Former Fox news host Glenn Beck’s new web venture, GBTV, will bring in an estimated $20 million in revenue its first year, and has already secured more than 230,000 subscribers, the Wall Street Journal reports.
As we noted last week, Beck’s biggest challenge will not be revenue, but rather staying in the public eye. Shock jock Howard Stern has done very well financially since leaving terrestrial radio for satellite, but he is no longer making daily headlines as he once did. Of course, Beck still has his radio show, in addition to his other ventures, so the comparison is not perfect.
While Beck’s daily 5-7 PM show is bound to get the most attention, the programming surrounding that show is an interesting case as well. GBTV has acquired the rights to a number of classic TV shows, many of which have a radio theme in some way. Some of the shows are in the public domain, while others are not and are being paid by Mercury Radio Arts for their use. A spokesperson for Beck also confirms that GBTV intends to acquire additional original series from outside production companies, just as a more traditional network would.
Exactly what those series would be about are still unclear, but GBTV programming already includes the classic TV shows as well as a children’s show, “Liberty Treehouse,” so it seems as though any genre is potentially on the table.