Should M6 be afraid of losing its frequency to SIX, Xavier Niel’s new project? The businessman, owner of the company that owns Free and several press titles, has taken a step further by expressing his desire to appropriate the place occupied by the historic channel. He presented his media embryo to the audiovisual regulator, Arcom, this Wednesday, February 15.
“What we are proposing to you is not to replace one channel with another, it is to create a new channel”, insisted the billionaire who is attacking television for the first time. With its alternative, it competes for the first time with M6 since 1987, the year of the privatization of TF1 and the arrival of M6 on the sixth terrestrial network.
“My concern is that there will no longer be any innovation and that television will very quickly disappear and that for our young people, our children, it will be replaced by the platforms”, justified Xavier Niel before denouncing that “those who make the TV no longer believe in television”. The TF1 and M6 groups, historical holders of DTT channels 1 and 6, whose operating licenses expire on May 5, must defend their renewal before Arcom. For his part, the president of the company NJJ Holding, has drawn the outlines of SIX, a chain that he wants to be ambitious but not revolutionary for all that.
A traditional grid
The detailed schedule of this embryonic television channel designed by Xavier Niel and his team is composed in a rather traditional way around major weekly events.
Monday and Wednesday will be devoted to entertainment, Tuesday and Saturday to French fiction, Wednesday to cinema and Friday will alternate between music and documentary. Finally, Sunday will be occupied by an information magazine.
To achieve its ambition, the sixth channel would then become a “major partner” of French audiovisual production. In this way, he intends to compete with streaming platforms.
“YouTube, TikTok and Spotify don’t have a music monopoly”
Music streaming is also in the sights of SIX. “Television has abandoned music, denounced Xavier Niel. […] Musical tastes have changed, TV has not. According to him, only about fifteen artists are systematically invited to television sets. “At the same time, Booba fills stadiums in France, we never see him on TV. JuL is the most streamed artist, I don’t remember seeing him on TV. »
With SIX, the ambition of the billionaire is to take television out of its “snobbery” towards “whole sections of the music industry”. He wants to make more room for artists with “music at all hours”.
“Youtube, Tiktok and Spotify don’t have a monopoly on music,” he insisted.
Evenings that do not start “not after 9 p.m.”
Faced with the audiovisual regulator, Xavier Niel defended his vision. “With Free we have given freedom back to the user, with SIX we want to give freedom back to the viewer. »
He then denounced the gradual switch of prime time programs from 8:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. “What happens when you do that? he asked. In our networks we see that the peak of the audience on the platforms is 8:30 p.m. The owner of the telecom giant believes that the major television channels have “lost viewers” by shifting their programs ever further in favor of advertising pages. He promised that on SIX, “prime time will never start after 9 p.m.” with the goal of “putting people before money.”
The billionaire further promised that the channel’s linear signal would be distributed free of charge to broadcasters.
A drafting protected from “private interests”
The days will be organized around two information “pillars” of 90 minutes each. A large part of these meetings will be devoted to “debating with participants with varied profiles”. One at 12 p.m. and the other at 7 p.m. “The two big JTs are doing their job very well,” admitted the billionaire. “The objective of these two large slices of information is to give the keys to form an opinion, not to impose one. »
To guarantee the independence of SIX journalists, Xavier Niel plans to guarantee the right of veto of the editorial staff on the choice of the editorial director. This team would rely on a code of ethics and a committee dedicated to the pluralism of information. “The objective is to protect the editorial staff from any outside intervention,” he insisted. The shareholder should never be able to intervene on a subject to protect particular interests. »
If the billionaire has drawn the outlines of this project, M6 must in turn defend its piece of fat to prove to the regulator that its project still holds water to occupy its channel. Will Arcom favor Xavier Niel’s bet or will it bet again on M6? A decision must be made “by the end of February”.