FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION

Media Ownership Working Group

Program Diversity and the 

Program Selection Process 

on Broadcast Network 

Television

By Mara Einstein

September 2002

2002 -

5
Executive Summary: This paper examines the extent to which program diversity has 

changed over time on prime time, broadcast network television. This issue is assessed 

using several different measurement techniques and concludes that while program

diversity on prime time broadcast network television has fluctuated over time, it is not 

significantly different today than it was in 1966. The paper also explores the factors 

used by broadcast networks in recent years in program selection. It finds that networks’ 

program selection incentives have changed in recent years as networks were permitted to 

take ownership interests in programming.
2

A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE ON PROGRAM DIVERSITY

Mara Einstein

Department of Media Studies

Queens College

City University of New York

The views expressed in this paper are those of the author alone and do not necessarily 

reflect the views of the Federal Communications Commission, any Commissioners, or 

other staff.
3

Introduction

This paper analyzes the correlation between the FCC’s imposition of financial 

interest and syndication rules and program diversity on prime time broadcast network 

television. To demonstrate this, diversity will be examined in terms of 1) content 

diversity (types of programming) and 2) marketplace diversity (suppliers of 

programming). This analysis suggests that the structural regulation represented by the 

FCC’s financial interest and syndication rules have not been an effective means of 

achieving content diversity. 

Study Methodology

By evaluating the content of programming over the periods surrounding the 

introduction and elimination of the financial interest and syndication rules, we will 

measure the trend in program diversity during the time when the financial interest and 

syndication (“fin-syn”) rules were in effect. In particular, this analysis focuses on how 

programming was affected by the presence or lack of the financial interest and 

syndication rules, which perforce requires examining the networks as economic entities. 

In evaluating the content of programming, determining an appropriate taxonomy 

that remains valid from decade to decade is the first step. For this study, two types of 

categorizations were used. The first set of categorizations are from a study by Sterling 

and Kittross, which quantified different types of programming from 1947 through 1974 

(Sterling, 1984, p. 195-198). This taxonomy was selected because it provided the most 
4

thorough analysis of programming during the initial evaluation period (1969-1973).1 

This taxonomy was applied across the entire time period studied.

The second set of categorizations which are used to analyze the period after finsyn was developed from three different sources. One source was a study conducted in the 

1960s called The People Look at Television. In this study commissioned by CBS, Steiner 

(1963) created program categories based on how viewers actually watch television versus 

how networks or producers would categorize programming. The second source was the 

Dominick and Pearce (1976) study. The third source was our own analysis of prime time 

network programming between 1989 and 2002. The second taxonomy, which was 

specifically designed to take 1990s genres into account, is applied only to the 1989-2002 

time period. 

Previous researchers used between five and fifteen program categories to analyze 

program diversity (Dominick and Pearce, 1976; Steiner, 1963; Wildman and Robinson 

1995). This research uses 22 categories for both the 1966-1974 and 1989-2002 time 

periods. This was done in large part to improve categorization of the various subtypes of 

programming within the drama category. While drama is one of the predominant 

program genres, there are certain subcategories within this segment that attract more 

attention than others, and these categories change over time. 

Fall program schedules were taken from McNeil (1996) for the 1960s and 1970s 

as well as up until 1995. Subsequent years were from Broadcasting and Cable and 

Variety, major industry trade publications. Midseason replacements were only 

considered if they were part of the schedule the following year. Only regularly scheduled 

 

1 See appendix for full listing of categories.
5

programming was considered eliminating specials from this analysis. Movies were 

grouped together, since any more fine-grained distinctions would require a special study. 

Shows were categorized based on descriptions in McNeil and in later years from 

zap2it.com (and its predecessor ultimatetv.com), a website that includes show 

descriptions and press releases containing descriptions of television programs, as well as 

network and program distributor websites.

The time periods eva luated were determined with specific reference to the 

creation and elimination of the fin-syn rules. The initial period of study is 1966 to 1974.2

This time period allows for four years of data prior to the start of the rules, the actual year 

the rules went into effect, and four years of data following their implementation. The 

time period evaluated allows for any changes in program selection to appear on the 

schedule and any fluctuation that may be due to programming trends unrelated to the finsyn rules. The second time period covers 1989 to 2002. This period was selected 

because changes were made to the rules in 1991 and 1993. The rules were finally 

repealed in 1995. Therefore, this time period covers two years prior to any rule changes 

through the years of the rule changes up until the present time. We evaluate prime time 

programming because fin-syn affected only programming during this time period.

Time, rather than shows, was used as the basic unit for analysis. This was to 

account for the variety in show lengths in the earlier evaluation period. Some shows 

were 45 minutes, some 90 minutes, in addition to the 30 or 60 minute shows we are used 

to today. Therefore, quarter hours were used as the time period of analysis. More 

programming was eva luated in the seasons prior to 1971. After 1971, program hours in 

 

2 Throughout this research individual years represent the beginning year of the broadcast season, therefore 

1966 represents the 1966-67 season, 1974 represents the 1974-75 season and so on.
6

prime time were reduced significantly due to the introduction of the Prime Time Access 

Rules. 

Using the two taxonomies described above, we analyzed three types of data..

First, we examined program content in the two time periods. Changes over time were 

evaluated using simple percentages of the various program genres and the percentage of 

time these genres appeared on the program schedule during each season. 

Next, we looked at diversity in the program schedule in several ways. First, we 

used Dominick and Pearce’s diversity indicator. “This is an index of the extent to which 

a few categories dominate prime time. It is derived by summing the percentages in the 

top three categories per season and subtracting from 100. It can range from zero (all 

content is accounted for by only three or fewer categories) to 79 (content is divided 

equally into 14 categories). A low score would indicate a restricted range of choices for 

the audience” (p. 73). With 22 categories, the numbers could range from zero to 86. 

This index is helpful in evaluating changes in the types of programming that may 

dominate the prime time schedule. Next, we evaluated the diversity of programming on 

the schedule overall, e.g., how programs were concentrated into a limited number of 

genres or how they were distributed over many genres. This is known as vertical 

diversity and is measured using the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index index, which is used by 

economists to measure concentration in a particular industry. It has been adapted by 

social scientists to measure diversity in program content. This analysis builds on the 

Dominick and Pearce index by taking all of the schedule into account and not just the top 
7

three categories.3

Vertical diversity, however, does not provide a complete picture of what is 

available to the viewer at any particular point in time. Therefore, we examined horizontal 

diversity as well. The horizontal diversity index evaluates the number of different types 

of programs available to the viewer during a particular half-hour period. 

The final area of analysis focused on the suppliers of prime time programming. 

This was done to determine if there is a correlation between the types and diversity of 

programming and the producers of that programming – an area that is overlooked in most 

diversity research. Here, too, changes over time were evaluated using simple 

percentages. For example, how much prime time programming is produced by Warner 

Brothers and how has that changed over time? Has this number been affected by the 

change in the fin-syn rules? Does the company produce more programming now that 

they own a television network? Percentages were also used to determine the amount of 

concentration in production of prime time programs over time. 

Measuring Program Diversity

Figure 1 shows the percentage of time the three broadcast networks devoted per 

week to each of the program genres from 1966 to 1974. Figure 2 presents the same 

information from 1989 to 2002. (The categories have been collapsed for easier 

presentation. For a full listing of the categories and percentages by type, see the 

appendices.) 

 

3 For other studies that have relied on the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index index, see Litman (1979), Park

(1999).
8

Program Genres by % - 1966-1974

0.0%

10.0%

20.0%

30.0%

40.0%

50.0%

60.0%

1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974

Year

Percentage

Drama

Comedy

Motion Pictures

News and Information

Variety

Quiz/Panel

Music

other

It is clear that the quantity of certain types of programming fluctuate during this time 

period. In the 1970s, the largest growth was in dramas and motion pictures, accounting 

for 56% and 23% of prime time programming hours, respectively, by the 1974-75 season. 

Quiz and panel shows had disappeared by the early 1970s, as did music and variety 

series. Documentary series, part of news/information, had disappeared from regular 

prime time programming by 1973. The increase in “other” programming is attributable 

solely to the introduction of Monday Night Football in the 1970-71 season. Situation 

comedies remained a steady percentage of the prime time schedule throughout the time 

period.
9

Program Genres by % - 1989-2002

0.0%

5.0%

10.0%

15.0%

20.0%

25.0%

30.0%

35.0%

40.0%

45.0%

50.0%

1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

Year

Percentage

Drama

Comedy

Motion Pictures

News/Information

Variety

Quiz/Panel

Music

Other

Looking at the 1989-2002 period, there are two interesting trends. First, there was 

a significant increase in situation comedies over the previous time period. Whereas 

comedies accounted for between 13-20% of the schedule during the 1960s and 1970s, for 

much of this later time period that number hovered around 30%. In 1998, the percentage 

of situation comedies began to decline and are now back in the 15-20% range. News and 

information programming has increased significantly versus the previous period. Quiz 

and panel shows briefly reappeared in 2000 and 2001 but were not present in 2002. 

Motion pictures were on a steady growth path in the early 1970s, but declined through 

much of the 1990s and are flat entering the new century. Dramas also appeared to be 

declining early in this time period, but there has been a stead growth trend since the 

beginning of the 1990s. Dramas have particularly taken off within the last two years. 

Variety programming has disappeared from the prime time schedule, at least from the 

networks’ perspective. The recent spurt in “other” programming can be attributed to an 
10

increased hour of Monday Night Football, an extended hour of the Wonderful World of 

Disney, and an increase in “reality” programming. 

Programming and Regulation

Analyzing these data in connection with the rise and fall of the fin-syn rules, there 

appears to be a strong correlation between the cost structure of various program types and 

the content of prime time network programming. The only program genres to increase in 

quantity during the 1970s were dramas and motion pictures, which are among the more 

expensive types of programming. Driving the growth in dramas was the increase in 

crime/detective shows. There does not appear to be any economic or regulatory cause 

associated with that trend. The increase in motion pictures, however, belongs to an area 

where the networks continued to produce their own programming. At that time, ABC 

and CBS had been producing made-for-television movies in house.

Even without the financial interest and syndication rules, the prime time 

landscape had begun to change in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

1. There has been a shift away from the half-hour situation comedy 

series, and half-hour series generally.

2. Dramatic programs have become increasingly one-hour, 90 minutes, or 

even two hours. This is known as the ‘long form.’

3. Fewer original programs are being ordered by the networks. Ten years 

ago, a typical season was 39 originals and 13 repeats. Today it is 

likely to be 23 originals and 23 repeats, or, at best, 26 originals and 26 

repeats. When 23 originals and 23 repeats are ordered, making a total 

of 46 weeks of programming, the remaining weeks are often used for 

news or entertainment specials, including pilots.

4. A new program form, the mini-series, has evolved. These mini-series 

usually have fewer than 20 original programs in any one season, for 

example, NBC’s popular Columbo series has only eight original 

episodes in any one season, and this mini-series rotates with other 

mini-series on the network. (Pearce, 1973, p. 34) 
11

Several factors contributed to these programming changes, the most important being the 

escalating cost of programming. Program costs increased approximately 60% from 1965 

to 1972 during a period of time when the cost of living rose by 33%. Increased program 

production costs can be attributed to the introduction of color television, the production 

of which is more expensive than black and white. The cost of a half-hour pilot increased 

from $72,000 to $250,000 between 1960 and 1973, while program costs for a half-hour

ongoing television series increased from $50,000 to between $115,000 to $135,000 

(Pearce, 1973, p. 34-35).

The quantity of public affairs and children’s programming began to decline in the 

early 1970s. This may be attributed in part to the Prime Time Access Rules. With fewer 

hours available in the prime time period, the networks reduced less profitable public 

affairs programming in favor of established, scripted genres. In fact, public affairs and 

documentary programming virtually disappeared from the prime time schedule in the 

early 1970s, when regularly scheduled prime time public affairs programming dropped 

by 30 percent. This type of programming did increase during the 1973-74 season, but it 

was likely attributable to the significant amount of prime time coverage given to the 

Watergate hearings and the Presidential election during that season. Only NBC 

maintained a weekly series of this type, America and NBC Reports during the 1972-73 

season. By the following season, no network had a weekly public affairs program in 

prime time (p. 43). Children’s programming was virtually eliminated due to the Prime 

Time Access Rules. As the start of prime time moved from 7:30 to 8:00 p.m., networks 

no longer had the time period in which they used to schedule this genre of show.
12

The early 1990s show an increase in programming that is either less expensive to 

produce and/or more easily sold into syndication. Reality programming and 

newsmagazines are the least expensive types of programming that the network can 

produce. Even a program such as Survivor has minimal upfront expenditures on the part 

of the network, because there are no writing or talent costs.4 Newsmagazines are also 

relatively inexpensive to produce. The industry figure is approximately $400,000 per 

one-hour show (versus $2 to $3 million for a one-hour drama) (Schlosser, J., 2002, p. 21). 

Also, newsmagazines are produced by the networks themselves. They do not have to pay 

an outside production company. Talent costs are amortized over many programs. This 

programming is also repackaged on other network-owned news entities, providing added 

opportunities to amortize the cost over several airings.

One other type of inexpensive programming made a comeback on network prime 

time – game shows. ABC had such a successful run during the summer of 2000 with a 

game show called Who Wants to be a Millionaire? that the network aired the show four 

times a week during the 2000-01 season. This show was responsible for pulling ABC 

from last place to first in the Nielsen ratings race. The other networks, hoping to 

replicate ABC’s success came out with new game shows, some of which were more 

successful then others. Only NBC was able to replicate “Millionaire”’s success with its 

game show, The Weakest Link. These shows are very attractive from an economic 

perspective. First, production costs consist primarily of editing, talent costs and prize 

money – miniscule in comparison to costs associated with a scripted program. Second, a 

 

4 A downside to reality programming is the uncertain market for syndicating these types of shows. 
13

successful prime time game show can be repackaged as a syndicated “strip” show, which 

Millionaire and Link have both done. 

Comedies are more expensive to produce than reality series or game shows, but 

they have proven to be the best genre for sale into the syndication market. First, affiliates 

and independents like to program this type of show during the prime access and late-night 

time periods. Second, comedies have the added advantage of being less expensive to 

produce initially than drama series. While comedies were 13 percent of the schedule in 

1974, by 1989 comedies accounted for over 27 percent of the schedule. This genre 

represented almost a third of the schedule through the 1990s, when it began to decline in 

1998 Thus it would appear that the elimination of the fin-syn in the early 1990s may 

have combined with the attractive economics of comedies to produce peak quantities of 

comedies by 1997. Since that time, the networks have pulled back because it does not 

make economic sense for them to over-produce one type of programming. 

The recent growth in drama programming should be noted. This has occurred in 

spite of dramas being more expensive to produce than comedies and being less lucrative 

in the syndication market. One reason for this increase is the elimination of Sunday night 

movies. The networks used to program this night with blockbuster movies, made-for TV 

movies, or miniseries. It is possible that the networks’ exit from the movie business may 

have freed up revenue to produce more original (and/or more expensive) programming. 

Another possible reason for the move toward dramatic programming is the increase in 

repurposing. Repurposing refers to the appearance of a show on a cable network within 

one or two weeks of the show’s debut on a broadcast network. Repurposing began in the 

late 1990s as a way for producers to more quickly recoup their investment. It has since 
14

become a way for networks to do the same thing. Repurposing started with Law & Order: 

Special Victims Unit in 1999. The show would air first on NBC and then on USA Cable 

Network nine days later. USA Network, owned by the same company as Studios USA

(now Universal), is the producer of Law & Order. In this way, repurposing is doubly 

attractive for Studios USA. They make money from selling the show to NBC, and then 

they sell advertising within the show when it is repurposed on USA Networks. Other 

companies have begun repurposing as well. Once and Again aired first on ABC and then 

on Lifetime – from production to double distribution, all owned by Disney. Alias, which 

is produced by Touchstone, airs first on ABC and then on ABC Family. Thus far, 

repurposing has not been applied to genres other than drama.5

Program Diversity Analysis

A. Dominick & Pearce Methodology

The following chart is based on Dominick and Pearce’s diversity indicator. This 

index demonstrates the extent to which a limited number of categories dominate prime 

time. “It is derived by summing the percentages in the top three categories per season 

and subtracting from 100” (p. 73). With 22 categories, the numbers could range from 

zero to 86. The lower the number, the less diversity.

 

5 Because this phenomenon is so new, the long-term syndication implications have not yet been tested in 

the market. 
15

Dominick Pearce Diversity Indicator

43

47

50 49 50

40

31

37

39 38 37

42

38 40

35 36

30

44

39

46

49

44 44

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

19661967196819691970197119721973197419891990199119921993199419951996199719981999200020012002

Year

D/P Index

Dominick Pearce Index

Diversity in this sense was at its peak in between 1968 and 1970. However, diversity 

began a downward trend beginning in 1971, the first full year of the fin-syn rules. 

Remember, the lower the number, the less diversity in programming. Thus more time 

was being devoted to fewer types of programming. The ten-point decline in diversity 

from 1970 to 1971 can be attributed to an increase in motion pictures on the prime time 

schedule. Twenty-five percent of program hours made up of movies became the norm for 

several years. Crime/detective programming also became a major staple of prime time. 

In 1973 when diversity was at its lowest during that period, three categories – motion 

pictures, crime/detective dramas and situation comedies – accounted for 69 percent of 

network prime time programming. It is likely that the increase in motion pictures can be 

attributed to the introduction of fin-syn. Since the networks couldn’t participate in 

programming, they put on programming that wouldn’t benefit other television producers. 
16

However, cable television was not yet widely available and Hollywood was just starting 

to release films to the networks, so this too may have contributed to the increase in this 

type of programming. Certainly the increase in crime/detective programming is difficult 

to attribute this to economics or regulation. It may have been that the networks wanted to 

create a situation whereby they could say to regulators that diversity decreased when they 

were no longer allowed a stake in the programming. However, there is no evidence to 

support this theory other than speculation.

By the 1990s, diversity had recovered from its 1970s low of 30 to rebound to

almost peak levels by the 2001-02 season. Early in the decade, diversity hovered in the 

30s. Some of this may be attributable to the repeal of fin-syn. Throughout this time 

period, the networks would begin to produce their own programming and to look for 

long-term syndication opportunities. This need to exploit economic opportunities led to 

the increase in situation comedies and an abundance of newsmagazines throughout the 

decade. Motion pictures, sitcoms and crime/detective shows accounted for the three top 

programming slots through most of the decade. 

1997 is a pivotal year during this time period. After diversity has remained 

constant for eight years, it dives sharply in 1997 and then rises even more sharply 

thereafter. The flood of situation comedies on the networks saw its peak in 1997 with 40 

comedies on the air representing 30 percent of prime time programming. The same year, 

crime/detective dramas represented 25 percent of programming. That is 55 – more than 

half of all programming – represented in only two genre categories. 

The current diversity trend may be attributable to the changing economic structure 

of the industry. The networks have a handful of expensive programming they have had 
17

to balance with less expensive programming. This has led to the “new” genres, like game 

shows, reality programming and even comedy variety programming coming back to 

prime time. While game shows appear to have been a short-term fad as evidenced by 

their disappearance from the schedule and an accompanying decrease in diversity, other 

shows, particularly reality programming, seem to have staying power. It is important to 

note that diversity increased after the repeal of fin-syn. While diversity initially dropped, 

particularly in the years immediately following the rules’ repeal, diversity has most 

recently increased to pre-fin-syn levels. This is not to say that there is a breadth of 

diversity – the scale reaches to 86 and the diversity score never exceeded 50 in either 

decade.

The bottom line is this: diversity increased after the repeal of fin-syn. While 

diversity initially dropped in the years immediately following the rules’ repeal, diversity 

has most recently increased to pre-fin-syn levels. 

To ensure the coding was not skewing results based on categories not existing in 

the 1970s, the programs were also coded using an index geared toward 1990s 

programming. The prime time schedule in the 1960s and 1970s was filled with westerns 

and variety series – programming that has disappeared from prime time in the 1990s. 

Similarly reality programming and newsmagazines are genres that did not exist, or only 

existed on a limited basis, in the earlier time period. By creating a code for the later time 

period wherein the categories aligned with the currently schedule, a more fine-tuned 
18

analysis of the latter time period could be done. 

Dominick Pearce Index

48.0

43.0

48.0

41.0 42.0 41.0 41.0 39.0

49.0 50.0

60.0

46.0

60.0

52.0

0.0

10.0

20.0

30.0

40.0

50.0

60.0

70.0

80.0

1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

Year

D/P Index

Dominick Pearce Index

The pattern follows a trend similar to that using the codes from the 1970s. 

Diversity is at its highest during the 2001-2002 season and continues into the 2002-03 

season. The lowest point is during 1997 when the schedule was dominated by situation 

comedies. This coding does suggest that the programming is more diverse then using the 

coding from the earlier periods. Whether we believe that or not, the similarity in trends 

further supports how ineffective the fin-syn rules were in achieving their diversity goal. 

B. HHI Methodology. 

An alternative means for looking at diversity is the Herfindahl-Hirschman index 

(HHI). The HHI is calculated by summing the squares of the percentage, or share, of 

each program type. This index measures the size distribution of programming...The 
19

higher the HHI, the greater the concentration of programming into a few program types, 

and hence the less the diversity (Litman,1979, p. 403). Thus if we can equate high 

concentration with a limited number of program genres, then we can use this index as a 

determinant of lack of diversity. While Dominick and Pearce allowed us to evaluate 

concentration within the top three categories of programming, HHI goes one step further 

by taking into account all program types on the schedule.

The following chart provides the Herfindahl indices for the years being studied. 

Figure 3

Herfindahl Index 

0

0.05

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

19661967196819691970197119721973197419891990199119921993199419951996199719981999200020012002

Year

Lower Data Points = Greater Diversity

Herfindahl Index 

As with the Dominick index, the 1970s showed a marked decline in program diversity on 

the networks suggesting a strong concentration of programming into a few program 

types. The HHI follows the same pattern as the Dominick Pearce index. The pattern is 

consistent – after the rules were enacted, diversity decreased; when the rules were 
20

repealed, diversity increased. It would seem possible, therefore, to correlate the 

regulation to diversity in programming.

Using 1990s coding, again we see a now familiar pattern – programming at its 

most concentrated during the 1997-98 season. With this coding, the increasing diversity 

trend continues into the 2002-03 season. Remember with the Dominick Pearce index, 

diversity remained flat. Since the HHI shows increasing diversity, it demonstrates that 

past the top three categories of programming there is more variety for the television 

viewer.

Herfindahl Diversity Index

0

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001

Year

Diversity Index

Herfindahl Diversity Index
21

C. Horizontal Methodology

While the two previous methods evaluate programming vertically, that is across 

the entire programming schedule, another means of looking at diversity is to measure it 

horizontally. A horizontal index evaluates what is on the three networks at any given 

point in time, so it more truly evaluates the diversity of programming a viewer has 

available to him or her at any particular half-hour period. This is an important distinction 

from a horizontal index. Litman (1979) provides the following example:

...assume each of the networks decides to offer a new documentary 

program in its schedule. This would increase the “vertical” diversity in 

each network’s schedule; however, if these new documentaries are 

broadcast opposite each other, then the viewer has no choice at that point 

in time. Hence, changes in vertical network diversity may not fully 

translate into increased viewer options. (p. 403)

A horizontal index is calculated by counting the number of program genres available 

during each half-hour period of the prime time schedule. This number is divided by the 

total number of hours or prime time programming. This determines the average number 

of program types during prime time. Perfect imitation would equal one while perfect 

diversity would equal three (p. 404). 
22

Horizontal Diversity Index

2.72

2.78 2.82 2.82

2.68

2.84

2.60 2.58

2.50

2.41 2.45

2.36

2.27

2.45 2.45

2.23

2.14

2.50

2.32

2.43

2.68

2.52

2.88

1.00

1.20

1.40

1.60

1.80

2.00

2.20

2.40

2.60

2.80

3.00

19661967196819691970197119721973197419891990199119921993199419951996199719981999200020012002

Year

Diversity Indes

Diversity Index

This index tells a slightly different story than the other two. In the early time 

period, the fluctuations in horizontal diversity reflect the fluctuations in diversity overall. 

That is, as fewer types of programming were available overall, the networks had more 

similar programming on at the same time. However, this is only on a very limited basis. 

Perfect diversity is a three. Until 1974, the diversity index does not go below 2.6 

suggesting that the networks are counter-programming in order to pull viewers from their 

competitors. In the 1990s, the re is a significant reduction in horizontal diversity on the 

networks. This would make sense in light of the new program options available to most 

viewers. The networks may feel less of a need to diverge from one another, but rather, 

want to diverge from cable. For example, one reason variety/music programming 

disappeared from the schedule in the 1990s is because these programs were available on a 

24-hour basis on individual cable networks like Comedy Central and MTV. These 
23

program types are no longer viable options for the networks, so instead they produce 

more comedies and drama s which are their forte and which cost less to produce than 

movies. Economics comes into play here as well as the networks’ production of 

programming that is less expensive and/or more easily syndicated. Not surprisingly, 

horizontal diversity has its lowest point in 1997, just as programming reached its lowest 

level of diversity. It is also not surprising to see this index rebound during the 2001-02 

season when there were many more new genres available for viewers.

1970s vs. 1990s code

0.00

0.50

1.00

1.50

2.00

2.50

3.00

1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

Year

Horizontal Diversity Index

1970s code

1990s code

As we have seen with the previous charts, recoding the information has little impact on 

the diversity index.

The Connection Between Producers and Diversity
24

The FCC’s contention has been that there is a correlation between who the 

suppliers of programming are and the diversity of programming that they produce. This 

is based on the Commission’s past minority ownership and EEO policies as well as the 

fin-syn rules which suggested that more producers, and specifically not the networks as 

producers, would create more diversity for prime time network viewers. To test this 

theory, we assessed the identity of the program suppliers during the the two time periods

surrounding the introduction and repeal of fin-syn. Changes over time were evaluated 

using simple percentages. This information is then compared with the program diversity 

information. By looking at who the producers are and comparing that with the level of 

diversity, we can see whether or not the FCC’s hypothesis is correct. 

The FCC has also been concerned about the level of concentration within the 

television industry. One of the major effects of the repeal of the fin-syn rules was the 

change in the structure of the television industry. This change led to significant 

concentration in the supply side of the television industry as well as increased vertical 

integration of the broadcast networks. Examination of program suppliers would not be 

complete without examining the impact of this significant change. As mentioned 

previously, many media scholars have decried the effects of media consolidation as 

anathema to diversity. This research will suggest otherwise.

Unfortunately, information for the earlier period was intermittent, so the analysis 

there is limited. There is enough, however, to evaluate who the major suppliers were and 

how many there were. Information on the 1990s and beyond was plentiful and provides a 

thorough picture of the interaction between supplier and content. 
25

Table 1

Twenty Leading Network Suppliers: Prime Time, 1970, 1977

Share of Programming Hours (%)

Supplier 1970 Supplier 1977

1 Universal 12.8 Universal 18.4

2 Twentieth-Century Fox 7.3 Warner 6.7

3 Paramount 6.4 Spelling/Goldberg 6.1

4 Columbia 6.1 Lorimar 5.4

5 MGM 4.5 MTM 5.3

6 Filmways 3.6 Columbia 3.6

7 ITC 3.0 MGM 3.5

8 Harbour 2.6 Paramount 3.5

9 Spelling/Thomas 2.3 Aaron Spelling 3.2

10 Talent 2.2 Twentieth-Century Fox 3.2

11 Teleklew 2.0 Walt Disney 2.9

12 CBS 19. Tandem 2.9

13 Walt Disney 1.9 Quinn-Martin 2.7

14 Leonard Freeman 1.8 Tat 2.4

15 NBC 1.8 Toy 2.2

16 Sullivan 1.8 CBS 2.0

17 Peekskill 1.7 Four D 2.0

18 Xandu 1.7 Whacko 1.7

19 Van Bernard 1.5 Schick-Sunn 

Classics

1.6

20 Glenco 1.5* David Gerber 1.6

66.9 80.9

 * Others with 1.5 market share: Barnaby

 Note. Adapted from NISS Report.

The above chart shows the share of programming by the leading prime time 

program suppliers during the 1970 and 1977 television seasons. This provides data for a 

year before the fin-syn rules and for a year after the rules had been in effect for a number 

of years. While in both years the top ten included many of the major studios, such as 

Universal and Warner Brothers, there were still several independent companies 

accounting for significant percentages of the prime time schedule. In 1970, while the top 

five slots were held by major studios, the next five were held by independent studios. 

Eleven of the top 20 suppliers were independent production companies. Also of note is 

that the top 20 suppliers accounted for almost 67% of prime time programming. In 

1977, independent producers were still well represented in the top 20. Spelling/Goldberg, 
26

Lorimar, MTM and Aaron Spelling were all independent producers in the top ten in 1977. 

Eight out of the bottom ten suppliers were also independent companies. Overall, then, 12 

out of the top 20 suppliers during 1977 were independent companies. However, the 

program supply market was beginning to consolidate, which is evidenced by the fact that 

the top 20 suppliers in 1977 accounting for almost 81% of the prime time hours versus 

67% only seven years before.

By the 1990s, I could not even evaluate based on the top 20 because there were 

not enough suppliers to fill that many spaces, so the top 15 were analyzed for 1995, 10 

for 2002. (Totals do not equal 100 percent because of movies on the schedule, i.e., 

movies represent 12.2% of the 2002 prime time schedule).

Table 2

Network Suppliers: Prime Time 1989, 1995, 2002

Share of Programming Hours (%)

Supplier 1989 Supplier 1995 Supplier 2002

1 Lorimar 12.9 Warner Brothers 18.9 CBS 28.0

2 CBS 7.6 CBS 12.1 ABC 21.2

3 Columbia 7.6 NBC 8.3 NBC 14.4

4 Universal 6.8 ABC 7.6 Warner Bros. 9.9

5 Warner Brothers 6.8 Paramount 6.8 Universal 6.8

6 ABC 6.1 Universal 5.3 20th Century Fox 1.5

7 MGM 4.5 Columbia 4.5 Bochco Prod. 1.5

8 Paramount 4.5 Disney/Touchstone 4.5 Endemol Ent. 1.5

9 Stephen J. Cannell Prod. 4.3 20th Century Fox 3.0 Hallmark Ent. 1.5

10 Disney/Touchstone 3.8 Steven Bochco Prod. 3.0 Next Ent. 1.5

11 20th Century Fox 3.8 Carsey-Werner Co. 2.3 87.8

12 NBC 3.0 Brillstein-Grey 1.5

13 Viacom 3.0 Cosgrove/Muerer 1.5

14 Carsey-Werner 3.0 Gothic Renaissance 1.5

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

New World

Castle Rock Productions 

Cosgrove/Muerer Prods.

GTG Productions

Alien Productions

Steven Bochco Prods.

Carson Productions

MTM Productions

2.3

1.5

1.5

1.5

0.8

0.8

0.8

0.8

Castle Rock Ent. 0.8

81.6
27

87.7

* 1989 = 1989/90 season

**Lorimar attributed as part of Warner Brothers as of 1990

***Spelling and Viacom counted as part of Paramount as of 1994

 Witt Thomas attributed to Warner Brothers as of 1995

** *** 1996 - Disney/Touchstone attributed to ABC and Castle Rock to Warner Brothers

If a broadcast network owned any part of a show, the show was created to the network.

In 1989, there were still a number of independent companies – Lorimar, which was the 

leading supplier that year, Cannell Productions, Carsey-Werner , New World and a 

handful of smaller companies like Alien Productions and GTG Productions. ABC and 

CBS had already cracked the top ten while NBC was at Number 12.

6 This was likely in 

anticipation of changes to the fin-syn rules. Consolidation of top suppliers continued 

with fifteen suppliers accounting for 80% of prime time programming. By 1995, the 

three broadcast networks were the second, third and fourth leading program suppliers for 

prime time, together accounting for 28% of prime time. Only Warner Brothers produced 

more programming than the networks. While there were six independent companies 

within the group of the top fifteen suppliers, they accounted for just over ten percent of 

programming. By this time, the top 15 accounted for more 80% of programming. By 

2002, the three original broadcast networks are the top three program suppliers 

accounting for almost 64%, or two-thirds of all of prime time. In fact, the top six (which 

by this point consisted of the six broadcast networks and Universal) accounted for 82% of 

 

6 The fin-syn rules did not forbid the networks to produce their own programming. It was the consent 

decrees that limited this production. By 1989, the networks could produce 4 hours of programming per 

night and by 1990, that would restriction would be eliminated.
28

programming. The leading six suppliers accounted for less than 50% only eleven years 

earlier.7

Table 3

Six Leading Network Suppliers: Prime Time, 1989,1995, 2002

Share of Programming Hours (%)

Supplier 1989 Supplier 1995 Supplier 2002

1 Lorimar 12.9 Warner Bros 18.9 CBS 28.0

2 CBS 7.6 CBS 12.1 ABC 21.2

3 Columbia 7.6 NBC 8.3 NBC 14.4

4 Universal 6.8 ABC 7.6 Warner Bros. 9.9

5 Warner Bros 6.8 Paramount 6.8 Universal 6.8

6 ABC 6.1 Universal 5.3 20th Century 

Fox

1.5

Total top 6 47.8 59 81.8

Breaking this down a bit further, since the financial interest and syndication rules 

were concerned with maintaining the vitality of the independent production community, 

an analysis was done of the percentage of programming by type of producer. 

 

7 Twentieth-Century Fox appears to be under-represented in this chart. That is because most of its 

programming appears either on the Fox network or the mini-nets, or shows are produced in conjunction 

with a networks as is the case with several Fox shows that appear on CBS.
29

Figure 14

 Prime Time Programming Producers - 1989-2002

0.0%

10.0%

20.0%

30.0%

40.0%

50.0%

60.0%

70.0%

1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

Year

Percent of Prime Time Programming

Network

Majors

Mini Majors

Independents

Movies

Producers were categorized as network (this includes only the 3 major networks for this 

analysis), Hollywood major, what we term a mini-major (which are companies such as 

Lorimar, Orion and Viacom), independents, and movies. Movies were evaluated as a 

separate category, because their suppliers are varied, but their presence on the prime time 

schedule is significant. 

As the chart clearly demonstrates, the mini-majors have all disappeared by the 

end of the decade, having all been acquired by a larger corporation(the exception being 

Viacom which acquired CBS and thus no longer qualifies as a mini-major). Independents 

have fallen from supplying 15% to 6% of the prime time schedule from 1989 to 2002. It 

appears the major studios have lost the largest share, going from a high of 48.5% in 1990 

to 18.2% in 2001. This is deceiving, however. Instead of three networks and eight major 
30

studio producers, we now have six combined network/producers. These studios have not 

disappeared, but rather have merged with networks to become vertically integrated 

corporations. Because of this, the big winners have been the three major broadcast

networks. These three companies went from a low of 13.6% in 1990, just prior to the 

changing of the fin-syn rules, to a high of 65.9% in 2001 with a slight drop in the 2002 

season. However, that is an increase of over 450%.

Based on the diversity analysis earlier in the chapter, diversity was at its peak 

between 1968 and 1970. Based on the current analysis, we saw that the industry was the 

least consolidated in 1970. Although that would suggest that a larger number of suppliers 

tend to produce greater program diversity, that trend does not continue into the 1990s. 

While programming during the 1990s was in the mid-level of diversity, between 35 and 

42 on an 86-point scale up until 1997, by 2001 diversity is at its highest (49) even while 

the industry was its most consolidated. 

In looking at the consolidation of the supply market for prime time programming, 

the changed structure of the industry has to be taken into account.8 Up until this point, 

only the three original networks have been considered as networks. However, this is not 

the reality anymore. Fox is considered by all in the business as well as outside of the 

industry to be a full-fledged network. The newest networks -- UPN and WB-- have also 

established themselves as full broadcasters. WB more so than UPN, but this too may 

change with Viacom’s purchase of UPN and Fox’s purchase of a number of UPN affiliate 

 

8 Many programs are produced as collaborations between networks and studios, networks and producers or 

producers and studios. In this analysis the network was considered the producer if they had any financial 

stake in a show. The network was given primacy to show the impact of fin-syn. 
31

stations. When we take this into account, the distribution of program supply changes a 

bit, as is evidenced in the chart below.

Table 4

Suppliers of Prime Time Programming – 2002

As 3 Networks, 4 Networks and 6 Networks

% by Supplier in Hours

3 Networks 4 Networks 6 Networks

# of Hours % by 

Supplier

# of Hours % by 

Supplier

# of Hours % by 

Supplier

Networks 42 63.6% 52 64.2% 77.5 74.5%

ABC 14 21.2 14 17.3 14 13.5

CBS/UPN 18.5 28.0 18.5 22.8 25.5 24.5

NBC 9.5 14.4 9.5 11.7 9.5 9.1

FOX 10 12.3 12.5 12

WB 16 15.4

Majors 12 18.2% 12 14.8% 5.5 5.3%

Columbia 0 0 1 1.0

20th Century Fox 1 1.5 0 0

Universal 4.5 6.8 4.5 5.6 4.5 4.3

Warner Brothers 6.5 9.8 7.5 9.3 9

Independents 4 6.1% 7 8.6% 9 8.7%

Bochco Prod. 1 1.5 1 1.2 1 1.0

Barbour/Langley 1 1.2 1 1.0

Carsey-Werner 1 1.2 1 1.0

Endemol Ent. 1 1.5 1 1.2 1 1.0

Hallmark Ent. 1 1.5 1 1.2 1 1.0

Next Ent./Telepictures 1 1.5 1 1.2 1 1.0

STF Productions 1 1.2 1 1.0

Titan Sports 2 1.9

Movies 8 12.1% 10 12.3% 12 11.5%

This chart analyzes the percentage of prime time programming supplied to the 

networks by source. This is done in three different ways. First, suppliers are calculated 

simply based on the three original broadcast networks. Then, Fox is added to the original 

broadcast networks, making it a four-network analysis. Finally, all six networks are 

considered as part of the network group. 
32

There is little difference in the percent of production by the networks when 

analyzing a three versus four network universe. If we look just at the three broadcast 

networks, they account for 63.6% of prime time broadcast network programming. When 

we add Fox that number increases slightly to 64.2%. However, add UPN and WB and 

the number increases to nearly 75% of the prime time schedule being supplied by these 

six companies. This increase occurs principally because not only are UPN and WB 

added to the network total, but Warner Brothers (WB’s parent company) is eliminated 

from the major studio figures. The only majors not associated with a network, Columbia 

and Universal, account for 5.3% of programming. 

Independents account for only four hours or 6.1% of programming on the three 

original broadcast networks. When all six networks are analyzed, independents account 

for 9 hours or 8.7% of programming. While not significant in comparison to what the 

major studios are producing, it is significant in relation to what they produce for the Big 

Three. When viewed from the six-network perspective, independents had slightly more 

success with the three newest networks than with the three oldest networks. For purposes 

of program supply analysis, perhaps the most salient fact is that the six vertically 

integrated network/producers create and distribute three-fourths of all prime time 

programming. This means that only 25% of prime time programming is being supplied 

by companies other than the six networks themselves and almost half of that percentage 

is movies, not regular prime time series. 

Having said all of this, it is important to bear in mind the previous diversity 

analysis. While many media critics have decried the consolidation of the media industry 
33

due to its negative effects on diversity, this research does not support that theory. As the 

industry has become more consolidated, program diversity has increased. 

Summary/Conclusion

Diversity was at its peak in the late 1960s before the advent of the financial 

interest and syndication rules and declined two years after those rules were implemented. 

Throughout the 1990s, diversity has remained fairly constant, approximately in the 

middle of the historical range, but has increased sharply in the years following fin-syn’s 

repeal. The recent increase in program diversity has coincided with increased 

verticalization within the broadcast television business. That is, as networks began 

owning and producing more of the program they distributed, our taxonomy finds that 

program diversity increased.

Changes in program diversity correlated in similar fashion under all of fin-syn 

rules on all of the measurements tested. Based on Dominick and Pearce’s diversity 

index, which is a measure of the concentration of programming in the top three genres, 

diversity decreased from an index of 50 in 1969 to a low of 31 in 1973 and rebounding to 

37 in 1974. This number increased to 39 in 1989, dove to 30 in 1997, but has since 

jumped to 49 – virtually matching the pre-fin-syn high. The Herfindahl-Hirschman Index

index, also a measure of concentration, demonstrated the same pattern of diversity. 

Based on these figures, it may be possible to say that fin-syn contributed to a decline in 

diversity, since the drop occurred at the same time as the rules. Similarly, the repeal of 

the rules, led to an increase in the diversity of genres within two seasons after its repeal.
34

These indexes analyzed vertical diversity, that is diversity within a single network 

or throughout the entire broadcast schedule. A horizontal index was used to measure 

diversity across networks at any given time period. The horizontal index also showed 

that diversity was flat in the early 1970s and throughout the 1990s and beyond. What this 

index also demonstrates is that the networks do not schedule the same type of 

programming at the same time as their competitors. The networks counterprogram 

against one another. The networks did this in the 1970s, and they continue to do so in the 

2000s. Even with three to four dominating program types it is possible for the networks 

to put on programs that are different from the other networks in any given time period. 

And they do.

Looking at program genres, three types of programming dominated the prime 

time viewing hours throughout the time period studied. These were dramas, situation 

comedies and movies. In both the 1970s and 1990s, drama was the leading program 

genre. In the 1960s, these dramas were primarily action/adventure shows or westerns 

whereas by the 1970s the dramas were in the crime/detective category and this trend 

continued into the later period. In the early period studies, dramas were followed by 

motion pictures and then sitcoms. The order was reversed in the 1990s. The reason for 

the increase in sitcoms over movies in the 1990s is twofold. First, with the advent of 

cable, movies became more readily available to viewers. Cable also provided these films 

uncut, uncensored and without commercials, something broadcasters could not do. 

Second, situation comedies are relatively inexpensive to produce with the added bonus of 

syndication after their network run. Purchasing movies are a sunk cost for the networks 

while creating sitcoms is a long-term investment. 
35

Recent developments in program diversity may be due in part to the economics of 

program production. As broadcast networks aggressively sought to limit program 

production costs, they began relying more heavily on non-scripted, less expensive 

programming. The primary example is newsmagazines. In fact, for the first time in 

1998 this genre overtook movies as the third most prominent genre in prime time. This 

was likely due to economics. The economic efficiency of newsmagazines may derive not 

only from their lower production costs than scripted programming, but also from the 

networks’ ability to use existing news production assets to generate newsmagazines. 

However, even with the addition of this new genre, there was no perceptible increase in 

diversity, because rather than being an incremental genre, it replaced other more 

expensive programming genres. 

It should be noted here that the increase in newsmagazines may be attributed to 

the repeal of fin-syn. Before fin-syn, the networks had the most experience in producing 

news and public affairs programming. While news departments were cut in the 1980s, 

the networks always maintained these divisions. Thus, the networks were in a position to 

produce their own programming, e.g., newsmagazines, without buying or creating a 

studio as soon as the consent decrees let them so do. While these were not the only 

shows in which the networks had a vested interest, they were the only shows in which the 

networks were the sole producer. 

In addition, the networks introduced other low-cost programming beginning in 

2000. Game shows provide inexpensive programming that can be flexibly slotted into 

the network schedule. Reality programming, depending on the format, can also be slotted 

as needed. These shows, particularly game shows, can be quickly produced and are 
36

family friendly. A show like Survivor or Big Brother has the added benefit of being 

produced by CBS News (though they call it something else). Allowing what has become 

a cost center to become a potential profit center. 

The conclusion is worth restating. There has been a discernable change in 

diversity. Yes, there has been consolidation in the production side of the business. Yes, 

the networks – whether we are talking about three, four or six – now account for an 

overwhelming majority of the programming that appears in prime time. However, while 

that change in program supply might be expected to have a negative effect on program 

diversity, this paper finds such consolidation has not had a meaningful effect on the 

diversity of content. 

After the fin-syn rules were repealed, the broadcast networks have reverted to 

their pre-fin-syn behavior in airing a significant portion of programming that they own or 

produce. The majority of programming not produced in-house is programming in which 

the networks have a financial interest. In addition, network production of entertainment –

separate from network ownership of programming -- now exceeds the levels produced by 

the networks in past years. In the 1970s, the networks produced news and public affairs 

programming and left the entertainment programming to outside suppliers. This in-house 

production of entertainment has led to a corresponding reduction in the number of studioproduced programs and, in fact, fewer Hollywood production companies altogether. 

This analysis suggests that it does not matter who or how many people produce 

programming for network prime time schedules. Rather, it is economic factors that 

contribute to the variety of programming that will be available to audiences. As networks 

needed to be more creative in their financing, they found both new types of program 
37

genres and new ways of paying for it. This further supports our conclusion that program 

diversity on prime time broadcast television is unrelated to the number of firms 

producing the programming or whether the network has an ownership stake in the 

programming. Instead, one possible explanation of changes in program diversity is the 

economics of program production and cost recovery. The extent to which purely 

economic considerations affect program diversity on broadcast television cannot be 

determined with any precision. What can be said based on the analysis contained in this 

paper is that program diversity declined in the years immediately following 

implementation of fin-syn, and in the years immediately following fin-syn’s repeal. This 

correlation, at a minimum, casts some doubt on the effectiveness of the FCC’s fin-syn 

rules in achieving program diversity on prime-time network television. 
38

References

Dominick, J.R. & M.C. Pearce (1976). Trends In Network Prime-Time 

Programming, 1953-74, Journal of Communication, 26, 70-80.

FCC Network Inquiry Special Staff (1980). Volume I: Final Report: New 

Television Networks: Entry, Jurisdiction, Ownership and Regulation. Washington, DC: 

GPO.

Litman, B. R. (1979). The Television Networks, Competition and Program 

Diversity. Journal of Broadcasting, 23(4), 393-409.

McNeil, A. (1996). Total Television: The Comprehensive Guide to 

Programming from 1948 to the present (4th Edition). New York: Penguin Books.

Park, S. K. (1999). Trends in the Supply of Television Programs for Network and 

Syndication Markets. Feedback, 40 (2), 14-21.

Pearce, A. (1973). The Economics of Prime Time Access. Washington, DC: 

FCC.

Schlosser, J. (2002, January 21). The Plot Thickens. Broadcasting & Cable, p. 

21.

Steiner, G.A. (1963). The People Look at Television: A Study of Audience 

Attitudes. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Sterling, C. H. (1984). Electronic Media: A Guide to Trends in Broadcasting and 

Newer Technologies 1920-1983. New York: Praeger.

Wildman, S. S., & Robinson, K. S. (1995). Network Programming and OffNetwork Syndication Profits: Strategic Links and Implications for Television Policy. The 

Journal of Media Economics, 8 (2), 27-48.
Appendix 1

Content of Prime-Time Network Television Programming

1966-1975 and 1989-2003

Coded Based on Sterling and Kittross

Program Hours by Quarter Hours per Week 

1966-67 1967-68 1968-69 1969-70 1970-71 1971-72 1972-73 1973-74 1974-75 1989-90 1990-91 1991-92

 Special/Varied 20 6.7% 20 6.7% 20 6.8% 12 4.0% 8 2.7% 0.0% 4 1.6% 8 3.2% 4 1.6% 0.0% 0.0%

 Comedy 8 2.7% 12 4.0% 24 8.1% 19 6.4% 24 8.1% 20 7.9% 16 6.3% 12 4.8% 4 1.6% 0.0% 0.0% 4

 Country and Western 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 4 1.3% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

 General/Talk 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 4 1.3% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

Variety 9.3% 10.7% 14.9% 11.7% 12.1% 7.9% 7.9% 7.9% 3.2% 0.0% 0.0%

 Musical Variety 16 5.3% 16 5.4% 12 4.1% 35 11.7% 28 9.4% 8 3.2% 12 4.8% 4 1.6% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

 Light Music 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

Music 5.3% 5.4% 4.1% 11.7% 9.4% 3.2% 4.8% 1.6% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

 General 12 4.0% 4 1.3% 8 2.7% 22 7.4% 28 9.4% 20 7.9% 26 10.3% 20 7.9% 36 14.3% 40 15.2% 48 18.2% 32

 Women's Serials 8 2.7% 4 1.3% 4 1.4% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 4

 Action/Adventure 74 24.7% 56 18.8% 24 8.1% 16 5.4% 12 4.0% 16 6.3% 12 4.8% 0.0% 20 7.9% 12 4.5% 16 6.1% 16

 Crime/Detective 10 3.3% 22 7.4% 46 15.5% 32 10.7% 46 15.4% 40 15.9% 42 16.7% 66 26.2% 66 26.2% 48 18.2% 28 10.6% 36

 Suspense 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 4 1.3% 10 4.0% 18 7.1% 14 5.6% 12 4.8% 8 3.0%

 Westerns 44 14.7% 54 18.1% 40 13.5% 26 8.7% 18 6.0% 16 6.3% 12 4.8% 8 3.2% 8 3.2% 8 3.0% 4 1.5%

 Animated Cartoons 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

Drama 49.3% 47.0% 41.2% 32.2% 36.2% 40.5% 43.7% 42.9% 56.3% 45.5% 42.4%

Motion Pictures 40 13.3% 48 16.1% 56 18.9% 62 20.8% 54 18.1% 66 26.2% 58 23.0% 64 25.4% 58 23.0% 32 12.1% 40 15.2% 48

Comedy/Situation 52 17.3% 40 13.4% 46 15.5% 54 18.1% 50 16.8% 44 17.5% 36 14.3% 44 17.5% 32 12.7% 72 27.3% 76 28.8% 82

 Audience Participation 4 1.3% 4 1.3% 6 2.0% 6 2.0% 4 1.3% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

Quiz and Panel 1.3% 1.3% 2.0% 2.0% 1.3% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

 Newscasts 2 0.7% 2 0.7% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

 Forum/Interviews 0.0% 2 0.7% 4 1.4% 4 1.3% 4 1.3% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 20 7.6% 16 6.1% 20

 Documentary/Information 4 1.3% 4 1.3% 0.0% 2 0.7% 2 0.7% 0.0% 4 1.6% 0.0% 0.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8

News Information 2.0% 2.7% 1.4% 2.0% 2.0% 0.0% 1.6% 0.0% 0.0% 10.6% 9.1%

 Children's Shows 4 1.3% 8 2.7% 6 2.0% 4 1.3% 4 1.3% 4 1.6% 4 1.6% 4 1.6% 4 1.6% 4 1.5% 0.0%

 Sports 0.0% 2 0.7% 0.0% 0.0% 8 2.7% 8 3.2% 8 3.2% 8 3.2% 8 3.2% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8

 Miscellaneous 2 0.7% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 4 1.5% 6

Other Types 2.0% 3.4% 2.0% 1.3% 4.0% 4.8% 4.8% 4.8% 4.8% 4.5% 4.5%

 Total Quarter Hours 300 100% 298 100% 296 100% 298 100% 298 100% 252 100% 252 100% 252 100% 252 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264

Source: Sterling, 195-6
1992-93 1993-94 1994-95 1995-96 1996-97 1997-98 1998-99 1999-2000 2000-01 2001-02 2002-03

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

1.5% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 2 0.8% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 2 0.8%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

1.5% 0.0% 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.8% 1.5% 1.5% 0.8%

0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

12.1% 40 15.2% 24 9.1% 36 13.6% 24 9.1% 32 12.1% 24 9.1% 40 15.2% 52 19.7% 52 19.7% 60 22.7% 48 18.2%

1.5% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 8 3.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0%

6.1% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 4 1.5% 16 6.1% 16 6.1%

13.6% 36 13.6% 40 15.2% 40 15.2% 44 16.7% 44 16.7% 64 24.2% 44 16.7% 36 13.6% 36 13.6% 34 12.9% 52 19.7%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

33.3% 36.4% 30.3% 34.8% 34.8% 34.8% 39.4% 36.4% 37.9% 36.4% 41.7% 43.9%

18.2% 40 15.2% 48 18.2% 48 18.2% 48 18.2% 48 18.2% 24 9.1% 32 12.1% 36 13.6% 48 18.2% 32 12.1% 32 12.1%

31.1% 72 27.3% 76 28.8% 70 26.5% 80 30.3% 76 28.8% 80 30.3% 64 24.2% 60 22.7% 48 18.2% 42 15.9% 42 15.9%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 16 6.1% 16 6.1% 0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 6.1% 6.1% 0.0%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

7.6% 24 9.1% 32 12.1% 36 13.6% 28 10.6% 32 12.1% 40 15.2% 40 15.2% 48 18.2% 36 13.6% 32 12.1% 32 12.1%

3.0% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

10.6% 13.6% 15.2% 16.7% 12.1% 13.6% 15.2% 15.2% 18.2% 13.6% 12.1% 12.1%

0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0%

3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 16 6.1% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0%

2.3% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 2 0.8% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 8 3.0% 2 0.8% 0.0% 12 4.5% 24 9.1%

5.3% 7.6% 6.1% 3.8% 4.5% 4.5% 6.1% 12.1% 6.8% 6.1% 10.6% 15.2%

100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100% 264 100%
Appendix 2

Content of Prime-Time Network Television Programming

1989-2003, Coded with 1990s program code

Program Hours by Quarter Hours per Week 

Genres

Comedy 1989-90 1990-91 1991-92 1992-93 1993-94 1994-95 1995-96 1996-97 1997-98 1998-99 1999-2000 2000-01 2001-02 2002-03

Situation comedy -- family 38 14.4% 38 14.4% 40 15.2% 32 12.1% 38 14.4% 34 12.9% 28 10.6% 20 7.6% 32 12.1% 26 9.8% 22 8.3% 16 6.1% 10 3.8% 16 6.1%

Situation comedy -- office 18 6.8% 20 7.6% 22 8.3% 22 8.3% 14 5.3% 12 4.5% 22 8.3% 14 5.3% 20 7.6% 16 6.1% 16 6.1% 10 3.8% 10 3.8% 12 4.5%

Standup or star comedian 2 0.8% 4 1.5% 6 2.3% 8 3.0% 20 7.6% 20 7.6% 22 8.3% 32 12.1% 18 6.8% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 16 6.1% 14 5.3% 10 3.8%

situation comedy 14 5.3% 14 5.3% 14 5.3% 10 3.8% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 8 3.0% 10 3.8% 10 3.8% 10 3.8% 10 3.8% 6 2.3% 8 3.0% 4 1.5%

TOTAL COMEDY 72 27.3% 76 28.8% 82 31.1% 72 27.3% 76 28.8% 70 26.5% 80 30.3% 76 28.8% 80 30.3% 64 24.2% 60 22.7% 48 18.2% 15.9% 15.9%

Animation 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0%

Comedy - Variety 0.0% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 2 0.8% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 2 0.8%

TOTAL VARIETY 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 4 1.5% 0 0.0% 4 1.5% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 2 0.8% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0%

Drama

Light and medium drama 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 16 6.1% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 8 3.0%

Heavy drama 20 7.6% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 0.0% 0.0% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0%

Personal, "real life" or family drama 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 16 6.1% 20 7.6% 16 6.1% 20 7.6% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 20 7.6% 8 3.0%

Legal drama 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 16 6.1% 4 1.5% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 16 6.1% 16 6.1% 24 9.1% 16 6.1%

Medical drama 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 4 1.5% 0.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 16 6.1% 12 4.5% 20 7.6%

Action/adventure 20 7.6% 16 6.1% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 12 4.5% 8 3.0%

Sci-Fi 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 4 1.5% 8 3.0% 0.0% 4 1.5% 8 3.0%

Drama, stories -- other or general 4 1.5% 16 6.1% 4 1.5% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5%

Crime drama 16 6.1% 20 7.6% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 16 6.1% 8 3.0% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 12 4.5%

Police, detective, private eye 24 9.1% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 12 4.5% 28 10.6% 24 9.1% 20 7.6% 28 10.6% 40 15.2% 24 9.1% 20 7.6% 20 7.6% 22 8.3% 32 12.1%

TOTAL DRAMA 120 45.5% 112 80 92 80 92 92 92 104 92 100 96 102

Movies 32 12.1% 40 15.2% 48 18.2% 40 15.2% 48 18.2% 48 18.2% 48 18.2% 48 18.2% 24 9.1% 32 12.1% 36 13.6% 48 18.2% 32 12.1% 32 12.1%

TOTAL MOVIES 32 12.1% 40 48 40 48 48 48 48 24 32 36 48 32 0.0%

Other

Sports 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 16 6.1% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0%

Reality series 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 18 6.8% 24 9.1% 12 4.5% 8 3.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 12 4.5% 0.0% 0.0% 12 4.5% 20 7.6%

Newsmagazines 20 7.6% 16 6.1% 20 7.6% 24 9.1% 32 12.1% 36 13.6% 28 10.6% 32 12.1% 40 15.2% 40 15.2% 48 18.2% 36 13.6% 32 12.1% 32 12.1%

Children's Show 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 0.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0% 8 3.0%

Miscellaneous 0.0% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 2 0.8% 4 1.5% 4 1.5% 0.0% 0.0% 2 0.8% 16 6.1% 16 6.1% 4 1.5%

Total 1/4 hours 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 ###### 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0% 264 100.0%
1

THE PROGRAM SELECTION PROCESS

Introduction

Ultimately what appears on prime time broadcast network television is the 

responsibility of a handful of network programming executives. The process for 

selecting programming has been in existence almost since the medium’s inception. At its 

simplest, producers come up with a show idea, they pitch the idea to the network and the 

network says yes or no to the show. A number of factors determine which shows the 

network will accept or reject. Those factors have changed over time even while the 

process itself has not. One factor that has been cited as affecting the program selection 

process is the imposition and subsequent repeal of the FCC’s financial interest and 

syndication rules. This paper describes the steps involved in broadcast networks’ 

selection of programming and evaluates the effect of the fin-syn rules on that process. 

In the 1970s, what led the FCC to institute the financial interest and syndication 

rules was a concern that the networks were becoming both too powerful and too 

demanding when it came to this selection process. Too powerful, in that they were the 

gatekeepers of news, information and entertainment for the American public. This was 

so because of the limits of the radio spectrum, which made the broadcast networks the 

only providers of television programming in most U.S. markets. Too demanding, 

because networks were requiring an equity stake in a program before it would be 

accepted as a part of the prime time schedule. The networks had ownership in more than 

70 percent of their prime time schedule by the mid-1960s, up from only 45 percent the 
2

previous decade. This strong arming of producers was a fundamental reason for the 

creation of fin-syn. Not only was the Commission concerned about network participation 

in the selection of programming. They were concerned about network input into 

programming once it appeared on the air.

Since the rules were repealed in 1995, the economic structure of the industry has 

changed drastically. The television networks have become vertically integrated 

institutions with the ability to produce programming through internal business units. A 

number of developments in the video market may have encouraged this trend. First, 

production costs and licensing and talent fees have continued to outpace the rate of 

inflation. Corporate parents pressure the networks to purchase programming internally in 

order to achieve synergies and increase profits. But perhaps the most observable basis 

for increased financial pressure on the broadcast networks is the increased competition 

they face from newer broadcast networks and from programming networks on cable 

television and Direct Broadcast Satellite (DBS) systems (McClellan, 2002, p. 6).

These developments have caused networks to aggressively seek out new ways to 

increase revenue and decrease costs. Networks are increasing revenue through new 

methods of syndication, “repurposing” of recently-aired shows, and taking a financial 

interest in programming that appears on air. Decreased costs are achieve through 

purchasing more in-house productions, producing more lost-cost programming like game 

shows and reality series, and by cutting layers of middle management. These pressures 

from corporate parents come in the face of increasing competitive pressures from new 

broadcast networks, cable, and DBS.
3

Based on a series of interviews with network executives and prime time program 

producers, it appears the incentives introduced into the program selection process by the 

repeal of the fin-syn rules have clearly affected the program selection process within 

broadcast networks. This paper describes the program selection process at broadcast 

networks and how it has been affected by the elimination of the fin-syn rules. The 

interviews and other information presented in this paper suggest that the networks have a 

greater incentive to select programs produced in-house. That incentive, however, 

continues to be tempered by networks’ competing incentive to attract audiences by 

selecting the “best” program irrespective of its source. Although it appears that networks 

continue to prefer, all else constant, the acquisition of programming from in-house 

sources, the acquisition of programming from independent (i.e. non-network) producers 

is made more attractive by the ability of networks to obtain, in many cases, partial 

ownership of the show in exchange for the show being picked up by the network. While 

networks’ increased ownership has increased post fin-syn, as we discuss in a separate 

paper, the post-fin-syn program selection process has not resulted in a meaningful change 

in program diversity. 

There are two fundamental ways networks can procure programming to distribute 

over their owned and affiliated stations – acquire a show from an independent producer 

or produce the show in-house. In either case, the network will pay an annual license fee 

to the producer, which allows the network to air the episode twice. That fee is negotiated 

once the show has been selected for the prime time schedule. Historically, the fee was 

set, with minor annual increments, for the first four years of the show’s life. In the fifth 

year, the network and the producer negotiate the license fee for one or more subsequent 
4

years. More recently, that five year period has been extended to seven years or more. 

The terms of renewal are greatly affected by whether the network has an ownership 

interest in the program. If the show is truly independent, the network is going to pay a 

higher license fee than if a show is produced in-house or if the show is partially owned by 

the network. This is so, because if the network has a financial interest in a show, it has 

far greater control over renewal terms than if it lacks an ownership interest.1 Another 

way to think about this is to imagine that you are buying a house. If you are buying the 

house from someone you don’t know you are likely to pay one price. If you are buying 

the house from your mother, the price is going to be very different. (The same is true 

when it comes to syndicated programming. Often, the vertically integrated companies 

will buy their own programming. For instance, The X-Files is produced by 20th Century 

Fox, originally aired on the Fox network and then was syndicated on FX, the Fox cable 

network. Fox has been accused of not selling the show at market rates because all of the 

selling was done internally.)

What is true now and has always been true is that selecting programs for the 

prime time schedule is the most important aspect of a network programming executive’s 

job. Prime time programming is the lifeblood of the television network because it fills 

the most visible and most profitable of time period.2 It is the product that is sold to all 

constituencies – viewers, affiliates and advertisers. And while advertisers may be most 

concerned about the audience a program attracts, affiliates will focus on how a show will 

 

1 Under the financial interest and syndication rules, the networks could have an equity stake in only a 

limited number of prime time programs.

2 Success in prime time ratings have traditionally spilled into other dayparts. For example, if people are 

watching CBS in prime time, they are more likely to watch CBS late night (David Letterman). Also, 

wherever a television set is turned off is where the set turns on again, so if someone is watching NBC in 

prime time, they will automatically turn on the “Today Show” the next morning.
5

play in their community, and viewers are interested in entertainment and information, the 

network executive is concerned about all of those things when selecting shows for the 

prime time schedule. 

Content, audience, and programming mix are just some of the factors that are 

considered. In addition, network executives must juggle business relationships between 

networks and studios and between networks and producers. They must also take into 

consideration test results from audience research on pilots. These things are not new. 

What is new since 1995 is their incentive to select in-house productions and to obtain an 

equity stake in a programming that is not produced by the network. A second change is 

the evolution of the syndication market, which affects programming decisions by altering 

the timing and perhaps the level of the financial return for the network. 

The bottom line for media critics, however, is two-fold. First, with increased 

vertical integration, independent producers have less access to audiences or they must 

align themselves with studios or networks in order to get their show on the air. It has 

become standard that producers will align themselves with a studio. The ones that we 

spoke with did not necessarily feel that this was a bad thing. Second, more attention to 

the bottom has led to lesser quality programming. No one that we spoke with claimed 

that television is of low quality overall. Yes there are some shows that are very low 

brow, but taken as a whole the prime time schedule could be compared to the Golden 

Age of Television.
6

Network Prime Time Program Selection Timeline

Programs may be developed throughout the year, but the majority of programs are 

developed using a timeline that has been around since the beginning of television. (This 

timeline provides a context for understanding the program selection process.) It is a 

schedule based on the broadcast year of September to May. This schedule is one that 

most suits advertisers. For reasons discussed below, its compressed and somewhat 

inefficient design may contribute to what some critics contend is a lack of quality 

programming.

Throughout the fall and after the launch of the new season, programming 

executives will meet with producers and writers to hear new programming ideas. If the 

network likes a particular idea, they will ask that a pilot script be developed. This is 

known as a script commitment. This script is a sample script, an idea of what the first 

show will be like. The network will finance this script, which currently costs around 

$75,000 to $100,000. In return for financing the script, the network retains the right to 

order the pilot (a fully created episode of the show) and if they like the pilot, the show 

itself. The network may have 100 to 150 scripts written during a typical pilot season. 

From these scripts, the network will select approximately 20 to 30 shows to be produced 

as pilots. The number of shows to reach the pilot stage may be less than this depending 

on the number of shows the network needs to replace in its current schedule. 

Once a pilot is approved for production, the producer of the show will be given 

“development money” by the network. The amount is approximately one million dollars 
7

per pilot3 and usually covers most of the producer’s costs. Often the producer will 

supplement the money provided by the network in order to produce a better pilot. 

Once the network selects a pilot for its schedule, a licensing agreement is signed 

between the network and the producer. The network retains the exclusive right to air the 

series, usually for five years, with a network option to cancel prior to that time.

The networks start to make decisions about what will appear on the fall schedule 

in March, when the networks hold what are known as “development meetings.” These 

meetings are small-scale presentations for the top 100 to 200 advertising clients. There, 

the top network programming executives tout the network’s recent performance and, 

more important, tell the advertisers what they think will be on the fall schedule. No final 

decisions have been made by this point, but, it is an opportunity to begin building interest 

among advertisers’ for the network’s new programming. There is some interaction 

between the network executives and the advertisers in the form of a question and answer 

period. However, since most of the programming decisions are so preliminary, it is not 

possible for the advertisers to have input into the programming. While these meetings 

are private, soon after, the trade press begins to speculate about what will appear on the 

fall schedules. Although these meetings occur two months before programming 

decisions are finalized, these meetings continue to serve the advertisers’ apparent interest 

for these events.4

Throughout the remainder of March, April and May, pilots are created and refined 

with input from the network programming executives. During the first two weeks of 

 

3 This is an average number. Depending on the track record of the producer, whether it is a half-hour 

comedy or an hour drama, it can be more, though usually not less.

4 In 2002 for the first time, as a cost-cutting measure the networks did not hold these meetings.
8

May, pilot screenings are held where all the top network executives, not just 

programming executives, evaluate the potential shows. Again, no final decisions are 

made at these meetings, but everyone’s input is taken into consideration. Final pilot 

decisions are made during the second and third week of May. 

Programmers use a number of criteria to determine what shows appear on the new 

schedule. For returning shows, programmers look at factors like past performance, age of 

the show, and how many other shows are not returning to the schedule. For new shows 

the programmers will think about the track record of the producers of this program, the fit 

of the program with the rest of the schedule, and, if necessary, the fit of the show for a 

particular day and time. For all shows, programmers consider the demographics of the 

audience the show is likely to attract, whether the show can be used effectively to 

counter-program against the competition, and whether the costs are reasonable and the 

talent recognizable or if not, at least likeable (Head, 1989, p. 28).

The final prime time program schedule is presented to all advertisers during the 

third week of May in New York City. These presentations are large-scale productions 

that can cost the network up to a million dollars or more. From the network perspective, 

these presentations are valuable opportunities to make a favorable impression on 

advertising executives responsible for placing several billion dollars worth of advertising 

time. After the advertiser meetings are held, the networks present the new fall schedule 

to their affiliates. Next, the networks present the shows to the press at the annual July 

press tour, where the nation’s television press screen the pilots and can interview the cast

and producers of the programs selected. The viewers finally get to see the shows 
9

sometime around the third week of September when the new fall season launches. After 

the new season starts, the process begins all over again.

This method for choosing programming may contribute to what some critics 

believe is a lack of quality programming on broadcast networks. Since all pilots are 

being produced at the same time, talent resources are being stretched thin. This is 

particularly true in the last few years with the introduction of two new broadcast 

networks and the continued forays by cable networks into original production. In 

addition, the shows are being produced under severe time constraints in order to meet the 

May deadline. It is possible that this schedule affects the quality of programming 

ultimately aired on broadcast networks. 

In the remainder of this research, network programming executives and prime 

time program producers provide additional insight into this process. They discuss the 

elements that are part of the consideration set when deciding on what programs will 

appear on the prime time schedule. These executives had opinions on all of these 

processes, from how a show is selected to the number of people involved in the process. 

They are concerned about the networks’ increased participation in programming, though 

more so from a financial standpoint than a creative one. They also had suggestions for 

changing the process, but they were not overly optimistic that it ever would.

Prime Time Program Development Process

As discussed above, while there are several steps in the selection of programming 

for the prime time schedule, the two primary areas are development, which is the 

nurturing of a show through the pilot stage, and selection. We have separated these into 

two areas for more clarity of the process. As well, while it is the selection process that is 
10

of particular interest, it is important to understand how network executives assemble the 

pool of programs to select from.

The development of prime time programming is done primarily by the 

programming division of the television network. The process is fairly standardized, and 

the participants were consistent in presenting the process. From the network point of 

view, the first step in the process is the needs assessment. Warren Littlefield, a television 

producer, working with Paramount Television, whose show Do-Over appears on the WB, 

explained this process. Prior to his current position, Littlefield had been at NBC for over 

20 years, through the time of Cosby and Family Ties to Friends, ER and Will & Grace. 

He oversaw the development process for nine years as the Entertainment President at 

NBC, a position he left at the end of 1998. “The first thing you do is you look at your 

schedule. You assess your needs. An example would be if you were at ABC in 1999, all 

you knew all year long was Home Improvement was leaving. Home Improvement was 

leaving! What are you going to do to lead off Tuesday night at 8 o’clock? Well, you 

have to deal with that. And you formulate based upon the needs of your schedule and the 

strength of your competition, a strategy. So you look at your assets, you look at your 

liabilities, you do a needs assessment.”5 Flody Suarez, currently an independent 

producer and former programming executive at NBC, expanded on this process. “At the 

beginning of a development season, development people at a network will sit and look at 

their schedule and say, ‘Okay best case scenario we’re going to need this many shows. 

Worst case scenario we’re going to need this many and this is probably where we’re 

 

5 Interview with Warren Littlefield, producer and former Entertainment President, NBC (July 28, 1999). 

All subsequent quotations from Littlefield are derived from this interview. 
11

going to need them. What are the kinds of shows that we think can succeed in those time 

periods? And let’s focus on those. What’s not on television right now?’”6

Once the network has determined the types of shows it needs and the time periods 

that need to be filled, they must go about getting the programming to fill those slots. This 

is where the network turns to the Hollywood creative community, which includes 

independent producers, the major studios and their own in-house production units. As 

Warren Littlefield explains, this next step in the process is to open your doors to 

producers. “‘Come bring us your shows.’ And in that process you listen to all the 

studios, as well as your own studio and you constantly are telling the studio community, 

the agent community, the writer/producer community every forum you can possibly 

speak to ‘here’s what we think we need and what do you have?’” Suarez agreed saying, 

“You put out the word to the town. That’s kind of what you’re looking for, and you take 

pitches.7 Sometimes somebody pitches you something that doesn’t fit your model at all, 

but it’s a good pitch, and they’re good writers so you buy it.”

As this comment suggests, just because the network has done a needs assessment 

and publicized its needs, the creative community may bring different programming to the 

network and the network will consider such programming. Suarez explained that 

networks will look at programming that may not be part of the initial plan, but that has an 

interesting creative element attached to it. “[T]hey bring you stuff you weren’t looking 

for. They pitch you writers and you say, ‘Okay I like the writer. Let’s hear the idea’ and 

 

6 Interview with Flody Suarez, producer and former programming vice president, NBC (August 25, 1999). 

All subsequent quotations from Suarez are derived from this interview. 

7 Pitches are meetings where a writer or producer or a studio “pitch” there idea to a network. This may be a 

phone call or a more formal meeting.
12

then the department ends up buying, a slate of projects. A lot of them will be right in that 

target of what you were looking for and then a lot of them will be these wild cards. 

These flyer-type projects, which end up in many cases seeming special and different 

because you don’t have five of them sitting there.” 

The selection process described by these networks is not a science. The networks 

start with a framework – the needs assessment. They know they need to replace certain 

shows that are going off the air because they are too old or the ratings have not been high 

enough to warrant that the show’s return for another season. They understand that there 

are certain time slots that need to be filled. This could be an 8 o’clock comedy or a 10 

o’clock drama. This too will affect what the network asks for from the creative 

community. However, the needs assessment is not a hard and fast rule. It is a game plan 

from which to work. The executives want to leave themselves open for unplanned for 

opportunities. Most of those so called “flyer projects” that Suarez spoke of come from 

producers or writers who have a strong point of view about a project. “[A] lot of things 

also just come in where simply someone says ‘here’s my idea. You know, this is my 

idea. A funny thing happened to me. I want to write about my life experience.’ Family 

Ties came out of the life experience of Gary Goldberg being an aging hippy and having 

kids who were more conservative than he was. The Cosby Show came out of Bill 

Cosby’s experiences of being a parent. Home Improvement from Tim Allen. So a lot of 

it in the development process, particularly in a half hour comedy, is creators or talent 

coming up with a point of view,” according to Littlefield. 

A strong point of view is fundamental to the pitch and ultimately the long-term 

viability of a show. Matt Williams, one of the producers of Home Improvement, 
13

described his development of the show much in the same way as Littlefield talked about 

it from the network perspective. “I wanted, and my partners wanted, to write a show 

about an American family and especially a show built around a father. And then we end 

up, thank God, bumping into Tim Allen through Jeffrey Katzenberg at Disney, and this 

was a perfect match. So we really took our time and really honed the concept of the 

show and what that show was about, what we wanted to say and it was driven purely by 

Tim’s personality, Tim’s standup and what we wanted to do about family life.”8 

The pitches described thus far are the simplest – a writer creates a concept for a 

show and tries to sell it to a network or studio. There is a range of additional sub-issues 

in this basic sequence, particularly with respect to the financial arrangements. . Stephen 

McPherson is the President of Touchstone Television, the production division of ABC 

Entertainment. McPherson was formerly at NBC as a programming executive. He 

provided the following analysis of the development process. “The simplest [way for a 

show to get picked up is a writer walks in the door and pitches a show to a studio and 

they go, ‘great we’d like to do it.’ They then pitch it to the network, they say, ‘great we’d 

like to do it.’ He writes a script; it’s picked up to pilot; it’s picked up to series, and it 

goes on the air. The most complicated ones are...a British television series exists and 

you’re going to do a remake of it and you make a deal with the exec producers of the 

British show to supervise American writers who do it through a studio here and 

potentially it’s a co-production because there’s not domestic financing. Big stars always 

 

8 Interview with Matt Williams, producer (January 11, 2002). All subsequent quotations from Williams are 

derived from this interview.
14

make a difference and big properties make a difference and pre-existing network 

commitments and penalties make a difference.”9

But whether simple or complex, after a show has been pitched and the network 

has determined that it is interested in a show idea, the negotiation of the contract begins. 

The contract can be for a script, a demo, a pilot or a series commitment. The following 

describes what might be a “typical” production deal for better-than-average independent 

producers. NBC’s experience with Friends is typical of this. “[W]hen we bought 

Friends from Warner Brothers, Bright, Kauffman, Crane...were not super hot, but they 

were fairly hot,” says Littlefield. “And so we had to say based upon their heat, we had to 

guarantee a “pilot commitment.” Now, what does that mean? That probably when the 

deal was all said and done in a negotiation it probably meant if we didn’t make the pilot 

off of what they were writing, we probably would have owed them a couple of hundred 

thousand dollars. To make the pilot was a million dollars. And so many deals are simply 

a script, 75,000 plus fringes. Okay, so under 100. Then you get the little more heat, a 

pilot commitment, so now your exposure is several hundred thousand. And if it’s a firm, 

you gotta roll film, a demo, is 500 thousand, and a firm pilot, you’re going to make it, is 

at least a million and can be for a half hour up to 2 million.”

Programming executives at each network go through this process with twenty to 

thirty producers. That number will vary depending on how many shows the network 

needs to replace. It is not this particular step of the process that critics of the post-fin-syn 

 

9 Interview with Stephen McPherson, President of Touchstone Television and former programming ivce 

president, NBC (January 11, 2002). All subsequent quotations from McPherson are derived from this 

interview.
15

environment take issue with. Rather it is the actual selection and what goes into deciding 

what finally ends up on the screen. 

Prime Time Program Selection Process – Factors in the Final Decision

Several factors go into making the final decision on what programs will appear on 

the prime time schedule. These include relationships between networks and producers, 

what is most profitable for the network, whether the show is produced internally, how 

well the show has tested with audiences, the show’s prospects for attracting advertisers, 

and the show’s prospects for success in the syndication market. 

Relationships

A major factor in the final selection process is the relationship between a network 

and a studio. If the studio already has a show on the network, or has a particularly hot 

property, it can use it as leverage to sell more programming to a network. This is not an 

unusual business practice. In fact, networks do it themselves when selling advertising 

time. If an advertiser wants to be on ER, for instance, the network will package 

commercials in that show with commercials in other less popular programs. The 

implications may be smaller, but the business practice is the same. 

Of course, a very important relationship now is the one that exists between the 

network and its own in-house studio. All of the networks have their own in-house studios 

either through merger, acquisition or creation. A few years ago, Disney restructured its 

organization in order to increase the sale of programs internally. Stephen McPherson, 

President of Disney’s Touchstone Television, explained his relationship with the ABC 
16

network this way, “We’re incredibly close [with the network]...we try to work as closely 

as we possibly can and frankly the closer, the better...We’re not obligated to sell 

everything to ABC. Certainly we try to mine that rela tionship and it’s an important one 

for us and for them...we have a vertically integrated relationship with a network but we 

produce successful material for other broadcast networks as well.” 

While the implications of the internal relationships will be discussed more fully 

below in the section about vertical integration, it is important to note here that internally 

produced programming has an advantage in the network’s program selection process. 

Ted Harbert, former chairman and president of ABC Entertainment, explained why this is 

so. Mr. Harbert worked at ABC for 20 years, the last four (1993-1997) of which he was 

responsible for all prime time and late night programming. He left ABC and signed a 

multi-year deal to develop programming with Dreamworks, where he worked on Arsenio, 

a vehicle for Arsenio Hall, and It’s Like You Know..., another short-lived sitcom. In 1999, 

Harbert was named president of NBC Studios, the in-house production unit for NBC 

which produces for multiple dayparts including prime time. Harbert explained:

Michael Eisner is saying okay ABC [and Disney] everybody just get together in 

the same room and do it together. I think their [Disney’s] shows will get on the 

air. That isn’t going to mean that they’re better. If you put the network person in 

charge of both sides of the fence, saying, ‘Okay, you’re in charge of the studio 

side, of developing shows from the studio side and you also have to...choose the 

shows as the network person that go on the air.’ It’s impossible to ask the 

network person to have that much objectivity. To be able to look at the show 

they’ve been developing from the very, very beginning and say, ‘Oh, no what I’ve 

just been working on personally, that I’m personally invested in from the very 

first moment with the writer, gee that’s much lousier than the Warner Brothers 

show. I’m gonna go with the Warner Brothers show.’ I just think it’s a virtually 

impossible thing to ask the people.10

 

10 Interview with Ted Harbert, President NBC Studios, formerly producer and chairman and president ABC 

(August, 1999). All subsequent quotations from Harbert are derived from this interview.
17

Another very important factor is the relationship between a network and an 

individual producer. These usually exist in the form of a series commitment. This is a 

contract between the producer and the network, whereby the network agrees to pick up 

the next project by the producer virtually sight unseen. “Contracts certainly play a big 

part in [the decision making process]...Marta Kaufman, David Crane have two shows on 

the air that were 22-episode commitments because we had commitments to them,” says 

Suarez, about his experience at NBC. “John Wells has commitments, you know, based 

on ER. And those are good shots to take...Sometimes it works and sometimes it 

backfires. Certainly Frasier worked. Wings was a success...[Pursuit of 

Happiness]...was a disaster. But it’s not a science. It is an art and you have to treat it as 

that. When you start treating it like a business, it tends to fall apart.” 

Series commitments have been a means by which the networks reward producers 

for having a successful show. The networks are willing to risk acquiring an unsuccessful 

show, because once a producer has a hit, the other networks want to work with that 

producer. This is important because historically the success of a producer is a key 

determinant for the success of a show overall (Biebly and Biebly, 1994). By providing 

the producer with a series commitment, the network guarantees that the next creation by 

the producer will appear on that network. NBC did this with Steve Levitan, producer of 

such hits as Frasier and Just Shoot Me. Littlefield explains, “Everybody wanted to be in 

business with him. So it was going to cost thirteen on the air no matter what, so NBC 

stepped up, made a commitment to thirteen on the air. He did a pilot...Now, if you hate 

the pilot, you can buy out of it, but it’s really expensive, millions and millions. More 

likely you say, ‘Hey, you know what, this is who we said we’d be in business with, let’s 
18

see what they do.’” A commitment usually consists of thirteen episodes, but can be as 

many as 22 or even higher in very special cases. As Littlefield described was the case 

with Cosby on CBS. “Cosby I think was a 44. CBS Cosby...But they have the ability to 

I think probably, they’ll end it up with 44 guaranteed fees, but they could have cut back 

to 22 episodes or something, but anyway, it’s quite unique and that was a time when CBS 

was desperate for an announcement, so that’s the deal they made.”

Paul Haggis is an example of a producer who has a series commitment. His 

commitment is with CBS which means he must first present his work to the network 

before he can sell it elsewhere. Mr. Haggis is a writer/producer, whose most recent 

show is Family Law which aired on CBS. He has worked in Hollywood for more than 20 

years as a writer and/or producer on such shows as thirtysomething, Due South and EZ 

Streets. While he has a commitment with CBS, he is not tied to a particular production 

studio, which is the case with many other producers. He spoke about the different ways 

his shows have gotten onto the network: 

I’ve had a long relationship with CBS. Oh, I guess I’ve been...creating series for 

ten to twelve years for them. And I think I’ve done four or five. I can’t 

remember. I don’t like to count the failures. (laughs)... [With Due South], Jeff 

Sagansky approached me and said would you create a show about a Canadian 

Mountie or trapper who comes to Big City USA...and that show was owned 

entirely by Alliance Entertainment. [With] EZ Streets which was my next 

show...I sold the project myself as a writer/producer to CBS and then I sent it out 

for bids around to the various studios, met with them and finally decided and it 

got down to either Universal or Paramount, and Universal was willing to put the 

most money into the budget and so we went with Universal.11 

For Haggis, the series commitment could mean ownership by the network or by an 

outside production company.

 

11 Interview with Paul Haggis, producer (February 22, 2002). All subsequent quotations from Haggis are 

derived from this interview.
19

Most often with a series commitment the network does not get a financial interest 

in the show, 12 which is why series commitments are expected to become a thing of the 

past. According to Littlefield, “A lot of shows have gotten on the air because there were 

series commitments and I would say that that trend will probably fade away. The 

networks always want to make fewer of those so they’re not shackled by them.” This is 

true. Networks want to have as much control over what appears on the schedule as 

possible. What is also true is that by eliminating commitments, the networks eliminate a 

lot of overhead.13 

McPherson agrees with this assessment, but explains that the economics of the 

business has changed networks’ reliance on producer commitments: 

Giant overall deals [were based on] the model used [by] the movie studios 

[whereby] your one hit pays for all your failures, and I think there’s really a sense 

that that can’t be the way that we operate. We have to do shows for less money. 

We have to cut down the deficits. As foreign money becomes harder to get, as 

domestic syndication becomes more cluttered, as there become more channels and 

choices for everybody, there’s less off-network money, so you’re really just 

talking about people looking at the business and saying, ‘Ok this didn’t make 

sense. This didn’t make sense. How can we save money here, save money there.’ 

Because in the end it all comes down to money.

Financial Considerations 

Perhaps most importantly, and the factor underlying the other aspects of the 

decision making process is the cost of production, which of course ties into the 

company’s bottom line. The first place where cost cutting occurs is in the pilot stage. 

 

12 Networks do not receive a financial interest in shows with a series commitment because the 

producer/studio has the upper hand in negotiating the terms. As Suarez explained it, “NBC...had a lot of 

deals that made it impossible to own, you know the John Wells, the Marta Kaufmans, the Steve Levitans, 

they couldn’t force ownership in those...” 

13 The networks are not the only ones doing this. Studios have reduced the number of writer/producers on 

their payrolls as well as a cost-cutting measure.
20

“[T]here’s not a dramatic reduction, but there are fewer [pilots],” according to Littlefield, 

“because the development process is so costly that people have gotten a little more 

conservative about that.” Ted Harbert agreed. “The process hasn’t really changed. Yes, 

there are less pilots made than there were before, because networks are losing money and 

so they’re cutting their budgets so they’re making less pilots.”. So far, the only major 

studio to reduce production dramatically is Twentieth Century Fox, which reduced its 

pilot output by one third in 2002 (Adalian, 2002, p. 8). Recently, there have been 

rumblings in trade publications about producers creating presentations rather than fullblown pilots. However, McPherson attributes this to posturing by the networks rather 

than a change in the process. “[P]resentation just means the networks are going to pay 

less money...But you have to realize with that, it was studios competing to get on the air 

and being deficit entities we’re going to do everything we can, and everything we can 

includes spending more money to make the best show we can because it’s a sales tool. 

So by people saying we’re just going to do presentations that’s just a way of saying we’re 

going to pay less for pilots...When they [the networks] look at their budget rightfully 

they say – let’s [use] fake numbers – they say, ‘Ok, we have 10 million dollars. We’re 

going to do 10 drama pilots. But you know what, we’re going to actually do 12 drama 

pilots but for each of them we’re not going to pay a million dollars, we’re going to pay 

800,000.’”

Rather than spend less on pilots, it seems the networks have become more 

selective in who they give money to. Certainly the cost of production has increased. In 

1988, a half-hour pilot cost between $650,000 and $750,000. A one-hour pilot was more 

than double that amount (Lewine, Eastman and Adams, 1989, p. 148). Now, the cost of a 
21

half-hour sitcom pilot can approach two million dollars. When the relationship is 

important enough, that number can go higher. Warren Littlefield gave me an example of

an outrageously expensive drama pilot. “Well, if you want to be as recent as John Wells’ 

8 o’clock Sunday night, Third Watch, I was told that was a little under 6 million.” Pilots 

have reportedly been created, however, for as much as $10 million (Wild, 1999, p. 76).14

This suggests that while the networks continue to express concern about rising program 

production costs, they are willing to pay for shows that they believe will ultimately make 

them money in the backend. Fewer pilots being produced would mean less access for 

producers, however, there is no clear evidence to date that the number of pilots being 

produced has been significantly reduced. 

One way that program cost issues have clearly affected program selection is the 

acquisition by networks of a financial interest in programming. As mentioned above, 

when networks take a financial interest in a show, they are more able to control the terms 

of renewal. This is true because they are in essence negotiating with themselves and 

therefore will create the most favorable terms possible. A turning point for the way 

networks view the value of ownership and control of programming was the infamous ER

license renewal in 1997. NBC was so desperate to retain this show for the network that 

they ended up paying $13 million per episode. That license fee appears to have 

galvanized the networks in their aversion to shows in which they have no financial 

control. Littlefield explained the networks’ perspective on the importance of ownership 

in the following terms:

Well, the fact of the matter is if you look at the traditional model, the network 

basically rents for a four, five, six, whatever year period, rents a show in the form 

of a license fee. It’s an unacceptable model. Because in the first four years, the 

 

14 UPN reportedly paid this figure for a series called Seven Days.
22

network has all the leverage, you build a monster hit or even a modest hit and the 

lion’s share of the profits come to you at the network. However, you have built 

from nothing this phenomenal asset and then they can turn around and “ER” you. 

And then the shift changes dramatically and you can eliminate all profitability for 

a time period. You can destroy your financial equation and you have no 

participation whatsoever in the lifelong value of the asset when you have done a 

tremendous amount to help create the asset, so it’s just not a model that’s 

acceptable. So what you’re going to see is, not 100% ownership of a schedule at 

a network, but you’re going to see more and more ownership or joint 

ownership...So what you’ll see I think is a lot more joint venture deals. You’ll 

see more long-term protection for networks, so that an ER can’t be repeated. 

There is widespread agreement that the ER deal was a bad one, particularly from 

other producers. According to Dick Wolf, producer of the Law & Order franchise of 

shows, “The ER deal is the worst deal in the history of show business. And if they had 

made it a year earlier, it would have been about 3 million an episode. NBC lost football, 

they lost Seinfeld, and this was a perceived emergency. There’s nothing on television 

worth 13 million an hour” (Longworth, 2000, p.17). 

The ER deal had ramifications beyond just paying such a high fee for one show. 

It affected almost every other show on the network schedule. Tom Fontana, producer of 

Homicide, was forced to reduce the budget on his show to accommodate the ER fee. 

“NBC’s capacity for profit has been basically eliminated. That’s not to say they’re losing 

money, but they’re not making money. I’m told GE has a policy that, if one of the 

companies which it owns doesn’t earn 10 percent profit a year of its budget, then they sell 

that company. Right now, NBC is not going to do that...so they are in the process of 

downsizing...NBC the network airs Homicide, and NBC the studio produces Homicide, 

so I have been asked to try to reduce the budget in the eighth year...” (Longworth, 2000, 

p. 44). Both existing and new shows are affected. 
23

Taking a financial interest in programs has become a way for networks to protect 

themselves against this type of financial hit. Suarez predicted in 1999 that “...it [will] be 

[no] more than a year of two away when the networks own a piece of every show on their 

air. Otherwise people can hold them up for ransom the way ER did. NBC turned that 

show into a hit with the producers and with everyone else, but ended up being the only 

one who had to pay through the nose for it.” He was right. With only limited exceptions, 

all of the networks have some financial stake in the new shows that appear on their air. 

The Impact of Network Ownership on the Decisionmaking Process

The significant factor affecting program selection was not necessarily whether the 

network produces a show themselves, but whether or not they have a financial interest in 

it. The television executives interviewed for this report agreed that networks would 

continue to increase their level of program ownership in the coming years. Some 

producers and executives were surer than others that the networks would require at least a 

piece of every show that appeared on their air. Some thought it was a bad thing and 

others were neutral about it. 

As noted earlier, network executives sometimes have conflicting incentives 

between selecting the “best” show versus selecting the one that will make the network the 

most money. The continued concern about being forced into an ER-type renewal 

situation (i.e. being forced to pay higher license fees on successful shows in the fifth year 

when owned entirely by outside suppliers) plays heavily into the executives’ decision 

making process. Explained Littlefield:

[Y]ou really do have to focus on one level what’s the best show. On another 

level, you have to say, however, it may be the best show, but it could bring about 
24

my extinction or it could be part of my extinction. So you’re constantly fighting 

[selecting the] best product, or how do I get a piece of it or how do I protect 

myself? And that’s the age that we’re in right now...you can create a great, great 

value through network television for the life of the product and enough people 

still want to do that and you can only do that with a network...that’s what the 

networks are good for...to create asset value. So that’s why people are willing to 

say, ‘Hey, we’ll be in business with networks.’ And virtually all the studios are 

open to some form of a sharing of risk and sharing of equity. 

So even while the networks sometimes must decide between best show versus best buy, 

they remain acutely aware of their ability to provide something that no other media 

vehicle can, and that is the ability to create a valuable asset because no medium can 

provide the kind of exposure and promotion that network television does. This is why 

producers are willing to accept the new economic realities. 

As expected, ownership in programming contributes to one program being 

selected over another. It is generally believed that some shows are also being maintained 

on the schedule for longer than they might be if the network did not have an interest in 

the show. Even shows in which the networks did not originally have an interest have 

had their financing restructured to allow the network to become a financial partner in 

order for a show to stay on the air, particularly in that ever-important fifth year. 

NewsRadio is an example of this type of negotiating. Half a season short of syndication, 

the show was going to be cancelled. The producers gave up ten to fifteen percent of their 

syndication profits in order to remain on the air (Stroud, 1998, p. 26). This type of 

“negotiation” concerns production executives like Tony Jonas, president of Warner Bros. 

Television, “ ‘Shakedown’ is probably too strong a word, but they should not have the 

right to insist on ownership just to provide real estate on the airwaves” (Wild, 1999, p.11)

Giving a piece of the show to the network has become a normal way of doing 

business since the repeal of the fin-syn rules, because access to the airwaves depends on 
25

giving the network a financial interest in the program. Sometimes these requirements are 

subtle, like requesting that a producer create their show with their studio’s production 

facilities, and sometimes they are quite blatant – your money or your show. While some 

producers are not happy with this situation, others see partial network ownership as an 

opportunity to improve the show’s chances of getting, or staying, on the air. 

Suarez says it can actually work in the producer’s favor. “We have no problem 

with splitting ownership of a show with a network. It’s the same deal to a producer. I 

don’t care who’s paying us to produce the show. And the backend is the backend to us. 

So actually, I like it because then a network is invested in the show and they have more at 

stake and more reason to put it on...And more reason to keep it on in kind of middling 

success, because it’s harder and harder to launch a show.” Rob Burnett, president of 

Worldwide Pants, an independent production company which produces Ed and 

Everybody Loves Raymond, suggested that network ownership may even help small 

independent producers by sharing start-up production costs. “For us since we are not big 

enough, we are not desirous of deficiting shows ourselves necessarily. If we are not set 

up to deficit and distribute shows we ultimately need a financial partner. So it makes 

more sense for us to get a financer earlier in the process...If we are ultimately going to 

have to invite someone to the party, you might as well invite them to help set up the 

party.”15

The networks have sought and received ownership of programs to varying 

degrees. 

 

15 Interview with Rob Burnett, producer and President of Worldwide Pants (March 22, 2002). All 

subsequent quotations from Burnett are derived from this interview.
26

CBS will have a 91 percent stake in its total network schedule next season, 

representing 23 shows and 20 hours of programming; Fox will have a 72 

percent stake in its total network schedule, or 18 shows representing 13 

hours; ABC will have a 62 percent stake in its total network schedule or 

21 shows representing 19 hours; and NBC will have a 52 percent stake in 

its schedule or 23 shows representing 19 hours next season...UPN has a 

67 percent economic stake in its fall schedule, and AOL Time Warner’s 

WB Network has a 47 percent stake in its schedule. (Mermigas, 2002, p. 

30)

CBS has been very aggressive in requiring that the company have a financial interest in 

all new shows that appear on their air. In the 1999-2000 season every new show on the 

network was partially owned by CBS (“TV Season Preview,” 1999, p. A6). That trend 

has continued. While a few new shows have gotten on the air without the network 

having an equity stake, these shows are the exception. This trend exists at the other 

broadcast networks, but to a lesser extent. ABC, as discussed, combined its Disney 

production division with its ABC programming area in 1999. This was done specifically 

to increase the amount of Disney-owned programming on the ABC schedule, and thus far 

ABC has in fact taken ownership stakes in a larger percentage of shows since that time. 

In 1999, ABC produced only four scripted entertainment programs on its prime time 

schedule. Three years later, it has eleven such shows. NBC is the only network not 

affiliated with a major television production studio. Unlike the other networks, NBC had 

to create its own studio whereas its competitors became integrated through studio 

acquisitions. Because of this, NBC has not been as synergistic as the other networks.

According to Suarez:

There is no set rule, but I think that CBS was certainly incredibly aggressive. 

They own a part of every show that they put on. NBC was incredibly aggressive, 

but had a lot of deals that made it impossible to own, you know the John Wells, 

the Marta Kaufmanns, the Steve Leviathans, they couldn’t force ownership in 

those, but I think they own a good deal of everything else they put on. Which 
27

may work or may not. You know it’s great to own it because the upside is so 

huge and you are spending a lot of time and money to create a hit that you want a 

piece of that backend. I think ultimately at the end of the day in the next few 

years, every network will own a piece of every show that goes on their air and it 

will just become standard. To be on the air at any network, you’re going to give 

up X% of your show...Then people won’t play this game any more. It’s just, 

‘Okay, you’re on with us. We own 50%, you own 50%. Let’s call it a day and 

make a hit.’ And there’s enough profit there for everyone. 

One of the areas most affected by in-house production is the genre of made-forTV movies. It is an area that the networks have been readily able to enter at the expense 

of the independent production companies. Movies that are being produced by outside 

production companies are primarily big-budget miniseries that the networks could never 

afford to produce on their own. In fact, movies have virtually disappeared from the 

network schedule with each network having only one night devoted to this type of longform programming.

Vertical Integration

Relationships with the production community, audience testing, profit motive 

have long been part of the consideration process for network programming executives. 

Vertical integration, however, is a new element in this decision-making process. Vertical

integration exists when a producer of any product owns multiple aspects along the line of 

production. In the case of television networks, they now can own production (creating 

the show), distribution (presenting the show to audiences) and ancillary markets (selling 

the show into syndication). This is only a recent turn of events. With the repeal of the 

fin-syn rules, networks were allowed to produce and own the programming that they 

distributed via their owned and affiliated stations. The market was opened for networks 

to be unlimited in producing their own programming. This led to considerable 
28

consolidation within the industry among producers, networks and syndicators, thus 

vertical integration. Now network executives need to keep these multiple aspects of the 

business in mind when making their program selection. 

The network executives interviewed for this paper were asked if they felt there 

was a difference in the process of developing programming internally versus externally. 

They saw little difference between acquiring programming from an in-house studio 

versus an external source, at least in terms of the actual process. “The selling may be a 

little different, but essentially what you’re always trying to do is package elements,” says 

Littlefield. “We have an idea or they have an idea. Find the writer and then you commit 

to a script. They come in, they lay out the characters, they lay out the story. You 

approve the story. They write a draft. You react to that, you give notes and then you say 

‘let’s try it’.” 

Having multiple perspectives on this process, Harbert agrees with the assessment 

of internal programming selection. “Traditionally, even an in-house operation will come 

in and pitch a show and it’s bought the same way and is selected as a pilot the same way 

and is turned into a series the same way.” 

Currently, ABC, Warner Brothers and News Corp., owner of Fox Broadcasting, 

have a vertically integrated organization whereby a studio and a network report up 

through the same management structure, but operate as separate divisions of the 

respective companies. Stephen McPherson at Touchstone explained it this way, “I think 

vertical integration is both a management thing and a relationship thing, because you can 

vertically integrate an organization and if the people managing those various divisions 

and parts are not working together then it really doesn’t matter. I think you need to make 
29

sure that each of the divisions maintains its autonomy, because I think that’s what makes 

them productive and profitable, so it’s a constant balancing act, [but in terms of the 

selection process] certainly vertical integration makes a difference.”

Vertical integration is seen as eliminating a valuable step in the development 

process. First, developing programming is a creative process. When one entity created 

the programming and another would select it, the two companies would argue and 

disagree and out of those discussions, the show would often be improved. What has 

happened instead, according to Suarez is “...you ended up not pitching internally. You’d 

just develop the shows yourselves.” So, unlike other executives interviewed, Suarez 

stated that the process did favor internal shows and eliminated the much of the 

development process altogether. Producers also stated that this process was detrimental 

to the overall quality of network programming. “I believe the best creative work always 

happens when there is a creative tension,” says Matt Williams. “It used to be, studio 

executives would go into the network and they would fight like hell because they had 

ownership of this show, literal ownership, but also they felt proud about a show and they 

would beat the shit out of the network to get their show. How do you do that when it’s 

the same company? And so what usually happened is out of that tension there was 

always a better show evolving where you challenged each other.” 

Another issue with vertical integration is that objectivity is lost in the selection 

process. While network executives are given incentives to programming the best shows, 

there is the possibility that that incentive is not enough when someone has worked on a 

show himself. “If you put the network person in charge of both sides of the 

fence...developing shows from the studio side and you also have to then choose the 
30

shows as the network person that go on the air, it’s impossible to ask the network person 

to have that much objectivity,” according to Ted Harbert. “To be able to look at the show 

they’ve been developing from the very, very beginning and say ‘Oh, no what I’ve just 

been working on personally, that I’m personally invested in from the very first moment 

with the writer, gee that’s much lousier than the WB’s show. I’m gonna go with the 

WB’s show.’ I just thing it’s a virtually impossible thing to ask the people.” 

Some of these issues may be self-correcting by the market. While Disney 

restructured to be more synergistic that strategy has not proved to be successful for ABC. 

ABC has been unable to retain a network president and they have been going out-ofhouse for their programming. So much so that ABC has entered into a first-look 

agreement with HBO and has begun repurposing Monk, a show that airs first on the USA 

cable network. 

Given vertical integration and the combined network/programming departments, 

all things being equal, an internally produced show is going to get an airing over one in 

which the network does not have an interest. It is also more likely to get a better time 

shot and be kept on the air longer. While it is possible that some shows of lesser quality 

shows are given preference over those produced by outsiders, this is a situation that may 

be self-correcting by the market. Ultimately, the network’s job is to make money and the 

best way to do that is to put on the best shows. Much in the same way that the networks 

overproduced comedies in 1997, they realized that was not in their best interest and 

pulled back production of these shows in subsequent years. Similarly, if producing 

shows internally is not going to make a network profitable, as was the case with ABC, 

producing shows with external entities will be reinstated.
31

Pilot Testing

Once the network has selected the scripts to make into pilots and the pilots have 

been produced, the networks must decide which ones will actually be scheduled for prime 

time. Part of that process is program testing, which has been accused of leading to riskaverse program selecting. “You have to have this star...,” says Paul Haggis. “You have 

to frontload the project, so if it fails someone can point a finger and go well, it had all the 

right earmarkings, it had this actor and this actress and this showrunner and it had a good 

script and so they can report to their bosses that they did everything they could and it still 

failed. Rather than taking a flyer on something with some strange idea with a bunch of 

nobodies in it and if it fails they say oh how could you be so stupid. Oh, I don’t know I 

guess we’re just stupid.” All of this leads to a reliance on research and testing – a 

quantifiable way to justify decisions.

Testing has long been part of the television industry. In Inside Prime Time, Gitlin 

(1983) quotes networks executive in the 1980s who explain that testing is “a tool...which 

should take a back seat to instincts” (Tom Werner, head of prime time programming at 

ABC) and “as one of ten things that feed into a [programming] decision” (Barbara 

Corday, head of comedy development at ABC) (p. 44-45). Producers have complained 

about testing for thirty years (Cantor, 1988, p. 165), and they continue to do so today. 

There are inherent problems with testing methodologies and in this sense, testing for 

television is no different than testing for any other product – people are concerned about 

the impression that their response will have with the person performing the test. Dick 

Wolf provides the following example, “...It’s just like when I’ll Fly Away was the second 
32

highest testing pilot in five years because, if you call up a bunch of people on a cable test 

and ask, ‘Would you watch a show every week about the civil rights movement in the 

sixties?’ what do you think people are going to say? ‘No, I’m a racist, I have no interest 

in watching that’? Of course they’re going to say ‘yes’ but nobody watched.” 

(Longworth, 2000, p.16).

The difference now versus ten or twenty years ago is that testing methods have 

become more sophisticated. In years past, the network would rent an auditorium and 

invite people off the street to view and evaluate a particular pilot. This type of audience 

testing has largely been replaced by cable testing in which programs are sent to test 

subjects’ homes through their cable box. Cable testing is considered superior to 

“auditorium” testing because the programming is viewed in its “natural” setting and 

because larger numbers of people are included in the testing sample, which make the 

numbers more statistically significant. It does still have its flaws. First, viewers are 

seeing the show without any pre-publicity. Second, viewers are only seeing the show 

once. If a concept is new or different, this type of testing, as with previous methods, will 

tend to have that show test badly. Harbert explains the process, “Cable testing...we put 

out a show to 15 markets and call up and recruit 30 families a market and get 450 

families to watch a show and then they’re called immediately afterwards...but the big 

fallacy in that is that not a show goes on the air now without at least a half-million dollars 

of marketing put into it where the audience is prepared for what they are going to see. 

The shows shown on cable testing they’re seeing them cold and again if the show has 

any, a lot of edges anything too different or unusual the audience will be sort of caught 
33

off guard and say, ‘I don’t like that,’ but when they get used to what they’re seeing after, 

then they can grow to love it and again those become the biggest hits.”

Networks also use focus groups to supplement cable testing when assessing 

programming. These are groups of 10 to 12 people selected specifically because they fit 

a demographic profile of the program’s target audience and who are asked questions 

about the show and asked to evaluate it after having viewed a pilot. Rob Burnett 

explained the problem with this research methodology. 

It does is have a terrible averaging effect on what they put on television and what 

is misleading about it, I believe, is if you have a group of people and you go 

around the room and rate the show 1-10, and if everyone rates the show a 6, 

there’s your rating. And then you have another show, where 3 people rate it a 10 

and 7 people rate it a 0, that rating is a 3 basically for those 10 people in the room 

and that 3 won’t get on the air. But the truth is, a show that can get 3 people to 

give it a 10 can be very powerful, because that is a 30 share and you have 3 

people that are very passionate about the show and the other people hate the 

show, it doesn’t matter. There’s the other show where everyone is getting 5’s and 

6’s, no one is going to watch the show, because no one cares about the 

show...you know its kind of like if you think of everyone in your house, all 

twenty people in your house and you have to decide what to get for food, and 

everyone is going to vote and you have to pick something that everyone likes, you 

know that you are never going to get the crazy Vietnamese-Thai food, that’s never 

going to happen. You are always going to get pizza, every time, and I think that’s 

what happens here. 

The testing story of Seinfeld is well known in the industry. Seinfeld was one of 

the worst testing shows ever. Due to the willingness of network executives to consider 

factors other than audience testing results, Seinfeld was picked up by NBC and went on to 

be one of the most successful shows in the history of television. Nonetheless, examples 

like this generally have not tempered network executives’ dependence on testing in 

program selection decisions. 
34

Research has been called the lamppost to the drunk. It is something that network 

executives can lean on to justify their decisions. When large sums of money are at stake 

executives tend to rely on research to validate their decisions. This over-reliance on 

testing has been criticized as one of the culprits to making network executives more risk 

averse and relying on old, accepted program formulas. 

Changes in the Syndication Marketplace

Increasing numbers of channels competing with broadcast networks has only 

increased the financial pressure on networks. One consequence of this financial pressure 

has been to move programs into syndication more quickly than ever before. Syndication 

has traditionally been a major source of profits for owners of hit television shows. 

Syndication of a program was generally delayed until the show had run for approximately 

five years or when there were 200 episodes. This was done in part to avoid siphoning 

viewers from the network airing and in part to have enough shows in the can to be able to 

strip it during the week. Since syndication is where money is made, the networks are 

becoming less concerned with this potential conflict and opting to monetize their 

investment in programming more quickly than in years past. As a result, networks have 

begun selling shows into broadcast and cable outlets at the same time even at the risk of 

reducing viewership of newly-produced episodes of that show. 45 Ted Harbert explains 

what happened with Home Improvement. “Now networks...can’t wait to get a show that 

they have into syndication to a fault. They want them out there so quickly to try and reap 

some revenue, but possibly to the detriment of the show that’s still on their prime time 

 

45 One exception to this has been Law & Order, which saw increased ratings on the network after it began 

airing in syndication on the cable channel, A&E.
35

schedule. I mean the studies prove that once a show that’s on the air goes into 

syndication the network ratings come down. The best example, I think, is Home 

Improvement, which is a show that a lot of kids and teens watch. And when it was on the 

air in syndication at 7 o’clock, there was no reason for parents to let their kids watch it 

again at 8 o’clock or even when it was at 9 o’clock, actually it was at 9 o’clock then. 

Kids used to beg to stay up and to watch Home Improvement when it was on at 9. When 

it went into syndication, parents could say, ‘Okay you saw it already tonight. Go to bed.’ 

And that hurt the show.” 

Shows are no longer on a timetable when it comes to syndication. As McPherson 

explained it to me, a show goes into syndication “whenever that distribution entity feels 

that it can take advantage of the asset in the most productive way.” That “most 

productive way” is changing due to the proliferation of television outlets. “There’s 200 

channels, 800 channels, if you get DirecTV, there’s many more choices and there’s less 

of a value to a lot of the programming that used to make up a lot of that air time. There’s 

just much more stuff being done. Disney channel produces for itself. They’re not going 

to take reruns of a family sitcom. As you have this proliferation of choices, there’s still 

going to be a great syndication market for Friends or Seinfeld, but there’s going to be less 

of a market for a lower level hit, mid-range show that people feel like, ‘Well, rather than 

pay syndication money for that, I’ll produce my own.’” This means that syndication may 

not be the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow that it used to be. Paul Simms, producer 

of NewsRadio, “[T]here are so many more channels, but there are also so many more 

sitcoms now. You make your money back, and you make a good amount of money, but 

it’s not the huge jackpot payoff it used to be. That’s going to affect the business. It used 

 
36

to be production companies could say that ten flops are worth it to get one hit; it’s 

getting to be more like it’s worth four or five flops to get one hit” (Wild, 1999, p.29).

In addition to accelerating the traditional point for selling programming into 

syndication, networks are attempting to reap more immediate financial benefits on shows 

they own by repurposing them on cable networks. Repurposing refers to airing episodes 

of network programming on another channel within a few days after its initial broadcast 

network airing. An example of this is Alias. This program is produced by Touchstone, 

airs on ABC on Sunday night and repeats later in the week on ABC Family. Fox also did 

this with 24 when it aired its original show on a Tuesday night and then repeated that 

same episode twice on the FX channel within one week of its initial broadcast airing. 

What has made the selection process different how versus during the time of finsyn is plain and simple economics. The marketplace is more complex. Production is 

more expensive. Syndication is more uncertain. Audiences are more fragmented. The 

networks are doing what they can to make money within a very volatile business 

environment. It appears that their programming decisions reflect the constant tension 

between selecting and airing the best programming and selecting the programming that 

will make the most money for the network. 

How Producers Stay in the Game 

In the changing marketplace of program selection, producers have had to become 

more creative in the way they do business. In many cases this has meant being aligned 

with a major studio or with a broadcast network, particularly since they are becoming – if 

have not already become – one and the same thing. This aids in getting a show produced 
37

and ultimately on the air. As explained by Warren Littlefield, these deals can be 

structured in a variety of ways.

There’s all kinds of deals. Let’s go to some examples...20th Century Fox 

Studios pays [David Kelley] a lot of money to have the distribution 

worldwide and the joint ownership with David Kelley of all of his 

television. David Kelley has series on ABC, CBS, and Fox. So their 

strategy has not been exclusivity. Their strategy has been...they would go 

out and sell a couple of series deals here and a series deal there and they 

spread it around....Bochco had the opposite concept. He had a deal at 20th

Century Fox for many years just like David Kelley, only he would go in 

and tie up exclusively with a network. Originally with NBC, then with 

ABC and then with CBS...He’s very frustrated by the stuff he put on 

CBS, that it didn’t get treated differently and Bochco decided to go to a 

studio and he’s not, it would seem now, making an overall network deal, 

so he’s going to spread it around. He’s going to do it more like Kelley at a 

new studio, Paramount... it’s safe to say with someone like Bochco, of his 

caliber, that it’s a joint venture. They’re probably 50/50 partners. And 

that gives him a very healthy initial deal to come to the studio and it gives 

him heavy ownership in what he creates. 

Paul Haggis, again, is affiliated with CBS and not with an independent studio. He 

explained his experience with CBS on a show he produced called Family Law. “I sold 

the concept to CBS, I said, ‘Here is what I want to do,’ the head of drama development 

and I talked it back and forth. He said, ‘That’s a great idea. Where do you want to do it?’ 

I said, “Let’s do it at Columbia. They’re good people.” And so I took it to Columbia and 

they said, “Great. Let’s do it.” And then Columbia and CBS got together and said this 

should be a Columbia and CBSP, or CBS Productions, co-production, and that was 

without my input. I didn’t disagree, but that’s a studio and network decision. I’m a profit 

participant, I’m an owner of the show, but I’m not, I don’t know the copyright. 

Producers sign it over to the studios and the studios, in this case, co-sign it over to the 

network.”
38

Most producers are now aligned with a major studio or a network. As discussed 

here and in other sections, this does not appear to be problematic from the perspective of 

producers interviewed for this paper. It has meant an added level of security in having a 

vested financial partner early in the process. While there is no guarantee that these 

relationships will lead to a show being put on the air, being with a studio/network 

provides some added security that a show will be picked up particularly if the network 

has a financial stake in the show. 

Once the Show is on the Air

In addition to the selection process, the FCC was concerned about the level of 

network involvement in a show once it was on the air. Executives and producers 

uniformly agreed that established producers were left alone by the networks. They also 

agreed that young talent (when they could get in the door) was heavily managed by the 

networks. Littlefield gave an example of what happens before a show gets on the air. 

“When Will & Grace was pitched, we had made a deal. I made a deal at NBC Studios for 

Mutchnick and Cohen [Will & Grace’s producers]... And so they came in and pitched 

this huge ensemble of characters and kind of over in the far right-hand corner were the 

Will and Grace characters. And so what I said to them is ‘Well, take those characters, 

forget all these other people, take these two characters over here in the corner and put 

them in the center and you’ve got a show’... over several meetings and discussions where 

they came back and refocused the idea, pitched it out again, then wrote a draft, did a 

couple of re-writes, finally there was a piece of material that I felt was strong enough to 
39

go forward. So then I sent it around to everybody else at the network, let them freak out 

because we’re putting gay characters on the air and then eventually we made it.”

Little has changed in terms of the network involvement in the creative process 

once a show gets on the air. Cantor (1988) described how the network involvement 

worked in the 1960s and early 70s. For new shows, a network executive would sit in on 

story conferences, scripts would be reviewed by the network censor and the show was 

viewed for final approval (Cantor, p. 122). On the other hand, highly rated shows or 

shows with competent producers were exempt from network supervision (Cantor, p. 127). 

Now, the story is very much the same. Once a show is on the air, the network executives 

were in agreement that many shows needed network oversight. 

The amount of network supervision was dependent upon the experience of the 

producer. Again, Littlefield explains:

It varies tremendously based upon who you’re in business with...[T]hink of it as a 

...chart that went from 1 foot tall to 6 feet tall and you have all types of sizes in 

between, 1 being they’re very young, they’re very inexperienced, they need a lot 

of help and a lot of supervision, then they get a lot of that. That can also be 

termed interference. But the fact of the matter is there’s a lot of people out there, 

because there are so many networks, because there’s such a drain on talent who 

don’t fully know what they’re doing and they haven’t had the training. And 

you’re paying them enormous amounts of money every week and so they get a lot 

of involvement where stories have to be approved, directors have to be approved, 

guest casting has to be approved, every draft is gone through, runthroughs, there’s 

a lot of network and/or studio intervention. Or, there’re people like Kaufman 

Bright Crane [producers of Friends and Veronica’s Closet] who are extremely... 

competent showrunners. They know what they want to do and probably the 

greatest thing, with a Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld, the greatest thing you can 

do is get out of their way. You know, I mean I think our greatest input ever on 

the Seinfeld show was: you need a girl. Okay? We looked at the pilot, it’s funny. 

Get a girl. Okay? That was our contribution. That and we didn’t fuck it up. We 

kept it going. 

Ted Harbert’s experiences at ABC reflect those of Littlefield at NBC. “There are 

a lot of producers who have shows on the air that aren’t very good, both the shows aren’t 
40

very good and the producers aren’t very good. It requires a lot of network involvement to 

try to help that producer find out what their shows about, find out how to tell a story that 

makes sense, and really help in just about every area of the show. There are other shows, 

like NYPD Blue or The Practice from David Kelley and Steven Bochco, where there’s no 

network involvement needed at all, because those people are incredibly competent and 

not only are not looking for network involvement, but also don’t need it because they’re 

that good. It goes from 0 to 100...[U]nfortunately we live in this business where we eat 

up so much volume, we invite a lot of hacks into the room to put on shows that need a lot 

of editorial restraint and oversight.” 

McPherson offers a similar view on the extent of creative input by network 

executives: 

I think it depends on the relationship with the exec producer, frankly,” says 

McPherson. “I think in some shows they’re [the network is] incredibly involved 

and in other shows they’re not...There’s only so much a network or a studio 

executive can impact on a show if you haven’t hired someone who has a vision 

that they can execute on a week in week out basis. There are very few shows you 

could point to – I couldn’t point to one – where it isn’t driven by a singular 

creative personality who has a vision for the show or a team in Larry David and 

Jerry Seinfeld, that is executing it day in and day out. Can you help it with promo 

and make sure they’re getting seen? Yes. Can you help with casting? Sure. Can 

you make sure that the story lines are going in the right direction or what you 

perceive is the right direction? Yes. But in the end it’s about those people doing 

the shows and that’s why they are such valuable assets. And they are few and far 

between, unfortunately.

From the producer’s perspective the networks are involved in programming on 

two levels: oversight by a programming executive and review by the network’s 

“standards and practices” group.16 The producers expect the networks to be involved by 

providing notes at table readings. “You always have your point person,” says Matt 

 

16 The Standards and Practices area of the network reviews scripts and final shows to make sure that they 

adhere to the network’s requirements in terms of language, sexual content, etc.
41

Williams. “You always have your executive that comes to the readings. It’s not your 

president of the network or anything, and they make suggestions and they give script 

notes and I’m, at least we have always made it a policy, we are political and rightfully so. 

You listen to all notes and then you go off and if you hear a good idea fine and good. But 

there was no one who ever came in and said you must do this, you MUST change this.” 

Says Haggis, 

Well, you know you have a different set of people developing the pilot and then 

the people who are going to supervise the series on the network level. So your 

current department takes over after about the sixth episode or so...And it all 

depends [on] the personality of the man or woman at the top as to how they 

supervise those shows and how much they trust the writer/producer...We had 

fairly light input as far as criticism, as far as ‘Don’t do that story,’ and when we 

did hear ‘Don’t do that story,’ it was usually because another series was doing a 

similar story that week and so they didn’t want two stories about abortion. One 

on our show on Monday and one on Judging Amy on Tuesday, or any of the other 

of their shows. And then we would argue and if we got into a really touchy area 

and we did three or four times on Family Law, we’d argue it out. It would be 

either myself and the head of current programming, or myself and the president of 

the network, would sit down and they would say, ‘No, we don’t think this is 

appropriate.’ And usually that was an intelligent sort of passionate meeting in 

which we were discussing is this responsible television or is this not. 

Rob Burnett explained it this way:

T]he network has the control, they in the most classic sense are the client, 

and we are the producers, the sellers. The client has to be satisfied...The brightest 

and best network executives are ones that understand at its core, the writers and 

producers of a show will have to guide the show and they stay back and can make 

helpful suggestions... if you think of a doctor and a patient, I think the writers are 

the doctors and the networks are the patients. And the patients can say, I feel this 

way, I feel that way, but they don’t really know how to be doctors. So, they can 

be very useful in sort of suggesting things to the doctor but they haven’t been to 

medical school...What makes it very complicated and where I am very 

sympathetic to the network is most of the doctors out there are pretty bad, and 

they are key in this analogy, so I think that they are well within their rights to be 

very hands on and panicky sometimes, because I have seen first hand a lot of the 

people that are in charge of these massive productions and they are not very 

qualified to do it, so it’s a very difficult dance honestly, but the most successful 

shows on television, I believe, are ones where you get the right writer, the right 

casting, and it happens.
42

It is rare, however, that a network will ask someone to pull a show or drastically 

change a script concept, although it does happen. Tom Fontana had the following 

experience while working on Homicide:

The only time I can think of where I pulled a script that we were going to 

shoot was we had done a story about a SIDS death: it was based on a true 

story about a woman who had had a number of her children die, and they 

were supposedly SIDS deaths, but the truth was she had murdered them. 

Roz Weinman, who is the head of broadcast standards, called me and she 

said, “Listen, I’m asking you not to do this story, not because I think 

you’ve done it badly, but because, for parents whose children have 

actually died of SIDS, it’s such a painful thing to have gone through, that 

to then have a show with the kind of clout that Homicide has, implying 

that they might have killed their child.” She said, “I don’t think you really 

want to do that to these parents.” And when she said that, I said, “You’re 

absolutely right.” And I pulled the story. But that was the only reason I 

did it. What was great about it was that Roz and I fight all the time about 

everything, and I mean everything! And it was the only time she called 

me not out of a concern for the advertisers or the lobbyists or anything like 

that. She was coming at it from the same place that I like to think that I 

come at my writing from, which is the human heart. And I couldn’t not do 

it. (Longworth, 2000, p. 48)

Paul Haggis had a similar story from an episode of Family Law:

There was, I remember we wanted to do an episode about a woman who was 

alleging discrimination because she’d had a double mastectomy and was suing her 

employers because of that. And this woman had been sort of pushed to the edge 

and there was a scene in which she stands and she rips her blouse open, because 

they’re accusing her of doing this for cosmetic reasons. She rips her blouse open 

and she says, ‘Do you think I would do this for cosmetic reasons?’ Now, so we 

went back and forth on that. It was a very powerful scene and we’d had this 

prosthetic chest made for the actress which was exactly accurate as to what this 

would be. Do we show it? Do we not show it? So we ended up not showing it. I 

felt very passionately that we should. The president of the network felt very 

passionately that we shouldn’t. Not because of the reasons that you think. But 

because she didn’t think it was responsible. She thought it might scare other 

women off from getting life saving operation...It wasn’t ‘Oh don’t do that’ 

because of some salacious reason or ...’Do something because it’s going to get us 

ratings.’ They weren’t coming to me for those reasons. They were coming for 

good solid reasons and you have to respect that input.
43

Even ER gets notes from the network:

Sure, [the network may ask us to change] language,” says John Wells, the show’s 

producer. “Not so much with story line, occasionally, but that usually has to do 

with health care issues. On ER it’s because they’re concerned that we in some 

odd way provide a lot of health care information to the viewing audience more 

than anybody else does. So they’ll get concerned if they think we’re not being 

balanced in a portrayal of a health care situation. But, sure, on language...The 

network, they’re genuinely concerned about how far can they push it and not lose 

advertising. And, at the same time, knowing that you could get beat to death on 

the other side by cable and by what other people are putting on the air. So they’re 

very conscious of it. It’s not just ‘Oh, we won’t let you do this because we’re 

prudish’; it’s ‘How far can we push it to compete with cable, and at the same time 

not alienate advertisers and some audiences?’ (Longworth, 2000, p. 134-5)

In all of these cases, the network input was from a point of sensitivity to the audience 

rather than advertiser or ratings concerns. 

From the producer’s perspective, similar to that of the network executives, 

network participation is different depending on how well established the producer is in 

the business and how well the show is doing. “It depends on how successful the show 

is,” according to Matt Williams. “I’ll give you an example. When I was a 

writer/producer on the Cosby show, no one said a word. In fact, I think we saw the 

network show up once, maybe, and that was usually for a party, so there was no 

involvement. With Roseanne, the same thing. There was some minor involvement early 

hon, saying shouldn’t the stories be a little stronger...so at the beginning and this was not 

imposed, it was suggested, a little bit more traditional story plotting and ok, we listened, 

but little involvement... If a show’s working, they’re all smart enough to keep their 

mouths shut and just stand back and let it go...Ironically, on our series that failed, there 

was much more involvement. ‘Can’t you emphasize this more? Can you bend the story 

lines more in this direction?’ And I think that usually happens, and this is where I’ll take 

some of the blame, it usually happens if you don’t have a really clear, specific premise 
44

for your series. If you don’t know exactly what the show is about and what it’s going to 

do for 200 episodes, that’s when the network will come in...” 

As Littlefield explained earlier, the networks do have final say on a lot of areas 

including selection of directors, script review and casting. However, the network input is 

dependent on the relationship with the producer and most things are negotiable. Suarez 

says, “The answer is...it’s a marriage. You don’t always do everything they want. They 

don’t always do everything we want. Good network executives don’t try and dictate. 

They understand it’s a process, an evolution...it’s not cut and dry...do you get a note 

from a network saying kill off this character? No, no network is going to be that 

invasive...”

Many producers I spoke with and several that have been quoted in other sources 

have touted the advantages of producing for cable or one of the newer networks because 

of the “freedom” that these entities afford a producer. However, Steven Bochco, 

producer of NYPD Blue and Hill Street Blues among others, explains how this is not a 

panacea either, “Anytime you’re in business with an entity that has ‘above the line’ 

creative controls, it means, in theory at least, you cannot hire an actor without their 

approval. You cannot hire a director without their approval. You cannot hire a writer 

without their approval. They have control over final cuts of all your product. So, on the 

one hand you’re gaining tremendous latitude on the page, but you’re giving up a 

tremendous amount of creative control on the other side of it. So, you know, I’m not sure 

that’s such a great bargain, quite honestly” (Longworth, 2000, p. 201).

It is inevitable that the networks will be involved in the creative process at some 

level. They are paying for the show. They are promoting the show. However, as many 
45

of the producers said, they are also working to put on the best show they can – their jobs 

depend on it. They hire the best people to do the job that they can and let them do it. 

There are, however, different levels of competence among producers. Both the network 

executives and independent producers concur that the level of network involvement 

seems to correlate with the level of experience that the producer has. The more 

experience, the less network involvement.

Blanding the landscape

The real issue is what appears on our television screens. Many have accused the 

networks of putting on bland, uninteresting and uninspired programming. While some 

suggest that the new verticalization of networks and program production is at fault, there 

are other aspects of the network television business that contribute to what some see as 

suboptimal quality programming. These factors include: (1) a class of middle managers 

at television networks whose incentives steer them toward less risky, more formulaic 

programming; (2) a greater reliance on decisionmaking-by-committee; and (3) the 

introduction of marketing and advertising concepts, specifically the need to create new 

shows for an advertiser-friendly demographic, into the program selection process. 

Persons interviewed for this report indicate that these factors also play a meaningful role 

in the programming that networks decide to air. 

With respect to the role of middle managers at television networks, some critics 

say that the changing structure of the television industry has led to network downsizing 

and therefore fewer middle-level executives with more at stake. The remaining middle 

managers are more afraid of losing their jobs and also continue to face the increased 
46

financial pressure discussed earlier.17 Neither network executives nor producers had 

anything particularly positive to say about this group of middle managers, though this is 

nothing new. In the eighties when the network hierarchy was more bureaucratic, these 

executives had the same sort of mentality. 

More layers in the hierarchy means more executives with the power to say no, 

and the proliferation of that power means more executive involvement at 

every stage of decision-making and program production. ‘There is a curious 

corporate principle,’ according to Len Hill, ‘that says a person with a vicepresident’s title will find enough work to fill the day. There’s a producer’s 

axiom: Beware of networks that have too many vice-presidents.” Many 

producers share this lament (Gitlin, 1983, p. 129). 

Most participants felt that programming executives, while not necessarily uncreative, 

were too afraid of losing their jobs to make any type of risky decision. As in the past, 

they considered this a contributing factor to the blanding of the TV landscape. Harbert 

talks about it this way, “[T]here are also a lot of shows that have too much oversight that 

don’t need it, so that the idea of the network and studio bureaucracies growing to the 

point where there are just so many people involved in the process that’s just 

counterproductive.... it’s very difficult when there’s a lot of pressure on their jobs to 

turn the profitability around, so unfortunately a lot of people interpret that as meaning 

they have to go increase their involvement. They have to stay on top of it more and give 

more notes. Well, that will just have an inverse relationship to what they’re trying to 

achieve [good programming].”

Paul Haggis explained the mentality of network programming executives this 

way: 

I think as long as you have smart people running the networks you’re always, 

they’re always going to try and do great programming. Nobody sits down to do 

bad programming, or create a bad show and you always try to get the best writers, 

the best actors. It’s just the decisions. You know when you actually decide, sit 

 

17 Of the four major broadcast networks, only NBC and CBS turned a profit last year.
47

down behind closed doors and say this one goes, this one doesn’t...The business 

is shrinking, and people are working more out of fear. There are fewer daring 

network executives. That’s not true. There are, Moonves [Leslie Moonves, 

chairman of CBS], there’s no man I admire more than Moonves. Great guy. He’s 

a straight talker and he really loves taking chances. Whether he can or not, 

something like EZ Street he says he loves the show, I’ll program nothing but this. 

They’re not watching what do I do? The answer would be keep it on anyway and 

they’ll come to you. You hope that they’ll still do that. They certainly did it with 

Homicide and a few other shows. That’s becoming, that’s a story you don’t hear 

as often.

 

It is not just middle managers that are the issue. More and more programming 

selection is done by committee. “A television program is selected to go on a network 

schedule through a committee process,” says Ted Harbert, “A low level executive buys 

the idea and tells them to go write a script. A script is written. The president of the 

entertainment division and their staff read all the scripts and decide which pilots to make. 

The pilots are produced, the pilots are screened for all levels of management at the 

network including Los Angeles management and New York management. This includes 

the sales department, the research department, affiliate relations department and overall 

network and corporate management. Then, depending on the network, a committee gets 

together and decides which pilots are chosen to become series and announced for a fall 

schedule.” It is no longer creative people that have input into the decision, but also sales, 

marketing and other network departments. 

Marketing came up as an issue with a number of people that I spoke with. While 

producers used the word marketing, what they meant was advertising – that is creating a 

show with a particular, advertiser-friendly audience in mind. Some producers said they 

would not produce a show for a demographic or a time slot and that the networks did not 

ask them to. “Your agents or your people or your people or your advisors are always 

saying they’re looking for an 8 o’clock show or they’re looking for a 10 o’clock show or 
48

whatever I’ve never, they never come to me and say that, but that’s what I hear from 

other writers,” says Haggis. “No, it’s hard enough finding a good idea. And, if you 

happen to find one that fits a teen audience or you happen to find one that fits geriatrics if 

it works, you pitch what’s in your soul...and then you hope it’s going to fit.” 

Others, however, admitted to trying to create shows for a particular time slot or a 

particular audience and most of them failed miserably. Matt Williams commented on his 

attempts to do this, “Thunder Alley. Buddies. And these were short-lived series. Not 

that we didn’t make some creative mistakes. I’m not passing any blame here. But it truly 

was, ‘OK, this is the approximate time slot, this is the kind of demographics they’re 

looking for. Let’s create a show for that.’ And I learned pretty quickly – at least from my 

perspective, I’m not talking as a marketing expert or advertising or any of that part of the 

industry, I’m talking purely as a creative individual, it never worked.” The advertising 

structure does affect the content in so far as it promotes lesser quality programs to fit a 

preconceived idea.

Overall, however, there does not appear to be any consensus about the state of the 

television landscape – some of it is very good and some of it is not. Rob Burnett 

described it best when he called it polarized. “I think some of the shows, particularly the 

one-hour shows are frightfully good. You look at shows like The West Wing, Law & 

Order. I think those shows in quality you can put up against a lot of feature films...I 

think on the comedy side some of them, like Raymond and some others, are also very, 

very impressive. And then there is a lot of stuff that is horrible, just really, really 

horrible.” Stephen McPherson had a similar sentiment, though he was more positive 

about the landscape overall: 
49

I think it’s really underrated. If you look at the quality of both comedy and drama 

work that is done week in week out on television...between West Wing and Law 

& Order and The Practice and ER and Alias...There’s really good drama 

work...Comedy wise, Will & Grace is as funny as any movie that I’ve seen lately 

and great romantic comedy. I think in the family genre, My Wife and Kids and 

Raymond are doing as good funny work as is out there. The thing is, television 

constantly gets berated for its quality, and it’s such a vast market that by the 

nature of that there’s just going to be crap out there. What happens is that things 

succeed and then people try to imitate them and those usually fail. But the new 

stuff, the stuff that sets new kind of boundaries, those things succeed. People are 

bitching now about reality. Do we have too much? Well, yeah, we do have too 

much because we have reincarnations or copycats of two things in Millionaire and 

Survivor that were fresh and new and interesting and incredibly entertaining and 

then everyone tried to do their version of it. And that doesn’t work. 

It is this repackaging of successes that some say leads to the blanding of the 

landscape. It is a risk averse strategy the film industry uses as well, for example, Rocky 4 

and 5. That, however, does not mean there is not good television out there. It’s just not 

all great. “I think it’s not as good as it was a few years ago, but not as bad as it was many 

years ago,” says Paul Haggis. “I think we really had some wonderful shows appear over 

the last 20-30 years and this was the second Golden Age of television for a while. It was 

some really great, great shows and I couldn’t wait to watch. I don’t see as many of them 

as I used to...There’s still some great shows on, but they tend to be shows that have been 

on -- NYPD Blue, Law & Order, shows that have been on for some time...I couldn’t give 

you 1 to 10 [rating], because I don’t know what 1 is or 10 is, but I think it could be better. 

It doesn’t stink.”

Conclusion
50

While the program development process – creating a needs assessment, 

communicating to the Hollywood community what the network’s needs are, committing 

to scripts and pilots – has not changed, the program selection process has. This process 

has been most affected by the change in the structure of the television industry, which has 

changed the economics of the industry. With increased consolidation has come 

increased alignment of producers with large studios or with the networks themselves. 

With changes in regulation, there has been the corresponding increase in network 

participation in the programming on their air, either through in-house production or their 

profit participation with outside suppliers. 

No one seems particularly pleased with the current system and several 

participants expressed concerned about the effect of the current system on program 

content. Producers are concerned about their ability to produce the kind of shows they 

would like to produce. Some, like Matt Williams, are leaving television and are working 

in film instead. Others, such as Paul Haggis, are frustrated with the system and are 

working in both television and film. Haggis explains why he is working in multiple 

arenas: 

The landscape has changed a lot and I’m still pitching television shows. I still 

have multiple 13 commitments. I still love television. I still want to do it, but the 

landscape has radically changed...[with] the market share dropping the networks 

seem to be more conservative in what kind of programming they want to 

choose...You want to sell to the widest possible audience and my stuff tends to 

be, when I’m doing my best, work that can upset some people, or at least 

challenge some people...A long, long time ago, television was where you could do 

the brave work, the cutting edge stuff and films were where you did 

megahits...Things have sort of shifted in Hollywood where things are happening 

in films, the independent films have really come into their own in the last 15 years 

and they’re doing more and more interesting films out there and less and less 

interesting television. Not that great television isn’t still being done. There’s 

terrific television being done, but it’s much harder to get it on the air. Where it 

used to be I’d pitch one idea over the phone and sell it, now I’m pitching four or 
51

five ideas before they find something that I’m happy with that they’re happy with, 

so we can go ahead on a series. 

Independent producers’ desire to produce programming that is different or risky 

or in any way out of the ordinary is not new. One producer in the 1960s said, “...they 

wanted the series to go a certain way and I another, so they let me out of my contract 

because I like to do things my way” (Cantor, 1988, p. 128). Established producers were 

often shut out in the 1980s as well. Herb Brodkin, a producer of both series and 

miniseries, claimed that only about ten percent of his ideas ever got on air (Gitlin, 1983, 

p. 122). 

 Network executives are concerned, however, about the product becoming 

homogenized because of program selection by committee. Ted Harbert offers a simple 

formula for networks to improve their programming:

I would just throw everybody else out of the room. I think it should be the head 

of the company, the head of the entertainment division and one or two of his or 

her trusted executives and not a gang...I would let the research department do 

their research, but I wouldn’t let them participate in the process, because they all 

too often say a show will never work...That also goes for the sales department, 

the affiliate relations department, all these departments and that say oh, no my 

constituency won’t like that or will like that. What that ends up doing is bringing 

in so many voices into the system that it takes all the, it rounds out the selection 

process so that you have homogenization. Anything with extremes ends up being 

eliminated and mostly safe shows...what I call nice shows, nothing wrong with 

them, but also nothing right with them and to me that’s the other, besides 

technology the other contributing factor to the erosion...[O]nly when a 

programming chief stands up and says this is what we’re doing do shows that end 

up really mattering, doing well get on the air. And often when the head of 

programming will take the chance and say thank you all very much for your input, 

forget it this is what I want to do, those are the decisions that have led to the most 

successful programs.

 

Suarez agreed, “[T]he problem becomes when they’re letting the marketing 

department or the sales department have an equal say in the decision when they’re not, 

when they’re not the ones who were involved in the process. Anyone who worked on 
52

Mr. Rhodes [a show NBC owned] could tell you O.K, that show’s never going to make it. 

We don’t have the writing staff, we don’t have a lead actor, I don’t care how it tests, 

there’s no show there. It’s all smoke and mirrors... we tricked you, but we knew we 

tricked you and we can’t do that 22 weeks and that’s where the system fails...We fixed 

the pilot. You can’t do that every week.... And so it went on, and it stayed on for I think 

18 episodes and was a failure. And cost the company a lot of money.”

Harbert continued by summing up the state of the business as he saw it , “The 

history of broadcasting, and film for that matter, has always rested on the idea that you 

need a diverse source of ideas to come up with a good schedule. And only being rather 

focused on picking the best and not letting anything else get in the way is what’s led to 

successful, profitable schedules. Because of the change in the share levels, because of all 

the erosion and therefore the loss of profitability...and costs continuing to rise they’re 

searching around for ways to get back profitability....I’m not a big fan of vertical 

integration, but frankly no one cares what I think anymore about that and they’re going to 

do it anyway, so I might as well go join them. There’s not a lot of choices.”

From the perspective of the FCC and the repeal of fin-syn, the issue is what are 

the networks doing in terms of their relationships with producers vis-à-vis their powerful 

position as gatekeeper to the American viewing audience. Are they demanding financial 

interest in the programs that appear on their air? The answer is yes. Are they giving 

preference to shows that are produced in house? Again, the answer is yes. Are the 

networks involved in the creation of the shows once they are accepted for air? Here the 

answer is a qualified yes. They are involved, but not to the point of telling producers 

what to write and not write. As shown in our companion paper analyzing historical 
53

changes in diversity over time, there is no evidence that changes in the fin-syn rules have 

affected program diversity on broadcast network television. Whether increased network 

involvement in the production and ownership of television programming has affected the 

“quality” or other attributes of network programming is less clear. This paper is intended 

to advance the debate on program diversity, and perhaps even program quality, by 

explaining the network program selection process by relying on the insights of 

experienced network executives and independent producers. 
54

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