ʻŌiwi TV reaches across generations, socio-economic statuses, and geographic locations as the sole media venue where the Hawaiian language, culture and perspective thrive. Through Digital Channel 326, ʻŌiwi TV reaches over 220,000 households across the entire State via Oceanic Time Warner Cable’s network. Through its website, mobile, and social media venues, ʻŌiwi TV is reaching Hawaiians everywhere and engaging a generation of Hawaiians that expect to access anything and everything from anywhere at anytime.
In 2009, ʻŌiwi TV partnered with Oceanic Time Warner Cable, the Kamehameha Schools, and the ʻAha Pūnana Leo to break the barrier and for the first time establish a Native Hawaiian television station. ʻŌiwi TV is Native Hawaiian owned and operated –empowering people to assert our Native Hawaiian identity and promote outcomes that benefit our community, our natural resources, and most importantly our future generations.
Our success is based by our ability to affect and sustain positive outcomes within areas affecting our communities. ʻŌiwi TV is a place where viewers know they can find high-quality Hawaiian programming that engages, educates and entertains from a Hawaiian perspective. This perspective reinforces who we are through our ways of thinking, being, and acting while also distinguishing us as a unique people in our local, national, and global communities.
ʻŌiwi TV has three priorities that guide our strategy and operation.
1. Education
We educate our own community, as well as others, through news and programming that strengthens and reinforces our self-identity as Hawaiians. We also support the Hawaiian medium and language educational system by offering much-needed resources that are readily available on digital platforms for use in classrooms and homes.
2. Normalization
We are at the forefront of a movement that normalizes our ʻōlelo (language), moʻomeheu (culture), and kuanaʻike (perspective) through broadcast media- which adds tremendous value to our contemporary Hawaiian society.
3. Catalyst for Change
ʻŌiwi TV acknowledges the current status of Native Hawaiians, given the circumstances of our past, and aims to tell a new narrative in Hawaiʻi’s society today; one that raises all things Hawaiian to a place of authority and influence.
ʻŌiwi TV has changed the paradigm for Native Hawaiian learning by offering teachers and students easy access to high-quality programming that features Hawaiian language, culture, and practice. ʻŌiwi TV also offers similar programs for the whole ʻohana to access in the comfort of their own homes, creating new opportunities to strengthen a collective understanding and appreciation for the Hawaiian people, culture, history, and language now and for generations to come.
Indigenous Television
ʻŌiwi TV is an Executive Council member of the World Indigenous Television Broadcasters Network (WITBN), a group of similarly focused indigenous broadcasters who have the common purpose of strengthening our respective native languages and cultures through the medium of television. WITBN connects the indigenous communities in a way never before possible through shared stories and experiences. WITBN is empowering the global indigenous voice and solidifying a collective indigenous identity. For more information on WITBN visit their website (www.witbn.org).
Interactive Television
ʻŌiwi TV utilizes CloudTV, an open applications video-on-demand (VOD) platform developed by Active Video Networks that enables the authoring, deployment and distribution of television apps from the network cloud to video products such as televisions, websites and portable devices. The CloudTV technology enables ʻŌiwi TV to deliver interactive content to television screens in a way that is positioned with the shifting trends in how people consume content, instantly and on-demand. Viewers expect real-time access to the programming they want to watch, when they want to watch it, and ʻŌiwi TV delivers exactly that.
The interactive features of ʻŌiwi TV create a dynamic and robust user experience on television. ʻŌiwi TV is able to deliver multiple streams of content to our viewers including videos, news feeds, and community-minded advertising.
Channel 326:
ʻŌiwi TV recently redesigned channel 326, creating a new user experience and adding many functions and features. The new design is simple to navigate and allows viewers more control of their ʻŌiwi TV experience.
New features include:
- Redesigned homescreen with “how to” video
- Easy to use visual navigation pane
- Interactive News feed
- Interactive banner ads
- @oiwitv Twitter feed
- Multi-speed video controls (FFD, REW, PAUSE, STOP)
