Yes it does, Holby is shown at 10.35 in Scotland. You can deduct about 400,000 for River City viewers (or maybe they have increased and Holby viewers have actually diminished ?) You will get the actual figures in the officials.

While I was being a little glib the point is that main dramas cost much more and therefore could be said to be putting in more effort. In fact much more effort.

But thats always been the case but Holby ratings were up last night and I just wondered if there were any obvious reason.

Just to be a bit different, yesterday's 20 biggest shares:

1 - BBC News (13:00): 41.1% (3.10m)
2 - Breakfast: 38.7% (1.56m)
3 - BBC Regional News (13:30): 38.6% (3.00m)
4 - EastEnders: 34.3% (7.78m)
5 - Emmerdale: 33.7% (7.18m)
6 - BBC Regional News (18:30): 33.4% (7.01m)
7 - Bargain Hunt: 32.5% (2.08m)
8 - BBC News (18:00): 31.4% (6.13m)
9 - BBC News (22:00): 29.6% (5.79m)
10 - BBC Regional News (22:25): 29.0% (5.15m)
11 - Homes Under the Hammer: 28.0% (1.55m)
12 - Wanted Down Under: 27.3% (1.42m)
13 - Rip Off Britain: 25.4% (1.33m)
14 - The Jeremy Kyle Show: 24.8% (1.34m)
15 - Pointless: 24.1% (3.96m)
16 - The 7.39: 23.9% (5.77m)
17 - This Morning (11:30): 22.7% (1.22m)
18 - ITV Regional News (18:00): 22.0% (4.29m)
19 - Holby City: 21.8% (5.16m)
20 - Father Brown: 21.6% (1.66m)

Sorry. But this has to be the post of the year so far? What effort goes into IAC compared to programmes of better quality? Including the New Year's Eve fireworks.

Countdown (Channel 4 +1 at 4.10pm) jumped the shark with Danny from Essex.

"How many letters?" "None"
"How many?" "7" "Which is?" "Acquitted" (Susie Dent) "Fine except there's no C and two letters too many!"
Numbers "No, nothing"
Then he watched the final conundrum (where you're supposed to press a button) with his hands closed together.
A strange episode.

EDIT: "I play football" "Oh, where?" "Dagenham" "No, what position?!"

https://twitter.com/_DannyDavey

EastEnders staying stable is good sign. Wednesday is an odd one though as it is out of its usual timeslot. If it manages to hold up then that would be a great achievement.

Someone from Essex who cant spell and cant count - reinforcing a few stereotypes there.

It looks like he was awful on purpose.

Theses are certainly episodes part of the slow burn and the climax of them could generate big ratings.

On the horizon I think that's the type of episode that could give EastEnders a ratings boost. I get the feeling the BBC will promote Stacey's return to EastEnders like crazy.

RW would turn in his grave.

First they dumb down with the Ten Cats spin off, now they have chav contestants on to whip up a social media storm.

I think they will let anybody on now just to be a social media sensation.

The interesting bit in that article though was the comment that she also hinted that Waterloo Road was not going to go on indefinitely. Suggesting that the cast have been given a bit of a heads up that it is on its way out.

Perhaps the ratings are finally sinking in or, failing that, the referendum result might give a way for the BBC to permanently transfer the show's running costs to an independent Scotland where they can offer to buy it back from them in a direct exchange for a job lot of new series of That Puppet Game Show and Don't Scare the Hare.

Seems a fair trade.

Cameras, 100s of crew members flying over to Australia, the other side of the world, and broadcast LIVE on British TV for 3 weeks. The whole set-up is a huge production, ok it may not be as much effort as some dramas, particularly period, but that doesn't mean they don't put effort in to make the programme worth watching.

Some on here think that simply because one of the tasks is to eat bugs as a task for food, its a waste of space on TV - over 14m watched the 1st episode for peak sake, the audience speaks volumes.

The Fireworks are not set up by the BBC though?, only the cameras to film it so not as much effort as IAC.

I know you don't like it, but a lot of viewers clearly do, hence it domination over TV in November.

A poor start for The Taste considering everything Channel 4 have thrown behind it. The massive promotion doesn't appear to have paid off in anyway either because its not like a massive audience tuned at the start of the hour and then switched off as it went along. Elsewhere The 7.39 held up extremely well. Be interesting to see how it does in the final figures next week.

Very disappointing start for The Taste considering all the promotion. They'll have expected at least a million more than that. Can see it falling from here too as I thought it was very dull.

Elsewhere, cracking rating for Pointless at teatime. ITV running Paul O'Grady instead of The Chase really gave that show a shot in the arm, and cost The Chase momentum at the same time.

Ronant, do you have a rating for The Chase with +1 included, and also for Britain's Best Bakery at 4pm? No worries if not.

Or did Laurie Brett mean her time on Waterloo Road? Either way I don't think the ratings will rise tonight because it faces Midsomer Murders.

My point was the audience for the slot was up but it could be down to River City rather than Holby.

Make the most of your trashy little show being top dog! I can guarantee that the BBC will not give it such an easy ride next series! Jonathan Creek for the live launch and for the two Sundays following? I wouldn't be surprised. It has apparently been held back until Autumn. There is obviously a reason for that.

What wrong with you? Please don't tell its because NYE fireworks didn't top IAC, that would be a silly thing to fall out over.

You said you don't take sides, but this post is highlighting that you do, but lets not fall over it.

Masses of promotion for The Taste and especially made trailers. You'd hope for more than 1.8m to kick it off. But the rating across the hour was stable so it might grow.

Intelligence launched on CBS to a fairly decent 2.4 out of NCIS 2.9 rating, may be worth a look at by C4 or C5 if it sustains a decent rating. It moves to Monday at 10 next week so will have stiff competition from The Blacklist and Castle be interesting to see how it holds up.

Fairly major storyline came to a head as Jac gave birth
There were interviews with the actors involved in some soap magazines and I think they were on THis Morning

Regarding the clash between Musketeers and Selfridge, i think the BBC drama will come out top due to an new interst with the audience and because Mr Selfridge if full of adverts, it will be recorded by a large chunk of the audience while Musketeers is watched Live.

I predict

Musketeers 6.8m (could even get CTM sized ratings 8m+ with a strong 16-34 demo)
Selfridge 6.2m inc+1


And comedy, i think no matter which channel the comedy is on, we should all be happy to see an increase it the genre. For too long its been lacking from our TV screens and so an increase is certainly a step up. Since BOAF laucnched so well, if it hold up ITV can lauch new comedy after it next year with a comedy audience already there.

No. It's not because of the fireworks. I couldn't give a monkeys about whether it's number 1 or not. It's a friggin' fireworks show that has little impact on the telly programmes of 2013. I just get peeved when people make out that IAC is such a high quality production with so much effort going into it! If it's number 1, it's number 1. The sun will rise tomorrow, Tesco's will still be open. But, the BBC allowed it to be number 1 by putting (in the words of Samuel) a niche documentary series on at the same time. I want shows to get to number 1 because they deserve it. OK, lots of people watched IAC. But when decent opposition was on the ratings dropped right down to the 8m's. In that respect I think, as popular as IAC was, it didn't deserve to be number one. I would much rather Broadchurch, Downton or Doctor Who be number one. There really is effort put into those shows. Or, even BGT which commands and receives a consistent rating throughout its run. I don't take sides, I do generally lean towards the BBC, but my anger is aimed at the fact the jungle show won by default and not because it had something credible to beat. If it had beaten something substantial, then fair play. I would accept it. But it didn't.

And, I'm not falling out with you. You have to accept ITV will be criticised as much as I accept the BBC will. Learn to stop taking it personally.