4I Feckless Youth

A FEW years ago, a network-television executive was asked to describe his ideal audience. He was looking for “voracious consumers of free television,” he said, people who couldn’t afford cable services, didn’t have jobs during the day or reasons to go to bed early, and were easily overwhelmed by programming choices and so preferred to stick with one channel throughout the day.

His ideal audience, in other words, was the very young, the very old, and the very sick. Today, the target audience has shifted a bit. The very old and the very sick are on their own. The desirable demographics that all the major networks battle over are the very young, the somewhat young, and the under-30. That’s the main reason network television has an eerie Lord of the Flies vibe to it: Almost every show features, exclusively, characters without a trace of the tiny lines and wrinkles that begin to appear around, say, age 32.

About the Author

Rob Long

Rob Long is a writer and producer and a co-founder of Ricochet.

A FEW years ago, a network-television executive was asked to describe his ideal audience. He was looking for “voracious consumers of free television,” he said, people who couldn’t afford cable services, didn’t have jobs during the day or reasons to go to bed early, and were easily overwhelmed by programming choices and so preferred to stick with one channel throughout the day.

His ideal audience, in other words, was the very young, the very old, and the very sick. Today, the target audience has shifted a bit. The very old and the very sick are on their own. The desirable demographics that all the major networks battle over are the very young, the somewhat young, and the under-30. That’s the main reason network television has an eerie Lord of the Flies vibe to it: Almost every show features, exclusively, characters without a trace of the tiny lines and wrinkles that begin to appear around, say, age 32.