Comments on: ITV Profits Drop

By: Al (Original)

Al (Original) — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 09:39:32 +0000

If money’s a proble, do away with the regional news service and use the money to fund a proper HD channel with LUXE TV encoding equipment.

At the end of the day regional news costs a fortune. There are dozens of channels, dozens of regional studios and staff and for what, 1 hour per day (1 x 30 minute bulletin and 2 x 15 minute bulletins approx).

It must cost ITV a fortune to fund it for 1 hours worth of programming, hardly a good cost to benefit ratio. The money would be far better spent on a dedicated HD channel to remove the problems of the red button service and up the quality and content. Even a very limited service on a dedicated channel would be better than a red button service riddled with problems.

At the end of the day, anyone wanting regional news still has the BBC to fall back on and their own local papers. It really is a duplicate service at huge expense to a commercial broadcaster thats struggling.

HD is the future and the flagship for ITV. If ITV don’t invest and nurture the service then ultimately they will lose viewers and in turn further advertisers and revenue.

Personally, I’ve already abandoned watching ITV 1 simply because the split recordings cuased by the news and the dramas of the red button system simply aren’t worth it. I’d rather watch ITV 3 or 4 or another broadcasters channel than ITV 1 now. If a films on ITV1 I wait for it to be repeated on ITV4 so there’s no split with the news. If its on ITV HD, I don’t care, give me ITV 4 SD anyday, less drama. I am a huge HD fan, but I simply can’t be bothered with an ITV system that doesn’t work properly. As for recording of ITV 1, wouldn’t even think about it, simply not worth the hassle.

By: Linda

Linda — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 08:13:08 +0000

The sound issues on the Coventry v Chelsea match caused a stir with hundreds of complaints sent to ITV, but instead of ITV fixing the problem for the Fulham v Man UTD match they upscaled the picture in SD. However, I don’t want ITV to disappear altogether because they do have some good points and neither do I want to see their football matches given to SKY. I will not join SKY because they charge another £10 a month to watch HD and they seem to have enough problems of their own to.

By: Daniel Murphy

Daniel Murphy — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 12:35:34 +0000

I’m not surprised. They are a bunch of morons. I am currently watching the Coventry v Chelsea match in HD, I’ve had to switch back to SD as the sound drop outs make it unwatchable. They really can’t get anything right.

By: Tony Hales

Tony Hales — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 11:15:38 +0000

HD is the future and ITV know that. If you want to sell shows to the US you need to offer HD else your not in the game at all. Just drop all the plus one channels and ITV3 and 4. That will provide plenty of savings in EPG costs alone let alone anything else.
In a few years there will only be HD TV’s available so what would be the point in transmitting in SD at all. I don’t see any channels still broadcasting in 405 line black and white.

By: Ben H

Ben H — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 19:36:26 +0000

ITV have got a good boss at the helm in the shape of Michael Grade. Sadly he’ll not be able to realise his ambitions for the channel in the short term because of declining advertising revenues (combination of multi-channel competition and the economic downturn). All we can hope is that during these lean times they position themselves to come out at the end of it stronger – but that could be 2-3 years, and there may need to be some serious restructuring (and possibly merger) to get to that point.

I know everyone (including me) knock’s ITV for lack of HD content, but we shouldn’t forget that they were one of the founding members of the freesat consortium – without which this conversation wouldn’t be taking place. I hope they can get back on their feet and start giving us better quality programming – and more HD!

By: peterhb

peterhb — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 18:45:38 +0000

Agree with pretty much all of the coments about the demise of ITV.
@Davei, I too am saddened by the loss of regionality.We now only get so called regional news and that is a poor standard compared with what we used to have, the format and presentation governed by the national company.

Your idea for reverting to the strong regional presentations certainly appeals.
Perhaps if ITV goes bust we night get a resurgance of regional companies ?

By: Mark B

Mark B — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 13:48:58 +0000

Firstly id like to say that I am a huge fan of bbc 1, HD, 2 and c4. But i also think ITV has managed some excellent tv of late, the 3 part dramas have been of a quality that bbc sometimes seem to miss, whitechapel (tho oddly not in HD), unforgiven, the children, Lewis, their HD football and even im a celebrity and dancing on ice for light hearted entertainment (viewing figures alone show the merrit in a commercial organisation showing dumb reality tv). The other streams showing repeats have some classics on them too. Considering ITV provides 4 (+3 time shifted) channels i think they havent done quite as badly at program making as some have suggested. Obviously id prefer all their content to be to my taste, but there seems to be more good quality shorts coming through than of late. Now i would love to see C4 HD, but i cant because they suck up to sky, at least itv supports this venture, even if its limited. Anyway, i need to go now to watch loose women:-<

By: Davei

Davei — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 16:15:50 +0000

Oh, and it looks like Five is cutting its staff by 25%. Things aren’t looking good in the world of commercial FTA TV.

By: Davei

Davei — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 16:09:27 +0000

The trouble (or part of the trouble) seems to be that the more ITV try to cut costs the more it loses its identity/identities. The old regional ITV identities had viewers’ loyalty. Times have changed and the market is different now, but there’s a lot to be said for courting the good will of the public.

I have no idea of the economics of this, but I would suggest getting rid of national ITV1 and replacing it with new regional services which combine network and regional identities (though the number of regions/sub-regions may need to be more limited than in the past due to cost). You could have services with names like ITV Southern, ITV Yorkshire, ITV Westward (thus acknowledging the past – if those names are available for use) and ITV Capital or ITV Metropolitan, ITV Dragon, ITV Somewhere-North-East-Of-The-Lakes, ITV Badger, ITV Otter, and so on, and so on. It may be costly, but I suggest it would aid recognition and, hopefully, encourage viewer affection. Throw in a few cheap and daft regional interest programmes (‘Cornwall’s Most Haunted Tin Mines’ anyone?), and the advertisers will come flocking… maybe (well, people will watch cheap and daft if it has some connection to them).

Oh, and how about an ITV HD channel with its own identity, rather than a part time service carrying Manchester-area ads (and I don’t mean a part-time ITV Granada HD – or ITV Northwesterly HD – either!).

By: Tony

Tony — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 15:06:47 +0000

Mike – Perhaps you and I watch programmes rather than channels, but I’m sure the vast majority of couch potatoes select either BBC1 or ITV and stick with it until bed time.

The BBC has a track record of proving shows like Have I Got News For You, QI, and Weakest Link on BBC2, them dumbing them down and moving them to BBC1 to get a bigger audience. That gave ITV a big advantage – they didn’t have to dumb their shows down any further. It just seems that, over the years, they’ve gradually got rid of virtually everything worth watching.

Top shows on both BBC and ITV used to atttract 20+ million viewers. Now they’re doing well to get 5 million – and falling.