Oprah Bares All About Starting OWN
In a two part documentary titled “Oprah Builds A Network” Oprah discusses the struggles of her new network. Part one aired Sunday night and part two is scheduled to air next Sunday July 15th.
In the special Oprah will talk about all the struggles that she has faced starting her new venture in television.
She described her status as celebty as being both a help and a hindrance to the fledgling network.
Oprah said that her reputation raised expectations “beyond anything I was capable of doing on my own.”
Is Oprah Getting Desperate As New Network Struggles? Behind The Scenes Special
She also told of how she did not have focus in the beginning because she was busy wrapping up the Oprah show. “I can honestly say I wasn’t committed to the network because I was committed to the show,” Oprah said.
OWN, a joint venture with Discovery Communications and Harpo Productions, has attracted just 283,000 viewers in prime time, significantly below the 6 million or so viewers who watched her daytime talk show.
Have you followed Oprah over to OWN?
Awww poor Oprah—she had great success with her show—maybe she should have stuck with that—running a network is a huge undertaking. I don’t follow her network, but comments I have heard—no new content—same shows over and over—just in different time slots.
Kathy Dowsett
http://www.kirkscubagear.com
Poor Oprah, she has more money than God. I don’t feel sorry for her.
The network has nothing to offer that’s not been shown elsewhere, so it’s no surprise it’s failing.
The sooner it goes away, the better.
Oprah has had her day…she is one of the richest women in the world, and all of the help she gives out to help others, doesn’t come out of her pocket….she needs to move out and move on.
My observation is that the whole network OWN is geared to self-congratulation of Oprah. She should have either retired with great success under her belt or let someone else run the new network. I think she got a bit too big for her boots!
Oprah was letting someone else run the new network, that is why it wasn’t doing well. The person running it wasn’t doing a good job, so she took over. Come fall, you will probably see an improvement.
Its time to share the wealth. Many New talents, other then myself too. Their is a lot of crisis in the the world around us. I would rather focus on lifes real problems, the hungry starved..homeless..and a lot more going out there then just happy smily faces and who is getting married and divorced…seems to be more galmourous then the real
Her network has nothing to keep my interest. She should have retired with great success under I think she got a bit too big for her boots!
I still wish her good luck
On second thought, keep the network, make Oprah go away, far far away,
Oprah is and will remain an outstanding human being. What she has done with her show was remarkable. As for OWN we got it later here in Canada. I think the big appetite for this was diminishing because it has been on the air for a few months already in the states so the interest and publicity had gone down. As for the content, we were under the impression it was going to be following the same idea and philosophy has her show was.
I was a bit in dismay when I found out it was an extra on my cable and that a lot of the programs where more on the investigation and profiling then anything. When Rosie came along it was like a breath of fresh air, than it was over no more Rosie. Master class is probably the best show on this network, almost everything else has and is already been done on the major network and we don’t have to pay extra to watch it. Reruns are also a factor, how many times are we supposed to watch the same show over and over. This would count for a drop in interest. Oprah herself is an amazing person her idea are well placed and with good intention. The fact that she has money has no relevancy here. She made her fortune out of hard work and that absolutely does not mean she is done and has to go. Au contraire it proves she is absolutely amazing and can do more. Far from self indulging she is trying to create something new following her philosophy of life which has made her who she is because there is a craving for this in society.
I do get OWN and I watch it all the time. There are some pretty good shows on there. And now that Oprah is CEO and looking after things, I’m sure there will be a lot more.
I do think a lot of the problem is that people have to pay to get the channel. Some people just can’t afford it. It’s not a lot, but if you don’t have the money, you don’t have the money.
J-M says…”Reruns are also a factor, how many times are we supposed to watch the same show over and over.”
This is not Oprah’s fault. All pay per view channels are like that. They will repeat the shows for so many days and then it will be a different one. It’s no different than watching the shows on the other channels. It’s like the shows are on once a week.
I don’t know if it’s actually classed as a “pay per view” or not. I already had the channel because it was included in the “package” I already had.
Not that Oprah is looking after things, I would bet that there will be new and better shows starting up this fall.
I will say one last thing. OWN is no different than any other network. How many shows do you really watch on the other networks? No one watches shows on one network from morning until night. I might watch one show on ABC in one week. Maybe two on NBC, in one week. It would be a rare occasion that I would watch tv all night on one channel.
Except I do on OWN, now that I think of it. Friday nights or Sunday nights had all good shows on. They do have repeats now, but then so do all the others, BECAUSE IT’S SUMMER!