History Main / ScrewedByTheNetwork

* Tired of not appearing on television, WWE Superstar ''Wrestling/ZackRyder'' made a YouTube show called ''Z! True Long Island Story''. It became so popular, that Zack Ryder became one of the most talked about personalities in wrestling at the time. He got tons of merchandise, and WWE was forced to [[HeelFaceTurn turn him face]] and he would go on to win the United States Championship. Even a co-star, The Big O ended up appearing on ''Wrestling/TNAImpact'' as a Gutcheck participant. This all came to an end however when Zack Ryder moved his show to the official WWE channel. The company then proceeded to constantly edit and reject his episodes, causing them to be missing scenes that the WWE found would not be good for the company's image. There was so much ''ExecutiveMeddling'' that Zack Ryder would constantly take to Twitter to explain why every other episode had long delays in uploading by WWE's constant rejections. Zack Ryder was no longer motivated to even do the show anymore, but WWE forced him to continue until it finally ended after 100 episodes.

* CCP's financial troubles in 2011, largely clustered around expensive microtransactions and an incomplete ''Incarna'' expansion to ''EVEOnline'', resulted in nearly 20% of the company's staff being laid off, including a number of people working on its recently-purchased tabletop gaming subsidiary. At the same time, the general market for tabletop games and traditionally published works hit a major pothole, and publishers that once put out supplements on a monthly basis were down to two or three books per line a year. WhiteWolf's ''TabletopGame/NewWorldOfDarkness'' and ''TabletopGame/{{Exalted}}'' were increasingly pushed to online-only release, and eventually split to Onyx Path with a Kickstarter model.
** ''TabletopGame/{{Exalted}}'' also had an issue with the network screwing its writing staff. The game's already touchy mechanics are unforgiving to poorly-written Charms or Artifacts, and at least one freelancer was hired early in development without having access to the basic combat system rules. The Second Edition Sidereal's author didn't have enough time with the new mechanics to understand the importance of Keywords. Another author -- reliably and consistently unnamed by Holden Shearer, the poor man who had to take the resulting hatemail -- was responsible for several poorly written charms, including the terribad Solar Charms in ''Dreams of The First Age'', and remained on the mechanics team until ''Scrolls of Fallen Races''.

* Pro Bull Riding got screwed by the ''networks''. Originally, full events were shown on Versus, but new licensing deals mean events are now shown on NBC, NBC Sports Network (formerly Versus), CBS, and the PBR's own streaming online broadcast site. Often a single event will be divided up between two of these outlets, making it extremely difficult for fans to keep track of.

** It's safe to say that the NHL has been screwed again by NBC. On May 12, 2013, the St. Louis region had CorporateGreed airing on CNBC over Game 6 of the Washington Capitals at the New York Rangers. This was despite cable listings listing Game 6. Let's just say there were some irate St. Louis hockey fans.

Often the cause of FollowUpFailure. Compare ExecutiveMeddling, ExecutiveVeto, InvisibleAdvertising, and ScrewedByTheLawyers. Also compare NoExportForYou, though that doesn't affect the actual production, but the export of a given product.

* DC's highly controversial treatment of Stephanie Brown. Made the centerpiece of a highly controversial story complete with being written massively out of character and became a victim of Women In Refrigerators. She got an ongoing after she came back but was cursed with ReplacementScrappy status due to replacing the fan favorite Cassandra Cain in the role of Batgirl. When her series proved to be a massive critical success (becoming the only DC book to get into USA Today's top ten comic books), it got cancelled early to make room for the company wide reboot. She was promised a place in the Smallville Comic, only for her to be replaced by Barbara Gordon (and as recently discovered, not because Barbara was more well known, she was specifically singled out and removed, Gordon was picked after Stephanie was removed). Its been suspected that DC Editor Dan [=DiDio=] is the one resposible for this treatment, as it started after he got in charge, he was connected to most of her poor treatment, and has been the most hostile towards fan critique about it.

* IndyCar has had a similar path when Versus picked up the load for most (but not all) of its events starting in 2009: ratings have been substantially lower due to Versus simply not being a well-known network (plus the ExecutiveMeddling by the channel's owner, Comcast) even though viewers agree that Versus gives much better treatment to the series as opposed to ABC/ESPN(2); however, the ABC-aired races in 2009 (the Indy 500 and several other summer events) hadn't had as drastic a dropoff as the cable races and started to put a bit more effort into the broadcasts. Of course, a lot of this stems from Tony George's own ExecutiveMeddling that caused the American open-wheel racing split from 1996-2008. Though with the NBC Sports division taking over Versus in 2011, coverage will at least be held to a higher standard.

->''"Starting now on Creator/{{Channel 4}} is a brand new show that we paid a ridiculous amount of money for which we'll launch in a blaze of publicity, and after a few weeks, we'll get bored of it and move it around the schedule where no-one can find it, then we'll brand it a flop, take it off the air for six months, then reluctantly put it back on at three in the morning."''

* Roadrunner Records abruptly dumped practically every DeathMetal band on the label starting pretty much the instant Music/TypeONegative produced the label's first Gold-seller. Most of the bands coming off the label ended up slamming Roadrunner for giving their final albums there little or no promotion, and Music/{{Suffocation}} actually got hit with massive cuts to the budget for their second album, ''Breeding the Spawn'', which resulted in the weakest production of any release by the band to date, before being formally dumped right after their next album, ''Pierced from Within'', hit stores. Music/{{Obituary}} managed to hold on with the label for a few years longer than most of their contemporaries, but most believe that the SoOkayItsAverage nature of ''Back from the Dead'', as well as the band's breakup the next year, was caused by [[ExecutiveMeddling interference from the label]], and when Obituary reformed in 2005, they immediately went to a different label.

* Roadrunner Records abruptly dumped practically every DeathMetal band on the label starting pretty much the instant Type-0 Negative produced the label's first Gold-seller. Most of the bands coming off the label ended up slamming Roadrunner for giving their final albums there little or no promotion, and Suffocation actually got hit with massive cuts to the budget for their second album, ''Breeding the Spawn'', which resulted in the weakest production of any release by the band to date, before being formally dumped right after their next album, ''Pierced from Within'', hit stores. Obituary managed to hold on with the label for a few years longer than most of their contemporaries, but most believe that the SoOkayItsAverage nature of ''Back from the Dead'', as well as the band's breakup the next year, was caused by [[ExecutiveMeddling interference from the label]], and when Obituary reformed in 2005, they immediately went to a different label.

* DavidBowie's 1993 album ''Black Tie White Noise'' (his first solo effort in four years) did well in Europe, hitting Number One on the U.K. charts. But it flopped in North America -- in part because U.S. distributor Savage Records went belly-up shortly after it hit shelves.

* In Australia, the Seven Network's screwing of the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Soccer_League National Soccer League]] lead to the entire competition eventually collapsing in 2004. The channel bought the rights for a pay tv sports channel, but after they lost the rights to AussieRulesFootball, they shut down the pay tv channel, and never bothered airing the soccer in any regular fashion, and never live. A highlight package after midnight on Wednesdays was the ''best'' the coverage got at times.

** It is actually worse than simply 'shutting down the channel', the NSL was deliberately screwed over by the network. In a subsequent lawsuit over the failure of the pay tv channel, it emerged that network executives were angry that the managers of AussieRulesFootball were not giving them enough credit for buying the National Soccer League rights then burying the sport.

* WCW's not the only wrestling company to get screwed... take the case of Wrestling/{{ECW}}'s turbulent relationship with [[SpikeTV TNN]], as explained in the following clip which TNN refused to air on their program (it ended up airing on ECW's syndicated program, ''Wrestling/{{ECW}} Hardcore TV''). [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6jGyAjWqW0 "You have to be an ECW fan to watch this show, because, God knows, the network has never put out one freaking commercial or one press release to let you know that we're here!"]]. Paul Heyman would go on to explain in the Wrestling/{{WWE}}-produced documentary ''The Rise and Fall of ECW'' that he blamed TNN's double-dealing for the demise of ECW; TNN rather publicly negotiated with, and subsequently signed, WWE to their network while marginalizing ECW further and further by the week, but refused to pull the trigger and actually cancel ECW, which prevented him from shopping the show around to other networks. In the last few months of the TNN run, Heyman was in open WriterRevolt, ramping up the show's offensive content and brazenly insulting TNN and its execs in an attempt to incite TNN to finally cancel the show in hopes of finding greener pastures elsewhere.

* In 2005, {{ESPN}} opted not to continue its relationship with the NationalHockeyLeague (fresh out of the lockout that canceled the entire 2004-05 season), and the cable rights were taken over by OLN (which then became Versus), [[NetworkDecay a channel dedicated to outdoor sports]] with distribution not as wide as ESPN's. When NBC finally offered to air the 2007 NHL playoffs, they ''cut away from a series-clinching playoff game IN OVERTIME'' to show 90 minutes of pre-race coverage of ''The Preakness'', knocking the remainder of the game over to Versus. Though thankfully, they've learned their lesson (and Versus, now known as the NBC Sports Network following Comcast's acquisition of NBC, has become a lot more established since.)

* DonRosa like almost all the other Disney comics artists never got any royalties for his work, only one-time payments based on the number of pages. This led to him barely scraping for all of his career, mostly supported by the higher wages of his wife and together with his deteriorating eyesight, eventually made him depressed, lose the passion for his work and retire. He explains all this in [[http://career-end.donrosa.de/ his epilogue to the Don Rosa Collection]], which Disney [[KickTheDog refused to print]], resulting in him putting it [[StreisandEffect online for everyone to read]].

** Archie themselves are reviving the heroes in 2012 as ''The New Crusaders''... as part of a web-only subscription service where the new stories are six pages each!
*** To make it less annoying, the six-page installments of ''The New Crusaders'' are going to be WEEKLY, which means 24-30 pages a month for the series, at a subscription fee of $2.99-$3.99 a month, plus thousands of pages of classic stories, as well!
*** At least Archie is offering a free print preview of ''The New Crusaders'' as part of the upcoming Free Comic Book Day version of ''ComicBook/MegaMan'' #1!
*** And there is going to be a print version of ''The New Crusaders'', which will debut in August, three months after the digital version will debut!

* In 2005, {{ESPN}} opted not to continue its relationship with the National Hockey League (fresh out of the lockout that canceled the entire 2004-05 season), and the cable rights were taken over by OLN (which then became Versus), a channel dedicated to outdoor sports with distribution not as wide as ESPN's. When NBC finally offered to air the 2007 NHL playoffs, they ''cut away from a series-clinching playoff game IN OVERTIME'' to show 90 minutes of pre-race coverage of ''The Preakness'', knocking the remainder of the game over to Versus. Though thankfully, they've learned their lesson (and Versus, now known as the NBC Sports Network following Comcast's acquisition of NBC, has become a lot more established since.)

* The Indy Racing League has had a similar path when Versus picked up the load for most (but not all) of its events starting in 2009: ratings have been substantially lower due to Versus simply not being a well-known network (plus the ExecutiveMeddling by the channel's owner, Comcast) even though viewers agree that Versus gives much better treatment to the series as opposed to ABC/ESPN(2); however, the ABC-aired races in 2009 (the Indy 500 and several other summer events) hadn't had as drastic a dropoff as the cable races and started to put a bit more effort into the broadcasts. Of course, a lot of this stems from Tony George's own ExecutiveMeddling that caused the American open-wheel racing split from 1996-2008. Though with the NBC Sports division taking over Versus in 2011, coverage will at least be held to a higher standard.

** According to the WordOfGod, the Red Circle heroes (as well as most of the [[MilestoneComics heroes]]) were barred from appearing in other titles due to the fact that DC would have to pay royalties for each guest-spot. So that's why save for Static, the Milestone and Red Circle heroes rarely got to appear in other, more popular titles.

** It's safe to say that the NHL has been screwed again by NBC. On May 12, 2013, the St. Louis region had CorporateGreed airing over Game 6 of the Washington Capitals at the New York Rangers. This was despite cable listings listing Game 6. Let's just say there were some irate St. Louis hockey fans.

* Website/YouTube bots have taken ''WebVideo/YuGiOhTheAbridgedSeries'' down a dozen times by now. For bogus copyright claims. All submitted by the same bot.

* Paramount attempted to screw Wrestling/{{WWE}} by moving ''WWESmackDown'' into the famed FridayNightDeathSlot (where it would face not only constant pre-emptions for local sports, but the loss of a good portion of its audience to people getting out and doing stuff on Friday nights), in order to try and pressure WWE into keeping ''Monday Night Raw'' on Spike TV. However, thanks to an aggressive marketing campaign by WWE (even rebranding the show ''Friday Night [=SmackDown=]!''), the show managed not only to not lose any viewers, but gained enough ground that it was one of the few Creator/{{UPN}} shows picked up by the post-merger [[Creator/TheCW CW]].
** They ultimately wound up screwing them anyway, but it took a few years; when it came time to renew contracts, CBS wasn't interested despite the high ratings. ''[=SmackDown=]'' moved to the much-less-notable Creator/MyNetworkTV, and started beating Creator/TheCW in ratings by a good margin.