This week I heard some DJs talk about “All My Children”. One DJ said it had been cancelled, which made the other DJ say it was still airing online. The first DJ said something to the effect that if something used to be on TV and is online only, it’s been cancelled. What do you think? When something switches from TV to online (or like Newsweek, from print to online only) do you consider them the same show?
Too early to say. If it’s still making money somehow, then it’s not cancelled. But it’s an experiment, and until online-only is considered approaching equal footing to broadcast TV, I’d say it’s in a limbo state. Ask again in five years.
Same show, different medium. I wouldn’t say canceled.
I’d say it was canceled, since that is generally an airing decision.
Doesn’t mean that it ended. Scrubs was cancelled by NBC and picked up by ABC. Though generally both are done at the same time, canceling a show need not mean shutting down production.
It was pulled from its original media; I’d say that qualifies as canceled. You wouldn’t say that a TV series wasn’t canceled just because they continue to make movies about it.
Arrested Development was still cancelled, even though it’s been reincarnated on Netflix. Even if it had been brought back on broadcast television - it was still technically “cancelled.”
Yeah, it depends on how you’re meaning the word “canceled.” Technically, Scrubs was cancelled (by NBC), but I never really thought of the series itself being canceled at that point, as it was picked up by ABC. More like it changed networks. But “canceled” is correct usage, too, in my opinion, although can perhaps be a bit confusing.
I would consider a program jumping from a network to online-only to be a similar type of “cancellation.” That is, I don’t really consider that series to be canceled (as a series), but changing distribution mediums. If the storylines continue, the main actors continue, etc., it’s not “cancelled” to me, even online (which is how I end up watching most my shows anyway. Do I care that “House of Cards” is Netflix-only, for example?)
Yip. There’s a difference between a canceled show and a show that has been canceled. I’d have to hear the context to know what the DJ in question actually meant. However, based just on what’s stated in the OP, there is a clear misunderstanding. The OP is referring to cancellation in the present tense, and, thus, as a state of being. The DJ apparently referred to it as a past event.
The show was canceled, but the show is not currently canceled. It is still making official episodes. It is still the same basic medium–episodic videos. There is no change other than who you must pay to get access to the content–your cable bill or your Internet bill.
It’s irrelevant how many people are watching. The show is still being produced and still being broadcast to viewers.
Was TV its original media? I know a lot of those shows actually started on radio.
I think I’d say it depends on who’s hosting it online. If a network takes it off the air, but puts it on the network’s own website, then they haven’t canceled it, just shifted its format. Canceling would mean that someone’s saying “we don’t want to have anything to do with this show any more”.
All My Children and One Life to Live (and Arrested Development, Futurama, and others) were indeed cancelled. They were taken off the air for a substantial amount of time, and when they came back they had:
- sold rights
- new sets in a new studio
- new production company
- new distribution company
- new producers and in many cases, new writers.
In the soaps’ case, new union contracts and a mix of new and old actors as well.
Contrast a show like Cougar Town or Buffy, where the production stayed the same but the distribution (UPN, TBS) changed. Or Stargate, B5, Dexter, etc.
To obfusciatrist and pulykamell’s points, it seems like a show is only cancelled if someone notices. Mind the gap!
More or less, yes.
All My Children was definitely canceled. It was taken off the air, everyone was fired, and no episodes were made for a year.
The company that bought the rights to continue it announced that they could not actually go forward. As far as anyone in the world knew, the show was completely dead. I call that canceled.
Yes, TV was its original media. The Proctor & Gamble soap operas (sponsored by soap!) that started on the radio are all pining for the fjords now.