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It’s the TV economy, stupid.
Amid speculation of PBL Media’s crippling debt, Channel Nine has denied a rumour it is trying to sell its share of the London 2012 Olympic rights.
“At the very time that our enemies are putting this around we have been in the process of wrapping up the (2011 and 2015) Rugby World Cup rights as well,” Nine spokesman David Hurley told BusinessDaily.
“We’d hardly be doing that and in the same breathe be trying to shop around the Olympic rights.”
Mr Hurley did say that all networks were having to “live with the realities” …
Airdate: Rugby League World Cup
Channel Nine will air the Rugby League World Cup: Australia v New Zealand at 8:30pm Sunday October 26th.
Other teams to play in the series will include England, France, PNG, Scotland, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa.
The series will conclude in Brisbane on November 22nd.
Amid calls for the television ratings to be tallied excluding Olympics, Seven has previously said Nine’s World Cup Series should also nullify ratings for its relevant weeks. Advertisers have traditionally removed Olympics and Commonwealth Games from annual results.
Nine lands Rugby World Cup
The Nine Network has secured the rights to the 2011 and 2015 Rugby World Cups.
In a deal with the International Rugby Board and in conjunction with FOX Sports, Nine has announced plans to deliver comprehensive coverage of the 2011 World Cup in New Zealand and the 2015 tournament. It follows the network’s acquisition of the London Olympics in 2012.
CEO David Gyngell told The Sunday Telegraph: “We really are the wide world of sports now. The guarantees of our industry are local news services and big sporting events. They are the tent …
Is Week 41 Nine’s last shot?
With 2.07m viewers for the NRL Grand Final it’s game on in TV land for this week’s ratings crown.
Last night the network attracted a 33.2% share over rival Seven’s 25.2%. Nine hasn’t won a ratings week since July.
Just the second hour of the match factored into Nine’s primetime share, only in Sydney and Melbourne. Time delays in Queensland, and South Australia meant a slim 30 minutes made it into primetime, and none in Western Australia. At least it gave Nine’s other shows a healthy lead-in.
In comparison to 2007, moving the …
ABC beats TEN as Seven wins
It was the week that American critics began to knife Kath & Kim (officially), ABC told staff it would cut up to 35 production jobs, Nine denied having a contract with the wife of a convicted crim, an actor lambasted his former soap, Today Tonight announced its next host would be a sports presenter and said its film crew helped -not hounded- an interviewee, Seven ’streamlined’ its Lotto results, buyers eyed a key production company, the Imparja / Nine Darwin deal fell apart, a TV critic died, and suddenly so did …
Matthew White to anchor Today Tonight
Seven will return a male anchor to Today Tonight when sports presenter Matthew White replaces Anna Coren, it has been announced.
He will be the first male presenter in for the programme since Stan Grant vacated the chair for Naomi Robson in 2000.
The announcement of White for the role is a surprise name, most of the rumours were looking elsewhere as to Coren’s replacement, with many tipping Samantha Armytage would take the role. Most recently White was part of Seven’s Olympic team, filling in on Sunrise, presenting sports on Seven’s Sydney bulletin …
2.58m goal for Seven’s AFL
Updated: Channel Seven’s broadcast of the AFL Grand Final was the biggest television audience of the year -outside of its own Olympics coverage.
The biggest audience tuned in for the end of the game, when a whopping 2.58m viewers watched Presentations. Seven has merged its separate listings for Presentation, Post Match, Pre Match, and actual match to ascertain an average audience of 2.49m. It peaked at 3.86m across metro and regional audiences.
In Melbourne alone 1.29m viewers watched the match, followed by Sydney…
Seven: ASTRA comments “bored us rigid.”
The war of words between ASTRA and the Seven Network over sports and the anti-siphoning list continues.
Today the Seven Network was all puffed out of arguments, issuing a blunt, two-sentence response to the three page press release from ASTRA.
Seven simply said, quote, “ASTRA’s latest comments have bored us rigid. We’re so bored we can’t even raise the enthusiasm to reply.” Unquote.
You gotta love a bared-boned, dinky-di Australian reaction from the network, and one that is totally outside traditional corporate responses. TV Tonight wishes we had more tell-it-like-it-is responses from our …
The Extra detail on the 5:30 battle
On any given weekday in the 5:30pm race it isn’t difficult to see the wins by Deal or No Deal are a headache to the Nine Network. It thumped Million Dollar Wheel of Fortune out of existence.
On Wednesday Deal had 761,000 national viewers while Antiques Roadshow had 473,000. But that isn’t the full picture.
While nobody is denying the might of Deal, the figures don’t acknowledge the fact that not only is Antiques a one hour show, but in Brisbane it airs from 4:30 - 5:30pm. That’s because the locally-produced Extra airs …
Maintain the rage
If there’s one way to know you have made it in the music industry it’s when you get a call from the ABC to be a guest programmer on rage. It’s the television equivalent of being on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine. Not only is it the ultimate “desert island discs” wishlist, but you are following in the footsteps of legendary musos before you.
“Often with Australian artists we get the ‘oh my god I’ve wanted to do that for so many years!’ We often get that little speech, which is …
Foxtel appoints Olympic team leader
Foxtel’s Head of Entertainment, Graham Burrells has been appointed Creative Director of the broadcaster’s Olympic and Commonwealth Games Project. Foxtel is a partner in the 2010 Winter Olympic Games from Vancouver, the 2010 Commonwealth Games from Delhi, and the 2012 Summer Olympic Games from London.
Burrells will have responsibility for the look and feel of the coverage and for the supervision and production of news magazine programs, colour specials and event programming.
Foxtel’s Brian Walsh said, “Now that this year’s biggest sports event has concluded, the baton has been passed to Foxtel. …
Airdate: Olympic Welcome Home Parade
Seven will air the welcome home parade for the 2008 Olympic Athletes taking place in Sydney next Monday at 12pm for 90 minutes.
A Melbourne parade airs at 1pm on Wednesday September 17th for one hour in Melbourne.
Given the time in between the closing ceremony and the welcome home parade is so long, it’s a shame they didn’t wait for the Paralympians to join them. From memory they get their own parade, hopefully to screen on ABC later.
Seven will follow the Melbourne parade with an Extreme: Celebrity Scandals special ….which may or …