Haneef interview disappoints for 60 Minutes and Nine. After paying a rumoured $100,000 to $150,000 for an exclusive interview with Dr Mohamed Haneef, the Nine Network would have expected more from 60 Minutes and its usually strong Sunday evening line up last night. Nine boss, Jeff Browne and 60 Minutes Executive Producer, John Westacott, are probably wondering if it was worth it after the overnight ratings showed the normally strong ratings for the program and the network were hammered by the second last night of Big Brother on Ten; a strong program on the ABC and clever programming on Seven with a couple of new shows that squashed Nine into third place on the night. Nine’s share went from 27.4% last Sunday night to 23.5% last night. Ten was second on 24.2% and Seven scored a now rare win for the night of 25.9%. Nine would look at the money spent on Haneef as good branding and it seems it was secured not only by an open cheque book but by a 60 Minutes producer who stuck doggedly to the Haneef side and eventually got her man. If anything the Haneef side has erred in opting for the cheque book because it has coloured his story, just as Mumdoah Habib’s story was coloured in the public’s mind by appearing on 60 Minutes at the start of 2005. It’s the old story when it becomes known you have given an interview in exchange for money, the value of your comments are devalued by viewers or readers. It’s a simple fact of life. But Nine and 60 Minutes will look on this payment as “branding’ money” as 60 Minutes is being mentioned in publicity and news stories (although not in all opposition media and you can sense the very jealous grinding of teeth!). Nine executives though would have looked at the story going to air last night and been confident of success. 60 Minutes finished second on the night with 1.539 million people. That’s around 100,000 to 150,000 down on what it has been getting in recent weeks, and more on its recent peak of around 1.8 million people. — Glenn Dyer

The Oz’s John Lyons is Middle East bound. The Australian’s newest recruit, former Sunday program executive producer, John Lyons is Middle East bound for the News Ltd paper. That’s after around six months or so of heavy duty reporting in Sydney as a “senior correspondent”. Lyons’ newspaper reporting skills will be brought up to speed for the frenetic, dog eat dog culture that is The Australian with its reporter heavy staff that bears little resemblance to its circulation or its financial position. News Ltd sources say that in around six months or so time Lyons will be sent to be the paper’s Middle East Correspondent. Meanwhile Sunday, the program he deserted at the Nine network, has been told it has a budget until the end of the ratings year. Beyond then no one knows but contracts are not being renewed at Nine. Sunday is now being overseen by former managing producer, Paul Steindahl. — Glenn Dyer

“Buckets” Browne looks to rewrite the rules. In what is now a typical bleat, the executive in charge of the Nine Network, Jeff Browne, wants to re-write the rules so as to make his reign at the top of the network more flattering. Last week official figures showed the Seven network had lifted its share of advertising to a record 39.2% and Nine’s share fell to a record low of 32.7%. But Mr Browne, known as “Buckets” in TV land for thinking that network TV was only a “bucket of contracts” (he is a lawyer) wants the way advertising is measured to remove one-off distortions, such as the Commonwealth Games and the AFL, both of which Nine had in 2006 but doesn’t have now. It is the latest in a growing list of silly statements from the man who ran Nine with his mate Eddie McGuire, and ran it badly. I’m sure Mr Browne would willingly give up the revenue that Nine gained from the Commonwealth games and the AFL in the interests of being logical. Of course he wouldn’t and his comments smack of sour grapes and frustration. Just as his other comments, also reported in the Australian Financial Review this morning, that Nine is coming back and the ratings margin with Seven is narrowing. Well Nine has lost the first three weeks of the second half of the ratings year, despite Seven having a slew of high rating viewer favourites resting or on rotation and now coming back for a few weeks or in 2008.

Last night’s TV ratings
The Winners: Seven snuck home along the rails as Big Brother and the serial killer detectives in Midsomer Murders conspired to pop Nine’s chances. Third place isn’t a good look at Willoughby these days, not when you are busy telling the media how well placed you are to win and beat Seven, as Nine boss, Jeff Browne has been doing lately. Seven News was the top with 1.648 million viewers, helped by a late AFL game which boosted audiences in Adelaide, in Melbourne and in Perth. Seven’s Adelaide prime time was pushed back an hour by the late finish to the AFL. 60 Minutes was second with 1.539 million. The paid for Mohamed Haneef interview wasn’t as helpful as expected because 60’s audience was down on a week before and they don’t watch Big Brother! Nine News was third with 1.537 million people, then came the Big Brother Eviction with 1.427 million. Seven’s half hour Australia’s Best Backyards with Jamie Durie won the 6.30pm slot with 1.416 million people. Midsomer Murders on the ABC won the 8.30 slot with 1.359 million people and Hot Property returned for Seven at 7pm and won that slot, averaging 1.297 million people. Grey’s Anatomy averaged 1.289 million people from 8.30 to 10.20pm so it picked up the back end of the slot. Ugly Betty burbled along at 7.30pm and none of its viewers were looking at BB or tick, tick, tick. Nor were the 1.152 million people watching The Worst Jobs In History on the ABC at 7.30pm. The 7pm ABC news averaged 1.130 million, Backyard Blitz on Nine at 6.30pm (Jamie Durie again), 1.077 million. 6.30pm Big Brother averaged 1.077 million people and Rove in LA averaged 1.012 million on Ten and was the 14th and final program with a million or more viewers. Jamie Durie is the night’s big winner: seen on two networks in the same timeslot on the same night and beat himself! Can he back up next Sunday and repeat the dose? The Circuit was again good TV on SBS at 9.30pm with 257,000 viewers.

The Losers: Losers? Nine showing a repeat of CSI at 8.30pm it averaged 989,000 people. The Network is obviously trying to husband fresh eps of CSI for the rest of the year but it really is an insult to viewers on a night that was the network’s most solid night of the rating week. It’s like a message to viewers saying, “go elsewhere for entertainment”, and they are, to the ABC to watch Midsomer Murders. That program has obviously run out of bodies in Midsomer, one of the victims was a local chap who died mysteriously in China! I knew that would happen. The producers will be forced to bus victims in for the upcoming episodes. Now which other series has too many bodies? Dr Who perhaps? And what happened to the witchcraft in previous series?

News & CA: Seven News again won nationally but needed the 141,000 margin in Perth to do it. Seven won Melbourne and Perth, Nine News won Sydney, Brisbane (the NRL working for once) and Adelaide. Seven actually won by 158,000 viewers in Melbourne! No wonder Nine’s Jeff Browne wants to ignore the AFL ratings and revenue. Ten News At Five was solid for the half hour with 816,000 people. World News Australia averaged 221,000 at 6.30pm. In the morning, Seven’s Weekend Sunrise averaged 402,000, the ABC’s Landline, 285,000 at Noon, Sunday was flat on 230,000 on Nine, Insiders on the ABC averaged 169,000, Offsiders, 147,000, Inside Business, 129,000. It is a very entertaining two hours of chat, facts and opinion on the ABC at the moment: Offsiders is the stand out, its sports panel makes the political panel on Insiders look stodgy.

The Stats: Seven won with 25.9% (24.2%), from Ten with 24.2% (21.9%) and Nine with 23.5% (27.45%. the ABC was on 19.7% (20.2%) and SBS was on 7.0% (6.4%). Seven won Sydney and Perth. Ten won Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide. What was interesting as the way Sydney rejected Big Brother. Ten’s share in that market averaged just 18.8%, its lowest nationwide and proportionately BB’s audience there of 303,000 was very low. It was 10th in prime time, compared to much higher finishes in other markets. In regional areas though, the attractions of BB and other programs failed and WIN/NBN won for Nine with 26.2%, from Prime/7Qld with 24.4%, Southern Cross (Ten) with 22.2%, the ABC with 20.0% and SBS on 7.1%.

Glenn Dyer’s comments: It wasn’t a night the Nine Network could be terribly proud of. Beaten by Ten (which it probably felt there was a risk of happening), but allowing Seven to sneak through and win and set up a week’s victory so early? Seven, after its early flurry of wins on Sunday night, had settled back to run second behind Nine and get closer than it was in 2005 and 2006. That it has done and by Tuesday night it usually sets up a winning margin over Nine, and makes sure of it with the AFL and Better Homes and Gardens on Friday night, so last night was a bonus. Which, after the battering from the C7 case decision, the Kerry Stokes mob would have appreciated. But media buyers are about to lock in their advertising deals for the rest of 2007 and the way Seven is belting Nine and Ten (and the way Ten has picked up its game) Nine’s share of ad revenue might be squeezed lower this half. Jamie Durie on Seven showed Jamie Durie on Nine a clean pair of secateurs and Seven returned Hot Property to its line up at 7pm and it rated its socks off. By those numbers you’d think we are in a property boom. Nine, which did very, very well with Location Location, The Block and Renovation Rescue, is now restricted to an advertorial program for a an in-house website called myhome, which is struggling to make any headway against Fairfax’s Domain and News Ltd’s realestate.com. Midsomer Murders drained Nine’s older viewers once again, but Nine didn’t provide any real competition with a repeat of CSI and it was another night of “defensive programming” at Nine. Tonight Seven has Border Security and Surf Patrol and then a double ep of Criminal Minds, Nine has What A Year returning, this time with Bert Newton and Julia Zemiro hosting instead of Mike Munro and Megan Gale. The Newton-Zemiro team are actually older than Munro-Gale! The ABC has Australian Story and Enough Rope, Top Gear is on SBS at 7.30pm and Ten has the Big Brother finale tonight. Will anyone really notice? Ten has some very hard decisions to make about BB and it should start with host and some of the producers!