Just when you thought it was safe...

You didn't really think I had cured my addiction to GSN posts, did you?

As I watched a lot of GSN's premiere five-hour marathon of network Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? last night, I had two thoughts. Well, actually I had a few more thoughts, like which snack I wanted from the kitchen. But the two deep cogitations I'll talk about here:

1) This show is rated TV-PG instead of TV-G? It's so squeaky clean, with kids and all. Maybe it's the references to cheating at school.

2) He who pays the piper calls the tune. This show is part of the massive move on GSN's schedule toward more traditional material. Which just happened to occur after Sony made the deal to assume operational control and majority ownership of GSN.

The second thought is by far the more important. After Sony took over, things happened in a hurry. Original production went on hiatus. The schedule got a lot older, more traditional and less edgy. Programming VP Kelly Goode was invited to seek alternative employment. The press release on her successor talked about targeting GSN's "core audience of adult females."

The news of a Richard Dawson Family Feud marathon on Sunday, November 27 is the cherry on top of this sundae. Sony has clearly decided to give up the young-demo chase, at least for now, and live with the usual old-skewing, female-skewing audience for traditional game shows.

So much for those unsourced rumors on the GSN Internet boards about an impending move in exactly the opposite direction.