Which is the worst regional news theme on ITV1?

I'm not a fan of the current Central News West theme... it wasn't as exciting as the previous music sets (1997, 1999, and 2001 are the best IMO).

Also on the awful music list...

- Border Lookaround (current)
- Central News East (current - it doesn't sound like a theme suited for a news programme)

Just the typical anti-BBC, anti-licence blindly pro-ITV comment I have come to expect from you. When are you going to stop playing kissy-ass with David Liddiment? My interest has become more than just Look North, it's expanded to all BBC regions, which proves I'm not a one-region bore.

Were you lying then, when you said you found Lisa Gallagher attractive?

As someone who sees the ratings on an almost daily basis the current split is about 19/20 to Calendar and about 33/34 percent to Look North (for both programmes). I'd say they were pretty much in the lead!

Not quite true what you said about the 540 performing better in all ITV regions - many lost out to Neighbours at 5.30pm on BBC1.

What's needed is something of an audience puller at 5.30pm on ITV1. It was interesting when BBC2 weren't showing "The Weakest Link" the Millionaire Classic show did much better therefore handing a good inheritance to the regional news shows.

As others have said, Calendar changing to red and blue is irrelevant, maybe the wanted a change as the last 10-15 years has used a light bluey/purpley sort of colour scheme. Also the logo on the Calendar desk is still blue!

And what's Granada got to do with it, Calendar is made by YTV, just because Granada own YTV doesn't mean they have a say in every little local issue!

You can't really compare all that stuff with Calendar as the BBC is a big organisation with lots of non-tv interests, YTV's Calendar is just a news programme. A bit like comparing itv.com to bbc.co.uk.

I often think that during the birth of ITV, the IBA or whoever should have given all the ITV companies a commercial radio station to go with the tv station

Oh calm yourself down dear, I know it's hot outside, but try and address my points as to why I believe that Calendar is a superior service overall for me, rather than resorting to silly insults.

And for the record David Liddiment is no longer with ITV, call yourself a TV Forumer ? It's not the BBC Forum you know, do try to keep abreast of events across the whole spectrum of broadcasting.

Yup the final titles for Granada Tonight were dark red, with purple everywhere, but it must be noted that, the GT look we are talking about was introduced on the same day that ITV changed it logo (The one where they dropped IT= for i t v) so I think it was October 1998. Though if you have a video copy (I mean one off the TV) it is worth looking at them, there's a place in the titles, where the words Bringing the News Home to you, all appear one after each other, you see a small Granada Tonight logo in the background, but in the circle above GT and opposite the G, I am very certain that in this circle it has IT= in it, but I am not 100% sure here, but if you have this on video, take a look at it.

But this was my least favourite look, it outdated very quickly, I didn't like the music either, I muched preferred the all purple look, which only lasted 10 months! Plus the music for the purple look was ten times better, but I do prefer Granada Reports, overall to Granada Tonight for many reasons.

You have a point, but wasn't commerical radio not around in 1955?

But with this plan, it would have been. It makes sense really Digiwatsit. And if it had gone ahead Andrew, they could well have been closed by now!

I have stirred up a hornets nest here about Calendar! If you read the mission statement and programme statement (available on the YTV website) it does state that Calendar has a tough timeslot, but it has always been on at this time. It also reveals that Look North loses 50% of it's audience through the transmission, whereas Calendar builds.

Quoting somebody elses figures Calendar achieves a market share of 1.2m throughout the programme, whereas Look North starts high (1.8m accross both opts) and drains to 0.9m by the end of the show. Now i'm no Einstein and I don't fancy the weather man, but say that Calendar is still slaughtering Look North.

If you read 'A day in the life of Television' (Boxtree 1989, I think) Harry Gration moans on about the lack of resources at the BBC and looks longingly at YTV and it's resources and viewing figures.

Throughout the seventies Calendar got 2.5m viewers. Compared to these days when umpteen channels exist, a drop of 1m in 30 years on a programme that competes with childrens shows and the national news, it's not bad.

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True. But overall Look North has more viewers over that half hour than Calendar and it's the average over that time period that counts.



Don;t know where you've got those from (YTV press office perhaps?) but the figures I have seen put neither Look North nor Calendar anywhere near that amount of viewers.



I'm sure he did but the boot is on the other foot now with the BBC (certainly in Yorkshire and Lincs) far better resourced than they were in the 80s and 90s.

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I agree isn't bad (though not with the figures you quote!).
Calendar would be given a helping hand by the ITV network by putting something on at 5.30 that would give Calendar a bigger audience inheritance.