Newswise — August 13, 2007) National Geographic Channel (NGC), in partnership with the Bronx Zoo-based Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), announced today that it has launched a new programming category on its broadband service, NGC WILD!, that will showcase WCS's research efforts around the world and at its five zoos in New York City.
NGC WILD! is a free, ad-supported online channel featuring the best of NGC's natural history programming, which viewers can access with the click of a mouse. NGC WILD! launched earlier this year and can be accessed through a dedicated Web site at www.ngcwild.com. The fully searchable broadband service currently offers more than 60 short-form pieces, two to five minutes in length, that rotate weekly, and one full-length program each week.
The new Wildlife Conservation Society category will showcase the efforts of this international conservation organization that runs the world-famous Bronx Zoo and operates conservation projects around the world. Content is also provided in four other categories: Amazing Moments, Animal Preservation, Predation and The Tamer Side. A further category, Preserve Our Planet, an extension of NGC's conservation initiative, will be added in the near future.
At launch, the Wildlife Conservation Society category will feature six short-form pieces, each approximately five minutes in length, and a full-length interview:
"¢ Gabon: The Last Eden — Narrated by acclaimed actress and WCS board member Glenn Close, Gabon: The Last Eden explores one of the last remaining vestiges of unspoiled wild Africa. In 2002, one visionary African leader and a group of WCS scientists defied conventional wisdom — wisdom that insists oil and logging are the only way to bring prosperity to an impoverished land. Out of the wild, they created 13 new national parks — the largest parks system in the world — protecting a fascinating array of wildlife such as the forest elephant and gorilla.
"¢ Megatransect/Africa Extreme — WCS scientist and National Geographic Explorer in Residence Mike Fay trekked 2,000 miles through one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet: Equatorial Africa. From the northern stretches of Congo to the Atlantic-coast beach in Gabon, Fay's trip, documented by National Geographic photographer Michael "Nick" Nichols, was instrumental in protecting this pristine ecosystem, christened "The Last Place on Earth."
"¢ Africa: The Megaflyover — Inspired by Megatransect, in 2004 Mike Fay took flight for one of the most incredible adventures of our time — a seven-month journey from the southern tip of Africa to Morocco's northern shores, yielding more than 100,000 images to create an aerial mosaic of the continent.
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"¢ Reptile Wild — Dr. Brady Barr, a herpetologist with a passion for crocodilians, is featured in segments from his NGC series Reptile Wild. Join Brady as he travels with WCS field staff to Congo's remote Lac Tele region in search of the African python and along the way deciphers the mystery behind Congo's own Loch Ness-style legend, Mokéle-Mbémbé — a large creature reported to live in the lakes and swamps of the Congo River basin.
"¢ Crittercam: Lions — A small camera, Crittercam, is worn by a lioness that joins her pride for a midnight hunt through the African bush. Join WCS lion researcher Laurence Frank as the remarkable Crittercam technology takes viewers inside the lives of the lioness and her cubs.
"¢ Behind the Scenes — Full-length interviews feature Mike Fay and photographer Nick Nichols, who discuss 12 years of conservation work in Central Africa, and the Megatransect, Fay's 2,000-mile trek across equatorial Africa.
Within eight weeks, additional content — more than 20 news items and interviews — will go live.
NGC WILD! also links from its broadband site to integrate with National Geographic Channel's primary Web site, www.nationalgeographic.com/channel, as well as the National Geographic Society's Web site, www.nationalgeographic.com, and its multitude of mission-related content designed to help increase and diffuse geographic knowledge while promoting conservation of the world's cultural, historical and natural resources.
NGC WILD! is also a featured channel on National Geographic's Joost offering, with 10 hours of standard-definition content streamed through Joost and refreshed on a monthly basis.
"The Wildlife Conservation Society is engaged in compelling and important work around the world — activities that fit seamlessly with other content on NGC WILD!," said Brad Dancer, National Geographic Channel's Vice President of Research and Digital Media. "NGC WILD! is another destination where the National Geographic Channel can provide content in the rapidly expanding digital environment."
"We are thrilled to be featured on NGC WILD!, an exciting medium that will allow our work to reach new audiences in this digital age," said John Calvelli, Wildlife Conservation Society's Senior Vice President for Public Affairs. "This latest partnership highlights the efforts of both WCS and National Geographic, two organizations that have worked together to save wildlife — and communicate those efforts to the world — as we enter another century of collaboration."
Since 1895, the Wildlife Conservation Society has worked to save wildlife and wild lands around the globe. Today WCS has field staff at work in over 60 nations, protecting many of the last wild places left on our planet. To bring the mission home, the Bronx Zoo-based WCS is distinguished as the only global conservation organization that also operates the world's largest system of urban wildlife parks, educating more than 4 million zoo and aquarium visitors each year about the importance of wildlife conservation. To learn more about WCS, visit http://www.wcs.org.
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Based at the National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C., the National Geographic Channel (NGC) is a joint venture between National Geographic Ventures (NGV) and Fox Cable Networks (FCN). Since launching in January 2001, NGC initially earned some of the fastest distribution growth in the history of cable and more recently the fastest ratings growth in television. The network celebrated its fifth anniversary January 2006 with the launch of NGC HD which provides the spectacular imagery that National Geographic is known for in stunning high-definition. NGC has carriage with all of the nation's major cable and satellite television providers, making it currently available to almost 65 million homes. For more information, please visit www.nationalgeographic.com/channel.
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