Everything Boy George was also big in Brisbane that month during a visit to the city. He opened new studios for Radio 10. TVO pre-empted primetime with a ‘tell all’ special that was sponsored by the radio station; it was a Parkinson special.
4 Likes
It’s a miracle…
The usual question from me, are you able to upload to You Tube please - the 7 & 0 openers mostly as I don’t think we have seen any from 1984 except the one from 9 you uploaded previously?
TVO uploaded with Olympic ident, opener and Boy George story.
I don’t have the BTQ one but another grab from that night
Also airing that week Road to LA with the mandatory mustache.
3 Likes
The media world is stunned when more than half of the three million viewers in Sydney watching Sarah Ferguson marry Prince Andrew chooses Seven over the coverage on Nine hosted by Ray Martin, Maggie Tabberer and Dame Edna Everage.
Seven had gone the extra mile by gaining exclusive rights to the Thames/ITV coverage. Nine, Ten and the ABC shared the more staid and serious BBC coverage. The gamble had resulted in Seven’s coverage peaking at 42. Nine had 23% of the audience while Ten and the ABC tied in third place.
The Royal wedding didn’t quite top the figure achieved by Seven for the wedding of Simon and Vicki in A Country Practice in October 1983. That wedding peaked at 44.
Source: SMH.
3 Likes
Sydney results for programming in the weeks following the 10 TV Australia relaunch.
| Network | 6pm-midnight (week ending 29 July 1989) |
|---|---|
| ABC | 11.1% |
| Seven | 30.5% |
| Nine | 30% |
| Ten | 26.3% |
| SBS | 2% |
Ten’s successes
| Program | Peak rating |
|---|---|
| Sunday Night League replay | 25 |
| The Comedy Company | 28 |
| Sunday Movie: Predator | 20 |
| Neighbours | 26 |
Ten’s best performing new shows
| Program | Peak rating |
|---|---|
| Quantum Leap | 15 |
| Superquiz | 14 |
| Candid Camera on Australia | 13 |
Ten’s disasters
| Program | Peak rating |
|---|---|
| Public Eye | 6 |
| The Great TV Game Show | 9 |
| The Price Is Right | 7 |
| Family Double Dare | 9 |
| The Wonder Years | 11 |
| Network | 6pm-midnight (week ending 12 August 1989) |
|---|---|
| ABC | 10.7% |
| Seven | 31.2% |
| Nine | 28.7% |
| Ten | 27.9% |
| SBS | 1.5% |
Ten’s successes
| Program | Peak rating |
|---|---|
| Sunday Night League replay | 25 |
| The Comedy Company | 30 |
| Sunday Movie: Black Widow | 23 |
| Murder She Wrote | 22 |
Ten’s disasters
| Program | Peak rating |
|---|---|
| Public Eye | 10 |
| The Great TV Game Show | 8 |
| The Price Is Right | 9 |
| Family Double Dare (final) | 6 |
| The Wonder Years | 9 |
| The Bronx Zoo | 7 |
| Superquiz | 9 |
| Candid Camera on Australia | 13 |
4 Likes
Wow, what would’ve been airing on Seven during those two weeks to edge them ahead of Nine between 6pm & midnight?
It’s probably a good thing Ten Sydney had the Sunday Night League replay leading into the then-still fairly popular The Comedy Company + Movie of the Week, because there didn’t appear to be much interest for what was airing on other nights.
A good selection of movies and mini series compared to Nine’s poor offerings. Seven had a consistent schedule of popular regular programming- A Country Practice, Acropolis Now, Hey Dad!, Fast Forward, 'Allo, 'Allo, Beyond 2000 and the final episodes of Family Ties.
1 Like
It rated terribly but it seemed to last quite a while before going into afternoon reruns, although I don’t really know how Ten managed to get it a “C” classification so that they could run it at 4.30pm as a lead-in to Ten News at 5.00, which they did for some time.
2 Likes
Some shocking numbers for the revamped 10 TV Australia
yeah, 1989 and 1990 weren’t kind to 10 TV Australia.
1 Like
Top 12 Programs Mainland Capitals- July 29 - August 4, 2001
| Rank | Program | Network | Audience millions |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | World Swimming Championships, Day 8 | Nine | 2.51 |
| 2 | Friends | Nine | 1.95 |
| 3 | Harry’s Practice | Seven | 1.88 |
| 4 | Nine News Sunday | Nine | 1.86 |
| 5 | Hot Property | Seven | 1.78 |
| 6 | Blue Heelers | Seven | 1.74 |
| 7 | Ground Force | Seven | 1.63 |
| 8 | Seven News Sunday | Seven | 1.63 |
| 9 | All Saints | Seven | 1.56 |
| 10 | Who Wants To Be A Millionaire | Nine | 1.55 |
| 11 | Getaway | Nine | 1.54 |
| 12 | This Is Your Life | Nine | 1.53 |
How times have changed. Network programmers would kill for those numbers these days. World Swimming Championships couldn’t even get a run on pay tv in 2019.
10 Likes
But that is probably more a reflection on the sport?
Sydney Viewing Habits: August 16-August 23, 1998.
| Network | Sydney share | 5-city share |
|---|---|---|
| ABC | 15.9 | 14.2 |
| Seven | 23.6 | 27.5 |
| Nine | 30.6 | 29.8 |
| Ten | 26.9 | 25.0 |
| SBS | 3.0 | 3.4 |
Ten has a rare second place finish in Sydney thanks to the Seinfeld finale and the Sunday movie.
| Rank | Program | viewers '000s | overall rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Bill (Saturday) | 480.2 | 18 |
| 2 | A River Somewhere | 382.3 | 41 |
| 3 | The Bill (Tuesday) | 376.8 | 45 |
| 4 | ABC News (weeknights) | 368.9 | 47 |
| 5 | The Scold’s Bridle | 366.5 | 49 |
| 6 | Hetty Wainthropp | 361.3 | 52 |
| 7 | ABC News (Sunday) | 359.5 | 53 |
| 8 | The Games | 346.1 | 59 |
| 9 | Late News (Sunday) | 342.3 | 61 |
| 10 | Hamish Macbeth | 292.2 | 72 |
| Rank | Program | viewers '000s | overall rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Better Homes & Gardens | 576.7 | 6 |
| 2 | Blue Heelers | 573.5 | 7 |
| 3 | Home Improvement | 507.4 | 14 |
| 4 | Greatest Bloopers | 498.1 | 17 |
| 5 | The Great Outdoors | 471.5 | 20 |
| 6 | The World Around Us | 464.7 | 23 |
| 7 | Working | 416.6 | 33 |
| 8 | Who Dares Wins | 387.8 | 38 |
| 9 | Seven News (Saturday) | 383.6 | 40 |
| 10 | JAG | 382.0 | 42 |
| Rank | Program | viewers '000s | overall rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Friends | 691.1 | 2 |
| 2 | Nine News (Sunday) | 599.2 | 3 |
| 3 | Water Rats | 587.9 | 4 |
| 4 | Nine News (weeknights) | 582.2 | 5 |
| 5 | Funniest Home Videos | 569.2 | 8 |
| 6 | The Drew Carey Show | 564.5 | 9 |
| 7 | A Current Affair | 556.4 | 10 |
| 8 | Burke’s Backyard | 544.2 | 11 |
| 9 | Our House | 509.4 | 13 |
| 10 | Money | 501.5 | 15 |
| Rank | Program | viewers '000s | overall rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Seinfeld (Clip/Finale) | 921.7 | 1 |
| 2 | Apollo 13 | 518.8 | 12 |
| 3 | The Simpsons (Wednesday) | 468.5 | 21 |
| 4 | The Nanny | 455.6 | 25 |
| 5 | The Simpsons (Sunday) | 449.9 | 27 |
| 6 | Roseanne | 442.9 | 28 |
| 7 | The Panel | 432.4 | 30 |
| 8 | Just Shoot Me | 432.4 | 31 |
| 9 | Seinfeld (weeknights) | 408.2 | 35 |
| 10 | Healthy, Wealthy & Wise | 348.8 | 58 |
| Rank | Program | viewers '000s | overall rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | South Park | 226.4 | 98 |
| 2 | Hitler: A Profile | 92.9 | 189 |
| 3 | The Cutting Edge | 71.4 | 224 |
| 4 | Disaster | 67.8 | 233 |
| 5 | The Movie Show | 65.5 | 236 |
Source: SMH.
6 Likes
That figure is just for Sydney alone… these days a network would love to get that number nationally.
5 Likes
Seven aired one of the biggest blockbuster movies of all time on Saturday night on 7Flix but it barely made a blip on the ratings radar. It was a very different story when ATN 7 screened Oscar winning epic Ben-Hur for the first time over four hours from 7.30pm on Wednesday, March 10, 1976.
The dawn of colour television was upon Australia in early 1975 when Seven moved to entice viewers to the new technology by acquiring big movie titles at a cost of several million dollars. Ben-Hur, The Wizard of Oz, The Dirty Dozen, How The West was Won and Goodbye Mr Chips were amongst the titles Seven acquired.
The investment paid off. The ratings for the first run of Ben-Hur were described as “astronomically high” in an article in The Sun-Herald in March 1976. So many viewers were tuned to Seven that the other three channels only scored single digit ratings on the night. The slaughter would continue when Seven screened The Wizard of Oz for the first time on Australian television a few months later.
The week Ben-Hur and This Is Your Life scored huge ratings for Seven, Nine had success with an expensive Neil Diamond special and the Logie Awards but it wasn’t enough to topple Seven.
| CHANNEL | RATING |
|---|---|
| ATN 7 | 33.1% |
| TCN 9 | 30.2% |
| TEN 10 | 25.5% |
| ABN 2 | 11.2% |
6 Likes
The 1981 ratings year in Melbourne ends with GTV9 winning all 32 weeks of the eight survey periods.
The top rating programmes on Melbourne television in 1981 were:
| Rank | Program | Channel | Peak rating |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Royal Wedding | ALL | 84% of all TV sets in Melbourne were tuned to the four available channels. Nine had the top rating of 34. |
| 2 | The VFL Grand Final | HSV7 | 53 |
| 3 | 60 Minutes | GTV9 | 52 |
| Sale Of The Century | GTV9 | 52 | |
| 5 | A Town Like Alice | HSV7 | 44 |
| Twenty-five Years Of Television | GTV9 | 44 | |
| 7 | Bert and Patti’s Ford Superquiz | GTV9 | 43 |
| 8 | Movie: Towering Inferno | ATV10 | 42 |
| 9 | The 1981 Logies | ATV10 | 40 |
| Special: The Hoges Report | GTV 9 | 40 | |
| 11 | Movie: Papillon | GTV9 | 39 |
| 12 | The Sullivans | GTV9 | 37 |
| Movie: Ashanti | GTV9 | 37 | |
| Paul Hogan Show (Rpt) | GTV9 | 37 | |
| Movie: Sybil | GTV9 | 37 | |
| 16 | National Nine News | GTV9 | 36 |
| 17 | Cop Shop | HSV7 | 35 |
| Bert Newton’s New Faces | GTV9 | 35 | |
| 19 | The Melbourne Cup | ATV10 | 33 |
| Movie: Omen | HSV7 | 33 | |
| Movie: Force 10 From Navarone | GTV9 | 33 |
In Sydney, TCN 9 won all eight of the major ratings periods, but not all 32 weeks, for 1981. ATN7 and TEN10 came equal second.
The top 10 regular programmes for 1981 in Sydney were:
| Rank | Program | Channel | Peak rating |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sale Of The Century | TCN9 | 46 |
| 2 | Bert and Patti’s Ford Superquiz | TCN9 | 40 |
| 3 | 60 Minutes | TCN9 | 37 |
| 4 | National Nine News | TCN9 | 33 |
| Buck Rogers in the 25th Century | TCN9 | 33 | |
| 6 | Hart to Hart | TCN9 | 30 |
| Bert Newton’s New Faces | TCN9 | 30 | |
| Bless This House | ATN7 | 30 | |
| The Love Boat | TCN9 | 30 | |
| 10 | Kingswood Country | ATN7 | 28 |
The top rating specials in Sydney for 1981:
| Rank | Program | Network | Peak rating |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Royal Wedding | ALL | 83% of all TV sets in Sydney were tuned to the four available channels. Nine had the top rating of 41. |
| 2 | A Town Like Alice | ATN7 | 49 |
| 3 | The Hoges Report | TCN9 | 43 |
Source: The Age/SMH.
2 Likes
Not to mention the Sydney figure for South Park higher than almost anything on SBS nationally now.
2 Likes
The SMH, 15 March 1984. Ten Sydney had the top rating news for the previous three weeks, which was at 6:00pm and winning that timeslot. It was all because of Ten’s smash hit Perfect Match at 5:30pm.
SMH Google Archives.
Not sure if this is the right place for it, but I have stumbled across a TV Tonight article from 2009 where Seven won all markets sans Adelaide (where it was second - to Ten).
Ten won Adelaide, and was second in Sydney and Perth. This pushed Nine to a rare third place in Sydney (though it would win that market the following week), and overall.
3 Likes