Did you consider the 2004 rebrand the downfall of CN?

[Moe]

Betty Cohen's departure in 2001 was like the network being diagnosed with Huntington's, or Parkinson's or another really degenerative disease.

It wasn't too bad at first, but eventually it just became worse and worse until you end up with the situation we have today.

Her team was the only one who understood that CN should have a diverse lineup that catered to all ages, and not just be Disney Channel 2 or Nickelodeon 2.

I believe that merger of WB and Turner in 1996 changed the direction for CN.

CN went from everyone in 1992 to just kids today.

Even if you looked at some of the older posts from the early 2000s when the Powerhouse era was still in swing, you'd find posts lamenting that Cartoon Network aired too many Cartoon Cartoons and anime and not enough classics as they did in the beginning. So I can safely say adult viewers at the time were not receptive to the 2004 change.

Oh wow, that's interesting and I rarely watch CN because I was at deaf school with boys want to watch different channels like TNN, AMC, TBS, TNT, MTV, BET, local channels, Sci-Fi, USA, FX and sport channels.

I only could catch to watch on CN during weekend with my sister.

After 2004, one student who is anime fan, tuned to CN after school to watch anime shows during City era.

Back in 2002, I tuned to Nick to watch cartoons at dorm and boys made fun of me for watch kid shows, so I was like... hand the remote control to them and I was very unhappy. It was partial factor that I hate deaf school.

 

[Leviathan]

I actually disagree. Samples's tenure also remembered that CN should have a diverse lineup for all ages. Heck towards the start of said era Adult Swim was introduced. I'd say the degenerative disease would start when Stuart Snyder came in, when the network went from amazing to just decent. Then when Christina Miller showed up the network really started to go on auto pilot and Gumball and TTG basically became the SpongeBob's of CN.

I don't count Adult Swim in that era because that's when AS became an autonomous sub-channel, with ex-Cohen people in the driver's seat.

As of CN's issues over the years can be neatly summarized as "Execs want to shoehorn CN into being a traditionally just-for-kids network like Nickelodeon and Disney". That really began after Cohen left.

 

[Toonhead2002Ultra]

I don't count Adult Swim in that era because that's when AS became an autonomous sub-channel, with ex-Cohen people in the driver's seat.

It didn't become a sub-channel immediately. It was considered a CN block from September of 2001 when it was created until the end of March 2005 when it took the 5am hour and received separate Nielsen ratings from CN. It was initially meant to be a part of CN where they would air adult content as opposed to its own thing. I guess you could argue that CN airing more modern shows and shelving vintage content throughout 2001 to 2003 was when CN was starting to tilt more towards kids as opposed to being for everyone. Adult Swim's growing prominence into its own network could've also created the mindset that "Adult Swim is for adults only so CN must be for kids and teens only".

 

[R Lopez]

Adult Swim's growing prominence into its own network could've also created the mindset that "Adult Swim is for adults only so CN must be for kids and teens only".

Yeah, the timing of Adult Swim taking off in 2003 (when Family Guy became the highest-rated show on the network) coinciding with CN wanting to be a more like Nick and Disney Channel resulted in the pivot of 2004.

For me, CN lost its edge at that time. (That edge has occasionally returned in the form of individual shows.) After 2004, CN just didn't do experiments like Space Ghost Coast to Coast. Sunday Pants (for those of you who know what that is) is a good example of something that might've had a better chance at success just a few years earlier.