It’s not the Real World, it’s not Big Brother and it doesn’t pay $1 million, but Alliance Atlantis Broadcasting’s newest venture, U8TV, offers Canada’s young and hip, as Michael MacMillan says, ‘a chance to get a life.’

In partnership with TvForReal.com, in which Alliance Atlantis Communications holds a minority interest, aab has announced the launch of its ninth channel, a reality-based tv station on the Net to be hosted by eight Nexus-generation (ages 19-34) Canadians.

The eight participants, who have yet to be chosen, will move into a downtown loft, where, for at least a year and with a salary of $30,000 each, they will host three hours of daily, original information and lifestyle shows, laden with e-commerce, commercial advertising, product placement and sponsorship opportunities.

The remaining 21 hours will represent the time when the ‘lofters’ put the shows together and occupy themselves with the rest of the mundane and, perhaps, provocative ‘real’ events of their day.

The payoff? Again, ‘a chance to get a life.’

As part of its Real Life Stories initiative, aab’s Life Network will air U8Life, a half-hour package of the webcast every evening, with additional highlights to be aired on the weekend. ‘A great opportunity for cross-promotion,’ says aab president Phyllis Yaffe.

aab, the majority and controlling shareholder in U8TV, recently applied to the crtc for a Category 2 licence with the channel – the idea being that within the next two years the tv and the Web service will co-exist, programming simultaneously, says Life’s senior vp of programming Barbara Williams.

But as a Web-based service, the new channel is not subject to crtc regulation. That said, the broadcaster is not obliged to license programming from outside the fray, even though MacMillan says it ‘likely will, sooner than later.’

While aac’s yet-to-launch new media division is involved in the launch of U8TV, ‘our new media strategy is to re-engineer the whole company to work in a world of digital, without borders,’ says MacMillan. As such, the new property falls under the jurisdiction of aac’s broadcasting division, while new media continues to penetrate all areas of the integrated company.

Corus Entertainment owns a 20% interest in the channel, which, like other aab channels, costs roughly $10 million to launch and is expected to start yielding a profit by year two, says Yaffe.

TvForReal.com and U8TV is spearheaded by cofounders Lili Shalev (president), former producer of Canada am; Zev Shalev (ceo), former executive producer of Canada am; and former ad gal Fiorella Grossi (ceo).

In financial news, aac’s revenue for Q1 of fiscal 2001, ended June 30, dropped to $109.4 million from $163.3 million in the same quarter a year earlier.

The company attributes the loss, which it says was expected, to quarterly timing differences inherent in the production delivery cycle. During the quarter, only one feature film was delivered compared to three films in the previous year’s first quarter. The Television Group only delivered 19.5 hours in the current Q1 compared to 36 hours in Q1 of the previous year.

‘[The results] are exactly on plan,’ says MacMillan. ‘We’ve reduced the volume of primetime drama, we’ve increased our kids programming, expanded in documentary and we’ve put a real emphasis on broadcasting.’

ebitda for the first quarter was $20.8 million, compared to $18 million a year ago, an increase of 16%, attributable to increased broadcast revenue (24%), improved margins from all operating groups and control of operating costs.

‘There’s no reward given for chasing volume,’ says MacMillan.

Revenue from the Motion Picture Group dropped to $36.9 million from $61.4 million in the same quarter the previous year.

The Television Group’s revenue for the quarter was at $38.2 million, compared to $68.2 last year.

Net profits for the quarter were $3.1 million, or $0.10 per share. During the same period last fiscal, the company had $7.2 million in profits, but that included gains from the sale of an investment of $2.5 million. After adjusting for the non-recurring gain, earnings per share for the first quarter last year were $0.17 per share, fully diluted. *