Launch TalkTV

[Steve Williams]

I would also suggest moving The Talk to 5pm, as that is a more suitable slot for that.  Fox News launched The Five at 5pm, moved it to 9pm for a while, but it didn't work there, so moved it back to 5pm.  I would suggest that Talk TV do the same, and move The Talk to 5pm, cos it really is a daytime show that is currently in Prime Time and either have Jeremy Kyle at 9pm, or someone else at 9pm and Jeremy Kyle at 10pm.  Lose the Piers Morgan repeat at 11, and replace it with something akin to the Fox News @ Night programme that Fox currently airs at Midnight ET.

The Talk would probably be better at 5pm, but the problem is that all the personnel on Talk TV have enormous egos and they all want to be in primetime. Unfortunately for them primetime is an absolutely dead slot for news channels.

There's a tiny audience for news talk in this country, it's a genre that is by and large of no interest to most viewers. There are some shows in daytime that do alright - though things like Jeremy Vine and Loose Women don't win their slot, the latter being beaten every day by Bargain Hunt - but there's no market for it in primetime. And why would there be, people want to watch proper programmes in the evening.

So Piers would do better at 5pm, probably, because people might put it in their schedules and it would be the kind of show you could dip in and out of, and it wouldn't have to compete with proper programmes. But Piers absolutely wouldn't go for that, because he's got an enormous ego and wants to be on in primetime because he wants all his mates to see him. Unfortunately for him, nobody wants to watch that kind of show in primetime, and nobody ever will.