Launch TalkTV

[DavidWhitfield]

The headline text is in (what appears to be) Arial rather than whatever their usual (Gotham-ish but not Gotham) font is.

[soupie]

Maybe these font issues are the main thing holding talkTV back from being a mega success?

[Inspector Sands]

Maybe these font issues are the main thing holding talkTV back from being a mega success?

The main problem seems to be Piers Bold. Possibly they might soon change that to Piers Sans 

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I thought it was obvious?

Considering all the kudos Inspector Sands got I don't think anybody else could see the issue.

Whatever it is, it's incredibly subtle.... or I'm just not very observant this time of the morning

Seems it was the former, and I knew it would be an anticlimax to find out

[Kristian.nielsen]

https://variety.com/2022/tv/global/piers...235266461/

[London Lite]

https://variety.com/2022/tv/global/piers...235266461/

An excellent piece from Scott Bryan which reflects my feelings on Talk TV and GB News that audiences aren't really interested in skewed news and topical debate on television. Our media landscape is different from the US where Fox News has been on-air since 1996 and while newspapers are in decline, they have been the echo chambers for the target audience of these channels for decades.

[Kristian.nielsen]

Piers wote on Twitter:
We’re not making a show for TV, we’re making a show people can watch anywhere, anytime, anyhow.

And yet they started a TV Channel with his show as the main attraction

[Omnipresent]

The official Twitter account for Piers Uncensored has less than 50,000 followers and overall engagement for most tweets is low.

It's still early days, but if News UK want to stick with the TalkTV project it's best to accept sooner rather than later the current format doesn't work.

[Scrotnig]

The mistake they’ve made is going with Morgan.
He’s not as universally popular as they think he is. And he is the name people will associate with the channel.

It’s a shame because the News Desk show is excellent and Morgan’s show is definitely well made and produced. It’s just not going to attract people as it stands.

They are going to need to do what GB News did and re-evaluate things. GB News now mostly comes across as confident in what they are doing (which they certainly didn’t at first). Talk TV, for me, isn’t really coming across as anything, it just “is”.

Also - TV can to some degree work on the radio, as GB News seems to mostly prove, but I don’t think radio works on TV. At least, not the way Talk TV do it anyhow.

[Jon]

The mistake they’ve made is going with Morgan.
He’s not as universally popular as they think he is. And he is the name people will associate with the channel.

It’s a shame because the News Desk show is excellent and Morgan’s show is definitely well made and produced. It’s just not going to attract people as it stands.

That’s a good point, because I doubt he’s either well liked by left or the right.

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Taking out all the programmes that have been added for the TV channel. I do wonder whether these talk radio stations on TV in their own right are worthwhile, I would imagine stations like talk or LBC might as well be on TV because it shouldn’t be that much more expensive than just running a radio station.

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Also - TV can to some degree work on the radio, as GB News seems to mostly prove, but I don’t think radio works on TV. At least, not the way Talk TV do it anyhow.

I can’t talk about the ratings as no idea what the radio programmes on Talk TV get, but I think it works quite well and the presenters are good at engaging with the TV audience. But it doesn’t stop anyone listening on radio or massively affect that experience. I just see it as something similar to watching a video of a podcast, albeit something you can dip in and out of.

[Inspector Sands]

Piers wote on Twitter:
We’re not making a show for TV, we’re making a show people can watch anywhere, anytime, anyhow.

Problem for him is that no people are watching it in any place at any time! 

I think the big mistake they (Piers and News UK) have made is thinking that Piers has a massive audience to bring to his show. He doesn't.

He has a lot of Twitter followers (those he hasn't banned of course) but there's no massive Piers Morgan fanbase hanging on his every word, he's treated by the public with mostly indifference. Twitter followers doesn't necessarily reflect popularity in real life. He livened up a fairly pedestrian breakfast show by stirring things up, increased the ratings bit, and they didn't really fall that much after he walked out. 

The other issue is that he is difficult to pigeon-hole politically. They're trying to mould him into a US style commentator on a network of channels that lean towards the right wing and whose newspapers in the UK support the government. However his highest profile job - the one where he made his name - was at the UKs biggest socialist newspaper. Towards the end of his time at GMB he was very critical of the current British government which made him popular amongst the sort of people that Talk TV and his show won't appeal to 

He's on a channel that has spent a lot of the last 2 years building itself a niche as a covid sceptic whereas he has been very openly supportive of things like vaccine passports and was one of the few challenging the government over their lax covid response. In the US he spent a lot of his CNN show being pro gun-control, yet he's on Fox now whose audience won't share that opinion. 

So the question is who is Pier's audience?

[Joe]

They are going to need to do what GB News did and re-evaluate things. GB News now mostly comes across as confusing what they are doing (which they certainly didn’t at first).

Is it a good thing, to come across as confusing?

[Scrotnig]

They are going to need to do what GB News did and re-evaluate things. GB News now mostly comes across as confusing what they are doing (which they certainly didn’t at first).

Is it a good thing, to come across as confusing?

Darn! I meant GB News comes across as CONFIDENT.
See, it's all so confusing I confused my own post...

[Kristian.nielsen]

So much for free speech https://metro.co.uk/2022/05/12/piers-mor...-16632983/

[TMD_24]

Piers's aim for fair debate not going well tonight.

https://twitter.com/aljwhite/status/1526...UAw9i8fh2A

[Inspector Sands]

Possibly needs a content warning on that post.... NSFW or children! 

So presumably the TV output doesnt have a dump delay like the radio derived output does. I wonder if that was dumped from the radio station output?


I love the comment on that Twitter post comparing it to Partridge Over Britain