I’d agree Ridge made the role his own and the show was still successful but I always missed Tony Barber when he left. I still watched Sale but there was never anyone who was going to be better as the host. I rarely watched Wheel after Seven boned Burgo. Just felt Tony wasn’t suited to that format.
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Popstars was another one of those Seven shows that was extremely popular when it first started, but then waned as it went on.
It is two decades ago this year since the show became a smash hit, producing the girl group Bardot.
Subsequent seasons saw the show produce the first mixed group, Scandal’us (the UK equivalent produced a group called Hear’Say), the first solo winner (Scott Cain) and then the format was revamped in 2004 to “Popstars Live”, which tanked in the ratings (for the record, Kayne Taylor won that season).
YouTube credits - PopstarsAustralia and Mike Devery
Of course, this show made Sophie Monk famous and she is probably the show’s most successful graduate (though she was part of the group Bardot).
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The show launched after the Sydney Olympics before declining in ratings like most 7 shows back then.
Popstars also had an INXS special to search for the new frontman in 2004.
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Incorrect - Popstars launched in the first quarter of 2000 - around the same time Bardot became massive. The Mole also hit our screens at this time and won a Logie for Most Popular Reality TV Program.
And it was 2005 that INXS held the show to find a new frontman after Michael Hutchence had died in 1997.
Well of course it was given Bardot’s formation was the format of the show 
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The search for the INXS singer was American, and was called “Rock Star: INXS” and I believe aired on CBS in the US and FOX8 here. It wasn’t associated with the Popstars brand
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Adopt-A-Dot campaign just after the Olympics was one of the most tackiest TV campaigns ever.
Keep a BP/i7/TV Week/Coke branded bit of plastic with a light in it on your set during the entire program and you just might win a Ford car, Apple computer or Sharp television!
Some TV sets burnt as a result of this campaign while “activating” the dot
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I don’t think that happened?
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If TV sets really burnt as a result of Seven’s “Adopt a Dot” campaign, I’m sure there would’ve been some typical stories in the newspapers and A Current Affair.
Besides, the on-screen icon for “Adopt a Dot” was only tiny! A bit less transparent than the watermark, but still smaller in size than the main Seven watermark:
Full credit to @Zampakid for that screencap, BTW! 
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Bring back Blue Heelers.
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Blue Heelers was a major casualty of Seven buying back the AFL rights in 2006.
For that season, the show moved to Saturday nights at 8:30pm - typically a low-drawing timeslot - which saw it pitted up against AFL coverage on Ten (the first episode that season went H2H with the match between Essendon and the Sydney Swans on Ten) and The Bill on the ABC.
Bernard Curry, who’d later host Beauty and the Geek Australia, was a guest actor that season. The whole show would wrap up with a Sunday night episode on 4 June 2006.
I believe that the 2013-2015 repeats of Deal Or No Deal (prior to being moved to 7TWO) were more successful and memorable than Million Dollar Minute in any way. 7TWO repeats rarely get any views, and with a better understanding of their schedule it could deserve a refocus and rebrand.
This must be from either 13 or 20 February 2006.
YouTube credit: CanberraTV
Well before The Morning Show and The Daily Edition were born.
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Sorry to reignite this thread seven months later…are there any clips on YouTube of Australia’s Worst Driver?
One of the most funny (yet humiliating for the person who got their car crushed) shows of all time.
Wonder if the show would work for Seven in a daytime slot this day and age.
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A shocker of a show. Popstars launched after the Sydney Olympics but flopped.
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Didn’t it first premiere on Seven early in 2000?
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I think it did.
Also it mustn’t have flopped too badly as they made another series the next year… and the year after that.
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The original series of Popstars featuring Bardot was a massive hit. It then faded over the next couple of series (Scandalous and a blond male guy-Scott someone?- were successful in those versions).
Popstars Live was a big flop. It was 7’s answer to Australian Idol in 2003/4. Hosted by Luke Jacobz and featured Molly, JPY and others as judges… but IIRC some of them left and maybe only Molly was left by the end???
Scott Cain.
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Yep - i’m pretty sure the first single was out in May 2020
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