Explain the appeal of Duck Dynasty to me in 20 words or less.

[Chan790]

16. Their programming stunk so they got "reconceptualized"

It's not a public-interest venture...cable channels exist for the purpose of drawing ratings and making money. If your programming isn't drawing eyes, you've either got to fold it up and call it a day or change the programming.

Many cable channels do this in less radical ways and you never notice...an executive from Viacom (parent company of HBO) once declared "HBO will never produce original serial programming, that's not what we do." AMC used to only show classic films in the public domain...there's only so many times you can show The Wizard of Oz and It's a Wonderful Life before some shit's got to give. FX was originally created to be what Spike is now...Spike changed programming philosophies when they realized that men didn't want to watch the TV equivalent of FHM, male-oriented reality TV, old action movies and shit like 1000 ways to die (though the success of that program and Ultimate Warrior have kept them on the air). C-Span and The Weather Channel now show original programming related to their subjects and have on-air hosts...TWC used to be nothing but an on-air loop broadcasting the local report of NOAA/NWS with no on-air people at-all. C-Span/C-Span2 used to broadcast the two chambers of Congress 24-hours-a-day...at 3am, you could spend 40 minutes watching the janitor vacuum the dais of the Senate.

TV is a business. Nobody wanted to watch the programming of the original concepts of A&E, The Learning Channel. The History channel hasn't changed philosophies, they just started increasing the number and type of shows they had that drew the most ratings: Nazis, military history and cryptohistory like Ancient Aliens. People really like Ancient Aliens...or at least Georgio's hair. Major networks do this too: last year, nearly 50% of CBS primetime slots were dedicated to something that didn't exist 20 years ago: reality shows.