Nintendo is preparing to take on the might of the world's biggest broadcasters by launching its own television channel.

Viewable by anyone with a Wii games console and an internet connection, the Wiinoma channel is expected to deliver a family- oriented blizzard of cartoons, “brain-training” quizzes, cookery, educational and other lifestyle shows: all of it original content produced exclusively for Nintendo.

News of Nintendo's move into broadcasting is likely to fill executives of many traditional television companies with dread. One senior executive at Fuji Television, termed it “the stuff of television producers' nightmares”.

I say, the quicker someone can drive a stake through the heart of current Japanese TV programming the better.