If there's a TV network named "right," we can only hope there'll be another one named "wrong."
A new cable channel called Right Network is, in fact, starting up -- paved the way, I'm
guessing, by MTV's "Jersey Shore." All to say we are entering the age of partisan viewers with increasingly divergent opinions and sensibilities. Viewers who are happy to be ticked off, turned off;
viewers who both love and hate body spray and hair gel.
Right Network's content is tinged with conservative
sensibilities. From a branding point of view, it's an interesting name, one that will probably attract viewer sampling. But it probably won't deliver TV programs about the "right" things people of
any political persuasion should do.
Actor Kelsey Grammer is an investor in the project, which promises
to be "pro-America," "pro-business," and "pro-military sensibilities." No mention of "pro-entertainment" -- though a YouTube clip does show some comic Grammer touches.
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Pro-business? I doubt
any cable or broadcast network would call themselves "anti-business." Believe me, any network that gets viewers is pro-business. By this definition, you can call "Jersey Shore" pro-business and
pro-America. Americans watch the show, I'm told.
Even this isn't enough. It's "media business" that should be the main factor. Is Fox News pro-business -- or pro-media business? It might be
both -- but it needs to be the latter for it to work.
Television networks can give themselves labels -- including a word with several meanings like "right." But it better not be just about
politics. You'd better entertain, otherwise viewers will move on.
If Chewing Gum Network started up tomorrow, it would attract interest as well. But is it the right chewing gum network? And,
more important, how big can they blow bubbles?