Lost TV Channels (movies, commercials, television, series)

[tvdxer]

Let's create a thread for remembering TV channels that no longer exist, or those that exist in the same name but only that.

I can think of the following networks:

Discovery Civilization. Circa 2001 - This is one of the networks I miss most. Part of the Discovery multiplex (which at the time included Discovery Home and Leisure, Discovery Kids, Discovery Science, and Discovery Wings), it focused on history and the social sciences, airing documentaries and series on current and past global issues, archaeology, and historical topics. Unlike the History Channel, it was not entirely focused on war.

Unfortunately, ratings took a dive, so Discovery rechristened it "Discovery Times" to reflect a partnership with the New York Times. Unfortunately, the channel's quality took a steep dive, and soon became unrecognizable as they once again changed the name to "Investigation Discovery", this time becoming a "true crime" channel.

Discovery Civilization still exists in Canada.

Discovery Health. Until 2011, this was the place to catch the corny but interesting Mystery Diagnosis and True Stories of the ER shows. Then citing low ratings, Discovery renamed it the Oprah Winfrey Network.

Mind Extension University. Later known as Knowledge TV, this was an educational channel for which you could earn college credit watching the courses. I don't know how it worked (maybe you had to contact them and they would send you work in addition to the courses), but it was a smart idea while it lasted, and before online courses became the norm. I think I last saw this network in about 1998.

Syndicated Entertainment Television (SET) - I never had the opportunity to watch this channel, but it lasted for a very short while in 1996. Apparently they carried a menu of syndicated shows (as their name suggests).

Foxnet - Before a Fox affiliate was established in virtually every market, you could watch Fox programming on a basic cable channel called "Foxnet". Duluth, Minnesota, my home town, finally got a Fox affiliate in 1999 (KQDS-TV); as we were then without satellite, we saw "upgrading" from 4 to 5 local channels a major advance.

Equator HD - This channel was initially on VOOM, a short-lived satellite service (competing with DirecTV and Dish Network) whose main selling point was more HD programming (at a time when high-definition sets were mostly priced above $1,000). Because there was few HD channels available in 2003, VOOM rolled out its own HD networks: HDNews, Kung Fu HD, Monsters HD (horror movies), Gameplay HD (video game action), Rush HD (concerts), and several others. One of the more interesting was Equator HD, which aired a variety of travel documentaries from around the world shot in HDTV. VOOM closed shop in about 2005 or 2006, and many of the VOOM HD "Originals" were moved to Dish Network, where I initially saw them. Equator HD quickly became my favorite of the bunch. Much to my dismay, in May 2008 Dish Network replaced all of the VOOM HD Originals with "HD" versions of the mainstream cable networks (which often were not true HD at the time).

Like Discovery Civilization, Equator HD is still on Canadian cable lineups.

MuchMusic - MuchMusic is / was the Canadian MTV. It came to the United States in about 1995, and to my knowledge, was virtually the same as its Canadian version, except with the commercials changed. Unfortunately, it began to diverge from its original counterpart in about 2000, and became the abhorrent Fuse in 2003.

Some other ones (remember any of these?):

America's Health Network
Kaleidoscope
Fox Boyz
Fox Girlz
CBS Eye on the People
Channel America
American Independent Network
Network One
Las Vegas Television Network
Valuevision
America's Talking
NET (National Empowerment Television)
Nostalgia
All News Channel
Colours TV
The Box
The Tube

[plwhit]

NBC, CBS, ABC, MTV and WPIX right off the top of my head...

[tilli]

I sure miss the old Sci-Fi channel. I still find it so surreal that they renamed it SyFy and started showing wrestling in prime time.

[Creekcat]

SyFy channel is not even a shell of the Sci-Fi Channel.

[e_cuyler]

Discovery Health has morphed into Discovery Fit and Health [replacing FitTV], and seems to more or less be the same channel with many, though not all, of the same programs.

I have another, The Nashville Network, which is now Spike. There was a brief, embarrassing attempt to "rebrand" as The National Network, didn't last long. Ironically, it too involved having wrestling shows. The Nashville Network was about like CMT is now, if I remember right.

Sci-Fi was bad long before it changed its name...changing to SyFy was just the last nail in the coffin.

How about Turner South? That's gone now, right? It was another Turner channel that was only available in the Southern states.
I never got it, but had out-of-state friends who did.

[tvdxer]

Some other channels which changed names (and concepts):

ZDTV -> TechTV -> G4 TechTV -> G4 (actually a merger; at one time, G4 and TechTV existed as separate channels)
CBN -> The Family Channel -> Fox Family Channel -> ABC Family
America's Talking -> MSNBC
Court TV -> TruTV
WB -> CW
UPN -> My Network TV
CBS Eye on the People (great channel!) -> Discovery People -> nothing
Daytime / Cable Health Network -> Lifetime
Outdoor Life -> VS.
Movie Time -> E!
Discovery Home and Leisure -> Discovery Home -> Planet Green
Discovery Wings -> Military Channel

Channels which are a mere shell of what they once were:

TV Land
TLC

[e_cuyler]

I'm guessing Planet Green may not last long, it seems like its programming is mostly reruns of shows from other networks.

[raubre]

VH1 Mega Hits (later played indie rock videos which was decent.) It's now Logo.

MTVX showed rock videos, now is MTV Jams (great more rap music )

How about lost Home Shoppping Channels (America's Store, CVN, Shop at Home)

[swmr1ml]

do MTV and VH-1 even show music videos anymore?

[raubre]

Originally Posted by swmr1ml

do MTV and VH-1 even show music videos anymore?

At 4:00 in the morning.