Classic TV Listings

What is the history of TV guides using WS (wide screen) to describe programs? I seem to remember looking out for shows that featured that.

It did used to happen I recall, but perhaps it was after 2003 as there is nothing indicated with WS or HD on these pages

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Would you have any other 2002 TV Listings? Particularly Weekdays from April-August and October-November. I’m trying to track down some dates for a few ABC Programs I’m trying to sort through. And dates would help!

Will look through my archives and see what I can find…

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I remembered that this was during the Easter Ratings period.
Very curious, but what does the term 3261 mean with the Wheel of Fortune next to it?

I’m pretty sure that was the program’s G-Code.

Yep, surprised to see many 4 digit G-Codes as I thought most of them were around 6 digits but it might also have depended on region to get the right channel.

For the technology at the time, they were a pretty impressive thing, we never had a VCR that could use them though but it would have saved a bit of time setting all the recordings!

They even used to go down to 2 or 1 digits!

I think it was ABC News on a Saturday or Sunday was often with a G Code of “1”. No idea how they used to derive the codes.

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Yeah but programs rarely ran to time so you’d have to manually add minutes before and after the scheduled times.

G-Code was mostly a waste of time.

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Surprisingly things weren’t as bad at running to time back then, less live programming and reality shows and things were a bit more structured - ie full credits after shows and movies etc… It was later on into the 2000’s that they started getting more and more messy and trying to mess each other’s schedules up.

Late nights were always right off schedule though.

Exactly. They might have been a minute or two out but that was probably about it in prime time at least. Live programming might have been a bit less predictable but overall it wasn’t too bad. I knew if I set the VCR for anything I’d probably add a 5 minute buffer and most of the time that was enough. If it was a live program I’d maybe add a bit extra recording time just to be sure. But IIRC, G-Codes did have the option to extend the pre-set times by x minutes.

Daytimes were probably a bit less predictable. The Midday Show would always run beyond its 90 minutes run time but I suspect there was enough buffer in the soaps that followed that there was some leeway to pick up the slack (you could probably cut out whole scenes and really who would notice?), and by the time the kids shows came on at 4.00 it was back to normal.

I noticed! That used to really annoy me. Days of Our Lives would usually run for the full hour but The Young and The Restless would be hacked to pieces, particularly on Fridays when improv shenanigans on Midday’s “A Town Like Dallas” would inevitably blow out that show by 15-20 minutes. The opening act on Y&R would always be noticeably shorter before the title sequence and other scenes would abruptly end before ad breaks. Kind of ruined the drama when the Katherine Chancellor/Jill Foster-Abbott death stare wasn’t allowed to play out to full effect.:grin:

I remember watching oft repeated sitcoms like Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie as child and noticing extra scenes in episodes I’d previously seen. You’d usually notice it when the show changed stations or it started airing in the mornings instead of late afternoon. Obviously the scenes had been removed to accommodate the extra ad minutes Australian broadcasters were permitted to run. I felt very very cheated when I learned it was a common practice.

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Why weren’t you in school?? :nerd_face:

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Ten has done it basically forever with Bold and the Beautiful (often incredibly butchered as well for the G rating) and I’d argue that 99% of the audience never notices.

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Surprisingly I only wagged school on two occasions- both athletics carnival days.

School finished at 2.30pm for me and it was only a 10 minute walk home. I’d be sitting in front of the TV stuffing my face by 2.45 most days. It was possible to take off early on Fridays if you happened to score a teacher taking sport who didn’t care. Wasted youth and it helped I was a “latch key kid”.

There’s no way I’d let a child of mine get away with wasting time like that. The ability to recite story lines from Y&R 30 years ago isn’t a life skill I’m proud to have.

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Better than reciting storylines from Passions, which was a 3:10pm staple for me when I was getting home from high school. :slight_smile:

I found out later it was also butchered to hell.

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Melbourne, Anzac Day (Fri 25 Apr) 2008
from The Age Green Guide

ABC1
6.00 Edgar & Ellen (G)
6.20 Spooky Sisters (G)
6.25 Young Dracula (G)
6.55 Amazing Adrenalini Brothers (G)
7.00 Time Warp Trio (G)
7.25 Captain Flamingo (G)
7.45 Eliot Kid (G)
8.00 Wow Wow Wubbzy (G)
8.10 Louie (G)
8.20 Finley the Fire Engine (G)
8.30 Play School (G)
9.00 Anzac Day March
1.00 Gallipoli Dawn Service
2.00 Anzac Day Memorial Service
2.30 Villiers-Bretonneux Memorial Service (90th annual Anzac Day Dawn Service, from France)
4.00 Curious George (G)
4.10 George of the Jungle (G)
4.20 My Goldfish is Evil (G)
4.45 Secret Show (G)
5.00 Rollercoaster (G; Young Dracula/Zoey 101)
5.55 BTN Daily
6.00 Message Stick
6.30 Can We Help? (G)
7.00 News
7.30 Stateline
8.00 Collectors (visiting a Perth collector of Gallipoli memorabilia)
8.30 Midsomer Murders “Hidden Depths” (PG)
10.05 Grumpy Old Men “The Nanny State” (PG; debated by Arthur Smith, John Humphrys, and Jeremy Clarkson)
10.35 Lateline
11.25 Casualties of War (MA15+al)
11.55 triple j tv
12.25 Good Game
12.55 rage (M)

ABC2
7.00 Lateline
7.35 Lateline Business
8.00 Naked Science
9.00 ABC Asia Pacific News
9.30 Australia Wide
10.00 ABC Kids
2.50 This is Emily Yeung
2.55 Creature Features
3.20 World Ahoy
3.25 King Arthur’s Disasters
3.50 Potatoes & Dragons
4.00 New Inventors
4.30 At the Movies
5.00 Australia Wide
5.35 Catalyst
6.00 Compass
6.30 Lone Pine Service from Gallipoli
7.30 Something in the Air
8.00 Black Books
8.30 Doctor Who
9.30 Chaser’s War on Everything
10.00 Extras
10.30 Stereo MCs: Live in Manchester
11.15 close

Seven
6.00 Sunrise
9.00 The Morning Show (PG)
11.00 Raggs “New/First” [P]
11.30 News
noon Movie “The Desert Rats” (bw/G)
2.00 The Quiet Lions (PG)
3.00 Golden Girls (PG)
3.30 Jury Duty (PG)
4.00 It’s Academic [C]
4.30 News at 4.30
5.00 M * A * S * H (PG)
Prime Albury airs Deal or No Deal (G)
5.30 Deal or No Deal (PG)
Prime Albury airs local news
6.00 News
local news on Prime
6.30 Today Tonight
Seven News on Prime
7.00 Home & Away (PGav)
7.30 Better Homes & Gardens (G)
8.30 AFL: Fremantle-Geelong (from Subiaco)
11.30 News
mid. “Above Suspicion” (Mvl)
2.00 Auction Squad (G)
Prime shows Expo (G)
3.00 Home Shopping
4.00 NBC Today

Seven HD
6.00 Sunrise
9.00 The Morning Show (PG)
11.00 Raggs “New/First” [P]
11.30 News
noon My Restaurant Rules
1.00 Movie “The Unforgiven”
3.00 The Great Outdoors
4.00 Lilo & Stitch: The Series
4.30 News at 4.30
5.00 M * A * S * H (PG)
5.30 Deal or No Deal (PG)
6.00 News
6.30 Today Tonight
7.00 Home & Away (PGav)
7.30 Better Homes & Gardens (G)
8.30 AFL: Fremantle-Geelong (from Subiaco)
11.30 News
mid. “Above Suspicion” (Mvl)
2.00 Auction Squad (G)
3.00 Home Shopping
4.00 NBC Today

Nine
6.00 Today
9.00 Mornings with Kerri-Anne (PG)
WIN shows Ellen DeGeneres (PG), followed by Susie (PG) at 10
11.00 News
11.30 Fresh (G)
WIN airs Hi-5 [P]
noon Movie “The Great St. Trinians Train Robbery” (G)
WIN airs Mornings with Kerri-Anne (PG)
2.00 Days of Our Lives (PG)
3.00 Entertainment Tonight (PG)
WIN airs Time Life (PG)
3.30 Hi-5 [P}
WIN airs The Nanny (PG)
4.00 The Shak [C}
4.30 News
5.00 Bargain Hunt (G)
WIN airs Antiques Roadshow (G)
5.30 Antiques Roadshow (G)
WIN shows Entertainment Tonight
6.00 News
6.30 A Current Affair
WIN shows local news
7.00 Two & a Half Men “Big Flappy Bastards” (PGs)
WIN shows A Current Affair
7.30 Police Ten 7 (PGl)
WIN Albury airs the NRL game between Brisbane and South Sydney
8.00 Airline (PG)
8.30 Movie “The Upside of Anger” (M)
10.00 WIN Albury airs Movie “Half Past Dead” (M)
11.00 Seinfeld (G)
11.30 Nightline
mid. NRL: Brisbane-South Sydney
WIN Albury airs Nightline at midnight, and Movie “Lords of Dogtown” (M) at 12.30
2.30 (2.35 on WIN) MADtv (M)
3.30 Friends (PG)
4.00 Peter Popoff
WIN airs Good Morning America, followed by Entertainment Tonight at 5.30
4.30 Good Morning America

Ten
6.00 Early News
7.00 Toasted TV (G)
8.30 Rock It! [P]
9.00 9am with David & Kim (PG)
11.00 News
noon Anzac Day from the MCG (G)
2.00 AFL: Collingwood-Essendon (MCG)
5.30 News
6.00 Friends “The One Where Joey Loses His Insurance”
6.30 Neighbours (G)
7.00 The Biggest Loser (PG)
7.30 Simpsons “Three Gays of the Condo”/“Dude, Where’s My Ranch?” (PG)
8.30 Movie “Elizabethtown” (Ml)
11.00 News
11.30 Sports Tonight
mid. Late Show with David Letterman (PG)
1.00 IPL Cricket: Kings XI Punjab-Mumbai Indians (at Mohali)
4.00 Queer Eye for the Straight Guy (PG)
SC10 airs Infomercials
5.00 This is Your Day with Benny Hinn (G)
SC10 airs Bayliss Conley (PG)
5.30 Christian City TV (G)
SC10 airs Jesse Duplantis Ministries (PG)

SBS
6.00 UEFA Cup Soccer: Rangers-Fiorintino cont’d (from Ibrox)
6.55 Filipino News
7.20 Italian News
7.55 German News
8.25 Spanish News
9.15 French News
9.55 Russian News
10.30 Greek News
11.30 Arabic News
noon Indonesian News
12.30 Turkish News
1.00 Bob Brought the War Home (G)
1.30 Insight
2.30 Korean Anzacs (PG; English/Korean, two Koreans and an Australian find peace in friendship after war)
3.30 Living Black
4.00 Nightly Business Report
4.30 The Journal
5.00 NewsHour with Jim Lehrer
6.00 Global Village “Royal Stables for Desert Horses” (G)
6.30 World News Australia
7.30 Gallipoli (PG; the battle through the eyes of soldiers from the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Turkey)
9.40 World News Australia
10.10 Lovesick (MA15+sml; looks at Cirque de Soleil’s show Zumanity)
mid. Movie “Beneath Her Window” (MA15+l; Slovene)
1.35 VH1 Illustrated (Mas)
2.00 WeatherWatch Overnight
5.20 Japanese News

C31
6.00 Wake Life
6.30 Cruizin’
7.00 Cultural News
7.30 International News
8.00 Euromaxx
8.30 Move It or Lose It
9.00 Adventure Bound
9.30 Theatre Royale
10.00 Kiss Shot
11.30 Geelong Newsbeat
noon Union Show
12.30 One World Sri Lanka
1.00 Asian Community TV
1.30 It’s a Great Life
2.00 Love That Bob!
2.30 Masterclass in Oils
3.00 Robyn
4.00 Nat Chat
4.30 Musos
5.00 1700
6.00 Chinese Weekly
6.30 Yianni
7.00 Words of Peace
7.30/8.02 TV Hellas
8.30 Level 3
9.00 The Surfer’s Life
9.30/10.02 Pool TV
10.30 Late Night Programs

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Our old friend!

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Today’s TV: 25.4.1963, Melbourne

Source: TV Week

  • The ANZAC Day March is covered live by ABV2, HSV7 and GTV9, followed by the Shrine Service on 7 and 9.

  • There are war docos during the afternoon and matinee movies on 2 and 7 also have wartime themes.

  • Professor Browne’s Study on Nine has an Anzac theme, and later a documentary 21 Years Later on the Kokoda Trail.

  • Being ANZAC Day there is a football replay, on 9 before the news.

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Today’s TV: 25.4.1967, Tasmania

Source: TV Week

  • ABC (ABT2/ABNT3) broadcasts the ANZAC Day March
  • TNT9’s evening movie is World War I drama 40,000 Horsemen
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