KEY POINTS:
Television New Zealand and Whatever Happened to....? production company EyeWorks Touchdown have cause to celebrate the new Paul Holmes programme which debuted on Tuesday night.
Around 13 per cent of the potential viewing public watched the show.
Of the people glued to the box from 8.30pm to 9.30pm, nearly one-third were watching Whatever Happened to....?.
It is early days for the eight-episode series, which marks a rousing return to form for Holmes after awful ratings on Prime.
All parties did rather nicely out of the taxpayer financing for this commercial venture. TVNZ received $1.2 million for the eight one-hour shows, which translates into about $150,000 per episode.
As for advertising revenue, TVNZ would have raised about $140,000 throughout the show, which included an advertorial clip about the change to decimal currency in 1967 in which Holmes pointed out the charter show's sponsor, UDC Finance, was around.
We weren't able to get to the bottom of how this taxpayer-funded show fitted into TVNZ's financial arrangements. A lot of the show was made up of archive footage owned by TVNZ though it is not clear whether TVNZ charged Eyeworks Touchdown to access it.
It is also not clear whether TVNZ charged Eyeworks to use its studio space.
At a media briefing last week Rick Ellis dismissed criticism of the show's 100 per cent taxpayer funding saying nobody would be raising questions if Holmes were not involved.
I beg to differ. Holmes can have his own show. The question is whether TVNZ - with its own financial problems - is being bailed out with taxpayer funding for commercial shows.
A game of two channels
Relations between television bosses have slipped another notch with Sky TV dismissing TV3 gripes about filching World Cup rugby.
Sky chief executive John Fellet said yesterday an application for a High Court injunction - which is being decided today - was TV3 trying to turn back the clock for media and ignoring TV viewing habit changes.
TV3 chief operating officer Rick Friesen said Sky's approach was "typical of its use of its monopoly".
"I can't think of any other country where someone would abuse sports rights in this way," he said.
A TV3 insider said the International Rugby Board view was clear and when TV3 raised the issue about use of clips on Monday, Sky came back with "a two-fingered salute".
Justice Helen Winkelmann will decide today whether to permanently stop Sky using World Cup coverage from TV3 after granting an interim injunction on Wednesday.
Under international agreements non-rights holders are allowed clips of events on news programmes, as occurred on both TVNZ and Sky-owned Prime. But TV3 says Sky is using clips on sports magazine shows for its pay channels.
TV3 paid big bucks to buy both free-to-air and pay TV rights and cup coverage is part of a big promotional push for the channel.
Sky turned down an offer of extra rights for around $1 million.
A TV3 insider said: "We paid a lot for the exclusive rights and now Sky is embarrassed.
"A lot of people are paying Sky for rugby and they have no coverage of the game's biggest global event - that is why they are running our stuff," said the TV3 source.
John Fellet made no apologies.
"TV3 is trying to turn back the clock on news," says Fellet.
"In the old days TV markets were made up of three or four channels each with a news bulletin - but that has changed."
"You can't escape the fact their channels have declining viewership and the way we consume news is different.
"TV3 is drawing the distinction that everything they show is a news show and everything that everybody else does is a magazine."
Fellet says that in the US, Sky's use of clips would be acceptable news usage. Fair usage has been around a long time.
"We lift sports off TV3 just like they lift it off ours." He is confident about the outcome of today's court case.
A court decision in TV3's favour would tighten rules around sports rights, of which Sky is the biggest holder. "I don't know how I can lose," Fellet.
Pig-headed on Prime
Programming rights and rebroadcasting is becoming a big issue with the launch of the consortium of free-to-air channels running the digital platform Freeview, which is starting to compete directly with Sky.
TVNZ chief executive Rick Ellis clashed recently with Sky's John Fellet over Fellet's claims that the new digital channels TVNZ 6 and TVNZ 7 should be available on Sky because it would give them a lot more digital customers.
Ellis says the new channels are meant to attract customers to Freeview and Sky wants to slow its progress so Freeview does not grow as an alternative digital platform. Freeview general manager Steve Browning says such "platform wars" had occurred in other countries. But New Zealand's relationship between pay TV and free-to-air TV is unique because pay TV monopolist Sky also owns Prime TV.
Ellis says: "The free-to-air industry is going through a strategic historical and critical period changing from analogue signals to digital."
He says Sky's purchase of Prime should not have happened. Asked about the current situation, with Sky delaying Prime joining Freeview, he said: "At the end of the day Sky is being pig-headed about it."
Small impact
With all the entertainment options out there it is surprising video rental stores are still trading profitably even while taking a staunch approach to penalties for transgressions such as late returns.
A colleague left out a second disc in an overnight return, and found his account loaded with $21 in penalties, approaching the monthly fee for a DVD delivery service such as Fatso.co.nz or Sky's DVD Unlimited, where there are no late fees.
The Video Retailers' Association says the new competition that emerged three or four years ago has not eaten into existing rentals and customers don't see overdue fees as a negative.
Indications are they are right. Fatso.co.nz - which includes Stephen Tindall among its shareholders - reports that after an initial flurry of publicity sales have settled down.
Sky's John Fellet, who is developing all manner of new options such as pay-per-view movies and internet protocol television, is under no illusions that Sky's service is going to take over the entertainment world.
"It's been estimated that the sales amount to three large outlets - which is not that large.
"We developed the service and we are happy with its return, but it is like a window of opportunity in a certain stage of the market," says Fellet.
Video retailers, meanwhile, are promoting their role as providing an attractive retail option. It's lucky that late penalties are either uncommon or customers don't mind paying.
Ban the bomb
TVNZ's decision to ban TV3 news cameras from a media briefing of its 2007 annual results opens up a can of worms.
On Monday TVNZ invited journalists and market analysts to a briefing to explain the reasons for a pivotal event in the state broadcaster's history - its first-ever loss of $4.5 million and plans to turn it around over the next two years.
TV3 News was not invited and when they arrived were turned away because they were "the opposition", presumably on the assumption that the 3 News report would poke the borax.
They said the information was available publicly and they were allowed to choose who they wanted at their briefings.
But it sounds like someone at TVNZ had a rush of blood to the head.
