The little heard-of The Documentary Channel has doubled its subscriber base since its inception.  This has allowed it to grab the attention of DirecTV and has agreed to share its rights with the satellite giant.  I’ll be honest, as I’ve gotten older and wiser, I have been drawn to more documentaries.  I like seeing the “making of” or the back stories of significant events or people that have influenced the world.  Now with their new agreement, things could take off for the small channel.

The Documentary Channel will run 24-hour round the clock coverage of independent documentary features.  This allows them to reach over 25 million homes at any time.  This is a perfect thing for the DVR…you see a person you like or a story that interests you, record it.  Save the episodes for a rainy day and since the turnover can’t be that much, I’m sure that you can find a time that you can record that isn’t during primetime.  Even ESPN has been doing a 30 for 30 documentary series that has really taken off.  They’ve gotten big name directors to do film shorts of historical sporting events.

I’m sure that the channel will interest some folks.  There is only upside for the channel because if it does really well, then they also develop an option to expand even more, perhaps agreeing with Dish Network in the long run.  But for now, hooking up with DirecTV is good enough for them.  The exposure that they and their programming will receive doesn’t really have a pricetag.