News Channel goes live Saturday
by David Hinkle 
{ Jan 25th 2007 at 12:45PM }
We've been given the Internet browser and the Weather Channel, now it's high time we got the News Channel, wouldn't you say? Oh, what's that, Nintendo? We get it Saturday? Awesome!So, yes, we're all going to be given a chance to check out the Wii's News Channel this Saturday. And in case you're still in the dark on what that does, it's a channel that takes pictures and headlines from the Associated Press, presenting them to the user in a multitude of languages outside of Japanese. Japanese-language news will be provided by a separate agency.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
pr0vidence @ Jan 25th 2007 2:11PM
meh. If this goes anything like the weather channel, the headline will be something about the birth of christ.
When it all comes down to it, these features that gaming systems have are very useless to me. I wanna play games and that's it. I don't use my ps2 as a DVD player. I don't use my PSP as a movie/music player. I don't need my wii to give me news and weather. I have a PC to do that. Please, Nintendo, I love you to death, concentrate on making games, it's what you do best, and you are great at it.
Ken @ Jan 25th 2007 3:02PM
The news channel will be great. I use the weather channel every morning to check the weather for the day, and now while I'm eating my cereal I could be reading some top news headlines.
It may be useless to you pr0vidence, but I use it. And so will other people. So I think this is a nice add-on.
yooper1019 @ Jan 25th 2007 2:44PM
CNN was covering this today.
bowlhed @ Jan 25th 2007 3:01PM
newsss,coming to the UK?
Moe @ Jan 25th 2007 3:16PM
Games is still the #1 reason for owning a Wii. I see the wather channel and the news channel as additional goodies. Think about it. Do people usually turn on their tv, then their Wii and then search through the channel? I don't. What I do is play my games and sometimes when I'm done, I want to check tomorrow's weather, and I click on the channel. Same thing for me, on the news channel. I can check it before or after I'm done playing. So games are #1 and these other features are additions to the gaming.
Zan @ Jan 25th 2007 3:17PM
This is cool!
Jay @ Jan 28th 2007 1:34AM
I use the internet browser when my girlfriend hogs the computer for her Warcraft obsession. We also use the weather channel every day before work, so I think I will use the News channel as well.
PJ @ Jan 26th 2007 4:01AM
News Channel just went live. I've been surfing for about an hour and it has a unique yet simple interface. I'm glad they went with the "Associated Press" and not one conglomerate news company.
Matt Drewry @ Jan 26th 2007 4:20AM
I've just done run the system update here in the UK and the News Channel just appeared.
It's quite a nice extra - all the stories are supplied by AP and are divided up into sections National News, Sports, Business etc etc. Some articles have a little map to the left hand side when opened that shows you where in the world the story comes from (denoted by a blue sphere on the headline page), whilst others just contain the text.
Once read, both types grey out on the headlines page to show you've looked at them, although then can of course be reopened if you need to.
There's also a slideshow option for each topic area (complete with elevator music!) which seems to cycle through the current headlines, zooming you across the globe in the top portion of the screen to where the story is happening. Clicking when a headline is displayed, takes you to the full story. I guess this could be a useful option when you're eating your breakfast or something.
Overall like the weather channel I don't think I'll be using this everyday but I'm glad to have it, especially for those times I can't be bothered to boot my laptop
Matt Drewry @ Jan 26th 2007 4:29AM
Oh yeah, the UK got Mario Kart 64 too this morning!
Tom B. @ Jan 26th 2007 8:32AM
I think we got it in the US today also! I did anyway. Pretty sneaky, Nintendo.
It's an interesting diversion. The interface combines elements of the Photo, Internet, and Forecast Channels. Time will tell if I'll really use it regularly. I never ended up using the Forecast Channel.
b @ Jan 26th 2007 8:36AM
I just updated my news channel and checked it out this morning. Pretty cool stuff. I like how they organized the news articles based on where its from