TV Japan

TV Japan, Channel #265

In response to the earthquake and following tsunami and nuclear problems Cablevision has decided to allow TV Japan to broadcast free of charge, temporarily.

Usually this channel is one of many channel that are in the 200 channel range that must be special ordered in order to view. These 200-299 stations are generally foreign language stations. For $24.95 you get a small selection of non-English stations of your choice, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Russian, etc.

Surprisingly in NYC these channels are popular even with the add cost.

TV Japan's  normal programing  has been stopped for the immediate future to run 24 news coverage of the disaster. Cablevision said they will let the channel broadcast for free until March 17.

Watching a bit of the coverage it is much like a U.S. disaster coverage with the exception of the eyewitness show. If this was an American disaster you would have reporters hunting for victims to exploit or grandstanding eyewitnesses telling the horrible papercut stories. There use of paper pictures to describe the nuclear plants were easy to follow then the stuff on regular channel. And that is in Japanese without subtitles.

No need to explain there is a large Japanese community in NYC, as well as a large every other ethnic group or country in NY. So a little applause to Cablevision for being nice.