It seems that NEWFM will being trying to recapture some of the Fatboys magic from earlier in the decade. Half of the original Fatboys team, Steve St John, has re-joined the Sandgate station and is rumoured to be forming an on-air partnership with Don Mayo.

Mayo has worked previously at NEWFM before joining the long list of announcers shown the door by owner Bill Caralis. However all seems to have been forgiven with Mayo about to return to the fold.

It is believed that the new breakfast team of St John and Mayo will launch on 9 June.

Meanwhile noticeable changes have begun to occur to the NEWFM playlist with the music begin to rock more.

Source: Jane Schulze, The Australian

ADVERTISERS are being offered a front-row seat in the evolving world of music retailing through a unique Australian joint venture.

GroupM, the media investment arm of global communications group WPP, and Universal Music have teamed to create BrandAmp, a company set up to give advertisers unprecedented access to the world of music.

As physical sales of recorded music continue to decline and advertisers seek new ways of reaching customers, BrandAmp will match advertisers with musicians in an attempt to expand the businesses of both clients.

That means Universal Music’s artists, such as Brian McFadden and Vanessa Amorosi, will have the chance to work with the advertiser clients of GroupM agencies MediaCom, MindShare, Maxus and Mediaedge:cia.

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If only all advertising could be this good. If only all budgets could be this big. A piece of art. Enjoy.

Source: Lara Sinclair, The Australian

NOT satisfied with its estimated two-thirds share of the $600 million-plus annual search and directories advertising market, internet search giant Google is launching an attack on the online display advertising dollar.

And it is not just by trying to get a bigger share of display advertising budgets (the money that advertisers spend on video, pop-ups and banner ads). That is slow going, given 97 or 98 per cent of Google’s worldwide revenues are still derived from paid search ads, as opposed to video ads placed on its YouTube website, for example.

Rather, the company is attempting to stimulate growth by trying to persuade entire categories of advertisers that in these uncertain times, a larger share of their online advertising budgets should be devoted to paid search advertising at the cost of display.

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They say in advertising that it helps to show the benefits of using the product in question. Often this is best done by showing the negative effects of not using the product…as is the case in this classic TVC.

Where else would this commercial come from but Brazil?

Partly for pure entertainment value, partly because some ads are just incredible, partly for inspiration, and partly because its great content for this blog…….I am launching a new department at Media Hunter. Great TV Commercials will feature, funny, entertaining, poignant and evocative TVC’s from around the world.

Simply enjoy.

Newcastle TV ratings week 21, 2008

Novocastrians love their league and when its Origin time they tune in en-masse. Its seems this year is no exception with NBN’s State of Origin 1 coverage being the big ratings winner last week, and so far for the year.

NBN averaged 150,000 viewers for the big game making it the most watched program in the Hunter this year.

The rest of the week was a good one for NBN too, easily accounting for Prime and Southern Cross TEN in the all viewers figures.

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Source: MediaSpy and news.com.au

Plenty of speculation still surrounds the identity of the author of the novel Boned which is soon to hit bookshelves.   Meanwhile, news.com.au
has published an excerpt from the book which focuses on a fictional
Kate Corish, an almost-40 news presenter who learns she is about to get
the sack.

Heading the fictional Channel 8 network in the book is CEO Billy Simpson, bearing some resemblance to former Nine chief Eddie McGuire in his passion for football.

As to the identity of the author, even the book’s publisher Penguin claims to not know.  Some of the names being speculated as possibilities include former high-profile TV identities Tracey Spicer, Gretel Killeen, Naomi Robson, Jana Wendt, Helen Dalley, as well as the presenter at the centre of the original ‘boned’ saga, Jessica Rowe.  Back-stagers such as publicist Wendy Squires, Mia Freedman and David Hurley, all formerly of the Nine Network, are also on the rumoured list of possibilities.

All, and others, have denied being involved.

Current Nine CEO David Gyngell is looking forward to reading the book:

“If it’s good enough we might even make a mini-series of it, and maybe even call it UnderTelly.”

National TV ratings race. Source: David Dale, Sun Herald Blogs

The viewing habits of Australians last week evoked a very traditional
stereotype: a nation preoccupied with football, gardening, home
renovations and Dannii Minogue. Only a sudden passion for tigers showed
any deviation from decades-old norms.

Wednesday’s State of Origin rugby league match attracted 2.09 million
viewers (including a surprising 283,000 in Melbourne). It was the
highest figure for any program this ratings year and for any State of
Origin game this decade. The other most watched shows of the week were:
Australia’s Got Talent (7) with 1.60 m; Seven Sunday news 1.65m; 60 Minutes (9) 1.57m; Better Homes and Gardens (7) 1.52m; and David Attenborough’s Tiger — Spy in the Jungle (9) 1.54m

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