TV Guide Channel is looking for America's Next Producer

Desperately in need of programming apparently, TV Guide Channel has partnered with the production team behind Project Runway and Top Chef to create America's Next Producer. The reality competition will pit 10 contestants against each other as they attempt to create, uhhh..., television programming. The prize is a first-look production deal with the TV Guide Channel. This is either the most self-reflective, post-post-modern move on the part of a network or the laziest. I haven't decided which.

The contestants will be living together under one roof - of course - and they'll be doing things that putting together three-minute sizzle reels on shows they're pitching to the network. Nothing is off limits. Game shows, comedies, dramas, reality. Here's one - how about a show about the programmers at a network who are so desperate for original programming that they put together a show to trick people into giving them content for free while being the content themselves.