And yet more GSN

Sorry for the obsession with our little game show network. But the GSN boards are buzzing right now with a rumor that Amy Davis' appointment as programming chief means bizarre departures from traditional game shows. The rumors are based solely on the word of one poster, who says he's relying on three unidentified "sources."

Who knows? He may be right. But I'm skeptical, as I posted in reply...

And so far the only "sources" we have for all these rumors about GSN's future are three unnamed people mentioned by one poster, whose negative opinions about the network are well known. Those three unnamed people might be Moe, Larry and Curly for all we know.

In fact, the percentage of pre-1990 material on GSN may well continue to go down, as it has throughout the network's history. That's only to be expected as the years go by and newer acquisitions and originals accumulate. But these rumors about wild departures from traditional game shows and the complete elimination of older game shows are based on nothing more than the word of one poster, supposedly relying on three completely unidentified "sources."

And the rumors directly contradict what has recently happened and continues to happen on the network. The percentage of pre-1990 material has actually increased lately with the addition of five more hours of Pyramid. Improv-a-Ganza and Love Triangle have been almost eliminated from the schedule. Baggage is being cut back, beginning next week, in favor of the much more traditional and much less risque Catch 21. The biggest acquisition in a long time is the very traditional and family-friendly 5th Grader, debuting next month in excellent Sunday night timeslots.

Even more to the point, GSN's own press release on Amy Davis' hiring talks about focusing on the network's core audience of older women. All the recent moves by the network are consistent with such a focus and a return to more traditional and less controversial game shows. This again argues against the speculative rumors spread by a single poster with his unnamed "sources."

I realize the poster presenting these rumors has a fan club on these boards, people who share his negative opinions of GSN. But until we see some real evidence supporting these rumors, why should we believe them?

This reminds me of that famous hoax about a supposed new GSN game show involving a 300-ton pile of coal. Some posters around here fell for it hook, line and sinker (despite many indications that it was just a ridiculous joke) because they were willing to believe the worst about GSN. Unless [the poster presenting the rumors] can produce some real evidence to back up his assertions, I'm not buying.

UPDATE: Things get curiouser and curiouser. Now we've got another poster claiming inside information about Amy Davis' hiring. Is the info accurate? Who knows? But I posted my reaction...

Other poster: Somebody was about to become the new programming director and that person just may have had to turn it down for family reasons. Not saying who though, but that's as much information as you are getting [emphasis mine]. The person who was going to be hired was a huge game show fan who wanted to add variety back to GSN. Going back to 2008/2009 and making them better was going to be the plan. Also, this person was very friendly with Les Moonves of CBS and was trying to negotiate a Price is Right return to GSN. The person had to stay put in the East Coast to continue running his/her company. Amy was not the 1st choice Casey!

Nobody wants to tell us anything lately (wink).

Anyway, who cares if Amy Davis was the first choice or ninety-ninth choice? No programming director can go against the general direction set by [GSN president David] Goldhill and his Sony superiors. Otherwise, the programming director becomes an ex-programming director.

I'm tempted to say...see [former GSN programming exec] Goode, Kelly. My opinion - and it's just my opinion, I'm not claiming any super-duper inside "sources" - is that Sony's assumption of day-to-day control over GSN earlier this year and Kelly Goode's exit from the network were not coincidental events.

What matters is what shows up on the network. Let's just sit back and watch. So far the recent, continuing and near-future trend is clearly towards an older, more traditional, less risque schedule. (You might call this the anti-Kelly direction.) We'll see if this trend continues.