TVNM 6
TVNM 6 is a television channel created in 2007 by Television New Michillies for the Freeview service. Currently the channel mainly transmits highbrow programming and has the lowest ratings of the broadcaster's family of channels as a whole.
History[edit | edit source]
TVNM 6 was announced in May 2005 during the TVNM Digital Forum in Wenderland. The edition was devoted to the possible launch of digital terrestrial television in the New Michillies. The plan was that Television New Michillies would launch two new channels on Freeview, one of them being a port of an existing channel (TVNM News 24) and the other being made entirely for Freeview (TVNM Home). In late 2006, TVNM announced that the new channels would be on air by March 1, 2007 (days ahead of the 50th anniversary of television in the country). The channel eventually launched on February 1, 2007, under the new name TVNM 6, which was chosen because it wouldn't represent anything in particular regarding its content, but would have symbolic value over the Freeview slot. It was also widely regarded that many people would confuse TVNM Home for a lifestyle channel, something MediaWorks New Michillies managed to make in 2018. TVNM 7 rebranded by doing so when it launched on Freeview the same day.
The channel was divided up into three "theme channels": Kidzone was a pre-school service that was shown from 6am-4pm, Family was a slot that conteined shows that were "informative, safe and reliable" according to the broadcaster, airing 4pm-8pm and Showcase would air arts, documentaries and drama series that were formerly screened on TV One and TV2. The channel also brought back the Goodnight Kiwi for the end of transmissions at midnight.
Family and Showcase were both dropped from the schedule in 2009 and Kidzone then extended to 6pm.
TVNM 6 was reformatted when the old content migrated to TVNM Heartland (now TVNM Gold) and the children's content to Kidzone 24 (now TVNM Kidzone). With TVNM getting more channels on Freeview, budget cuts had to be applied to TVNM 6. Upon dropping Kidzone, the channel had only six hours of operation a day, since some of the money was used to fund U (shut down in 2013). The lack of advertisers didn't help and it was believed that TVNM 6 would shut down.
The channel eventually "rejuvenated" in 2013, expanding to eight hours a day (4pm to midnight) and refocused its contents on drama and the arts, as well as including some current affairs programs dropped by TVNM 7 during its reformatting. In 2016, the channel's broadcasting hours increased again.
As part of TVNM's rebrand on November 11, 2019, TVNM 6 was repositioned as a "lifestyle, health and arts" channel. This move is touted by TVNM as means to "improve a failing channel". Most of the programming will be commissioned for the channel and the rest is mostly imported.
Programming[edit | edit source]
The channel is currently on air from 10am to 12am on weekdays and from 8am to 12am on weekends. Programming is mainly highbrow in nature.
TVNM 6 is the only TVNM channel to play the Goodnight Kiwi at the end of its daily schedule. When off-air, it shows the schedule of the coming day for all TVNM channels on loop.
Some shows airing on the channel include:
- [MIC] Film School
