CNN axes Nuts TV Freeview channel

Nuts TV, the broadcast spin-off of IPC’s weekly men’s magazine, is being axed from its Freeview slot just over a year after it was launched. The channel will now only be available online.

The channel, launched by IPC parent company Turner Broadcasting in September last year, has been broadcasting 20 hours of live TV per week, from 9pm to 1am on Freeview channel 42.

CNN International, which owns Turner Broadcasting, will replace Nuts TV with its European news channel. It is intended that CNN will launch on Freeview in January 2009, pending permission being granted by Digital Television Multiplex Operators Limited, which monitors all Freeview channels.

The new channel will be available from Monday to Sunday in a prime-time evening block, offering viewers its European programming line-up.

Nick Wrenn, managing editor at CNN International for the Europe, Middle East and Asia regions, says: “This move to Freeview is an opportunity to introduce CNN’s European prime-time programming to a new UK audience, at a time when international awareness and understanding of the global news environment has never been so critical.”

Nuts TV featured celebrity presenters, such as model Lucy Pinder and comedian Dan Wright, hosting shows relating to the content of its magazine.

Each night started off with Rude News, a daily digest of “the least important global stories of the day”, and was followed with shows focused on sports, girls, sex and motoring.

The channel recently signed a deal with boxer Ricky Hatton to do a live weekly show called Ricky Speaks.