Don't F*** With River! [Firefly]

[Pielorinho]

Why does this remind me of the old column from the Onion: "Justify your Existance?"

Pretty much. I stomped around the office for a full week, muttering and cursing the people who'd done this to my course. (They'd also gone through and messed up the punctuation in the course, due to their misunderstandings of grammar, and didn't believe me, an English tutor, when I protested).

Later I read in the IBM style manual that all IBM copyrights didn't apply within the organization, and that any department was explicitly free to copy the materials of any other department. I was tempted to forward the entire exchange to the higher-ups at IBM, but I was a subcontractor, and doing so probably would've lost my company all future contracts with this department.

But that's a pretty long hijack. Let's just say that Fox may not have acted in its own best interests .

Daniel

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

For everyone hoping to see the Firefly films be a success and see Firefly return to TV, don't hold your breath on the TV part. FOX holds the rights to any TV broadcast of Firefly for ten years. If the movie is a success (and I really hope it will be) I don't see FOX just saying OK, you can have the rights to it. They might sell it, which would drive up the costs for any other network, or they might try and bring it back to FOX, but my understanding is that Whedon has very little interest in working with FOX again. Firefly is a great show and deserved better, but at this point I'm just hoping that the film is a huge success and that we get the other two films that Whedon has plans for.

 

[LightPhoenix]

For everyone hoping to see the Firefly films be a success and see Firefly return to TV, don't hold your breath on the TV part. FOX holds the rights to any TV broadcast of Firefly for ten years. If the movie is a success (and I really hope it will be) I don't see FOX just saying OK, you can have the rights to it. They might sell it, which would drive up the costs for any other network, or they might try and bring it back to FOX, but my understanding is that Whedon has very little interest in working with FOX again.

The following post is wholly dependant on FOX being both competent and a corporation... that is, they know how to make money. Of course, Pielorinho's story chills me to the bone, and pretty much speaks to everything that is wrong with our economy and even culture (at least in the US) today, so who knows.

It also assumes that there's no internal interference from Fox, negative or positive. That is, no one is gunning for the show, but no one is actively supporting it either.

Finally, it assumes that while it didn't make good enough ratings on Fox, it made good enough ratings for a smaller network, and recouped all costs of production and then some.

Consider the following three scenarios.

First, that Serenity is a flop. Humor me. Well, if it's a flop, then the property is worth essentially nothing, and Fox would be stupid not to sell it, for whatever they can get for it. In which case it's certainly possible for the show to be picked up by someone else, though extremely unlikely.

Second, Serenity is a success, but Fox chooses to dump the property anyway. For instance, if the movie grosses enough to recoup expenses and a little more, but not necessarily a smash hit. In this case, Fox would probably ask a fair amount for the series, and another network might buy it because the show would turn a profit on a station where the almighty rating isn't as important. In this case, we might see it show up on something like UPN, WB, or SFC. Either way, Fox makes some money on a series that doesn't gross enough on their channel to cover expenses, and thus would just cost Fox money.

Also, an ancilliary remark on this scenario. One might argue that Fox wouldn't want the competition, sort of like what ABC pulled with Clerks. I'd argue that Fox doesn't give a good gorram. The cable networks, while gaining ground, still hold very little impact on the major networks. If Firefly was brought back to TV on, say SFC, it's not going to impact Fox ratings at all, really. So there's absolutely no profit in holding on to the property in this case when they know it won't make them money on the air but someone else will buy it. ABC pulled what they did with Clerks because they didn't want the program going to Fox, who were competition.

Side note, it still feels really weird to refer to Fox as competition to ABC.

Thirdly, Serenity is a success, and Fox chooses to keep the property. That is to say, Serenity is the smashing success we all know it will be. Now, Fox is sitting on a property that can make money on their network, and again it would be foolish for them to sit on something that would be turning in a profit. Even if it's not up to Fox standards, they could always show it on FX or one of the other cable channels they own, which demand less ratings (and subsequently, IMO, have better programming, but that's another topic). Now, Joss may be reluctant to work with Fox again, but he'd be in a huge position of control with regards to bargaining. In this case, it's really Joss' decision if Firefly returns to television.

So you see, realistically it's in Fox's best interest to fascilitate the return of the show.

 

[Chimera]

Later I read in the IBM style manual that all IBM copyrights didn't apply within the organization, and that any department was explicitly free to copy the materials of any other department. I was tempted to forward the entire exchange to the higher-ups at IBM, but I was a subcontractor, and doing so probably would've lost my company all future contracts with this department.

I' ve worked for a variety of small, large and multi-national corporations in 20 years of IT service. It always astonishes me that I have to remind people that; We work for the same company. I am not your enemy, or your competitor. I am your co-worker. We are on the same side.


Anyway, Fox has shown a long history of self-destructive behavior in the development, then sabotage and abandonment of interesting series. It's very much a symptom of the above in that there is a disconnect between the development people and the day-to-day operations people. The entire network is extremely bi-polar.

 

[Cthulhudrew]

Anyway, Fox has shown a long history of self-destructive behavior in the development, then sabotage and abandonment of interesting series. It's very much a symptom of the above in that there is a disconnect between the development people and the day-to-day operations people. The entire network is extremely bi-polar.

Case in point, when Fox News attempted to sue the Simpsons when it lampooned Fox News during one episode (they ran "ticker tape" during one of the news broadcast that made fun of it.)

Let's see if I can find some more info... ah, here we are:

Murdoch's War on Journalism: Check the last couple of paragraphs.

Also, Fairly Unbalanced Fox Sues Itself.

I can completely believe that someone(s) got it into their head at this company to scuttle Firefly (or insert favorite cancelled program here) because they didn't like it. As long as the money for the production isn't coming out of their pocket, and they could avoid taking the blame for the company losing money, petty people will pretty much do whatever they want.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

. Of course, Pielorinho's story chills me to the bone, and pretty much speaks to everything that is wrong with our economy and even culture (at least in the US) today, so who knows.

I am not sure if it is the wrongness of our culture or it is a general problem with us humans - unable (possibly unwilling) to see the bigger picture.
At least it is definitely not limited to the US or the economy (though usually money is involved in this kind of things).
Unfortunately, the errors are made on several levels - in the IBM example, there is obviosuly a mistake in the way the budgets are assigned, otherwise the Executive wouldn´t have made his stupid demand (and in a way, it is not stupid if the department really needs the budget). If the Executives responsible here would have talked and listend to each other, they might have had a better solution. But apparently they didn´t. *shrugs*

 

[Liminal Syzygy]

Re: Your experience at IBM Pielorinho. One way of looking at it is that the behavior of the department you were working for is disfunctional. Another way of looking at it is that IBM is obviously not set up as a company so that the cost of such a course can be properly shared across the company. If the latter, then if they were put into that environment then the people in the department you were working for were only making a rational business decision. Otherwise there would be no course as they would take a loss and be blamed for it.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

<snip>
So you see, realistically it's in Fox's best interest to fascilitate the return of the show.

This is an excellent, well-structured argument. You should forward this to FOX executives to be sure they understand the potential they have to make money off this deal.

 

[Pielorinho]

Another way of looking at it is that IBM is obviously not set up as a company so that the cost of such a course can be properly shared across the company. If the latter, then if they were put into that environment then the people in the department you were working for were only making a rational business decision.

True--but remember, the style manual explicitly said that any department could copy information from any other department. In other words, their attempts to hide information from other departments, in order to increase their own budget, at the very least broke the spirit of the rules; more likely, it broke the letter of the rules (especially if they ever denied another department's request for a copy of the instructor's notes for the course, which ended up consisting of everything we'd originally put in the student's notes).

Daniel

 

[Robbert Raets]

Hmm. This has a familiar ring, if not exact. It happened to one sci-fi TV series back in the 60's.

Heh.