VisionTV is a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to t ...

Category A

specialty channel A specialty channel (also known in the United States as a cable channel or cable network) can be a commercial broadcasting or non-commercial television channel which consists of television programming focused on a single genre, subject or target ...

that broadcasts multi-faith, multicultural, and general entertainment programming aimed at the 45 and over demographic. VisionTV is currently owned by

ZoomerMedia ZoomerMedia Limited is a Canadian media company controlled by Moses Znaimer, the founder of the Citytv network. Originally focusing on properties targeting what the company calls "zoomers", or the 45+ demographic, in 2022, the company began expand ...

, a company controlled by

Moses Znaimer Moses Znaimer (; born 1942) is a Tajik-born Canadian media executive of jewish descent. He is the co-founder and former head of Citytv, the first independent television station in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and the current head of ZoomerMedia ...

. VisionTV's funding comes from cable subscription fees, viewer donations, advertising revenues and the sale of airtime to faith groups.

History and viewership

Licensed in December 1987 by the

Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC; french: Conseil de la radiodiffusion et des télécommunications canadiennes, links=) is a public organization in Canada with mandate as a regulatory agency for broadcasti ...

(CRTC), the channel was launched on September 1, 1988 under the ownership of a nonprofit organization that eventually evolved into

S-VOX S-VOX Foundation was a Canadian non-profit media organization dedicated to producing content on spirituality. The organization is the successor to the non-profit entity that operated VisionTV, and later other related Canadian speciality channel ...

. It was initially one of Canada's more popular cable channels. However, with the proliferation of new cable channels, it has been moved up the dial by carriers and become less available to audiences, causing a drop in its viewership. VisionTV lacked clout with cable carriers as it was then a one-channel operation owned by a not-for-profit organization rather than a large commercial entity operating many channels. Notably, Rogers Cable was criticized in 1997 for moving Vision to Channel 59 on its

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most pop ...

system, rendering it inaccessible to many apartment residents because 59 is the channel most commonly overridden by the lobby camera service in apartment buildings. After Vision protested, Rogers offered to put Vision on channel 78 as well, but Vision turned that down because many of its viewers' sets can't reach that far. Network vice-president

Rita Deverell Rita Shelton Deverell, CM (born 1945 to Versie and Hugh Shelton) is a Canadian television broadcaster and social activist, who was one of the founders of the Canadian television channel Vision TV. She also served as news director for the Aborigin ...

, who hosted interstitial segments between programs, was the network's most prominent on-air personality from its launch until she left in 2002 to work for APTN. In June 2009, S-VOX announced it would sell its broadcasting assets to

, a company controlled by

. The sale was approved by the CRTC on March 30, 2010. ZoomerMedia assumed control of S-VOX's broadcasting assets on June 30, 2010. In December 2010, ZoomerMedia introduced a new logo and on-air identity for the channel with the tagline, "Zoomer Television" (Zoomer being a word coined by Znaimer meaning " boomers with zip"), emphasizing its focus on more general entertainment programming for the 45 and older demographic. In August 2013, the

Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC; french: Conseil de la radiodiffusion et des télécommunications canadiennes, links=) is a public organization in Canada with mandate as a regulatory agency for broadcasti ...

(CRTC) denied Vision's application to continue mandatory carriage which had required all Canadian cable systems to carry the channel.

International Expansion

In the spring of 2021, a similarly branded and programmed channel, Zoomer TV, launched in the United StatesTV & Film News – Telefilm responds to funding petition from diverse language producers
Broadcast Dialogue, 06-03-21 on the online streaming service, Distro TV. The channel broadcasts programming aimed at the 45 and over demographic.

Programming

VisionTV's programming consists of two programming streams; ''Mosaic'' and ''Cornerstone''.

Mosaic

Its Mosaic block consists of faith related programming representing 75 faith groups within various religious denominations, including

Catholics The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

Protestants Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

Muslims Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abra ...

Sikhs Sikhs ( or ; pa, ਸਿੱਖ, ' ) are people who adhere to Sikhism, Sikhism (Sikhi), a Monotheism, monotheistic religion that originated in the late 15th century in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent, based on the revelation of Gu ...

and

Hindus Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

. While the station sells time to several

television evangelists Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, e ...

, most of its Christian programming tends to originate from more mainstream denominations such as the

United Church of Canada The United Church of Canada (french: link=no, Église unie du Canada) is a mainline Protestant denomination that is the largest Protestant Christian denomination in Canada and the second largest Canadian Christian denomination after the Catho ...

and the Catholic Church - although United Church of Canada stopped producing its weekly program in 2008 due to a poor time slot, high costs of airtime and lack of viewership.

Cornerstone

VisionTV's ''Cornerstone'' programs include music, feature films, dramas, comedies, documentaries and programming on social issues that explore spirituality, morality, and cultural diversity as well as other general entertainment programming. The network also sponsors an annual Canadian drama competition, which solicits television series proposals revolving around faith and cultural diversity and then funds a pilot episode for the winning proposal. Two noted Canadian series, ''

Lord Have Mercy! ''Lord Have Mercy!'' is a Canadian television sitcom, produced by Leda Serene Films, first shown on Vision TV in 2003. It received further showings in Canada on Toronto One, APTN and Showcase later the same year. The series, one of the first ...

'' and ''

Da Kink in My Hair ''Da Kink in My Hair'' is a play by Trey Anthony, which debuted at the Toronto Fringe Festival in 2001. The play's central character is Novelette, the Caribbean Canadian owner of Letty's, a Toronto hair salon. Novelette is forced to confront her ...

'', have been developed from pilots commissioned by VisionTV. VisionTV also commissioned and aired 2010 comedy series ''

She's the Mayor ''She's the Mayor'' is a Canadian television sitcom which aired on Vision TV in 2011."She's ...

''.

VisionTV HD

On March 23, 2017, ZoomerMedia launched VisionTV HD, a 1080i

high definition High definition or HD may refer to: Visual technologies *HD DVD, discontinued optical disc format *HD Photo, former name for the JPEG XR image file format *HDV, format for recording high-definition video onto magnetic tape * HiDef, 24 frames-pe ...

simulcast of the

standard definition Standard-definition television (SDTV, SD, often shortened to standard definition) is a television system which uses a resolution that is not considered to be either high or enhanced definition. "Standard" refers to it being the prevailing sp ...

feed. The HD feed is currently available on

Bell Satellite TV Bell Satellite TV (french: Bell Télé; formerly known as Bell ExpressVu, Dish Network Canada and ExpressVu Dish Network and not to be confused with Bell's IPTV Fibe TV service) is the division of BCE Inc. that provides satellite television se ...

Bell Fibe TV Bell Fibe TV is an IP-based television service offered by Bell Canada in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. It is bundled with a FTTN or FTTH Bell Internet service, and uses the Mediaroom platform. Bell Fibe TV officially launched on Septe ...

, Bell Aliant Fibe TV, Rogers Cable,

Optik TV Telus Optik TV is a product of Telus Communications, a subsidiary of Telus Corporation, that provides IPTV service in the Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, and Quebec. The service offers over 630 digital channels, including more ...

, and

Shaw Direct Shaw Direct is a direct broadcast satellite television distributor in Canada and a subsidiary of the telecommunications company Shaw Communications. As of 2010, Shaw Direct had over 900,000 subscribers. It broadcasts on Ku band from two communic ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Visiontv Analog cable television networks in Canada Christian mass media companies English-language television stations in Canada Religious television networks in Canada Television channels and stations established in 1988 ZoomerMedia