Sky News

That’s a fair point… but (you knew that was coming), regardless of her politics she does offer an insiders point of view. Peta is without doubt well connected and has a lot to offer.

As for presenting skills, they’re getting better and she’s not unwatchable. When you bring in people like Peta you have to expect a less than stellar performance at first. You’re not hiring them for their anchoring ability.

6PM is a difficult slot for Sky, they’re up against the powerhouse news bulletins of 7 and 9. The best strategy is to counter program. They’ve done that and it’s worked. Credlin performs better than anything that came before.

2 Likes

I don’t think it’s staggering at all. It’s just common sense on the part of Sky. And by common sense, I mean more “common cents”, good capitalist business sense. It’s a gap in the market. Obviously there’s an audience for someone who is authentic, not just an autocue-reader (autocutie), and someone who very much brings their personality and experience to the program. It would be stupid of Sky to go back to robotic presenters now.

I’d welcome actual robot presenters. At least when they malfunction it’d be entertaining television.

1 Like

The robot presenters would still be better than most of the humans at Sky :smiley:

5 Likes

True dat. :joy:

Editor-in-Chief of the Australian Paul Whittaker will become new Sky News CEO. Chris Dore, current editor of the Daily Telegraph replaces him.

2 Likes

Holy fuck they just move the news Corp hacks around their media properties. They’ll be no change in the right wing bias of sky news.

2 Likes

Taking a look back at the front pages of The Daily Telegraph from his time as editor, I’m not exactly enthusiastic about the prospect of having Paul Whittaker as the new CEO of Sky News Australia!

Sky News sent Rita Panahi’s young son to the WWE in Melbourne to do a report for Paul Murray Live.

My favourite part:
Over the weekend, the son of former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull, Alex, revealed that Markson had asked him to come onto her program to discuss the Wentworth byelection and the Government’s climate change policies.

However, he replied with: “I’d rather eat glass. I am all too familiar with your work.”

Turnbull then criticised Markson for planning to interview Kerryn Phelps, who is running in his father’s old seat as an independent.

“It will be sweet to see you on-air with your godmother,” he said.

That’s a fairly ordinary, albeit unsurprising, hatchet job from the SMH.

It also displays a fairly obvious lack of understanding of how audiences work; any program or format change almost inevitably leads to a drop in audience. The old audience goes elsewhere and the new audience hasn’t found the show yet. (Some obviously also stay).

The fact that Sharri maintained the audience on her first night is not a failure. Sure an increase would have been nice but she was replacing that right wing nut job show Outsiders so there’s minimal audience overlap.

As for the Melbourne reference, Melbourne has always been a problem for Foxtel, they have trouble gaining traction there. The low figure again is unsurprising.

As with all ratings, particularly subscription TV it’s the trend that counts because the survey panel is so small.

But, yes the Alex Turnbull quotes are entertaining… even if they’re also unsurprising.

1 Like

Yuck … so Sharri can do hatchet jobs on everyone in that fuckwit rag she writes for but the SMH cannot target her? She’s fair game considering her appalling behavior in the press.

3 Likes

So two wrongs make a right?

If the SMH is a quality publication then you would hope they’d be above that.

If, as you suggest, Sharri Markson is guilty of delivering hatchet jobs on so many others then a forensic report based on the facts would do the job, not some sloppy article which gets the basics wrong.

1 Like

Who cares …she’s a cow and deserves it. Nothing is really ever fair in life.

The conversation assassin strikes!

1 Like

I’m no fan of Ms Markson but I’m not sure this helps your case

5 Likes

I would wager that outside of high rise lobbies and Qantas lounges, that the majority of people watching sky via Foxtel reside in Western Sydney. No doubt about it.

1 Like

While I think there’s an element of truth in that… Sydney’s blue ribbon conservative areas are eastern suburbs, north shore and to an extent “the Shire”.

In general terms Foxtel is popular in the west due to sport and that’s certainly where a lot of their marketing is focused.

3 Likes

Even if many of the electorates there are politically stronger for Labor than the coalition you’d have to presume that a lot of people in Western Sydney are socially conservative, remembering what the results of last year’s same sex marriage postal survey were.

Given that the obviously right wing 2GB and The Daily Telegraph seem to be quite popular there, I wouldn’t be overly surprised if Sky News gets a reasonable audience (albeit, not as high as any free to air network) in Western Sydney due to the aforementioned factors.

Good points… The same sex plebiscite results in Sydney’s west revealed not so much political conservatism but religious observance. It was Muslims and islanders amongst others who drove the strong no vote in the west. (In addition to fundamentalist Christians in the Hills district).

Having said that the type of populist shit stirring that the Tele, 2GB and Sky indulge in is designed to exploit the insecurities of people who, rightly or wrongly, feel hard done by.

So I guess it’s fair to say there are potential right wing crazies everywhere.

2 Likes