35 (according to estimates), when the anthem was finished, the signal was cut and Commercial Television was never seen or heard of again. The following day, much of the former CNG building was destroyed and about one third of its staff killed. The frequencies were occupied by the new corporation's "elite channel" TV2.

Commercial television itself resumed in 1998 - under a new service controlled by the Central Newspapers Group - Skyway Television.