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Maybe everything Oprah touches doesn’t turn to gold. Ratings for OWN have since shown that an interest for a whole channel dedicated to Oprah-inspired programming is not in demand. But new earning reports reveal that the media mogul is also costing Discovery millions.

Discovery Communications released their third quarter earning reports Tuesday that showed the Oprah Winfrey Network is $55.6 million in the hole. OWN‘s operating expenses totaled $160 million while only bringing in $104 million. And despite new programming such as Oprah’s Lifeclass andThe Rosie Show with Rosie O’Donnell, ratings are still down.

But Discovery CEO David Zaslav is staying optimistic. He said:

OWN’s fortunes will improve now that Winfrey is serving as full-time CEOWe are working hard to develop content that will appeal to her audience. We are building some meaningful audience growth and flow. Viewership is up from previous levels (and) there’s some nice momentum going into 2012. […] We are starting to swing in a positive direction in term of getting people to spend more time with us.

Let’s hope for the best.

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