TV Niue is a

Niue Niue is a self-governing island country in free association with New Zealand. It is situated in the South Pacific Ocean and is part of Polynesia, and predominantly inhabited by Polynesians. One of the world's largest coral islands, Niue is c ...

an television channel owned by the

Broadcasting Corporation of Niue The Broadcasting Corporation of Niue (BCN), also known as the Niue Broadcasting Corporation, is a government-owned

History

The first attempt at bringing a television service to Niue emerged in 1986, when John Bliss from the U.S. state of

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

obtained permission from the government to install a cable network fed to each village from a terrestrial antenna located in the capital,

Alofi Alofi is the capital of the island nation of Niue. With a population of 610 in 2022, Alofi is the second-smallest national capital by population (after Ngerulmud, capital of Palau). It consists of two villages: Alofi North and Alofi South. Th ...

. The subscription service charged an installation fee of NZ$50 for the decoder and NZ$5 for a monthly subscription. Content was relayed from satellite, with relays from the

Armed Forces Radio and Television Service The American Forces Network (AFN) is a government television and radio broadcast service the United States Armed Forces provides to soldiers stationed or assigned overseas, and is headquartered at Fort Meade in Maryland. AFN comprises two sub ...

relayed off

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as well as pre-taped black-and-white U.S. movies from

The Nostalgia Channel YTA TV (an initialism for its former full name, Youtoo America; commonly referred to as just YTA) is an American television network which originally launched in February 1985 as a cable channel. Unusual for a network of its type, it has had mult ...

. The system used

NTSC NTSC (from National Television System Committee) is the first American standard for analog television, published and adopted in 1941. In 1961, it was assigned the designation System M. It is also known as EIA standard 170. In 1953, a second ...

for recording and

PAL Phase Alternating Line (PAL) is a color encoding system for analog television. It was one of three major analogue colour television standards, the others being NTSC and SECAM. In most countries it was broadcast at 625 lines, 50 fields (25 ...

for transmission. The service was provided by Bliss Cablevision, which over the course of three years had extended its coverage across the island. The new service broadcast on channel 6. When the underground cable near Lakepa was near completion, the company was discontinued and its assets were taken over by the government, who with assistance from

Television New Zealand Television New Zealand (, "Te Reo Tātaki" meaning "The Leading Voice"), more commonly referred to as TVNZ, is a New Zealand state-owned media company and Crown entity. The company operates a television network, TVNZ+, streaming service, and 1N ...

, replaced it with a terrestrial service. The service was owned by the newly created BCN. Broadcasts started in October 1988.Television: The Niue experience, ''

Pacific Islands Monthly ''Pacific Islands Monthly'', commonly referred to as "PIM", was a magazine founded in 1930 in Sydney by New Zealand born journalist R.W. Robson. Background ''Pacific Islands Monthly'' was started in Sydney in 1930. The first issue ran in August ...

'', October 1989 By October 1989, TV Niue only had four programming staff and one employee. TVNZ's technicians had left the channel in its early weeks, while others were sent to New Zealand or Fiji for technical training. The station had two news bulletins in English, but had plans to introduce programs in Niuean later. In the early 2000s, Shona Pitt, current owner of Cook Islands Television, was the owner of the station. Presently BCN is responsible for a digital multiplex network of several relayed channels alongside the local service. Three new channels from Discovery Communications (the present

Warner Bros. Discovery Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. (WBD) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational mass media and Outline of entertainment, entertainment Conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It was formed from WarnerMedi ...

) were added in October 2019

Programming

In its early years, TV Niue received its programming from TVNZ's Pacific Service, who supplied the station with videotapes on a weekly basis. One Network News and sporting events were rebroadcast by satellite. The channel produces news bulletins in both

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

and Niuean languages."Niue Travel Guide - Communications"
, World Travel Guide''Tonga-Samoa Handbook''
David Stanley, 1999, , p.284

References

{{reflist

External links

Television Niue
official website
Television Niue
channel on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

: BCN News in English and Niuean Mass media in Niue Television channels and stations established in 1988