Pat Kenny show on UTV Ireland

John Joe Jones

Was anyone watching the first show last night ? I have no interest in gaa, so i switched off after a short while.I think it's a shame that they didn't get a more high profile interview for the first show.

iseegirls

I can't even find a thread about it - complete lack of interest on boards anyway. Be interesting to see the ratings.

Elmo

John Joe Jones wrote: »

Was anyone watching the first show last night ? I have no interest in gaa, so i switched off after a short while.I think it's a shame that they didn't get a more high profile interview for the first show.

I think that The high profile murder of his daughter on her honeymoon and the accusations against his son in law is of greater interest. Unfortunately

Delta2113

Just switched on at the start -terrible opening graphics - personally not bothered about the GAA.

It wont do well - the channel is a disaster. Scheduling times shocking -already a u-turn on news. In fairness they have acted so maybe we live in hope but I doubt it.

Elmo

Delta2113 wrote: »

personally not bothered about the GAA.

I have no interest in gaa

http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/ian-odoherty/television-pat-eases-himself-back-into-the-game-31223437.html

From Ian O'Doherty

many of us down south couldn't give a fig about the number of All Ireland titles he won with his county

While from Bernice Harrison

http://www.irishtimes.com/culture/tv-radio-web/pat-kenny-s-well-hyped-return-to-tv-makes-for-low-key-monday-viewing-1.2213806

This is great if you’re interested in the GAA, particularly the Tyrone GAA, which Harte manages and led to three all-Ireland victories, the last in 2008. But as Harte walked out on to the gloomy set, you could sense the home audience shrinking.

I don't know do people have a problem with the GAA. If Pat Kenny had bag Rory McIlroy I don't think there be many saying "You know I am not a big fan of Golf".

Is there a boarder divided also, "northy TV" and "home Audience".

Fine Rory McIlroy would possibly be a good guest from an International perspective, but I wonder if the same kind of comments would be made if they had put a famous Irish Rugby player from Northern Ireland on the show? (I have no interest in sport so I can honestly say that no sports person would have me watching, no matter how famous).

I think there is also a certain amount of anti-UTV Ireland happening in the press, certainly Ian O'Doherty's TV review is bizzarely pro-TV3.

Not because I particularly want to watch TV3, and certainly not because I ever want to watch Big Brother. No, the reason for my delight was one which will probably strike a chord with plenty of blokes. Big Brother has only appeared on Channel 5 for the last few years and because you can't record Channel 5 in this territory, the remote controller insisted that it was watched live in my house.

While this review by Ed Power is clearly against everyone outside the pale

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/television/tv-reviews/ed-power-pat-kenny-appeared-to-be-under-orders-to-channel-his-inner-oprah-31213966.html

Though a titan in his sport, his selection underlines the suspicion that UTV Ireland doesn't quite understand its target market. To succeed "down south" it must gain a foothold in Dublin and across great swathes of the capital the GAA is gawped at with metropolitan bafflement.

No I don't get it as a non-sports fan there are a number of reasons why Mickey Heart is a good choice.

1. He's a successful sports man across the country weather you admit that or not.
2. Unfortunately he has a tragic story to tell, that was pushed into the spot light of the Irish media.
3. Particularly for Pat Kenny's style of interview. Pat Kenny was always better at understanding his interviews, on both Kenny Live and The Late Late Show is best interviews were with people who had a life story to tell. Something that neither Gay Byrne or Ryan Tubrity could do. Tubrity still seems to like the idea of being a chat show host rather than actually doing the job.

MagicMarker

I don't think I've watched more than 10 seconds of this channel at a time, just from channel hopping. Had no clue that his show had started. Haven't heard anything about it.

Elmo

Here's another person saying "I am not a fan of the GAA"

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/television/tv-reviews/television-much-ado-about-not-a-lot-in-kennys-new-utv-gig-31219394.html

Indeed, if you weren't in thrall to GAA exploits north of the border, there was little to rivet the attention.

Though he does go on to say he's a Rugby fan. But still it does quite sit does it. I imagine that very few GAA fans would hark on about not being Rugby Fans. I know many sports fan who think Soccer is a load of muck but persist on watching it.

Anyway I don't get it.

An Ciarraioch

Elmo wrote: »

Here's another person saying "I am not a fan of the GAA"

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/television/tv-reviews/television-much-ado-about-not-a-lot-in-kennys-new-utv-gig-31219394.html



Though he does go on to say he's a Rugby fan. But still it does quite sit does it. I imagine that very few GAA fans would hark on about not being Rugby Fans. I know many sports fan who think Soccer is a load of muck but persist on watching it.

Anyway I don't get it.

Indeed, maybe not to everyone's taste, but a well-known sports figure, especially in rural areas, and the ratings were respectable. As for tonight, though - 60 years of Eurovision? Good luck with that, is all I'll say!

AwaitYourReply

An Ciarraioch wrote: »

Indeed, maybe not to everyone's taste, but a well-known sports figure, especially in rural areas, and the ratings were respectable. As for tonight, though - 60 years of Eurovision? Good luck with that, is all I'll say!

Pat Kenny In The Round is such a strange concept for a new channel like UTV Ireland to have presented to viewers. That said, I would not lay the blame on Pat Kenny for his part as he is a very polished professional who in my view has not been used properly or wisely in the format the station has adopted. The type of programme and the choice of guests is very hit and miss - the time slot is bizarre when you consider they are right up against RTÉ One 9 O'Clock Main Evening News. For UTV Ireland to devote a whole hour (when you allow for all advert breaks) to just ONE hit and miss interviewee per show was never a wise choice for the station - it's even more bizarre given how late it took UTV Ireland to showcase their star performer on a more regular basis after launch night nearly 5 months later! Another point that audiences here in the Republic of Ireland are accustomed to in that they are more familiar with LIVE broadcast chat shows unlike the recorded live format used across the Irish Sea.

None of my criticism is a reflection on Pat Kenny as a broadcaster - he is an excellent presenter on NewsTalk Radio 106-108FM at 10:00am on weekdays. Almost everything about UTV Ireland apart from the imported soap operas: Coronation Street and Emmerdale has been shown to be a lot of huff and bluff. In my view, Pat Kenny would deliver much better value to UTV Ireland as an anchor of Current Affairs/News/Science+Technology type programming. How difficult would it have been if Pat Kenny had presented an audience participation type live broadcast show like FrontLine or Questions & Answers (mark II)

Other strange choices UTV Ireland made include:
During their pre-launch, they made a great big deal in looking for the equivalent of on-screen Continuity Announcer Julian Symonds and we were introduced to the two individuals on opening night but I've not seen them on-screen since! Why say you intend doing it this way and then drop it almost immediately? UTV Ireland had made it clear they were going to have someone on their "southern" UTV Ireland station to take us through the latest soap opera gossip in a similar manner to what Julian has done on UTV(NI)

I want all our TV/Radio stations operating from Ireland which includes UTV Ireland in Dublin to be a success but they need to seriously address the odd choices and scheduling as they have shown that their audience research is way off the mark as far as those here in the Republic of Ireland would come to expect. Wake up UTV Ireland address the concerns raised - not everything depends on revenue - there are some strange editorial decisions that need to be examined and refreshed before it is too late!

icdg

Not sure whether it was mentioned but the Mickey Harte episode got an airing as a once-off on UTV NI on the late May bank holiday Monday in NI.

AwaitYourReply

icdg wrote: »

Not sure whether it was mentioned but the Mickey Harte episode got an airing as a once-off on UTV NI on the late May bank holiday Monday in NI.

The thought had occured to me that the episode you referenced seemed a more suitable choice for UTV NI given where Micky Harte represents in terms of local sporting community. Of course Micky Harte is a decent man with some public profile (not to mention the awful personal tragedy) but I'm just not sure that a whole hour of Micky Harte in 1-2-1 conversation was a wise move to kickstart this type of series down here in Southern Ireland.

I cannot see the show being commissioned for a second series OR; if it is the whole format would have to be radically altered and scheduling slot looked at again. Apparently some episodes will not be shown until after the Summer but this is part of the initial 1st series commissioning as far as I understand.

AwaitYourReply

Why did UTV Ireland not wait until RTÉ had finished their season of live chat shows and launched Pat Kenny on say the first Friday following the end of The Late Late Show 2014/'15 season? For instance they could have launched a "pilot episode" and then depending on ratings make a decision to stick with Fridays and repeat it on Sunday night at 10pm and see which gains more traction. It's hardly rocket science UTV Ireland! Anyone who looked at how TV3 got badly burnt when The Dunphy Show at The Helix tried to compete live with The Late Late Show with Pat Kenny all those years ago. Another example was when SKY News Ireland failed when they tried to compete with RTÉ One Six-One News - the channel did not last too long!

Elmo

AwaitYourReply wrote: »

Another example was when SKY News Ireland failed when they tried to compete with RTÉ One Six-One News - the channel did not last too long!

I'd be more inclined to suggested that TV3 failed to compete with Six-One rather than "Sky News Ireland".

Sky News Ireland was a fob to Irish audiences. Sky is largely a pay TV operator and while audience share is important, subs are more important to the success or failure of a programme. Sky command a 10% + share of the Irish TV Advertising market. If "Sky News Ireland" was on today and it only had 10 viewers sky would still be making about €500m from the pay TV market and €20 - 30 million from advertising revenue.

As for UTV Ireland's Ireland Live they should know RTÉ News will take a break in August, which would have boosted Ireland Live's audience, instead it has a smaller audience that Nuacht RTÉ.

AwaitYourReply

Elmo wrote: »

I'd be more inclined to suggested that TV3 failed to compete with Six-One rather than "Sky News Ireland".

Sky News Ireland was a fob to Irish audiences. Sky is largely a pay TV operator and while audience share is important, subs are more important to the success or failure of a programme. Sky command a 10% + share of the Irish TV Advertising market. If "Sky News Ireland" was on today and it only had 10 viewers sky would still be making about €500m from the pay TV market and €20 - 30 million from advertising revenue.

As for UTV Ireland's Ireland Live they should know RTÉ News will take a break in August, which would have boosted Ireland Live's audience, instead it has a smaller audience that Nuacht RTÉ.

Sky have been allowed to grab and swallow a lot from the Irish TV marketplace for quite some time but have been very slow to invest much back into Ireland in the way of quality programmes specifically designed for an Irish audience apart from the very odd commission such as Moon Boy in more recent years.

Although TnaG (later rebranded as TG4) had launched before TV3 on Oct 31, 1996 they used receive a lot of assistance from RTÉ in their early years but are now a completely stand alone tv channel as far as I know. When TV3 first started way back in September, 1998 they were the first Irish terrestrial commercial tv channel and had to tolerate a national tv transmission network run and operated by a rival broadcaster (i.e.) RTÉNL later renamed 2rn.

TV3 being the first ever direct competitor from Ireland were always going to have to experiment and no doubt TV3 have made their own share of errors with scheduling and programme commissioning etc; which is why it was all the more reason for UTV Ireland not to repeat similar errors as there were now some valuable case studies that UTV Ireland could examine of TV3 and Sky News Ireland. TV3 were never seriously going to have the same resources to be able to compete with RTÉ News and I think they soon realised this fact but many of their journalists/reporters eventually ended up at RTÉ TV.

Former TV3 staff include the below which was a useful training environment:
Claire Byrne - TV3 News, NewsTalk Breakfast, now RTÉ rising star
Gráinne Seoige - TnaG?, TV3 News, Sky News Ireland, RTÉ
John Kilraine - TV3 News , now RTÉ News Dublin Correspondent
Will Goodbody - TV3 News, now RTÉ Science & Technology Correspondent
Ray Kennedy - TV3 News, Sky News Ireland, RTÉ News
Lorraine Keane - TV3 Entertainment News, XPOSÉ
Claire Brock - TV3 News, now UTV Ireland Live
Brian Daly - TV3 News, Sky News Ireland, TV3 News

Sky News Ireland which is now effectively defunct in terms of Irish output apart from it's opt out Irish advertising commercial breaks. As such it has no longer any specific Irish news programmes! Sky News even ditched their whole weather forecast presenting team from the main Sky News channel quite suddenly a few years ago as a further means of cost cutting while they had no problem stumping up millions for certain sporting rights. The low viewing rates for GAA coverage on Sky Sports is probably another cynical example of how Sky still chooses to buy the rights as the increase in ROI Sky Subscribers is their main short, medium and long term goal in this marketplace.

AwaitYourReply

Actually, the Pat Kenny In The Round show is suddenly getting a major promotion in the past 7-10 days which is strange that it took so long before they seriously realised it needed to be pushed heavily on other media outlets outside of UTV Ireland own tv channel. It will be interesting to see if the marketing promotion and arrival of Summertime in RTÉ results in a noticeable rise in viewership from the earlier broadcasts that went out!

Elmo

Firstly lets stop this red herring of high prices with the analogue network or DTT. TV3 knew the prices when the entered the market and AFAIK while TV3 have won some of the cases against RTÉ they also have lost a few. There are other on here who have followed that story in more detail and might be able to put forward a review of it from 1998 up and including DSO. Including the fact that TV3 choose not to be on all transmitters. (In a different thread).

Although TnaG (later rebranded as TG4) had launched before TV3 on Oct 31, 1996 they used receive a lot of assistance from RTÉ in their early years but are now a completely stand alone tv channel as far as I know.

TG4 is an independent broadcaster, however RTÉ still provide it with Nuacht TG4 and about 30mins of other programming at no cost to TG4.

TV3 being the first ever direct competitor from Ireland were always going to have to experiment and no doubt TV3 have made their own share of errors with scheduling and programme commissioning etc; which is why it was all the more reason for UTV Ireland not to repeat similar errors as there were now some valuable case studies that UTV Ireland could examine of TV3 and Sky News Ireland. TV3 were never seriously going to have the same resources to be able to compete with RTÉ News and I think they soon realised this fact but many of their journalists/reporters eventually ended up at RTÉ TV.

TG4 ironically has proofed to be a better training ground for producers etc. (actually point out by Rick Hertherington when TV3 started) TV3 and UTV Ireland direct competition with Six One is not ill-conceived.

Six-One had only been on the air 9 years with the arrival of TV3, while up to that point it was reduced to 30mins for 3 months of the year. TV3 had a 6:30 news from 2001 - 2006 and the reason to drop the 6:30 was not down to audience figures, I believed they bettered Xposé. It was felt that it was too much of a repeat, hence The 8pm news now????

Sky will of course try to keep their Irish subscribers. It will be interesting to see if they keep GAA when the 3 years ends. Sky Sports News is the most watched pay TV channel in Ireland today with 1.9% of the audience at times.

Lorraine Keane - RTÉ 2fm AA Roadwatch and some RTÉ TV. Gráinne Seoige was indeed TnaG before TG4, Six One and Ireland Live are the only 2 new news programmes she has not be involved in with the launch.

In terms of going up against RTÉ News Six One. Really for TV3 it didn't matter. During the Canwest years it was always about keeping the bare minimum of Irish programming regulations with the aim to raise advertising in other parts of the schedule. By introducing Ireland AM TV3 were able to increase their hours of broadcast while also retaining their commitments to the IRTC/BCI/BAI. (While the presenters might have been worried it would be dropped due to low audience, it really didn't matter).

UTV Ireland had an established base of Jornalist for local Radio and could have opted to go for a outside company to produce its Irish news. It over spent on Ireland Live and the plush set/UTV Ireland offices.

Atlantic Dawn

Having it on a Monday night is dumbass central, it should be on a Sunday night.

AwaitYourReply

Elmo wrote: »

Firstly lets stop this red herring of high prices with the analogue network or DTT. TV3 knew the prices when the entered the market and AFAIK while TV3 have won some of the cases against RTÉ they also have lost a few.

I don't recall mentioning anything about "high prices with the analogue network or DTT" in this thread. In my earlier post, I expressed the view that a broadcaster that was not affiliated in any way to RTÉ such as TV3 cannot always have found it an ideal situation when the organisation charged with maintaining and operating the national transmission network for all terrestrial operators in the state has closer links to RTÉ versus TV3 or any other independent broadcaster for that matter going forward under the current regime. Whether TV3 knew this before, during or after the event is irrelevant as most people know that 2rn = RTÉ NL transmission network anyway. The feeling out there seems to be that it still has very close ties to RTÉ and this should have changed a long time ago.

The day that RTÉ was no longer the only legal TV+Radio broadcaster in the Republic of Ireland market is the day that a whole new regime should have begun but as usual it is probably dragged out for political considerations. How many years was the original incarnation of the BAI Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (the IRTC) unable to handle matters and affairs relating to RTÉ whilst the RTÉ Authority continued to handle it's own matters internally. There, I have not even mentioned price or rates once - it's also about ethics, standards, good governance and culture and maybe less of the nepotism too.

Yes, I had known that TnaG > TG4 had close links with RTÉ alright - Our President Michael D. Higgins was the Minister who ensured TnaG came into being on Hallowe'en Night 1996!

Six-One - RTÉ News being on air for 9 years (i.e.) almost a whole decade by the time that TV3 had first commenced broadcasting in the same jurisdiction would have been a huge advantage for RTÉ as they were able to tweak any bugs and flaws and develop it in their own time while not watching their backs from other domestic competition. Séan Duignan was the first anchor of Six One News along with Anne Doyle if I am not mistaken and later Eamonn Lawlor returned as Brussels Correspondent to replace Duignan as anchor of the programme.

Elmo

AwaitYourReply wrote: »

I don't recall mentioning anything about "high prices with the analogue network or DTT" in this thread.

No you inferred TV3's dealings with RTÉ Networks

When TV3 first started way back in September, 1998 they were the first Irish terrestrial commercial tv channel and had to tolerate a national tv transmission network run and operated by a rival broadcaster (i.e.) RTÉNL later renamed 2rn.

Back in 1998 TV3 had far more opportunities that the negatives you mention.

1. The first non-RTÉ Irish channel (as you point out TnaG was a division of RTÉ, though largely independent).
2. Higher number of viewers in 3/2 TV Land.
3. Spillover viewers had just 4 UK channels some had Channel 5.
4. Cable services only offered 15 to 20 channels
5. No channel had Irish opt-out advertising. UTV would have sold "Irish" ads with their NI ads.

it's also about ethics, standards, good governance and culture and maybe less of the nepotism too.

All issues that RTÉ had had to deal with right through out the 1980s and 1990s. Forced to sell a major stake in Cablelink to Telecom Éireann, caps on advertising sales, forced to save Ardmore Studios, forced to sell Cablelink to NTL, a 10 year gap between Licence Fee increases causing the Irish Licence fee to be one of the lowest in Europe, including Eastern European states etc etc, so RTÉ were not immune to political pressures. Indeed AFAIK RTÉ where forced to reduce the price of Network cost for Century Radio. So TV3 hadn't been the first entity to deal with 2RN.

The IRTC was not with out its flaws as a political entity.

Without the need of Coro St and Emmerdale TV3 had a 7% share of the audience by 2000 increasing 10% with the arrival of those shows, peaking to 14% in 2006.