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What Actually Happened to TechTV?
thelancer asks: "Early last year, Australian cable got TechTV. But not for long. It turned out the fix was already in, and TechTV left Australian screens at the end of 2006 when G4 pulled the plug on international distribution. As someone who only got a taste, but desperately wanted more (of what I saw in the first two months, not nearer the end), I've done the rounds and read some stories on the buy out, but nothing has given me the who, when, and the all important why? And they all assume you know the history. Can the Slashdot crowd put together a more complete picture on what really happened at TechTV?"
Business happens. You've never seen two businesses team up in order to lose money before? I guess you don't have AOL down under either...
That is why I don't even have cable nor satellite anymore. Hundreds of channels of junk. It's all the same anymore. You mainly have so called 'reality' shows, Television for women should read 'Television where all men are created evil'. TNN had country music, then it became a country themed television network. After that it became 'The National Network, the new TNN. Now it's spike TV, just like all of the other TV networks. CMT is near where TNN was before it went over to SpikeTV. None of the so called 'Music video' channels have music videos anymore, but reality shows for teens. ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, ETC, all have mainly reality shows. NBC is the worst with "Deal or no deal". Whatever happened to true Game shows, there is no game in Deal or no Deal. Next thing I know National Geographic will start airing Reality crap as well.
So really, why have a television anymore? Most entertainment can be found on the Internet anymore. IN2TV if you must have that TV fix, archive.org for any multimedia that is under public domain.
Ok, I've shown myself to be a geek, obviously. Mod accordingly...
"So after all this, you make my case for me. To end this stalemate, you must die..."
Well I enjoy Turner Movie Classics. But then I like old movies. I used to AMC but they are showing a bunch of crap from the 80s and 90s now. Yes I hate reality tv as well. I do like the car shows on SpikeTV along with STNG. Other than that Cartoon network, PBS, History Channel, and every once in a while Discovery and The Science channel.
TV isn't bad I use my Replay to record shows that I want to see and watch them when I want to.
You just have to be selective and time shift.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
I watched TechTV for a few weeks back in 2001 when it was still on and I found it boring and irrelevant. Most of the tech stuff they had on there was already old by the time they broadcast it, due to the fact that I had already read it on the Internet and began to forget about it by the time they could show it.
I kind of felt the same sentiment towards that channel that I do towards hard-copy tech magazines (I found them very enjoyable in the early 90's prior to the web boom, but obviously, due to the web, they have pretty much dropped down to zero-relevance). News and information (the focus of TechTV) has much more value, the more "hot off the press" it is. Only the Internet can provide the most "hot off the press" news in a practicle, relatively low-cost manner.
a few weeks later i heard about the potential buy-out; i knew nothing about comcast (in eastern nd/western mn) and didn't care... until the day it was announced that the buy-out had taken place.
g4tv is a perfect example of why this country is tearing itself apart. everything is directed at children in the sub-30 age group. i'm only 23, but i can safely call these people children because it's a mental age condition that i'm referring to: the kids who sit around playing video games until they have to go to work at mcdonalds; the kids who spout obscenities all over because it must be cool; the children who listen to rap because they can't think for themselves and buy whatever they're told is cool; the children who think that video game design is cake and think they can do it too... even though they failed out of english in grade 3-9 (take your pick), opted for business math instead of algebra and took some sort of food or eco science course instead of chemistry because it's too hard; the babies that were left in daycares and in front of the television to grow up because their parents were too busy to take any notice, even when they started smoking at age 12.
this channel serves to do nothing (aside from x-play... most of the time) but show the whiny generation (what is it, gen z now?) that it's ok to avoid responsibility and get stoned in your parents' basement (luckily, that show about weed was very short-lived) because being smart is overrated.
aldous huxley made greater predictions in 'brave new world' than nostradamous ever could, this world is shaping into huxley's brave new world more and more.
> So really, why have a television anymore?
;)
Two words: Alton Brown
Last year, I used DISH Network. One of my favorite channels was dropped, and I called DISH to ask why. The customer service rep I got actually had a statement to read about it:
"The channel in question was a channel owned and distributed by Comcast. When our previous contract to show the channel ended, Comcast wanted to triple the rates for said channel. In order for us to have continued to show it, we would have had to raise your rates $10/month for that single channel alone; we chose to simply drop the channel. If you have any further questions, we suggest contacting Comcast at xxx".
Comcast ruins everything they touch; I should know, I'm now stuck using their shit service. The only thing decent they have is their cable internet, and in our market, it costs twice as much as everywhere else in the country, along with their $80 a month cable. But hey, they have a monopoly which our city agreed to.
So, in response, of course they ruined TechTV. They had no other option.
Like most of you, I never did have G4 (until now). When I first got satellite television, I found TechTV (around 1999, so right after their name change).
The Screen Savers, by far, was the [u]best TV show on air[/u]. Call for Help, as well, was very nice, along with Extended Play.
Later, I eventually saw the ads and small blocks demonstrating G4TechTV (an intermittent name). They had The Screen Savers, still, but also added shows such as Cinematech (which can be good, sometimes), Arena (sometimes good, usually bad, though), and Brainiac (pretty funny and it's educational!). I thought it was going to be neat to have a few more game-oriented shows.
What I didn't realize, though, was that G4 eventually took over TechTV entirely - I was thinking "what happened to the name 'G4TechTV', and why is it now just 'G4'?"
Now, they completely ruined The Screen Savers before killing it (providing us with teen-oriented script kiddie hosts) and redubbing it The Attack of the Show (seems like their naming committee spent all of their funds on hookers and booze, like the Microsoft game console naming committee).
To be brutally honest, G4 is the worst thing to ever hit the airwaves regarding nerds/geeks - it makes us look bad. Not all of us are porn-obsessed, Star Trek-watching, constant gamers that never leave their mother's basement in fear of not having G4.
For them to have a half-decent network, I would recommend reworking the entire channel - bring back all of the TechTV shows, perhaps rip out the so-so or bad ones, and adding in the only good G4 TV shows.
I miss my TechTV. I miss my nightly The Screen Savers block.
you nailed it, that is how it went down. except nuber 6. it will be years before Comcast can recoup.