So, confirmed - live ITV FA Cup football beaten by a live rugby international not featuring any British team.

yes and sytycd beat take me out, despite TRENDING ON TWITTER

There is nothing wrong with programmes aimed at an older demographic, particularly ABC1s who will have a high disposable income. These programmes tend to be quite well made and interesting to watch and also have healthy ratings. I will admit African Heartbeat is like watching paint dry.

Show's why E4 and even Channel 4 is a broadcaster to keep. The whole of 4's corporation's budget is smaller then BBC One's according to the guy above.

The Wicked Witch of the missing post strikes again!


I also suspect that Rugby could have a more lucrative demographic, though I'm not sure.

delete

OMG! Take Me Out, despite being the second most discussed topic in the World last night, is nearly a million down on last week. How can Twiiter trends be so wrong.

I wonder if anyone is still going to say SYTYCD is a flop despite it increasing for the last 2 weeks and settling at a very decent 5m+, and last night's figure was of a mammoth fillerfest.

That's why ITV like to cover the world cup as it attracts male ABC1 viewers that normally avoid ITV1. They also expressed an interest in covering the Six Nations during the nineties, but seem to have gone off the idea- possibly on cost grounds.

They bid for the six nations on the last occasion

However, it is unlikely they will again as this is a pricey sports contract and has a very demanding fan base. ITV will probably go for the world cup, as this is where they can get massive ratings if England do well, again and their highlights show has a small but very loyal audience.

Does anyone have the ratings for Newcastle v Swansea City please - Sky Sports 1 Sat 13th Feb @ 1245.

Many thanks,
dubsj
ps Newcastle were lucky to get a point!

Idiots. Absolute idiots.

How Zucker continues to maintain his job is truly beyond me.

I thought it was generally agreed that it wasn't an indication of viewing figures anyway. It's not like anyone is disagreeing with you on that front.

$2 billion is a lot of money but it covers Global rights to 2 Olympics something like 30+ total days of primetime, we can't imagine how much NBC makes in ad sales from thier exclusive olympic coverage which goes back decades. Think Olympics Think NBC.

If it can pull in 20 million viewers nightly then I don't think they will have too many sleepless nights. NBC is owned by the massive Comcast & General Electric Coroporations - think bottomless pits of cash - something BBC & ITV don't have.

They paid $2.3billion for 2006/2008

Wasn't he the one who took a decision to abandon BBC1's coverage of an England World Cup Qualifier part-way through the match, and replace it with a Wales qualifier in 1993?

In the end, neither home team qualified.

He tried to move the premiership highlights to primetime when he was at the beeb, but thankfully they shot him down

Oh dear.

Regardless of the terrible lead-in, I'm still surprised Harry Hill was quite so far down on his usual numbers. The Total Wipeout repeat did very well and set up SYTYCD, which probably did about as well as could be expected given where its been for the past few weeks. I do think they'll bring it back - though its potential is unfufilled, it does at least have that potential - which is more than can be said for most BBC LE commissions of recent years.

Dreadful numbers for the FA Cup for ITV. I'm a football fan and could barely recall that it was an FA Cup weekend - in news terms, its been lost in the fog of the Winter Olympics and Six Nations.

Incedentally, I expect the BBC will be pleased with the way the Six Nations is going so far, results wise. With France beating Ireland yesterday, they're still on course for a big showdown with England in the primetime match in March. If England can win one of their next two matches, they'll be in contention for that game too. A big primetime decider could do 7m or so, I imagine.

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It's easy to see why NBC are heading for a loss on the Olympics when you consider the astonishingly high price paid for them. It gets even worse if you factor in the massive production costs. They sent over 3000 staff to Beijing (the BBC sent 350-odd), building their own bespoke studios, moving much of their news and daytime operation out there, and setting up extra cameras at all of the venues to tailor the coverage to the US audience. The Olympics are fundamental to the NBC brand - the Olympic rings are even incorporated into their on-screen logo for months leading up to the games. Dick Ebersol (NBC Sports chief) had made the Olympics so central to their identity, it appears they'd pay almost anything to avoid losing it.

All of this just about made sense in a booming ad market, when US athletes like Phelps provided a huge boost to TV audiences for the first 7 days of competition, hooking them in. But with advertising failing, fee's increasing, and no guarantee of similar achievements by US athletes, the investment is looking like something of a bygone era.

What did the total audience look like during last night's main programmes? It seems odd that everything was subdued, so was the overall audience much lower than last week.


I agree, which proves that the BBC publicity machine across TV, radio and online is worth its weight in gold. ITV were trailing the coverage on ITV1 but they can't do more than that.

If TV Burp's ratings were dragged down by following-on from 10 minutes post-match football analysis, how come Total Wipeout's ratings weren't dragged down by following-on from half an hour of post-match rugby analysis.

I think he's getting by because his portfolio is so broad that the failings in NBC primetime can be overlooked.

Until recently, NBC was fine everywhere apart from primetime. Now of course the late night line-up has hit the rocks. But USA Network has been a huge success, Bravo, Syfy, MSNBC all do well too. AFAIK the film studio and theme parks are doing fine and even though NBC itself sucks in primetime, Universal Media Studios produces House for FOX.

He has given interviews in the past that show he has absolutely no ambition for NBC primetime. If Leno can't recapture his old numbers when he returns to The Tonight Show, then it might push more pressure onto Zucker but he seems to be invincible.

Does anyone know when New Tricks and Kitchen Burnout (Marco Pierre White) are going to play.

I see that BBC ONE provisionally have New Tricks scheduled for Wednesday 3rd March but not sure if that is a repeat.

What will Burnout do for ITV1? 4m?

And having seen the trailer for the new Ant and Dec show - Push The Button - can this equal or better TakeAway?

It wouldn't surprise me if BBC One repeats all of last year's series of New Tricks before the new one. Episode one of last year's series will be repeated this Wednesday.

Interesting (slightly)-related article:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/me...s-1899057.html

It's been reported in the media that Kitchen Burnout will air on Fridays in April.

As for New Tricks, new episodes will probably air in the summer.


Probably a repeat. But that might change once the schedules are confirmed as it's been speculated that 'Five Days' will be stripped across the first week of March on BBC1.


I don't think it'll hit 'Takeaway' levels but it should rate well, certainly for the first week. I'm thinking around 6m.

On the STV website, it says that it'll begin on Saturday 27th February at 7:45pm, though this is provisional.
Last edited by rzt : 14-02-2010 at 19:52

I think that episode of New Tricks will be a repeat as it normally airs in the Summer (July-August) so I think it'll be back after the World Cup. Burnout's due in April I think, and I reckon it'll get about 4m, which is what the Friday episodes of Hell's Kitchen got last year. I think Push The Button will do well, probably around the 6.5-7.5m area, which is what Takeaway has been getting in the last few years.