Channel drift

Channel drift, or network decay,^[1] is the gradual transition of a television network away from its original programming focus to either target a newer more lucrative audience, or to broaden their viewership by including less niche programming. Often, this results in a shift from highbrow programming aimed at more educated viewers, toward lowbrow programming aimed at a wide audience. Almost all versions of channel drift feature some sort of incorporation of infotainment and/or reality television into a channel's lineup.

Overview

Networks that focus on a particular genre, such as Golf Channel and History Channel, tend to air shows outside of this scope that the channel's management feels that the viewers would also like to see, by balancing the needs of expanding a network's audience while continuing to service a channel's most loyal viewers. The degree of channel drift can vary: some of the nonconforming programming may have a loose association with the channel's intended purpose (such as in the case of the History Channel, Pawn Stars, American Pickers and Top Shot), while other programming may have no association whatsoever (such as Ax Men and Ice Road Truckers). Channel drift can also result from the acquisition of sports rights or reruns of popular television series that would otherwise not fit the channel's format; Outdoor Life Network, for instance, acquired the rights to the National Hockey League in 2004, which required the network to begin transitioning toward a general sports network.

A channel may rebrand itself to more accurately reflect its new content. Sci-Fi Channel changed its name to Syfy for both trademark reasons and to allow a stretching of the network's definition of appropriate programming, including Law & Order: Special Victims Unit reruns and WWE professional wrestling.^[2][3][4] Another example is the conversion of Court TV to truTV, which allowed it to show more reality-based programming (though retaining a law enforcement focus, such as repeats of World's Wildest Police Videos) and slowly phase out their advertising-adverse legal system and courtroom programming, a process which ended in October 2009 when the remaining courtroom analysis programs transitioned to CNN.com's legal news section, and unpromoted and reduced court coverage from CNN Center on the mainline channel. TruTV even airs the first three rounds of the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship.^[5] Other examples include the drifting of the former The Learning Channel, which has officially renamed itself under the three-letter acronym "TLC" since its transition to reality television series, and that of virtually all of the MTV Networks.

MTV Networks were a pioneer in channel drift. Music Television (as MTV was originally known) was originally a channel devoted to popular music videos upon its launch in August 1981, but began adding entertainment and reality programs geared toward a young adult audience in the 1990s, beginning a progression toward its current focus of reality and scripted programming targeted primarily at teenagers and young adults (the music videos on the main channel were eventually limited to overnight and morning time periods, while transitioning to MTV2 (which itself would gradually drift from an all-music video format to include reruns of MTV programs, original series and acquired off-network sitcoms), then to MTV Hits).^[6][7] Video Hits One likewise began as an outlet for adult contemporary music before transitioning to an urban pop culture channel as VH1; Country Music Television drifted to southern culture and general rerun programming as CMT; and The Nashville Network, perhaps the most dramatic, drifted to general entertainment format as The National Network^[8] and then to a male-heavy program lineup now known as Spike.^[9] While Nickelodeon has largely remained a children's-oriented channel throughout its history, its late-night Nick at Nite programming block (which for Nielsen ratings purposes is a separate channel from Nickelodeon) has drifted greatly from airing classic television (first from the Golden Age of Television, later expanding to shows from the 1960s and 1970s), to more recent shows still airing in local syndication, to its current focus on adolescent/young adult audiences similar to that of ABC Family. Nick at Nite, in fact, launched TV Land as a spin-off channel due to its increased focus on more recent programming (as well as the elimination of non-sitcom programming on Nick at Nite), only for TV Land itself to eventually shift to more recent programming and even original programming.

One of the earliest examples of channel drift, and one that predates cable television, was CBS. During the late 1960s, CBS had a reputation as a network with a disproportionate number of shows that targeted rural and older viewers, which were seen as less attractive to advertisers. Beginning in 1970, incoming network vice president Fred Silverman orchestrated the rural purge, in which these shows would be canceled in favor of shows targeting younger, suburban viewers with more disposable income.

An unusual example of channel drift is the case of the Fox Broadcasting Company. Throughout its early existence, and even after its ascent to major network status, Fox had a reputation as a lowbrow, alternative network notorious for its "knockoff" programs and often absurd reality and game show programs. Beginning with the major success of American Idol beginning in the early 2000s, Fox drifted away from this reputation; its dramas and sitcoms became more conventional compared to the Big Three television networks, as did its reality shows, although the network does occasionally still schedule "knockoff" reality shows such as Skating with Celebrities and The Choice for its lineup (nevertheless, even these shows are relatively tame compared to the level of absurdity in Fox's pre-Idol programming).

Channel drift is not always successful, and can often lead to backlash. The Weather Channel, for instance, faced severe backlash for its attempts to add movies to its lineup (already having drifted from all-forecast programming into reality shows for much of its lineup over the course of the previous decade) in 2010. In addition to numerous complaints, Dish Network even went so far as to threaten to drop the channel and had a replacement channel, The Weather Cast, ready for launch (The Weather Cast actually made it to air for about three days, but Dish never dropped The Weather Channel). The Weather Channel backed off and has not aired any movies since, but again drifted away from its forecasting coverage into a mostly reality show-oriented lineup by 2014, at which point another carriage dispute (this time with DirecTV, which indeed dropped The Weather Channel in favor of WeatherNation TV) prompted the channel to go back to all-forecasts during the day at least temporarily to restore its reputation. Most of the efforts of Cartoon Network to drift into live-action series have typically been unsuccessful and short-lived, although its late-night Adult Swim programming block (which like Nick at Nite is to Nickelodeon is a separate channel from Cartoon Network) has had more success airing live-action programming.

ABC Family is the one of the few known instances in which the amount of channel drift allowed on the channel is limited to some degree. Launching as religious network CBN Satellite Service (a cable extension of televangelist Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network) in 1977, it later incorporated family-oriented secular programs by 1984, which became the channel's dominant form of programming for nearly two decades. After The Walt Disney Company acquired the channel from News Corporation in 2001, Disney decided to reformat the channel as "XYZ" (a reverse reference to ABC) and shift its target audience to a more hip audience such as college students or young women (possibly to avoid redundancies with the family-friendly format of Disney Channel). This plan was aborted because of contractual stipulations imposed by Robertson following the channel's 1990 sale to International Family Entertainment in which the channel's name must contain the word "Family" permanently (having incorporated the word in its name since 1988 as The CBN Family Channel, then as The Family Channel and later Fox Family after being sold to News Corporation), and that it be required to air CBN's flagship program The 700 Club twice each weekday as well as a day-long CBN telethon each January (following its sale to News Corporation, a requirement that the channel air a half-hour CBN talk show, then known as Living the Life, was also added among the stipulations). To create XYZ, the Family Channel would have had to cease to exist – Disney would have had to create XYZ as an entirely new network, and negotiate carriage agreements with pay television providers from scratch.^[10][11] However, it has drifted from its strictly family-friendly format under Disney ownership, ABC Family gradually dropped series aimed at children from its schedule and incorporated programs aimed at young adults featuring profanity, some violence and sexual content, alongside its family-oriented series and films.

Outside the United States

Channel drift tends to be most common in the United States, where cable and satellite television channels are almost completely unregulated by that country's federal telecommunications regulator. In other countries, cable television channels are subject to the rules and regulations set forth by each country's communications bureau and must be licensed accordingly. For example, some countries (for example, Canada) have regulations that stipulate some channels' purposes when authorizing them, particularly for those channels that were licensed for the purpose of providing underrepresented subject matter. This can prove problematic for channels in those countries that share a branding with their American counterparts; for instance, Outdoor Life Network still exists in Canada due to the requirements of the channel's original conditions of license, long after the American OLN abandoned that branding (the American OLN is now known as NBC Sports Network).

Radio format drift

To a certain extent, channel drift can also occur in radio, especially music radio: see, for instance, the transition from oldies to classic hits, beautiful music to smooth jazz, and MOR to adult contemporary. In these cases, channel drift occurs when a format's older music becomes less popular or profitable (often due to the fans of that music dying, retiring and leaving the area, or aging out of advertising demographics) and newer music is inserted into the playlist to draw younger listeners.

See also

• Key demographic

References

Further reading

• Dominic Small (2009). "Channel Changing". Off the Telly. 

External links

• More live action programs on cartoon network
• Network Decay
• Network Decay - TV Tropes Wiki
• Top 5 Networks That Have Sold Their Souls
• Demographic Downfall: Television Executives Missing the Point