On This Day

TV History
3009

Looks like the date was actually 25 January, not the 24th.

YouTube: matt01video

I think even Eddie had a public whinge about that, that Nine had somehow allowed Ten to get away with having the main event every year, though IIRC it was a sweetener for Ten taking one for the team, as it were, and committing to prime time Saturday AFL in the NRL states.

EDIT: That’s exactly what happened At last, football's seriously Ten (September 2002)

Ten paid a heavy price for winning the finals; it has committed for five years to prime-time Saturday night games in the tough Sydney and Brisbane markets. Nine, on the other hand, has sold national Friday Night Football packages on the basis of its AFL and NRL commitments in the respective football markets. The Sydney experiment this year has certainly failed in prime time; Ten’s telecasts often fail to register a five and never reach double figures.

However, Nine chiefs privately agree that had Kerry Packer played a bigger part in the negotiations, he would never have dealt away all of the finals.

Last year, Packer senior took his disappointment to the highest level at Ten and offered an eight-figure sum for five grand finals. Reportedly, the complex and attractive deal involved another Ten program, Big Brother , but Ten refused.

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3010

Well, this is how it went If I recall correctly:

In December 2000, the AFL recieved two bids, one from Channel Seven and One from News Corp, Nine and Ten. I am not sure about how much Seven bid, but Nine, Ten and News Corp’s combined bid was $100 million for five years, 2002-2006.

If Seven matched the bid, they would have their rights extended from 2002-2006. However, they only paid $40 million a year compared to the $100 million a year the other three paid. Seven decided not to match the offer and the rights were given to Ten, Nine and News Corp.

Seven later got rights for 2007-2011 with Ten/Fox, and 2012-present with Foxtel. In 2005, Nine and Foxtel ditched Ten for a bid of $156 million a year. So Ten went to Seven and asked to bid with Seven, in which they accepted as they were failing since they lost rights.

Seven and Ten were given permission to match the deal with their first and last rights agreement. Kerry Packer died in December 2005, and Seven/Ten waited a few days after, then matched the bid.

Unlike 2002-2006, Ten didn’t have finals exclusively, and the 2008/2010 grand finals were on Seven. For Ten everything was mostly the same with the Saturday arvo/evening game continuing and Seven getting the Nine games. They also shared the Brownlow medal with 10 getting the even years and Seven getting odd.

There was talk of giving four games to SBS or C31 (highly unlikely the latter would’ve got it) but Foxtel bought four games off Seven.

I think Kerry Packer was also shocked, and tried to buy the grand finals off Ten as well as Big Brother, but they refused.

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3011

Tim Lane didn’t want to call matches with Eddie with Lane defecting to Ten

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3012

Didn’t want to call Collingwood matches with him.

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3013

In the promo’s, they stated they would put the focus on the state (example - foucs on South Australia, while being produced from Melbourne)

Plus, it just had such a CBS/American vibe to it:

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3014

25/1/2010 Sunrise relaunches its graphics and receives a brand new set, moving away from the moving news ticker in favour of a flipping one. The show also gets somewhat of a re-format, with correspondents/reporters for each market.

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3015

This was a great day and such a well put together relaunch. That set actually won international set design of the year.

I also found it interesting that Simon Reeve was the Sydney Correspondent. How did that work given he lived in QLD?

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3016

Didn’t Adelaide’s News move back to SA with this relaunch?

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3017

The promo’s came out while the news was being produced in Melbourne.

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3018

But studio presentation moved back to Adelaide at this time.

3019

Loved the Sunrise set from 2010-2016. Wished it lasted longer

3020

Maybe he was still living in Sydney at the time of his appointment (also take into account he was hosting It’s Academic at the time), and then moved to Queensland when Million Dollar Minute was axed, commuting to Sydney each weekend for Weekend Sunrise before he left Seven in mid-2020.

Others have had the same arrangement over the years:

  • Between 2008-10, when Sharyn Ghidella was the news presenter on Weekend Sunrise, she would present the Saturday edition of Seven News Brisbane, fly south to Sydney that evening, present the news on WS on the Sunday and then fly back to Brisbane for that night’s news. This ended in 2010 or 2011, when WS extended to Saturdays, on which day they had Sarah Cumming read the news.
  • When Ian Ross was presenter of Seven News Sydney, he would commute between Sydney and the Gold Coast, where he was living at the time, flying south on either Sunday or Monday and then returning north on Thursday, Friday or Saturday (he presented on Mondays-Fridays between 2004-05, Mondays-Thursdays between 2006-08 and Sundays-Wednesdays in 2009, his final year).
  • More recently, David Brown was commuting between Melbourne and Sydney during his time as weather presenter on Seven News Sydney. This ended when Brown left the bulletin in November 2020, citing COVID-19 border restrictions and a desire to spend more time with family in Melbourne.
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3021

2 posts were merged into an existing topic: Historic News Events

3022

30 January 2006 Nine refreshed its brand ahead of the 2006 television season and the 50th anniversary of Australian TV. Gone were the dots replaced with the numeral 9 in a blue box as well as the “Seven Colours for Seven Day” being replaced with the warehouse look.

National Nine News, Today, Wide World of Sports, Sunday and A Current Affair all had makeovers too. Jessica Rowe also commenced co-hosting with Karl Stefanovic on Today but lasted until May 2007.

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3023

The 2006 refresh was a terrible out come across the network, with the balls returning a year later.

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3024

That came at a crucial time in TV history as Nine was starting to be seriously challenged by Seven in the ratings war.

If I remember correctly, this relaunch proved quite polarising and just less than two years later the dots returned to the Nine logo full-time (after it was slowly reintroduced in some way in 2007).

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3025

Also GTV viewers didn’t liked the new remix of Cool Hand Luke and went back to the Cowbell theme before the Comm Games began

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3026

what is the “cowbell” theme?

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3027

To this day it’s still used by WIN News and of the five metro markets for Nine, it lasted the longest at QTQ, which stopped using it in 2012 (though between 2008-11 they used the standard ending theme you now hear across all bulletins).

3028

I always mark the 2004 Athens Olympic Games as the beginning of Seven’s dominance over Nine with Sunrise, Today Tonight, Deal or No Deal and the Seven News brand all turning around in the ratings, along with the launch of Border Security and Dancing with the Stars. The beginning of 2005 saw the Australian Open, LOST and Desperate Housewives add even more momentum to the Seven Network, leading Nine to go into a panic.

2004/5 also saw the launch of Seven’s successful promotion of “Tim the TV man”. This all resulted in Nine refreshing its network brand a year later on this day in 2006.

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