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(I copied and pasted this post from another bboard
quote:
Originally posted by Bryn_Conwy
One more little one – the Farscape BB on SciFi has been apparently locked down – you can now only post on current threads, no new ones – this post is from the Delurking to join the fight thread now up to approx. 140 posts – this post is NOT one you want to send to SciFi – but i think most of us probably share similar feelings with this guy:Date: 09/10/2002
From: ZimNovaSAVE FARSCAPE!!!
What’a a matter, you have to shut the BBoard down because the comments are running 98% against your lame decision to cancel or allow the cancellation of Farscape?
What a bunch of frekiks. Read your mail. Answer the phone (if you can), look at the huge campaign to save the show being waged not only by fans but by media critics as well. Read the news being spread at over 20 mainstream entertainment web sites questioning your wisdom.
Over a few hundred thousands of dollars per episode you may have doomed the future of the entire Sci-Fi Channel. Too Bad eh?
PS if you guys think this is too strong to have up in here i will take it down [/quote]
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This issue may begin to snowball. I mean, we’ve all taken issue with the SciFi Channel from time to time. But nothing compares to this. Their most popular sci-fi show with a hardcore group of dedicated fans, cancelled without warning. Bad stuff is going to result from this. Prepare to sit back and enjoy the fireworks. It’s going to get nasty!
(I cut and pasted this from another bboard again
quote:
Originally posted by DangerWillRobinson
*** FROM BG2 & A SCI-FI MOLEHey it’s me again. I tried to tell everyone on the scifi chat room what’s up but too many which is ok. I spoke with my mole at Scifi in NYC and here are a couple of things that are going on:
(1) Scifi is totally to blame. They know that going into season five would be expensive and they wanted to pay less for the show, they went to EMTV and is strapped for cash they said no and SCIFI opted to get out. Scifi knew this well ahead of everyone, they employed a win-win situation, by this I mean their programming strategy. By constantly airing the show and ratings didn’t go up they could claim that its core audience did not grow and vice versa. By changing time slots, the network hoped to increase ratings for SG1, a show that costs less to produce, they were implementing a preemptive strike blaming poor ratings but what happened was the opposite SG1 fans watched Farscape INCREASING its core base making the press release a lie. Numbers don’t lie. Scifi did not plan to announce the cancellation of the show until mid or near the end of the season.
(2) The network execs told everyone not to say anything about this, DK,BB, & &RM all jumped the gun to try to let everyone know what was happening ASAP so that fan momentum would start.
(3) They are reading all emails, letters, faxes, and telegrams sent to the office but are throwing ones out that are vulgar and nasty. They are getting flowers, crackers and Farscape toys. My mole also told me that they don’t mind calls as long as it’s professional and polite. They will hang up on you if you start yelling and cussing. Everyone has a good chance to reach an exec or at least their assistant and they are more than happy to help you with any info. My source also suggested that all correspondence contain your full name not chat or BB name as well as some demographic info like your age, household income. If some fans are still in HS then use the parent’s income, my source believes that Scifi is going to try to convince advertisers to pay for more advertising if it can show them the demographics thus willing to pay for a fifth season. This is very important, also to write to all of the sponsors and threaten to stop buying or using product. Mention in the letter that you bought their product after seeing a commercial aired during Farscape and if possible send the UNUSED product back to them. Don’t forget a sponsor may make a variety of products that all of us can be using so look hard.
(4) start to email etc. to your local papers first. If they run a story a larger media outlet will most likely pick it up i.e. AP and call your local cable company and threaten them by telling them that you may switch to direct TV or satellite.
(5) Because of the leak Scifi knew what was coming so it was expected but not to this degree. They thought that only the BBs would be the only place to vent and did not expect such a huge backlash. However the suits think that this will fade by Wednesday so everyone has to keep the heat up at least a week or two or they won’t take us seriously. My source said that you can mail, fax or email everyday and to reference the previous letter that was sent. (6) Right now no one is talking to no one, network suits, Henson people, DK etc. there is a lot of anger and shock and betrayal as to what happened so there is an informal cooling off period.
This comes from my mole at scifi and I can assure you is fact.
More stuff to ponder:
quote:
Variety have a report on Farscape’s cancellation.
http://www.variety.com/index.asp?la…egoryid=14&cs=1Since most people probably don’t have an account, I’ll repeat it here in full:
quote:
——————————————————————————–Sci Fi nixes ‘Farscape’ skein
Channel cites declining viewership, heavy costsBy JOHN DEMPSEY
The Sci Fi Channel has cancelled Jim Henson TV’s “Farscape,” which had begun slipping in the ratings in its fourth season after racking up consistently solid ratings from March 1999 through the end of 2001.
Sci Fi cited declining viewership and “the extreme and growing cost of production” for its decision to kill “Farscape.”But Juliet Blake, president of Jim Henson TV, U.S., said “Farscape,” shot in Australia, cost only about $1.5 million an episode, which is at least $500,000 an hour less than the production cost of the UPN primetime sci-fi series “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Enterprise.”
And the cost to Sci Fi, which pays about half of the production cost in license fees, went up, Blake continued, mainly because it ordered more runs of each “Farscape” episode.
Sci Fi still has a number of unaired hours of the series, which it will play off at 10 p.m. Friday from January to March 2003. The show had originally run earlier in the evening, and Blake said the 10-p.m. slot cost “Farscape” some of its younger viewers.
A summer Nielsen report conceived by Turner Research showed that “Farscape” had fallen to only a 1.2 rating in cable homes, or 958,000 households, from May 27 to Aug. 18. By contrast, “Stargate: SG-1,” the Friday-at-8 original series on Sci Fi, averaged a 1.7 rating for the same period, or 1.32-million homes.
The Henson Co. is working on the script of a “Farscape” theatrical movie, and one of the series creators, Rockne O’Bannon, is writing an anime version.
Henson produced 88 episodes of “Farscape” for Sci Fi before getting the pinkslip.
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