Its name is derived from UHF 31, the frequency and channel number reserved for analogue broadcasts by metropolitan community television stations in Australia.

[2] The Australian Broadcasting Authority had granted Melbourne Community Television Consortium (MCTC) with a temporary open-narrowcast licence on 5 March 1993.

[citation needed] In September 2014, Australian federal communications minister Malcolm Turnbull announced that licensing for community television stations would end in December 2015.

[11] C31, like other community television stations, started moving operations online, and began streaming its channel live from ctvplus.org.au, allowing access to viewers outside of its traditional broadcast area.

[19][20] Its signal is transmitted from Mount Dandenong and Como Centre, South Yarra, reaching much of the Greater Melbourne, Geelong and West Gippsland areas on free-to-air television.

[9] C31 broadcasts a vast array of locally produced content including news, sport, youth, arts, and entertainment programs.

[22] It used to be live, but the station got complaints from the Australian Communications & Media Authority when there was a dead fish floating on the top of the tank for several days.

After having its timeslot continually cut back over the years to make room for more traditional programming, Fishcam finally ceased broadcasting on 4 March 2007.

Many comedians, performing artists and producers worked at C31 before moving to mainstream television, these people include Rove McManus, Amy Parks, Greg Tingle, Hamish and Andy's Hamish Blake and Andy Lee, Adam Richard, Peter Helliar, Merrick and Rosso's Merrick Watts and Tim Ross, Jo Stanley, Darren Chau, Corinne Grant, Jamie McDonald, Tom Ballard, Tommy Little, Dave Thornton, Jess Harris, Alex Tigani, Josh Schmidt and Kim Hope.