Thaindian News

By Meena Kar
Dec 10, (THAINDIAN NEWS) The talk show queen Oprah Winfrey is all set to bid her last good bye to her own renowned talk show, on ABC. She is rather aspiring higher to launch her own cable television network, named after her, “Oprah Winfrey Network”, which will hit the air from 2011. It is expected that the Oprah Winfrey would collaborate with Discovery network in this endeavor.

Discovery will give a loan of $189 million to the channel, which expects to generate $101.7 million in ad revenues its first year. They also plan to invest more than $162.3 million next year on its programming. Christina Norman, OWN’s chief executive officer has said that Oprah Winfrey wants her new channel to be nothing but great. Ron Schneier, chief operating officer of online advertising service MyVideoRights has said that this might turn out to be a bit risky as no one has ever created a channel with original programming from scratch ever before. The advertisers have been pressurizing Oprah Winfrey to have high ratings from the channel in order to gain their full support, while the channel is expected to be profitable in three years. However, is the loyal fans of Oprah Winfrey are under the impression that they would be able to see the host in another new talk show 24*7, then they would be disappointed. A daily talk show would not be aired until September. Reportedly, Oprah Winfrey would appear on her own channel only 70 hours in a year, to make special appearances only.

Oprah Winfrey has taken up the role of network’s programmer-in-chief. She has approached Rosie O’Donnell, to conduct a talk show in her channel, Duchess of York Sarah Ferguson will be executing a six-part series of documentaries. The channel is anticipated to generate more revenues than Discovery Health.