Week commencing 15th January 2007
Celebrity Big Brother is currently experiencing a resurgence of ratings on the back of the alleged racism row, however, overall ratings are still down on last year's show. The audience is currently topping 5 million viewers. Wednesday night's instalment of the Channel 4 reality show (17th Jan) averaged 5.2 million viewers, the third highest audience of this series to date. With a 21% share of the audience, it peaked with its last 15 minutes with an audience of 5.7 million. But despite the huge amount of press coverage generated by the on-screen bullying of Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty, the average audience for the fifth series of Big Brother is still down on last year. The 9pm and 9.30pm shows have averaged 3.9m viewers so far this year, compared with 4.1m at the same stage of the fourth series last year. In audience percentage terms, this year's show has 16% compared with 17% in 2006. The highest audience for this year's run was the 7.1 million who watched the contestants enter the house, followed by the 4.7 million who watched the Goody family arrive two weeks ago. Source: Media Guardian
A new report from JupiterResearch claims that Freeview will be the big digital switchover winner in the next five years, with pay-TV companies such as Sky and NTL:Telewest set for a struggle to win customers. The report estimates that there are 5.3 million households in the UK which are still only able to receive analogue television, adding that over the next five years 4.6 million households will go for Freeview's DTT service. Over the same period, Sky is estimated to bring in 1.2 million new households whilst NT:Telewest is forecast to attract 700,000, with IPTV services like HomeChoice and BT Vision predicted to draw around 1 million. In the period to 2012, JupiterResearch says that Freeview will become the main television provider in more households than any other platform, and estimates that by the end of 2006 Freeview was in 10.1m households with Sky in 8.6m and NTL:Telewest in 3.3m. Source: Newsline
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has issued a statement asking for interested parties to comment on the deal which saw BSkyB acquire a 17.9% stake in ITV. The statement stated: "The OFT believes that it may be the case that a relevant merger situation has been created since Sky and ITV may have come under common control for the purposes of the Enterprise Act 2002 (the Act) as a result of Sky acquiring material influence over ITV, and that the turnover test is satisfied. The OFT is therefore issuing a formal invitation to comment (ITC) with respect to the transaction. The ITC invites interested third parties to submit any further views they have on jurisdiction and whether the merger situation identified above may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition within any market or markets in the United Kingdom for goods or services that warrants reference to the Competition Commission." In a recent interview, James Murdoch said that Sky's decision to acquire the stake in ITV was not designed to spoil a potential merger between NTL and ITV, whose board rejected a bid shortly after BSkyB announced its move. Source: Newsline
 Former Daily Express and FT Weekend editor Richard Addis is launching a free daily newspaper at the end of March, targeting high-worth Londoners with arts, leisure and current affairs content. The tabloid paper, called Newsstand, will be delivered every weekday morning to 30,000 homes with upmarket London postcodes. Newsstand will commission some articles, including comment, but will rely on third-party deals for much of its content. "We are looking to approach flourishing websites that have no print arm and strike deals to use their content. They get free distribution and reach all of the people we deliver to, and we get high-quality content," Addis said. Addis has set up a company, London Bridge Publishing, in partnership with former Financial Times colleague Ryan Bowman to launch Newsstand, and has plans for further launches as well as offering contract publishing services similar to those offered by the Press Association. Further plans include producing specialist publications, such as a Polish weekly magazine. He hopes to capitalise on the large number of Polish immigrants in the UK, which he says have a combined purchasing power of £6bn per year, and claims existing publications aimed at this market are tired and outdated. Source: Mediaweek
The national daily newspapers once again saw their overall circulation decline, dropping by just over 3% year on year for December 2006. It was a dismal picture across all sectors, with the popular titles suffering the most significant losses. The Daily Mirror felt the largest dip, losing around 138,000 issues, or more than 8% from its total, to leave it with a circulation of just over 1.5 million. The Daily Telegraph was the only daily paper to boost to its circulation, adding around 2,100 copies. The Times was the worst affected quality title in real terms, shrinking its circulation by more than 25,500 copies or almost 4% from its total year on year for the month. In the mid-market The Daily Mail remained static year on year for the month at a total circulation of around 2.3 million, whilst its Mid-Market counterpart, The Daily Express, dropped more than 26,500 copies from its total, leaving it with a figure of 773,768. All Popular daily titles saw their circulations fall year on year in the last month of 2006, with The Daily Mirror suffering the worst actual decline. Market leader The Sun also shed copies from its total, which now rests at just over three million after a drop of more than 90,000. The sunday newspaper market experienced an overall drop in circulation of 5.1% year on year for December, a decline in real terms of 603,176. The Mail On Sunday experienced the largest increase in real terms, with its circulation growing by around 26,000 year on year. The biggest decline was felt by the Sunday Mirror , which lost around 190,000 from its circulation. Source: Newsline
 The Sun's website, www.thesun.co.uk, had 1.2 billion page impressions in 2006, with individual readers visiting the site 160 million times, according to website analyst Hitbox. A redesign in 2006 allowed for video streaming and podcasting, and a number of new features including the MYSun social networking, Sun Bingo, Diet, online reader classified channel Sun Local, Singles and mobile services. The News Group website is currently planning a further redesign with new features. According to Hitbox, 56 million new readers came to The Sun via the website in 2006. The Sun credits its achievements to the website's new facilities, particularly user-generated content, as well as the site's ability to break national news. Source: Mediaweek
AOL UK is testing a new TV guide that will include a search engine enabling users to locate video on the internet and programme their personal video recorders. Visitors to http://tvguide.aol.co.uk will be able to start using the TV Guide, which is currently in its beta testing phase, and there will be a further roll-out on the AOL portal early this year. The technology will allow users to look at conventional listings, personalise them according to favourite channels, order reminders by email, SMS or AOL Instant Messenger and find related video available to watch on the internet. Tom Weiss, chief executive of TV Genius, explained that, for example, a user could find out when Coldplay would next be on television. The software will then let the user set their Windows Media Centre PVR to record the show automatically. Source: Mediaweek
 Regulator Ofcom is to revamp its regulation of short-term radio licences, which could see a host of new stations able to cover events such as conferences. Following a consultation which showed backing for proposals to liberalise restrictions on 28-day restricted service licences (RSLs), Ofcom has decided to extend the number of short-term RSLs. Long-term RSLs will also be made more flexible under the new regulations, enabling commercial and non-commercial organisations to apply for a long-term RSL, which run for between one and five years. The current total of long-term RSLs is 138. There were 498 short-term RSLs licensed in 2006 and 10 new long-term RSLs. Source: Newsline
 London Underground is looking for a sponsor for its busking spots, as a deal with beer company Carling has ended after three years. Carling's branding, which includes the half-moon area where the buskers stand in underground stations, has now been replaced by LU designs while awaiting a new sponsor. The LU busking scheme was originally implemented as a result of customer demand for musicians to be licensed to perform in stations, and was made legal after LU won the right to change the law in May 2003. Steve Lewis, contracts manager for advertising and sponsorship at London Underground, said the spots will remain managed in-house until a suitable sponsor is found. A new sponsorship deal will be sought in collaboration with LU's advertising contractor, CBS Outdoor. Source: MediaWeek
Edited by The Buying Team |
