[TWork]

I know nothing about television programming -- how its determined what show ideas actually get produced, how the various networks decide when to show what and how often?

Why does it seem that 95% of the shows out there are complete crap? My tastes can't be that radically different than the average viewer, can they? I don't mind commercials. I have a DVR and I understand that the networks have to pay the bills. But, why is it that there seems to be so few quality programs out there? I'm not a Nascar fan, but at least I can understand why networks would show it. I'm not a huge watcher of football, baseball, etc, but I understand that there's a fan base for it.

Who watches shows like Millonaire Matchmaker, The Girls Next Door, Pimp My Ride, Snoop Dog's Fatherhood (or whatever it's called), Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader, Jon and Kate Plus Eight, Truck U, Bullrun, professional wrestling, etc? The list goes on and on and on.

And, assuming there's an audience for these shows, why are they repeated over and over again -- I don't mean a rerun on a different day. Some networks show the same episode 4 or 5 times in a single day and twice in a row in some cases. Some networks like Speed or Bravo may only show 6 or 8 different shows in a single 24 hour period. I don't mean different programs -- we're talking the exact same 6 or 8 episodes of the same programs. How can that be profitable?

I understand that the WRC might ask for too much money for some networks to show their races, but isn't there some middle ground between showing something with a limited audience like the WRC and the demolition derbies that Speed Channel plays over and over again? Back in the day you could turn on channels like MTV and Speed and actually see music videos or racing. How do these networks get so far away from their original charter?

There are hundreds of channels available these days, yet the programming is still so poor. Is the demand for Nascar so great and lucrative that it merits 12 hours of programming in a single day?

And, some shows seem like such overt advertisements for products, why not just drop the pretense and call it an infomercial? There are tons out there, but examples would be shows like Two Guys Garage, Truck U, or any of the "Test Drive" type shows like the ones with Tommy Kendal on Speed. These shows are so short on actual content and there's not even an attempt to be objective. God forbid there actually be a negative word about a product. We're not talking about 2 am programming, these are shows that are in prime TV watching time slots.

Sorry for the long post, but I'm hoping someone can educate me. What gives?