Bravo is out and Lifetime is in?

Big news this afternoon as Lifetime (aka the channel for Traci Gold and Meredith Baxter Birney) has stolen Project Runway out from Bravo!. Now Bravo! is suing the Weinstein Company who produces the show but word is they've got little legal ground to stand on. Lifetime might be a winner in all this but both Bravo and Runway look to be losers to me. Bravo loses its biggest hit and a show that established its identity. It also looks like this could have further implications since the same production company makes Top Chef, Tim Gunn's Guide to Style and that crappy new dance show they have. Could Bravo! lose everything and just have Workout and The Real Wives of Orange County? Sure sounds like a possibility. Meanwhile Heidi and co. are moving to a channel whose audience is 50 to 100 year old women who's idea of good TV is Golden Girls reruns and epically bad made for TV films with Tina Yothers and Tori Spelling. I'd be shocked if half the Runway audience knows what channel Lifetime is in their cable lineup. I expect eventually the show will reclaim its audience but I expect the initial ratings to bottom out. About the only good news is that we get 3, count them 3 seasons of Runway this year. A new one on Bravo! in July and then the premiere on Lifetime in November. Now that's fashion forward.