7 May
2004
7 May
'04
9:09 p.m.
I think in this (as is usually the case) it came down
to a financial
decision. Vulcan wasn't making any money off TechTV, which is why they
decided to sell. The sad fact is that TechTV only worked when there was
an enormous tech boom and you had millions of wannabes watching so that
they could keep up with all the latest tech trends. Now that the tech
boom is over and all the carpet baggers have gone back to whence they
came, there is also no longer a real market for TechTV. The only
viewership they have now is the hardcore geeks, and that really isn't
enough to carry an entire station, as the programming additions within the
past year or so have demonstrated ("Conspiracies", "Anime
Unleashed",
etc.)
Frankly, I never liked Tech TV, and very few of my hardcore geek friends
liked it as well. I think viewership was really low all around.
What makes absolutely no sense, however, is why
Comcast would buy the
channel, then fire all the talent as well as the crew.
They could have purchased it just for the "license". While the cable
channels are not regulated by the FCC like the broadcast stations, some
companies (Infinity, Clear Channel, etc.) do this exact thing to
independent radio stations just to get that "slot". It has nothing to do
with the format, the employees, the listeners, or anything else, for that
matter. Just the fancy bit of paper hanging on the wall.
William Donzelli
aw288(a)osfn.org