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TV For Dogs (Not As Weird As You Think)

This article is more than 10 years old.

Next month an audience that has thus far gone woefully under-served by television networks will finally have its day—dogs. On August 1, Israeli-based Jasmine TV Ltd. will be launching DOGTV nationwide on Direct TV, offering content aimed specifically at the canine set.

For $4.99 per month, dog owners will be able to tap into programming that will allow their pets to be entertained while guarding the house alone, indoors. One might find this absurd, but according to DOGTV CEO Gilad Neumann the concept can act as a cure for the gnawing emotional distress that many housebound animals experience.

“Dogs spend many hours alone at home every day,” says Neumann. “As we work harder and both household members usually go out to work, dogs spend a lot more time at home. They’re very lonely, they’re bored, they suffer from separation-anxiety often and people look for solutions.”

For years pet authorities have recommended that pet owners leave televisions or radios on for their lonely animals, said Neumann, and now there are shows optimized to grab hold of the animal’s attention.

Sounds and movement are important in keeping a dog’s attention, but that’s only part of the equation. Post production of visual content includes changing colors to fit a dog’s eyesight. “Dogs are color blind,” Neumann explained. “They can only see blue and yellow, they can’t see red and green like humans do.” DOGTV’s accentuating certain colors may seem slightly bizarre for a human audience, but for canines it’s the difference between fascinating television and the kind of boredom that makes chewing up every pillow in the house seem like fun.

DOGTV’s canine content categories include relaxation, stimulation and exposure. Exposure serves the purpose of providing dogs with a type of stress inoculation, Neumann explained. “We expose dogs to more challenging situations like doorbells, vacuum cleaners, riding in cars, children—things that they tend to be more stressful around. With the right volume of content we help them, basically, deal with it better.”

The channel is four years in the making, standing on two years of research, including over 40 studies on animal behavior and senses, and the opinions a three-person team of animal experts – Nicholas Dodman, Victoria Stilwell and Warren Eckstein. Another two years were spent on content development and testing the channel in the San Diego market.

DOGTV’s Direct TV launch will make the channel available in over 20 million households, 24 hours a day. With dogs in about 40% of U.S. households, Neumann and Jasmine TV feel this idea will be a winner, especially since the company owns all of the content. Jasmine TV has made a business broadcasting licensed movies, series, and HBO On Demand on over 50 channels on several continents in the past ten years. Its newest venture is 100% developed in-house. “Basically an end-to-end product that we can license anywhere in the world on any format,” Neumann said.

One speed bump for DOGTV is grabbing ad dollars. Getting advertisers to pay for commercial time during programming watched only by pets would be a truly Herculean if not Sisyphean task. But the network is not completely turning away from human eyeballs—there will be an evening prime time block of content aimed at pet owners, focused on tips from the company’s team of pet experts. “During that time there’s an opportunity to do sponsorship and commercials,” said Neumann.

Follow me on Twitter @KarstenStrauss