I kind of need an explanation on the concept.

I know I sound like an idiot, but it's purely cultural.

In England there used to be only 5 channels (only 3 before 1982) and In order to see any softcore movies you'd have to wait 'til about 2am to catch an eighties "skinflick" on Channel 4. Channel 5 (or FIVE as it's now known) launched in 1997 and showed them at a much friendlier time of 11:30 and thus I was able to get through my teens.

Since I gather Softly from cable is based on a US television/movie concept, I was hoping someone might enlighten me.

Cheers in advance.

It's a spoof of late-night TV. A lot of shows on Cinemax were set up with some sort of framing device, like "Hot Line" and "The Best Sex Ever" which involved calling into a radio station with sexy stories, or "Red Shoe Diaries" that focused on different women's sexcapades. Another thing I think Brad's getting at are shows like "Up All Night" that had a host presenting different movies, usually softcore fluff. Hence the name "Shannon Shears": Shannon Tweed was a famous softcore star, and Rhonda Shear hosted "Up All Night" in the 90s. Does that help?