Media: Trendspotting
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Time isn't doing the pounds 10m Dance to the Music of Time any favours. Over 3m people tuned in to see the first episode on 9 October and another 300,000 taped it. That seems to have been enough for a lot of people. The second episode could only attract 2.4m viewers, with another 100,000 taping - although you suspect not bothering to watch the tape. By the third episode, this had fallen to 2.3m.
The naked truth
A new advertising agency, Renegade, has launched, claiming it can marry the skills of a PR agency with those of traditional advertising. A survey of advertising stories covered in the editorial of national newspapers would seem to indicate that this makes sense. That is, until you see the top three campaigns to attract editorial coverage: Wonderbra, Pretty Polly tights and Walkers Crisps. The thing they all have in common is scantily clad women - Walkers currently have the Spice Girls. Is an entire agency needed to tell you that national press news and picture editors will run photos of women with their clothes off?
Giving 110 per cent
Cinema attendances have been rising for 10 years and cinema advertising has been booming. Booming so much, in fact, that Carlton Screen Advertising could claim 75 per cent of cinema audiences while Pearl and Dean claimed 35 per cent... Er, wait a minute. This disarray has now been cleared up by the release of the first official figures, which show them both to have been making generous estimates of their market share. Carlton has 64.9 per cent and Pah Pah Pah Pah Pah Pah Pah Pah Pah Pah, or Pearl and Dean, has 30.6 per cent. The figures may be down but at least they are plausible.
Coat-racks emptying at 4
By the lights of the new thrusting Channel 4, A Dance to the Falling of Ratings would never have been commissioned. A pounds 5m drama series has just been cancelled by new boss Michael Jackson in his review of the channel's output and 100 shows are threatened because they are under-performing. Shows getting less than the magic 3m viewers in peak time will be told to "get their coat", as they say on The Fast Show. Peter Ansorge, the man who commissioned A Dance to... went to get his coat shortly after Mr Jackson arrived.
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