Live TV
| L!VE TV | |
|---|---|
| Launched | 12 June 1995 original (1) 2003 relaunch (2) |
| Closed | 5 November 1999 (1) 28 February 2006 (2) |
| Owned by | Mirror Group Newspapers |
| Picture format | 4:3, 576i (SDTV) |
| Replaced by | Babeworld (2) |
L!VE TV was a British television station that was operated by Mirror Group Newspapers on cable television from 12 June 1995 until 5 November 1999. It was later revived for Sky from 2003. In 2006, the new L!VE TV's name was changed to Babeworld to reflect the channel's gradual change of focus towards "adult material".
L!VE TV was proposed by David Montgomery as MGN's foray into pay television. Mirror Television, a Mirror Group plc subsidiary, bought Wire TV which included sports content shown at certain times during Wire's output. Sports programming on Wire had been expanded when several sporting rights were acquired, such as Vauxhall Conference football, the live broadcast rights to screen Lennox Lewis's WBC title fights and the 1996 Cricket World Cup as well as other sporting coverage following a deal with Chrysalis Sport. Mirror Group planned to turn Sportswire into a separate channel to operate alongside the proposed L!VE TV, which would replace Wire. Wire was closed at the end of May 1995 but the proposed Sportswire channel came to nothing, leaving Mirror Television with just L!VE TV.
At its launch in 1995, the station was headed by Kelvin MacKenzie with Janet Street-Porter as managing director and a team of young presenters, dubbed as "Tellybrats", who were new to TV. Street-Porter created a schedule based around three blocks of live broadcasting each day from its base on the 24th floor of London's Canary Wharf building. The output was orientated towards a rolling mix of celebrities, interviews, reviews, lifestyle features and reports from events and happenings across the UK. A typical early show was a two-hour afternoon piece based on viewers' wedding videos. By the second week only one had been sent in, and on phoning the participants to have a live commentary, the presenters were informed that the couple were too busy shopping.
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