Ivan Methuselah's Digi-Box Ration Book

2010 - APRIL-JUNE

Lets just get stuck in, shall we?

Figure 2.1 - TV, Radio and Film, week by week

Overall TV Radio Film

Being ill, I've been a bit more discerning with my viewing and listening habits this quarter. No particularly violent swings of form save this final week which benefited from a double-bill of Dollhouse and my binging on old Adventure Game episodes unearthed on YouTube. The last week excluded, TV averaged 11pts per week, outdone by radio with 12ppw. This was only partly circumstantial. It's true that there were some programmes on TV for which I would normally have tried to find some time, but there weren't many. The harder truth is that now radio has no obstructions to its scoring, it is mopping up good and proper because I listen to more radio than I watch television. It's only right that this is at last being represented in the results. Meanwhile, film's average for those 12 weeks was a pathetic 3ppw (scoring nothing at all on w.c.15th May). This again is partly down to the new scoring system, although this quarter I've abandoned the time-lock, so any good film can now score irrespective of showings in previous months. It seems not to have really helped the cinematic cause.

Let's throw the internet into the mix:

Figure 2.2 - Broadcast TV versus On-Line TV

Broadcast TV Broadcast TV (excluding Film) On-Line TV

The paucity of film this quarter is shown up in this graph. As is the period in which I was most inconvenience by Margaret. Now I'm back to life I can return to the net. Crystal Maze proto-type The Adventure Game now has some episodes skulking about on YouTube (though mostly from the earlier, less refined series'). The first series is somewhat alien to me; the second a little more familiar, while it is the format of the third which tinkles loudest in my memory. It's a shame that the Drogna game wasn't played in the one episode of Series 3 that's up... I feel there's a chunk of my brain that'll be unlocked when I see that again.

Figure 2.3 - Broadcast Radio versus On-Line Radio

Total Radio Broadcast Radio On-Line Radio

Here's a similar graph for radio, showing a little more consistency in my use of the computer. On-line broadcasts account for 27% of all radio points, while net TV accounts for 22% of all telly.

Figure 2.4 - Network by network, week by week

BBC TV ITV TV 4TV 5TV BBC Radio

The black mass of wireless continues to tower over the television networks. The ITV's massive impressive column in the final week is down to Dollhouse and the football World Cup. It's not been a great World Cup really. Holland did well but at the expense of the thing that made Holland interesting. Germany and Argentina were good value for money. Italy did what they do best and spent most of the time on their bellies like worms. As for the rest, they were all a bit boring (New Zealand notwithstanding). ITV averaged 3ppw, as did 4TV (both took a week off on the 19th of this month; otherwise 4TV were omnipresent while ITV had a couple of pointless weeks at the start of the quarter). BBC TV managed 6ppw and radio 13ppw. 5TV, living entirely from its film output, appeared in only three weeks of the 13: an utterly dismal showing.

Figure 2.5 - Digital vs Analogue, week by week

Digital Digital excl. Film4 Analogue

The powers Film4 once had are all but gone, thanks only in part to the new scoring system and more to a simple lack of anything good being shown. More critically, the division between the digital-only channels and analogue radio and TV is marked. At no point this quarter did digital exceed analogue in points, and it only overtook analogue's lowest mark of the quarter in the final week of the run. The oscillation of analogue TV is pretty and coincides with the Formula One season, though that alone cannot account for the all of the c.8pt peak-to-peak amplitude.

Figure 2.6 - Digital TV vs Analogue TV (excluding film), week by week

Digital Analogue

Removing radio and film from the previous analysis, we get a straighter fight between digital and analogue TV. Digital failed to score at all in this regard for the first three weeks of the quarter and only thrice did it outperform analogue TV. Analogue's two lowest scores coincided with (in the first case) a poor episode of Doctor Who and (in the second case) an episode watched on the iPlayer. Other factors also played a role: for instance there was no Dollhouse in w.c.19th June. Also, as noted above, both dips coincided with Formula One rest-weeks.

Figure 2.7 - Analogue channels week by week

BBC1 BBC2 ITV1 Channel 4 five

Last year's wall, BBC2, ran out of bricks this quarter, scoring only once (thanks to Springwatch and The Red Shoes) since the end of the Snooker. In its stead, a new wall: BBC1. B1 owes its powers to Doctor Who and Formula One (which also takes a good deal of credit for B2's best showing of the quarter), with the World Cup assisting slightly in recent weeks. Eurovision also helped out for the first of two impressive spikes, while the fallow period hammocked between owes a little to iPlayer cannibalism. The independent channels gave a comparatively lack-lustre performance, I1's later peaks being down to the World Cup. C4 got on the board with Glee, an amusing piece of adorable fluff that walks a curious tightrope between cynicism and earnestness and usually makes it across in one piece. It's the closest thing we have to Dennis Potter albeit without all the sex and meta-textuality. A curious devotion to the music of Journey aside, it strikes an adequate balance between comedy and melodrama but will certainly cock it up come the inevitable second series. Channel 5 had nothing to offer but its films. Watch it disappear totally in the next graph:

Figure 2.8 - Channel by channel,
TV Programmes versus Film, week by week

Figure 2.9 - Network by network,
TV Programmes versus Film, week by week

BBC TV ITV TV 4TV 5TV

Nothing much to surprise us here with the possible exception of ITV scoring more points from television than from film output (thanks to Dollhouse and the World Cup). Glee put E4 into a rare positive standing and nearly balanced out Film4 in the 4TV stakes. 5TV scored only through films.

Figure 2.10 - Average performance of each weekday

Overall TV Radio Film

The "what day was I out" graph says that I was out on Mondays and Tuesdays. In Our Time helps make Thursday the best day both for radio and overall, and Kermode is visible on Friday too. Doctor Who makes Saturday TV's best day with Dollhouse putting Wednesday close behind. Monday is the best night for films. Tuesday is the best night for drinking.

Remove the table-cloth!: