ABC Family to rebrand as ABCF

[MarcB]

His main concern seemed to be that The 700 Club should not become an orphan program without a network.

Please. His show has and continued to run on TBN for years. In some markets including Springfield, Mass it's still on OTA TV. And these days he's on half a million other religious networks.

It also occurs to me that Disney can say with some confidence that they DO provide a network with only family friendly programming - called the Disney Channel.

Family friendly. Mmm-hmm. Yep. With all the teen-age girls drooling over the Jonas Brothers. (GAG ME) and all the boy drooling over Miley "Hannah Montana" Cyrus.

 

[LKellerIII]

It also occurs to me that Disney can say with some confidence that they DO provide a network with only family friendly programming - called the Disney Channel.

Family friendly. Mmm-hmm. Yep. With all the teen-age girls drooling over the Jonas Brothers. (GAG ME) and all the boy drooling over Miley "Hannah Montana" Cyrus.

I find Disney Channel equally gag-inducing. But when you think of what the blue-noses consider "family friendly," I'd say it qualifies. You won't find any of those teen Disney performers with pierced (non-ear) body parts, tatoos, or even bare midriffs. Nor will you find them having premarital sex.

Which is not to say that Disney doesn't promote these kids on the basis of their sex appeal. But it's done within very careful boundaries.

 

[vchimpanzee]

I was going to suggest ABC-DEF......the alpha network!

That's what I was going to say!

 

[vchimpanzee]

Isn't there a clause in the contract that requires the network to use Family as part of the branding?

Yep, it goes all the way back to when MTM purchased the channel from Pat Robertson.

Actually, it was the other way around -- Robertson bought MTM.

As for the requirement to use "Family" in the name, I won't be surprised if Robertson sues Disney for breach of contract, as "Family" would no longer be part of the name.

Why not? Family is no longer part of the content either.

 

[vchimpanzee]

This sounds like just a ploy to drop the "family" name so they can broadcast more adult material. Just like when "the Nashville Network" became TNN and later Spike so they could drop the country music.

ABC Family has been broadcasting more adult material for a long time now. They don't need a name change to do that - but it would look better if they de-emphasize "family." They probably get a lot of complaints from parents who assume that their programming is family oriented, then get a huge shock when they sit down with their 'tweens to watch Secret Life of the American Teenager, which is basically all about the sex lives of a group of under 18 kids.

When they had reruns of "Whose Line Is It Anyway", at least at first, they had a group of stick figures or something similar to represent a family, and they sent the little ones to bed. They weren't happy. And an announcer siad something about the adult content. They also started saying "A Different Kind of Family".

 

[formeraa]

His main concern seemed to be that The 700 Club should not become an orphan program without a network.

Please. His show has and continued to run on TBN for years. In some markets including Springfield, Mass it's still on OTA TV. And these days he's on half a million other religious networks.

It also occurs to me that Disney can say with some confidence that they DO provide a network with only family friendly programming - called the Disney Channel.

Family friendly. Mmm-hmm. Yep. With all the teen-age girls drooling over the Jonas Brothers. (GAG ME) and all the boy drooling over Miley "Hannah Montana" Cyrus.

As for Pat Robertson, I bet he get to air his program FREE of charge, according to the contract. In the past decade (don't know about the current recession), air time was getting increasingly expensive due to the dramatic increase in infomercials. At one point, TBN was refusing to air one-hour shows (700 Club and in-house programs being the exception).

 

[thenewageriseth]

According to SitcomsOnline.com it looks as though that ABC Family will rebrand as ABCF sometime this fall. http://blog.sitcomsonline.com/2010/08/abc-family-fall-2010-schedule-has-still.html

"ABCF". Wow. *smh* ???

 

[DToTheJ]

His main concern seemed to be that The 700 Club should not become an orphan program...

Please. His show has and continued to run on TBN for years. In some markets... it's still on OTA TV. And these days he's on half a million other religious networks.

Jimmy Swaggart was "the man" back in the day when it came to carriage of his show. Jim & Tammy, too...

 

[MarcB]

Jimmy Swaggart was "the man" back in the day when it came to carriage of his show. Jim & Tammy, too...

I remember Jimmy Swaggart used to be on NUTMEG TV the Public Access Cable Station that served my hometown of Bristol, Connecticut along with 7 other towns. This was years ago.

 

[DToTheJ]

Public access? Swaggart was pulling a Brother Stair, apparently.

 

[formeraa]

I've noticed that ABC Family is using the "ABCF" moniker on Twitter. I wonder if someone in the OP's article surmised that the whole network was going to ABCF based on Twitter. Now, that would be FUNNY!