Nick At Nite: Rest In Peace

[RadioMan203]

People can complain about the state of Nick at Nite all they want, but in the end, the viewers talk. And that's not a fluke week either. Nick at Nite's ratings are always high.

True, but given the choice of either being a "drone" watching the garbage on n@n/tvbland or being an "independent thinker" and actually watching "good" programming I'd pick being one of the latter. Most people with taste will agree that n@n/tvbland is not what it use to be. Many family people I know don't even watch it anymore, opting for more friendly programming.

 

[bpatrick]

People can complain about the state of Nick at Nite all they want, but in the end, the viewers talk. And that's not a fluke week either. Nick at Nite's ratings are always high.

Apparently that's not true of TVLand. It was one thing when they
started running "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," but now I see
they're having an elimination contest for would-be models over age
35, with the winner getting a contract with the Wilhelmina agency.
Is this what TVLand's supposed to be?

 

[BRNout]

People can complain about the state of Nick at Nite all they want, but in the end, the viewers talk. And that's not a fluke week either. Nick at Nite's ratings are always high.

Apparently that's not true of TVLand. It was one thing when they
started running "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," but now I see
they're having an elimination contest for would-be models over age
35, with the winner getting a contract with the Wilhelmina agency.
Is this what TVLand's supposed to be?

No it is not. Extreme Makeover: Home Edition no more belongs on TV Land than Soul Train belongs on CMT. Wrong, wrong, wrong! Viacom is killing this channel by using slow torture.

Oh yeah, and they now have multiple showings of Cosby, too. Zzzzzzz~!

 

[Maine-i-ac]

Man oh man oh man. I haven't responded to a topic on this board in ages, but, I just read this whole thread. OK, N@N is dead. Has been for a decade now. TV Land has also passed on. Petition your cable/satellite provider for RTN or American Life TV. Or do what I did in 2003, yank the cable out of the wall and rely on your OTA channels and your DVD player and get out and enjoy life again! How many channels do you REALLY need?

 

[rwells2265]

Man oh man oh man. I haven't responded to a topic on this board in ages, but, I just read this whole thread. OK, N@N is dead. Has been for a decade now. TV Land has also passed on. Petition your cable/satellite provider for RTN or American Life TV. Or do what I did in 2003, yank the cable out of the wall and rely on your OTA channels and your DVD player and get out and enjoy life again! How many channels do you REALLY need?

Often far easier said than done. Were I not married and/or have a 15-year-old (although in another state - but visits here on vacations), I would've gone cold-turkey OTA back in February when we dropped Comcast. My wife likes some of the cable channels, i.e. Food TV and Hallmark ... she more or less watches most of the $$ we pay for satellite, 'cuz I sure the hell don't.

Ahhh, but the music channels on Dish Network .... gotta say I like having those around.

What I wouldn't give to have RTN or American Life, though.

--Russell

 

[mleach]

People can complain about the state of Nick at Nite all they want, but in the end, the viewers talk. And that's not a fluke week either. Nick at Nite's ratings are always high.

True, but given the choice of either being a "drone" watching the garbage on n@n/tvbland or being an "independent thinker" and actually watching "good" programming I'd pick being one of the latter. Most people with taste will agree that n@n/tvbland is not what it use to be. Many family people I know don't even watch it anymore, opting for more friendly programming.

If Nick@Nite aired the same single episode of Roseanne, Cosby or Home Improvement for an entire week, just one episode and repeat that back to back all week long, it would not surprise me at all that the ratings for Nick@Nite that week would NOT go down. Or if it did, not by much.

I agree that Nick@Nite and TV Land is not as good as they used to be. And I know quite a few who just don't watch them anymore but lets face it..a lot of people will watch anything. If a channel say like Nick@Nite that has been around for years, all of a sudden showed 30 full minutes of a cat using and playing around the litter box, well people will watch that and Nick will still get high ratings.

A lot of people when it comes to quality just don't care anymore.

 

[Bob1370]

This discussion is reminiscent of a lot of the recent discussions on the radio forums about the demise of oldies radio as we knew it (precipitated mostly by the killing of New York's WCBS-FM and its replacement with 'Jack' two years ago).
These channels change, sometimes out of all recognition, because the demographic target is a constantly moving one. If you want to hit the 35-54 target with the shows they grew up with, well, that's a different batch of shows now than it was back in the 1980s when these channels got started. A generation that grew up on Danny Thomas, Lucy and Dick Van Dyke has been replaced by a generation that has no direct memory of anything older than Cheers, Frasier, Cosby, Tim Allen and Fresh Prince--so those are the shows they'll now program (along with the shows the current 35-54s remember as endless reruns on their local stations like Star Trek, TOS). Friends will probably be coming soon to either TVLand or Nick at Nite as well.

TVLand would now be running Seinfeld too, if that show didn't have such an amazing power of sustaining and constantly renewing its fan base in the more lucrative realm of broadcast prime-time access syndication...

 

[BRNout]

If Nick@Nite aired the same single episode of Roseanne, Cosby or Home Improvement for an entire week, just one episode and repeat that back to back all week long, it would not surprise me at all that the ratings for Nick@Nite that week would NOT go down. Or if it did, not by much.

I agree that Nick@Nite and TV Land is not as good as they used to be. And I know quite a few who just don't watch them anymore but lets face it..a lot of people will watch anything. If a channel say like Nick@Nite that has been around for years, all of a sudden showed 30 full minutes of a cat using and playing around the litter box, well people will watch that and Nick will still get high ratings.

A lot of people when it comes to quality just don't care anymore.

After seeing these channels go farther and farther away from their original programming, I have come to the same conclusion. Honestly, I don't know who is watching them - but someone must be. Both have gone waaaaaaaaaay downhill over the past 10 years. First, N@N started going down, but that was justified with the invention of TVL. Now, TVL has been completely and utterly desecrated. Showing 4 hours of cat box footage every evening would do nothing to soil the reputation of this channel. It's already gone the route of last week's toilet paper.

Thanks a lot Viacom. You suck!

 

[BRNout]

This discussion is reminiscent of a lot of the recent discussions on the radio forums about the demise of oldies radio as we knew it (precipitated mostly by the killing of New York's WCBS-FM and its replacement with 'Jack' two years ago).
These channels change, sometimes out of all recognition, because the demographic target is a constantly moving one. If you want to hit the 35-54 target with the shows they grew up with, well, that's a different batch of shows now than it was back in the 1980s when these channels got started. A generation that grew up on Danny Thomas, Lucy and Dick Van dyke has been replaced by a generation that has no direct memory of anything older than Cheers, Frasier, Cosby, Tim Allen and Fresh Prince--so those are the shows they'll now program (along with the shows the current 35-54s remember as endless reruns on their local stations like Star Trek, TOS). Friends will probably be coming soon to either TVLand or Nick at Nite as well.

TVLand would now be running Seinfeld too, if that show didn't have such an amazing power of sustaining and constantly renewing its fan base in the more lucrative realm of broadcast prime-time access syndication...

I'm 41 and grew up with Lucy, Dick Van Dyke, Hogan's Heroes, the Odd Couple, the Munsters, Brady Bunch, Beaver, etc. I am old enough to recall first runs of That Girl and many others too. And, the shows that you mentioned would hit right in the middle of 35-54....all were in frequent syndication during the 70's and early 80's. So, clearly they are going after 18-34 demo - the 35-54 demo is already too old to enjoy most of the crap that they are showing. They've collectively thrown us under the bus.

The Fresh Prince doesn't hold a candle to the likes of I Love Lucy or Dick Van Dyke and never will. I'm sure that Will Smith himself would agree with me on that one. Not to mention Rosanne, etc. Bleeccch.

 

[gr8oldies]

Did you all really expect that TV Land, Nick at Nite, etc were going to start their original line-ups in the 1980s and follow that specific audience to their graves? As a previous poster said, its a moving target.

 

[BRNout]

Did you all really expect that TV Land, Nick at Nite, etc were going to start their original line-ups in the 1980s and follow that specific audience to their graves? As a previous poster said, its a moving target.

There continues to be an audience for that genre of shows. So in a word, yes, I expected that TVL - in particular - would stay true to that mission. As the original target audience probably has another 40 years or so before "hitting their graves," it is not that bad of an investment. Don't start thinking like the slime on Madison Avenue that 45 year olds should be relegated to nursing homes and Geratol. That hype is crap. And, it's contributing to a continued decline in viewership. Talk about thinking INSIDE the box!

At the minimum, someone else should pick up the ball and run with it.

Now I see TVL running ads for some E!-style reality show that will be added to their schedule. Horrible, just horrible. There are already 100+ channels of that crap...why not one for the rest of us?

 

[Grindlfan]

AMEN to that BRNout!