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ABC Family
Launched	April 29, 1977 (original launch; as CBN Satellite Service) August 1, 1988 (relaunch; as The CBN Family Channel) September 15, 1990 (renamed as The Family Channel) August 15, 1998 (relaunch; as Fox Family Channel) November 10, 2001 (relaunch; as ABC Family)
Network	Disney-ABC Television Group
Owned by	ABC Family Worldwide Inc. (The Walt Disney Company)
Picture format	480i (SDTV) 720p (HDTV)
Slogan	A New Kind of Family
Headquarters	Burbank, California, United States
Formerly called	CBN Satellite Service (1977-1984) CBN Cable (1984-1988) The CBN Family Channel (1988-1990) The Family Channel (1990-1998) Fox Family (1998-2001)
Sister channel(s)	Disney Channel, Disney Junior, Disney XD, ABC, ABC News Now, Soapnet, Live Well Network, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN Classic, ESPNEWS, ESPNU
Website	www.abcfamily.com
Availability
Satellite
DirecTV	Channel 311 (SD/HD) 1311 (VOD)
Dish Network	Channel 180
Cable
Verizon FiOS	Channel 199 (SD) Channel 699 (HD)
Available on most cable systems	Check local listings
IPTV
AT&T U-Verse	Channel 178 (East, SD) Channel 179 (West, SD) Channel 1178 (HD)

ABC Family, stylized as abc family, is an American television network, owned by ABC Family Worldwide Inc., a subsidiary of the Disney-ABC Television Group division of The Walt Disney Company. ABC Family offers contemporary and family programming, including off-network syndicated reruns and original series, feature films and Made-for-TV original movies, and some religious programming.

The network was founded in 1977 as an extension of televangelist Pat Robertson's Christian television ministry, and eventually evolved into The Family Channel by 1990. In 1998, it was sold to Fox Kids Worldwide Inc. and renamed Fox Family.^[1][2] On October 24, 2001, Fox Family Worldwide Inc was sold to The Walt Disney Company. The sale to Disney included Saban Entertainment and Fox Family.^[3][4] The channel generally offers programming aimed at a wide audience, but primarily features series and movies aimed at teenage girls and young women (age 15-30).

History[link]

ABC Family launched on April 29, 1977, as the CBN Satellite Service, an arm of Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN). The name later changed to the CBN Cable Network in 1984 and grew to a million homes by that year. On August 1, 1988, the word "Family" was incorporated into the name to better reflect the format, becoming The CBN Family Channel. By 1990, the network had grown too profitable to remain under the CBN banner without endangering CBN's non-profit status. CBN spun it off to a new company called International Family Entertainment Inc. (run by Robertson's son, Tim Robertson), and the name was changed to simply The Family Channel on September 15, 1990.

As The Family Channel, it attracted a slightly older (and religious) audience not sought by advertisers; only about one-third of homes watching the network included children or youth. The Family Channel started airing television shows for preschool children, preteens, and teenagers to target all members of the family.^[5]

International Family Entertainment, Inc. was sold to Fox Kids Worldwide Inc. in July 1997, and Fox Kids Worldwide Inc. was renamed Fox Family Worldwide Inc. The Family Channel was officially renamed Fox Family Channel on August 15, 1998.^[1][2] Following the sale to News Corporation, The 700 Club was scaled back to two airings a day (though the sale agreement required the channel to air it three times daily, once each in the morning, late evening and overnight hours), with the evening broadcast being moved out of prime time, pushed an hour later to 11 p.m. ET from 10 p.m., while Columbo was moved from 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET on Sundays. More cartoons were added to the lineup, many of which were from the Fox Kids library, with about eight hours of cartoons airing a day. However, Fox Family also became a cornerstone for syndicating foreign TV series, such as the popular British S Club 7 TV series, which became their flagship series for the channel until the early 2000s. The channel also syndicated many Canadian series, both animated and live action, including Angela Anaconda, Big Wolf on Campus, I Was a 6th Grade Alien, and briefly The Zack Files; along with running cartoons and anime based on video games, such as Donkey Kong Country, Megaman, and Monster Rancher, mostly a part of the channel's morning lineup. The channel aired reruns of some Fox Kids series such as Bobby's World, Eek! The Cat, and Life with Louie, and added some recent family sitcoms as well. The new schedule also included reruns of the CBS Saturday morning series Pee-wee's Playhouse, which had not been seen on television since 1991. When Fox bought the channel in 1997, programmers sought a new dual audience—kids in daytime, families at night. In 1999, Fox tried to spin off two digital cable networks from Fox Family, the Boyz Channel and the Girlz Channel, which both contained content focusing on each gender; both networks went off the air a year later due to lack of demand and the controversy that developed over the gender-segregated channels. To a point, Disney is attempting to relaunch the concept somewhat in February 2009 with the conversion of Toon Disney into the tween boy-targeting Disney XD, while Disney Channel has shifted towards featuring programming appealing to girls (though not necessarily in the same gender-exclusionary manner as the Boyz/Girlz Channel concept).

Under Fox's ownership, Fox Family saw its ranking slide from 10th to 17th place as a result of an increasingly competitive race for younger viewers and the bickering over ownership between News Corp. and Haim Saban. Some observers believe that it chased away some of the older viewers and never really replaced the core audience. As a result, primetime ratings declined 35% in the past three years. It is also suggested that Fox hired more employees than needed, and when Disney took over, as many as 500 were laid off (this came at a time when Disney itself was downsizing, with 400 others laid off from its failed Go Network online service), but Fox Family also used many freelancers for certain aspects of the channel, such as their short-lived "block jocks" and most of the monikers for the network were created by freelance artists. However, the Disney acquisition took the channel into a deeper decline in its early years.

Fox Family Worldwide Inc was sold to The Walt Disney Company, for $2.9 billion on October 24, 2001. The sale to The Walt Disney Company included Saban Entertainment. The Walt Disney Company bought Capital Cities/ABC in February 1996, and changed the corporate name to ABC, and the network was officially renamed ABC Family on November 10, 2001.^[3][4][6][7]

The sale to Disney was considered one of the largest mistakes or problems occurring during the tenure of Michael Eisner.^[8] The failure was primarily due to the acquisition being done by the strategic planning department of Disney, without consulting anyone at ABC. The original plan was to use the channel to essentially show re-runs of ABC programming, but this plan was completely impossible since ABC had no syndication rights to the majority of their own programs. During this time, the network did air same-season repeats of Alias, Less Than Perfect, Life with Bonnie, and The Bachelor, almost all of which were Touchstone Television productions (The Bachelor is distributed by Time Warner's Telepictures). But in trying to change the focus of the channel, Disney also canceled several Fox Family series, like State of Grace, and cut back on the network's TV movies, which were among the few programs Fox Family was doing well with. The ratings tumbled further as the network became dependent on syndicated reruns and no original programs (save for original wrap-around segments around Bachelor repeats, and children's programming). ^[9]

The next major plan was to reposition the channel to market it to college students, young women, or to a more hip audience under the name XYZ, a reverse reference to ABC. Disney soon found that the channel could never be renamed as such. The original sale from CBN to Fox/Saban contained a stipulation that the channel contain the word "Family" in the name forever, no matter who owns the network. To create XYZ, the Family Channel would have had to cease to exist—terminating all existing cable TV contracts—and XYZ would have to be created as a new network. Cable companies would not be obligated to put XYZ in the spot vacated by the Family Channel. ABC scrapped the idea after discovering this clause.^{[citation needed]}

The name was revisited at one point in 2003, serving as a program block entitled "The XYZ.", showing programs and movies aimed at the above groups. The network was also used as a buffer to burn off failed ABC series, such as All American Girl, which featured Spice Girl Geri Haliwell.^[10]

Change[link]

Another one of Robertson's stipulations in his sale of the original Family Channel to its future line of secular owners was that his syndicated talk show, The 700 Club, be aired twice daily on the network (although the channel is only required to carry the program twice a day, ABC Family carries The 700 Club three times each weekday; once in the morning, twice at night), along with a shorter CBN talk show called Living the Life. Following controversial remarks made by Robertson on the former program about Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, as well as other equally controversial comments regarding gays, feminists, Muslims, abortion, and many other social issues,^[11] ABC Family moved to distance itself from the program (the showing of which is also required under Robertson's original sale stipulations, along with the airing of a day-long CBN telethon in late January every year); On August 29, 2005, ABC Family changed the disclaimers before, during, and after the broadcasts from "The following/preceding program is/was brought to you by CBN" to "The following/preceding CBN telecast does not reflect the views of ABC Family." Since 2003, ABC Family has been producing more successful original movies and series.^[12]

Today[link]

In August 2006, an all new slogan and visual style premiered on ABC Family: A New Kind of Family. As previously stated, the word "Family" is required under the terms of the lease from Robertson.

On August 31, 2006, ABC Family aired Jetix for the last time as a part of Disney's plan to convert all Jetix airings to Toon Disney. Jetix aired various programs since its debut on the network in 2002, which included Metabots, Beyblade, Digimon: Digital Monsters, Daigunder, Get Ed, and many others. Of its long list of programs, the Power Rangers series was its most successful.^[13] Sitcom repeats currently air in Jetix's former timeslot from 7-9 a.m. ET, with the morning airing of the 700 Club/Living the Life block pushed back a half-hour further to 9:30 a.m. ET^[14] and sitcom reruns airing during the 9 a.m. ET half-hour. Since the removal of Jetix, ABC Family has not aired any programming targeted at pre-teen audiences; those programs now air on sister network Disney Channel (though this is nothing new for the network, as just before the Fox purchase, ABC Family (as The Family Channel) did not carry any children's programming at all).

Despite being co-owned with Disney Channel—and targeting a similar audience, very little of Disney Channel's programming has aired on ABC Family (except for reruns of Boy Meets World and Sister, Sister which have previously aired on that network; in fact, episodes of Sister, Sister that aired on ABC Family until it was removed from the lineup in April 2010 were the edited Disney Channel versions as ABC Family did not purchase the original syndicated prints of the show from CBS Television Distribution). However, the channel has aired some films featuring performers that have been associated with Disney in recent years, such as Hilary Duff, The Jonas Brothers, Ashley Tisdale, Demi Lovato and Selena Gomez. The only Disney Channel productions to air on ABC Family were the 2008 movie Camp Rock and the 2011 films Lemonade Mouth and Phineas and Ferb The Movie: Across the 2nd Dimension, which are also three of only four Disney Channel movies to air domestically on a non-Disney Channel branded network (Cadet Kelly is the other having aired on The Wonderful World of Disney in 2002; though TV Guide once claimed that ABC Family once aired reruns of The Famous Jett Jackson just prior to the removal of the Jetix lineup).

In October 2007, ABC Family completely redesigned their website, giving it a more modern look as compared to its previous look. They also streamlined the Broadband Player, putting more content on it including reruns of Three Moons Over Milford, and episodes of 7th Heaven, Grounded for Life, Kyle XY, and Greek, as well as adding some Fox Kids programming they still own, such as Attack of the Killer Tomatoes.^[15]

Kyle XY had given the channel the most viewers in the network's history, but in 2008 that record was broken by the series premiere of The Secret Life of the American Teenager. After nearly 3 years, the record was broken again with Switched at Birth premiering to 3.3 million viewers on June 6, 2011. Since then, ABC Family has launched more shows geared towards young females, such as popular dramas Make It or Break It and The Nine Lives of Chloe King, and comedies 10 Things I Hate About You, Melissa & Joey, and State of Georgia

In July 2009, the network posted best-ever July deliveries in Prime and Total viewers thanks to returning series The Secret Life of the American Teenager and new series Make It or Break It, 10 Things I Hate About You and Ruby & The Rockits along with extended features from the Harry Potter film franchise and the TV debut of Labor Pains.^[16] On June 8, 2010, the premiere of the ABC Family original drama series Pretty Little Liars, successfully broke series premiere ratings records for ABC Family, across all major viewing demographics of women and young people.

Aside from some common programming and targeting the same audience, the various iterations of CBN/Fox/ABC Family have had no affiliation with the Canadian network Family, although some electronic guide providers confusingly display Family's 1988-1998 logo (which partially resembles ABC Family's pre-1998 logo as The Family Channel) as that of ABC Family's logo.

ABC Family HD[link]

ABC Family HD is a 720p high definition simulcast of ABC Family that launched in early 2008.^[17] All of the network's original series and films currently are produced in high definition, which are aired in a widescreen letterbox forrmat on the SD channel. Films when possible also air in HD. ABC Family HD is being offered on select cable and satellite providers such as Comcast, Time Warner Cable,^[18] Cox Communications,^[19] Verizon FiOS, AT&T U-verse, Charter Communications and DirecTV.^[20] Dish Network does not carry the HD feed due to a carriage dispute with Disney.

Programming[link]

ABC Family currently offers a slate of mostly reruns of contemporary comedies, such as Full House, 8 Simple Rules, Grounded For Life, Still Standing, Friends, What I Like About You, America's Funniest Home Videos, That '70s Show and My Wife and Kids, with the only off-network drama series on the schedule being Friday Night Lights (since moved to ESPN Classic due to low ratings and better audience compatibility) and Gilmore Girls (which resumed airing weekdays at 5pm ET in February 2012 as reruns of Secret Life performed under expectations). Since 2000, the network has aired several sitcoms that have aired on ABC's former TGIF block, including the Miller-Boyett produced Step by Step (one of the longest-running shows on the channel, running from 2001 to 2010), Family Matters (2003-2008), Two of a Kind (1999-2005), Sabrina, the Teenage Witch (2006-2011), and Full House (2003-2012), with Boy Meets World the only TGIF series that is currently airing on the network.

The channel also produces a limited amount of original series, such as The Secret Life of the American Teenager, Melissa & Joey, Pretty Little Liars, Switched at Birth, The Lying Game, and Jane by Design, and former series such as Kyle XY, GREEK, Lincoln Heights, 10 Things I Hate About You, Ruby and the Rockits, Huge, and the recently ended series, State of Georgia , The Nine Lives of Chloe King and Make It or Break It. Of these original series, the channel has had minimal success with situation comedy programming as of recent, with its drama series having generally outlasted the original sitcoms. ABC Family airs their original series on Monday and/or Tuesday nights, and recently Wednesday nights for its new comedy block, typically preempting programming that airs in the 7 and 10 p.m. ET timeslots the rest of the week. The network airs each season of its original series in a relatively uncommon format for broadcast television or basic cable, as the first half of the season airs with consecutive episodes, followed by a 4-6 month break, then the remaining episodes of the season are broadcast afterward; ABC Family typically only reruns episodes of their original series in a marathon that airs prior to a season premiere, mid-season or season finale, or other special occasion, though the channel does air week-behind encores of original series that air in the 8 p.m. ET hour prior to the newest episode and a same-night encore of the newest episode the evening of an episode premiere.

The channel also airs a limited amount of religious programming, a remnant from the network's CBN ownership, including the aforementioned weekdaily broadcasts of The 700 Club and The 700 Club Interactive, as well as ministry programs from Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer, James Robison, Joseph Prince, Doug Batchelor, Ed Young and the late Zola Levitt; aside from the 700 Club and 700 Club Interactive airings, most of the religious programming carried by ABC Family generally airs between 5-7 a.m. ET each weekday and on Sunday nights from 12-2 a.m. ET.

It is one of only two Disney-owned cable channels in the U.S. (ESPN Classic being the other) to air infomercials and one of the only cable channels to air informercials before 2:30 a.m. ET.; they air from 1-7 a.m. ET weekdays, 2-7 a.m. ET Saturdays and 12-7 a.m. ET on Sundays.

Movies[link]

ABC Family airs movies Wednesday nights at 9 p.m ET and Thursday nights (and if no original series are scheduled, Monday and/or Tuesdays also) at 8 p.m. ET and a day-long schedule of films on weekends from as early as 7 a.m. (sometimes later, such as around 7:30 or 8 a.m. ET) to as late as 2 a.m. ET on Saturdays and 12 a.m. ET on Sundays. Movies airing on the network are targeted at various audiences, from pre-teens to teens and adults, with a large amount of films airing on ABC Family being distributed by Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group (owned by ABC Family's parent company The Walt Disney Company), 20th Century Fox (owned by the channel's former parent News Corporation) and Warner Bros. Entertainment. ABC Family has also purchased the cable television rights to many film series, such as the Harry Potter film series (which ABC and Disney Channel also hold rights to), 2004's A Cinderella Story and its 2008 made-for-DVD spinoff Another Cinderella Story and most recently the Legally Blonde film series (after securing rights to the 2009 made-for-DVD release Legally Blondes). From 1998 to 2002, ABC Family also secured cable rights to several films starring Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen (this was around the time the network aired their short-lived ABC sitcom Two of a Kind, but just prior to carrying Full House).

The channel also produces its own original movies, as sister network Disney Channel does (though Disney Channel's movies are targeted at a slightly younger audience); some of ABC Family's most popular original movies include Night of the Twisters, Holiday in Handcuffs, the Au Pair trilogy, My Fake Fiance and Cyberbully. ABC Family has also recently been generating high levels of viewers with their weekend movie events. The "Harry Potter Weekend" Block in July 2009 generated some of the highest levels of viewers for the year so far weekend events.

ABC Family is also becoming known for giving previews to upcoming movies, as it has done for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Hairspray and Stardust.^[21]

Sports[link]

For the 2000 and 2001 seasons, Fox Family was home to a weekly Thursday night Major League Baseball game (a game that had previously aired nationwide on Fox Sports Net from 1997–1999), as well as select games in the Division Series round of playoffs. As part of its purchase of Fox Family, in addition to that game, Disney acquired the MLB rights that were also held by Fox Family's sister station FX. Those two game packages were moved to ESPN beginning with the next baseball season, but the playoff games remained on ABC Family for one additional year due to contractual issues. A deal was made to move those playoff games to ESPN, who produced the games for ABC Family, starting with the 2003 season. Although the games aired on Disney networks, Fox kept the exclusive negotiation to renew the contract after the 2006 season. Fox chose not to renew their rights to the Division Series, which went to TBS as part of its new baseball contract.

Seasonal programming blocks[link]

25 Days of Christmas[link]

The channel has been known for airing many Christmas specials, such as the Rankin-Bass programs The Little Drummer Boy and Santa Claus Is Coming to Town. ABC has since expanded this holiday programming, adding made-for-television movies, a litany of Rankin-Bass sequels (this was complicated somewhat because the broadcasting rights some of the original specials, including Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, were still owned by CBS), and other original programming to create "The 25 Days of Christmas." This program block airs from December 1 through 25th, in prime time during the weekdays and from noon through prime time during the weekends. There have been some movies that aren't necessarily holiday related. In 2006, for example, Harry Potter movies were shown along with Mary Poppins (the 2004 Enhanced Home Theater Mix version with redubbed sound effects) and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Also that year, Dr. Seuss on the Loose and The Cat in the Hat were added, however, not with How the Grinch Stole Christmas. However, ABC cuts a lot of parts of these specials out, including the "Peppermint Mine" scene in "Rudolph", and the song " I'm Kubla Kraus", in Jack Frost.

13 Nights of Halloween[link]

The success of 25 Days of Christmas led to this holiday spin-off, which airs from October 19 to October 31 each year. It was previously known as the 13 Days of Halloween during the Fox Family era. Fox Family created The 13 Days of Halloween in 1998. The programming block became one of the biggest successes of the network, being repeated in 1999, 2000, and 2001. In 2002 after ABC purchased Fox Family, it was changed to the 13 Nights of Halloween. It was not aired in 2003 as new programming executives simply decided not to air the successful programming for reasons that remain unclear. The 13 Nights of Halloween returned in 2004, featuring reruns of Scariest Places on Earth, the premiere of the ABC Family Original Movie “The Hollow", and other shows like Smallville and Gilmore Girls. The 2005 schedule provided a return to more traditional Halloween programming and scary movies. It has been steadily growing ever since but still hasn't gotten the same attention it had in the Fox Family era. Films that air during 13 Nights of Halloween include The Sixth Sense, Corpse Bride, Scooby Doo and occasionally Stephen King's It and Nightworld: Lost Souls.

ABC Family's Campus Crush[link]

In 2009, ABC Family debuted this back-to-school-themed block, which airs from the first week of August. "Campus Crush" features episodes of its original series and romantic comedy and drama films, as well as school-themed episodes of its syndicated series.

Past programming blocks[link]

ABC Family Action Block / Jetix[link]

Aired various children's programs since its debut on the network in September 2002, which included Medabots, Beyblade, Digimon: Digital Monsters, Daigunder, Get Ed, and many others. Was rebranded into Jetix in February 2004 when the Jetix block was launched on Toon Disney. Of its long list of programs, the Power Rangers series was its most successful. Discontinued on the network in September 2006, though it continued to air on Toon Disney. Sitcom repeats currently air in Jetix's former timeslot from 7-9 a.m. ET, with the morning airing of the 700 Club/Living the Life block pushed back an hour further to 9 a.m. ET. Most of Jetix's programming was previously aired on Fox Kids and Fox Family. As of February 13, 2009, Jetix's official home, Toon Disney, was rebranded into Disney XD, and Jetix no longer exists.

International version[link]

ABC Spark[link]

On October 26, 2011, it was announced that Disney/ABC would be partnering with Toronto-based media company Corus Entertainment to launch a Canadian version of ABC Family under the name ABC Spark, which launched on March 23, 2012.^[22] The channel, which is licensed by the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission as a Category B specialty channel (which under CRTC rules, Canadian digital cable and direct broadcast satellite providers can choose to carry the channel on an optional basis), is aimed at 15-34 year olds.^[23] The ABC Spark name was chosen to avoid viewer confusion and/or legal issues with the preexisting and unrelated Canadian channel Family, which is owned by competitor Astral Media, and carries programming from ABC Family sister network Disney Channel. In Canada, ABC Spark is available on many cable and satellite providers including Cogeco,Bell,Shaw and Telus to name a few. Rogers a major cable company unusually doesn't provide service for ABC Spark.

Criticism[link]

Since 2006, the critics have gone after programming on ABC Family. Most feel^[who?] the network has gone from family friendly to "too risqué," and shows like Greek and The Secret Life of the American Teenager are far too racy for "family viewers." Critics feel the executives at ABC Family are only after viewership numbers and are unconcerned about showing younger generations in questionable scenarios in series and film. Mostly, the main focus is on teenage pregnancy and underage drinking.^[24]

It should be noted that despite the channel's name including the word "Family" (the network is, as previously mentioned, contractually required to keep the word in its name), the channel's programming content standards had changed several years earlier after the sale of the channel by International Family Entertainment, and the channel had been airing even some acquired series and movies that contain profanity, violence and sexual content or dialogue after the sale, particularly since being purchased by The Walt Disney Company. ABC Family does air parental advisory tags at the beginning of some TV-14 rated programs, such as That '70s Show and some episodes of The Secret Life of the American Teenager.

Network slogans[link]

• Stay with Us (1977–1985; as CBN Satellite Service and CBN Cable)^[25]
• Just Watch Us (1985–1988; as CBN Cable)^[26]
• Together, We're Family (1988–1991; as The CBN Family Channel)^[27]
• The Greatest in the Family (1991–1995; as The Family Channel)
• There's Nothing Stronger (1995–1996)
• Just Watch Us Now! (1996–1998)
• You Belong (1998–2000; as Fox Family)
• It's Electric (2000–2001)
• Everything You Want to Know from A to Z (2001–2003; as ABC Family)
• It's All About You (2003–2006)
• A New Kind of Family (2006–present)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• ABC Family at the Internet Movie Database
• TheFutonCritic: ABCFamily
• Official YouTube Channel