1. How about sitcoms. There were some good ones out there (Seinfield, Fraiser) but I long ago got sick of this entire genre. Every one is the same: the male lead is an overgrown, imbecilic, sports obsessed (but almost never an actual athlete or even remotely athletic), sex obsessed man child. The female lead, usually a wife/girlfriend, is a overbearing, tyrannical, manipulative, psychopath who will often spend the episode tormenting or outsmarting her husband/boyfriend over a real or imagined slight, which along with the male leads idiotic antics is where the shows comedy is supposed to be derived. Both characters tend to be immature, petty, and lack any real passion or redeeming characteristics. Almost the polar opposite of the MLP characters.
2. The characters. I can follow just about any fiction if a really like the characters. The ponies are deep, interesting and likable and I am always interested in seeing what the writers will do with them next. It also doesn't hurt that the setting is well developed and the animation is gorgeous.
3. Do away with the reality TV shows. Absolutely worthless. I recently cancelled my cable tv because there is nothing but this garbage on. You can't even get away from it on the history, discovery and sci-fi (now SyFy, ugh) channels now. With netflix and streaming video, there is no need for cable tv anymore. I am hoping on demand streaming video will kill reality TV. I think a lot of the garbage on TV is just to pad out the programming so they can have as many channels running 24/7 as cheaply as possible.