S2 was a television station broadcast throughout the Scottish and Grampian ITV regions by

SMG plc STV Group plc (formerly known as Scottish Television plc, Scottish Media Group plc and SMG plc) is a media company based in Glasgow, Scotland. Beginning as a television broadcaster in 1957, the company expanded into newspapers, advertising and r ...

, the holder of the Scottish and Grampian region ITV franchises. S2, which aired on the

digital terrestrial Digital terrestrial television (DTTV or DTT, or DTTB with "broadcasting") is a technology for terrestrial television in which land-based (terrestrial) television stations broadcast television content by radio waves to televisions in consumers' ...

platform (branded ONdigital, at the time), was launched 30 April 1999 and closed just over two years later — as part of a deal with

ITV Digital ITV Digital was a British digital terrestrial television broadcaster which launched a pay-TV service on the world's first digital terrestrial television network. Its main shareholders were Carlton Communications plc and Granada plc, owners o ...

— on 27 July 2001. The channel was also broadcast on cable television services

NTL NTL may refer to: Companies * NTL Incorporated and NTL Internet, later Virgin Media, communications media company ** NTL Ireland, later Virgin Media Ireland * Arqiva, UK company formerly ''NTL Broadcast'' and ''National Transcommunications L ...

and

Telewest Telewest (previously Telewest Broadband and Telewest Communications) was a cable internet, broadband internet, telephone supplier and cable television provider in the United Kingdom. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange, and was also o ...

. At launch, S2 was on air between 4pm and 2am, seven days a week, with its target audience being 16- to 34-year-olds. ''S2 Live'', an entertainment show was S2's flagship show, and aired every night, presented by

Sarah Heaney Sarah Heaney (born 19 May 1970) is a former Scottish television presenter. Life and career She began her TV career with Live TV as a news reporter, then went on to front ''S2 Live'' on the now defunct SMG digital channel S2. In early 2000 ...

. The channel also repeated drama and documentary programmes, originally shown on Scottish/Grampian. S2 also broadcast sports coverage, including Scottish rugby. By the end of its life, it had lost nearly all of its Scottish programmes and mainly

simulcast Simulcast (a portmanteau of simultaneous broadcast) is the broadcasting of programmes/programs or events across more than one resolution, bitrate or medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at exactly the same time (that is, simultane ...

ITV2 ITV2 is a British free-to-air television channel owned by ITV Digital Channels, a division of ITV plc. It was launched on 7 December 1998. For a number of years, it had the largest audience share after the five analogue terrestrial stations, a ...

, but covered the ITV2

graphic Graphics () are visual images or designs on some surface, such as a wall, canvas, screen, paper, or stone, to inform, illustrate, or entertain. In contemporary usage, it includes a pictorial representation of data, as in design and manufacture, ...

with an

opaque Opacity or opaque may refer to: * Impediments to (especially, visible) light: ** Opacities, absorption coefficients ** Opacity (optics), property or degree of blocking the transmission of light * Metaphors derived from literal optics: ** In lingu ...

S2 graphic. This caused controversy and forced the broadcaster further into removing the channel. Although S2 initially had great ambitions for the station, it closed in 2001 as part of a deal with ITV Digital. The channel capacity was first replaced by the now defunct

ITV Sport Channel ITV Sport Channel was a short-lived digital sport television channel, that was owned by Carlton Communications and Granada plc. It was launched on 11 August 2001 and closed on 12 May 2002, precipitating ITV Digital's collapse over a month late ...

and then

. The Grampian and Scottish franchises have operated together as STV since 2006.

References

External links

Official Website - at launch
(

archived An archive is an accumulation of historical records or materials – in any medium – or the physical facility in which they are located. Archives contain primary source documents that have accumulated over the course of an individual or ...

)
Official Website - at closure
(

) 1999 establishments in Scotland Defunct television channels in Scotland Mass media in Glasgow Scottish brands STV Group Television channels and stations established in 1999 Television channels and stations disestablished in 2001 {{UK-tv-channel-stub

See also

References

External links