Because someone thought it made sense. Remember that decisions about TV programming don’t come out of Iowa… we’re talking NY and LA so what happens in the middle of the country doesn’t seem to matter much to them anyway. Sorry for being so cynical but that’s the way it is folks.
The problem they were trying to solve was too many racey and/or violent shows when lots of kids were normally watching TV with their parents. Instead of having the parents control what shows their kids watched the networks were told to control the type of programming they provided during certain times of the day and night.
Needless to say it didn’t work and was probably unconstitutional to boot. Then the industry tried the V-chip but I don’t think that has really worked either.
IMHO, if parents are concerned about what shows their younger kids watch they should closely monitor the programs and turn the damn thing off if they can’t. For older kids the parents have to trust that they will watch reasonable programs… but with some of the stuff that they show on HBO and other cable networks it’s hard for the teenagers to avoid watching shows that their parents would really rather they not watch in the first place!
I think it’s not a matter of when you put your kids to bed. I think it’s just that TV programmers only want two time slots - east and west coast. If you get to thinking about when parents need to be putting their kids to bed, then you have to program for a whole other time slot and that would suck.
Oh… sorry… I was so involved in my rant I didn’t get the jist of your question. Why are there effectively only two time zones? I’m afraid that’s a question perhaps only Cecil can tackle. I live on the West Coast and often travel to Chicago where all of my usual shows are on an hour earlier than I expect. It takes me a day or two to remember that it is different than when I am in SF or NY.
No big deal you say, but really quite annoying as I turn on the TV at 9:55 pm and watch the last five minutes of a show I wanted to watch at 10:00 pm. Arghhhh.
I think there are really four times zones in the US (Pacific, Mountain, Central, and East), and I believe that most of Alaska falls within the Pacific time zone. Hawaii is 3 or 4 hours later than California so they either watch shows real early or there is a delay for them.
I suppose it would be a pain to have the delays for the Central and Mountain time zones like they do for the West Coast but it I can’t imagine why they wouldn’t try and coordinate these things. 60 Minutes should be on at 7:00 PM on Sundays no matter where you happen to be watching it… IMHO.
[nitpick] Prime time is 7pm - 11pm in the Eastern time zone. The Prime Time Access Rule (PTAR) requires networks to allow affiliates to program one hour of prime time themselves rather than airing network programming for that hour. For various reasons, circumstances aligned such that affiliates nearly all use the 7pm - 8pm block for syndicated programming. [/nitpick]
As for the family hour, it was not 8-9 p.m. (or for that matter 7-8 p.m.) It was the first hour of network prime time programming. The networks could have started their prime time schedule at 3:00 a.m. and that would have been the “family hour.”
Don’t hold me to this, but I believe the family hour concept was overturned because the courts found that networks had colluded to set standards. After the court rulings, the networks tried a “voluntary” family hour, but it soon went away. To this day, the networks blame cable for the demise of the family hour.
Specifically, the family hour was overturned because of a lawsuit from the Writer’s Guild of America (WGA). The FCC, as they are wont to do, threatened the networks with increased regulation if voluntary Family Hour provisions were not adopted. The National Association of Broadcasters, in 1975, adopted a Family Hour amendment to the Television Code, reserving 8-9pm for programming “suitable for a family audience,” with wide latitude for intepretation. The WGA filed suit against the FCC and the networks alleging infringement of their First Amendment rights, and in 1976 a Federal judge ruled in their favor.