Defeating the Brand

Remember when a cable channel's brand used to mean that they played programming surrounding that brand? Right now on the Biography Channel they're playing 'Murder She Wrote'. Monday on G4, a channel that used to be all about video games and technology, they had an 'Arrested Development' marathon. The best one I've seen of late was a few weeks ago. Bravo, the channel that for ages raced A&E for snootest channel out there, ran 'Friday the 13th: Part VII - Jason Takes Manhattan'. Bravo played a slasher film and not even a very good one.

Now, apart from the Bravo item that I still don't understand, the basic idea is obvious. The channels in question aren't programming towards the brand of the channel or, if you will, the concept behind the channel, but they are programming towards the demographic they expect to be watching the channel. Both channels, and I'm sure they're not the only ones, no doubt have survey information handy that shows what demographic is primarily watching their channel and the other interests that demographic has. Presumably swerving from the brand in this way just increases the amount of time that demographic stays on the channel.

I still think it's a dumb idea. There are plenty of more 'generic' channels out there that can do this sort of thing. However, if you've done all this work to generate a specific brand identity, why throw it away? This would be like Spike, the 'Man' Channel, showing 'chick flicks' or Sci-Fi playing a Masterpiece Theatre period piece that lacks aliens in it. Or the NFL network showing a hockey game. It defeats the purpose. By making themselves more generic they make themselves more disposable and more easily replaceable.

And why would they want that?

Geekisode - Afterword

About halfway through writing the Crisis, I considered what I was doing and all the characters I was dusting off to play with again. It seemed weird to do this much revival for no reason but, to be fair, it is the sort of thing that I would do. Still, could I put a date to it? Or a reason? It would be a nice ‘cherry’ to top the sundae.

The beginning of the ‘Season’ Doctor Who series? That started in 1994 I believe. It’s the twelfth anniversary of that but, to be fair, I really didn’t produce that many stories in that series: only seven full stories, two side stories and a short story. The short story was published by another fan group but it’s still not that much to celebrate.

How about the beginning of the ‘Teen’ Doctor series? That started in 1990, right? So it’s the sixteenth anniversary of that series. More to celebrate from a completion standpoint but still, not quite right.

My mind clicked back even further, the time when my desire to write something went from a desire to an achievement for the first time. That was when I was in the sixth grade and when I wrote that first ‘Doctor What’ story for English class (as well as a two part ‘Sherluck Phones’ story, all truly rubbish). I would have been about twelve then. Now I’m thirty-two.

I’ve been writing for twenty years now.

Welcome to my twentieth anniversary story!

You would think I’d have gotten the hang of this by now.

Thank you. For everything.

Now I have another novel to work on. Excuse me.

-SMW 11/28/2006 (And lets ignore the possibility that I could have been eleven when I wrote those stories, hmm?)