ABC News Re-Launches Digital Channel
April 5, 2005 — -- ABC News Now is re-launching its 24-hour digital news operation on TV in July and will expand its online video services with a wide selection of on-demand reports from all ABC News broadcasts.
The enhanced service will also feature local news. Ten ABC-owned stations have signed on to provide local news reports, both for the ABC News Now's live channel and for video on-demand services.
"ABC News Now will offer an unmatched menu of international, national and local news programming. By creating content specifically for digital distribution, we are offering the broadest array of programming to operators who increasingly want to reach consumers in numerous ways," said ABC News President David Westin.
"From day one, our owned and affiliated stations have been enthusiastic supporters of this unique programming concept. We look forward to further collaboration with our affiliates, enhancing the experience for our viewers and helping us meet our goal to reach the ABC News consumer anywhere, on any device, 24 hours a day, seven days a week."
In March 2003, ABC News Now launched the first-of-its-kind 24-hour streaming news channel, which features live coverage of breaking news, hourly briefs and original reports. It's available to nearly 30 million Internet homes.
ABC News Now also features broadcasts from "World News Tonight with Peter Jennings," "Good Morning America," "Nightline," "20/20" and "Primetime Live," along with selections from ABC News' library of historic news events dating back to 1963.
"The genesis of the service was in some ways a love of politics and a determination that ABC News would find a way to provide live coverage of both political conventions last year. I hadn't anchored live gavel-to-gavel coverage in years, and it was terrific. This was an opportunity to cover the news like ABC News, at its best, can," said Jennings.
"We all work for Now at one moment or the next," Jennings said. "It's a place for some of our senior people and a lot of our younger crowd to think out loud in ways that we cannot on the network, while, I might add, never forgetting that ABC News puts the fact ahead of opinion."