Overseas Television

I’m surprised not that much talk of this has shown up here, only one mention by @Medianext.MX [who is also where I got the vast majority of this information, thanks in advance], but there is a big change coming to the French TV landscape.

Arcom, the media regulator in France, has somewhat regular hearings to decide if channels should have their licenses renewed. Last year, they held hearings for 14 of the original channels that launched with TNT [French DTT]. 2 channels, C8 [owned by Canal+, and home to right-wing evening show “Touche pas à mon poste !”] and NRJ 12 [owned by NRJ Group, who also own Chérie 25 and radio station NRJ Hits] lost their hearings, and will be removed from TNT at the end of February.

In their place, 2 new channels, T18 [formerly Réels TV/CMI TV, owned by Czech Media Invest, whose main shareholder, Daniel Křetínský, owns famous French magazines, like Elle, Télé 7 jours, & Franc-Tireur, though this will be ran independently from those] and OFTV [Ouest-France TV, owned by Ouest-France] will launch, with T18 launching on June 6th, and OFTV launching on September 1st.

Separately, Canal+ has announced that they will be removing Canal+ [the channel, TNT channel 4] off of TNT, as well as their other pay TV channels Canal+ Sport, Canal+ Cinéma(s), and Planète+ [TNT channels 42, 43, & 45].

Since all this is happening, the channel numbers on TNT will also be reshuffled on June 6th. France 4 will move from channel 14 to channel 4, taking Canal+'s space. Similarly, LCP-Public Sénat [a parliamentary channel] will move from channel 13 to channel 8 [taking over from C8] and children’s channel Gulli will move from channel 18 to channel 12 [taking over from NRJ 12].

There will also be a block of news channels, with BFM TV moving from channel 15 to channel 13, CNEWS moving from channel 16 to channel 14, LCI moving from channel 26 to channel 15, and France Info moving from channel 27 to channel 16.

For the new channels, T18 will launch on channel 18 [currently Gulli] and OFTV will launch on channel 19 [currently vacant, former occupant France Ô closed in August 2020, with Culturebox launching in February 2021, before moving to evenings on France 4 in May 2021 [with France 4 now just being the linear channel for Okoo [children’s content] & Culturebox full time, with all young adult programs formerly on France 4 moved online], where the space has been vacant since the closure of Culturebox as a full channel]. All other TNT channels are unaffected.

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