Narrowcasting Schedules and Stars
Jennifer Gillan · 2014
Scheduling is an industry practice that is incorrectly perceived to have changed completely in the post-network era. While the U.S. schedule itself has certainly expanded exponentially, many core elements of scheduling logic have remained constant since the 1960s. More to the point, schedule-related elements that are typically characterized as a byproduct of the current multiplatform television industry have parallels in the United States’ three-network schedule when CBS, NBC, and ABC competed with each other for the highest ratings. Those ratings allowed the winning network to sell to advertisers the idea that its programs would reach the most potential consumers. It has been taken for granted that networks did not get in the business of narrowcasting to niche audiences or building of distinct channel brands around those niches until the post-network era of the 1990s. At that time the power of the three-network system was displaced in the expanding U.S. channel spectrum.