From the department of WTF

[pbray]

The Sci Fi Channel is relaunching itself on air and online on July 7 with a new name: Syfy.

Network President Mr. Howe said changing the name to Syfy will make a difference. “It gives us a unique word and it gives us the opportunities to imbue it with the values and the perception that we want it to have,” he said.

Comments

[diamondreads.livejournal.com]

Isn't that just the craziest thing? Course, I'm still questioning what the wrestling world has to do with science fiction, too, and they keep showing that on there. I think they have finally just lost their minds or else the aliens have landed and taken over the channel.

[pbray.livejournal.com]

It sounds like a triumph of the marketing department--look if we change our name, no one will notice that we haven't bothered to spruce up the place.

[scbutler.livejournal.com]

Marketing always wins, damn their eyes.

[pbray.livejournal.com]

Heck, they'll probably offer you your own half-hour show--The Secret Lives of Daves...

[larryhammer]

The problem with unique words is they're blank slates, marketingwise.

---L.

[pbray.livejournal.com]

If they'd chosen something that wasn't pronounced "Sci-Fi" it would have been an interesting choice, but as it is they kept the pronunciation while changing the spelling, so it's a half-assed move.

[libwitch.livejournal.com]

Is the new name for people who think that pronouncing SciFi is too har? They try to say it with a hard C? I am so confused....

[pbray.livejournal.com]

It's like a teenager deciding they no longer want to be called Jane, instead they must be referred to as Jeynne.

[cedunkley.livejournal.com]

This sounds like an alternate reality: What if Lynyrd Skynyrd created the SyFy Channel?

So, in looking into the name change it seems there was already a SyFy Portal, which has now changed its name to Airlock Alpha.

And what of the SyFy Genre Awards (that I didn't even know existed until a few minutes ago)? Will they now become the Airlock Alpha Awards?

It seems strange that - of the SciFi Channel was going to change its name - it would change to a name that already exists in the form of Science Fiction news and awards.

But then again, as has been mentioned here, Marketing is a strange beast.

[pbray.livejournal.com]

And if marketing mated with the legal department to find a name that was both unique and trademarkable, well, then, no wonder the camel has five humps and flippers instead of feet.

[guinwhyte.livejournal.com]

Sadly, I think that is exactly how/why this came about.

[katatomic.livejournal.com]

I think I'm going to pronounce that "SeeFee" just to piss them off.

[jjschwabach.livejournal.com]

If they're changing their identity, does this mean no more utterly predictable creature features with bad CGI, worse acting and completely excrable cinematography? Because I'd totally hang out more on the See-Fee Channel if that was the case.

But it probably just means more... uh... dudes... *wrestling?!*

[melissajm.livejournal.com]

And Things Of The Week crawling out of the ground...

To think they used to have Farscape... :sigh:

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

Yes, but then to think how they completely ballsed that up at the end...

[melissajm.livejournal.com]

True. :sigh again:

[jjschwabach.livejournal.com]

Yes, they had to go and spoil it all by doing something stupid like, "Oh, they can't just be a bunch of dudes in space..."

I remember the Good Old Days, when it was just another cable station that showed old stuff no one else wanted. It was better then. Apparently, no one has ever told them that just because you *can* shoot the same scene from two angles at once and show it on a split screen, doesn't mean you *should*. Or that, you know, if your Cyclops is only a foot taller than your other actors, hire someone from the WTF... I mean, that wrestling show you inexplicably show, and put the dude in a costume. Way better than unfinished CGI that isn't even I.

[elven-wolf.livejournal.com]

I remember the Good Old Days, when it was just another cable station that showed old stuff no one else wanted. It was better then.

Those were the days, my friend.

I'm with those calling it See-Fee. I finally give up.

[jjschwabach.livejournal.com]

They lost there way a long time ago, and not in a galaxy far, far away.

They were showing the new Who, but they don't seem to be anymore. I know it's on hiatus, but did they ever show Season Four?