Show Pre-Emptions Anger?

[pete1974]

Army, I`m sorry to hear that and I`m glad your friend is OK.  And I think you definitely do fall under the banner of people directly affected by that quake.

[trytobecharming]

We turn back the clock to January 28, 1986, when the space shuttle Challenger exploded, killing all seven of its passengers. At noon, all three major networks began non-stop coverage of the tragedy, and their switchboards lit up like Christmas trees with angry housewives kvetching that they were missing their soap operas. Seven real people died in a tragedy and all America's housewives cared about were the pecadillos of fictional cheating pretty boys and trashy high-maintenance women.

CBS cut in during the commercial break between SCSD2 and the SHowcases, and NBC cut into Scrabble(airing at 11:30AM EST on NBC stations following NBC daytime schedules) I imagine around the same time.

[GR_Man_9009]

We turn back the clock to January 28, 1986, when the space shuttle Challenger exploded, killing all seven of its passengers. At noon, all three major networks began non-stop coverage of the tragedy, and their switchboards lit up like Christmas trees with angry housewives kvetching that they were missing their soap operas. Seven real people died in a tragedy and all America's housewives cared about were the pecadillos of fictional cheating pretty boys and trashy high-maintenance women.

One of the astronauts that died in the Challenger accident was a teacher from my home state of New Hampshire named Christa McAuliffe.

[thepriceis_J]

We turn back the clock to January 28, 1986, when the space shuttle Challenger exploded, killing all seven of its passengers. At noon, all three major networks began non-stop coverage of the tragedy, and their switchboards lit up like Christmas trees with angry housewives kvetching that they were missing their soap operas. Seven real people died in a tragedy and all America's housewives cared about were the pecadillos of fictional cheating pretty boys and trashy high-maintenance women.

And that was outrageous that they would complain, considering the fact that their children, in all likelihood, watched this horrible tragedy and saw seven people die in front of their eyes. Since Christa McAuliffe was a teacher, NASA and many schools around the country made it a point to air the launch for kids. My older brother who was 5 at the time, saw it.

[CBSpromoman]

i think todays interruption could have waited the 15 minutes, where theres a nice half hour block of time devoted to news. 

Except for the fact that not every station airs a newscast immediately following 'Price.'

Today's interruption was warranted.

[Ccook]

Oh, I knew CBS cut into Price for a bulletin; I was going on when CBS, NBC and ABC went to non-stop coverage.

[GameShowDude]

I believe pre-emptions should be abolished because there are 3 24-hour news channels that you can watch.  Also a lot of people these days get news from the Internet. 

[Ccook]

Yes, but not everyone in the U.S. has access to cable, satellite or the Internet.

[pete1974]

OK, I feel like a goon now, in this thread I kept reading "pre-emptions" and in my head I was thinking "Break-ins".

[Axl]

For what it's worth, CBS didn't cut away from its Challenger coverage once it started.  I'm not sure about the others.  CBS was the only network that had its own live camera already set up at KSC when the disaster happened.  I've done a fair amount of research on this, and there were several interesting anomalies about the news coverage that day.  (But probably not appropriate for me to go further off-topic here)

I believe pre-emptions should be abolished because there are 3 24-hour news channels that you can watch.  Also a lot of people these days get news from the Internet. 

I don't think that's an entirely unreasonable point of view... as long as it's really an intellectual discussion, and not a matter of, "Boo-hoo, they interrupted my show, so I don't like news."  And speaking of Haiti earlier, did any network actually interrupt scheduled programming for that story?  I don't remember any offhand, so it may be a bad example.

[pete1974]

Come to think of it, you`re right!  I`m afraid that was the first thing I thought of when I was trying to illustrate my point about "break-in worthy" vs otherwise

[trytobecharming]

I believe pre-emptions should be abolished because there are 3 24-hour news channels that you can watch.  Also a lot of people these days get news from the Internet. 

They're not going to abolish those kinds of preemptions when the networks see fit to do so. Anyway, CBS will show shows that were fully or partially preempted either later in the season or during summer reruns for TPIR and probably for LMAD. THe preemptions that seemed most unnecessary for me in recent years for a Philly sports related story being breaking news during one game show, and CBS cut into TPIR in 2004(during Summer reruns season) to report Marlon Brando's death.

[brtsimpson142]

Pre-emptions are a dicey thing.  This being the height of sports season (when is it NOT?), I tune in sometimes to see my favorite shows, only to see a ball game in its place.  (Tonight with COPS and Thursday for Fringe are just two examples).  I've always thought that the networks should establish two networks, one that shows regularly scheduled programming and one dedicated sports/alternate network.  Same goes for news preemptions, there should be a second channel that's guaranteed pre-emption-free, that way those who don't want to ever see or hear the words "CBS Special Report" don't have to.  In this digital age, seems like that would be an easy thing to do.

[imhomerjay]

CBS bumped the second showdown, but in Philly, both were bumped, as the local affiliate broke in on the same story during the first one.  Such is life--I have zero problem with either one.  Legitimate news about national security>any entertainment show. 

Now Tiger Woods blathering about how sorry he is for misuse of his putter, that I might quibble with.   

[The_Great_Butler]

CBS cut into TPIR in 2004(during Summer reruns season) to report Marlon Brando's death.

You don't know how glad I am to see I'm not the only one who remembered this and was going to type it in this thread.