Ok, now we know the right time, and know its up against Who wants to be a Millionaire?, so what do you think the viewing figures will be for this episode? {I know there was a simlar topic to this, but this was before the time was comfirmed plus noone knew for sure who The Doc would be up against on ITV}

I say it will get 8.7 Mil Viewers

Don't forget it's Celebrity Who Wants To Be A Millionare.

My Prediction: - 9.5mil

10.2 million

4 men and a dog

I'm going to go all OTT and say 11.1 Million.

Are the BBC banking on Doctor Who to become the natural successor to Del and Rodney?
Only Fools and Vortex...

Higher ..... 11.3



At least

It really depends what its up against - but I do think it looks like a cracking good story, and its in a really good slot. I think it could match the audience for the opening episode so I'm going to say 10 million.

OMG I say 59.99999999 million

As Millionaire is sandwiched between Emmerdale and Corrie,the proles who can't turn over from one channel to another will (I think) disappoint the BBC.
I think the success of WHO earlier this year was a fluke-after all ,it only up against Ant&Dec,so I think the Christmas Invasion will get under 7 million.
But lets hope the viewers can be selective and let it retain its current super status at the Beeb,which should give a boost for season 2.

Oh come on, methinks pretty much anyone can change a tv channel, and millionaire is very stale- hearing 'is that you're final answer' for the millionth time??? Borrrrrring.

I don't think who will break 10 million but it will get close.

No predictions as to the final figure, but I'm hoping it will be the most-watched programme on tv this christmas.

I don't know if it will beat the soaps (that's nigh on impossible these days) but wouldn't it be great if it did?

I hope it will do well, but somehow I suspect, with Christmas being such a family time, it'll end up on more VHS and DVD recorders than actual telly screens

lol it would be brillaint but i think it will be 3rd or 4th most watched show

Christmas Day ratings - traditionally among the highest - have been falling for years. Pretty much like all ratings across the main networks year-round.

I think it'd be realistic to expect around 10m - 5 years ago I reckon it could've got another 5m. BBC1 is the nation's favourite at Christmas - especially on the day itself.

Who Wants... seems to be tiring in relation to its previous form, and - let's face it, DW is going to get a lot more hype than "Sir" Terry Wogan on Millionare...

Here's a question - if we watch it on Telewest Teleport (sort of like Sky + ) does that count towards the ratings?

VB

I dont know how it works, but if you have your cable boxed tuned to bbc 1 to tape it but you are not actually watching it, does that not get picked up?

I don't think it quite works like that.. i think it's based on a sample of about 5000 people with specially adapted sets.

There are 23m or so licences so if 1000 people with the special tv's watch a prog this equates to about 4.6m viewers.
Of course I could be all wrong about this

Yes, they are still using the sampling method which will not change until analogue tv is switched off, I think.

http://www.barb.co.uk/about.cfm?flag=about

It's very easy for the digital tv broadcasters to measure how many people are watching a programme, as digital tv is intrinsically measurable. But until then, I guess they have to stick with the sampling method.

weeeelllll...

It can only measure what the STB is tuned to (and, IIRC, only then if there's a return path, e.g. Sky/Cable).

Not the same as actually being watched!

K

True, but I'm sure that the equpiment at the sky/cable broadcasting offices can show how many boxes are tuned to a particular broadcasting stream at any one time. They would have to, in order to manage capacity.

But as you say - just because boxes are tuned to that channel, it doesn't necessarily follow that people are actually watching.

Still, it will be a heck of a lot more accurate than upscaling a sample of 5100 homes to project the viewing habits of a population of millions - some with multiple tvs - don't you think?

A lot depends on how good their sampling system is as to how good a measure 5000 sets will give you. And one has to concede that a research organisation is going to know their onions on that score. But I would have thought that as the number of variables (channels) and population size has increased, then statistically a greater sample size would be necessary for the findings to remain as accurate as they were when there were only 3 or 4 channels to choose from.

What's interesting about the subject is that, the larger the population that you're trying to estimate, the better your estimates become! Sounds daft but if you think about it for a second, all becomes clear...

How good is any prediction based on a sample of 5100 homes going to be about what YOU personally watch? Terrible! But it will do better at predicting what your street watches. And better still at what your town watches, and so on.

(To see this used in a SF context, read "Foundation"!)

Statistically, a random sample of 5100 homes would come up with answers that are accurate to about 1.5%. This assumes

1 no so-called 'bias' (or systematic error) in the sample you have (e.g. that you haven't asked a disproportionate number of white males between 16 and 34)

2 that the behaviour of the population follows what is known as a 'normal' (or Bell-curve) distribution. In simple terms, more people behave in an average manner than an extreme manner.

In fact, the BARB panel are specifically chosen to be representative rather than random (so the accuracy is probably a bit better than that quoted, but you can't prove that mathematically).

Anyway given those assumptions, the accuracy figure comes naturally from the maths. (Note that this is a mathematical process, the 'lies, damned lies and statistics' effect comes from when people start to misuse the numbers later on!)

The comment about the number of channels is more valid for the 'hardly watched' channels/programmes. If there's only a small number of sampled people watching something (e.g. 1), a small change in that number (e.g. 2!) gets scaled up to 'Hey our ratings have doubled!.

K

Of course anyone can change a channel,its whether they can be bothered.
You only have to look at how ,in previous years,shows like The X-Files and Have I got News for You increase viewers by almost 50% simply by switching channels-a clear demonstration of viewer laziness,and also how many people will not watch programmes simply because they are on BBC2 or C4.
Similarly,many households have a tv on in the background with nobody watching,and most will leave it on their preference regardless of whether its being watched.
Laziness is also why many will watch Emmerdale,plan to watch Corrie,and won't be bothered to switch over.
ITV lives on this,which is why they will often do things like extended episodes of soaps wrapped around something that they need to hang on to viewers for ,like I'm a celebrity,to get the masses to give it a go

I still like millionaire but I hardly watch it any more, go through bouts of watching it all the time, think we watched close to every episode shown on Challenge over last Christmas and Easter.

Don't think it'll stand a chance against the Doctor though, think ITV would have been better off running Coronation Street opposite it, but they've made it so viewers can switch over at 7 to Doctor Who, and then back again to CS.

Doctor Who's the only thing I'm bothered about watching on Christmas evening, I'll be issueing a loud "shhhhhhhh...." to my mom and grandma before it though, missed out on loads of "The Doctor Dances" because of their nattering.