False or dubitable "facts" about YA

Four widely-published ostensibly-factual statements about Young Americans (YA) are either plainly false or highly dubitable and misleading.  Contrary to those statements:  

(1) YA was not a spin-off of Dawson's Creek

(2) YA is set not in Connecticut, but in Massachusetts; 

(3) YA's ratings were not low, at least in the opinion of its principal sponsor; and 

(4) YA was not "cancelled" by The WB, but rather seems never to have been intended to continue for more than eight episodes.

(1) Many published descriptions of Young Americans -- apparently starting with an article by Allison Ballard, "Dawson's Creek spin-off planned," published  on March 30, 2000 -- have called YA a "spin-off" of Dawson's Creek (DC), an extraordinarily successful and influential teen drama produced by Columbia Tri-Star and broadcast on The WB for six seasons, from January 1998 to May 2003.   That appellation is false and misleading.

(2) A less important widely-published falsehood about Young Americans is that the fictive town of New Rawley, where most of YA is set and where its fictive Rawley Academy is located, is in the state of Connecticut.  That misconception, which may have originated in one of the many never-updated reviews of YA that appeared in July 2000, based on a viewing of only its first episode, no longer appears in the English-language Wikipedia article about YA, but persists on the homepage of the IMDB entry for YA, which describes Rawley Academy as "an elite school in Connecticut."  It also persists in many other online venues, as a Google search for "Young Americans" "Rawley" and "Connecticut" quickly shows.

(3) It has repeatedly been suggested publicly that YA's summer 2000 ratings (measures of how many viewers watched it) were lower than its producers, sponsor or broadcaster had expected or had hoped for ( thereby contributing to YA's not having continued for more than eight episodes).  That is dubitable.

Coke liked the results it got from Young Americans. ... It got a respectable 2 percent of the available viewers (about the same rating as other prime-time shows on WB) during its run ...  That success is the reason Coke is interested in doing it (buying a title sponsorship of a TV show) again on NBC.  

Similarly, Episode Ninja's entry for YA states that "The show ... did extremely well in the ratings."

(4) It has often been stated publicly that only eight episodes of Young Americans were produced because The WB cancelled the show.  However, that more than eight episodes of YA were ever intended is highly dubitable.

Subject: Young Americans

Author: From The WB (205.173.143.35)

Date: 09/20 10:40

Dear fans of Young Americans,

We'd like to thank you for your interest in YOUNG AMERICANS and for helping make its limited summer run a success.

We bought eight episodes of YOUNG AMERICANS to give viewers like you a fresh alternative to summer reruns. We aired the entire run and we're glad you enjoyed it. At this time, we have not ordered additional episodes of the series.

Thank you,

The WB Television Network