UPDATED: A later report in the Brisbane Times contradicts the Daily Telegraph story noted below: “No, it is not true,” Ms Schnitzerling said.”We’ve been doing some rehearsals, but a couple of months ago we did the same thing with the early news,” she said. Asked specifically if there were plans to extend the 5pm news service, Ms Schnitzerling said: “Not at this stage…but we have been shooting pilots.”
It’s been rumoured for months, but today the Daily Telegraph confirms Network TEN will extend its 5pm News bulletin to a 90 minute edition, ending at 6:30pm.
The high-risk strategy is being plotted in Sydney by TEN’s national news supremo Cathy Schnitzerling. Secret pilot shows have been filmed in most state capitals, it claims.
It is understood the show will borrow from the Sky News format with a chatty presentation heavy on sport and with regular headline updates. Key reporters will offer provocative commentaries on news and current affairs.
By dropping a $25,000 for each episode of The Simpsons, TEN could save $6million a year.
Last week TEN publicity was at pains to point out it was winning the 5:30pm slot so upstaged by the battle of the game shows on Seven and Nine.
Changes in television news continue elsewhere as Nine readies a new one-hour mix of news and current affairs at 4:30pm and a new set for its 6pm Sydney News.
Even TEN’s “mystery 7pm show” for the second half of the year has a news-angle, though likely to be a lot more funky with an emphasis on entertainment.
Source: Daily Telegraph
Get rid of the Simo Repeats if their not rating and re run the main news items at 6pm. Any other extended news format will Fail up against the allmighty 7 and 9 high raters!!!
Sounds ok with me. I can’t believe the ruckus other sites have caused though making it out as though The Simpsons was going to go completely. It was only about the repeats going. The new eps would stay, but those they repeat into infinity would go.
I used to watch The SImpsons when they first came to Australia soon after the heights of the Ninja Turtles, when ‘The Simpsons’ were seen as the next big thing, but I stopped watching them when 10 started replacing so many programs with Simpsons repeats.
uh oh spagghettios… I don’t like this idea at all…. but I guess I’m a biased massive Simpsons fan… *sigh* back to the internet I go
Just an observation: Im starting to miss 10 in high defintion. Sure 1 HD looks good, but it really should be a mixture of both 1 SD and 10 SD. And as for channel 12, or 1 SD, man is its bit rate low, I sometimes think im watching youtube it’s that bad.
A 90 min news is too much….. I remember when the News started 6.30pm. I dont watch much of the Simpsons, but I think it go at 4pm
I have a few comments:
1. A 90-minute bulletin is only useful if there is more serious news items from outside the home state and around the world, but not entertainment news.
2. During public holidays (e.g. Good Friday and Christmas), the bulletin could be cut back to 60 minutes.
3. With sports news pushed back even further, will it diminish the audience for the 7pm edition of Sports Tonight on ONE?
4. What will happen on public holiday Mondays when there are AFL matches in Melbourne?
I’m glad I come here for TV news. The other media reporting headlines of “Ten Axes The Simpsons” is ridiculous. If they choose to not play repeats at 6pm this is hardly “axing”. As long as they are playing new episodes, it’s not axed.
@MichaelQ: That’s wishful thinking. Tell me how many times neighbours has been axed when ten comes up with a new 6pm show, and how many times the simpsons 6pm repeats has been axed? I’d say 0% of the time because there’s no way ten would just axe a 20 something year old show that has many fans, both here and overseas (im not a fan, but I understand that one can be a fan of a tv show, after watching lost) in favour of an extra 30 mins of news. I don’t know if people in england would be as keen to watch the last 30 minutes of ten news instead of neighbours.
@John: totally agree, simpsons@6pm provides alternate viewing. When i was younger, id watch that instead of boring news, now i do like watching 7 news at 6, but only until about a quater past the hour, not interested in the sports, finance or weather report, there are other ways of obtaining that.
I have to say people are getting unreasonably protective of Simpsons repeats. I love The Simpsons, but if this does go ahead, the fact of the matter is, News will do better that incessant repeats of The Simpsons, and people might be more inclined to watch The Simpsons on Friday and Wednesday (still 3 eps a week!) because they haven’t seen it five other times anyway. I can’t believe people are complaining about removing repeats!
Ten are (finally) displaying what seems like an effort to actually compete with Nine and Seven which is more than can be said for the 17+ years they have accepted coming third – oftentimes TEN’s 7pm-10:30 shows do well but their share has been dragged down by their 6pm-7:00 programming. Even if this doesn’t affect Seven or Nine that much the 700k-900k that their news garners is still better than the 500k-600k that The Simpsons gets and has the potential to improve ratings for Neighbours.
Plus if it goes ahead and fails, I’m sure the extra 6 million dollars they could be saving would count for something for TEN’s broke owners. IMO this plan if put in action would be a positive step.
wow thats cool as….
news, news or news at 6pm!!!!!
for gods sake ch10 u cant use sport as an excuse coz u already have channel one for that, and ten news already repeats the same news reports within an the hour long program
the simpsons is so successful becuase ppl who don’t watch the news enjoy having options!
if u must axe the simpsons from 6pm weeknights, replace it with something else like futurama or friends (but then friends would be heavily edited at 6)
yeah channel 10 is officaly screwed
They’ll still play new eps on Wed nights.
TEN need to be congratulated this year for trying their best. They are the one (good) network who don’t axe shows every day. Everyday when I come onto this website, the word ‘Axed’ is followed by a channel seven or Nine program.
Channel Ten also start the majority of their shows on time. Apart from the live ones.
Channel ten are also trying heaps of new things, out of the norm: Bold and Beautiful at 6pm, eradicating kids tv from the afternoon, and now this.
Their promos for shows are also fantastic.
This idea may actually be quite successful. The Melbourne presenters are great. Seriously.
like bindi said many news sites are going with the headline the simpsons has been axed, at the moment the 90min bulliten is just speculation and even if it turned out to be true episodes would still be shown 5 days week(new eps Wednesday, one hour repeats Friday, and one half ep each on sat&sun
people are so over reacting to this, how does going from 10 episodes a week to 5 constitute an axing of the simpsons? if a show is still on air it is not axed. people didn’t make this big a deal back last year when the 6pm timeslot got shuffled around with will and grace, friends and taken out. and it isn’t even for sure yet, doesn’t sound like it has been confirmed by 10 at all so people could be having a big cry over nothing.
I’m sorry Ten, but you’ve just wrecked a perfectly good programme! I mean, seriously – sacrificing ‘The Simpsons’, which is watched by a considerable segment of your audience, for 30 minutes of cross promotions, ‘Headline Recaps’, fluff and ads?
Everytime The Simpsons loses its 6pm slot I switch off. Without it I was my hands of Ten, it has nothing else going for it.
They should keep it at 1 hour and put neighbors on at 5pm the news from 5:30 to 6:30pm and a current affairs show on at 6:30pm but unlike trash tonight and a crappy affair the ten one actually tells the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth without relying on sensation it would probably do pretty well
I just wish either the ABC or SBS would bring their news forward to 6pm so there would be an intelligent bulletin to watch in that slot.
Well that was a fun story while it lasted.
Why do people automatically think a 90 mins News means the end of The Simpsons repeats?
I would think Neighbours is much more likely to be given the chop and move Simpsons / Whatever repeats to 6:30 as a comedy break before the new 7pm show. (or put The Daily Show @ 6:30).
Neighbours between a 90 mins News and 7pm News / Discussion / Sports show doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Beleive it or not I’d probably watch this – I don’t generally get home till 5.45 so the first news I see is Nine (Seven is just ass) but if I was given the choice between Hitchener and Walden – I’d choose Walden, he always has the potential for unsolicited comment
Heavy on sport and heavy on fluff huh.
Might have to start recording these to see Mal Walden in Melbourne crack the sads at some non news story and make a funny comment from time to time as he is known to do.
Channel 10 why not put your News as is to 5:30pm to 6:30pm, move Bold And The Beautiful to 5:00pm and put something on for the younger audience at 4:00-5:00pm, remember the days of Wonder World, Totally Wild and the like, even come up with a Teen style Magazine Show (even with some real issues like binge drinking and such) , add to that things on to watch on Twitter, Facebook or whatever (Console Gaming etc like a Teen version of Attack Of The Show in parts) but not an hour and half of News.
I will miss the weeknightly Simpsons repeats, but if the new Simpsons on Wednesday’s and the Simpsons hour on Friday’s remain I’ll be satisfied.
The weeknight Simpsons were going all the way back to season 5 anyway, which I am kinda sick of seeing.
Any idea of when the extended 90 minute news edition starts?
With the financial problems Can West (who were incredibly stupid not to sell
Ten off 2 or 3 years ago) are having, this is actually a sensible and long overdue move by Ten, but they’d be better off at 6 pm, just repeating the first 30 minutes of the 5 pm bulletin, for people who get home after 5.30.
If people wonder why The Simpsons (that should’ve probably ended in 2000, as it’s got progessively worse since then and many of its once keenest fans no longer even watch it) keeps getting made by News Corp and why it’s voice actors keep doing it, this article answers why – because everyone concerned now does it for the money, as it’s a hugely lucrative show, from overseas syndication profits.
@Tim: You’re exactly right!
A lot of full time employees watch the 6pm news so they’re not going to turn on channel ten now, which will most likely just have the sports report from 6-630pm.
Plus, they’ll lose i’d say all existing 6pm viewers, thus having to make up a new audience, which I don’t think will be that easy, and it certainly won’t pull in as many viewers as simpsons repeats did.
One reason why im disappointed is i’d started collecting episodes from 6pm. What I mean is, i’d tape it on a dvd-ram disc, then copy it to the computer, convert it to a readable format, edit out the ads, then convert it to mp4 so I could view it on an ipod. I have about 90 or so eps, but i’d like to keep that growing.
Sounds like a great opportunity for TEN to save some money by padding out their news with inane, Sunrise style anchor banter and some more sport. Hell, their already producing more sport packages for the ONE HD edition of Sports Tonight so they may as well dump it into the main bulletin as well. The wisdom of Cathy knows no bounds. First she dumps Ron and now this. I’m betting this will be short lived and Homer, Bart and co will be back after some well earned long service leave.
Will still switch over to Nine at 6 for their news. Can imagin what crap will be being spoken by then to fill up the Ten Bulletin. If this is an effort to take Nine and Seven’s news ratings, good luck CH10. 90 Min’s of news, give it 2 months!
An extra half hour of George Donikian being a goose and making Rebecca Morse look awkward, how exciting.
Its only the 6pm repeats right? Ten aren’t “axing the SImpsons”, just the incessant repeats of the same episodes over and over? No problem with that, despite being a Simpsons fan, but the replacement is a bad move.
I don’t see how Ten can honestly think they’ll take viewers from 7 and 9 by adding 30 minutes of puff and cross-promotion. 7 and 9 do puff and cross-promotion so much slicker than 10. I guess being “heavy on sport” might be the factor that does draw a few away from 7 and 9. But I’ll be sticking with ABC and SBS for news, and Ten for …. what …. just footy and Futurama repeats now.
I really enjoy the news hope it works out for ten
Why dont they use that $6 million a year to broadcast to regional Alice Springs and its surroundings………..?
There are already enough sports “analysis by the experts” programs. I for one would rather see a slightly more indepth news bulletin. I have given up on the commercials – there is no way you can present the activities of the world, particularly in todays climate, in 9 minutes, including a commercial break, which is all you get. Devote more than 15 seconds to a story and see how it goes. One of the problems seems to be that reporters now days dont seem to be able to produce anything other than “noddies” and fluf. If this is going to be “sportertainment” I think it will crash & burn.
(as for the Simpsons, it is about time that was left to die & decompose in peace – it hasnt been funny for half a decade and if you havent already seen the episodes being repeated in the 6.00pm timeslot on any of their prior 10 or more screenings, hard cheese)
im not saying i think the article is wrong but if it has been confirmed why doesn’t the article contain any quotes from anyone at ten, also has a date been set.
not sure if i think this is a good idea or not, but ill make up my mind once this new 90 minute bulletin starts, will be interesting to see what the extra 30 minutes will consist of.
First they axe judy judy, now the 6pm simpsons!
Channel 10, seriously, what’s going on? I watch the simpsons every night at 6pm.
Ten have enough trouble filing an hour with news and now they want to extend it by 30 minutes? Will this be a national show or local? I don’t want to see a more chatty George Donikian, take away his teleprompter and he is completely lost! This is a terrible idea and I’m quite surprised at the positive response here.
I must be an old fashioned girl, i still like my news compact.
So they’re going to save $6 million a year by doing this? But that’s just 48 x 5 x the cost of one Simpson’s episode. They seem to be saying that they can provide an extra 30 minutes of news per day at zero cost. Makes you wonder what the quailty will be like
Any idea when this would start?
It will be more cost effective than Simpsons, as it’ll be cheaper to just keep the news running than starting up a new program, they just need to do a reintroduction at 6pm with new titles etc; like when Sunrise and Today go from their early morning 6-7 and have the show titles and “today on……..” at 7.
I’d pick Ten News over both Seven and Nine.
Its success will depend on content. If it is really anything like Sky News, then you’ll be flicking over to 7 or 9 long before 6pm as it’ll get repetitive. I can’t see much change to 6pm as a result.
Heavy on sport will mean even more self promos for what some of us can see on ONE.
It’s a stupid move by Channel 10 if they axe ‘The Simpsons’ cause droves & droves more will goto Pay-TV
Well, it’s a good risk.
If it doesn’t work simpsons will be back on.
probably ten news will beat nine news and seven news ratings may drop.
time will tell.
you’ve used the wrong graphic
This is massive news…I wonder if they’ll do it 7 days or just 5…..i think they could dominate weekends if they did it 7 days!!!!
Makes sense, why not use the staff and content you have already paying for. FTA is going to go more this way to stay relevant by running more live/local content to compete against the internet over time. And not everyone is home at 5pm anyway. Hopefully when TEN starts its second multi-channel that regular non-news and non-sports programs find a new home.
You’d never think that replacing The Simpsons with the news would actually save money? How strange.
I’m not sure the strategy of continuing the news for another half hour will work though. A lot of people switch on the TV at 6pm for the news and I don’t see them changing from 7 or 9 to 10.
Gee I don’t like the sounds of this “chatty” new format…
I think this is a great move by Ten, and one which a lot of us here on tvtonight have been suggesting for a while. Really hope this works out for them.
I like the sound of it, i’ve always liked 10 news better than the other 2 commercial news
David, any idea of when this will start?
Poor Narelda Jacobs! She will be exhausted and out of breath when reading the for ninety minutes in Perth. Hopefully she gets a friend to present with.
Interesting.
“Heavy on sport”.
Bored now.