Fringe time
In 1971, in an effort to loosen the hegemony the Big Three television networks had on television in the United States, the Federal Communications Commission implemented two rules, the Financial Interest and Syndication Rules (fin-syn), which prohibited the networks from owning interests in syndicators; and the Prime Time Access Rule, which prohibited networks from programming a one-hour slot in the evening hour, the slot now known as fringe time.The intent of the new rules was to encourage individual station licensees to produce more local programming.One such program, Wheel of Fortune, has survived in syndication since that era, outlasting the show's network run.Other formats that filled fringe time over the years include news magazine (mostly syndicated entertainment-based programs), music-based shows (such as Hee Haw, Solid Gold, America's Top 10, and Dance Fever), and off-network rerun, usually sitcom.Both fin-syn and the Prime Time Access Rule have since been repealed; the networks, although they have reacquired most of the syndicators they were forced to spin off, have never resumed directly programming the fringe time slots they were forced to abandon, except for occasional sports and special programming.