Nelonen (Finnish for 'Number Four') is a Finnish commercial television channel. It started out as Helsinki's local television channel PTV in 1990 on the HTV cable network (now part of DNA), and changed its name first to PTV4. On June 1, 1997, the channel expanded to national coverage and changed its name to Nelonen, the Finnish name of the number four. Nelonen is mostly owned by Sanoma Corporation, which owns the Helsingin Sanomat and Ilta-Sanomat newspapers. Its largest owner was Aatos Erkko. Much of its programming is imported Australian, American, British, and European programs with Finnish captions. Its main market is the 25-44 demographic.

Nelonen
Logo used since 2020
CountryFinland
Broadcast areaFinland
HeadquartersHelsinki
Programming
Picture format16:9 576i (SDTV) 16:9 1080i (HDTV)
Ownership
OwnerSanoma Media Finland
(Nelonen Media)
Sister channelsJim (HD)
Liv (HD)
Hero (HD)
History
Launched1 June 1997; 27 years ago (1997-06-01)
Former namesPTV (Paikallistelevisio)
PTV4 (1990-1997)
Links
Websitewww.nelonen.fi
Availability
Terrestrial
Digital terrestrialChannel 4 (HD)
Channel 24

Programming

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Finnish series and shows

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Imported series, telenovelas and animated shows

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Logos and identities

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Criticism

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Nelonen was launched quickly and in an unprepared state. It has been criticized for importing "trash shows", especially during its first years. Mostly the subject of criticism have been related to its weekly imported "4D documentaries" concentrating on entertainment value and on highly emotive issues instead of artistic or other deeper values. The channel's entertainment output also consists of many other programmes which may be considered to be poor quality - imported game shows or Finnish versions of them (such as Reikä seinässä, a Finnish version of the Japanese 'Human Tetris' game) and reality TV shows dominate the scheduling. On the other hand, Nelonen's scheduling also contains several award-winning drama series.

Controversy

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During the fall of 2007, a day after the Jokela school shooting, Nelonen decided not to air a scheduled episode of the TV series Dexter. The TV series depicts a fictional serial killer Dexter Morgan and it was said to be inappropriate after such dramatic and nationwide turn of events. The episode was instead shown a week later.

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