WWTBAM press release

[PeterMarshallFan]

This is not a GSN bashing post, just a PR and my comments on it.




Game Show Network Wins 'Millionaire' Rerun Rights

The Game Show Network is betting that fans of \"Who Wants to Be a
Millionaire \" have long forgotten whether those nail-biting \"final
answers\" were right or wrong. The cable network has picked up the
original Regis Philbin -hosted ABC hit game show for a repeat run.

The series will air seven days a week on GSN beginning Oct. 13. It
will be preceded by a promotional four-hour \"marathon\" broadcast Oct.
12.

GSN has acquired 150 of the 350 original episodes of the ABC show from
Disney-owned producer Buena Vista Television and has the option of
ordering more in the future, GSN senior vp programing Bob Boden said
on Monday. Boden described the deal as one of the most significant to
date for GSN.

\"This is the most successful show that we have ever acquired,\" he
said.*

The deal includes rights to several celebrity and professional athlete
episodes as well as several shows featuring $1 million winners.

Boden expects the game show will have significant repeat value because
even ardent fans of the general-knowledge game will probably not be
able to recall many of the crucial answers or which competitors made
it into the high dollar digits.**

\"You may remember the seven people who actually won the $1 million,
but the others, you don't know how far they went,\" he said.

Boden also emphasized that \"this is one of those classic game shows
that can play over and over and still be great television.\"***

GSN also is adding an interactive element for viewers that will allow
users to play along with each show in real time. The aim is to offer
players the chance to answer each question that the on-air contestant
receives. The top 10 users' scores and their respective player names
will be broadcast live on-air twice during each show.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter
-----------------------------------------------------

*-Did he forget they once had TPIR, which has been on for 15 times longer than WWTBAM was?

**- Is he sure about that? There are plenty of $500k and $250k winners that could be recognized quickly, IMO.

***- Feh.

BTW, wouldn't 7 a week burn out the 150 eps pretty quick?

[SplitSecond]

*-Did he forget they once had TPIR, which has been on for 15 times longer than WWTBAM was?

Would you care to be the person who states in a press release, \"This is the second most successful series we've ever acquired\"?

**- Is he sure about that? There are plenty of $500k and $250k winners that could be recognized quickly, IMO.

The way my mind works, my subconscious will have probably stored a lot of the answers (at least for the episodes I watched), but not where most of the players stopped or lost.  I'll get the benefit of feeling smarter when I play along, but most of my investment in the players' progress will be genuine - at least as genuine as it can be for a rerun.

***- Feh.

It is public relations, after all.  I don't know anybody who keeps a job like that by damning their own programming decisions with faint praise.

[aaron sica]

[quote name=\'PeterMarshallFan\' date=\'Sep 23 2003, 04:01 PM\'] BTW, wouldn't 7 a week burn out the 150 eps pretty quick? [/quote]
Well, not as fast as the original \"Hollywood Squares\" took to burn through 150 eps, mainly because WWTBAM won't be shown three times a day like HS was. WWTBAM will be on once Monday-Friday (5 episodes), with two on Saturday and two on Sunday, for 9 episodes a week. That will take about 16 weeks to go through the run.

[TV Favorites]

Would you care to be the person who states in a press release, \"This is the second most successful series we've ever acquired\"?

He could have said \"one of the most popular series...\"

BTW, wouldn't 7 a week burn out the 150 eps pretty quick?

Also, some of the weekend airings could be repeats from the weekday airings.  Probably the weekend afternoon slots will be like that.

[clemon79]

[quote name=\'TV Favorites\' date=\'Sep 23 2003, 03:21 PM\']

Would you care to be the person who states in a press release, "This is the second most successful series we've ever acquired"?

He could have said "one of the most popular series..."
 [/quote]
 Or, he could have said what he said, knowing that the only people who would take umbrage with such a qualitative statement would be people like us, who, if I have to remind you again, don't amount to the ingrown hair on the boil on the ass of the person representing the entire viewership of GSN.

[uncamark]

[quote name=\'PeterMarshallFan\' date=\'Sep 23 2003, 04:01 PM\']This is not a GSN bashing post, just a PR and my comments on it.[/quote]
Well, actually, it's a Hollywood Reporter story that moved on the Reuters wire.  The quotes might've been taken from a press release, but it wasn't a hyper.

If the last paragraph starts \"Game Show Network is the 24-hour cable network devoted to the world of games and gaming...\" or something to that effect, *then* it's a press release.