Throng

Season 2 of Glee premieres on Ten on a new night - Wednesdays, 7.30pm from September 22.

This puts it literally hours after the US premiere.

Episode 2 will be seen on September 29, then there is a two week break during the Commonwealth Games - where Ten will fall behind, but it will protect them from any breaks in the US until ratings ends in the last full week of November, 2010.

Also premiering on Wednesday nights, at 8.30 from September 22, will be season 7 of House. 

Ten have released programming information about their Commonwealth Games coverage, which beings with the Opening Ceremony on October 3, and runs through to Thursday October 14.

From Monday October 4 until Thursday October 14, coverage will commence on Ten and ONE each day at 11am, and conclude at 4am the next morning (times AEST), breaking only for the 5pm news in each market. Only other exceptions are Saturday October 9 and Thursday October 14, when the broadcast will start at 11.30am to cover the 20km walk and marathon events respectively.

At 6am daily will be a three hour program called Good Morning Delhi. The show will highlight the overnight action and feature crosses right round Australia to catch up with all the families and friends of the competitors. Hosts are Brad McEwan and Kath Robinson.

Thursday September 2, 2010.

The X Factor wins the night, but at 1,366,000 for top show for the night, it shows not that many people watching TV overall. Second in the 7.30 timeslot was Ten with Bondi Vet and Recruits, while Getaway on Nine was the sacrificial lamb here, down to 873,000 losing some of its audience to X Factor.

At 8.30 - new Cops LAC on Nine debuted to 1,168,000, half a million more than Rush that copped a massive drop as a result of having another Australian cop show on at the same time. It just goes to show there just isn’t enough audience to go round to have two Australian cop based shows on at the same time, or that people are simply over these sorts of shows.
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Updated Sept 3rd, includes up to Wed Sept 22, 2010

Updated late night Monday and Tuesday Sept 6 & 7. Star Trek moves from Tue to Mon, while The Hills follows the movies on Tuesday night, with a marathon of sorts from 11.40pm until 2am.

A Big Bang Theory marathon on Sunday September 5 sees the Middle pushed out for one week. Two and a Half Men is no longer in the GO schedule at all, with movies on Sundays coming forward to 8.30 from Sept 12.

The Vampire Diaries confirmed for September 13, 8.30pm. Hellcats confirmed for 7.30pm Monday September 13. Gossip Girl confirmed for 10.30pm Monday Sept 13. And new Ladette to lady USA confirmed for 9.30pm Monday September 13. All amounts to a new Monday night line up on GO!

At the end of this week, there will only be 12 weeks left of the ratings year for 2010 - yet Nine still have a list of shows still to come in 2010 that simply will no longer fit in their main channel line up unless they start doing some serious overhauling of the schedule or moving more shows to GO! and the imminent third channel.

I would go as far to say, that a number of these shows simply won’t be seen at all until 2011.

Here is the list, with updated comments.

Shows to come in the remaining 12 weeks of the ratings season on Nine include:

Nine are now heavily promoting the 2010 return of the Block. That should mean it will be on air within the next few weeks.

The finale of the first season of the Block in 2003 was watched by 3,110,000 viewers and is the 10th most watched TV show or event in the past 10 years. Prior to the arrival of Masterchef in 2009, the Block finale was the 3rd highest rating non-sport show of the last ten years, with only Australian Idol bettering its figures.

The 2004 season did not fair so well, with 2,280,000 tuning in for its final. The lower result, high expenses and changes in management and direction at Nine saw the Block axed after its second season.
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Where is that news of Nine’s third channel we have all been waiting for?

Two weeks after Seven announced 7mate and one week after Ten announced Eleven, there is still no news out of Nine in relation to their third channel despite there being rumours flying around that Nine’s channel will launch days before 7mate commences on September 25.

Seems things are leaky at Nine compared to any other network, as there is plenty of news around pointing to the channel being called GEM, mostly targeting females over the age of 40, and the content being mostly crime and lifestyle based.

Until 7mate was announced on August 19, nobody knew anything about the channel, or even if Seven were going to launch a third channel in 2010. In fact, I personally believed they would be last off the block like they were with 7TWO.

So just where can you find those GO! Jeeps giving away some freebies?

At a launch for a rival networks’ new channel - that’s where!

Wonder if GO! were invited to attend and parked out front? Not likely!

Nothing like a bit of friendly rivalry.

At least Seven have their third channel coming. No news from Nine still even though rumours still persist that their third channel will be on the air days before 7mate is.

If you do want to know where the GO! Jeeps are normally, visit the GO Facebook page. Note, however, the GO! Jeeps only do Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

Source: mUmBrella

Wednesday September 1, 2010

Nothing like boobs to get ratings - the Undercover Boss episode featuring Hooters outdid the third night of X Factor auditions overall - but when you look city by city - the overall win is thanks only to Brisbane where it seems an abnormally larger number of viewers chose Undercover Boss over the X Factor.

At 8.30, the ABC continues to dominate with Spicks and Specks and The Gruen Transfer easily being the highest rating shows in the 8.30 hour for the night and whole week if Rafters is excluded. Nine’s Farmer Wants a Wife comes in second, with Lie to Me 3rd, and City Homicides’ two hour average 4th.

9.30 sees Nine take the lead with RPA close to a million, easily above City Homicide’s two hour average, while the long awaited return of United States of Tara after an election hiatus draws 685,000.
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7TWO Highlights, updated September 2, 2010.

Packed to the Rafters 1st Season - Sundays 5.00pm

That 70's Show - Sundays 6pm until Sept 5.

Breaking the Magician's Code: Magic's Secrets Revealed - Sundays, 6.30pm. Final Sept 12.

Family movies - Sundays, 7.30pm. Followed by 2 other movies. This will change Sept 19 or 26 when The Xtra Factor premieres.

Heartbeat - Mondays, 7.30pm & Saturdays 7.30pm. Final Sept 13. Back to S1EP1 Sat Sept 18.

Kingdom - Mondays, 8.30pm. Season 2 final Sept 6

Wycliffe - Mondays, 9.30pm. Double ep Sept 6. Moves to 10.40 Sept 13.

Knight Rider - 8.30 Tuesdays. Final ever epsiode Sept 7 as a double.

Tuesday August 31, 2010

Given that the X Factor is a week of auditions, and that last night’s show was not that different to Monday nights‘ show, why did it rate so much better - at nearly 1.5 million? Perhaps the encores on 7TWO helped, but more likely, the regular audience of Minute to Win It sticking with their Tuesday night channel Seven routine helped lift the viewers. Monday night’s X Factor ratings were around what Seven was normally doing on a Monday night. Wednesday nights’ show also be strong.
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More bad news in relation to multi channelling for regional viewers in the mainland Eastern States with Southern Cross Media Group refusing to commit to Eleven, the new channel the Ten network will be launching early 2011.

Management of the company say that they would to invest upwards of $13 million to bring the channel to the regions and they fear the company will not receive the audience support to make it a worthwhile investment.

Southern Cross CEO Rhys Holleran said that they were only made aware of the new channel a few hours before the information was released. There will be further meetings to discuss the channel in more detail.

Now - here is a classic example of where the current system of separation between regional and metro television markets is a disadvantage to bringing the same services to the country as the cities.

With The X Factor Australia on Seven now, going through the audition episodes, I thought it was time to take a look again at - what has to be - the all time classic American Idol audition.

In the 2010 American Idol season, and as part of the Atlanta, Georgia auditions, General Larry Platt - aged 62 - appeared and auditioned, performing his song called “Pants on the Ground”.

The judges - including guest Mary J Bligh - were almost on the floor with laughter. Larry was officially too old to audition for American Idol, but his performance of “Pants on the Ground” has lived on ever since. At over 7,000,000 hits on YouTube, his catchy tune has been viewed by more people than the number of records that many of the successful Idol contestants go on to sell.

So popular was “pants on the Ground” that Larry Platt made an appearance on the years’ American Idol Grand Finale.

Free-to-air networks could be able to include Australian content from their digital multichannels in local content quotas, if a Julia Gillard-led Labor government is re-elected.

There is expectation by producers and broadcasters in the television industry that the communications minister, Senator Stephen Conroy, could permit a concession “within months”.

If such an announcement were made, it would allow Australian drama, children’s or documentary content on digital multichannels to count towards content quotas, currently restricted to the primary channels.

Despite the unknown election result, there is a growing consensus on both sides of politics that broadcasters should have more concessions to promote the adoption of digital television before the analogue switch-off in 2013.

“There’s been a relentless lobby in Canberra,” one major producer confirmed.

Tasmania will be left behind the mainland capital cities and many regional areas with confirmation from Southern Cross Media Tasmania that they have no agreement in place with Seven and Ten to bring those two networks third digital channels - 7mate and Eleven to Tasmania in the near future.

Currently, Southern Cross Media broadcast the Seven and Ten network programming to Tasmania, including 7TWO and ONE HD, but not 7HD or ONE standard definition.

In mainland capitals, 7HD will be phased out with 7mate becoming the HD service for the Seven network. ONE’s standard definition simulcast will be turned off to make way for Eleven.

With Tasmania not getting 7mate on September 25, it means they will not be able to see the AFL Grand Final in HD - without a 7HD signal, it would not have been in HD in any case. At least there is significant time to prepare for Eleven prior to its early 2011 launch.