Ooh I do like the idea of Popstars or Pop Idol coming back on Channel 5.

Anyone know how Must Be The Music did? Guessing upwards of 400k thanks to the extra publicity Pepper & Piano got the show?

Both the Sun and Mirror running with stories tomorrow about the X Factor's future with The Sun saying Cowell will quit X Factor and the Mirror speculating that Cowell might axe X Factor and BGT.

that might be going a bit far

And then he'll strip naked and run through Clapham Common.

Surely Simon is not stupid enough to cut the British shows while the American programmes are still growing. While he may not judge either The X Factor or Britain's Got Talent I cannot see him saying ITV cannot air them next year.

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ITV's schedule seemed to be supported well by Coronation Street at 7pm, with Heartbeat and U Be Dead performing after it finished. BBC1's complementary schedule also did well and UItimate Big Brother held up.

Yes I suspect so, perhaps their headline is misleading.

Superb Countryfile ratings against the might (ish) of Coro St.

No major surprise - for me at least - for U Be Dead. A 2 hour crime drama premiere, 9pm slot, September, well promoted, big name lead - I suspect 5-7m was what they expected, and just about got.

Heartbeat doing too well for a show about to be axed. Bound to get a reprieve with those numbers. Surprised the axe is so near as well - didn't they have dozens of stockpiled episodes to play out?


Sounds like that could of come from the lips of the man himself.

I wonder where TXF's largest audience ranks in the all-time list of TV ratings? I bet it wouldn't even make the top 50 shows.


A dark day for British television and our music industry if true.



I'm off to stock up on fizz just in case...

Here is the Mirror article,

http://www.mirror.co.uk/celebs/news/...5875-22542711/

Why on earth would he axe Britain's Got Talent? It sounds a bit far fetched. The ratings seem to suggest there is still an appetite for both shows.

Congrats on 40,000 posts, btw.

Thanks - I talk far too much.

EDIT: On your first point, he's probably just trying to get more money out of ITV by making idle threats. I do wonder if ITV should call his bluff because he may have a problem if The X Factor doesn't take off in America.

Perhaps he's seen how news of the axe boosted the ratings recently for clapped-out, knackered old shows like Last of the Summer Wine and Heartbeat, and thought he might try the same to up the numbers for his own jaded shows?

Don't think they need much boosting looking at their current ratings. I know it's diabolical that The X Factor doesn't get a 100% share like you expect but it's still doing well.

I'm sure he's being overdramatic to some extent. It's no surprise that he would be the one to decide when it ends but there's no reason to do that now.

Also, BGT isn't too time consuming either, unlike X Factor.

If ITV were really sneaky they'd leak a story that they've "had meetings with Simon Fuller" and Cowell would quickly come into line!

Cowell certainly isnt stupid, he may think the British shows could do with a year off to help the longevity of each series or he knows how badly ITV need him and is trying to get even more money from them.

Also, if Cowell is too busy in America then he may not want the British shows to go ahead if he's not personally involved. He's the sort of person who cant accept second rate shows and may think that without him both shows will lose viewers.

Seven
18:00 Seven News 1.54m
18:30 Today Tonight 1.51m
19:00 Home and Away 1.04m
19:30 The X Factor 1.31m
20:30 Criminal Minds 1.19m

Nine
18:00 Nine News 1.30m
18:30 A Current Affair 1.28m
19:00 Two and a Half Men (R) 1.04m
19:30 Two and a Half Men (R) 1.09m
20:30 Rescue Special Ops 0.85m

Ten
18:00 The Simpsons (R) 0.67m
18:30 Neighbours 0.67m
19:00 The 7pm Project 0.95m
19:30 Undercover Boss 1.08m
20:30 Good News Week 0.94m

Cowell doesn't strike me as the sort who would be happy with 10-11m each week even if it is topping the charts with that.

If it was getting 20m a week, he'd still be burning the midnight oil to find a way of getting to 25m...

That's true enough. That's why I'm surprised Britain's Got Talent has changed so little over it's time. I guess Simon leaving is going to change the dynamic somewhat.

X Factor is holding up still. I think Undercover Boss was hurt by the lead in/lead out. Neighbours seems to be increasing slightly. Nine had a reasonable night considering they aired an hour of repeats.

Should Seven's news hour be beating X Factor?

It's very normal for Seven's news hour to top the day, so that in itself is not too much of a concern. It rates extremely well every day without fail. I think, in the context of last night which was quite low rating for Monday standards, The X Factor did pretty well actually to grow 130k week-on-week when other shows were down. Undercover Boss was down quite a bit and Nine's Rescue: Special Ops was low.

A sad time for aussie drama really because I can't think of a single one currently on air that is pulling in respectable figures. There is obviously Packed to the Rafters and Offspring but they are more comedy than drama. On the other hand you have straight drama like Rush, City Homicide and Rescue Special Ops... all of which are tanking. It's a cross network problem and not likely to improve. I think it's sad that viewers are not getting behind homegrown drama because I don't think it's necessarily the case that these shows aren't any good, but it could just be a case of too many cop shows at once with little between them. You have to wonder if Seven made a huge mistake in getting rid of All Saints which was ultra dependable, pulling in 1.2m or more a week at 9:30pm when all of the shows listed above are consistently below 1m at 8:30pm.

Neighbours is down on the past two Mondays, that were both 700,000+

Did you hear the latest? Ten are quickly coming to the conclusion that they might have to repeat Neighbours on the main channel anyway in order to meet local drama quotas! Are they chickening out already? Of course, this won't be a problem if the rules are relaxed to include multi-channel contributions.

To be honest, I am not keen on Ten's idea of creating their own 6pm news hour at all. All three of the main channels showing news at 6pm doesn't sound like a very good idea to me and it reduces choice for viewers that want something else early evening. I know Seven and Nine's bulletins happily co-exist in that slot, but they're both very well established. I simply can't see how a national Ten bulletin is going to fair much better against Seven and Nine's regional bulletins and current affairs shows than The Simpsons and Neighbours are currently.

no I had not heard this, it would be best for TEN if it was able to count Neighbours on ELEVEN towards it local production quota. I dont know if that is best for Austrlian drama content in Austrlia however.

Not sure what repeat pattern they want to use, I dont see any point at all on Neighbours beign on ELEVEN if it will repeat on TEN, that just creates confusion, ok Hollyoaks does similar.

Its certianly intersting that they are considering a TEN airing, would seem to suggest, they dont expect it to get good ratings on ELEVEN. However that seems hard to predict at this stage.

However TEN still seems to support Susan Bower, which is what I find odd.

I would have been tempted to try something like this:

1700 Ten News at Five (as normal)
1800 The 6pm Project (rebranded from 7pm)
1830 Neighbours (as normal)
1900 Ten News at Seven
1930 Regular Programming

I know the method of having two fixed bulletins at 5pm and 7pm hasn't worked very well for Five over here, but I think it could potentially work for Ten as there seems to be a much bigger appetite for TV news over there. It would still have to compete with ABC News but that's nowhere near as bad as trying to take on both Seven News and Nine News simultaneously.

The 7pm Project meanwhile has grown steadily since it began and built its audience to respectable levels. If it could replicate its current success at 6pm it could be a real coup for Ten.

As for Neighbours, I would keep it at 6:30pm for at least 2011 to see if there was any improvement with the new lead-in and lead-out.

I dont know if moving 7pm Project back an hour like that, is going to be as easy as you make it out to be, still it would be nice to think Neighbours could get a boost from its ratings. The Simpsons was not really helping it.