I’ve always thought a Ellen/Tonight/Rove style daily show for an hour at 6pm (with headlines on the 1/2hr) with an Aussie comedian would work. I know it would be difficult to get guests everyday, but the morning shows manage to do it. Then just reduce The Project to 30mins at 7pm (& perhaps add “The Breakfast/Morning Project” at 6:30am, could be a way of retaining Carrie)… wishful thinking.
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But The Project already has a chat show element to it. Why would a straight chat show work better than a news/chat show?
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The Simpsons / Neighbours / 7pm Project
I’m sure someone at CBS has looked at Ten’s history and asked why Simpsons and Neighbors was a staple in the early evening slots for 20 years. That’s an easy way to bring back and win younger demos.
CBS essentially bought Neighbours for Eleven and it seems like a given that it will be returned to Ten.
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That will do worse than the current line up. No way in the world that would rate higher than the current line up.
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I am sure they have. Do you think that is why they wanted Neighbours axed back when Eleven launched? And remember it is CBS they aren’t going to be wanting to jump on the Simpsons bandwagon.
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They need to balance it out with the fact younger Australians simply aren’t watching broadcast television, and the numbers of those who are are going to crash further in coming years.
As you said, they need to bring back Ten’s track record of event television (like Australian Idol, Big Brother back in the day) with a mix of smart but mainstream irreverent Australian comedy Ten has always championed.
A proper streaming and catch-up service that actually streams the channels has to be a priority. If anyone can work out a way to start selling ad time on catchup services for a decent dollar, it’s CBS.
They should also think about fixing the news department. It’s only grannies who watch Ten FAF. It’s time that was cut to 30 minutes and a slick national news bulletin with local windows was rolled out. The dreary Ten News format hasn’t changed in decades. It’s stale and is broadcasting to audience they dont want.
I don’t think relaunching old shows like Big Brother is a smart move, but there are a million cheap formats that could do well like a local Come Dine with Me while they work out what to their new tent pole programming to complement Masterchef, Batchelor, etc.
Commissioning a quality drama or comedy and have it stream first on demand, and having it air a week later could be a good way to flip the way they think about catch-up services. And they could charge a decent amount for ads during the first run online stream.
Whatever happens looks like it will be under CBS ownership as creditors favoured the CBS bid. The only way it won’t happen is if the Foreign Investment Review Board and the Liberal government not allowing it.
Still a little way to go, but regardless the relationship between CBS and Bruce Gordon will be tense
That won’t happen. Mal welcomed CBS to the media landscape. So did Bill.
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On what grounds?
In the US, Inside Edition runs for half an hour weekdays (time depends on region you look at), so ultimately it could air mid afternoon or even as a lead in to The Project (whether they keep the 1 hour format or change to a 30 minute format, who knows).
CBS could even try a local edition of 48 Hours or work out an alternate name for 60 Minutes, maybe call it something something like Close Analysis (from my internet searches, there is nothing with that name and assuming no one else has copyrighted it, it could at least be a working title). Also there could be an Australian edition of This Morning OR they could reboot/revamp Good Morning Australia to its original Australian format with 2 hosts OR maybe set it up like a panel style show with say 1 to 2 presenters in camera shot.
I think regardless CBS will trying to establish a serious news and current affairs portfolio.
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That I have no answer for, but yet, more likely than not, they will have no valid reason or some ridiculous reason.
Its our politicians that have created this mess, first creating affiliated markets in regional Australia, then allowing Pay TV, then allowing multi channel broadcasting, all without changing media laws to reflect a change media environment. Our media laws should have changed in early 2000s, to reflect the arrival of the Internet, rather than waiting until one of the major networks also becoming insolvent.
Maybe the argument of keeping TEN Australian owned would be the most likely argument, but then will that be the best for Australian media market?
A successful bid by Murdoch and Gordon would need to go through the FIRB too as Newscorp is American and Gordon is based in Bermuda.
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ultimately, if it isn’t approved on that basis, maybe Bruce and Lachlan will overlook that fact, after all, Bruce allowed the Nine affiliation to slip through his fingers and he also set it up for a potential CBS takeover by not renewing the guarantee of the loan facility for Channel Ten, indicating they don’t always think through all the possibilities
It does look like they can’t sell online ads right. But why?
Is it because advertisers think it’ll be on a computer screen? (I watch catch-up on Fetch or AppleTV).
Catch-up must be far better for advertisers than broadcast. They can prevent ad skipping, add local ads (like the nearby pizza shop), show us up-to-date ads (PVRs show last week’s ads for upcoming shows etc). And customise the ads specifically to the viewer, with buttons to “send me more info” etc.
I can see they don’t get it. Plus the apps can’t handle jumping to the middle of a show as they want to show the ads, and repeat the same ads every break. And the next mistake they’ll make is showing 8 mostly irrelevant ads like broadcast, but without skipping, instead of customising 2 relevant ads without skipping.
Sorry this is way off topic.
Guests would have more time dedicated to them then 5mins like they currently do on The Project, more like 15/20mins. Guests that aren’t news related would be put on the earlier show. With The Project at 30mins it would be more news focused anyway as there wouldn’t be time for cross-promotions/celebrity guests. The earlier show would have audience games, stand up comedy, music performances etc that The Project can’t have. There is a huge difference between a show like The Project and an Ellen style show.
We had the Australian version in 1992.
In these days of fast paced programming, a 20 min interview with a guest would be a drag, especially for early evening. It might work later in the evening but I can’t see that as an option at 6pm. And what happens if they have an uninteresting guest. How do you make them interesting and not ruin your whole night?
Actually, although a interesting thought in theory, we have had Ellen De Generes on GEM at 4:30pm and 5:30pm weekdays up until last year and Martha Stewart Show on 7Two at 4pm in the afternoon in the past. Neither of which are there now. In the early 2000s on Nine before being shifted to midday then at 1pm when it first moved to TEN
This could be the reason that such a daring idea has not being taken so far. Also we had the ill-fated This Afternoon program at 4:30pm on Nine in 2009 - a show that lasted for 2 weeks before a return of a half-hour news bulletin at 4.30pm, presented by Mark Ferguson, followed by Antiques Roadshow at 5.00pm. Millionaire Hot Seat continues at 5.30pm.
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The US edition is a 30 minute format, different to the Australian version which was a 1 hour weekly edition
And the original American version was a lot more high brow like the Australian version was.
The current version of Inside Edition is tabloid and low brow, just like A Current Affair is here now. Do you think viewers will watch that sort of show between Ten News and The Project when they have real news on Seven and Nine?
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Maybe, maybe not, its a hard one to determine, that’s why another option could be a 4pm half hour edition with news inserts at the start and end and invite viewers to watch Ten Eyewitness News at whatever time they decide to program it. It could be in TEN’s best interest to air Ten Eyewitness News at 6pm and The Project at 6:30pm and making space at 7pm for a game show of some sort. Ten would be the only one giving a half hour offering between 6pm and 7pm if they went with that option