Maybe so but 3 million across the 9pm hour looks better than what ITV got across the hour. If ITV didn't have their soap hour how well would they have done on the night? Take out the soaps and ITV didn't have any other programme that hit 3 million.

And you said this about QI.


So if QI is tanking what is happening with Moving Wallpaper?

And just for the record I do like Moving Wallpaper.

Not sure I agree because Piers' show seems to be performing perfectly well in the slot it is in.

To be honest I don't think it would be performing any better on Fridays, around the same probably or maybe even a bit less?

As for MW, I was shocked it was recommissioned in the first place to be honest as it didn't exactly set their ratings alight first time around.

I'm not wanting to judge Piers' show until we get this Sunday's ratings in... yeah, it did get 4.5m, but the audience might have either a) Stayed the same throughout; or b) dropped off say from 5.5m >> 3.5m throughout the show.

If this Sundays ratings come in and its 4m that'd be pretty good; if this Sundays ratings come in and its 3m then that'd be poor,

Yeah, I was also surprised to see it recomissioned. Not only were the viewing figures low, but it got quite bad AIs as well. These are the AIs I could find:

11/1/08 2100 Moving Wallpaper 73
18/1/08 21:00 Moving Wallpaper 74
25/1/08 21:00 Moving Wallpaper 77
01/2/08 21:00 Moving Wallpaper 76
07/3/08 21:00 Moving Wallpaper 78
22/3/08 21:00 Moving Wallpaper 79

11/1/08 21:30 Echo Beach 71
18/1/08 21:30 Echo Beach 71
25/1/08 21:30 Echo Beach 74
01/2/08 21:30 Echo Beach 74
07/3/08 21:30 Echo Beach 73
22/3/08 21:30 Echo Beach 76

Moving Wallpaper was usually one of the least liked shows of the day out of all the terrestrial channels. Its AI wasn't even that much higher than Echo Beach's, which got axed.

Swapping round Piers Morgan and MW/Al Murray might be a good emergency quick-fix for ITV. It would drag the Friday 9pm ratings up to 3.5m+, and MW/Murray should do better on at 10pm on a Sunday night when their target audience is in - 2m+ for both would be more acceptable in that slot than a midweek 9pm berth.

I think Piers' show got 4.8m for its first 15 minutes and then stayed at about 4.4m for the rest of the show.

I'm pretty sure the ratings would have dropped across the hour, simply because it's on at bedtime.

I think Sunday's show will do worse than last week because I don't see Richard Branston as having as much viewer appeal as Sharon Osbourne.

However I believe programme 3 is Katie Price. Ratings could increase from programme 2 for that, particularly if ITV make a big thing about the clip of her crying (whilst retaining the mystery over why she is crying.)

I wouldn't get too excited if it doesn't appear on Red Nose Day because the convention always was that the other channels drop their comedies on Red Nose Day - certainly in recent years Channel Four have usually dropped their regular Friday night comedies. I remember a few years back they showed Edward Scissorhands instead.

So I'm expecting a Taggart or something that week, but it won't neccessarily mean those two shows have both been dropped.

Yeah, I have to agree there. Satire does well on Sunday's at 10pm. The original home of Spitting Image and more recently Headcases, which I suppose didn't fair greatly.

But when 'Jimmy Carr's Commercial Breakdown' was scheduled there on BBC1, it brought in a stable audience.

Yes, there is definitely an argument that it is not good practice shall we say, for the commercial terrestrials to compete too hard against what is essentially a charity event. Normally ITV and Channel 4 put out weaker schedules as a result.

Having said that, with their respective comedy lineups rating so poorly anyway, perhaps they needn't change a thing this time.

I think that the other channels should provide an alternative to Comic Relief and not shutdown for the evening. ITV would compete more aggresively if they had the shows and do remember them scheduling an extra episode of Millionaire against Comic Relief when Millionaire was still hot. Nowadays they think oh sod it why waste shows when most people will watch BBC1 on the night.

Harold Bishop's final Neighbours episode failed to boost ratings for the struggling soap last night in Australia.

The episode attracted 670,000 compared to Home and Away's 955,000. This was actually down 5,000 on it's rating last Friday.

Last year, the departure of Home and Away legend Sally Fletcher pulled in 1.5m viewers on Seven.

In the same slot as Neighbours, current affairs show Today Tonight pulled in 1.2m for Seven, while Nine's A Current Affair trailed with 878,000.

The top rated show of the night in Australia was Seven's 6pm news bulletin with 1.3m.

Source: OzTAM

I'm surprised Neighbours hasn't been axed yet.

It probably would be axed if it wasn't for the UK.

That's quite poor for Neighbours.
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One more rating from last night: EastEnders (BBC3): 597,000 (3.5%)

That is exactly why Neighbours is still going. The fact that it is so popular in Britain kept it going for years unlike some other Australian snaps that were axed.

Possibly. Although I think the problem for Ten is bigger than just Neighbours. Their 6-7.30 schedule has been problematic for some time. With Neighbours slap bang in the middle of that, it simply doesn't have anything to prop it up.

The Simpsons and Friends repeats have been done to death now.

One option is to move Ten News to 5:30-6:30 but it's a bit risky with Seven and Nine's bulletins at 6.

Have they not thought about buying some brand new simpsons episodes.

QI has lost audience since moving to BBC1. ITV1were starting from zero with comedy shows. Some worked well in the ratings - Benidorm; some are good but cant get big ratings such as MW.

However the constant desire to give ITV a good kicking is getting boring especially when they try different things & they dont work ratingwise.

What do people want? If they want ITV to deliver minimum 20% share in every slot, it can be done with a mix of soaps, shiny floor shows & detective dramas. Varying the mix beyond that involves more risk and not everything will work as well atr least in the aggregate ratings. From what I recall MW was recomissioned largely because its demographics were better than a lot of other shows on the ITV slate which counts for something.

There is also the point to be made that Neighbours helps Ten meet it's local content quota. This provides Ten with the flexibility to air more imports in primetime.

Anyway, above 600k is still OK but for such a key episode I was expecting more.

Yes, they have the rights to these, but these tend to go out at 7.30/8.00 with repeats of older episodes at 6.00, like C4 do here in the UK. Sadly the 6pm showings are not rating at all well, with 575,000 last night versus 965k & 1.3m for the news bulletins on the rival networks.

I think we debated this to death on this very thread that shows like MW look trashy and are likely to send viewers away. Harley Street, Rock Rivals and Britannia High fall in a similar category.

I said, at the time, it was a face-saving recommission. There was a lot of hype surrounding the launch of Moving Wallpaper and its companion show last year, and they didn't want the embarrassment of scrapping both shows after one run.

We should spare a thought for Al Murray. His show was always going to be strangled at birth because of being scheduled directly after Moving Wallpaper.

I like giving ITV a kicking cos they're so smug when they get a success. However a struggling ITV is not good for British television.

Reference the recommission of MW despite its low ratings. It must be possible for comedies to make a profit with 1m viewers or less overwise why would ITV2 and C4 make any. (C4 have all these acclaimed comedies but never seem to get many viewers.)

Perhaps it's DVD sales that make the difference. In which case that would explain ITV1 going for MW and Al Murray - they appeal more to the 16-34 age group which is probably the one most likely to buy DVDs.

I certainly don't see how MW could be regarded as 'trashy'. Especially when held up alongside Rock Rivals.

Awful ratings but it was never going to be a huge success. For the record I still think it's a very good show but it's not an ITV1 show really. Echo Beach may have done some damage as well.

Shocking figures for Moving Wallpaper And AL Murray. I watched both but they're not my kind of thing really. Won't be watching next week, if they're still on