Billing itself as an information show about the world's "most pervasive and interesting subject," Sex TV is one of CHUM and CITY-TV's most explosive of the new digital specialty channels.

You may have already seen Sex TV as it first existed - a half-hour program shown on Saturday and Sunday nights at 11:30 p.m. After three seasons, it has become so popular with audiences around the globe that CHUM decided to expand the show into its own station.

"The show will be the flagship show on the channel, and it gives us a launching point," said Brad Brough, spokesman for the channel at CITY-TV.

And with that, Sex TV launches on Sept. 7. At once scholarly and wicked, Sex TV embraces sexuality in all its diversity. The channel will examine sex and its ever-present connections to fashion and physiology, language and lifestyle, Eros and erudition. The channel wants to approach sexuality intelligently.

"Sex TV approaches sexuality as a topic to explore in a respectful, clever and wholly entertaining way," Mr. Brough said. "It is a very smart show. The balance is not to whitewash issues if you're talking about female masturbation or tantric sex, but rather to talk about it honestly without going over the top.

"Nothing we do is for the purpose of titillation. That is sometimes a nice byproduct of the show. But something that is titillating to one person often completely turns off the next. We have to find that balance."

Because the station will be offered to viewers only as part of a package including other channels, Sex TV will offer two loops of programming - one suitable for daytime viewing and another, racier loop that runs at night and includes "soft erotica" - a version of Baby Blue, the CITY-TV staple. To begin with, only about 10 per cent of the programming will be produced in-house.

"Ultimately, once we're up and running we hope to initiate far more of our own programming," Mr. Brough said. "We have to satisfy the people who want to buy Sex TV and also not be perceived as a porno channel, because it's not that. That would scare away distributors.

"It's kind of a difficult place to be. It's not like it's HBO or the Playboy channel, where we can do whatever we want when we want because we're being bundled with other channels.

"But that's something we've battled with on the show - balancing on that line. Although the show is sometimes very explicit, it is always respectful and non-exploitive of our subjects. We don't make fun of people and we don't exploit people, whether they are a fetishist or a Catholic priest."

Included will be programming from Queer Television, as well as a documentary slot featuring work from all over the world. Not surprising, considering the success of Sex TV outside of Canada.

"We couldn't afford to make the show that we do if we didn't sell it to places other than Canada," Mr. Brough said. "It's been very well received in Japan, Australia and Brazil, and we've done very well ratings-wise in Toronto, despite being in a time slot that is very difficult."

To give an idea of what kind of programming is featured on Sex TV as it currently exists in a twice-weekly, half-hour format, some of the segments have included a series on penises, a three-part series featuring Getting Wood, Puppetry of the Penis and Biology of the Penis. Also featured has been shows on women who wrestle; Newmarket, Ont., dominatrix Madame de Sade, and former prostitute and porn-film actress Annie Sprinkle, now turned performance artist. The channel has covered topics on sexual fantasies and fetishes of every persuasion.

As promised, it is provocative and wicked, and it embraces sexuality in all of its diversity, "probing the hearts and minds of people all around the world for answers and insight."