Trouble is I guess the BBC don't really dictate the time slot completely as both ALW's availability and opening night need to be factored in.


Talking of the football, 1.3m absolutely pathetic and shows that the BBC buying live Championship football rights was really not in the interest of the licence fee payer at all. I think bar the first game most have struggled to top 2m.


Re: BGT. If they're having six shows before the final personally I'd prefer 4 live heats and then two semi-finals. 32 in the heats would be enough with three from each through to the semi-finals, and then three from each SF through to the final.

I suspect though if they're all heats they will drop to 7 in each heat (so 42 in total) due to the extra ad-break in a 90-minute show - though I'd have thought ITV would be better off extending each show to 2 hours, which could be quite easily done with relatively little padding.

A great night for ITV1 up to 9.30pm and then it collapsed. Not too many of us can become preachy about their scheduling after Britain's Got Talent - many of us thought that it was a good slot to build an audience but obviously people could not be bothered with The Prisoner and switched straight away.

BBC1 held up ok - as someone said before, BBC1 holds up a lot better aainst tough ITV1 opposition than the other way around. Doctor Who seems slightly on the low side, but is being given a ridiculous time slot. Why they're cramming so much in now I have no idea. Seemingly not many people have a clue either!

I was going to suggest this a few weeks ago when the debate about an overcrowded BBC1 Saturday night first started. But isn't it the case that the show starts next year? In which case waiting until July to launch the search would hardly be a major problem.

If they hadn't bothered with the Total Wipeout repeats during January and the Six Nations (and they were never in any worse slots than what it is now) the new series would be over by now, which would make it a bit less crowded - though not sure would solve all the problems as either DW or OTR would need to air early.

Could possibly have some kind of filler at 5.35pm, Over the Rainbow at 6.05pm and Doctor Who at 7.15pm, with room for a half-hour results show for OTR later in the evening.

They should've shown Total Wipeout in full in the winter instead of propping up the schedule then with repeats. Then they could've ran with:

5.30 My Family (rpt)
6.00 Over the Rainbow
7.15 Doctor Who
8.00 Over the Rainbow: The Results
8.30 Who Dares Wins
9.20 Casualty
10.10 BBC News and Weather
10.30 Match of the Day

That'd give Doctor Who a better slot, Over the Rainbow should perform better against waker opposition in the 6pm slot. If more time is needed for Over the Rainbow, they can easily stretch out their afternoon schedule and have no comedy repeat.

That means on Sunday they could go with something like:

7.00 Countrywise
8.00 Antiques Roadshow
9.00 *Drama*

Countrywise is given back it's stronger slot, as is Antiques Roadshow. There is flexibility, though, as Countrywise and Antiques Roadshow can easily be moved back if necessary.


Some Premiership games get less than that on Sky. For a BBC2 programme at that time on a Saturday night, 1.3m is not a bad rating.

Im sure the Dorothys wont want to read that, but you are right in essence, no other ALW search has had such similar contestants with so close an age range. Add in the fact that the Beeb never goes big on auditions and you get alot of the very similar doing the same thing to more or less the same standard. Thats probably why its not hitting as big as before.

Does anyone have demographics for BBC One and ITV1 as I would be interested as to which groups make up the audiences for both channels?

I think you've got the wrong programme. Countrywise is ITV's rip off of countryfile

well, you cant take the whole population as a measure of popularity.
Its like saying the beatles were'nt popular because 'only' 4 million bought sgt pepper. The true measure is that as rated against the competition, not as a % of the general population.eg, some people never watch tv that much so you cant include them.
And I'm male and love BGT.

You can see the demographic shares for the channels here: http://www.channel4sales.com/data/ov.../14/April/2010

http://www.channel4sales.com/data/au...e/January/2010

There's a selection of demographics you can choose from. In terms of 16-34s both BBC1 and ITV1 are roughly the same, but BBC1 are ahead in terms of upmarket viewers.

As expected, BBC1 always was more middle class than ITV and this is even more pronounced now as most ITV1 programmes are firmly aimed at a tabloid reading female demographic. I shall check these links.

Oh yep, sorry. Countryfile.

I did check these links and it confirmed a few things: ITV did very badly among men under 35 and middle class men and Channel 4 was the most popular broadcaster among under 35s, not surprising as many of their programmes like BB and Hollyoaks are aimed at this age group. Surprised ITV only achieved a 17pc share among women under 35 as ITV2is made for this age group, unless the bulk of ITV viewing, which the stats didn't show, is of ITV2 in this age group.
Generally, though, this does make depressing reading for ITV plc as young men and ABC1s make up only 15-20 pc of the audience. The over reliance on an older C2DE female audience must be hurting.

Remember though, 15% of 10m is better than 50% of 1m

I agree, shares only tell one side of the story - the actual number of people watching is surely more valuable.

I just question the judgment when one of the best slots on TV is given to a cult, sci-fi classic remake which has been larrgely panned by the majority of people who have already seen it as it has already aired in America nearly 6 months ago. The 9:30 slot could have had a light entertainment or reality show following another light entertainment show (BGT). ITV could have aired Kitchen Burnout after BGT last night and it would have done a lot better than 2.7m.

Good for BGT, I didn't expect it to be that high with minimal press coverage.

OTR seems to be becoming a flop though, BBC1 does seem to have racked up a long list of 'second divsion' reality/talent shows, most tend to be presented by Graham Norton. They very rarely seem to reach the premiership heights of BGT/TXF/SCD etc.

Doctor Who's rating is low, but as many have said, the slot is killing it.

The Prisoner may put to bed all those who keep saying over and over again that drama should return to late Saturday nights.

Also ITV1 have more 'big hittters' over a short space of time which bring them in the ad revenue. Britain's Got Talent, The X Factor, Dancing on Ice and I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here! (specifically the first two) probably hold up the channel for the rest of the year.

Furthermore, despite the understandable criticism of Coronation Street's key demo ratings, it's still the second highest rated show in that demo for most of the year (obviously the likes of The X Factor/Britain's Got Talent/Doctor Who beat it when on). What surprised me was to see Emmerdale's figues in comparison - I thought it'd be ahead of Coronation Street but actually it's behind.

I think Big Brother's audience has swung older too, with people who were 16-34 when the show started still being the core viewer base, therefore rasing the demos.

EDIT: Though looking at rzt's post below maybe I'm slightly wrong there.

The peak shares are shares of the total available audience at peaktime. So in a way, it does indicate the actual number of people from a demo watching a channel at peak time.

In January 2010, the peak shares for 16-34s were: BBC1- 16%, ITV1- 14%, C4 (including +1)- 14%, which suggests that around the same number of 16-34s watched Channel 4 programmes at peaktime during the month as ITV1.

That'll be because of Celebrity Big Brother as C4 were back down to 10% or so in February and March.

Well it had to go somewhere and considering it was quite costly it had to be given a decent shot even if it was always destined to fail.

Yeah true, ITV1 usually beats C4 even in 16-34s.

Just point out that the shares stated on that site are not 15% of 10m etc. They're 15% of the total viewing audience (for that age group).


BB's still popular with 16-34s, but you're right that the audience has aged - quite dramatically. In 2002, about 50% of its audience was aged between 16-34, while the last summer series it was only about 35%. In raw numbers, it's gone down from ~2.5m to ~0.8m, which is a bigger decline (%-wise) than the total audience for the show which has gone from 5.8m (2002) to 2.5m (2009).

It shouldnt have been made in the first place if it was destined to fail. Just because it was costly doesnt mean it should take a slot that was more suited to other shows. I reckon The Door would have done well after BGT, getting over 5m. However that show has been scrapped so another show that has no chance of coming back and will rate very badly can get a decent slot for nothing.

...

Well you could say that about anything. Nobody really knows how something will go down until it airs.