Re the Casualty debate, my suggestion some time ago (probably lost amidst the wave of TXF euphoria on here) was that the Beeb should reduce the no of episodes to around 30 a series, and start it (to a big fanfare) on SCD final night, running through to the school holidays starting in July. By airing it September-December it now gets lost against TXF, and when viewers know it's on but they are missing a week, or three, then they just drift away and can do without it. They should also make it less soapy and more of a medical drama, such as it was in its 14-17m heyday.

I spent this evening on our annual visit to relations where the TV is constantly on and always, but always, on ITV1 (yes, they do live on a council estate as it happens...).

Having endured a soap & sofa-ad fest, it was obvious that Englishman in NY was something ITV have very high hopes for - it was promoted in every ad break and over the end credits of both eps of Corrie and Emmerdale. So not, as GeorgeS put it earlier, an attempt only at a BAFTA-winning drama that was always going to get less than 2m and dumped in the least-watched ITV week of the year.

From what I saw of it, it looked very un-ITV like, and far too much of a minority interest to attract a mainstream audience. I always felt it would get something beginning with a '2'. However, with the heavy publicity and Corrie lead-in, perhaps it will end up with something around the 3m mark - alternatively, it could drop off a cliff. If it does, it could mean some interesting ratings for the Triffids.


The BBC would probably find itself less susceptible to attack by the Daily Mail and lazy MPs over its "little watched digital channels" if they scrapped CBBC and CBeebies as stand-alone channels, and ran BBCs3&4 24/7 but with kids programming from, say, 6am to 6pm. In essence, this is what they already do, save that 7pm is the switch point. If they did this, presumably BBC3/4 would end up with very respectable figures.


I thought the same last night but forgot to post when I came on here later. I wondered if they'd superimposed it on later, surely he couldn't possibly have known it would air on 2nd January in that slot whenever it was they filmed in Bolivia?

Yes.

If they did that the overall share for the "24/7 BBC3" would equal the sum of the current shares for BBC3 + CBeebies

And the share for the "24/7 BBC4" would equal the sum of the current shares for BBC4 + CBBC

Hope I've got that the right way round - ie I think CBeebies (and not CBBC) is on the BBC3 frequency.

So using the figures posted a few pages back:

"24/7 BBC3" = 1.29 + 1.36 = 2.65%

"24/7 BBC4" = 0.52 + 0.57 = 1.09%

So "24/7 BBC3" would be the number 1 digital channel by a very wide margin. "24/7 BBC4 would be in 7th place.

On Freeview it's BBC3/CBBC and BBC4/Cbeebies that share the frequencies so I'd assume it's the same elsewhere.

How do people think Celebrity Big Brother will do in January? The last main series did awfully, the final pulling just over 2-3m IIRC.

Will the fact it's the final series pull back the punters? Plus the launch is on a Sunday this year, could that help? Predictions/forecasts for the launch/series averages from you ratings guruuuuuuus?

I think it would be a bad idea to loose the both CBBC and Cbeebies branding. They should keep atleast one of them.

So either:
CBBC Channel - CBBC + BBC Three
BBC Three - Cbeebies + BBC Four

or

Cbeebies - Cbeebies + BBC Four (Maybe under a Cboobies zone like with Adult Swim)
BBC Three - CBBC + BBC Three

or keep both braidings and merge BBC Three into CBBC and BBC Four into Cbeebies.

I don't understand why the BBC are under attack for these 'under-performing' channels. They don't beat some commercial channels therefore not harming commercial competition, but still in the top few digital channels.

Daily Heil does hatchet job on BBC ratings, mentions ITV right at the bottom, seems message board rants are tainting journalistic ability these days.

Unless I am very much mistaken adding up BBC 1 2 3 4 and HD the BBC had 50%+ share at peak time over Xmas, the Heil wants them to have closer to 100% so they can bash them even more for being too powerful and dominating.....

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...cheduling.html

OK thanks. So the numbers would be:

"24/7 BBC3" = 1.29 + 0.57 = 1.86%

"24/7 BBC4" = 0.52 + 1.36 = 1.88%

making them the 2nd and 3rd highest rating digital channels, just behind ITV2.

Day of the Triffids 6.1m / 27%

Not The Nine O'Clock News 2.6m / 12%

An Englishman In New York 2.2m / 10%

Top Gear rpt 2.4m / 10%

at Englishman in New York.

@ AEiNY - beaten by BBC Two as well!

Hilarious. Completely undermined by the fact that amongst the Mail's highlights were Victoria Wood's "great" satire on clapped-out celeb culture and costume dramas and PotC eating up 2.5hrs of Boxing Day night...

Surely even Mail readers aren't so thick as to notice from their graphic at the bottom of the piece that BBC1 wiped the floor with ITV across Christmas Eve, Day and Boxing Day, completely at odds with the thrust of the main piece?


Thanks - useful to know the "true" picture.


Disappointing for Day of the Triffids with no real competition - I thought it was good for 8m.

AEINY did about as badly as expected, though no doubt GeorgeS will declare it a triumph after massively downplaying expectations yesterday.

You are covering all the bases there Robbie! I dont think anybody who was aware of the content expected more than about 2m. Given the SBS struggled to hit 1m on ITV1 why would a 90 minute drama about a flamboyant gay artist living in New York suddenly pull in big ratings? The promo's are done for every 9pm drama but they didnt turn Mister Eleven into a hit either so promos only take you so far.

Fact is this was always a BAFTA entry vanity piece and it will probably sell ok abroad to some of the arts channels plus generate reasonable DVD sales and possibly repeat on ITV3 so the overall return on the show wont be too bad (as compared to a complete drama clunker)

The point, however much the Mail may ham it up, in the interests of selling copy, remains valid. BBC1's key fortnight is now. This is the metric they have set themselves. Against their own test, they are failing. ITV's key weeks are the 8 weeks from mid Oct to mid Dec. Did they flunk those weeks? No they increased audience and share.

The point is that BBC1 and ITV1 are different channels. BBC1 is supposed to be a PSB licence fee funded service which has set entertaining people over the Christmas fortnight as one of its key missions. ITV1 has not got that mission in its bsiness plan, so comparisons to what ITV1 are doing are irrelevant (just as the flopping of BBC1 across November primetime was irrelevant to the success of ITV1 in that period)

Of course some posters play the man not the ball (they would make Leeds 1970's team blush) but the fact remains - channels will be judged against their own goals.

It's a sad state of affairs when ITV show an 'alternative', yet it only gets 2.2m.

bump to see DMNs post

28.12.09
Eastenders 9.6m / 39%
Emmerdale 6.5m / 29%
Corrie @ 1930 9.2m / 40%
Corrie @ 2030 8.8m / 35%

Knight Rider 0.8m / 4%
Heads or Tails 0.5m / 2%

Good ratings for Corrie and EastEnders, but poor for Emmerdale - I wonder what W&G got?

all things considered those Knightriders numbers are not so bad.

W&G 5.4m / 24%

I'm not shocked by the Englishman in New York rating. It was not mainstream enough to get a big audience on ITV, not even Channel 4 would air a drama like that. However I did think it would be around 3m due to the Corrie lead in. Unfortunately it does give ITV more reason to commision just the normal run of the mill cop shows and abandon other type of drama.

Day of the Triffids did well, though maybe it should have been closer to 7m bearing in mind that ITV only had 2.2m. The Bill is going to get thrashed tonight. If it can only scrape 3m against Paradox, what chance does it have against Triffids?!

Quite a good rating for EastEnders, but Corrie and Emmerdale were low (particularly Emmerdale with its sub 30% share). Looks like Wallace and Gromit dented it.

Crikey George, lighten up - you're not in an ITV strategy meeting now! Enjoy the festive break and worry about work next week...

I would hardly say the BBC is failing over Christmas - if BBC1's figures have been down on expectations at any point, it's often been because of the strength of BBC2 rather than ITV or any other channel. Look at last night - 6m+ for a big new drama but c3m watching a BBC2 retrospective. Likewise c7m and c3m on Christmas Night in the 7pm slot, or c5m & c7m in the 8pm hour on Sunday. BBC3 has also done quite well in relative terms.


The 2nd Corrie is down - wonder how Celeb MM did?


Shame they didn't air it on Christmas Eve - then we could legitimately say that the year's most-watched show had got 33m viewers in the 12 months to 24/12.

Really hope the Beeb has commissioned a new W&G for 2010.

The last 5 minutes bring the 2nd Corrie down...

Good for Coronation Street last night, not far adrift from EastEnders during their traditional strong period

39%/40% share is in line with normal Mondays isn't it?

Not a shock to see AEINY so low, it was never going to do well. Triffids did excellently, and it was great fun so it deserved to do well. It's gonna thrash The Bill tonight!

Meanwhile, I notice ITV2 are already showing BGT Best and Worst repeats in the run-up to April! Desperate, much?

Post to make my last post appear. This is getting annoying now.