General TV History

Sydney amateur TV station VK2TVG from late 1980s. I don’t know much about the station.

1 Like

I remember seeing very snowy images that I assume were of amateur TV in the 1980s, somewhere along the UHF band. Either just test patterns or still images with a “VK” call-sign on it. This sounds very ignorant but I never really understand what is the point of amateur TV. All they ever seemed to do was show test patterns or still pictures? Did they ever do anything other than that.

1 Like

I have some grainy video from VK2TVG of a university lecture. I’ve seen some holiday type videos broadcast on the SEQ group’s channel. They are still on air in digital but out of band now, so I haven’t tried to tune them in.

2 Likes

I don’t think I ever properly tuned into this station but what I do know is that after UHF-35 was allocated to the D44 Datacasting Trial in the Early/Mid 2000s, it moved to VHF-16 according to this post from 2005 which is amazingly still online.

Apparently, VK2TVG/Television Gladesville lost all their video library & equipment in a fire in Early 2010. Not sure what happened after that or if they ever transitioned to digital, etc.

2 Likes

I can see this working at 9:30!!. Aussies love sport.

This might explain why that might not work on FTA. Just replace ESPN with 7, 9 and 10.

Yeah, some of that is relevant and I was aware of it. But there are a few key things. Ten are local stations. ESPN is not. Ten is also free. ESPN is not.

What that means is that Ten can pull viewers to late night sports news - where ESPN can not - because it’s local news and it’s for an audience that primarily only has free TV.

I don’t remember seeing a breakdown of ratings between the North and South. Southern Cross had the advantage of AFL coverage which was a huge ratings boost.

Where it was most pronounced was in news, Southern Cross in the North and Tas TV in the South. However Southern Cross did make a key strategic decision of moving it’s bulletin from 6:30pm to 6pm. As explained in this article from the Mercury in 1998

3 Likes

I wonder if Steve celebrated that win like he did when his daughter was going well in the Commonwealth Games…

“Good turn, now. F***, yes, good turn. Push. Push of that wall. Push. Go Southern Cross. Go. Go Southern Cross. Keep going now. Go. Go Southern Cross, c’mon. Faster, faster. Go, go. Woo. Yes. Wooo.”

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

2 Likes

I was wondering if anyone has any videos of Sunday, the Sunday 9AM news that replaced it or the original TODAY on Saturday. I remember watching Sunday when it was Ellen Fanning and Ross Greenwood and then just Ellen the year later. The 9AM news was initially done by Tara Brown I think and then moved to the Today show set with Michael Usher.

This may be of interest to some…

and some more ripping outtakes from Agro’s Cartoon Connection on this one:

2 Likes

And here’s an interesting one - a compliation of NBC Today’s broadcasts from Sydney in 1986.

It’s interesting that Willard’s interviewing Max Walker in full Channel 9 commentary uniform, considering that they would technically have been ‘rivals’ with NBC affiliated Channel 7 (whose logo you can see emblazoned next to the ‘Today’ logo at certain points).

^^^Ten Sydney PRG from 1979 from here:

2 Likes

A couple more instances of ident/signpost/promo tracks popping up in different situations (or on production music sites)…

Ch7’s old classification music…


…was also used in ABC News 24’s launch promos in 2010 (from 1:09):

And right in the now… 7’s Cadbury-filled :wink: Royal Wedding promo…


(from Royal Wedding 2018 - thanks @SamSamTV )

… is actually “Dreams Last Forever” (particularly from 2:43). I’ve heard it previously but I’m not sure where. Fun fact: TT Adelaide’s “A Path To Heaven” theme is from the same label (X-Ray Dog).


Are you happy with these sorts of post here in TV History or would they be better in a dedicated thread? :slight_smile:

7 Likes

Happy 30th birthday today to NEW Ten in Perth

YouTube: fuzzybearish

5 Likes

Speaking of NEW-10, it was known as WCW-10 originally, but according to Wikipedia, it was changed to NEW-10 before the station even went to air.

It doesn’t say why, but it seems odd for a callsign to exist for such a short period of time.

There was a change of ownership of the licence before it had gone to air, plus in branding terms “NEW” probably made a much better callsign

3 Likes

So World Championship Wrestling were the original owners of the licence?

6 Likes

Apparently it was like that behind the scenes at West Coast Telecasters in Western Australia. :rofl:

1 Like

most likely

1 Like

Some Ten, Nine and ABC News (Melbourne) openers from sometime in the mid 1990’s, not sure of the exact year.

1 Like