Have to agree, the joker character was on fire tonight. The last half was really gripping.

What a brilliant actor. He plays homicidal psycho incredibly well!

SW's averages for the first three series :

Series 1 (1996): 10.92m
Series 2 (1997): 8.12m
Series 3 (1998): 8.5m

The default audience only apparently exists if a programme get ratings that are too high in the opinion of the poster. Why people cant just see that programmes get good ratings because people want to watch them.

Its about the only programme I watch on C5 now and am looking forward to catching up with it.

I hardly watch C5 usually only CBB/BB but this year so far has been great in terms of quality and different programming. Gotham, Lip Sync Battle, The X Files, 10,000 BC. Even the prison night they had at the very start of the year was very good.

I'm glad they have calmed down with the benefits programs and weirdly titled shows eg. Psycho Pussies!

BBC1 has gained a default audience because as more channels arrive, the viewers who watch commercial channels thins out more (and ITV have accelerated this for the main channel in the last couple of years). BBC1 stay strong because there main demographic is an older audience who are unlikely to watch many multi-channels (bar ITV3 and Drama). My grandparents do this.

I'm not critising this gain for BBC1 because they have not pissed about taking audience for granted like ITV.

But the fact does remain, being the biggest channel and the only channel without adverts, BBC1 does have the biggest default audience. As many on here have been discussing, when TVUK moves to ITV, the ratings will drop from what they were on BBC1.

Bytw, I'm not saying ITV hasn't got a feault audience, compared with Ch4. They do. But BBC1 has the biggest because their skew of viewers is older than other channels.

I only base this on what I know, and most of this is exactly what my grandparents do (even though they do watch ITV, its mostly dramas - anything else isn't usually interesting enough). If there is little on offer from the main channels, they stay on BBC1 because that is the channel which mostly appeals to their age demographic.

I'm not critisising this demographic btw, before anyone thinks I'm being ruse or insulting them.

I didn't say they didn't, and that is why ITV should be appealing to the older demographic because trying to skew young and male is not working.

Great post, I agree 100%.

ITV often chase the younger viewer, which is really hard to do. The young viewer doesn't sit and watch TV all the time, there's so many other options; Sky, Netflix and DVDs. Whereas older viewers (65+) probably haven't got that other options, they far more inclined to just watch whatever it is on the main channels. BBC have clearly realised this and most of their high rated shows skew to the older viewers.

So your basing your posts on what your grandparents do? So from one example you are extrapolating to the population as a whole. Anecdata taken to the extreme.

I've thought for a long time that people draw conclusions based on the scantest amount of research and you've just proven it.

(BBC1 is definitely not the only channel that shows adverts by the way!)

Considering the most recent Netflix figures show that 40% of users were under 34, I think it unlikely the majority of users are younger. Also over 50% of Netflix subscribers live with children which implies they are older or single. (These are US figures as the UK figures are hard to find)

This whole business of appealing to young/old is really a marketing thing that bears very little resemblance to reality. For years Countdowns advert breaks were full of stair lifts and "life long" Savings plans. Yet the viewers were mostly parents at home and students.

I'm sure this has been answered before but why doesn't BARB include ITV HD in their weekly Top 30s? I know that BBC HD in included - but what about C4 and Five?

I think it's something to do with the adverts shown on the SD and HD channels are different?

Twitter appears to be down so we might not get some of the numbers for a bit.

New TV Times next week section for the week of 30 Jan - 5 Feb has Vera and The Jump starting

I note with interest Drama is showing Spooks from the beginning from this Saturday which means a certain person's face will fry in a week on Saturday.

It's loading fine for me.

UKTV have a nasty tendency to cut things from shows. The Vicar of Dibley on GOLD for instance is ridiculous when it comes to censoring words that were deemed suitable for 8.30pm on BBC1! So, I reckon the fat fryer scene will be cut.

Speaking of ITV's HD channel. I know the figures that we get for ITV2 also include the +1, but do they also include the HD channel variant as well ?

It seems to be fixed now. Was down for about 15 mins I think.

Silent Witness 5.8m/25.2%
Benidorm 4.4m/19.1%

Both down a bit but I think that's still OK for Silent Witness but a bit disappointing for Benidorm. Definitely a show on the decline.

DS hasn't updated since Thursday! Anyone find it strange? I mean they posted about the American ratings and not the British ratings!

Is that Benidorm rating with HD and +1?

Charlotte Moore in charge of all of the BBC channels? No Controller for BBC2? You what?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/lat...name=corporate

If you want to know about ratings the DS ratings reports are the last place to go these days.

Power will go to her head.