Ghost Hunters has garnered some of the highest ratings of any Syfy reality programming. From the start, the show has found an audience for its mix of paranormal investigation and interpersonal drama. It has since been syndicated on
NBC Universal sister cable channel
Oxygen and also airs on the Canadian cable network
OLN. In the early shows, TAPS was headquartered in a trailer located behind Jason Hawes' house, and they drove one white van to investigations. Within one season, they had moved the operation to a storefront in
Warwick, Rhode Island, and acquired several new TAPS vehicles. In addition to their successful television venture, TAPS operates a website where they share their stories, photographs, and
ghost hunting videos with an ever-growing membership list. Because of the popularity of the show, TAPS cast members have signed contracts with at least two talent agencies, Escape Artistry and GP Entertainment, to manage their appearances at lectures, conferences and public events. TAPS also has a three-hour weekly radio show called
Beyond Reality, initially hosted by Hawes and Wilson. The radio show covers topics in a vast array of areas such as
cryptozoology,
spiritualism,
ufology, and
ghosts. The show includes guest appearances from other TAPS members and special guests such as
John Zaffis, Rosemary Ellen Guiley, Chris Fleming, and others who specialize in certain fields. Noted paranormal author Jeff Belanger and
Spooky Southcoast radio host and author Tim Weisberg served as fill-in hosts. The show also once simulcasted on
Spooky Southcoast, airing from the Mt. Washington Hotel in New Hampshire. New episodes are broadcast every Saturday from 7 pm to 10 pm
Eastern Time, though sometimes may skip a week due to the possibility of the hosts being busy with other ventures.
Popular culture Ghost Hunters helped popularize
paranormal television and
ghost hunting during its original run. For much of its initial airing on Syfy, it was the top-rated paranormal reality show on television. John Blake of
CNN opined in 2013 that
Ghost Hunters "is to the paranormal field what
Sugarhill's '
Rapper's Delight' is to hip-hop...." and the
October 28, 2010 episode of
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.
Criticism Ghost Hunters has attracted various critics and skeptics, such as
Joe Nickell of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry,
Skeptical Inquirer author
Lynne Kelly,
James Randi, and
Benjamin Radford. The Skeptical Analysis of the Paranormal Society (SAPS) was founded with the intent to recreate and debunk segments of the show. In June 2008,
Ghost Hunters was awarded The Truly Terrible Television (TTTV) Award by
Independent Investigations Group for peddling
pseudoscience and
superstition to its audience. During the seven-hour-long, live Halloween show on October 31, 2008, at least two events took place that critics have scrutinized: One occurs when lead investigator Grant Wilson has his jacket collar pulled down by an unseen force three times; all the while one of his hands remained at his side, which led detractors to claim he was pulling a hidden string. This happens again at one point where Hawes touches Wilson's back and his collar moves down again. Another occurs when a supposed disembodied voice tells the hunters, "You're not supposed to be here." Critics have claimed the voice sounded like it was piped in from an external audio source. In regard to the scrutiny, Wilson and Hawes defended themselves, stating that everything in the show is real. In a 2013 interview on
The Reveal, Wilson stated that their television contracts forbade them from faking evidence on the show. According to investigator Benjamin Radford, most ghost hunting groups including TAPS make many methodological mistakes. "After watching episodes of
Ghost Hunters and other similar programs, it quickly becomes clear to anyone with a background in science that the methods used are both illogical and unscientific". Anyone can be a ghost investigator, "failing to consider alternative explanations for anomalous ... phenomena", considering emotions and feelings as "evidence of ghostly encounters." "Improper and unscientific investigation methods", for example, "using unproven tools and equipment", "sampling errors", "ineffectively using recording devices" and "focusing on the history of the location...and not the phenomena." In an article for
Skeptical Inquirer, Radford concludes that ghost hunters should care about doing a truly scientific investigation: "I believe that if ghosts exist, they are important and deserve to be taken seriously. Most of the efforts to investigate ghosts so far have been badly flawed and unscientific — and not surprisingly, fruitless." In a
New York Times article about
Ghost Hunters and TAPS, Radford contended that "the group and others like it lack scientific rigor and mislead people into thinking that their homes are haunted." The show's editing has been questioned, such as activity that is not captured on tape and findings that are unsupported by evidence in the show specifically. Tools are used in ways that are not proven effective, or in ways in which they have been proven ineffective, such as
infrared thermometers that are claimed to detect cold spots in the middle of rooms when such tools are able only to measure the surface temperature of objects. == Other media ==