About OTV
Oceania Television Network (OTV) is the first 24-hour television station dedicated to showcasing the unique culture and people of the Pacific islands. For five years OTV has produced and acquired quality Pacific programs from across the region including entertainment, news, culture and educational programming.
In a region that has previously only received retransmitted Western and Asian television content, we believe that a home-grown Pacific regional station can help to preserve culture, foster pride and create a venue for sharing ideas and issues. OTV provides a platform for Pacific Islanders to develop their own voice in media.
OTV’s vision is to have a presence in all the islands of Micronesia and to gather content from Micronesia, Melanesia, and Polynesia so that the Pacific neighbors can share their stories and meet global challenges together.
We encourage viewers to contact OTV for program requests and contributions, which may include news stories, footage from local events or other content.
Development for Oceania Television Network began in 2005. OTV launched in January of 2007 in the Republic of Palau with an estimated 85% of households tuning in at prime time. Businesses, social programs and individuals quickly became interested in this new advertising opportunity and OTV doubled its programming time to fill the need. Oceania Television Network is now on air with Marshalls Broadcasting Company (MBC) and National Telecom Authority (NTA) in the Marshall Islands and on FSM Telecom in all four states of the Federated States of Micronesia (Pohnpei, Chuuk, Kosrae and Yap).
OUR GOALS ARE TO
- Preserve Pacific culture through exchange and dialogue
- Research and report on current news and events to strengthen democracy
- Provide an educational portal for remote villages
- Entertain with the appropriate social and cultural awareness
- Create a platform to raise the voice of Pacific islanders in the global community
- Enable Pacific islanders living abroad to interact with their relatives and communities.
THE INSPIRATION
One only needs to travel the islands of the North Pacific to see the obvious impact of Western and Asian media. Cultural identification is being lost in a single generation as traditional chiefs and elders struggle to combat the impacts of modern culture widely promulgated through media. When OTV humbly launched in 2007, it was the first time Palauans participated in developing their own images on television. Within weeks little girls were practicing to be the weather anchor and boys became interested in cameras. Despite the difficulty in creating a new market in a financially challenged world, the personal rewards have been overwhelming.
HUMBLE BEGININGS
When OTV first launched in early 2007 on-air programming was literally done from two I-Mac desktop computers. Using consumer play list software the OTV staff would schedule 12 hours of programming at a time and manually switch between the computers by unplugging the video feed to keep the programming going. Employees and volunteers were on call 24 hours to program and deal with a myriad of technical issues just to keep OTV on air. A broadcast server was purchased through a small grant from UNESCO IPDC in late 2008 allowing OTV to begin programming more efficiently.
OTV is Pride in Programming