Boycott Fox? You've got to be kidding.
POSTED BY: Thrawn
UPDATED: Friday, April 9, 2004 13:37
VIEWED: 16792
PAGE 3 of 8
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AURAPTOR
Why does Fox put forth such effort to go w/ a show like Firefly, John Doe, Wonderfalls ,etc.. and not promote it? It's such a waste of talent to put forth these great shows and then just cancel them after as little as 4 weeks.
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Two words, my friend, two very short words:
Tax Writeoff.
I call her "Vera"
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Perhaps if people in our demographic don't watch Fox, then the shows we like can be picked up by a network who will support their product.
Fox can die alongside reality TV... Hopefully Soon
" Thats not fair !!!!
I didn't even have a soul when I did that!"
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Thrawn wrote:
Quote:
The eventual goal, as you yourself have said, is to change Fox. We want to get the people that don't understand quirky and interesting shows to either die, get fired, or change their minds. Right?
Now. How are we going to do this? If none of us watches any shows on that network at all, the only people that DO watch the shows on that network are the people that watch reality shows. The consequences are obvious - these people are going to look at the ratings and think, "well, no one's watching (insert good TV show here), so let's cancel it. Those shows never succeed." And they'll be right.
If you want to change that, if you want to make Fox air good shows, you have to show them that people watch good shows. And how are you going to do that if you don't ever watch anything? Principle is all well and good, but in this case, following the principle is defeating your own purpose.
Okay, first off, I never said I wanted to change Fox. I said I wanted their TV programmers fired. While it may seem these two statements are the same, they are not. Yours is about Fox TV network. Mine is about some specific -- if anonymous -- morons who couldn't pour piss out of a boot with directions on the heel.
I'll try an analogy.
I've read biographies of Bill Gates. Now, I figure I'm in an extreme minority and probably flame-baiting here, but I like the guy. Or at least I'm withholding judgement to see if he carries through on his stated intention of giving away all his money to charities, with the exception of $50 million for each of his children.
On the other hand, Microsoft -- as an entity in its own right -- is an evil bitch. The company has virtually cornered the market and strangled anyone who attempted to compete with it.
Some say, "Microsoft is Bill is Microsoft," but I disagree. Companies become personalities themselves, and the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. For the sake of argument, whether you agree or not just play along for a sec... The equation goes like this: Bill's okay, the programmers are okay, the marketing people are okay, and the company's lawyers are...
well, there's no such thing as a lawyer with a soul, but we're playing along, right?
Put all these 'okay' people together and form a company and place that company in a competitive environment... What happens? The company -- like any organism -- evolves in accordance with Darwinism. Darwin was wrong, but we'll take it as read, still playing along.
In Microsoft's case, evolution yielded a predator. But it really had very little to do with the human element involved. Everybody just did their jobs, but something happened along the way and the thing grew fangs and venom pits.
Fox is not bad. It's just Fox, and I don't hate it for that. But it's got a cancer in its body: the aforementioned TV programmers responsible for cancelling Firefly. I don't want to change Fox, any more than I want to change my GSD into a poodle. But if my Shepherd gets a bad tooth, I have it pulled before it can infect the neighboring teeth, sicken and maybe even kill my dog.
Another analogy: If I go to a fast food restaurant and order a burger, and they give me one made from feces, is it your argument that I should continue buying feces burgers in the hopes that one day they'll start using dead cow, like any responsible purveyor of burgers would do from the outset?
Well, I ain't doin' it. I want dead cow burgers. Fox ain't got 'em, and what they do have is manure, so I'm going elsewhere and get the burgers I like.
But, to each his own; by all means, enjoy your shit sandwiches!
To Maugwai:
Since you mentioned "The Swan", I'd just like to say how horrified I was the very first time I saw the promo for that turd. How far have we fallen as a culture and a society that cutting up women and making them eye candy is entertainment?
How sad that these women don't see themselves as worthy people because of whatever physical 'imperfections' they may have. How sad that our cultu
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First question for all: Do you have a Nielsen box or are you able to influence someone who does? If not, whatever you do in regard to the FOX television network will not affect them one darn bit. By all means do what your principles tell you to do, but don't think you are having any effect.
Secondly, people ought to get a basic grasp of how the economics of television work. FOX the network buys shows for a certain fee, and they make money on them by selling advertising. The advertising rates are based on ratings. Reality shows are cheap to make and cheap to license. It's basic economics that a more expensive, scripted show will have to demonstrate that it can draw ratings fairly soon, or it will be dropped because it's a money loser.
FOX launched one of the longest-running SF shows of all time out of a Friday night slot: The X-Files. It seems to me that they keep thinking they can do it again. But they were a new and hungry network then and gave it time to build a cult following. Now that they are one of the big four, they have less patience and get nervous if something doesn't look like it's catching on right away. This may in the long run be a bad business practice, and FOX executives do seem to commission shows and then lack conviction in them more than the more established networks, but it is not some sort of evil conspiracy or vendetta. All these folks care about is making money, and the only way they can make money is to sell commercials at a good rate prompted by good ratings.
As was said above, the network makes nothing off of DVD sales, and downloading episodes also makes their audience look smaller than it is (assuming some Nielsen families download in the same proportion that fans do.) So, for heaven's sake, if you want the DVDs of a show FOX cancelled, go buy them. You aren't benefiting FOX in any way.
Also note that Joan of Arcadia has been a huge hit at 8 pm on Friday, and that CSI started out on Friday. It can be done if you can appeal to both mainstream and genre fans.
Cardie
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Anyone else here think that this Thrawn character sounds like a Fox exec? He is beating his drum for Fox loud enuff.. or maybe just beating something else.
I loved you analogies Zoid :)
STUFF FOX!!
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Quote:
Originally posted by zoid:
Okay, first off, I never said I wanted to change Fox. I said I wanted their TV programmers fired. While it may seem these two statements are the same, they are not. Yours is about Fox TV network. Mine is about some specific -- if anonymous -- morons who couldn't pour piss out of a boot with directions on the heel.
I'll try an analogy.
I've read biographies of Bill Gates. Now, I figure I'm in an extreme minority and probably flame-baiting here, but I like the guy. Or at least I'm withholding judgement to see if he carries through on his stated intention of giving away all his money to charities, with the exception of $50 million for each of his children.
On the other hand, Microsoft -- as an entity in its own right -- is an evil bitch. The company has virtually cornered the market and strangled anyone who attempted to compete with it.
Some say, "Microsoft is Bill is Microsoft," but I disagree. Companies become personalities themselves, and the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. For the sake of argument, whether you agree or not just play along for a sec... The equation goes like this: Bill's okay, the programmers are okay, the marketing people are okay, and the company's lawyers are...
well, there's no such thing as a lawyer with a soul, but we're playing along, right?
Put all these 'okay' people together and form a company and place that company in a competitive environment... What happens? The company -- like any organism -- evolves in accordance with Darwinism. Darwin was wrong, but we'll take it as read, still playing along.
In Microsoft's case, evolution yielded a predator. But it really had very little to do with the human element involved. Everybody just did their jobs, but something happened along the way and the thing grew fangs and venom pits.
Fox is not bad. It's just Fox, and I don't hate it for that. But it's got a cancer in its body: the aforementioned TV programmers responsible for cancelling Firefly. I don't want to change Fox, any more than I want to change my GSD into a poodle. But if my Shepherd gets a bad tooth, I have it pulled before it can infect the neighboring teeth, sicken and maybe even kill my dog.
Another analogy: If I go to a fast food restaurant and order a burger, and they give me one made from feces, is it your argument that I should continue buying feces burgers in the hopes that one day they'll start using dead cow, like any responsible purveyor of burgers would do from the outset?
Well, I ain't doin' it. I want dead cow burgers. Fox ain't got 'em, and what they do have is manure, so I'm going elsewhere and get the burgers I like.
But, to each his own; by all means, enjoy your shit sandwiches!
Respectfully,
zoid
First of all, I actually agree about Bill Gates/Microsoft. The situation there, though, is the exact reverse of what you're saying about Fox - I understand what point you were making, but I don't see how there's a point there besides background.
Then, skipping a bit, regarding the burger thing - say you had a choice of four restaurants (simplified because cable networks exist, but you get the idea). Each restaurant had bunch of dishes. You ate at all four every once in a while. One of them kept introducing really excellent dishes, then taking them off the menu because they didn't sell well. You'd still go eat them, right? If only for variety's sake. That's the better analogy. I'm not saying I watch what Fox usually airs; I don't, it's definitely shit-burgers. Every so often, they have a good one, and I watch it, and that's what I'm saying should be done.
Now, for the bit of your argument that was actually an argument. I understand what you mean about the particular Fox execs. I understand that you like the rest of the company, and it's just a few people that are bad. I don't understand how it makes my point invalid. They have jobs, they do jobs, and, so far, the ratings have pretty much proven to the rest of the network th
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Quote:
Originally posted by Calhoun:
Anyone else here think that this Thrawn character sounds like a Fox exec? He is beating his drum for Fox loud enuff.. or maybe just beating something else.
I loved you analogies Zoid :)
STUFF FOX!!
Heh. I'm 19 and go to Rice University. I work for no one having anything to do with TV. And you'll notice I'm not promoting what Fox did at all; I'm just saying that they're stupid rather than evil, and the only way that's gonna change is if we change it. You can't ignore them and expect them to change on their own.
Kindly refrain from insulting me when all I've done is post an opinion as intelligently as I'm able. I will, at least, grant you that much politeness.
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Quote:
Originally posted by zoid:
To Maugwai:
Since you mentioned "The Swan", I'd just like to say how horrified I was the very first time I saw the promo for that turd. How far have we fallen as a culture and a society that cutting up women and making them eye candy is entertainment?
...
My skin crawls just thinking of this.
...
I actually felt physically ill when I saw the promo. The phrase "Beginning of the end" came to mind, until I remembered it began a long time ago and no end is in sight. You know those Star Trek episodes where the existence of humanity was put on trial? We already lost.
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Quote:
Originally posted by GinoBiffaroni:
Perhaps if people in our demographic don't watch Fox, then the shows we like can be picked up by a network who will support their product.
Fox can die alongside reality TV... Hopefully Soon
" Thats not fair !!!!
I didn't even have a soul when I did that!"
That's possible but it seems to me unlikely...I mean, Tim and co. went pitching Wonderfalls to a bunch of places, and Fox is the only place that went for it. If Fox hadn't, no one would have, and that isn't much of an alternative.
I mean, I'd rather have Fox be included in the list of networks that put on good shows, wouldn't you? More places for good shows to go. If that can't happen, then Fox not buying them in the first place might be an alternative, but when Fox buys a good show I still think it's worth at least trying to support it rather than dismissing it out of hand because it happens to be on Fox, don't you?
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