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SINGAPORE: Come July 7, prepare to see TV screens hijacked by the phenomenon that is Live Earth.
The worldwide event, designed to create awareness of the hazards of climate change and made up of concerts at 11 venues on seven continents, was initiated by former United States Vice-President Al Gore.
Coverage of Live Earth will be offered continuously for 24 hours - with a break for the 9.30pm news - on MediaCorp TV Channel 5.
The broadcast will start at 7pm on July 7 and end at the same time the following day.
The round-the-clock broadcast is a first for Channel 5, which did not carry 2005's Live 8 concerts aimed at ending world poverty.
"We felt there was mounting worldwide interest in environmental concerns and Channel 5's best contribution would be our ability to help spread the message," said Joy Olby-Tan, Channel 5's vice president of programming.
And the broadcaster will be going green - literally.
In fact, the logos for all the MediaCorp channels - along with the masthead of TODAY newspaper - will appear in green on July 7.
The public will be urged to go green as well - Channel 5 plans to air announcements urging people to dress in that colour on the Saturday of the broadcast.
MediaCorp will also unveil eco-friendly initiatives in the month of July, in line with its commitment to furthering environmental and social causes, underscored by their signing of the United Nations Global Compact, an initiative led by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan aimed at getting businesses involved in social and environmental causes.
BEYOND THE SMALL SCREEN
The small-screen environmental consciousness-raising doesn't stop there.
Channel U will broadcast the entire concert from Shanghai, with a delay of a few hours. The concert is expected to last three to six hours.
Popera personality Sarah Brightman will headline the Shanghai show, which features artistes like Eason Chan and Joey Yung.
Among Asian nations, China is joined in the host country line-up by Japan, which will hold concerts in To-ji and Makuhari Messe.
The other venues include the Rothera Research Station in Antarctica, where a five-member band made up of scientists will broadcast their rock music to the world.
Adding to its already eco-heavy programming line-up, Arts Central will push the green message even further during the week of Live Earth.
The award-winning David Attenborough programme, Life in the Undergrowth, airs on July 4.
Throughout the week of July 2, the channel will also air three-minute shorts on worldwide eco-friendly efforts, courtesy of local production house Big Durian Productions.
LIVE EARTH: GOOD OR BAD?
The hype surrounding Live Earth is the culmination of a year's worth of environmental madness, which arguably started with the media attention given Gore's Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth.
The documentary, which won an Academy Award for Best Documentary this year, helped Gore refashion himself as the Bono of environmental causes.
With Gore, and celebrities like Leonardo DiCaprio jumping on the climate change bandwagon, this year's Earth Day was celebrated with particular interest, with all sorts of local and international organisations and businesses getting in on the environmental action.
But with all the hype has come some negative press. The event, fashioned after the multi-venue concerts of Live Aid in 1985, and Live 8 in 2005, hasn't earned the stamp of approval from the organiser of both earlier events, Sir Bob Geldof.
"I would only organise Live Earth if I could go on stage and announce concrete environmental measures from the American presidential candidates, Congress or major corporations," Geldof said. "I hope they're a success. But why is Gore actually organising them? To make us aware of the greenhouse effect? We are all f****** conscious of global warming."
The concert has also come under fire from environmental groups and personalities like The Who's Roger Daltrey for the amount of unnecessary waste that such large concerts tend to generate.
In response, the Live Earth organisers have said they will "design out" the generation of excessive pollution and waste, creating a set of Green Event Guidelines - which include recycling and using electricity from renewable sources - that they hope will set a precedent for future events.
Among those with mixed feelings about the concerts is Maharaj Krishnan Pandit, a professor of biodiversity conservation at the National University of Singapore.
"Sometimes it is very useful to involve celebrities because they can influence and draw crowds. We know how Bono helped in the Millenium Development Goals," he said. "But if the events become more important than the underlying message, then we know the result." - TODAY
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