Media Log - Tuesday, 21st of July, 2009

I'll kick this blog off with a look at the viewing habits of the Australian population, prompted by the recent finale of Masterchef (Sunday 19th) which attracted ~3.75m viewers, the highest number of any show in 2009 to date (The Australian, 20th of July, 2009).

This is greater than the State of Origin 1st Match (3.44m, thinktv.com.au, Top 50 Programs of 2009). That said, the average viewer audience for MasterChef was 1.6m per episode (The Australian, 13th July, 2009). This was the third most watched regular show of 2009, third only to Packed to the Rafters (1.8m per episode, 2nd) and Underbelly 2: A tale of two cities (>2m per episode, 1st). First match of the State of Orgin rugby series was the 2nd most viewed program of 2009 (3.44m).

The top 50 most viewed programs of 2009 (thinktv.com.au, Top 50 Programs of 2009) can be broadly collated into the following catagories (Highest to lowest):
-Sport: 38%
-Animals/ Lifestyle/ People: 24%
-Reality TV (Staged, created shows): 14%
-News/ Current Affairs: 10%
-Drama (Ficticious scenarios): 8%
-Comedy: 4%
-Movies: 2%

What the above information indicates is that sport is the most popular catagory, probably due to the universal enjoyment it creates, the viewer knows what to expect, it has tends to be a communal act ('get the mates over'), and is relatively cheap to broadcast. Especially if it is supported by advertising, which the above figures prove it will be.

The Animals/ Lifestlye/ People catagory is to be well supported by the public probably due to the human interest aspects of the programming. Reality TV is in the same catagory, however there is also the strong storyline behind each episode, such as eliminations being determined by their previous performance, or even by the audience.

News and current affairs would be expected to be higher up in the rankings, the lesser audience may be due to the ubiquitous nature of the news, it is available on the radio, internet, the newspaper, and the television.

Comedy and movies are statistically insignificant, proabably because they tend to be casually watched, so they don't register on the top 50 list.

Conclusions drawn from this data would've been more accurate if the data were organised by the number of viewers, however I think the results would've been almost identical.

References:
Amanda Meade, 13th July 2009. 'Seven still ahead but Ten cooks up an audience winner' The Australian Bussiness [Internet]
Available at: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,,25769567-7582,00.html?from=public_rss
[Last accessed: 21st of July]

'Top 50 Programs of 2009, Weeks 1-24' thinktv.com.au [Internet]
Available at: http://www.thinktv.com.au/Media/Stats_&_Graphs/Top_Programs/Top_50_Programs_Weeks1_24_2009.pdf
[Last accessed: 21st of July]