Show of hands, please.

[MelissaY1]

Yeah, it's this big internet meme now. If you look up "Stu" and "Chocolate Pudding at 4Am" on Youtube you'll get a billion videos. That's what my life is now. I think completely in internet memes. But you know what they say, All Weegees toast Dr. Robotnik.



I always say this... there's thousands of cable networks out there, and by logic, every show ever made should be on them with enough room for everything new. Logically. Now, there's just so many channels that run wall to wall nonsense, and all these channels that no one watches. I'm not even talking big name channels... local cable networks have these odd extra channels that run wall to wall nothing. I'd say there's probably some rights issues that have to be dealt with older SS episodes (Celebrity and music rights I guess) but it's a very important program in the history of television and they really need to let the old episodes out of the vault, if nothing else, for historical reasons.

If they indeed have every episode digitally archived, there should be no problem, even if they have to make re-edits for some reason. But there's just no where to put it unless PBS Sprout decided on a late night classics line up instead of reruns from earlier in the day no one is going to watch.

Really, not just Sesame Street, but classic Mr. Rogers, Electric Company, even more recent stuff like Square One Math and Reading Rainbow... heck, Shining Time Station with the GOOD episodes of Thomas. They're all begging to be seen. Even if they go on demand or something.

Oh absolutely agreed, Dr. Tooth! I have Verizon Fios, and there's about 40 stations I never bother to even take a peek at, and like half of them are "empty" local access channels. I'd love to see one of those put to good use with older shows.

Hub is on the right track with their reruns of Family Ties and Wonder Years and of course all the Muppet stuff they've been showing. My mom often complains how there's no channels anymore like Nickelodeon and TVLand used to be with ALL old shows and enough of these marathons with 20 episodes of "classics" like The George Lopez Show.

With the amount of time they have these marathons on, they could fit that much more variety and stuff. And since Cartoon Network transferred over, I never see old Looney Tunes shorts on anymore and THAT is just sacrilege as far as I'm concerned...

 

[Canadian Fan]

I think the only time I ever see classic Sesame Street clips (besides YouTube and Sesame's official webpage) are on 'Play With Me, Sesame'. It airs once a week on Treehouse channel in Canada and I only see it if my niece watches it. Treehouse also airs Sesame Street on Saturday mornings; Elmo's World and Bert & Ernie's Great Adventures air as separate programs on Treehouse.

I don't have the Old School DVD's, but I hear they're great. Actually, I grew up in the 1980's Sesame Street era, but I never found Elmo annoying. I always found the street scenes more like a kid's soap opera; especially the Maria & Luis love story (probably one of my favorite storylines along with Mile's adoption). The street scenes and Bert & Ernie sketches were my favorite parts of Sesame Street.

 

[Drtooth]

Oh absolutely agreed, Dr. Tooth! I have Verizon Fios, and there's about 40 stations I never bother to even take a peek at, and like half of them are "empty" local access channels. I'd love to see one of those put to good use with older shows.

Hub is on the right track with their reruns of Family Ties and Wonder Years and of course all the Muppet stuff they've been showing. My mom often complains how there's no channels anymore like Nickelodeon and TVLand used to be with ALL old shows and enough of these marathons with 20 episodes of "classics" like The George Lopez Show.

With the amount of time they have these marathons on, they could fit that much more variety and stuff. And since Cartoon Network transferred over, I never see old Looney Tunes shorts on anymore and THAT is just sacrilege as far as I'm concerned...

The niche market is dead... what can I say? We have these young brats come in and basically make everything so generic and like everything else on TV all in the name of ratings they're not even guaranteed to get. We're howling at the moon, but these stations are losing their regulars while NOT gaining any new viewers. CN is run by 2 people, one of them is an idiot that wants to keep them on the wrong path. Even the one that came up with those terrible live action shows realizes that's a massive titanic failure... but the OTHER guy doesn't care.

Now before anyone says "Companies only care about the bottom line," that's not even the case. I wish it was, but it isn't. It's all about the top line and fear they'd have to spend money and take risks. Risks gave us Spongebob. Who would have taken a chance with a cartoon about fish that act like humans? Now, it's the longest running series of modern times. What is it now, like 11? 12 years? And it didn't start to explode until 2001 or so... 2 years after it premiered. Seinfeld was on the chopping block for the first 3 seasons, but they took a chance and it became one of the most successful sitcoms. By Contrast, Desperate Housewives started out very strong, but now it became the "Oh, is that STILL on" show that jumped the shark more times than I can count.

As for reruns. That is what cable WAS all about when it started up. No one wanted to come up with anything original then because the cable channels weren't as important as they are today. Now original programming is ALL what it's about. Movie channels running series, regular channels running movies? REALLY? But the chanels that WERE earmarked for reruns should in fact do NOTHING but reruns. There are shows I'm a fan of I wouldn't buy every single DVD ever made of... and that's provided that they're completed. There's so much that can't be released due to low sales, copyright disputes (Cough cough Batman), and all that wonderful stuff. THEY need a chance to be put back on TV. Classic Sesame Street especially.

 

[CensoredAlso]

Yeah, it's this big internet meme now. If you look up "Stu" and "Chocolate Pudding at 4Am" on Youtube you'll get a billion videos.

Wow seriously? Lol, that's great. Classic Rugrats, they had guts.

 

[Drtooth]

Wow seriously? Lol, that's great. Classic Rugrats, they had guts.

I have a few favorites... one even blended the "I'm not STU! HEHEHEHE" (which should really be a fad in its own right)... but check out "Four Hours of Chocolate Pudding." Translated and retranslated into various languages back to English, making gibberish and nonsense.

 

[Son of Enik]

I would support this too. Once in a while you get a good vintage bit on "Play with me Sesame", but not often enough. I think a PBS Classic channel would be a great idea.

 

[Drtooth]

I'd tend to think a PBS classics channel wouldn't actually have kid's programming on it. But hey, PBS can still get away with showing old Julia Child cooking shows. Sigh... if only the digital PBS Kids channel didn't turn into PBS Older teenagers past 5, there could have been some great potential in a late night classics line up.

Seriously, if qubo can run He-man at midnight, Sprout can air older Sesame Streets and Electric Companies late night as well.

 

[ISNorden]

I'd tend to think a PBS classics channel wouldn't actually have kid's programming on it. But hey, PBS can still get away with showing old Julia Child cooking shows. Sigh... if only the digital PBS Kids channel didn't turn into PBS Older teenagers past 5, there could have been some great potential in a late night classics line up.

Whew, now I'm relieved that my cable provider doesn't carry that channel! Most of the tween-and-teen programming would have bored me to tears, and the actual kidvid wouldn't be too different from what PBS scatters between other digital channels in the mornings.

You've got a point about content on a dedicated Classics channel, though: since PBS has already set aside two sub-channels for children's shows, they would probably choose "classics" that were meant for an adult audience in the first place: Masterpiece Theater, The French Chef, Great Performances, and so forth. (Those shows aren't bad, mind you; they're just not what a fan of the older kidvid lineup is looking for!)

Seriously, if qubo can run He-Man at midnight, Sprout can air older Sesame Streets and Electric Companies late night as well.

I agree 100%! If they managed to solve some legal and financial problems, then Sprout could make good money from subscribers without kids of their own. (I doubt that the parents of most preschoolers are up at 3 AM watching Barney with the baby, or have the DVR set to re-record an episode that's already aired at 10 AM the day before.) Using the time between midnight and 6 AM for shows we grew up seeing on PBS, would be a golden opportunity for Sprout. Call it the "Remember When Show", with a host our age sitting on a set made up like our childhood living rooms...they couldn't miss.

 

[GonzoLeaper]

Just thought I'd throw my hat in the ring (but be careful with it- don't let the bulls trample it- or the boxers) and say- yes, I'd definitely love to see some more classic kids programming like older episodes of Sesame Street on a channel somewhere. (Along with other shows mentioned like The Electric Company, Reading Rainbow and certainly Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood.)

 

[Drtooth]

Whew, now I'm relieved that my cable provider doesn't carry that channel! Most of the tween-and-teen programming would have bored me to tears, and the actual kidvid wouldn't be too different from what PBS scatters between other digital channels in the mornings.

Well, the tween/teen programming isn't what you think. Sure, there's stuff like BizKids and a few other things on weekends I forget... really not happy they got rid of Animalia... but for "teen and tween" programming, you basically get Nova, Inside the Artists Den, Antiques Roadshow(!)... (No seriously !), History Detectives, and of ALL things, The French Chef. The kid's programming consists of stuff that's already on PBS anyway, except for some dry, unwatchable crafts show. Not even Sesame Street. They did have Reading Rainbow 2 years ago, but that was gone quickly. So basically, it's quite the opposite of Sprout's problem... they stop kid's programming at 5. Not even Electric Company, WordGirl, or Wild Krats which are made for older kids.

I agree 100% If they managed to solve some legal and financial problems, then Sprout could make good money from subscribers without kids of their own. (I doubt that the parents of most preschoolers are up at 3 AM watching Barney with the baby, or have the DVR set to re-record an episode that's already aired at 10 AM the day before.) Using the time between midnight and 6 AM for shows we grew up seeing on PBS, would be a golden opportunity for Sprout. Call it the "Remember When Show", with a host our age sitting on a set made up like our childhood living rooms...they couldn't miss.

They don't even need to make it a show or have a host, as far as I'm concerned. I just don't get the need for 24/7 preschool programming. I'm sure stuff is on demand if there's such an odd emergency and some kid is up in the middle of the night really sick or something. Again, that's why I brought up qubo and their 1980's Filmation late night line up. They used to have the same episodes of the same stuff air 3 and 4 times a day, especially at midnight (though for some strange reason, that's where they shoved Sammy's Story Shop. Come on... I know the show is BAD, but airing it at midnight?)... that's the height of pointless. Better than infomercials, though, but still, highly pointless.

Again, unless there's some sort of copyrights and royaltees that are so expensive they keep them from happening, there's no excuse to not even consider it.

And really, Barney's charms, whatever they were, are long gone. It's pretty much so old, it's bordering on retro now.