Canale 5

Canale 5 (in English Channel Five) is an Italian private television network of Mediaset, the media branch of Fininvest. Canale 5 was the first private television network to have a national coverage in Italy in 1980, based on a local channel, TeleMilano 58, founded in 1978. Canale 5 is one of Italy's most popular channels.

Much of its early content came from American television shows dubbed in Italian. Mike Bongiorno, the host of Lascia o raddoppia?, was also wooed away from RAI to host an early quiz shows on TeleMilano.

Today Fininvest controls 35% of Mediaset. The logo of Canale 5 was originally formed by the number five beside a long biscione (a snake, the ancient symbol of Milan) spitting a flower. In the 1980s the reptile was replaced by a bigger number leaving only a stylized head on the top with the flower. In 2000 Canale 5 launched the Italian version of the Big Brother franchise, titled Grande Fratello, the first reality show in Italy. This was the beginning of a new era of television marked by the medium of television referring to itself both as an important part of daily life and treating itself as a member of the family or a close friend, sometimes called as "auto-reference". In 2005, RIS Delitti Imperfetti was launched, an Italian fiction inspired by CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. Today there are many Italian fictions and the most famous are: Carabinieri, Distretto di Polizia, RIS Delitti Imperfetti and Elisa di Rivombrosa.