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Winfrey Will Have OWN TV Network

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By DAVID BAUDER, The Associated Press

Published: January 16, 2008

NEW YORK - Oprah Winfrey is getting her own TV network.

OWN - Oprah Winfrey Network - debuts next year in 70 million homes with cable and satellite in a deal announced Tuesday with Discovery Communications. It replaces Discovery Health network.

The announcement builds a media empire that includes the top-rated TV talk show, a magazine, a satellite radio network, a Web site and TV movies made under her banner.

"This is an evolution of what I've been able to do every day," Winfrey said. "I will now have the opportunity to do this 24 hours a day on a platform that goes on forever."

She will be chairwoman of the network, owned 50-50 by Discovery and her company, Harpo Productions. In return for taking over a network already operated by Discovery, Winfrey gives half ownership of the Oprah.com Web site.

Discovery owns 13 U.S. networks, including Discovery, TLC and Animal Planet. Discovery Health is one of the least successful. Discovery President and Chief Executive Officer David Zaslav was looking for ideas about it when his wife handed him a copy of Oprah's magazine.

He talked to Winfrey about a partnership, coincidentally shortly after she came upon a May 24, 1992, diary entry, when she wrote about her idea for creating her own network.

"David came and really spoke about the vision I'd been having for 15 years," she said.

Zaslav said Discovery's mission is knowledge and curiosity and "this is right in our sweet spot."

Winfrey envisions programming on issues such as money, health, weight, relationships and raising children.

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