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TV Week surprised over Seven / Nine Logie losses

"The ratings unfortunately don't come into it," says editor Thomas Woodgate.

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TV Week editor Thomas Woodgate was surprised that Seven and Nine went home empty-handed (save for half an award for Nine) at the Logie Awards.

Speaking to Mediaweek, Woodgate said organisers were given a full list of Popular winners around 15 minutes after voting closed.

“Quite frankly it’s surprising. Everyone looks at ratings. Married at First Sight, The Block, My Kitchen Rules, Home and Away are all solid raters, but it comes down to the fact it’s a popularity contest in those awards. People are voting online, the ratings unfortunately don’t come into it.

“It’s surprising if you think that Married at First Sight was getting an average of 1.4m or 1.5m a night, that would be a healthy voting base, especially the kind of people who watch Reality shows are highly engaged online.

“But at the end of the day the process is the way it is at the moment. Will that change in the future? Potentially -we don’t know yet. We’re just letting the dust settle on the awards.”

While Woodgate enjoyed Gleeson’s opening routine he was more tactful about the Gold acceptance speech.

“What I thought about his acceptance was, that for someone who is usually pretty composed, I felt like Tom was almost in a tunnel and he didn’t know how to get himself out of it.

“After anyone wins a Logie, the first place they go off stage is into the TV Week media room where they do an exclusive interview and photo shoot. I was the first person to talk to Tom when he came off stage, and the obvious question was, ‘What’s going through your head right now?’

“He was shell shocked. He said when Costa won [Logie for Best Presenter] he had a few drinks because he thought his night was over.”

Woodgate also welcomes debate around the Logies, which is good for the brand, and TV Week will meet with all networks and stakeholders to hear feedback before embarking on 2020 plans.

You can hear the podcast at Mediaweek here.

31 Responses

  1. Solution: To encourage more people to vote, thus broadening the nominees, a voter in each category is randomly chosen to receive a prize, ranging from $250 to larger cash amounts and prizes, such as holidays etc. Lots more people would vote. But ensure voting can’t be rigged, and no overseas votes. If more people are voting, people are less likely to complain about the results.

  3. I don’t know people consider their guilty pleasures award worthy – this may be the issue with MAFS? Under the cloak of anonymity that is my TVTonight user name, I can confirm ‘Dynasty’ as my current guilty please. Would I vote for it to win any awards – Hell, No! That said, Elizabeth Gilles stepping in to play Alexis when Nicolette Sheridan left was nothing short of magnificent in the worst kind of way.

  5. I would think that people who watch say Married at First Sight would be more just into the show and watercooler talk it so to speak, once it is over it’s on to the next thing. So unlikely to vote, whereas given say the nature of something like Gogglebox, people watching would more than likely vote for it as the show itself by critiquing what they watch voting.

  6. There’s probably a fair number of people who watched Married at First Sight solely for the drama, but would be reluctant to call it a good show that deserves an award.

    2. TBH I was hoping that if any reality show wins an award that it absolutely not be MAFS anything but MAFS (except Seven Year Switch or it’s now Super Switch, which is probably worse than MAFS but thank goodness it wasn’t up for nominations)
      MAFS could’ve been up for an award in the beginning, a few years ago when it started maybe, but now with what it’s turned into, it’s too late now, hardly has any dignity left, if any at all.

  7. I’d like to hear more about The Voice leaving their table when they didn’t win the award they were nominated for, as mentioned in the TT newsletter.

    4. Sharon Johal from “Neighbours” commented on this in her Instagram story – she noted that the whole table “disappeared” partway through the event (their table was adjacent to it).

  8. Well I suppose a lot of people who don’t have those Oztam rating set top boxes votes for the Logies. Does anyone actually know anyone who has one of them? I don’t. I’ve always said the ratings would be completely different if every single household was included. In this digital age you’d think it could be done.

      1. I once interviewed a user on radio where they said they didn’t indicate they were in the room when viewing because they didn’t want the network to get a boost. All hell broke loose.

  9. Perhaps the ratings system at present is not truly representative of the general viewing public, with only a small number of boxes around the country, not enough to be really true, in my opinion.

      1. True, but at least all of Australia has the opportunity to vote for the Logies if they wish to, whereas only a select few have input into the ratings.

    3. The fact that this very sketchy ratings system can kill or save a show and potentially hundreds of people’s jobs is a scary thought in reality!

    4. >> not enough to be really true, in my opinion.

      You’ve been around this block before. Allow me to remind you.

      https://tvtonight.com.au/2015/03/oztam-looks-to-new-measurement-beyond-2017.html

      Statistics, folks – statistics. Just because you don’t understand it doesn’t mean it doesn’t work…

      Because increasing the sample size tenfold to 80,000 people actually gains you bugger-all in terms of improved accuracy. Very rough “it’s-4:30am-and-I-can’t-sleep” estimate is that you’d need to increase the sample size 40x~50x to get appreciably better than +-1% accuracy.

      By all means have an opinion, but don’t expect it to be taken as a serious candidate for the truth.

      1. Yep and in fact it could taint it further as the balance could be thrown out, it’s like me saying that all my friends and I don’t watch MAFS, so I can’t believe that the ratings are reflecting what people watch right, or that in my office of the 50 people working there only 2 watched State Of Origin and the rest Masterchef, House Rules and streaming services. Of course it will be like that because hiring practices of that office will likely mean fairly like minded people would be hired to keep the office functioning well. Same as if I said at the Pub last night of the 150 there 96% where watching State of Origin, that is not a basis to judge what everyone is watching as most are there to do just that.

        So you go from 8,000 to 80,000, somewhere along the line you are going to get double ups or more in households of a certain type that could taint the results. Say Gogglebox if they…

      2. I see where you’re coming from, but the homes with ratings boxes have to indicate how many members if the household are viewing a show etc, visitors, absentees, second screens in other rooms, time shifting etc. It’s just all to complicated and ad hoc to come up with accurate figures. I’d like to see a system where each digital TV in Australia automatically tells OzTam what show is being viewed. Maybe one day.

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