The Winners:

A dull night. The 8.30pm to 9.30pm battle saw none of the programs top the million viewer mark. The Good Wife on Ten won with 872,000, from a repeat of Bones on Seven with 951,000, from CSI on Nine with 946,000.

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.685 million
  2. Nine News (6pm) — 1.645 million
  3. Dancing with the Stars (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.390 million
  4. RBT (Nine) (6.30pm) – 1.340 million
  5. Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation (Ten) (7.30pm) (returning series) — 1.328 million
  6. 60 Minutes (Nine) (7.30pm) — 1.265 million
  7. Send in the Dogs (Nine) (7pm) — 1.255 million
  8. Modern Family (Ten) (6.30pm) — 1.036 million

The Losers: Nothing really, but no real buzz about the night.

News & CA:

Seven News won Melbourne (thanks to the AFL lead in), Brisbane and Perth. Nine won Sydney with the NRL and Brisbane with the local Broncos team playing. Nine won Adelaide, Seven won Perth. A mixed outcome.

Insiders at 9am proved that its hour long focus on politics drags ’em in during an election campaign. Sunrise is still streets ahead, but Laurie Oakes and Nine will be surprised this morning.

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.685 million
  2. Nine News (6pm) — 1.645 million
  3. 60 Minutes (Nine) (7.30pm) — 1.265 million
  4. ABC News (7pm) — 884,000
  5. Ten News (5pm) — 637,000
  6. Weekend Sunrise (Seven) (8am) — 395,000
  7. Insiders (ABC) (9am) — 271,000
  8. Weekend Today (Nine) (8am) — 263,000
  9. SBS News (6.30pm) — 215,000
  10. Landline (ABC) (12pm) — 208,000
  11. Inside Business (ABC) (10am) — 190,000
  12. Offsiders (ABC) (11am) — 163,000
  13. Dateline (SBS) (8.30pm) — 159,000
  14. Meet the Press (Ten) (8am) — 45,000

The Stats:

  • FTA: Nine had a share of 30.0%, thanks to the strength of GO. Seven was second with 28.6%, Ten was next with 23.1%, the ABC was on 13.9% and SBS, 4.3%.
  • Main Channel: Seven won with a share of 24.6%, from Nine on 24.0%, Ten with 18.8%, ABC 1, 12.4% and SBS ONE with 3.5%.
  • Digital: GO won the night with a share of 6.0%, from ONE on 4.3%, 7TWO, 4.1%, SBS TWO, 0.8%, ABC News 24, 0.7%, ABC 2, 0.5% and ABC 3, 0.3%. That’s a total share of 16.7% for the seven FTA digital channels. The digital channels had high shares last night, boosted by the inclusion of ABC News 24 for the first time and the impact of Ten’s televising of the F1 GP race, as well as Nine’s programming of GO as a time-shifted Nine main channel.
  • Pay TV: Nine won with 24.8%, from Seven on 23.7%, Ten on 19.1%, Pay TV, 14.7%, the ABC 11.6% and SBS 3.6%. Pay TV’s 100 plus channels shared the 14.7% reported. The 12 FTA channels shared the 85.3% total share, which was made up of 13.9% for the seven FTA digital channels and 71.4% for the six FTA main channels.
  • Regional: Nine won through WIN/NBN with a share of 31.4%, from Prime/7Qld with 26.8%, SC Ten on 21.1%, the ABC, 15.7% and SBS, 5.0%. WIN/NBN won the main channels with 26.0% from Prime/7Qld with 23.1%; GO won the digitals with 5.4%, from 7TWO with 3.7% and GO on 3.0%. ABC News 24 did well in regional areas, averaging 0.8%, and as in metro markets, was the second most watched of the ABC channels last night.
  • Major Markets: Nine won everywhere, from Seven and Ten in most metros except Perth where Seven won from Nine and Ten. In the main channels, Nine won Sydney, Brisbane and Adelaide. Seven won Perth and Melbourne. GO won the digitals channels everywhere bar Perth where it was 7TWO. ONE was second in Perth, Melbourne and Adelaide with the Grand Prix. News 24’s best audience was in Melbourne with a 1.0% share (without Pay TV).

(All shares on the basis of combined overnight 6pm to midnight All People)

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Seven won All People from Nine and Ten (the MasterChef final didn’t help in the end as Ten’s audiences died on Friday and Saturday nights). Seven also won the main channels from Ten and Nine. Nine’s GO won the digitals from 7TWO and ABC 2. Seven won Sydney, Adelaide and Perth in All People. Nine won Melbourne and Brisbane.

On Saturday night viewers voted with remotes. Pay TV finished with a share of 21.4%, second to Seven’s 21.8% and ahead of Nine’s 21.0%. But the six FTA digital channels had a total share of 16.4%, That was more than the share for the night for the ABC or Ten Network. In Adelaide (20.1%), Perth (19.3%) and Melbourne (17.2%), the totals for the six FTA digital channels beat Pay TV because there is not much support for Rugby League (NRL games) in those markets. Pay TV won Sydney with a share of 30.1% and Brisbane with 24.7%, because of the combination of NRL and Rugby Union, not non-sport viewing.

This is not an isolated Saturday night’s outcome, but it shows just how disdainful the FTA networks are of viewers of their main channels.

Last night: No MasterChef and the lack of high quality Sunday evening viewing was very apparent. Dancing with the Stars was OK, but viewers are getting jaded. Likewise 60 Minutes which is no longer the destination for after dinner viewing. It used to be. Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation returned with more and improved party tricks to try and regenerate viewer interest. It’s a work in progress. CSI is another long time program that is fading.

ABC News 24: The big news was the immediate traction gained by ABC News 24. Yesterday was the first day of measurement under the OzTAM system. News 24 averaged 0.6% national share (five metro markets) with Pay TV included (0.7% on a FTA-channel only basis).

That beats SKY News. SKY can complain that its only seen in around a third of Australian homes, but as SKY’s mates at News Ltd told us several times last week, ABC News 24 is being broadcast in High Definition (which meant those people who watched ABC in HD, now have to watch it in Standard Definition). HD doesn’t have the same level of coverage of Australia as SD does (over 60%). despite that news 24 is available in more homes, so it should have more viewers, but not so quickly.

It’s vindication of the ABC’s decision to start the network because it was the second most watched of the national broadcaster’s four channels in prime time last night. Including Pay TV in the mix, ABC 1 had 10.3%, ABC News 24, 0.6%, ABC 2, 0.4%, ABC 3, 0.3% (but its only on 15 hours a day). And this is a five metro market audience. In regional areas it averaged a high 0.8%, proving there is real demand there as well.

In the five metro markets, News 24 beat SKY marginally from 6am to 6pm, 17,000 viewers on average to 16,000. But once prime time started, the gap widened. Between 6pm and 10.30pm, News 24 averaged 29,000, SKY News, fell to average 10,000, which is not what SKY would be boasting about today, nor the apologists at News Ltd and The Australian.

This is why News Ltd and the attack dogs on The Australian and at Foxtel have bagged the ABC, Mark Scott and News 24 (for missing coverage etc and oblivious to the operational faults at SKY which happen with every network, and especially with living, rolling coverage, such as drop outs and poor vision from a Julie Bishop press conference in Perth).

Ten’s broadcast of the Formula 1 Hungarian GP race last night on ONE averaged 345,000, which would have to be of the highest audiences so far for a FTA digital program.

TONIGHT: Good News Week on Ten, after The 7pm Project. RSPCA Animal Rescue returns to Seven at 7.30pm. Seven also had Criminal Minds. The ABC has back to back news and current affairs, from the 7pm News to Lateline Business. There’s a new Man vs. Wild on SBS, maybe Seven’s Hot in Cleveland and perhaps Rescue Special Ops. And a topic I’d like to see explored on Mythbusters on SBS, but won’t: does it matter if you sleep during an election campaign?

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports