Al-Jazeera Pays $500M for Al Gore’s Media Station

With its $500 million purchase of left-leaning Current TV, the Pan-Arab news channel Al-Jazeera will soon be broadcasting to tens of millions of U.S. homes. It’s a steep price, but the acquisition helps the network in its aim to quickly spread its message to more Americans.

The purchase will create a news channel called Al-Jazeera America, coming to American homes 90 days from now with a distinctly non-American view of the world. The network claims many people in the U.S. have sought its programming, and that it aims to present an “unbiased” view, “representing as many different viewpoints as possible.”

The deal already had its first casualty.

The nation’s second-largest operator, Time Warner Cable Inc., dropped Current after the deal was confirmed Wednesday, saying the network didn’t have enough viewers.

The change in ownership gives Time Warner Cable the right to drop the channel, but spokeswoman Maureen Huff said the company is keeping “an open mind” about airing the new Al-Jazeera America.

“As a service develops, we will evaluate whether it makes sense for our customers to launch the network,” Huff said.

That boosts the reach of Al-Jazeera to about 50 million homes, up from the 4.7 million that could watch Al-Jazeera English, which is available to some subscribers in New York and Washington. That’s down slightly from the 60 million homes Current TV was in.

It also amounts to a hefty payday for former Vice President Al Gore and cofounder Joel Hyatt, each of whom had 20 percent stakes in Current. Comcast had less than a 10 percent stake. Another major investor in Current TV was supermarket magnate and entertainment industry investor Ron Burkle, according to information service Capital IQ.

Gore confirmed the sale Wednesday, saying in a statement that Al-Jazeera shares Current TV’s mission “to give voice to those who are not typically heard; to speak truth to power; to provide independent and diverse points of view; and to tell the stories that no one else is telling.”

This article appeared in print on page 2 of the January 4th, 2013 edition of Hamodia.