Hey, Syfy! Excuses Won’t Work.

“He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.”  - Benjamin Franklin

Oh Syfy… Your Public Relations antics never fail to amaze me. It’s like you live in a completely different reality from that of your viewers; A reality where “fiction” means “reality shows, wrestling, and cooking;” A reality where Tuesday is your best night for programming; A reality where everyone marks schedule changes to their favorite TV shows diligently on the calendar on their refrigerators; A reality where TV viewers are dumb and can’t see through lies.

You recently posted “An Open Letter to Stargate Universe Fans from Syfy.” This turned out to be a rambling of excuses for why SGU was cancelled. Those familiar with Caprica have heard it all before – “We support Science Fiction, the viewers just didn’t tune in!” Poor Syfy. If only we’d try to understand!

But we do understand. The Sci Fi Channel became Syfy, wrestling bumped out the Sci Fi shows and Reality programming is being ordered up like greasy fast food. The writing is on the wall, but you’d have us believe we’re all making it up. You really wanted Caprica and Stargate Universe to succeed. I know.

That’s why you made that fancy chart for Season 1 of Stargate Universe – to prove us wrong. You know how much your viewers hate that you break seasons into 2 parts. So you point to the unusual rise in viewers after the Season 1.0 hiatus as an example that long breaks don’t effect ratings. Yet on your own Blastr blog, you scoff at the “ratings free fall” that NBC’s The Event took after a 3 month hiatus. So which is it?

Regardless, this chart clearly illustrates that SGU failed, right? Only, you had entered into an agreement with the producers of SGU that if the first 10 episodes met a ratings threshold you would produce Season 2. So why are you using this to show failure when by your own standards it warranted a successful renewal?

You moved Stargate Universe to Tuesday, the same night as you did with Caprica, to “introduce them to a new audience.” We see how that worked out for both shows considering the substantial viewer dropout. Ask Sanctuary fans how it’s doing since being moved to Monday with a 61% loss in ratings. You mean changing the night a show airs with little promotion causes it to shed viewers? Am I seeing a pattern here?

Oh, but how were you to know?! Warehouse 13 did so well on Tuesday! But, Syfy… you always fail to mention that Warehouse 13 is a Summer show, is episodic in nature and airs its seasons without a break!  Don’t you think that, just maybe, this gave it an advantage? Nevermind that you took the time to properly promote it and never switched the day it aired.

But let’s look at the average ratings for your most recent Tuesday offerings. Destination Truth averaged .929 million viewers and Marcel’s Quantum Kitchen took home a whopping .510 million. I wouldn’t call that my “most successful night” on television and I wouldn’t put a show I was worried about there. But then again I don’t live in “Syfy Reality.”

See, Syfy, we’re not dumb. Your excuses don’t fool us. I know you probably think we’re all nerds, geeks, freaks, who knows maybe even ghosts or aliens. In reality many of us are well cultured, well educated, and have plenty to offer your advertisers. But we won’t be entertained by the cookie cutter programming you’re choosing to air. Most of us have already pledged to tune out. The 6% drop in your audience for 2010 reflects that.

So sure, go ahead and live in your special reality, Syfy. A world where customer service doesn’t mean pleasing the customer but serving up excuses. Your viewers are only going to keep leaving as you cancel our favorite shows. And we’re not shy to tell everyone else to stop watching.

Please sign the Caprica Petition.