4 ms·

Has the history channel gone off a cliff? Or has it always been this way, and I just never noticed as a wide-eyed youth? I haven't watched it in years, but now

by gen220 6y ago

Has the history channel gone off a cliff? Or has it always been this way, and I just never noticed as a wide-eyed youth? I haven't watched it in years, but nowadays it'd be better described as "The Conspiracy Channel", with generous sides of American Pickers and Pawn Stars.

scruple 6y ago
I remember decent programming in the 90s when I was a kid. I haven't watched the History channel as an adult outside of vacations in places that have cable (have never paid for cable television in my life) but the last time I was somewhere and it was on, probably back in 2017, it was nothing like what I remembered.
dylan604 6y ago
Go watch a couple of episodes of one of their flagpole show called "Mystery Of Oak Island". It's produced in such a formulaic fashion that it's mind numbing. 7 seasons later, the people still haven't gotten any closer to their goals.
- gen220 6y ago
  I just spent 10 minutes trying to squeeze some some sense out of the episode summaries on wikipedia. (like squeezing water out of stone) It reminded me of how I feel after programming for 12 hours straight -- nothing makes sense any more and everything is connected... I can't believe they've made 7 seasons out of this. An example synopsis: > With only two weeks left in the season Rick, Marty and Craig debate what they will do while the crane operators are on strike. They decide to conduct seismic testing in the swamp. At Smith's Cove, another wooden structure is found and excavation of that begins. A rust coloured patch of packed rocks with water flowing out is found. In the war room, members of the team meet with researcher Chris Donah who contacted them about the swamp and its relationship with the constellation Virgo. Eagle Canada returns to the island to conduct seismic testing in the swamp using 2,025 charges and 4,000 geophones. On Lot 27, Gary and Marty metal detect the spoils from a previous excavation of the swamp. They find a button, a coin or token with a square hole in it. In the war room, the dendrochronology results are revealed. The samples date to around 1770 with a 99.99% confidence. This episode had 3.16 million viewers. What.
  - dylan604 6y ago
    Yeah, those numbers don't surprise me. It is one of their more popular shows, and they are milking it for everything it is worth. Websites of fans discussing their own theories and what not. It has a huge hook because of that. It's a modern day Indiana Jones search for the grail and/or ark. Essentially, the History Of Oak Island would be a pretty interesting 2 hour documentary. As a weekly reality tv show, they have to fluff it to fill the time slots so the style of it gets very old very fast. I had never heard of it until Prime recommended it to me, and then it just became one of those COVID shows playing in the background while I continued to bang out code. Every now and then it would catch me, and I'd actually pay attention to some of the historical research stuff they would go into.

by gen220 6y ago

scruple 6y ago

I remember decent programming in the 90s when I was a kid. I haven't watched the History channel as an adult outside of vacations in places that have cable (have never paid for cable television in my life) but the last time I was somewhere and it was on, probably back in 2017, it was nothing like what I remembered.

dylan604 6y ago

Go watch a couple of episodes of one of their flagpole show called "Mystery Of Oak Island". It's produced in such a formulaic fashion that it's mind numbing. 7 seasons later, the people still haven't gotten any closer to their goals.

gen220 6y ago
I just spent 10 minutes trying to squeeze some some sense out of the episode summaries on wikipedia. (like squeezing water out of stone) It reminded me of how I feel after programming for 12 hours straight -- nothing makes sense any more and everything is connected... I can't believe they've made 7 seasons out of this. An example synopsis: > With only two weeks left in the season Rick, Marty and Craig debate what they will do while the crane operators are on strike. They decide to conduct seismic testing in the swamp. At Smith's Cove, another wooden structure is found and excavation of that begins. A rust coloured patch of packed rocks with water flowing out is found. In the war room, members of the team meet with researcher Chris Donah who contacted them about the swamp and its relationship with the constellation Virgo. Eagle Canada returns to the island to conduct seismic testing in the swamp using 2,025 charges and 4,000 geophones. On Lot 27, Gary and Marty metal detect the spoils from a previous excavation of the swamp. They find a button, a coin or token with a square hole in it. In the war room, the dendrochronology results are revealed. The samples date to around 1770 with a 99.99% confidence. This episode had 3.16 million viewers. What.
- dylan604 6y ago
  Yeah, those numbers don't surprise me. It is one of their more popular shows, and they are milking it for everything it is worth. Websites of fans discussing their own theories and what not. It has a huge hook because of that. It's a modern day Indiana Jones search for the grail and/or ark. Essentially, the History Of Oak Island would be a pretty interesting 2 hour documentary. As a weekly reality tv show, they have to fluff it to fill the time slots so the style of it gets very old very fast. I had never heard of it until Prime recommended it to me, and then it just became one of those COVID shows playing in the background while I continued to bang out code. Every now and then it would catch me, and I'd actually pay attention to some of the historical research stuff they would go into.