Room to breathe? Feminist expression and the political economy of the Oxygen Network

In 1998, a group of television veterans launched Oxygen Media---a TV/Web programming service for women. The founders sought to use the Internet as a vehicle for developing socially conscious programming not provided by other commercial "women's" outlets. They hired politically minded Web producers and sought to "co-create" Oxygen with an active audience through Internet-based feedback. They established an "advocacy" department and hired a prominent political figure to oversee a number of impressive projects, including an activist Web site, a social/political survey and some feminist television programs. By 2001, Oxygen executives had shut down the numerous Web sites and eliminated both the Web and the advocacy departments. What began as a truly innovative service devolved into a standard cable network with an unremarkable Web site and programming that differs little from women's magazines and other television fare.;A number of developments conspired against the founders of Oxygen. Investors and advertisers lost faith in Web companies, broadband subscribers did not materialize in sufficient numbers, cable and satellite operators would not pay adequate licensing fees, and the sluggish economy reduced advertiser spending. All of these factors made it impossible for Oxygen to sustain original and experimental programming. The case of Oxygen Media---told here through interviews and press research---illustrates the ways in which "the market" and the commercialization of programming limit the creation of feminist content.;Evaluating the efforts of independent cable/satellite programmers like Oxygen is especially important considering today's high-barriers to entry. Cable television was once hailed as a revolutionary, democracy-enhancing technology because it could be used to distribute socially and politically diverse programming created by a wide array of independent producers. Unfortunately, various industry practices including vertical integration, launch fees, channel bundling, spectrum-hoarding and program repurposing and cross-promotion favor media conglomerates at the expense of independent programmers. At the same time, the cable industry's development of "walled gardens", its discriminatory transport of data, and its fight against streaming video ventures all render the Internet a far less promising distribution venue for alternative media than was originally conceived.