Rants

Bad news for ER fans.

[updated] ER is back in the schedule from Thur Dec 4 10.30pm

It is starting to look like ER is on shaky ground to remain at its 10.30pm Thursday night time slot on Nine.

This Thursday – Nov 12 – ER is pushed back to 11pm as Nine airs a 90 minute special from 9.30 called Fergie: The Duchess on a Mission.

The Duchess of York, who has been attacked in the past by the media because of her weight, moves to a council estate to help an overweight, chain smoking family adopt a healthier lifestyle on only 80 pounds a week.

Next Thursday – Nov 19 – ER is not on due to Nine’s CSI triple cross over night which sees all three CSI franchises air one after the other. This is despite the fact that episodes of both the Miami and New York CSI are will not even be up to date by them as neither of the two currently air. Only the Las Vegas version of CSI is fast tracked. The three CSI’s play out from 8.30pm Thursday Nov 19.

Then there is November 26 – the night of the ARIA awards. ER is not in the schedule for that night as the ARIA Awards will be on air for three hours from 8.30pm. This means at least two weeks without ER.

Following that week, we are then in the non-ratings period which means a completely different commercial TV schedule. Hopefully ER will be part of Nine’s line up over summer. Whether it remains at 10.30 Thursday or moves else where does not matter, so long as they keep the show on. Preferably two episodes a week as there are about 40 more episodes to go before the end of ER. Nine are currently showing episodes from season 14. The show ends after season 15. ER only recently returned to our screens after being off air for 10 months. 

It has been reported that the audience for free to air TV in Australia is shrinking. This year so far, the overall audience is down about 1% which is not much but considering this year we have seen four new free to air digital channels launched and that the population of the country has grown by 2%, the figure should be a concern for the free to air networks.

Meanwhile, the subscription TV sector has seen growth that continues year by year. Nothing sums it up better than this graph which shows the audience shares of the three commercial networks compared to subscription TV (STV). The graph clearly shows the increase of STV over Seven, Nine and Ten. It also clearly shows the demise of Nine’s strangle hold over Australian TV audiences and the rise of Seven in the past four year.

What this all means is that the advertising dollar for the commercial free to air networks is shrinking. Then factor in that now there are twice as many channels to spread their ads over as there was in previous years. Any wonder the networks are struggling and why the roll out of new channels has been slow.

Another consideration is the fact that what qualifies a show as being a flop or a hit has to be redefined. With so much more competition now in extra digital channels, subscription TV also increasing in the channels and services it offers as well as other entertainment media, no longer can we expect to see Australia’s top shows rate as high as they used to.

Where in the past a million might have been considered the bench mark for minimum performance of a prime time show on a free to air commercial channel, now it should be more like 750,000. And with digital channel shares increasing – now getting close to 10% of the total audience, the networks will need to come up with new ways to keep viewers watching and satisfying the demands of advertisers.

Source: Graph: www.mcn.com.au. Some info: www.mumbrella.com.au

In it’s first week on air, 7TWO has debuted as the second highest rating digital channel after GO which is ran by the Nine network. 7TWO key shows like Ugly Betty, Heroes and Stargate Atlantis have all rated around the 100,000 mark for the new channel. 7TWO has less ads then the main channels meaning that ad breaks are shorter and that one hour shows finish around 10 minutes early. 7TWO then use filler clips mostly sourced from the Sunday Night program to fill the time in between two shows.

But for those outside of the five main capital cities and 7QLD’s coverage area, they are missing out. While Darwin and Tasmania will receive 7TWO in December through Southern Cross, there is STILL NO CONFIRMATION from PRIME as to when 7TWO will start.

Rumours have suggested that the issue with PRIME is one of branding in the sense that they are uncertain as to whether to take on the 7TWO brand name or rebrand the channel as PrimeTWO or something else altogether. Currently, 7TWO and Seven cross promote each other with ads on both channels for the other channel as well as onscreen footnotes – the ones that tell you what is on now, on next ,etc – also referring to the other channel.

In order for Prime to take on 7TWO as is, they would need to add their own onscreen footnotes which would say something like “now on Prime…” and “Over on 7TWO…” and the reverse on 7TWO. What this means is that Prime would have to edit 7TWO to replace all the Seven ads with Prime ads. Not to mention the issue of local ads.

But 7TWO does not yet have local ads. It is a national feed meaning the same ads are sent everywhere. The Harvey Norman ad you see on 7TWO does not give locations but instead a 1300 number to call for your nearest store for example.

If branding truly is the issue, then the question must be asked – how can Southern Cross have 7TWO up by December 1 yet PRIME – 7’s biggest regional affiliate – cannot? Surely Southern Cross – who took three months to get ONE HD on the air in regional areas of the eastern states – would have the same issue with branding? Southern Cross Ten’s problem with ONE HD was infrastructure and technical limitations.

Prime was carrying 7HD as an unchanged channel from Seven. That is, they did not rebrand the channel as a Prime channel.

If it is too difficult or costly for Prime to rebrand 7TWO or to replace the Seven ads and onscreen clutter with their own then maybe Prime should consider rebranding as Seven. Seven is the number one network in Australia but that is not the case with Prime in all regional areas. In Newcastle, for example, Prime is often third in the ratings. A rebrand may help lift that position, increase Prime’s overall regional position, and even if there was an up front expense to do so, it would well be worth the long term return. Prime is in agreement to be a Seven affiliate until 2016.

Digital channels do not yet rate well so the financial return in terms of advertising would be very low especially in regional areas. Considering some shows like Jay Leno only rate 21,000 for the five main cities, the regional ratings would be down to a few hundred per regional area. Not much there for advertising. Obviously a national feed makes much more economic sense – or – in Prime’s case, a feed for the complete region of Victoria and NSW could do the job – I am sure people in Coffs Harbour for example would not be that fussed if they saw an ad for a business in Shepparton for example. National advertisers would still no doubt fill much of the ad time in any case.

It might be time that the way television is handled in Australia overall is reviewed. Aggregation was supposed to give people in the country the same channels as those in the city. While the concept of extra digital channels was not conceived when aggregation was put into action in the late 80’s / early 90’s, the digital channels should now be included and delivered to regional Australia at the same time as the cities. And when they cannot for whatever reason, then the networks responsible should keep their viewers informed.

With more channels on the horizon on 2010, the problem of effectively delivering them to all of Australia will only become more difficult as advertising dollars are stretched over more and more channels. Perhaps it is time that the regional networks start to assume national identities like in the cities so as to make the integration of new channels easier and more flexible. Not to mention the benefits of national advertising and national programming feeds which would benefit the networks financially. That being said though, there should still be local news services not just regionally but in the cities as well.

Even more confusion with 7 News saying 7TWO starts today BUT without mentioning PRIME – do they realise that Seven News is seen on most PRIME stations?

Again – those in PRIME’s viweing area will not have 7TWO yet. PRIME are yet to announce a luanch date.

All sounds a bit like ONE HD and SC Ten. It took SC Ten just over 3 months to get ONE on.

We are waiting for PRIME to give answers. As soon as we know, we’ll let you know.

FreeView have been quick to update their website to include both the new ABC3 logo revealed at a media conference for the new channel last night (Thur Oct 22nd) and the 7TWO logo revealed earlier today (Oct 23rd).

This means for metro viewers, all 16 channel squares are now filled up. The TBC for 7’s digital channel of course is now taken over by the 7TWO logo.

But in regional areas, it seems FreeView have gotten a little carried away.

I checked the Northern NSW region and found that they had added the 7TWO logo twice! Once next to PRIME and PRIME HD – which is where it should be given that it will be the PRIME network that would carry the new channel – and again next to SC10 and ONE HD!

[UPDATED] All the extra 7TWO logos have been removed. 7TWO logos are now only present for the five main capital cities as well as Queensland regional. Even the areas served by Prime – NSW and VIC regional do not have the 7TWO logo. GO still remians shown for Darwin despite the fact the channel is not even seen in Darwin.

Same story for Southern NSW, 7TWO was filling the third channel spot for both PRIME and SC10.

As I continued to look at other regional areas – like Darwin. Mildura and Tasmania – I could see the 7TWO logo there more than once. In the case of Mildura – who do not even have ONE HD yet, the 7TWO was there twice, and for Darwin, who do not have ONE HD or any HD channel attached to their channel Ten, 7TWO was there three times.

Obviously this is a mistake, BUT – and here we go again – with all the hype today about 7TWO, regional viewers will be looking to see if 7TWO is available in their area. While seeing the logo their twice is obviously a mistake, the fact is, that so far, there is NO confirmation that Prime will be running the channel, and even if they do, whether it will be called 7TWO or PrimeTWO or something else completely.

So far the only regional network that we know for sure will carry 7TWO is Seven owned 7 QLD.

This is VERY reminiscent of the issues that surrounded the launch of ONE HD back in March in the 5 capital cities and the confusion in regional areas as to when they would see that channel.

GO launched everywhere at the same time. That was probably a lot easier to achieve than it would be for Seven-7TWO and Ten-ONE given that Nine and major regional affiliate WIN seem to have a closer relationship when compared to Seven and Prime and Ten and SC10 (Note NBN is actually owned by Nine).

Time will tell what happens with Prime and other Seven regional affiliates with 7TWO.

Freeview website: www.freeview.com.au

[Updated] We don’t hear much from FreeView these days – which is surprising as now would be the best time ever to start pushing the FreeView concept given that Seven’s new digital channel 7 TWO launches Novmber 1, and ABC3 is set to commence broadcasting in December 4.

In the lead up to Christmas, it would be a great time to spruik about what free to air TV has to offer. But then again, with Foxtel and Austar launching 30 new channels, it sort of leaves free to air for dust.

Currently (5 city metro), there are 9 unique digital channels plus 4 simulcast channels.

The current 9 channels are (and their digital channel number):

ABC1 – 2 or 21
ABC2 – 22
SBS ONE – 3 or 31
SBS TWO – 32
Seven – 7 or 71
Nine – 9
GO! – 99
Ten – 10
ONE HD – 1 or 11

The 5 simulcast channels are:

ABCHD – 20 (although sometimes in some areas it shows unique content)
SBSHD – 30
7HD – 70
9 High Def – 90
ONE – 12

By the end of the year we can add the following two channels:

7TWO - 72 – Starting November 1, 12 Midday
ABC3 – 23 – Starting December 4, 6pm

ABC3 will be primarily aimed at children aged 6 – 14. ABC2 will continue to provide pre school content. ABC1 will also continue to show mixed children’s television at varying times. Seven are yet to confirm name and details of their new channel. ABC3 launches December 4, 2009.

That makes 11 unique channels and 5 simulcast.

In regional areas, however, the number of channels generally reduces. Some areas still do not have ONE or GO. Southern Cross Ten for example only offer ONE on channel 50 as ONE HD with no SD simulcast.

The regional channel listing is as follows (based on NSW):

ABC1 – 2 or 21
ABC2 – 22
SBS ONE 3 or 31
SBS TWO 32
Prime – 6 or 61
WIN or NBN – 8
GO – 88
SC10 – 5 or 55
ONE HD – 50

With the simulcast channels being:

ABCHD – 20
SBSHD – 30
Prime HD – 60
WIN High Def or NBN High Def – 80

It is not yet known for sure that Prime will carry Seven’s new digital channel. I would imagine that they will and it will launch at the same time like GO did. Therefore the new channel should appear on digital channel 62.

And of course, ABC3 to come December 4 everywhere.

Another Wednesday night, another dilemma for recording the shows I want to watch.

This week, with channel Nine back to normal programming, there was nothing I wanted to record from them. I’m not into Two and a Half Men, Money for Jam tells me nothing I don’t already know, RPA and the Gift are not my cup of tea, and the Crime Investigations Australia episode on had already been on Foxtel a few months ago.

At 7pm at our house, we record quiz show Jeopardy form the W channel. Although some categories are too American for us to be able to answer, it is a good to play along answering the questions and, at the moment, the only real question and answer quiz show on TV at the moment (well, there is Hot Seat, but it is a fundamentally flawed format that does not reward knowledge – the old format with lifelines was much better).

We play back Jeopardy at 7.30 after watching either the 7pm Project, the news or A Current Affair (either recorded off Nine or live on NBN). The one we watch at 7pm depends on the stories advertised and whether was have seen the news earlier in the day such as Ten news at 5 or Seven news at 6 (Seven’s news has more and better content than Nine’s plus they don‘t carry on as much about exclusives).

So the plan for last night was as follows. Record Jeopardy from W at 7pm, watch at 7.30 (Never watch Jeopardy live – the ad breaks are at least double the volume of the show – plus the show cuts down to 15 minutes after fast forwarding ads and the get to know contestants bits). Record Border Security from Seven at 7.30pm and watch back after Jeopardy. Record Celebrity Masterchef from Ten also at 7.30 and watch back after Border Security. Record City Homicide from Seven at 8.30 and watch back after Celebrity Masterchef. Record United States of Tara from ABC1 at 9.30 and watch after City Homicide. Also record Three Rivers on Ten at 9.30 (new show, got to give it a go) and play back after Tara.

All seemed to be going to plan until we finished watching Jeopardy at about 7.55. I noticed that in my planner Masterchef was not recoding. Upon checking, it said it clashed. I thought why? The IQ2 can record two shows at once. Jeopardy finishes at 7.30pm. Border Security and Celebrity Masterchef both start at 7.30pm. No problem.

Upon checking further though, W had updated their EPG so Jeopardy was programmed to finish at 7.31pm. Because of that one minute, the IQ2 reported a clash and chose not to record Celebrity Masterchef while Border Security was recording.

So here we go again. These are the problems:

1. It’s great that EPGs for channels get updated to reflect accurate times but for the IQ to not record a show over one minute is ridiculous. I know for a fact that the unit can record three channels at once as it does so with overruns without a problem.

2. Jeopardy actually finishes before 7.31. It is the next show that starts at 7.31 so it would have been OK for it to stop recording a minute early. Over on Seven, their shows at 7.30 NEVER EVER start at 7.30 – more likely 7.31 – 7.34 depending on the night. Border Security started at about 7.33. If Seven updated their EPG like Ten and W do, then there would have not been a problem. Jeopardy recording stops at 7.31, Masterchef recording starts at 7.30 (that was the exact correct time according to the Ten EPG) and Border Security would start recording at 7.33. All done without a problem.

3. So, like I said last week, the IQ2 should be able to handle these stray minutes where shows in different timeslots overlap even if it means you lose a feature like being able to rewind the live TV being watched at the time for those minutes. Or it should bring up an alert when an EPG changes and a potential clash is detected. The user should then have the option of dumping one of the recordings, being able to instruct one to start a minute or two later or being able to instruct one to finish a minute or two earlier.

Better yet – it should be law that ALL TV CHANNELS and I mean ALL including SEVEN and NINE must ensure their EPGs are up to date with the exact time to the minute. Surely they would now know that there are more and more people recording and watching TV their own way that rely on EPGs to record the shows they want to watch. At our house, we watch almost nothing live, opting to record everything and watch later or at a delayed time. That way we can get in 5 or 6 hours of programming in less then 4 hours.

With all of these recording conflicts of late – especially when trying to record shows from Foxtel channels and Ten that give accurate start and finish times as well as shows from mostly Seven and occasionally Nine that never update EPGs – leaving 8.30 for example as the start time for Packed to the Rafters knowing full well that it does not start until 8.40 – I am having to resort more and more to manually programming in times to avoid conflicts.

Next Wednesday I will manually put Jeopardy as 7.00 – 7.29 and that will avoid the 7.31 problem of last night. I wonder though how many people just would not bother and start giving up shows after that overlap or simply become too hard to record when you want.

Seven are now the worst offender for starting and finishing time lateness – and the new Thursday night line up is the worst for it. They should be telling Amazing Race fans for example that the show most likely will not finish until 10.45 – well over the 10 minute overrun most of us program our PVRs for. Thank God for the plus 20 feature on the IQ2. Although, just to be sure, we put in the show after Amazing Race to record as well just in case 20 minutes is not enough.

How hard is it for Seven to program the night as 7.30 Ghost Whisperer. 8.35 Beauty and the Geek Australia. 9.40 Amazing Race. 10.45 American Dad. 11.10 Family Guy…?

Again – blatant viewer disrespect. Hopefully when ACMA reviews the code of practice for free to air TV there will be guide lines relating to start and finishing times of shows and EPG accuracy. So long as these guidelines are NOT the same as Cityrail’s definition of the fact that a train is defined to be “on time” if it is within five minutes of its time tabled time. Five minutes is not good enough. Got to be down to the minute.

Don’t anyone think for a minute this network lateness is accidental. They know to the second their programming days in advance. They know exactly when every show will start and finish as well as what time to the second every ad plays. It is all planned and it is one of the most complained about problems with free to air TV. Lateness.

If any one at any of the networks can offer a logical explanation as to why it has to be this way, then tell us now. Tell us why we have to mess around with PVRs and juggle times just to record and watch what we want when we want. I think the networks are in for a rude shock come 2010 when the playing back of recorded shows (its about time) will be included in the ratings reports.

How it should have worked out: 7:30 Jeopardy. 7:50 Border Security. 8:15 Celebrity Masterchef. 9:00 City Homicide. 9:45 Tara. 10:15 Three Rivers. 11:00 Something recorded from earlier days.

Last night, Wednesday Oct 7, I decided to record the Hey Hey Reunion to watch back later in the night so I could fast forward through any bits I did not want or need to see – such as musical performances or when they tell you what prizes you can win on games like Plucka Duck, and the like.

At our house, we also wanted to see Celebrity Master chef , Border Security, City Homicide and United States of Tara. And that’s not including a few shows on Foxtel that needed to be recorded to watch later as well. This was pretty much the same position as Wednesday Sept 30 where we decided not to record Hey Hey Reunion as it was originally scheduled to air an encore on the Saturday night – which, as we now know, did not happen.

We have an IQ2 so we set about programming it to record everything just mentioned except for Border Security which we decided we would watch live as it was only half an hour long and not so bad as far as ads and “coming up next” bits go. IQ2 of course allows you to record two channels at once while watching a third.

In theory, this would have worked. With Hey Hey set to record until 10pm on Nine, that meant only one other show could be recorded at the same time. We programmed it so that at 7.30, Celebrity Masterchef would record, followed by City Homicide at 8.30 then United States of Tara at 9.30. Foxtel shows such as 30 Rock on TV1 were bumped out of the night and moved to their weekend repeats as even the TV1+2 airing at 9.30 was a conflict.

Some time during the day, Ten updated their EPG so that Celebrity Masterchef would air from 7.31 to 8.38. That meant the IQ2 decided – without telling us – that it could not record Celebrity Masterchef as it can only record two shows at once. The show simply dropped of the night’ recording without any notice as it would have meant the IQ2 would have been recording from three channels at once form 8.30 – 8.38. Luckily, I checked to make sure everything was recording as programmed at 7.30.

Upon finding that Celebrity Masterchef was no longer on the planner list for recording, I put it back in. The it told me that in order to record it I had to cancel City Homicide. As we know, Seven and Nine do not update their EPGs so City Homicide – although always starting between 5 and 10 minutes late – still shows as 8.30 – 9.30. Knowing that it will be late, especially since Border Security finished at 8.06, I manually put in City Homicide for 8.38 – 9.40 (allowing an extra two minutes in case it finished later).

The IQ2 said I would have to cancel United Stated of Tara in order to make this recording. So I thought, OK, Tara repeats on ABC2 Thursday at 9.30. So I then chose to put Tara in at 9.30 Thursday. Now – moving to Thursday, at 8.30 I had Chuck on FOX8 programmed as well as Beauty and the Geek at 8.30 on Seven, as well as the Amazing Race at 9.30. The IQ2 told me that if I wanted to record United states of Tara at 9.30 Tuesday, I would have to delete Amazing Race. I thought – why – there are only two shows recording at once here. I then look at Chuck and see that it is programmed with a finishing time of 9.31. Thus it thinks it has to record three channels at once at 9.30-9.31 and says no. So in order to get Tara in I have to chose to record Chuck on FOX8+2 at 10.30. Thank fully no conflicts there, that was the end of it.

So because Ten, and most other channels including the ABC and FOX8 update their EPGs to represent exact starting and finishing times, in order to record Celebrity Masterchef I had to make all of these changes and rearrange the best part two nights of programming to accommodate it. It should not be this hard to record and watch all the shows you want to!

There are a number of issues here that cause frustration in making sure we see the TV we want to – both relating to the networks and the IQ2.

1. Ten update their EPG to exact times but Seven and Nine do not – meaning that if you are planning to record two shows from 8.30, the 7.30 show from Ten which will say finishing at 8.31 or so will simply not record – and does so without warning. If they did not update the EPG and maintained the same finishing time of 8.30 that Seven and Nine do, then there would not be a problem.

2. The IQ2 can record three channels at once (but not four). It does this when it is recording overruns. We have the IQ set up to record 10 minute overruns – so if a show finishes at 8.30, the unit will record until 8.40. Even if you have two shows programmed to record at 8.30 on two different channels, the ten minute overrun on the first show will still record. When I say “but not four” – that means if you record two shows at 7.30 that are on two different channels then another two at 8.30 that are on two more different channels, then only one of the 7.30 shows will have the ten minute overrun recorded, while the other won’t. The result is, that for Ten minutes, you are recording three shows at once. Which leads to the next point.

3. The IQ2 should be able to handle a three channel overlap of up to Ten minutes even if that means sacrificing the ability to live pause or rewind the channel being watched live. It is clear that it can record three channels at once when it handles overruns. It should not care about there being a minute or even 8 minutes of overlap of recording three channels. The user should not have to reprogram their whole nights viewing over a matter of minutes. Perhaps future updates could solve this problem.

4. The IQ2 should alert the user whenever there are changes to what the user has programmed in for recording. Whether it be a show has been cancelled from the schedule, moved times or simply cannot record because of conflicts, there should be an alert that prompts the user to address the situation.

5. The problem of shows not recording due to conflicts can cause havoc to series links programmed in. Series link only schedules the next appearance of the show in the planned recording list. For a daily show, that means only the next days’ airing of the show will be in the planner to record, but not days in advance. That means you can program two shows to record at once in a time where a series link show will also want to record without knowing it. In this case, the IQ2 usually does not record the series linked show in favour for the two that have been programmed. Again – a notification when the series link updates its next day if the show will conflict would help alleviate this problem. Better yet, the IQ2 should put ALL future times of a series linked show in the planner to record – so in the case of a Monday – Friday show, that means there would be the next five already in to record. That way, you would not inadvertently program another two shows in at the same time as one you have series linked.

6. All channels should follow the same rules as far as EPGs and program start and finish times go. I have said enough about accuracy of TV guides elsewhere, but Seven and Nine continue to run late regularly and without notice, And Ten does the same, but with their EPG being up to date and the other two not, then the result is recording conflict and a lot of confused viewers. The result is more likely to drive viewers away as opposed to keeping them in on the pretence of an archaic strategy based on messing with start and finishing times in order to prevent viewers from changing channels.

All of the above was for the sake of one show from one channel which at least displays accurate start and finishing times. The fun was not over yet after the mass re-program. Given last weeks’ Hey Hey went half an hour over (we watched the last hour but had planned to watch the rest on the encore that never happened) we assumed the same would happen this week and set our IQ2 to record the following show – an encore of the second episode of the Apprentice Australia. Sure enough, Hey Hey ran late. But something strange happened to Nine’s EPG. Hey Hey still showed as finishing at 10pm, and the Apprentice changed to starting at 10.30. There was an empty block from 10.00 – 10.30 that you could not chose to record. So again, I had to manually program around that to get in the half hour from 10.00 – 10.30.

So in playing back Hey Hey, we watched the recording from 7.30 – 10.10 (including the 10 minute record overrun), followed by the manually put in half hour block to cover from 10.10 – 10.30, followed by a third recording which was programmed as the Apprentice Australia. And for anyone who did actually want to see the Apprentice (if any) that show and the news that followed were then running half an hour late.

Again – it should not be this hard. Sure – 2.3 million watched Hey Hey live, but for those of us who didn’t – possibly many thousands of others, how hard did Nine make it to capture the whole show? How hard is it to keep the EPG up to date? Channel nine ALWAYS run half an hour late after a live event – whether it is sport or a live show like Hey Hey. Although the Apprentice was updated to 10.30 instead of 10.00pm start, the fact Hey Hey finished at 11 means it was technically half an hour over the updated time. This cuases absolute havoc for all subsequent programming after the event and the fact that they do not program to take these times into account is a blatant disregard for viewers.

In what must be Nine’s most disgraceful last minute programming change EVER, according to TV Tonight, tonight’s (Sat Oct 3) planned encore of Wednesday’s incredibly successful Hey hey Reunion has been cancelled in favour of the movie 50 First Dates.

Apparently there is no reason for the move from Nine yet.

This is a move that will leave many fans high and dry who had been planning to watch the show on Saturday night instead of Wednesday. Then there were those that caught bits in between other shows on the night who decided based on what they saw to hold out until Saturday to watch the full encore.

And, given the fact that nearly three million watched the show on Wednesday, the talk up, the hype, the publicity that such a high rating show would generate would almost guarantee a very successful encore – with people tuning in to watch again, people tuning in who have heard about it that normally would not, and those who were unable to record it on Wednesday due to clashes with other shows they were recording on the night.

Honestly, I cannot understand why they would make such a move. It cannot be purely ratings related as the Hey Hey encore would actually have won Nine the night and hence the week. If there is some legal or rights reasoning as eluded to by David Knox on TV Tonight, then surely they should have had that sorted long before programming an encore for Saturday night.

At our house, we cought the last hour after watching other TV first. We expected it to be bad but were pleasantly surprised and were planning to watch it tonight after 9.30. Now we’ve hired DVDs instead.

Bad move, channel Nine. Give us the big PLEASE EXPLAIN.

At time of writing, both the EPG on Foxtel and the yahoo TV guide had NOT updated to reflect these changes.

In 2009 we have seen numerous examples of bad programming decisions from channel 9 but what happened last night – Monday Sept 28 – simply takes the cake!

Channel Nine would have known well in advance, that after 3 months of hype, Seven’s FlashForward would win the 8.30 Monday time slot. They have chosen to put the Mentalist on at the same time – which is not a bad decision considering the Mentalist tends to skew a different more female demographic to what FlashForward does. There was not enough promotion of the Mentalist in comparison. In fact, from what I saw, there was more hype around the premiere of the Vampire Diaries on GO at the same time as there was for the Mentalist. And the debut of the Apprentice Australia warranted so much attention that it had water marks during the Mentalist and was to be aired on GO at the same time as it was on Nine.

The Mentalist started at about 8.35 – same time as FlashForward, and after a brand new never before seen fast tracked episode of Two and a Half Men. Then, when the Mentalist finished, there was no time for credits – straight into the Apprentice – at about 9.35. Blink at the end of one show, and you see the next. Channel Seven did the same though – not even showing next week’s ad for FlashForward until the first ad break in Mercy. Meanwhile on GO – owned by channel 9 – the first ever episode of the Vampire Diaries started two minutes early.

That of course, meant it would have finished just as early, leaving GO with seven minutes to fill in until its ridiculous simulcast of the Apprentice Australia – which of course we now know bombed in the ratings. That time was filled in with music videos. Perfect time for people to tune out. Why anyone would watch a show on GO which is on Nine at the same time is a mystery given that GO is somewhat lower quality that Nine. Then there is 9HD on top which would be the choice in any case if you have access to it.

These are the problems with Nine’s and GO’s programming last night that, if rectified, would have helped them to a better rating night overall.

1. Start Mentalist on time – right on 8.30 – or at worst a few minutes before FlashForward started on Seven. That way, you get your people in before they try the new show on Seven.

2. Start Vampire diaries on time on GO. Early starting shows are in fact a lot worse than those that start late as you miss out on parts if you arrive on time to the show. Better yet – why have it on at the same time as big premieres on other channels? Sure – there was an encore at midnight – which allowed an extra 51,000 to watch it, but why would they have not put it on at a different time when there was not as much competition? The midnight repeat of Vampire Diaries also started early.

3. Never ever ever show the same show on your full time secondary channel as on your main channel. Sure – nothing wrong with promoting a Nine show on GO, but to air a Nine show on GO? At a different time maybe OK as an encore – but honestly – is the Apprentice even an appropriate show for the GO demographic? (Note that Ten and ONE show the same sport at the same time due to anti-siphoning laws which do not yet allow certain sports to be on only the digital channel – would be good to have say AFL live on ONE but delayed on Ten while normal programming airs especially outside of Melbourne).

4. If both the Mentalist and Vampire Diaries had started on time then the Apprentice would have also started on time at 9.30 meaning on GO they would not have needed music videos to put GO onto Nine time – that is – going from running shows early to running them late – which – as mentioned before – kills the audience and thus any perceived effect of the concept of lead ins (which really do not affect the viewing of any significant proportion of the population in any case). Again, the Apprentice should not have been on GO in any case. It would have cost them more than any benefit. Furthermore, did the Apprentice really have to go for 90 minutes? Will channel Nine ever learn that they just can’t make reality shows that actually rate?

Nine should consider an encore of the Mentalist to pick up more viewers, and reconsider the Wednesday night encore of the Apprentice in favour of the Vampire Diaries. Yes – I believe the Vampire Diaries on Nine would actually rate better than the Apprentice and would act as a great cross promotion for GO.