News

Although Seven are yet to reveal their complete summer line up for the week starting November 29, here is some idea of what will be on and when on Seven. The release of Nine’s schedule though should prompt Seven to release the complete schedule.

7pm weekdays on Seven will see How I Met Your Mother repeats air. Monday at 7.30 is Garry Unmarried while the final Flashforward for the year will be seen at 8.30pm. That is followed by a movie: Signs.

Tuesday nights from 10.30 sees regular programming include repeats of 30 Rock, followed by Parks and Recreation which is part of NBC USA’s Thursday night comedy line up followed by It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia at 11.30.

Late Wednesday night at 9.30 is Most Shocking, followed by Band of Brothers at 10.30 then the First 48 at 11.30pm. Louis Theroux is at 11.30 Thursday and Better Homes and Gardens repeats will continue on Fridays at 7.30pm.

New to Saturday nights at 6.30pm will be a travel and lifestyle series hosted by Ernie Dingo called No Leave, No Life. The series sees well known comedians fill in for hard working Australians who are whisked away for a well-earned week away from work with friends and family.

Other than all that, for most nights, 7.30 and 8.30pm timeslots are yet to be announced. Given that Ten are already airing ads for key programs in their summer line up, and that Nine have released their schedule, Seven should hopefully detail what they will show at crucial time slots.

[updated] Nine have released their summer line up for the week commencing Sunday November 29 2009.

At 7pm weeknights, Two and a Half Men will finally get a bit of a break with a 30 minute daily Australia’s Funniest Home Videos airing at 7pm weekdays. 7.30 – 9.30 Monday looks the same as it does now except the shows are repeats. Flashpoint returns at 9.30 Monday (let’s hope they play them in order).

On Tuesday at 7.30, Survivor returns to Nine with Survivor Samoa after having the last two series played on GO. Double episodes of Cold Case fill Wednesday nights while Thursday sees the first series of Rescue Special Ops played out in repeats, followed by CSI New York and ER at 10.30pm (thankfully they are continuing with ER).

Wipeout fills the Video Shows Saturday time slot – which prompts the question – with at least four GO shows now in Nine, will these shows continue on both channels or just migrate to Nine leaving different shows on GO? Perhaps not, if the GO schedule for this week remains unchanged.

Here is the programming summary:

Sunday Nov 29
6.30 20 to 1 repeats
7.30 David Attenborough’s Life in Cold Blood repeat.
8.30 Movies: Firewall, followed by Suspect Zero.

Monday Nov 30
6.30 ACA
7.00 Australia’s Funniest Home Videos – daily edition
7.30 Two and a Half Men repeat
8.00 Big Bang Theory repeat
8.30 The Mentalist Repeat
9.30 Flashpoint – new episodes
10.30 Burying Brian
11.30 Nine Late News

Tuesday Dec 1
7.30 Survivor: Samoa
8.30 Movie: Oceans Thirteen rpt
11:00 Secret Diary of a Call Girl rpt 2 eps

Wednesday Dec 2
7.30 Two and a Half Men rpt
8.00 What’s Good For You
8.30 Cold Case
9.30 Cold Case rpt
10.30 True CSI
11.30 Nine Late News

Thursday Dec 3
7.30 Getaway
8,30 Rescue: Special Ops rpt
9.30 CSI New York
10.30 ER
11.30 Nine Late News

Friday Dec 4
7.30 Motorway Patrol
8.00 Rapid Response
8.30 Movie: The Last Samurai
11.45 Nine’s Late News

Saturday Dec 5
6.30 Wipeout
7.30 Crusoe
9.30 Special: The Making of Avatar
10.00 Movie: Jammed

Programming information from Tv Tonight.

Week 46 overall ratings (Nov 8-14)

It’s all Seven for week 46 with the network winning over 9 by close to 4% and having 9 out of the top 10 shows for the week. Nine’s only top Ten show was the Monday night new episode of Two and a Half Men while Ten missed out on a top Ten spot by just 1 with NCIS at 11. Midsomer Murders was top for ABC at 13.

GO remains the highest rating multi channel but 7TWO continues to grow. In its second week, 7TWO climbs to 2.0% while GO remains steady at 2.7%. Wipeout is still GO’s top rater while Ugly Betty is the top ratings show on 7TWO.

Network Shares:
1 Seven 30.1%. 2 Nine 26.3%. 3 Ten 19.8%. 4 ABC 18.0%. 5 SBS 5.7%.
Channel Shares:
1 7 28.1%. 2 9 23.7%. 3 10 18.8%. 4 ABC1 17.5%. 5 SBS ONE 5.4%.
6 GO 2.6%. 7 7TWO 2.0%. 8 ABC2 1.5%. 9 ONE 1.0%. 10 SBS TWO 0.3%

Top 30 Shows for the week.
1 PACKED TO THE RAFTERS Seven 1,853,000
2 THE FORCE – BEHIND THE LINE Seven 1,601,000
3 BORDER SECURITY Seven 1,515,000
4 TWO AND A HALF MEN -MON 7.30pm Nine 1,456,000
5 BONES Seven 1,362,000
6 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,319,000
7 SEVEN NEWS – SUN Seven 1,313,000
8 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,296,000
9 LAST CHANCE SURGERY Seven 1,292,000
10 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,272,000 4330
11 NCIS Ten 1,251,000
12 BORDER SECURITY -WED ® Seven 1,233,000
13 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC1 1,224,000
14 HIGHWAY PATROL Seven 1,217,000
15 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,211,000
16 SUNDAY NIGHT Seven 1,202,000
17 THE MENTALIST Nine 1,187,000
18 DESTROYED IN SECONDS Seven 1,166,000
19 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,159,000
20 THE BIG BANG THEORY Nine 1,153,000
21 SEVEN NEWS – SAT Seven 1,153,000
22 CITY HOMICIDE-WED Seven 1,130,000
23 CELEBRITY MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA Ten 1,124,000
24 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC1 1,117,000
25 GETAWAY Nine 1,113,000
26 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,093,000
27 FLASHFORWARD Seven 1,090,000
28 20 TO 1 -TUE Nine 1,087,000
29 TWO AND A HALF MEN -RPT M-F 7pm Nine 1,069,000
30 TWO AND A HALF MEN -WED 7.30pm Nine 1,067,000

A few others (highlighting multi channels):
237 WIPEOUT GO! 170,000
295 UGLY BETTY 7TWO 126,000
297 DOCTOR WHO ABC2 125,000
299 M-BIRTH OF THE BLUES ABC2 124,000
301 HEROES 7TWO 123,000
303 M-CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG 7TWO 121,000
308 STARGATE ATLANTIS 7TWO 117,000
313 M-KILL BILL: VOL. 1 7TWO 113,000
322 KIDS WB SUNDAY GO! 108,000
323 THE BIG BANG THEORY GO! 108,000
327 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC2 105,000
329 M-CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD 7TWO 105,000
334 ELMO’S WORLD-AM ABC2 102,000
336 AIR CRASH INVESTIGATIONS 7TWO 101,000
337 HOGAN’S HEROES GO! 101,000
343 JUNKYARD WARS ABC2 99,000
386 UFC WIRED ONE 83,000

Five City OzTam figures. Raw data from TV Tonight and Media Spy.

Ratings Wednesday November 11 2009

The second last Sunday night of the ratings year saw another huge night for Seven with every show from 6 – 10.30 not only winning their respective timeslots but also being in the top 10 shows overall. Nine’s top shows were the news, 60 Minutes and 20-1 with False Witness – a three hour commitment – failing to impress the average audience at just over half a million.

Over at Ten, their figures prior to 7.30 were almost in the realm of digital multi channel ratings with Electric Dreams under a half a million and the Simpsons at 6 – although third on the time slot - even lower. Australian Idol’s second last show that revealed the final two still did not make the million but was strong in the demos. Rove’s final show ever went out softly at 760,000 – a figure that would have been a lot higher if people knew in advance it was the last show.

The battle of the digital channels last night saw GO with one of its highest shares ever with the last minute programming change Matrix Revolutions helping the channel to a share higher than SBS ONE. 7TWO got close to 4% itself with that channel’s highest night as well. In channel shares modified, both GO and 7TWO landed higher than SBS ONE.

Timeslot order.
6.00 1 7 News. 2 9 News. 3 10 Simpsons
6.30 1 7 Sunday Night. 2 9 20-1. 3 ABC1 Einstein Factor/News
7.30 1 7 Border/Force. 2 9 60 Minutes. 3 10 Aus Idol
8.30 1 7 Bones. 2 10 Aus Idol. 3 ABC1 Miss Austen Regrets
9.30 1 7 Castle. 2 ABC1 Miss Austin Regrets. 3 10 Rove
10.00 1 7 Castle. 2 10 Rove. 3 9 False Witness

Network Shares:
1 Seven 34.8%. 2 Nine 26.5%. 3 Ten 19.9%. 4 ABC 14.3%. 5 SBS 4.6%
Channel Shares:
1 7 31.1%. 2 9 21.2%. 3 10 19.1%. 4 ABC1 13.4%. 5 GO 5.3%.
6 SBS ONE 4.4%. 7 7TWO 3.7%. 8 ABC2 0.9%. 9 ONE 0.8%. 10 SBS TWO 0.2%
Channel Shares Modified:
1 7 28.3%. 2 9 19.3%. 3 10 17.4%. 4 ABC1 12.2%. 5 GO 9.1%.
6 7TWO 6.4%. 7 SBS ONE 4.0%. 8 ABC2 1.5%. 9 ONE 1.4%. 5 SBS TWO 0.3%

Network Shares Including Subscription TV:
1 Nine 25.3%. 2 STV 24.8%. 3 Seven 22.1%. 4 Ten 13.3%. 5 ABC 9.7%. 6 SBS 2.6%

Note that in these figures, they include day time viewing as well. If day time was included yesterday in network and channel shares, Nine would win over Seven given that the golf was on Nine and that GO shows on Sunday afternoon also do quite well. STV would have had a boost with more than the usual numbers of subscribers tuning in checking out the new channels.

Regional Network Shares:
1 Prime/7QLD 32.1%. 2 NBN/WIN 25.7%. 3 SC10 20.8%. 4 ABC 15.4%. 5 SBS 5.9%

Top 30 Shows:
1 The Force – Behind The Line Seven 1,580,000
2 Border Security-Australia’s Front Line Seven 1,476,000
3 Bones Seven 1,423,000
4 Sunday Night Seven 1,298,000
5 Seven News – Sun Seven 1,293,000
6 Nine News Sunday Nine 1,217,000
7 60 Minutes Nine 1,078,000
8 Castle Seven 997,000
9 20 To 1 -Sun Nine 930,000
10 Australian Idol Ten 924,000
11 ABCNews-Su ABC1 898,000
12 Rove Ten 760,000
13 Australian Masters Golf Nine 713,000
14 Miss Austen Regrets ABC1 637,000
15 Ten News At Five Sun Ten 623,000
16 The Einstein Factor ABC1 611,000
17 Darwin’s Brave New World ABC1 590,000
18 ABC News Up-Date ABC1 568,000
19 False Witness Nine 529,000
20 Sports Tonight Sun Ten 507,000
21 Californication Sun Rpt Ten 503,000
22 Electric Dreams Ten 488,000
23 Postcards Nine 394,000 M,A
24 The Simpsons Sun Ten 392,000
25 Real Crime Seven 380,000
26 Weekend Today-Early Sunday Nine 363,000
27 Weekend Sunrise Seven 348,000
28 Antiques Roadshow Nine 325,000 excl M
29 Compass ABC1 279,000
30 Weekend Today-Sunday Nine 277,000

A few others:
Who Do You Think You Are? SBS ONE 276,000
M-Splash Seven 276,000
Wipeout Go! 229,000
Wide World Of Sports Nine 187,000
Insiders ABC1 185,000  
Dateline SBS ONE 183,000
The Matrix Revolutions Go! 159,000
The Big Bang Theory Go! 150,000
M-Kill Bill: Vol. 2 7TWO 147,000
M-Big 7TWO 143,000
Sunday Arts ABC1 70,000

Ratings figures are OzTam Five capital city Preliminary figures. Five capital cities are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. Raw data sourced from TV Tonight and Media Spy.

Read the rest of the explanatory notes for ratings posts here.

Rove McManus announced on-air this evening that his long running talk show, ROVE, would be coming to an end, with tonight’s episode being his last after a record-breaking ten year run.

“It was a difficult call to make but after ten years it felt like time to step away from the show and take a break to properly reflect on what I want to do next as a performer.”

Rove’s decision came off the back of discussions with TEN over the last couple of weeks.

“The relationship with David Mott and the team at TEN has given us the space to make a show that we are extremely proud of over the last ten years. It is more opportunity than most will ever get. I thank them for their support and hope they have enjoyed the ride as much as I have.”

The strong relationship between Roving Enterprises and TEN will continue to grow with The 7PM Project and Before The Game, both on TEN through 2010.

Network Ten chief programming officer David Mott said, “ROVE has been a big part of the TV landscape and more personally the TEN stable over the years.”

“Our warm thanks and congratulations go to the crew, the cast, executive producer Craig Campbell and of course Rove himself for making a show that’s entertained us and made us laugh week in week out.

“The end of ROVE on TEN does not mark the end of Rove and TEN: a relationship that spans a decade is harder than this to switch off.”

Rove decided to hold off on announcing this decision until tonight so that the audience at home could hear the news from him first. He also wanted to avoid any fuss leading into the finale so that he could focus on the show.

“We only did our tenth anniversary show a few weeks ago. You can only have one flashback episode a year – that’s the law”

“I didn’t want tonight’s episode to feel like the end. I have closed a chapter and after I recover from the wrap party I will work out what’s next. If it is half as rewarding as the last ten years I will be rapt.”

Ratings Saturday November 14 2009.

Network Shares:
1 Nine 25.6%. 2 Seven 25.2%. 3 ABC 23.7%. 4 Ten 17.9%. 5 SBS 7.7%

Top 30 Shows:
1 Seven News – Sat Seven 1,153,000
2 ABCNews-Sa ABC1 991,000
3 Nine News Saturday Nine 907,000
4 Australia’s Funniest Home Videos Nine 865,000
5 Bill ABC1 828,000
6 Hope Springs ABC1 824,000
7 ABC News Up-Date ABC1 787,000
8 M-Monsters Inc. Seven 741,000
9 Gardening Australia ABC1 729,000
10 Taggart ABC1 724,000
11 Bring It On -Rpt Nine 626,000
12 Ever After Rpt Ten 590,000
13 Australian Masters Golf Nine 579,000
14 Ten News At Five Sat Ten 566,000
15 M-The Kingdom Seven 536,000
16 Silent Witness Rpt ABC1 423,000
17 Material Girls Ten 420,000
18 Sports Tonight Sat Ten 416,000
19 Two Weeks Notice-Rpt Nine 401,000 S,M,B
20 Antiques Roadshow Nine 365,000 Excl A
21 Mythbusters SBS ONE 351,000
22 The Simpsons Sat Ten 324,000
23 Iron Chef SBS ONE 303,000
24 Weekend Today-Saturday Nine 293,000
25 Monsters Vs. Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins From Outer Space Seven 268,000 S,B
26 RockwizSBSONE 251,000
27 M-The Fox And The Hound 2 Seven 246,000
28 M-Metro Seven 236,000
29 Saturday Disney Seven 230,000
30 Good News Week Sat Rpt Ten 221,000

A few others:
The Credit Union Christmas Pageant Nine 198,000 A only
Myer Christmas Parade 2009 Seven 177,000 M only
M-CampRock Seven 188,000
TheShak-Rpt Nine 178,000
The Valet SBS ONE 127,000
M-Birth Of The Blues ABC2 124,000
One Tree Hill Ten 115,000
Out Of The Blue Sat Ten 105,000
Air Crash Investigations 7TWO 101,000
Hogan’s Heroes Go! 101,000
The Nanny Go! 98,000 00
Charlie And Lola ABC2 96,000
Egypt 7TWO 73,000  

Ratings figures are OzTam Five capital city Preliminary figures. Five capital cities are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. Raw data sourced from TV Tonight and Media Spy.

Read the rest of the explanatory notes for ratings posts here.

Its the second last week of Australian Idol.

The remaing three are Hayley, James and Stan.

The first contestant who is in the running to be Australian Idol 2009 is…

Stan Walker.

James and Hayley are left hugging…

The second through is…

Hayley Warner.

That leaves James Johnston to go home and Hayley and Stan to battle it out tonight.

Also tonight, they will perform what will become their first singles should they win the competition.

Next week sees the Australian Idol 2009 announced at the Opera House in Sydney in front of thousands of fans.

The result follows our poll exactly with Stan in front, Hayley second and James third. Stan has won the polls just about every week, and after having about 60% of the vote in Throngs’ poll would be the favourite to win.

Voting lines are now open. You can SMS their name to 191010 or call

1902 555561 for Stan,

1902 555562 for Hayley.

Voting is open until 8.45pm AEDT Nov 22

Michael Buble was the mentor for the week and will also perform at next weeks’ grand final. All  past top 12 Idol contestants will perform at the Grand Final as well.

It’s got to be some kind of record – 30 new channels in one day on Foxtel (and similar on Austar). This morning, Foxtel subscribers will wake to see their equipment upgraded with a swag of new channels. In the case of Foxtel, all the channels no matter what package you are on – will be available to view for free for two weeks. That will give you the chance to see what channels you like and then to be able to chose your package thereafter. I imagine this time would also ease the congestion at Foxtel call centres with people wanting to change packages in the first days to get new channels.

There are 12 new channel brands including: Lifestyle You, 13^th Street, The style network, Eurosport, KidsCo, FMC, Starpics, Showtime Action, Showtime Comedy, Showtime Drama, Discovery Turbo Max and Nat Geo Wild.

There are 10 new HD channels which are: Foxsports 1, 2 and 3HD, Fox8 HD, W HD, Movie One HD, Showcase HD, Showcase Action HD, Showtime Premiere HD, Starpics 1 and 2 HD and UKTV HD.

And there are 8 new time shift channels – which are: 111 Hits +2, Discovery Channel +2, Discovery Turbo Max +2, Lifestyle Food +2, Lifestyle YOU +2, Sci Fi +2, Showcase 2 and Starpics + 2.

In addition, there are many other changes including Sky News local, some channel number changes, iSuggest and other new features that improve user friendliness and functionality for both the IQ and IQ2.

For more information about the Foxtel channels, go to www foxtel.com/next generation

In free to air, by the time ABC3 launches in December, there will have been five new channels added to the Freeview portfolio. Only one of them is a dedicated HD service. With both 7HD and 9HD only being main channel simulcasts, and a lot of content not actually being in HD in any case, it would seem that free to air generally places little importance in HD content. Although the networks are supposed to show something like 20 hours a week of HD content which does not have to be unique. Foxtel will now offer more channels in HD than the total number (11) of unique FreeView channels.

Still, the fact remains that in both subscription and free to air TV, 2009 has been the biggest ever for new channels and therefore more viewer choice. Including the free to air channels, that is at least 35 channels now on the ait that were not this time last year.

Channel Seven Melbourne today confirmed that as of Sunday November 15 Foxtel Satellite subscribers will be able to watch Seven through their satellite service.

Speaking on the upgraded service Seven Melbourne General Manager Lewis Martin said:

“This is very exciting news for Melbourne viewers who will now be able to watch all of Seven’s programming through their Foxtel Satellite service.”

Viewers will be able to watch Channel Seven on Foxtel’s Satellite service on channel 107.

7TWO will also be available on the Foxtel Satellite from November 24 on channel 127.

It’s got to be some kind of record – 30 new channels in one day on Foxtel (and similar on Austar). This morning, Foxtel subscribers will wake to see their equipment upgraded with a swag of new channels. In the case of Foxtel, all the channels no matter what package you are on – will be available to view for free for two weeks. That will give you the chance to see what channels you like and then to be able to chose your package thereafter. I imagine this time would also ease the congestion at Foxtel call centres with people wanting to change packages in the first days to get new channels.

There are 12 new channel brands including: Lifestyle You, 13^th Street, The style network, Eurosport, KidsCo, FMC, Starpics, Showtime Action, Showtime Comedy, Showtime Drama, Discovery Turbo Max and Nat Geo Wild.

There are 10 new HD channels which are: Foxsports 1, 2 and 3HD, Fox8 HD, W HD, Movie One HD, Showcase HD, Showcase Action HD, Showtime Premiere HD, Starpics 1 and 2 HD and UKTV HD.

And there are 8 new time shift channels – which are: 111 Hits +2, Discovery Channel +2, Discovery Turbo Max +2, Lifestyle Food +2, Lifestyle YOU +2, Sci Fi +2, Showcase 2 and Starpics + 2.

In addition, there are many other changes including Sky News local, some channel number changes, iSuggest and other new features that improve user friendliness and functionality for both the IQ and IQ2.

For more information about the Foxtel channels, go to www.foxtel.com/nextgeneration

In free to air, by the time ABC3 launches in December, there will have been five new channels added to the Freeview portfolio. Only one of them is a dedicated HD service. With both 7HD and 9HD only being main channel simulcasts, and a lot of content not actually being in HD in any case, it would seem that free to air generally places little importance in HD content. Although the networks are supposed to show something like 20 hours a week of HD content which does not have to be unique. Foxtel will now offer more channels in HD than the total number (11) of unique FreeView channels.

Still, the fact remains that in both subscription and free to air TV, 2009 has been the biggest ever for new channels and therefore more viewer choice. Including the free to air channels, that is at least 35 channels now on the ait that were not this time last year.