Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios is launching THIS TV, a new ad-supported 24/7 linear digital channel for the US market and has tapped Cookie Jar Entertainment to handle the kids program block.

The studio is partnering with Chicago-based Weigel Broadcasting Company to bring THIS TV into the free-TV market across the US beginning this fall.Cookie Jar Entertainment, meanwhile, will handle the children’s programming, supplying FCC-approved educational information series for the net.

The move comes as the FCC in the US prepares to stop transmitting analogue signals and move to strictly digital airwaves in 2009. The new net will draw from MGM’s 10,000 hour content library and Cookie Jar’s extensive supply of children’s series.

The roll-out of THIS TV will starts immediately on Weigel broadcast properties in Chicago, Illinois, Milwaukee, Wisconsin and South Bend, Indiana.