Originally Posted by Dancc:
“It was. In the history of television I cannot think of one show that has moved from a channel with higher ratings to a channel with lower ratings and GAINED viewers. It just doesn't happen. If anything the dropoff was smaller than expected.”
But
if C5 had offered a sufficiently fresh and interesting show, with good enough word of mouth, this series could have done better. There's nothing that says a show on C5 can't do better than a show on C4. The problem is that CBB has either been the same as it was on C4, or else it's changed in ways that haven't helped.
Your point is about the same show going from one channel to another. Of course if they don't improve the show, then it will do worse on the less watched channel, because there's nothing about it to take it away from that "less watched". But that does not mean it's impossible for them to change the show in ways that get it more viewers.
Quote:
“I'm just making the point that these are experts with a lot of knowledge of the market,”
I don't agree. They're mostly just parroting what C5 says, sometimes even quoting someone from C5! And their choice of statistics is one that makes the 2011 CBB look good. There's no sign of them analysing anything in any sophisticated way.
Quote:
“who would most likely rather slate Big Brother and take a more negative line like people in this thread. But they are not going to tarnish their reputation or that of the major publications they work for by slagging it off when it has clearly done well. So you can be safe in the knowledge that their analysis is fair. I'm not convinced it has been in here, not in a lot of cases anyway.”
I don't think they are people who would most likely rather slate BB either. There are some people like that (such as Mark Lawson), but they aren't writing these articles. But the Guardian listings sections, for example, were positive about this CBB before it had even started They weren't negative but compelled to change their mind by the viewing statistics.
And they wouldn't be taking any more risk with reputations by citing different stats or giving a different interpretation.
Quote:
“It's just realism, not excuses. This was the first Channel 5 series. If they can successfully halt the audience decline which had already started on Channel 4 and build on their very solid base by posting a higher rating series in the colder busier TV month of January, then they'll have done very well IMO.”
Calling it something else makes it sound better, but it's still excuses in the end. And "halt the decline" is the sort of spin that's used when the figures are poor but happen to be better than a previous even worse low.
