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Al Jazeera holds out for US deal When the long-delayed English version of the often-controversial Al Jazeera news channel launches tomorrow it will be beamed to a footprint of some 80 million homes worldwide. In English-language markets, the channel will beam down from the Astra and Eurobird satellites to DSat homes in the UK; the Globecast platform in the US; Optus in Australia; and foreign-language platform Orcus in New Zealand. With Globecast a minor player in the US DTH market, there has been something of a push to get the Al Jazeera English channel on to bigger stateside platforms in time for the channel's launch at noon GMT tomorrow.  Cable giant Comcast, which has 21 million digital subscribers, reportedly declined to take Al Jazeera English nationwide last week, and carriage talks with Cox Communications, DirecTV and Dish Network are unlikely to bear fruit before the channel's launch.Even having US and UK newscasters like David Frost, CNN anchor Riz Khan and former Nightline correspondent Dave Marash onboard hasn't managed to persuade any major US platform to carry the channel, perhaps amid capacity squeezes and perceptions about the Arab-owned channel's editorial stance. An Al Jazeera representative denied that having little US distribution would be a hurdle for the fledgling network, telling C21 that the world's biggest English-speaking market was "not crucial," that cable talks were still ongoing and that carriage in other parts of the world had allowed Al Jazeera to double its launch roll-out target of 40 million homes. Among the European satellite and cable platforms to carry the channel are TPS, Canal+, Neuf/Cegetel and Noos in France; TV Vlaanderen in Belgium; Canal Digital for the pan-Scandinavian region; and KDG, Premiere, Kabel BW, Kabel Kiosk and Telecolumbus in Germany. Sky Italia; Cyfra Plus in Poland; and Holland's Canal Digitaal and Essent Kabelcom are also onboard. In Asia the channel will go out on HK Broadband in Hong Kong; Astro Malaysia; Buddy TV in Thailand; Yes TV in Israel; TurkSat in Turkey; and NileSat and ArabSat in the Middle East. Wadah Khanfar, director general of the Al Jazeera Network, who joined in March, said the launch into 80 million homes was "unprecedented in the broadcasting industry. We will continue to build on this figure after launch and will be looking to expand our reach significantly." In addition to cable, ADSL, mobile platforms and satellite, Al Jazeera English will be available as a live stream online, in partnership with Real Networks. The channel will draw on news bureaus in Doha, Kuala Lumpur, London and Washington DC. Ed Waller 14 Nov 2006 © C21 Media 2006 
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