Reasons You Will Quit Me. Marieke Hardy, writer and Triple J presenter, is winding down her blog, hinting at a new serious bent (not too serious we hope). “I feel that the present model has probably run its course and it’s time for me to focus my writing elsewhere. I have other blog projects at whispering stage and wish to spend the second half of the year reading, sleeping, drinking wine, taking trips in my van, and hopefully knocking together some sort of junkyard novel. It is my sneaking suspicion that perhaps reducing the amount of mind-numbing political photo based ring-rings and scouring the newspapers for vacuous crap to tear apart each day may lead to some more productive work.” — Reasons You Will Hate Me

Can I buy a vowel, an audience? What happens when you screen a new game show and no-one new watches? That’s a question at the Nine Network today after the pensive new version of Wheel Of Fortune went to air in the 5.30pm timeslot as the new lead-in for the 6pm News and A Current Affair. In fact it’s actually called Million Dollar Wheel of Fortune so potentially it’s very expensive and only 718,000 watched from 5.30pm to 6pm — 1,000 fewer than the number who tuned in for the program it replaced, Antiques Roadshow. Seven’s Deal or No Deal averaged 940,000 viewers: last Monday night it averaged 974,000. But Nine News’ audience slipped from 1.421 million of last Monday, to 1.344 million last night, while Seven News saw its audience edge up from 1.614 million to 1.639 million last night. Deal or No Deal does have the benefit of Andrew O’Keefe as host who gives the program pace and a lot of energy. Tim Campbell and his female sidekick on MDWOF were too cool and restrained on last night’s first outing. Years ago Wheel Of Fortune was doing well on Seven when hosted by Baby John Burgess. Nine poached him to undermine Wheel‘s ratings, which it did and gave him such memorable shows as Catchphrase. I reckon Nine will have a go at Andrew O’Keefe if it can for the same reason. — Glenn Dyer

New York Times embraces link journalism. The New York Times has certainly embraced blogging … just look at all the third-party sources linked here: Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg News, Washington Monthly, Washington Post, USA Today, and an independent blogger! The value for the reader here is enormous — not only do they get Times blogger Mike Nizza’s framing and perspective, they get links to all of this original reporting and analysis on this issue. — Publishing 2.0

Last night’s TV ratings
The Winners: Border Security was tops with 1.657 million at 7.30pm for Seven, with Seven News next with 1.639 million. Today Tonight was third with 1.587 million and Sea Patrol was 4th with a lift to 1.505 million at 8.30pm for Nine. Seven’s Surf Patrol averaged 1.468 million at 8pm and the David Attenborough Tiger epidode averaged 1.377 million at 7.30 pm for Nine. Nine News was 7th with 1.344 million and Desperate Housewives 1.307 million at 8.30pm for Seven. Two And A Half Men averaged a high 1.304 million for the repeat at 7pm For Nine and beat Home and Away with 1.291 million in 10th spot. A Current Affair was 11th at 6.30pm with 1.285 million, CSI New York averaged 1.159 million at 9.30pm and the 7pm ABC News was 13th and the last program with a million or more viewers with 1.158 million. Australian Story averaged 904,000 at 8pm for the ABC, Boston Legal, 843,000 for Seven at 9.30pm, Good News Week, 862,000 for Ten at 8.30pm

The Losers: Big Brother Big Mouth: Ten at 9.30pm, 563,000. Even beaten by a below average re-cut of Andrew Denton’s More Than Enough Rope on the ABC at 9.35pm with 673,000. I think the message from Big Mouth is that viewers are not all that interested in BB this year. The episode last night from 7pm to 8pm was 976,000. Which is OK in most programs. But BB is supposed to do a bit better than that. It’s making life tough for Carson Kressley on How To Look Good Naked with 941,000 viewers at 8pm. That’s a pity because there are far more positives from Carson’s program than from BB.

News & CA: Seven News again won nationally and in every market but Melbourne and Brisbane. Today Tonight won everywhere but Melbourne where it and A Current Affair drew. Ten News averaged 932,000. Ten’s late News/Sports Tonight averaged 310,000. Nine’s Nightline, 217,000 close to midnight. The 7.30 Report, 819,000, Four Corners, 709,000, Media Watch 615,000. Lateline Business 143,000. SBS News at 6.30pm, 210,000, the 9.30pm edition, 171,000. 7am Sunrise, 366,000, 7am Today, 285,000.

The Stats: Seven won the 6pm to midnight battle narrowly, 30.4% (27.4%) from Nine with 30.2% (29.9%), Ten with 18.2% (19.5%), the ABC, 15.7% (17.4%) and SBS with 5.4% (5.8%). Nine and Seven tied in the 6pm to 10.30pm battle with Pay TV numbers included. Seven won Sydney and Perth and still won 6pm to midnight; Nine won Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide. Nine leads the week 30.6% to 27.3% for Seven. In regional Australia a different result with Nine winning through WIN/NBN with 33.6% from Prime/7Qld with 27.6%, Southern Cross (Ten) 17.3%, the ABC on 15.2% and SBS on 6.3%.

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Ten’s winter of discontent continues with another poor result last night, no matter how they pitch it. Australian audiences are right off Big Brother. Tonight you can also watch Australia’s Got Talent on Seven at 7.30pm. There’s All Saints also on Seven, Gordon Ramsay on Nine at 8.30pm, Ladette To Lady, also on Nine. A new Simpsons and NCIS on Ten and an interesting doco on the ABC at 8.30pm called The Powder and The Glory. It could be the highlight tonight.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports