Aso Broadcasting System

The Aso Broadcasting System (JOBX-DTV) is a Japanese television network. It has officially noted itself as the first English-language television network in its country. The network is owned and operated by Kabushiki Gaisha ABS.

History
ABS started broadcasting on the 1st of October 1987. The station launched as the first English-language television network in Japan, to great fanfare from the English-speaking population of Japan. The station started broadcasting on channel 10 in Tokyo.

The station's early programming lineup mostly consisted of subtitled programmes from Nippon Television and TV Asahi. ABS also produced it's own news programmes under the name "ABS N6", and was broadcast across the network nationwide at 6pm on weekdays (hence the "N6" name). This programme became ABS's flagship newscast, and is still airing today.

In 1995, ABS launched ABS Sat1, a BS broadcast satellite channel which acts as the network's main national feed.

The station launched its international outside broadcast satellite service on September 15, 1997. ABS claims that the service was launched "to give the world a taste of Japan's most unique entertainment, and news from a Japanese viewpoint, all in the English language". The same year also marked ABS's 10th year of operation.

ABS HD was launched as a 1080i high definition simulcast of ABS's national feed on the 15th of April 2007 as part of the station's 20th anniversary. The service shut down in 2011, when the main ABS television channel started airing in full 1080p HD.

At noon on the 24th of July 2011, ABS ceased analog television transmissions on channel 10, after 24 years of operation. The analog transmitter, along with ABS HD, were taken offline at midnight on that day.

In April 2015, ABS announced that it is planning to launch a 4K Ultra HD service by 2016.

ABS policies
ABS has a number of unique business policies.

"No programme interruptions" policy
Kabushiki Gaisha ABS has always had a strict policy against emergency programming interruptions.

ABS officially states that they will "never [internally] interrupt" programming on their channels, and issued the following statement:

"The Aso Broadcasting System will never [internally] interrupt their regularly scheduled programmes during emergencies under ANY circumstances, regardless of severity. We will, however, take measures to warn people of these situations whilst causing the least amount of programming disruption possible. The measures taken are as follows: As a television network that wishes to inform and entertain viewers, even during times of dire emergency, we will take all steps possible to minimise any interruption to our services. Please note that this does NOT guarantee that our service will be free of technical disruption. Transmitters can still be cut off, causing a loss in signal, by significant physical events (severely inclement weather, tsunamis, earthquakes, etc) or by the immediate aftermath of said events (electrical disruptions, transmitter misalignments, etc).
 * Emergency information will be placed on the bottom of the screen with a non-intrusive banner.
 * Regularly-scheduled programming will continue to air during the emergency period.
 * ABS will advise viewers to check other local news sources for the latest information.
 * Emergency statements will be issued on ABS N6, the Aso Broadcasting System's main daily news programme, which starts at 18:00 PM JST.
 * Additional statements will be issued around-the-clock on ABS N24, our 24-hour news channel, available to all viewers with BS Broadcast Satellite recievers, and streaming online on abs.co.jp/n24.

We hope that you continue to enjoy our programming, even during dire times."

Emergency Alert System
ABS's American feed is frequently cut off by cable and satellite operators due to laws enacted by the FCC requiring all television and radio stations in specific areas to suspend its programming and hand over to the Emergency Alert System in the event of an emergency situation. ABS has stated that it is not responsible for any programming interruption caused by the EAS.

2014 rebrand
ABS underwent a massive presentation rehash in the lead up to 2015. A new version of the ABS "mountain" logo was revealed on the 12th of April, 2014, and a massive extension to the ABS Television Center in Shinjuku, Tokyo was opened on the 15th of December. The extension would house new studios for its live talk shows and ABS N6, along with a new Welcome Center where visitors can meet Anpanman, Melonpanna-chan, Shokupanman and Currypanman, who were appointed as mascots representing ABS along with the other heroes from ''Soreike! Anpanman (broadcast by ABS under the name Let's Go! Anpanman'').

ABS also refreshed its on-screen presentation package.

During ABS's New Year's Celebrations, ABS's logo DOG, based on their 2011 logo, disappeared at 11:55pm. At the same time, abs.jp was seen displaying "Internal server error" Error 500 pages. Immediately at midnight, ABS started using its new logo as the basis for its new DOG, which appeared in the top-right corner of the screen 5 seconds before the end of 2014. Access to abs.jp was restored at 11:59pm.

ABS International also dropped the "International" tagline in their logo, however the name remains "as is" internally.

"Stand By Me, Stand By Us" campaign
On July 1, 2014, ABS announced that it was starting a large-scale advertising campaign for the "Stand By Me Doraemon" film, using the network as a main subject of promotion. A special slogan (Stand By Me, Stand By Us) was put into use (overriding the "Never Looking Back" slogan normally in use) for two months as part of the promotion, and a number of special idents were seen as well.

The promotion ended on the 1st of September, 2014, when ABS dropped the special idents and features.

Off-air filler content
When off the air, ABS either simulcasts its satellite news service ABS N24, or airs music videos based on music from its shows. It never outright leaves the air, and colour bars are used very rarely.

Let's Go! Anpanman Club!
The "Let's Go! Anpanman Club!" (Soreike! Anpanman Kurabu) is a programming block dedicated to the Anpanman series. The block features a series of Anpanman-themed activities (such as dance skits) and episodes of the show (Let's Go! Anpanman). There is also a "discussion" corner in the block, where the block's hostess, as well as Anpanman fans and characters gather to discuss topics pertaining to the Anpanman franchise. Some show producers have even appeared on this segment.
 * Regular schedule: Fridays, 7:45am - 9:00am
 * Day of Anpanman: 8:00am - 9:00am

It is one of the few ABS programmes that aren't cancelled on the Day of Anpanman (alongside the ABS N11:45 and ABS N6 newscasts). However, on the day, it is cut 15 minutes short, as its start time is rescheduled to 8:00am due to the "opening phase".

Alongside ABS, BS Nittele broadcasts a similar block on Fridays from 8:00am to 9:00am. ABS, however, starts the block at 7:45am, and runs additional content which brings its ending time to 9:00am.

Doraemon: A Visit To The 22nd Century
This variety show invites viewers to come with Doraemon and Nobita Nobi on "a visit to the 22nd Century" (the Doraemon character himself was sent back from that time period to aid the troubled Nobita from the present day). A number of segments make up this show: The show's live segments are presented in English (Japanese dialogue spoken by the Doraemon characters is subtitled), whilst Doraemon episodes shown in the "theater" segments are broadcast in Japanese with English subtitles, as with all standalone Doraemon showings on ABS.
 * Wednesdays, 4:00pm - 5:30pm
 * An "introduction" segment where the presenters (three of which are animated Doraemon characters - Doraemon himself, Nobita, as well as Sewashi Nobi, Doraemon's original owner before he sent him back in time, as well as two live-action presenters - Saburo Saito and Roydon Seaver) and a number of fans introduce themselves at the start of the programme,
 * Two "theater" segments, where new Doraemon episodes are shown in their entirety,
 * A "Secret Gadget Showcase", where the presenters pull a random gadget from Doraemon's supposedly bottomless "Fourth-dimensional Pocket", and perform a live demonstration of how it works in different situations,
 * A "Challenge" segment where fans are chosen as contestants for a Doraemon-themed game show, where they answer questions related to the series, and
 * A "Future Stage" segment, where Doraemon characters perform character songs, or where popular Japanese pop acts perform one of their songs live.

The show is repeated (one day later) by BS Asahi, a free-to-air satellite TV channel operated by TV Asahi.

Last-second August cancellation and Stand By Me Doraemon premiere
Doraemon: A Visit To The 22nd Century was cancelled on the 6th of August 2014, to make way for the worldwide early premiere of the "Stand By Me Doraemon" film, which was being heavily promoted by ABS at the time. The cancellation was announced just 8 seconds before A Visit To The 22nd Century 's timeslot at 4:00pm that day.

An announcement was made by an ABS continuity announcer at 3:59:52pm;

"We regret to inform you that Doraemon: A Visit To The 22nd Century will not be airing tonight. However, we will be doing something even better; you are about to see the brand new Stand By Me Doraemon film in its entirety. You, along with our fellow ABS viewers from all over the world, will be the very first to see these all-new adventures with Doraemon, Nobita and his friends, 2 days before its theatrical opening. And it's starting right now. This is the Aso Broadcasting System, with the WORLD PREMIERE of the new film, Stand By Me Doraemon!"

Doraemon: A Visit To The 22nd Century returned on the 13th of that month.

Day of Anpanman
The "Day of Anpanman" occurs on the 19th of May every year. On this date, the Aso Broadcasting System and its affiliates (local stations and ABS International) devote their entire day's schedule past 8:05am to airing episodes of ''Let's Go! Anpanman'' and spin-off content.

History
The "Day of Anpanman" was first proposed by Kenji Yukimura, the founder of Kabushiki Gaisha ABS, in 2012. Two more people then expressed major interest in the concept: Takashi Yanase, creator of the Anpanman franchise, and Shichirou Minami, founder of Shikoku Television Broadcasting (the Shikoku region's ABS affiliate).

On November 1st, 2012, it was announced that the inaugural "Day of Anpanman" was scheduled for May 19, 2013. The year was chosen as it coincided with the 25th Anniversary of the Anpanman anime series (Soreike! Anpanman/Let's Go! Anpanman) and the 60th anniversary of Nippon TV, the ABS partner responsible for bringing Anpanman to ABS Television.

Preparation phase
The "preparation phase" occurs between 5:30am on the 16th of May, and ends at 7:45am on the 19th of May. During this "preparation phase", the ABS Television Network attempts to air all of its most important programmes 3 days in advance before Anpanman shuts them out of their regular timeslots. Despite allowing viewers to see highly-anticipated programming outside of their regular timeslots (before the Anpanman lockout), the practice has almost always lead to mass confusion, timetabling problems, enquiries to ABS by phone and even a transmitter failure that knocked the entire network offline.

Opening phase
At 7:45am on the 19th of May, the ABS News team introduce the premise of the Day of Anpanman. This was done in a decorated studio (usually taken by ABS N6) for 2013, but is now done in a temporary location studio within the Yokohama Anpanman Children's Museum and Mall as of 2014.

At 7:59am, a final countdown to the start of the Day of Anpanman starts.

At 8:00am, the Anpanman characters perform a dance to "San San Taisou", one of the songs used in their show's ending credits, signalling the official starting point of the Day of Anpanman.

Programming phase
At 8:02am, the ''Let's Go! Anpanman Club!'' programming block starts as normally, albeit outwith its regular timeslot (the block usually starts on Fridays at 7:45am, but it cannot do so on the DoA as it conflicts with the start of the "opening phase").

At 9:00 am, the day's first episode of ''Let's Go! Anpanman (outside of the Anpanman Club'') is shown.

During the periods of 9:30am - 11:15am, 11:30am - 6:00pm and 6:20pm - 2:15am, the schedule consists entirely of either: ABS N11:15 and ABS N6 air as normal (albeit outwith their normal studio) for 15 and 20 minutes respectively before returning to Anpanman content.
 * Episodes of Let's Go! Anpanman
 * Showings of the series' feature films
 * Stage performances from the Yokohama Anpanman Children's Museum and Mall
 * Interstitials showing the ABS News team meeting and greeting the Anpanman characters, or showing the team participating in a range of Anpanman-themed activities
 * Music videos from the Anpanman series, or
 * Short two-minute news updates (aired by the local stations).

The Day of Anpanman ends at the following times:
 * 12:10am on Kyushu-Ryukyu Broadcasting
 * 1:55am on ABS Television Hiroshima
 * 2:15am on the Aso Broadcasting System, the Hyogo Broadcasting System, Sapporo Broadcasting System, Tohoku-ABS Broadcasting, Shikoku Television Broadcasting, Chubu-ABS Television, Nippon TV, ABS Sat.1, ABS International, NHK World and BS Nittele.

Service issues
Kabushiki Gaisha ABS and their services have fallen off the air frequently due to international carriage disputes, licensing problems, censorship, signal cutoffs and technical issues.

Carriage disputes
ABS has been involved in a number of disputes with international cable and satellite carriers:
 * On July 10, 2012, ABS noticed that their international service was being pulled by Cablevision and a number of satellite providers in Mexico due to carriage rate disputes. The Mexican cable providers approached Kabushiki Gaisha ABS with requests to continue broadcasting the channel during talks, but received no response. Therefore, ABS ceased transmission to Mexican viewers. The negotiations continued until August 7, when Total Play put ABS International back on their channel listings. Cablevision and the other satellite providers followed suit the next day.
 * On July 11, 2012, DirecTV (a satellite television provider in the US) stated that they had accidentally taken ABS International off their platform along with 26 channels owned by Viacom, who had engaged DirecTV in a similar dispute on the same date as ABS's Mexican dispute. They announced that ABS International had been put back on the air the following day.
 * On September 15, 2012, UPC Ireland dropped ABS International from their satellite television platform due to the two parties' inability to settle on a new carriage agreement (this after UPC Ireland and ABS reached a temporary extension of their previous agreement on September 1 in order to allow subscribers to view events happening in Ireland and Japan during the first half of September 2012). UPC Ireland reached a new long-term carriage agreement with the network one week later, which allowed UPC subscribers to continue viewing ABS International on channel 810 from September 22, 2012.
 * On December 31, 2012, Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks (which negotiates alongside TWC) dropped ABS International from their systems upon the expiration of its carriage agreement with the cable provider. The removal is the result of a carriage dispute. Then, on January 1, 2014, one year to the day after being dropped from Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks systems, ABS International returned to the two providers, the result of a new carriage agreement, which resulted from Time Warner Cable and Bright House making donations to improve ABS's American services.
 * On November 21, 2014, ABS International was pulled from Foxtel's channel lineup in Australia in a carriage dispute. Foxtel claims that excessive rate increases (including those for programming contracts that had no relation to the ABS Television Network) lead to the removal of the channel. ABS International returned to Foxtel on January 15, 2015 after a new agreement gave Kabushiki Gaisha ABS a share of AU$500,000 to improve its services in Australia. The additional funding allowed ABS N24 to take a spot on the Foxtel EPG.

International licensing issues
Doraemon, one of ABS' most popular anime series, has been the subject of licensing issues with the distributors and producers:
 * In Spain, Doraemon has been unable to air on ABS Television for at least 25 years. LUK Internacional, who is Doraemon's Spanish licensor, refused to give ABS Televisión España a license for the franchise in Spain. LUK distributed Spanish-dubbed episodes of the show to numerous broadcasters across the country (Canal Sur Andalucía, Televisión de Galicia being a few of which). LUK, however, could not distribute the Japanese version to ABSTE. This dispute lead to the dissolution of ABS Televisión España in 2005, and Kabushiki Gaisha ABS itself took control of ABS' Spanish feed, and put TV Asahi's new Doraemon series (as opposed to LUK's 1979 series dubs) on their schedule, with English/Spanish bilingual subtitles, in July of that year.

Technical problems
ABS has suffered a number of technical issues over a number of platforms:
 * On May 18, 2014, during the "preparation phase" leading up to the 2014 Day of Anpanman, the entire ABS Television network lost programming for more than an hour due to a fault at the ABS Broadcasting Center. ABS cited human error in a period of quickly-changing programmes (especially when ABS was trying to clear space on their schedule for an inevitable Anpanman marathon). Other ABS stations were also knocked off the air, as they all share the same satellite feed as ABS itself. Viewers were unable to see programming that was on the air between 9:36am - 10:55am due to these issues.

Signal intrusions
ABS has been targeted in numerous signal intrusion attacks:
 * An unknown intruder overpowered ABS's Chinese satellite transponder, corrupting their satellite signal and causing viewers that were receiving ABS through Chinese satellites to lose the network's programming for more than 96 continuous hours starting May 12, 2008. Kabushiki Gaisha ABS immediately accused Chinese authorities for signal jamming. The group responsible claimed that the seizure of China's ABS satellite feed was meant as "a sign of respect" to those who lost their lives during an intensity 8.0 earthquake in Sichuan province that year. The people involved in the intrusion were subjected to death by the Chinese Government after 4 days and 7 hours of black screen on ABS's Chinese feed.
 * Another unintentional shutdown occurred on January 7, 2015, when a group of hackers, in support of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, overpowered ABS' French feed on CanalSat channel 410, forcing Downtown's This Ain't No Task For Kids! off the air and replacing the programme with a tribute video, causing viewers that were receiving ABS International through French satellites to see video of a tribute to the people that died, with the text "Je suis Charlie" appearing every 5 seconds. The tribute video ran on ABS' feed for 2 hours before CanalSat removed the channel. The fans responsible claimed that the hijacking was meant as a "tribute and sign of respect" to the people who died in the Paris massacre. The people involved later apologized to Kabushiki Gaisha ABS and the French government 72 hours later. Kabushiki Gaisha ABS and the French Government both rejected their apologies, and the hackers were sentenced to life probation. ABS International was relaunched on CanalSat on January 10th.

Offensive content controversies
ABS has been involved in a controversy with a censorship board:
 * October 2008 saw ABS International being pulled by Airtel, Tata Sky, and many other cable and satellite providers in India owing to controversy surrounding Crayon Shin-Chan. The show, broadcast by ABS until then, was originally broadcast in Japanese by TV Asahi. Indian authorities had forced a Hindi-dubbed version of the same show, airing on Hungama Television, off the air at that same time. The show was entirely banned due to "excessive use of expletives and sexual references that should not be in a children's programme in the first place", in the words of an ABS N6 reporter on that day. The head of Kabushiki Gaisha ABS, Kenji Yukimura, explained to disgruntled viewers that the network "broadcast the show without any knowledge of what we were doing" and stated that they "genuinely screwed up." He said that "this garbage known as Crayon Shin-chan will never see our [ABS'] light of day again, and TV Asahi Corporation has been notified". He then commented that "Japanese broadcasting standards vary to many degrees when compared to those of other countries, and we understand that. However, unless we state otherwise, programming on the ABS Television network is solely regulated under Japanese broadcasting codes". ABS dropped the show and an additional newscast, under the name ABS N8, forced Shin-chan out of ABS' schedule for good, as N8 derived Shin-Chan of its timeslot (8:00-8:30am JST). ABS International was relaunched in India on the 5th of November. Unlike ABS, Hungama eventually placed the show back on their schedule on the 27th of March 2009.

Logos
ABS has used the same logo since its launch in 1987. ABS staff commonly referred to it as the "mountain" owing to its shape. The logo has been updated three times over the years for what ABS deems to be a part of its "more streamlined" branding package.