Owned by Bell Media Slogan Man's Best Friend. Language English Founded 2001 Motto Man's Best Friend. | Picture format 480i (SDTV) Country Canada Headquarters Toronto Owner Bell Media | |
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Launched October 18, 2001 (2001-10-18) | ||
MTV2 is a Canadian English language Category A cable and satellite specialty channel. Similar to its American counterpart, MTV2 is a lifestyle and general entertainment channel aimed at youth and teen audiences. The channel is owned by Bell Media, with the name and branding used under an agreement with the Viacom Media Networks division of Viacom.
Contents
History
On November 24, 2000, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) announced the licensees of the new, much-sought after, Category 1 digital services. Craig Media, in partnership with TD Capital Group Ltd, was granted a licence for a youth lifestyle service known as Connect. One of the licence's conditions was that the channel could not devote more than 10% of its schedule to the airing of music videos and music programming, in order to avoid direct competition with MuchMusic, owned at the time by CHUM Limited.
Nonetheless, in August 2001, Craig Media announced that it had reached an agreement with MTV Networks to license programming and the MTV brand in Canada for the channel, prompting a pre-launch name change to MTV Canada. Prior to the channel's launch, Craig purchased TD Capital Group's interest in the channel. The channel launched as MTV Canada on October 18, 2001. Shortly afterward, Craig sold a minority interest in the service to MTV Networks. MTV Canada aired a mix of Canadian-produced programs (including Pepsi Breakout and MTV Select), as well as shows from the American MTV channel (such as TRL and The Real World).
CHUM soon filed complaints with the CRTC, arguing that MTV Canada was violating its conditions of licence, exceeding its limit of 10% music videos, becoming a direct competitor to MuchMusic. Craig was later forced to make changes to reduce its percentage of music video and music-related programming.
However, these changes were soon rendered moot as Craig was acquired by CHUM Limited on December 1, 2004, prompting MTV Networks to exercise its right, due to a clause in its contract, to terminate the licensing agreement with Craig if a change in control were to occur. CHUM was required to pay CAD$10 million in licensing fees to MTV Networks for the time remaining in their contract. The contract termination also meant that MTV Networks was no longer able to retain interest the channels. This did not apply to TV Land Canada (now known as Comedy Gold), which may indicate that Viacom's sale could also be a result of the company's strained relationships with CHUM Limited; CHUM (with Cablevision's Rainbow Media) previously launched MuchMusic USA (now known as Fuse) to compete against MTV.
2005-present
On June 9, 2005, CHUM announced it would rebrand the channel as Razer, a change that took effect on June 30 of that year. The new channel was built on interactivity, allowing its audience to "program, host and contribute to elements to the service and make it their own". In addition to the new programming slate, Razer debuted RazerTXT, a new programming block where viewers could play a selection of SMS games while watching the shows. Razer would later debut Kamikaze, the branding and programming block used for various anime titles as well as shows such as Happy Tree Friends.
Meanwhile, Bell Globemedia (later CTVglobemedia) struck a licensing agreement with MTV Networks to launch its own MTV channel (previously known as talktv) in early 2006. In July 2006, Bell Globemedia announced that it would purchase CHUM for an estimated CAD$1.7 billion, including its interest in Razer. The sale was approved by the CRTC on June 8, 2007, with the transaction completed on June 22.
On August 1, 2008, Razer was relaunched as MTV2. Unlike the original channel (now known as Juicebox), with the vast majority of its programming consisting of music videos, the new channel became much closer in format to its U.S. counterpart. Because of their respective licences, it can air music videos and music programming unlike the current main MTV channel in Canada.
Ownership changed hands again when on September 10, 2010, BCE (a minority shareholder in CTVglobemedia) announced that it planned to acquire 100% interest in CTVglobemedia for a total debt and equity transaction cost of CAD$3.2 billion. The deal was approved by the CRTC on March 7, 2011 and was finalized on April 1 of that year, when CTVglobemedia was rebranded as Bell Media.
Programming
Presently, MTV2 airs a mix of comedies, documentaries, reality shows, and dramas. As of 2015, the channel doesn't air any of the original programs of its American counterpart, although some of its acquired shows have aired in syndication on MTV2 in the U.S or were produced by its sister channel, MTV, both domestically and internationally.