Ancients Behaving Badly

[StreamOfTheSky]

Today they aired a whole bunch of new episodes, unfortunately I didn't notice until this evening. I managed to catch Hannibal and Genghis Khan, could have watched Cleopatra but had to go out. Completely missed Alexander the Great and Nero, I really wanted to see the episode on the former. At least I got to watch GK's episode, still boo on history channel just suddenly airing them all without warning like that.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I concur for the most part. Discovery didn't have to worry about money, the reason cable companies have it as free programming is the same reason network companies have free programming - advertisements. They just got greedy and wanted market share

I'm not sure how it works in the US, but presumably advertising-funded channels want market share so that they can sell advertising 'space' to the advertisers... based on the theory that an advert which is seen by a larger and wider audience is more valuable and so worth more money.

TV stations that don't have to rely on advertising (e.g. the BBC in the UK which is funded by the license fee, or some wholly subscription based channels) are free from the tyranny of chasing ratings.