LONDON (Brand Republic) - Channel 4 has ditched its plans for an internet portal aimed at the gay community, because of a lack of resources.
The broadcaster had planned to launch the portal this summer, but this has now been put on hold for the 鈥渋mmediate future鈥. Channel 4 was behind the hit gay drama Queer as Folk, which was recently sold to the US.
The gay community is a potentially lucrative market. The US portal Gay.com, which recently raised £15m in funding, says that its audience has an income twice that of the national average and that gay people are known to be well-educated and long-time internet users.
Channel 4 says that has put the gay portal on hold while it 鈥減rioritises its investments鈥. It recently announced a £100m investment in E4 -- a digital TV channel devoted to entertainment 鈥- and several new film channels, as well as continuing to fund its existing loss-making movie channel FilmFour.