The News 12 Networks are a group of regional

cable news Cable news channels are television networks devoted to television news broadcasts, with the name deriving from the proliferation of such networks during the 1980s with the advent of cable television. In the United States, the first nationwide ca ...

television channels in the

New York metropolitan area The New York metropolitan area, also called the Tri-State area and sometimes referred to as Greater New York, is the List of cities by GDP, largest metropolitan economy in the world, with a List of U.S. metropolitan areas by GDP, gross metropo ...

that are owned by

Altice USA Altice USA, Inc., commonly known as Altice, is an American telecommunications provider with headquarters in New York City, owned by the Franco-Israeli businessman Patrick Drahi. The company delivers pay television, Internet access, telephone se ...

. All channels provide rolling news coverage 24 hours a day, focusing primarily on regions of the metro area outside

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

Queens Queens is the largest by area of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. Located near the western end of Long Island, it is bordered by the ...

, and

Staten Island Staten Island ( ) is the southernmost of the boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Richmond County and situated at the southernmost point of New York (state), New York. The borough is separated from the ad ...

History

The first of the channels, News 12 Long Island, was launched by

Cablevision Cablevision Systems Corporation was an American cable television company with systems serving areas surrounding New York City. It was the fifth-largest cable provider and ninth-largest television provider in the United States. Throughout its ex ...

on December 15, 1986, to customers on its Long Island system, as the first 24-hour regional cable news service in the United States. Over the years Cablevision expanded the reach of News 12 by adding additional networks across its footprint. The network was formerly operated by

Newsday ''Newsday'' is a daily newspaper in the United States primarily serving Nassau and Suffolk counties on Long Island, although it is also sold throughout the New York metropolitan area. The slogan of the newspaper is "Newsday, Your Eye on LI" ...

Media Holdings and presided over by Patrick Dolan, son of Newsday majority owner Charles Dolan and brother of James L. Dolan.

, who bought Cablevision in 2016, has retained Dolan as a senior network advisor. In December 2005, News 12 Networks generated criticism when it changed its website and mobile app to a pay subscription service for those who live outside the News 12 viewing area. The News 12 website is offered free of charge to subscribers of Optimum,

Spectrum A spectrum (: spectra or spectrums) is a set of related ideas, objects, or properties whose features overlap such that they blend to form a continuum. The word ''spectrum'' was first used scientifically in optics to describe the rainbow of co ...

Xfinity Comcast Cable Communications, LLC, doing business as Xfinity, is an American telecommunications business segment and division of the Comcast Corporation. It is used to market consumer cable television, internet, telephone, and wireless servic ...

. This has been used as a marketing tool against customers signing up for Verizon FiOS, or satellite providers

DirecTV DirecTV, LLC is an American Multichannel television in the United States, multichannel video programming distributor based in El Segundo, California. Originally launched on June 17, 1994, its primary service is a digital Satellite television, s ...

Dish Network DISH Network L.L.C., often referred to as DISH, an abbreviation for Digital Sky Highway, is an American provider of satellite television and IPTV services and wholly owned subsidiary of EchoStar Corporation. The company was originally establ ...

, which are available in many of the areas News 12 covers. At one point Cablevision even made the network's slogan, "Only on Cable. Never on FiOS. Never on satellite." (In some ads, FiOS was substituted with "phone company television" and in most areas, "Cable" was substituted with Cablevision in areas where Cablevision was only provided as a cable provider, notably Long Island). In response, Verizon FIOS partnered with RNN to create FiOS1 News in June 2009 and later expanded to the Lower Hudson Valley in 2014, which could be viewed only by FiOS customers. Unlike News 12, FiOS1's website was not behind the paywall and was open to all users, with the exception of its live broadcast (which was only offered to FiOS customers). In October 2016, newspaper reports stated News 12 was consolidating its Westchester and

Connecticut Connecticut ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York (state), New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. ...

News operations, moving news anchor desks and studio operations to

New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state located in both the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. Located at the geographic hub of the urban area, heavily urbanized Northeas ...

and

Long Island Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into the Atlantic Ocean. It constitutes a significant share of the New York metropolitan area in both population and land are ...

, and news and production staff at these operations would be laid off. Reports indicated Westchester News Director Janine Rose was fired, and Connecticut News Director Tom Appleby was dismissed. By August 2017, the seven News 12 Network cable channels began airing Cheddar's news summaries segments. In April 2018, Altice announced that it would form a new division named ''Altice USA News'' (renamed to ''Altice News'' after Cheddar acquisition) that would consist of News 12 and I24NEWS. The division was headed by Michael Schreiber now succeeded by Jon Steinberg. Altice has departed from Cablevision's long-standing policy of ensuring that News 12 remained exclusive to cable. In July 2019, Altice began to simulcast News 12 on Atlantic City station WACP between 6 AM and 9 AM every weekday morning. Beginning on November 4, 2019, Verizon FiOS began carrying News 12 and News 12+. They were meant to replace FiOS 1, which shut down 9 days later. Verizon later added sister networks i24News and Cheddar in early 2020.

Networks

References

External links

Official News 12 website
{{LocalCableNews Altice USA 24-hour television news channels in the United States Television stations in Connecticut Mass media in New Jersey Television stations in New York (state) Television channels and stations established in 1986