NBN Television Totally Explained

Everything about Nbn Television totally explained

NBN Television is an Australian television station owned by PBL Media that's based in Newcastle, Australia. NBN in Newcastle, which was the first regional commercial television station in New South Wales, has since expanded to 39 transmitters throughout the northern half of New South Wales, which include Tamworth, Tweed Heads, Lismore, Coffs Harbour, Newcastle, Hunter Valley and the Gold Coast, and was inaugurated by Postmaster General Charles Davidson on March 4, 1962.
The station's name, NBN is an acronym of Newcastle Broadcasting New South Wales.

History

The beginning

NBN's original owner, the Newcastle Broadcasting and Television Corporation (NBTC) was founded in May 1958 to begin preparations for the upcoming television licence allocations. The main shareholders in NBTC were United Broadcasting Company (owned by the Lamb family, owners of radio station 2KO), Airsales Broadcasting Company (owners of local radio station 2HD), and the Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners Advocate (to be bought out by John Fairfax and Sons Ltd.). In accordance with the Australian Broadcasting Control Board regulations, at least 50% of the company had to be locally owned. 750,000 shares were made available by the NBTC (at 10 shillings, equivalent to AU$1 each). Approximately 2000 people bought shares.
   The Australian Broadcasting Control Board awarded the commercial television licence for the Newcastle and Hunter Valley area to the NBTC on August 1, 1961. NBN-3 would transmit on VHF channel 3, from a transmitter atop Mount Sugarloaf near Newcastle. Council approval for the transmitter was issued on July 17 that year.
   In the lead-up to the opening night, the station promised at least two movies a week, as well as men's interest programs each Saturday afternoon between 3pm and 4pm - a commitment successfully met, along with female-targeted programming in the early afternoon, and children's programming from 4.30pm to 6.30pm weekdays and mature programming thirty minutes before closedown each night. NBN Television broadcasted fifty-six hours in its first week of transmission, setting the Australian television record for the most time spent on air in a week for a new television station. Also during the same year more extensions were added to the studios, which included a new car park, and was officially opened on November 17, 1978.
   On November 22, 1979 the Newcastle Broadcasting and Television Corporation officially became NBN Limited, and the station itself renamed from Channel Three to NBN Television. By the late 1970s, NBN was producing twenty hours a week of local and networked programming from its studios, which in turn led the station to purchase a Bell Jet Ranger helicopter for news coverage purposes. In 1981, Hadjoin Pty. Ltd., a subsidiary of Parry's Esplanade Limited (later Parry Corporation), purchased 19.88% of NBN Limited for AU$6.7 million. Michael Wasley resigned from the board at the end of the year as a result. In 1984, plans for a second independent station in Newcastle had failed. During that time, NBN and ABC Newcastle were asked to leave the VHF band to accommodate FM radio. NBN would have been on UHF channel 51, and ABC on UHF channel 48, however this didn't eventuate. A proposal to launch a radiated subscription television service with community broadcasting during the daytime hours had also failed that year.
   In the late 1980s, NBN's Perth-based owner, Parry Corporation, spun off NBN Limited into a new company, NBN Enterprises, and took a 40% stake in the new company, with Security Pacific Capital Corporation buying 60%. Parry sold their stake soon after, holding onto Papua New Guinea television station NTN, which NBN had helped to set up. Fulcrum Media's move to later purchase the station was a source for confusion, as it was revealed that many companies, including the NSW State Superannuation Board and Westpac Banking Corporation, held substantial stakes in Fulcrum Media.

1990s to the 2000s

NBN was one of many stations opposed to aggregation, and offered an alternative by opening up a second station which it would operate for a period of time before selling it. This proposal was however rejected, and aggregation occurred on December 31, 1991, with NBN acquiring Nine Network affiliation. Following aggregation, the station's coverage expanded to cover all of northern New South Wales, whilst concurrently programming extended to twenty-four hours in a day, in stereophonic sound. In 1994, NBN Television's logo was updated to a pseudo-Nine logo, similar to fellow affiliate WIN Television.
   Throughout the 2000s, NBN was regarded as one of the leaders in digital broadcasting, not only being the first to produce a nightly regional news bulletin in full digital format, using a digital friendly news set, but also Australia's first fully digital outside broadcast van.
   In 2004, Washington H. Soul Pattinson began moves to transfer control of the station to its publicly listed subsidiary, Soul Pattinson Telecommunications, which became SP Telemedia as a result.
   On January 30 2006, NBN adopted a new logo and on air graphics, in line with Nine's new logo. The news department didn't change over on this date, finally launching new graphics on March 15. During April 2007, SP Telemedia announced that it would consider selling NBN Television, and had received at least two bids, one each from WIN Corporation and PBL Media. On May 9, 2007, the PBL Media AU$250 million bid became final. The news service employs 60 staff and produces over 20,000 local news stories annually, of which is combined with news reports from the Nine Network, the American Broadcasting Company and ITN; with local stories in all of its sub-markets.

Local programming

NBN has always produced some local programming, and had set a record for most local programming and transmission hours in its first week of operation. It was also a member of Australian Television Facilities, and had a hand in the production of drama series Silent Number.
NBN premiered Today Extra in 1989. The lifestyle program was broadcast three days per week as part of NBN's day-time lineup. The former Hunter Pirates NBL basketball team (and their predecessor, the Newcastle Falcons) as well as the Newcastle United Jets soccer team (and their predecessor, the Newcastle Breakers), have also both received sponsorship from NBN Television.

Logos

The original NBN logo was used by the station until 1979, featuring the numeral three inside a ring. The three was used due to the station's frequency allocation, being transmitted on VHF channel 3 from a transmitter atop Mount Sugarloaf near Newcastle. However in 1994, NBN added nine dots into a new logo designed similarly to the Nine Network's, and also began using Nine's on-air promotion, with the NBN logo replacing Nine's. In 1998, the dots were changed to spheres.


1962 - 1979	1979 - 1993	1994 - 2006	2006 - 2008	2008 - present

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