Read The Leaked Email That Pins The Death Of Channel V On YouTube

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Pedestrian TV

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Perhaps it was inevitable, but good goddamn, it still hurt this afternoon when it was confirmed that – after 20 years of Aussie music TV goodness – Channel [V] is to be no more.  

PEDESTRIAN.TV was sent the official email sent around to now-redundant staff members by Head of Channels & Operations for the Foxtel Networks, Stephen Baldwin, and the Executive Director of Television, Brian Walsh overnight.

It blamed a steady decline in the way broadcast audiences consume music, naming YouTube as one of the biggest bugbears.

Read it and weep: 
“Dear Colleagues,

As foreshadowed in my presentation yesterday, we are making changes across our organisation in order to be match fit in an increasingly competitive landscape. One area I discussed with you was channel rationalisation. 

Over the past several years music clips have become ubiquitous with availability on services like YouTube, whilst linear broadcast audiences for music channels have been in steady decline. In order to run the Foxtel music services more efficiently we have decided to merge Channel [V] and [V] Hits. 

The new service will be called [V] Hits and we will create a +2 of this channel. [V] Hits will continue to be a clip based channel with no long form content.

This change will begin to take place this Saturday, with the channel branding completed by late March.

I would like to thank the music team for their hard work and dedication in making Channel [V] an integral part of the Australian music landscape throughout the years.

I would also like to thank those team members leaving us today. You leave with our best wishes for your onward journey.

Brian Walsh & Stephen Baldwin.”
The channel is responsible for launching the careers of Aussie presenters / personalities Osher Günsberg, Danny Clayton, Carissa Walford, Yumi Stynes and a bunch more.
Unsurprisingly, the news brought much memory-sharing from hosts both past and present, which is just as well ’cause former staffer Mitch Feltscheer let rip with some unreal behind the scenes goss. 

The channel’s mainstays waxed lyrical too, and there are some absolute nuggets to be found in their Twitter musings:

An amalgamation of Channel [V] and [V] Hits, called [V] Hits, will kick off as of this Saturday, and it’s expected to be wall-to-wall clips with zilch otherwise. Which is actually a total, total bummer. 

Photo: Pages Digital. 

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