The day of seeing cat videos on television on a daily basis are about to end. Today it was announced that NBC Universal, owners of G4, would be rebranding the network from geek to chic. This new rebranding effort looks to position the station with an emphasis of a more upscale gentleman’s channel – with content and a feel that you would find in GQ. What began in April of 2002, as a gaming channel, evolved into one of the leading aggregates of geek pop culture, technology, gaming, and memes on the boob tube and the Internets. It is a sad day for nerd culture my friends.

You have to give G4 credit, that station has built up a lot of geek cred for the last ten years. Attack Of the Show! has been feeding you all the viral video goods way before Daniel Tosh and Rob Dyrdek even began to think about hosting Tosh.0 and Ridiculousness – and they do it with more style and wacky shenanigans. G4 also brought the world American Ninja Warrior! Hell, it even gave Olivia Munn her start. From X-Play to your daily dose of Cops, G4 is the station for hard-hitting tech and gaming news while also providing fun mindless entertainment. Seriously, where am I going to go now for Sexy Yeti and Boba Fetish?

The network is looking to pull the ole switcheroo by early 2013. Although NBCU is looking for a more “sophisticated” look, Varietyclaims G4 will still be sticking to its video game and tech roots. Rebranding of G4 is solely to try and distinguish itself away from all the other young male driven audience channels like Spike, SyFy, A&E, and Discovery. With a more upscale look, it will definitely have an edge in that department. A more classier look would also mean deeper pockets of advertisers. A name change is still up in the air for now, but the real question is, what will happen to Fax Bear?!

G4 has always been the king of coverage for big events like Comic-Con, E3, and various other entertainment conventions. I really hope they continue to host these after the rebranding. Maybe, if G4 does not survive as a channel, it could move on as an Internet outlet like some magazines who have strictly gone digital? Chris Hardwick has certainly made himself known with his Nerdist Industries, which was recently acquired by Legendary Entertainment. Nerdist started off as a podcast and now has grown exponentially as a big pruveyor of digital content.

What hits me the most, like a kick in the nuts, is the fact that I moved out to California with the mindset that one day I would be working with the fine folks of G4. I admire everything that they exhibit, through the good times and bad, it just always seemed like these people had the best time on TV. I even met Candice Bailey during a Comic-Con party – she was just an absolute sweetheart.

I hope for the best to everyone who makes that station work. I follow a lot of G4 peoples on the Twitter and they all seem like wonderful individuals who love what they do. I’d hate for them to lose their jobs over this. The same goes for all the hosts of the shows. Since 2002, G4 worked really hard to give their niche the content they deserve and they are the only ones who do it best. G4 has seen it’s fair share of hardships over the years from many businessy type things, and has always survived adversity; let’s hope this is the same case and we’ll be ringing in the new year with everyone in 2013!

Source: Variety