The Sun-Herald

The Tribal Mind: Damned diversity, it's so divisive

by David Dale
What the Minister for Immigration and Citzenship desires more than anything else (well, apart from the resignation of Kevin Rudd) is a nation united around core values. And what could be more core than taste in entertainment, and more damaging to unity than the current programming practices of the mainstream TV networks?

This column has come into possession of documentary evidence which displays how shamelessly the networks are shredding social cohesion by pandering to minority interests. The ratings agency OzTAM dissects each week's ratings chart by age, gender, wealth and shopping habits, to assist advertisers in targeting particular markets. Only Kath and Kim finds a place in the top 20 of all demographic segments. After that, things fly apart, the centre cannot hold, mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, the blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned.

A prime example is The Simpsons, which should bring the family together on the couch but which turns out to be the second most popular show with males aged 16-39, number 15 on the chart for women 16-39, No. 22 with men 25-54, No. 37 with OG1/2s (which is industry jargon for the top two Occupational Groups, ie The Rich), No. 52 with women 25-54, No. 99 with grocery buyers, and No. 190 with people over 55. But wait, there's more ...

The shows that are tearing Australia apart:
House (10, pictured left) is 3 with The Rich, 13 with grocery buyers, and 71 with over 55s.
Sea Patrol (9) is 10 with grocery buyers, 17 with women 25-54, and 41 with males 16-39.
Top Gear (SBS) is 11 with males 16-39, 84 with women 16-39, 103 with grocery buyers, and 133 with over 55s.
Thank God You're Here (10) is 1 with males 16-39, and 74 with people over 55.
Spicks and Specks (ABC) is 6 with The Rich, 33 with women 16-39, and 55 with people over 55.
Temptation (9) is 14 with people over 55 and 82 with men 16-39.
Ghost Whisperer (7) is 10 with women 25-54, 67 with men 16-39, and 73 with over 55s.
Enough Rope with Andrew Denton (ABC) is 16 with the rich and 73 with women 16-39.
RPA (9) is 16 with grocery buyers, 27 with women 25-54, and 101 with males 16-39.
All Saints (7) is 9 with women 25-54 and 66 with men 16-39.
Rove (10) is 10 with females 16-39 and 83 with grocery buyers.
Midsomer Murders (ABC) is 1 with people over 55, 31 with the rich, 71 with people 25-54, and 114 with people 16-39.
Australian Idol (10) is 2 with females 16-39, 21 with grocery buyers, and 127 with over 55s.
Border Security (7) is 5 with people over 55 and 20 with men 16-39.
Getaway (9) is 10 with people over 55, and 53 with men 16-39.

Clearly government action is needed. Those programs must be moved to Pay TV (which is designed for eccentrics and troublemakers) and the networks required by law to start showing programs that will build the kind of Australia we all need.

We'd welcome your suggestions on entertainments the government would approve to unite our land.

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 10:30 AM
• Comments (18)

WHO WE ARE: The sinful alternative to breakfast

A column about Australia by David Dale, published in The Sun-Herald, 26/8/2007
Somehow I can't see Uncle Toby succeeding in his current scheme to transform the breakfast habits of a nation. Have you noticed how he's spending millions to promote a new product called Oat Brits? He's hoping we've retained enough of the cholesterol paranoia that started in the 1980s to shift from our decades-long addiction to wheat and corn in the morning. But Uncle Toby is pushing fibre uphill. He'll never replace the mighty rectangle.

Consider this Nielsen chart of market share in the cereal business ...
What Australians eat for breakfast: 1 Weet-Bix 8.7 per cent; 2 Kellogg's Nutri-Grain 7.2; 3 Uncle Toby's Plus 5.4; 4 Kellogg's Just Right 4.9; 5 Kellogg's Coco Pops 3.8; 6 Kellogg's Special K 4.4; 7 Kellogg's Sultana Bran 4.4; 8 Sanitarium Up & Go 4.2; 9 Kellogg's Corn Flakes 3.7; Kellogg's Crunchy Nut 2.5.

So entrenched are the breakfast habits of Australians that there's been very little change in that chart for 20 years, apart from a slow decline for Corn Flakes and the arrival last year of Up & Go, which is simply Weet-Bix in liquid form.

(If you want to know the rest of the Aussie morning ritual - most of us cover our cereal with Pura or Paul's milk, throw down a glass of Berri or Golden Circle fruit juice, spread Vegemite on a slice of Wonder White, and wash it all down with a cup of Nescafe Blend 43).

Despite the homely sounding name, Uncle Toby's is owned by one of the world's biggest food companies - Cereal Partners, a consortium of America's General Mills and Europe's Nestle. Kellogg's is American, of course. Weet-Bix is Australian-owned - produced by Sanitarium, a branch of the Seventh Day Adventist Church.

It seems odd that a church would be in the food business until you learn why breakfast cereal was invented in the first place: to stop the sin of masturbation.

When Dr John Kellogg became superintendent of the Seventh Day Adventist Western Health Reform Institute in Battle Creek, Michigan in 1876, he found that the patients were prone to all manner of unhealthy practices, according to his view of the world. He concluded this was because they were not regular.

The answer, he declared, lay in starting the day with high fibre. By toasting blobs of maize hash, he created a product he called Corn Flakes, and by shredding and compressing wheat, he created rectangles he called Granose. His brother Will Kellogg formed a company in 1906 to market the vision to the world (with added sugar).

One of Dr John's disciples at the Institute was a young Australian Adventist minister named Willy White. He returned to Melbourne in 1898 and set up the Sanitarium Health Food Agency, which started making corn flakes and granose. After Kelloggs started in Australia in 1924, Sanitarium changed the name of its shredded wheat rectangles to Weet-Bix, and became Australia's biggest competitor to the US company which had provided its inspiration.

With all the effort now put in by Sanitarium, Kelloggs, and Uncle Toby's to ensure our morning regularity, it's a wonder there's a single masturbator left on this continent.

Can Uncle Toby succeed?

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in Who We Are at 10:02 AM
• Comments (30)

The ratings race: Week 34

This blog is now a heritage item -- worth studying but not the latest word on the subject. For this week's discussion, go to www.smh.com.au/tribalmind.

To discover the real reading habits of Australians, go to The Tribal Mind

What Australia watched, Saturday
1. Seven news (7) 1.31m
2. Australia's Funniest Homne Videos (9) 1.14m
3. Saturday night AFL (10) 1.07m s 182,000, M 437,000, B 103,000, A 202,000, P 147,000.
4. Nine news (9) 1.02m
5. Ten news (10) 980,000.
8. Dr Who (ABC) 865,000.
12. The Bill (ABC), for Daniel, who probably isn't even reading any more, let alone watching, 638,000.
14. Die Hard (7) 581,000.
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

At this point in the week, the prime time average audience shares stand at: Seven 28.8 per cent, Nine 26.5, Ten 23.2, ABC 16.3, SBS 5.3.

What Australia watched, Friday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,427,000 362,000 373,000 296,000 171,000 225,000
2 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,247,000 369,000 321,000 237,000 143,000 176,000
3 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,209,000 379,000 278,000 238,000 118,000 195,000
4 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,149,000 411,000 379,000 240,000 119,000
5 NINE NEWS Nine 1,128,000 316,000 323,000 249,000 126,000 114,000
6 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,064,000 266,000 328,000 247,000 102,000 121,000
7 TEMPTATION Nine 1,047,000 246,000 377,000 205,000 109,000 111,000
9 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 21: ST KILDA V WEST COAST Seven 951,000 24,000 443,000 20,000 178,000 285,000
12 BRIDGET JONES: THE EDGE OF REASON RPT Ten 791,000 190,000 274,000 110,000 93,000 125,000
14 NEIGHBOURS Ten 733,000 158,000 233,000 158,000 69,000 115,000
19 JAMIE AT HOME FRI Ten 652,000 122,000 227,000 142,000 61,000 100,000
20 NINE'S LIVE FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 635,000 376,000 259,000
21 IT'S ME OR THE DOG FRI Ten 624,000 123,000 205,000 112,000 69,000 115,000
33 NINE'S FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 369,000 224,000 144,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

The daily media report by David Dale, updated 10 am Friday
Maybe Lisa McCune needs to show more cleavage. Last night The Ghost Whisperer, starring the queen of cleavage, Jennifer Love Hewitt, drew 1.2 million viewers to Seven at 7.30, and a million of them hung around at 8.30 to see the new anatomical program Fight For Life. So Sea Patrol lost 100,000 viewers.

Channel Nine still rules the waves on Thursday, but its winning margin over Seven is shrinking (as opposed to Hewitt's cleavage.)
What Australia watched, Thursday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEA PATROL Nine 1,477,000 458,000 410,000 272,000 187,000 150,000
2 GETAWAY Nine 1,409,000 392,000 400,000 298,000 145,000 175,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,397,000 366,000 344,000 297,000 168,000 223,000
4 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,369,000 398,000 357,000 276,000 156,000 182,000
5 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,336,000 344,000 333,000 274,000 183,000 203,000
6 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,191,000 288,000 398,000 272,000 104,000 129,000
7 NINE NEWS Nine 1,185,000 306,000 372,000 287,000 116,000 104,000
8 GHOST WHISPERER Seven 1,177,000 343,000 344,000 229,000 126,000 134,000
11 THE FOOTY SHOW Nine 1,071,000 281,000 431,000 127,000 116,000 117,000
12 FIGHT FOR LIFE Seven 1,030,000 273,000 320,000 175,000 113,000 148,000
13 LAW & ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT RPT Ten 1,002,000 252,000 313,000 197,000 100,000 139,000
15 LAW & ORDER THURS Ten 912,000 251,000 268,000 177,000 95,000 121,000
19 PRINCE CHARLES AND PRINCE WILLIAM ABC 837,000 241,000 283,000 152,000 67,000 94,000
23 NEIGHBOURS Ten 757,000 169,000 242,000 152,000 95,000 98,000
25 THE TIME OF YOUR LIFE Seven 665,000 204,000 200,000 94,000 75,000 92,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

The daily media report by David Dale, updated 10 am Thursday
Give them a reason, and Australians will come back to television. Kath and Kim was the first reason this week, and Thank God You're Here last night was the second. A mid-season record 2.05 million stayed with the comedians-in-crisis for an hour, creating a mystery which only the expert readers of this column can solve: what was it about last night that suddenly caused 200,000 more people than last week to switch to Channel Ten at 7.30? And then, why didn't 300,000 of TGYH's viewers hang around to watch House? We'd love to hear your theories, below.

Ten won last night, of course, and at this point in the week, the average prime time audience shares stand at: Seven 28.7 per cent, Nine 25.5 per cent, Ten 23.9, ABC 16.8, SBS 5.1.

What Australia watched, Wednesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 2,050,000 531,000 732,000 351,000 211,000 225,000
2 HOUSE Ten 1,698,000 463,000 529,000 264,000 228,000 214,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,515,000 402,000 394,000 286,000 161,000 272,000
4 TEMPTATION Nine 1,359,000 337,000 446,000 299,000 124,000 154,000
5 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,322,000 344,000 382,000 255,000 133,000 208,000
6 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,321,000 400,000 319,000 254,000 130,000 219,000
7 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,279,000 351,000 416,000 271,000 123,000 118,000
8 NINE NEWS Nine 1,238,000 360,000 376,000 255,000 131,000 115,000
9 RPA Nine 1,217,000 357,000 384,000 240,000 111,000 124,000
10 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,211,000 328,000 397,000 225,000 128,000 133,000
11 ABC NEWS ABC 1,092,000 306,000 346,000 199,000 114,000 127,000
12 WITHOUT A TRACE Nine 1,088,000 323,000 334,000 188,000 126,000 117,000
13 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,072,000 278,000 304,000 216,000 135,000 139,000
14 MOST SHOCKING Seven 1,055,000 260,000 289,000 213,000 115,000 178,000
15 THE CHASER'S WAR ON REPEATS ABC 968,000 265,000 338,000 170,000 93,000 102,000

What Australia watched, Tuesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,734,000 511,000 488,000 344,000 172,000 219,000
2 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,697,000 441,000 530,000 327,000 173,000 227,000
3 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,451,000 376,000 420,000 288,000 172,000 197,000
4 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,441,000 357,000 409,000 293,000 175,000 205,000
5 TEMPTATION Nine 1,354,000 373,000 414,000 267,000 146,000 154,000
6 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,341,000 410,000 416,000 208,000 135,000 171,000
7 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,307,000 375,000 349,000 276,000 119,000 187,000
8 NINE NEWS Nine 1,273,000 318,000 428,000 273,000 135,000 118,000
9 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,248,000 334,000 370,000 274,000 126,000 143,000
10 THE SIMPSONS TUES EP 2 Ten 1,233,000 272,000 492,000 167,000 169,000 133,000

The daily media report by David Dale, updated 10 am Tuesday
At this point in the ratings week, Seven is averaging 30.2 per cent of the prime time audience, with Nine on 23.9, Ten on 21.6, ABC on 18.9 and SBS on 5.5. Here's a sampling of shows in which readers of this blog have expressed interest. Feel free to ask about any we failed to mention ...

What Australia watched, Monday
1. Border Security Seven 1.656m
2. Seven News Seven 1.605
3. Australian Idol Ten 1.565
4. Today Tonight Seven 1.442
5. Home and Away Seven 1.390
6. A Current Affair Nine 1.318
7. Nine News Nine 1.305
8. Surf Patrol Seven 1.267
9. Temptation Nine 1.254
10. Criminal Minds Seven 1.229
11. ABC News ABC 1.147
12. Enough Rope with Andrew Denton ABC 1.104
13. 1 vs 100 Nine 0.969
14. Law and Order: SVU - Episode 1 Ten 0.966
21 Top Gear SBS 0.788
22 E.R. Nine 0.779
27 Shark Seven 0.711
30 Boston Legal Seven 0.542
39 Marx & Venus SBS 366,000
41 Footy Classified Nine 360,000 227,000 74,000 59,000
42 South Park rpt SBS 342,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

To register your prediction for the election and beyond, go to The foretelling.

Updated 9.30 am Monday
They not only topped the ratings on Sunday night -- they brought back to television nearly a million people who had apparently given up watching this year. The audience for the commercial debut of Kath and Kim was 2.5 million -- more than they've ever managed before (their record on the ABC was 2.09 million) and more than any program in the ratings year so far.

To compare their performance with previous TV records, go to The TV shows Australia loved. And give us your theory below on what it is about K&K that so appeals to Australians. Will they hold that audience for every episode?

What Australia watched, Sunday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 KATH & KIM Seven 2,521,000 674,000 876,000 418,000 260,000 294,000
2 MY NAME IS EARL Seven 1,667,000 438,000 601,000 285,000 165,000 179,000
3 SEVEN NEWS - SUN Seven 1,650,000 331,000 488,000 355,000 190,000 286,000
4 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 1,428,000 414,000 438,000 240,000 155,000 180,000
5 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,421,000 415,000 422,000 266,000 167,000 151,000
6 AUSTRALIAN IDOL - TOP 100 Ten 1,415,000 441,000 412,000 239,000 153,000 171,000
7 CSI Nine 1,373,000 395,000 394,000 272,000 158,000 155,000
8 AUSTRALIA'S BEST BACKYARDS Seven 1,267,000 351,000 445,000 252,000 219,000
9 HOT PROPERTY Seven 1,231,000 377,000 435,000 236,000 183,000
10 M-MEET THE FOCKERS Seven 1,223,000 337,000 453,000 178,000 131,000 124,000
11 BACKYARD BLITZ Nine 1,155,000 309,000 323,000 233,000 144,000 146,000
14 60 MINUTES Nine 1,134,000 319,000 307,000 245,000 127,000 136,000
23 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 20: KANGAROOS V GEELONG Seven 643,000 93,000 326,000 89,000 136,000
25 THE WEDGE EP 1 Ten 529,000 168,000 167,000 72,000 53,000 69,000
31 NINE'S SUNDAY FOOTBALL Nine 412,000 247,000 144,000 20,000

Updated 6pm Sunday
Channel Seven really needs Kath and Kim to work for it on Sunday nights, because it is suffering serious slippage in audience. Last week's season final of Grey's Anatomy should have done a lot better than 1.3 million (last year it got 1.8 million) and the new American legal series Shark should not be getting beaten on Mondays by Andrew Denton, 940,000 to 708,000.

As Seven sinks, Nine slowly rises, particularly with Sydney viewers. An ancient episode of Backyard Blitz, starring Seven's new poster boy Jamie Durie, jumped into the top ten last week, suggesting that not every geriatric turns to the ABC on Sunday, while Sea Patrol defied the critics' predictions and retained its 1.6 million on Thursday. Seven averaged 27.8 per cent of the prime time audience for the week, with Nine on 27.1, Ten on 23.3, ABC on 16.6 and SBS on 5.2.

There's no chance of Nine winning the year, but the race is going to be a lot closer than it looked in the first half. This column has remarked before on how the fortunes of Seven seem to follow the fortunes of Kevin Rudd, while Nine reflects John Howard. As go the opinion polls, so go the ratings. Go to The Tribal Mind to examine those parallels.

What Australia watched, week ending August18
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 1,785,000 464,000 589,000 300,000 197,000 235,000
2 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,734,000 479,000 543,000 318,000 166,000 229,000
3 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,731,000 487,000 515,000 329,000 168,000 231,000
4 HOUSE Ten 1,646,000 482,000 422,000 300,000 200,000 242,000
5 BORDER SECURITY Seven 1,616,000 485,000 438,000 266,000 167,000 260,000
6 SEVEN NEWS - SUN Seven 1,608,000 370,000 433,000 342,000 157,000 306,000
7 SEA PATROL Nine 1,586,000 448,000 517,000 268,000 184,000 169,000
8 AUSTRALIAN IDOL - AUDITION 3 Ten 1,584,000 502,000 486,000 230,000 199,000 167,000
9 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,561,000 466,000 492,000 284,000 193,000 127,000
10 BACKYARD BLITZ Nine 1,498,000 398,000 449,000 280,000 194,000 178,000
11 AUSTRALIAN IDOL - AUDITION 4 Ten 1,474,000 469,000 408,000 225,000 194,000 178,000
12 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,470,000 405,000 374,000 246,000 185,000 259,000
13 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,461,000 429,000 457,000 235,000 148,000 191,000
14 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 1,435,000 400,000 479,000 217,000 165,000 173,000
15 GETAWAY Nine 1,383,000 386,000 470,000 229,000 145,000 153,000
16 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,377,000 366,000 369,000 237,000 178,000 227,000
17 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,370,000 446,000 409,000 194,000 130,000 191,000
18 60 MINUTES Nine 1,350,000 311,000 435,000 259,000 148,000 197,000
19 M-THE INCREDIBLES Seven 1,347,000 336,000 407,000 256,000 123,000 226,000
20 NCIS Ten 1,320,000 326,000 431,000 231,000 190,000 142,000
21 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,313,000 388,000 338,000 252,000 137,000 198,000
22 GREY'S ANATOMY Seven 1,291,000 373,000 409,000 207,000 139,000 163,000
23 THE WORST JOBS IN HISTORY ABC 1,283,000 392,000 421,000 196,000 134,000 140,000
24 SURF PATROL Seven 1,262,000 351,000 377,000 203,000 128,000 203,000
25 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,260,000 357,000 419,000 221,000 149,000 115,000
26 CRIMINAL MINDS Seven 1,258,000 301,000 408,000 195,000 163,000 192,000
27 NINE NEWS Nine 1,222,000 333,000 375,000 261,000 147,000 107,000
28 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,212,000 323,000 387,000 256,000 130,000 116,000
29 ABC NEWS-SUN ABC 1,195,000 330,000 381,000 209,000 123,000 151,000
30 NINE NEWS SATURDAY Nine 1,171,000 346,000 336,000 255,000 150,000 84,000
31 CSI Nine 1,166,000 362,000 330,000 198,000 148,000 128,000
32 TEMPTATION Nine 1,165,000 301,000 385,000 221,000 134,000 123,000
33 SEVEN NEWS - SAT Seven 1,163,000 301,000 334,000 250,000 137,000 141,000
34 CRIME INVESTIGATION AUSTRALIA Nine 1,131,000 384,000 349,000 173,000 116,000 109,000
35 COLD CASE Nine 1,117,000 327,000 344,000 224,000 106,000 117,000
36 AUSTRALIA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEO SHOW Nine 1,113,000 308,000 376,000 183,000 115,000 130,000
37 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,083,000 279,000 289,000 237,000 138,000 141,000
38 WITHOUT A TRACE Nine 1,079,000 332,000 313,000 195,000 128,000 111,000
39 ABC NEWS-Mon-Fri ABC 1,075,000 306,000 344,000 182,000 111,000 132,000
40 1 VS 100 Nine 1,064,000 334,000 330,000 171,000 113,000 117,000
41 THINGS TO TRY BEFORE YOU DIE Nine 1,063,000 317,000 320,000 180,000 118,000 127,000
(OzTAM mainland capitals)

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). For further observations of Australian attitudes and behaviour, go to www.smh.com.au/tribalmind.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 08:03 AM
• Comments (173)

The Tribal Mind: We are what we read

by David Dale
Conventional wisdom has it that Australians don't do much reading for entertainment. While we can read -- we're the most literate society on the planet -- most of us choose not to, instead wasting our time with television, DVDs, video games, and the internet. Or so the theory goes.

Fortuitously, some statistics have fallen into this column's hands, from ACNielsen and the Audit Bureau of Circulations, which allow us to examine this theory.

What Australians have been reading in the past month:
1 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 800,000 copies;
2 The Sunday Telegraph, Sydney 671,500 copies a week (down 2 per cent on six months ago);
3 The Sunday Herald Sun, Melbourne 620,000 (up 1 per cent);
4 Women's Weekly 605,000 (unchanged);
5 The Sunday Mail, Brisbane 592,500 (down 1.5%);
6 The Herald Sun Mon-Fri, Melbourne 535,000 (unchanged);
7 The Herald Sun Saturday, Melbourne 513,000 (up 1%);
8 The Sun-Herald, Sydney 505,000 (down 1%);
9 Woman's Day 480,500 (down 5%);
10 The Daily Telegraph Monday to Friday, Sydney 392,000 (unchanged);
11 New Idea 391,500 (down 1%);
12 The Sydney Morning Herald Saturday 364,000 (up 1%);
13 The West Australian Saturday, Perth 357,000 (unchanged);
14 Readers Digest 352,000 (down 2 %);
15 The Daily Telegraph Saturday, Sydney 340,000 (down 1 per cent).

Numbers around 600,000 may not sound huge by comparison with the 2.5 million who watched Kath and Kim on Channel Seven last Sunday night, but consider the context. TV ratings figures are calculated by adding together the estimated audience in five mainland capitals. If you combine newspaper sales on a Sunday in those same capitals, you get 3.1 million. So 600,000 more Australians buy a Sunday paper every week than watched the most popular TV show of the year.

Steve Allen, who runs Fusion media consultancy, told his clients last week that Australia is "among the biggest newspaper reading nations of the world ... The overall pattern for a decade or so is a slow, gentle, decline of around 1 per cent per annum. Australia is still outperforming nearly all other major world markets.''

And that's just newspapers. On a Monday, 2 million people buy a weekly magazine -- Woman's Day, New Idea, NW, That's Life, OK!, Who Weekly, Famous etc. By comparison, the most watched TV show on a Monday, Border Security, has an audience of 1.6 million.

You may not have a high opinion of the kind of journalism that Australians encounter in those weekly magazines, but at least they are reading. Just this once, conventional wisdom has it wrong.

What do you make of Australia's reading habits?

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 06:08 PM
• Comments (26)

WHO WE ARE: The drink we have when we're having a drink

A column about Australia by David Dale, published in The Sun-Herald, 19/8/2007
The left of the Labor party and the right of the Liberal party are united in a strange delusion - they think we're a nation of beer swiggers and tea sippers. They use "chardonnay socialists" and "the latte set" as insulting synonyms for minorities whose views are not worthy of consideration because they are not part of The Real Australia.

They want us to believe that anyone who consumes a white wine named after a particular grape, or a coffee with an Italian name, must be a wanker - downright unAustralian. But as Daryl Kerrigan would say, tell them they're dreamin. Or, as Skyhooks would sing, they're livin in the 70s.

Here in the late Noughties, our national drinks are cappuccino and chardonnay. Tea lost its battle for our hearts and tongues long ago -- coffee consumption on the way up passed tea consumption on the way down in 1979. And on present trends, wine consumption on the way up will pass beer consumption on the way down in 2009.

Back in the early 80s, Australia was the third biggest consumer of beer per capita in the world (after Germany and Belgium). Now we're the ninth biggest beer consumer (with the Czech republic on top). Over the past 30 years we've nearly halved our beer consumption and nearly doubled our wine consumption.

The average adult Australian drinks five glasses of wine a week. Two of these are red and three are white. And two of the three whites are chardonnays.

These were the top selling whites of the past 12 months: 1 Jacob's Creek chardonnay; 2 Brown Brothers crouchen/reisling; 3 Houghton Smooth Dry White; 4 Oyster Bay sauvignon blanc; 5 Queen Adelaide chardonnay; 6 Wolf Blass Eaglehawk chardonnay; 7 Lindeman's Bin B65 chardonnay; 8 McWilliams Inheritance Fruitwood sauterne; 9 Evans and Tate Margaret River classic; 10 Wolf Blass Red label chardonnay.

I should explain at this point that I'm not devoting today's column to chardonnay because it's my favourite drop (pinot grigio is my preference). I'm telling its story to demonstrate the speed of social change in this country.

Thirty years ago there was no chardonnay planted in commercial quantities (our favourite white then was Ben Ean Moselle, made of muscat, gordo and sultana). Now it's our most grown grape -- 450,000 tonnes harvested a year (compared with 440,000 tonnes of shiraz and 40,000 tonnes of sauvignon blanc).

In the mid 1970s, a Perth businessman named Denis Horgan hired the Californian winemaker Robert Mondavi to turn a Margaret River cattle property called Leeuwin Estate into a vineyard. Mondavi planted his favourite French grape, fermenting it with a special yeast he'd brought from the Napa Valley and ageing it in oak casks.

The first release of this rare drop in the early 1980s coincided with the rise of the "greed is good" decade, when businessmen were desperate to show off wealth they didn't actually have. Horgan found he could charge whatever he liked for Mondavi's creation. Other winemakers frantically started planting chardonnay and copying the oaky buttery style. By the late 1990s chardonnay had spread from the posh restaurants of the inner city to the bottle shops of the outer suburbs.

So the Labor left and the Liberal right need to find a new term of abuse. Chardonnay has changed from an elite indulgence to the taste of Australia.

Can you explain the mystery: what is it about this particular wine that so appeals to us?

And in case you'd like to know, these are the top selling reds in Australia: 1 De Bortoli Sacred Hill cabernet merlot; 2 Jacob's Creek shiraz cabernet; 3 Brown Brothers dolcetto; 4 Penfold's Koonunga Hill shiraz cabernet; 5 Wolf Blass Red Label shiraz cabernet.

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in Who We Are at 06:32 AM
• Comments (42)

The ratings race: Week 33

To find out how Bruce Willis is going against Homer Simpson, go to The box office.

David Dale's daily media report, updated 10 am Sunday
Australians become boring people on Friday and Saturday nights. Or at least, the kind of Australians who stay home and watch the box on those nights must be boring people -- devoted to sport, news, and home renovations, apparently. Or could it be that the stations don't bother to try anything challenging, because they stereotype Friday and Saturday viewers as boring people?

At the end of the ratings week, Seven ended up averaging 27.8 per cent of the prime time audience, with Nine on 27.1, Ten on 23.3, ABC on 16.6 and SBS on 5.2.

We'd love to hear your predictions on how many viewers in the mainland capitals will watch the premiere of Kath and Kim on Seven tonight.

What Australia watched, Saturday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 NINE NEWS SATURDAY Nine 1,171,000 346,000 336,000 255,000 150,000 84,000
2 SEVEN NEWS - SAT Seven 1,163,000 301,000 334,000 250,000 137,000 141,000
3 AUSTRALIA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEO SHOW Nine 1,113,000 308,000 376,000 183,000 115,000 130,000
4 FORREST GUMP -RPT Nine 1,018,000 329,000 305,000 167,000 101,000 116,000
5 SATURDAY NIGHT AFL Ten 986,000 169,000 347,000 127,000 117,000 225,000
6 THE GREAT OUTDOORS Seven 982,000 268,000 278,000 214,000 120,000 102,000
7 THE DAME EDNA TREATMENT Nine 935,000 289,000 308,000 150,000 95,000 93,000
10 DOCTOR WHO ABC 790,000 201,000 250,000 168,000 82,000 89,000
12 THE BILL ABC 667,000 162,000 218,000 120,000 73,000 96,000
13 SATURDAY AFTERNOON AFL Ten 583,000 47,000 202,000 58,000 90,000 185,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

What Australia watched, Friday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,461,000 429,000 457,000 235,000 148,000 191,000
2 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,378,000 374,000 367,000 211,000 175,000 250,000
3 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,268,000 331,000 341,000 218,000 188,000 190,000
4 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,166,000 357,000 279,000 227,000 125,000 178,000
5 TEMPTATION Nine 1,136,000 318,000 352,000 199,000 128,000 139,000
6 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,097,000 312,000 353,000 206,000 109,000 117,000
7 NINE NEWS Nine 1,085,000 326,000 323,000 229,000 120,000 87,000
8 THE BOURNE SUPREMACY RPT Ten 1,000,000 223,000 342,000 165,000 130,000 139,000
9 ABC NEWS ABC 969,000 251,000 321,000 165,000 90,000 142,000
10 SILENT WITNESS ABC 968,000 264,000 283,000 167,000 101,000 153,000
15 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 20: COLLINGWOOD V MELBOURNE Seven 775,000 16,000 477,000 14,000 132,000 137,000
19 NINE'S LIVE FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 634,000 354,000 280,000
20 IT'S ME OR THE DOG Ten 603,000 145,000 200,000 105,000 71,000 82,000
21 JAMIE AT HOME FRI Ten 588,000 121,000 214,000 84,000 78,000 91,000
28 NINE'S FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 398,000 256,000 142,000
Updated 10 am Friday
Channel Seven started the week a winner, but after Ten stole Seven's younger viewers on Wednesday, and Nine stole everybody on Thursday, the average prime time audience shares stand at: Seven 27.4 per cent, Nine 27.0 per cent, Ten 23.5, ABC 16.8, SBS 5.2.

What Australia watched, Thursday
WednesdayDescription Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEA PATROL Nine 1,581,000 446,000 516,000 267,000 184,000 169,000
2 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,488,000 427,000 377,000 245,000 193,000 246,000
3 GETAWAY Nine 1,380,000 384,000 470,000 230,000 144,000 153,000
4 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,377,000 388,000 367,000 255,000 172,000 194,000
5 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,317,000 390,000 348,000 268,000 148,000 163,000
6 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,194,000 307,000 401,000 245,000 131,000 110,000
7 TEMPTATION Nine 1,167,000 281,000 424,000 211,000 128,000 123,000
8 NINE NEWS Nine 1,144,000 298,000 377,000 230,000 137,000 103,000
9 THAT '70S SHOW Seven 1,052,000 266,000 309,000 205,000 128,000 144,000
10 LAW & ORDER THURS Ten 1,050,000 288,000 285,000 225,000 118,000 135,000
17 LAS VEGAS Seven 849,000 239,000 240,000 149,000 106,000 115,000
22 NEIGHBOURS Ten 806,000 202,000 265,000 126,000 106,000 107,000
27 INSPECTOR REX RPT SBS 468,000 126,000 153,000 82,000 54,000 54,000
31 MARK PHILIPPOUSSIS' AGE OF LOVE Seven 418,000 144,000 138,000 48,000 43,000 45,000

What Australia watched, Wednesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 1,785,000 464,000 589,000 300,000 197,000 235,000
2 HOUSE Ten 1,646,000 482,000 422,000 300,000 200,000 242,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,505,000 389,000 383,000 272,000 184,000 276,000
4 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,318,000 333,000 349,000 216,000 183,000 237,000
5 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,303,000 372,000 336,000 242,000 144,000 209,000
6 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,267,000 357,000 423,000 222,000 150,000 114,000
7 NINE NEWS Nine 1,260,000 353,000 369,000 282,000 150,000 106,000
8 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,227,000 303,000 387,000 297,000 128,000 112,000
11 COLD CASE Nine 1,122,000 327,000 344,000 225,000 108,000 117,000
12 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,083,000 278,000 290,000 236,000 139,000 140,000
13 WITHOUT A TRACE Nine 1,079,000 333,000 313,000 195,000 127,000 112,000
16 THE CHASER'S WAR ON REPEATS ABC 902,000 268,000 289,000 150,000 91,000 105,000
17 LAW & ORDER Ten 887,000 197,000 272,000 180,000 115,000 124,000
20 NEIGHBOURS Ten 861,000 232,000 268,000 147,000 102,000 112,000
34 THE NATION Nine 413,000 111,000 137,000 77,000 48,000 40,000
36 SUNRISE Seven 392,000 146,000 85,000 82,000 41,000 39,000
39 AT THE MOVIES ABC 372,000 129,000 121,000 66,000 25,000 31,000
45 BINDI: THE JUNGLE GIRL-PM ABC 329,000 101,000 85,000 77,000 35,000 32,000
54 TODAY Nine 259,000 76,000 78,000 50,000 22,000 33,000
71 DATELINE SBS 206,000 84,000 59,000 36,000 11,000 18,000
74 THE MORNING SHOW Seven 197,000 72,000 42,000 45,000 15,000 23,000
106 9AM WITH DAVID & KIM Ten 94,000 20,000 32,000 13,000 14,000 15,000

Updated 10 am Wednesday
Once again it was a night of those pseudo-docos for which The Tribal Mind is seeking a label -- intrusivision, opdocs, voyeurtainment, and excrementaries are among the 109 suggestions received from readers so far (click here for that discussion).

Seven soared with Medical Emergency and RSPCA Animal Rescue, while Nine was comfortable with Crime Investigation Australia, which it purchased from Foxtel and which brings Steve Leibman back to mainstream television. Seven won the night and at this point in the week is averaging 28.9 per cent of the prime time audience, while Nine is on 25.7, Ten on 22.4, ABC on 17.4, and SBS on 5.5.

Ten will win tonight, Nine will win tomorrow night, and the suspense will be concentrated on Friday and Saturday. This page is updated seven days a week, so you'll know at 10 am Saturday which form of footy helped which network, and on Sunday if Forrest Gump can clinch it for Nine.

What Australia watched, Tuesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,734,000 479,000 543,000 318,000 166,000 229,000
2 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,731,000 487,000 515,000 329,000 168,000 231,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,466,000 422,000 365,000 246,000 185,000 249,000
4 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,459,000 377,000 405,000 250,000 178,000 249,000
5 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,372,000 377,000 379,000 276,000 126,000 214,000
6 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,370,000 446,000 409,000 194,000 130,000 191,000
7 NCIS Ten 1,320,000 326,000 431,000 231,000 190,000 142,000
8 NINE NEWS Nine 1,221,000 302,000 404,000 243,000 159,000 112,000
10 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,207,000 307,000 397,000 240,000 145,000 118,000
12 CRIME INVESTIGATION AUSTRALIA Nine 1,126,000 378,000 348,000 174,000 116,000 110,000
13 THINGS TO TRY BEFORE YOU DIE Nine 1,049,000 312,000 319,000 176,000 116,000 127,000
25 THE BILL-TU ABC 678,000 200,000 214,000 111,000 68,000 85,000
28 SOUTH SIDE STORY ABC 610,000 257,000 131,000 95,000 56,000 70,000
What Australia watched, Monday
1. Border Security Seven 1.616m
2. Seven News Seven 1.514
3. Today Tonight Seven 1.453
4. Australian Idol Ten 1.449
5. Home and Away Seven 1.412
6. Nine News Nine 1.372
7. A Current Affair Nine 1.349
8. Surf Patrol Seven 1.262
9. Criminal Minds Seven 1.258
10. Temptation Nine 1.195
11. Law and Order: SVU Ten 1.074
12. 1 vs 100 Nine 1.053
13. ABC News ABC 1.014
14. Enough Rope with Andrew Denton ABC 0.940
15. Deal or No Deal Seven 0.904
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

The daily media report by David Dale, updated 10 am Monday
Conventional wisdom is that movies don't do well on Sunday nights, because most people have already seen them at the cinema or on DVD. Conventional wisdom is that Channel Nine wins Sundays when it follows 60 Minutes with a new episode of CSI and when Ten's Australian Idol steals younger viewers from Seven.

Last night's prime time audience shares were: Seven 26.8 per cent, NIne 26.4, Ten 20.4, ABC 21.9 and SBS 4.4. The explanation for this unusual result is in the table below.

Last week Channel Ten rebounded from the humiliation that was Big Brother and tore younger viewers away from Channel Seven with Australian Idol, Thank God You're Here and House. The ABC is tearing older viewers away from both Seven and Nine with Midsomer Murders, and The Worst Jobs in History.

The result of this healthy competition was the closest-run week of the year, barely won by Seven with 27.6 per cent of the prime time audience, to Nine's 27.0, Ten's 23.1, ABC's 17.3 and SBS's 5.0. And Nine had the biggest share in Sydney and Melbourne, where it counts.

What Australia watched, Sunday
1. Seven News Seven 1.589m
2. Australian Idol Ten 1.583
3. Nine News Nine 1.560
4. Backyard Blitz Nine 1.498
5. Midsomer Murders ABC 1.432
6. Movie: The Incredibles Seven 1.358
7. 60 Minutes Nine 1.346
8. The Worst Jobs In History ABC 1.279
9. Grey's Anatomy Seven 1.267
10. ABC News ABC 1.194
11. CSI Nine 1.166
12. Rove Ten 1.020
13. CSI: NY Nine 1.008
14. The Einstein Factor ABC 0.900
15. Diana: Her Last 10 Days in Pictures Seven 0.778
21 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 19: GEELONG V ADELAIDE Seven 615,000 S61,000 M301,000 A59,000 B194,000 not shown in Perth
22 The Wedge Ep 1 Ten 587,000
23 The Wedge Ep 2 Ten 562,000
24 Survivor: Fiji Nine 521,000
27 NINE'S SUNDAY FOOTBALL Nine 453,000 S245,000 B197,000 P11,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Most watched shows on Pay TV last week
1 LIVE: NRL DRAGONS V RABBITOHS FOX Sports 3 218,000
2 LIVE & ACTIVE: AFL WEST COAST V FREMANTLE FOX Sports 1 203,000
3 LIVE: NRL SHARKS V STORM FOX Sports 3 172,000
4 LIVE: NRL ROOSTERS V WARRIORS FOX Sports 3 165,000
5 LIVE: AFL SYDNEY V ST KILDA FOX Sports 1 150,000
6 LIVE: NRL WARRIORS V TITANS FOX Sports 3 135,000
7 LIVE: AFL HAWTHORN V BRISBANE LIONS FOX Sports 1 124,000
8 LIVE: AFL MELBOURNE V SYDNEY FOX Sports 1 118,000
9 Movie: CARS Disney Channel 108,000
10 NRL EELS V SHARKS FOX Sports 3 84,000
(OzTAM)

What Australia watched, week ending August 11
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 1,876,000 506,000 650,000 305,000 217,000 198,000
2 BORDER SECURITY Seven 1,828,000 515,000 482,000 339,000 193,000 300,000
3 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,684,000 474,000 478,000 340,000 136,000 256,000
4 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,664,000 442,000 513,000 332,000 149,000 229,000
5 AUSTRALIAN IDOL - AUDITION 1 Ten 1,649,000 462,000 536,000 281,000 211,000 158,000
6 SEVEN NEWS - SUN Seven 1,601,000 387,000 429,000 339,000 154,000 292,000
7 SEA PATROL Nine 1,581,000 464,000 471,000 281,000 189,000 176,0008 HOUSE Ten 1,578,000 459,000 436,000 272,000 181,000 230,000
9 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,520,000 471,000 469,000 290,000 198,000 93,000
10 SURF PATROL Seven 1,462,000 390,000 427,000 274,000 154,000 217,000
11 AUSTRALIAN IDOL - AUDITION 2 Ten 1,455,000 391,000 461,000 249,000 171,000 183,000
12 GETAWAY Nine 1,452,000 418,000 443,000 260,000 158,000 173,000
13 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,444,000 374,000 379,000 259,000 185,000 247,000
14 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,426,000 439,000 456,000 220,000 123,000 188,000
15 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 1,423,000 408,000 428,000 231,000 159,000 197,000
16 60 MINUTES Nine 1,405,000 351,000 418,000 289,000 167,000 180,000
17 AUSTRALIA'S BEST BACKYARDS Seven 1,387,000 352,000 428,000 249,000 140,000 218,000
18 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,345,000 400,000 380,000 259,000 123,000 183,000
19 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,337,000 348,000 369,000 247,000 167,000 206,000
20 HOT PROPERTY Seven 1,322,000 343,000 383,000 238,000 163,000 194,000
21 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,310,000 379,000 325,000 261,000 133,000 212,000
22 CRIMINAL MINDS Seven 1,295,000 325,000 378,000 252,000 161,000 179,000
23 THE SIMPSONS TUES Ten 1,278,000 280,000 475,000 203,000 167,000 153,000
24 NCIS Ten 1,274,000 304,000 403,000 216,000 179,000 173,000
25 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,268,000 368,000 370,000 228,000 176,000 126,000
26 THE ALL NEW SIMPSONS Ten 1,267,000 284,000 463,000 206,000 164,000 150,000
27 THE WORST JOBS IN HISTORY ABC 1,255,000 385,000 411,000 182,000 137,000 140,000
28 GREY'S ANATOMY Seven 1,249,000 373,000 360,000 210,000 125,000 180,000
29 SEVEN NEWS - SAT Seven 1,248,000 335,000 332,000 226,000 132,000 223,000
30 COLD CASE Nine 1,242,000 368,000 400,000 221,000 125,000 128,000
31 BACKYARD BLITZ Nine 1,219,000 336,000 376,000 227,000 163,000 117,000
32 NINE NEWS Nine 1,211,000 345,000 375,000 251,000 140,000 99,000
33 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,167,000 314,000 373,000 233,000 132,000 115,000
34 1 VS 100 Nine 1,165,000 336,000 373,000 182,000 146,000 129,000
35 TEMPTATION Nine 1,162,000 298,000 394,000 219,000 130,000 120,000
36 AUSTRALIA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEO SHOW Nine 1,161,000 286,000 344,000 204,000 155,000 174,000
37 ABC NEWS-SUN ABC 1,155,000 344,000 355,000 192,000 126,000 138,000
38 NINE NEWS SATURDAY Nine 1,122,000 340,000 359,000 190,000 133,000 100,000
39 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,074,000 288,000 297,000 211,000 145,000 133,000
40 ABC NEWS ABC 1,068,000 306,000 340,000 170,000 108,000 144,000

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. For further observations of Australian attitudes and behaviour, go to www.smh.com.au/tribalmind.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 09:18 AM
• Comments (187)

The tribal mind: Memories can be beautiful, and yet

by David Dale
REMEMBER the days when we could sit back and say "Ah nostalgia -- it's not what it used to be"? Those days are back. After enjoying a roaring revival last year, with audiences well above a million even for repeats of the documentary series 20 to 1, the nostalgia fad is dead -- and with it, the career of Bert Newton.

Channel Nine axed Bert's show What A Year last week after its first two episodes failed to attract more than 700,000 viewers. It was another symptom of a national mood change that should make John Howard very afraid.

In the first half of this decade, Australians were people who preferred to look inwards and backwards. Now we're looking outwards and forwards.

Our favourite TV shows demonstrate the transformation. In the early noughties, we loved "lifestyle" shows about garden makeovers and home renovations, documentaries about the good old days, and dramas that solved all problems in a single episode. We'd retreated into our castle and pulled up the drawbridge, refusing to commit to any entertainment that required us to come back next week, because we were scared of the future.

Now our favourite dramas -- House, Sea Patrol, Grey's Anatomy, All Saints -- are serials, because we are excited about the idea of moving ahead. Our number one show, Thank God You're Here, is entirely predicated on the shock of the new. And our favourite works of non-fiction are set outside the home -- at airports, animal shelters, hospitals and beaches.

All this leads to ...
1. A prediction: The next big thing in television will be shows about the next big things in the world, capitalising on Australia's enthusiasm about the future.

2. A hope: This column has previously described Julia Zemiro as the most interesting woman on Australian television. That was before she became The Sidekick in What A Year. She showed flawed judgement in hitching her wagon to Bert Newton's star, only to find it was a black hole. Let us pray producers don't hold this against her.

3. A request: This column needs a label for the genre of half-hour documentaries, such as Border Security, Medical Emergency, RSPCA Animal Rescue and Surf Patrol, that dominates the ratings top 10. Traditionally programming has been categorised with terms like sitcom, soap, reality, lifestyle, makeover, docudrama etc. Here's your chance at immortality for being the person who expanded that list in 2007.

"Fly-on-the-wall infotainment'' is the best we can come up with, but it's unsatisfactory, especially for Surf Patrol, where there are no walls. If you can think of a better label, tell us about it.

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 11:20 AM
• Comments (117)

We are what we don't eat

David Dale, restaurant reviewer and writer, celebrates the 25th anniversary of the Good Living section of The Sydney Morning Herald ...

Over the past quarter-century, Sydney's adventurous eaters have embraced every conceivable style and nationality of food, except one - their own. Despite several brave attempts to bring us back to our roots, we've never taken to Australian cuisine.

I'm not talking about "modern Australian", which is really a mixture of French bistro and Italian trattoria with a few Asian touches. There's been far too much of that in the past 25 years. And I'm not talking about "traditional Australian", which just means transplanted English dishes such as roast lamb, barbecued beef, fish and chips and meat pies. We left that behind decades ago.

I'm talking about ingredients that kept the first Australians healthy for 60,000 years -kangaroo, quandong, Illawarra plum, emu, warrigal greens, crocodile, bush tomatoes, pepper berries, finger limes. Apart from the occasional nod to lemon myrtle and wattleseed, we've refused to give them the same credibility as the dullest ingredients imported from Europe or the Americas.

In the first episode of Good Living, I reviewed a restaurant called Edna's Table. At the time its owners, Jennice and Raymond Kersh, were doing an individual interpretation of French food. But they soon developed a passion for flavours that were exciting Australian palates long before the first white sails were sighted in Sydney Harbour. Edna's Table had no trouble attracting the tourists, who were eager for experiences they couldn't find in New York, Rome, Tokyo or Bangkok. But the locals remained stubborn.

Jennice Kersh thought we were suffering from a "Skippy complex" - a reluctance to eat the cute and the cuddly. Yet we never had a problem with little lambkins or fluffy chicks. She wondered if there might be a deeper issue - a reluctance by white Australians to be reminded over lunch of our ambiguous relationship with Aboriginal people.

Edna's Table, the last bastion of indigenous tucker, closed in 2005 and was replaced, of course, by a French restaurant.

The culinary cringe lives on.

Should we be eating more ecologically? What has been your experience with Australian ingredients? Discussion below

It's a fad, fad world
Sydney is nothing if not faddy. David Dale charts the foodstuffs and techniques that have dominated the city's dining scene over the years ...

1982 Raspberry vinegar
1983 Fruit as garnish on main courses, especially tamarillo and kiwifruit
1984 Sticky date pudding
1985 King Island double cream, then King Island everything
1986 Sundried tomatoes
1987 Tiramisu
1988 Pesto
1989 Goat cheese
1990 Caesar salad
1991 Tall food - ingredients stacked and layered on the plate
1992 Cajun-blackened everything
1993 Pizza with barbecued lamb and rocket
1994 Coffin Bay scallops
1995 Char-grilled octopus
1996 Aioli, with everything
1997 Bruschetta (mispronounced broo-shetta)
1998 Harissa, chermoula, Middle Eastern everything
1999 Mushroom risotto
2000 Caramelised everything
2001 Truffled olive oil (artificially flavoured)
2002 Seafood carpaccio
2003 Confit duck, then confit everything
2004 Affogato
2005 Pork belly and scallops
2006 Foam everything
2007 Organic everything

Any fads we missed?

We welcome your comments.

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 01:24 AM
• Comments (8)

WHO WE ARE: The Bollywood of the south

A column about Australia by David Dale, published in The Sun-Herald 12/8/2007
Skilled young Chinese and Indians: They're the people who are going to clinch Australia's claim to the title of "most interesting country in the world" by 2010.

Last week we noted a pleasant pattern in the way Australians have reacted to each new wave of immigration since 1788 - first suspicion, then tolerance, then enthusiasm about the way new ideas keep making this a livelier country. Apart from the occasional racist loony, most readers agreed with this analysis, but wanted to know more about the latest arrivals, in order to speculate on the kind of social changes we'll be enjoying in the next few years.

Helpfully, the Bureau of Statistics put out a report during the week called Australian Social Trends 2007, and buried in it are the figures we needed.

We know from the recent census that 23 per cent of Australians were born in another country, which breaks down as around 6 per cent born in Britain, 12 per cent born in Europe, and 5 per cent born in "East, Central or Southern Asia".

In 2006, we had a net gain of 132,000 foreigners intending to become Australian residents. Of these, 45 per cent were classified as "skilled settler arrivals", selected on their "ability to contribute to the Australian economy"; 26 per cent were "family settler arrivals", reuniting with earlier immigrants; and 9 per cent were "humanitarian settler arrivals", who had "suffered substantial discrimination amounting to a gross violation of their human rights" (mostly refugees from Sudan and Iraq).

So what kind of people are they? First, they tend to be younger than the people already here - 72 per cent of the new arrivals are under 35, while only 48 per cent of the existing population is under 35. The bureau says this is mainly because "Australia's immigration policy makes it compulsory for assessed applicants granted a skill migration visa to be aged under 45".

Where are they from? The countries that send most immigrants to Australia continue to be Britain and New Zealand, but the Asian contribution is growing fast. "In 2005-2006," says the Bureau, "China and India were the third and fourth largest sources of all migration to Australia, and the second and third largest sources of Skill Stream migration after the United Kingdom."

Between 2001 and 2006, the number of skilled migrants from China rose from 3,800 to 12,500 and the number of skilled migrants from India rose from 4,700 to 12,300.

The stereotype is that the Indians staff call centres and open curry shops (which would be no bad thing if true, since the current curry standard is pretty low). In fact, the Bureau says the peak occupations of Indian-Australians are computing, medical, clerical and business/ administration.

Apparently, 95 per cent of Indian settlers speak English "very well", 34 per cent describe their faith as Hindu, and 31 per cent describe themselves as Catholic.

Even the racist loonies would have to agree that they sound like highly respectable - and more important, highly interesting - additions to the national bubble and squeak.

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in Who We Are at 11:46 AM
• Comments (73)

The ratings race: Week 32

This blog is now history. For the latest discussion, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

The daily media briefing from David Dale, updated 10 am Sunday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEVEN NEWS - SAT Seven 1,248,000 335,000 332,000 226,000 132,000 223,000
2 AUSTRALIA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEO SHOW Nine 1,161,000 286,000 344,000 204,000 155,000 174,000
3 NINE NEWS SATURDAY Nine 1,122,000 340,000 359,000 190,000 133,000 100,000
4 GREAT COMEDY CLASSICS Seven 1,026,000 260,000 292,000 230,000 112,000 133,000
5 THE DAME EDNA TREATMENT Nine 981,000 256,000 326,000 131,000 110,000 158,000
6 THE GREAT OUTDOORS Seven 948,000 291,000 247,000 180,000 104,000 126,000
7 ABC NEWS-SAT ABC 906,000 243,000 282,000 161,000 103,000 117,000
8 DOCTOR WHO ABC 830,000 233,000 224,000 156,000 111,000 106,000
9 SATURDAY NIGHT AFL Ten 775,000 156,000 331,000 61,000 115,000 112,000
11 THE BILL ABC 691,000 157,000 237,000 111,000 93,000 93,000
13 SATURDAY AFTERNOON AFL Ten 602,000 69,000 208,000 91,000 153,000 82,000

Updated 10 am Saturday
Because Channel Ten has been pulling younger viewers away from Channel Seven, and older viewers just love Lisa McCune, Channel Nine has every prospect of winning this week. This will be only its third weekly victory this year, but could set the pattern for coming weeks, as long as Ten keeps winning Wednesdays.

With one night to go, Nine is averaging 26.8 per cent of the prime time audience, while Seven is on 27.4, Ten is on 23.4, ABC is on 17.4 and SBS is on 5.0. And tonight Ten will pull viewers away from Seven with an AFL match between Sydney and St Kilda. It's gong to come down to whether the non-footballing oldies who stay home on Saturday nights will prefer Inspector Lynley to Jane Austen goes to Bollywood.

What Australia watched, Friday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,345,000 400,000 380,000 259,000 123,000 183,000
2 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,323,000 362,000 337,000 238,000 173,000 212,000
3 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,192,000 305,000 333,000 219,000 144,000 189,000
4 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,150,000 308,000 294,000 248,000 116,000 184,000
5 TEMPTATION Nine 1,146,000 321,000 362,000 227,000 131,000 106,000
6 NINE NEWS Nine 1,090,000 304,000 327,000 256,000 112,000 90,000
7 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,079,000 290,000 330,000 239,000 118,000 101,000
8 ABC NEWS-EV ABC 1,015,000 281,000 312,000 174,000 96,000 153,000
9 SILENT WITNESS ABC 1,004,000 282,000 280,000 202,000 104,000 137,000
12 THE BOURNE IDENTITY RPT Ten 798,000 179,000 246,000 154,000 107,000 112,000
14 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 19: RICHMOND V COLLINGWOOD Seven 789,000 24,000 477,000 21,000 132,000 134,000
17 NINE'S LIVE FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 680,000 473,000 207,000
27 NINE'S FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 421,000 298,000 123,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

What Austalia watched, Thursday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEA PATROL Nine 1,575,000 462,000 469,000 279,000 190,000 175,000
2 GETAWAY Nine 1,451,000 418,000 443,000 260,000 157,000 173,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,386,000 352,000 399,000 228,000 186,000 221,000
4 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,329,000 341,000 374,000 240,000 191,000 183,000
5 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,307,000 383,000 328,000 237,000 156,000 204,000
6 NINE NEWS Nine 1,194,000 326,000 382,000 228,000 146,000 112,000
7 TEMPTATION Nine 1,184,000 308,000 391,000 220,000 132,000 132,000
8 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,158,000 303,000 373,000 223,000 141,000 117,000
9 THAT '70S SHOW Seven 1,059,000 256,000 337,000 219,000 117,000 130,000
12 LAS VEGAS Seven 934,000 267,000 256,000 166,000 128,000 117,000
13 BRAT CAMP ABC 877,000 267,000 280,000 108,000 110,000 112,000
17 CROSSING JORDAN Seven 822,000 211,000 252,000 131,000 115,000 113,000
18 LAW & ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT EP 1 RPT Ten 795,000 199,000 234,000 142,000 111,000 108,000
19 NEIGHBOURS Ten 779,000 172,000 254,000 151,000 99,000 102,000
20 LAW & ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT EP 2 RPT Ten 772,000 219,000 229,000 130,000 97,000 97,000
22 FUTURAMA - DAILY RPT Ten 724,000 129,000 239,000 145,000 112,000 98,000
27 THE BOLD AND THE BEAUTIFUL Ten 471,000 115,000 136,000 85,000 64,000 70,000
30 INSPECTOR REX RPT SBS 448,000 142,000 127,000 68,000 65,000 45,000
31 MARK PHILIPPOUSSIS' AGE OF LOVE Seven 420,000 122,000 146,000 51,000 56,000 45,000
33 JUDGE JUDY Ten 395,000 104,000 142,000 52,000 53,000 45,000
100 ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT Nine 117,000 33,000 31,000 26,000 12,000 14,000

Updated 10 am Thursday
The power package of cacophanous comedians and disputational doctors won the night for Channel Ten, which seized 29.9 per cent of Wednesday's prime time audience, ahead of Nine's 26.7 and Seven's 21.5. Older viewers remain locked onto Nine, which could end up winning the week if Ten keeps drawing the younger viewers from Seven.

What Australia watched, Wednesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 1,876,000 506,000 650,000 305,000 217,000 198,000
2 HOUSE Ten 1,578,000 459,000 436,000 272,000 181,000 230,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,425,000 376,000 364,000 247,000 208,000 230,000
4 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,325,000 354,000 367,000 245,000 171,000 188,000
5 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,295,000 381,000 310,000 268,000 126,000 210,000
6 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,256,000 364,000 369,000 227,000 174,000 123,000
7 NINE NEWS Nine 1,255,000 400,000 395,000 226,000 127,000 107,000
8 COLD CASE Nine 1,240,000 368,000 397,000 222,000 125,000 128,000
9 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,158,000 332,000 389,000 206,000 122,000 109,000
12 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,072,000 287,000 298,000 210,000 145,000 132,000
13 MEDIUM Ten 1,028,000 247,000 355,000 170,000 125,000 131,000
29 M-THE VILLAGE Seven 489,000 147,000 123,000 89,000 63,000 68,000
32 THE NATION Nine 406,000 131,000 150,000 53,000 41,000 32,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Updated 10 am Wednesday
The name Russell Crowe still means something in this town. Forbes this week put Crowe at the bottom of a ranking of 22 actors whose films produce profits for Hollywood, but on Tuesday night a documentary about how he helped save South Sydney rugby league club was the most watched program on the ABC, even beating the news.

South Side Story was No. 25 on the list of most watched TV show across the mainland capitals but it was No. 7 in Sydney, with 326,000 viewers. It even managed to pull 165,000 in Melbourne, where it beat Extreme Makeover. The most popular program was RSPCA Animal Rescue, with 474,000 viewers in Sydney. You couldn't expect Our Rusty to compete with Anthony the blue Wiggle.

At this point in the week, Seven is averaging 28.1 per cent of the prime time audience, Nine has 24.7, Ten has 24.1, ABC has 17.8 and SBS has 5.3.

What Australia watched, Tuesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,684,000 474,000 478,000 340,000 136,000 256,000
2 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,664,000 442,000 513,000 332,000 149,000 229,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,469,000 339,000 374,000 290,000 189,000 277,000
4 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,426,000 439,000 456,000 220,000 123,000 188,000
5 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,360,000 334,000 384,000 242,000 164,000 236,000
6 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,338,000 393,000 333,000 262,000 127,000 224,000
7 THE SIMPSONS TUES Ten 1,278,000 280,000 475,000 203,000 167,000 153,000
8 NCIS Ten 1,274,000 304,000 403,000 216,000 179,000 173,000
11 NINE NEWS Nine 1,170,000 304,000 375,000 268,000 133,000 89,000
14 THINGS TO TRY BEFORE YOU DIE Nine 1,013,000 249,000 318,000 185,000 121,000 140,000
15 LIFE BEGINS Seven 988,000 327,000 293,000 139,000 108,000 121,000
17 NEIGHBOURS Ten 925,000 238,000 302,000 150,000 114,000 121,000
23 CSI: MIAMI -RPT Nine 801,000 211,000 246,000 162,000 96,000 85,000
25 SOUTH SIDE STORY ABC 769,000 326,000 165,000 122,000 71,000 85,000
26 THE BILL-TU ABC 676,000 179,000 202,000 128,000 75,000 92,000
28 EXTREME MAKEOVER Nine 556,000 170,000 157,000 94,000 67,000 68,000
43 SECRETS, SOURCES AND SPIN SBS 307,000 103,000 91,000 50,000 32,000 30,000
105 MORNINGS WITH KERRI-ANNE Nine 101,000 33,000 30,000 16,000 8,000 15,000
106 TORCHWOOD TUES Ten 98,000 29,000 29,000 10,000 12,000 18,000
107 9AM WITH DAVID & KIM Ten 95,000 28,000 29,000 14,000 12,000 12,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Updated 10 am Tuesday
All the action on Monday night was at 9.30. Channel Nine relaunched E.R., hoping last month's bizarre behaviour by visiting star John Stamos would raise curiosity about his acting.

Seven launched Shark, hoping viewers could identify with a seriously nasty lawyer. And Ten played The Lost Tomb of Jesus, hoping an implausible documentary would benefit from the Da Vinci connotations and James Cameron's reputation as Titanic director. See below for the surprising winner of the timeslot.

What Australia watched, Monday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 BORDER SECURITY Seven 1,828,000 515,000 482,000 339,000 193,000 300,000
2 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,614,000 439,000 422,000 290,000 169,000 295,000
3 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,468,000 403,000 385,000 286,000 162,000 233,000
4 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,466,000 434,000 362,000 292,000 139,000 238,000
5 SURF PATROL Seven 1,462,000 390,000 427,000 274,000 154,000 217,000
6 AUSTRALIAN IDOL - AUDITION 2 Ten 1,443,000 387,000 457,000 248,000 169,000 181,000
7 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,342,000 362,000 415,000 260,000 164,000 141,000
8 NINE NEWS Nine 1,313,000 375,000 396,000 270,000 173,000 99,000
9 CRIMINAL MINDS Seven 1,295,000 325,000 378,000 252,000 161,000 179,000
12 LAW AND ORDER: SVU MON Ten 1,048,000 267,000 333,000 185,000 111,000 150,000
16 ENOUGH ROPE WITH ANDREW DENTON ABC 946,000 283,000 302,000 135,000 104,000 122,000
18 E.R. Nine 910,000 278,000 327,000 113,000 86,000 106,000
24 SHARK Seven 813,000 233,000 231,000 135,000 127,000 86,000
25 TOP GEAR SBS 748,000 198,000 264,000 111,000 85,000 89,000
27 THE LOST TOMB OF JESUS Ten 659,000 160,000 220,000 98,000 79,000 102,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Updated 4 pm Monday
Except that he has confessed to having a problem with alcohol, Ian "Dicko'' Dickson would have been cracking bottles of champagne when the audience figures for Sunday night came out yesterday. The launch of Australian Idol attracted 1.65 million viewers in the mainland capitals, doing serious damage to Channel Seven's usual Sunday favourites Ugly Betty (down to 1.05 million) and Grey's Anatomy (down to 1.25m).

Dicko was a founding judge on AI, emulating Simon Cowell's performance as "the bitchy one'' in the British and American versions (while "the kindly one'' was Marcia Hines and "the silly one'' was Mark Holden). While Dicko has been in the wilderness, the Cowell role has been performed by Kyle Sandilands.

This year's two-bitch formula seems to have worked for Channel Ten. Next year, will we get an extra kindly one and an extra silly one?

On Monday older viewers were distracted from Grey's by Midsomer Murders on the ABC, and younger viewers were distracted by Australian Idol. The result of Seven and Ten tearing each other apart was a victory for Nine, with 26.0 per cent of the prime time audience, while Ten got 24.7, Seven got 23.0, ABC got a stunning 21.7 and SBS got 4.6.

What Australia watched, Sunday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 AUSTRALIAN IDOL - AUDITION 1 Ten 1,648,000 461,000 536,000 281,000 211,000 158,000
2 SEVEN NEWS - SUN Seven 1,596,000 387,000 424,000 338,000 153,000 293,000
3 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,524,000 473,000 471,000 289,000 199,000 92,000
4 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 1,423,000 408,000 428,000 231,000 159,000 197,000
5 AUSTRALIA'S BEST BACKYARDS Seven 1,416,000 356,000 436,000 257,000 141,000 226,000
6 60 MINUTES Nine 1,396,000 347,000 414,000 289,000 165,000 180,000
7 HOT PROPERTY Seven 1,287,000 334,000 375,000 233,000 156,000 188,000
8 THE WORST JOBS IN HISTORY ABC 1,255,000 385,000 411,000 182,000 137,000 140,000
9 GREY'S ANATOMY Seven 1,249,000 373,000 360,000 210,000 126,000 180,000
10 BACKYARD BLITZ Nine 1,224,000 339,000 377,000 228,000 163,000 117,000
13 UGLY BETTY Season final Seven 1,051,000 270,000 295,000 174,000 140,000 172,000
14 Movie: HOSTAGE Nine 1,032,000 266,000 333,000 189,000 129,000 115,000
15 MELBOURNE COMEDY FESTIVAL DEBATE Ten 967,000 237,000 345,000 151,000 133,000 101,000
16 AMERICA'S NEXT TOP MODEL SUN Ten 905,000 204,000 285,000 180,000 134,000 102,000
18 WHAT ABOUT BRIAN final Seven 824,000 229,000 301,000 115,000 84,000 95,000
21 NINE'S SUNDAY FOOTBALL Nine 582,000 340,000 228,000 13,000
24 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 18: HAWTHORN V ESSENDON Seven 463,000 10,000 317,000 5,000 124,000 7,000
26 SURVIVOR: FIJI Nine 456,000 112,000 171,000 59,000 66,000 47,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Updated 6pm Sunday
Spoiler alert. If you are a fan of Grey's Anatomy -- one of the few who don't think it jumped the shark when the writers sent Addison to LA -- and if you're looking forward to being left in suspense by next week's season finale, when Christina is due to marry Dr Burke, please skip to another part of this column (for example, enter our emoticon short story contest by clicking on <*)))-{ , or predict the election result by going to All in the foretelling).

Everyone else already knows that Isaiah Washington, who plays Burke, has been dropped from the series because he used the term "faggott'' about T. R. Knight, who plays George. Now Washington has revealed that his period of unemployment lasted only a few days. His services have been snapped up by the producers of a new series called The Bionic Woman, due to start on Channel Seven in February. The makers, NBC, will only say that he will play "a mysterious person who is brought into the enigmatic scientific organization responsible for creating bionic Jamie Sommers (Michelle Ryan)''. Washington will appear in five episodes before spinning off into an "action-series project". So dry your tears for him, if not for Christina, whose marriage seems to have little prospect of longevity.

Channel Ten should have won last week, with Thank God You're Here and House riding high and Big Brother reaching its climax over two nights. But these hits weren't enough to counter Seven's lock on older viewers who love fly-on-the-wall documentaries and Nine's lock on older viewers who find Lisa McCune's acting credible. At week's end, the average prime time audience shares were: Seven 27.9 per cent, Nine 25.9, Ten 24.3, ABC 16.3 and SBS 5.6.

What Australia watched, week ending August 4
Description Network Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 BIG BROTHER - WINNER ANNOUNCED Ten 1,902,000 533,000 592,000 320,000 231,000 225,000
2 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 1,844,000 510,000 593,000 306,000 180,000 255,000
3 BORDER SECURITY Seven 1,693,000 514,000 435,000 291,000 182,000 271,000
4 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,689,000 436,000 518,000 332,000 159,000 244,000
5 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,685,000 464,000 500,000 312,000 142,000 267,000
6 SEVEN NEWS - SUN Seven 1,655,000 351,000 554,000 294,000 184,000 271,000
7 SEA PATROL Nine 1,601,000 480,000 512,000 258,000 177,000 173,000
8 BIG BROTHER - FINALE NIGHT Ten 1,581,000 386,000 500,000 311,000 184,000 201,000
9 HOUSE Ten 1,538,000 410,000 458,000 242,000 183,000 245,000
10 60 MINUTES Nine 1,537,000 464,000 460,000 292,000 152,000 168,000
11 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,536,000 501,000 395,000 314,000 196,000 131,000
12 GETAWAY Nine 1,471,000 447,000 423,000 290,000 143,000 169,000
13 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,463,000 399,000 374,000 254,000 181,000 255,000
14 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,453,000 442,000 447,000 216,000 163,000 186,000
15 BIG BROTHER DOUBLE LIVE EVICTION Ten 1,435,000 303,000 458,000 278,000 208,000 188,000
16 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,396,000 383,000 380,000 240,000 165,000 229,000
17 AUSTRALIA'S BEST BACKYARDS Seven 1,382,000 317,000 466,000 218,000 148,000 234,000
18 SURF PATROL Seven 1,379,000 401,000 404,000 201,000 149,000 223,000
19 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,361,000 424,000 396,000 232,000 141,000 169,000
20 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 1,359,000 389,000 429,000 203,000 163,000 175,000
21 HOT PROPERTY Seven 1,326,000 325,000 434,000 219,000 147,000 201,000
22 SEVEN NEWS - SAT Seven 1,318,000 374,000 311,000 284,000 142,000 208,000
23 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,306,000 401,000 329,000 237,000 136,000 202,000
24 NCIS Ten 1,302,000 333,000 428,000 202,000 173,000 166,000
25 THE SIMPSONS TUES Ten 1,282,000 308,000 470,000 182,000 173,000 148,000
26 GREY'S ANATOMY Seven 1,278,000 393,000 403,000 191,000 131,000 159,000
27 NINE NEWS Nine 1,260,000 347,000 386,000 253,000 159,000 115,000
28 THE ALL NEW SIMPSONS Ten 1,234,000 325,000 436,000 163,000 163,000 147,000
29 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,233,000 325,000 399,000 250,000 135,000 123,000
30 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,204,000 363,000 363,000 211,000 137,000 130,000
31 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,203,000 308,000 354,000 234,000 167,000 141,000
32 1 VS 100 Nine 1,193,000 299,000 368,000 210,000 152,000 163,000
33 CRIMINAL MINDS Seven 1,190,000 337,000 380,000 183,000 132,000 157,000
34 AUSTRALIA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEO SHOW Nine 1,184,000 334,000 318,000 236,000 123,000 173,000
35 COLD CASE Nine 1,174,000 376,000 341,000 238,000 110,000 109,000
36 UGLY BETTY Seven 1,172,000 340,000 345,000 162,000 148,000 178,000
37 TEMPTATION Nine 1,161,000 277,000 395,000 226,000 132,000 131,000
38 WITHOUT A TRACE Nine 1,156,000 337,000 390,000 193,000 125,000 111,000
39 NINE NEWS SATURDAY Nine 1,155,000 317,000 342,000 232,000 153,000 112,000
40 THE WORST JOBS IN HISTORY ABC 1,152,000 308,000 387,000 179,000 125,000 153,000

(OzTAM mainland capitals)

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 10:00 AM
• Comments (167)

The Tribal Mind: A wonderful winter for the flicks

by David Dale
What is the last thing anybody says in The Simpsons Movie? If you think it's the word "sequel", you must have allowed the cleaners to drive you out of the cinema too early -- even before you could have learned from the credits that scene-painting for TSM gave employment to the entire population of South Korea. Don't worry -- you'll pick up this answer to a million future trivia quizzes next time you go to see TSM*.

On the principle that every televised episode of The Simpsons has been seen by every Australian under the age of 30 at least three times, it's safe to predict that the movie will sell enough tickets to hold prime position on this list by the end of the year ...

The highest grossing films of 2007 (estimated final earnings): 1 The Simpsons Movie ($38 million); 2 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix ($37m); 3 Shrek the Third ($34m); 4 Pirates of the Caribbean - At World's End ($33m); 5 Transformers ($27m); 6 Spider-man 3 ($24m); 7 The Bourne Ultimatum ($22m); 8 Wild Hogs ($17m).

Because most of its intended audience want to go to movies as soon as they open, TSM is unlikely to join this list ...

The movies that stayed longest in cinemas this year:
1 Deep Sea 3D (66 weeks); 2 As It Is in Heaven (53 weeks); 3 The Lives of Others (16); 4 The Queen (14); 5 Babel (12); 6 Wild Hogs (12); 7 Romulus My Father (10); 8 Music and Lyrics (9).

And because most of its audience will buy tickets at reduced prices, it is unlikely to join this list ...

The movies that have made more than $40 million: 1 Titanic (1997); 2 Shrek 2 (2004); 3 The Return of the King (2003); 4 Crocodile Dundee (1986); 5 Fellowship of the Ring (2001); 6. The Two Towers (2002); 7. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (2001).

And there is no way it can ever join this list ...

The movies that sold the most tickets in Australian history: 1 The Sound of Music (1965); 2 Crocodile Dundee (1986); 3 Star Wars (1977/97); 4 Gone With The Wind (1939); 5 E.T (1982); 6 Titanic (1997); 7 The Sting (1973); 8 Grease (1978). For the complete list, go to The films Australia loved

Even so, it's been a wonderful winter for the flicks. Normally August is a bit of a dead zone, when distributors have to rely on the slow and steady adult market to carry them through to Christmas. This year Hollywood just won't stop sending out teen-friendly blockbusters. It's clear that total takings for 2007 will surpass last year's $866 million, which was the second biggest box office of all time. Yes, the movies have just done another Lazarus act.

What do you reckon: have the movies been better this year -- or just bigger?

The final words in The Simpsons Movie, said by a character who sweeps up at the end of the credits, are: "Assistant Manager ain't all it's cracked up to be. Four years of film school for this."

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. To join a daily discussion of Australian attitudes, go to http://blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 07:27 AM
• Comments (19)

WHO WE ARE: The shock of the new

A column about Australia by David Dale, published in The Sun-Herald 5/8/2007
Bloody foreigners -- they come here, don't speak the language, and act like they own the place. Australians have been saying that about new arrivals at regular intervals since the year 1788. The delightful thing is that after each burst of verbal or literal spear-throwing, Australians come around not just to tolerating the visitors but to revelling in the new ideas they have brought.

In 1833, Robert Lyon, a Sydney teacher, expressed surprise at the welcoming attitude of the original Australians. He told a gathering of English immigrants: "Ye destroy the natural productions of the soil on which they live, ye devour their fish and their game, and ye drive them from the abodes of their ancestors. They have all along shown themselves ready to be reconciled, desirous to live in peace and amity with you, and even willing to be taught your manners, laws and polity."

In effect, the original Australians were saying: "For those who've come across the seas, we've boundless plains to share." Later Australians took a while to achieve that generosity of spirit.

When the Chinese arrived in search of gold and stayed to run restaurants, the initial reaction was antagonistic. Introducing the first bill ever put to federal parliament in September, 1901, the Attorney-General Alfred Deakin said: "It is not the bad qualities but the good qualities of these alien races that make them dangerous to us. It is their inexhaustible energy, their power of applying themselves to new tasks, their endurance and low standard of living that makes them such competitors ... We are united in the resolve that this Commonwealth shall be established on the firm foundation of unity of race."

But in January, 1951, the Governor General, William McKell, propounded a different view of "the great immigration project upon which we are now firmly embarked". He said the newcomers were "bringing to Australia not only the benefits of their knowledge and skills, but of their age-old cultures. The old and the new should blend into a better and more varied community of people."

When I was growing up in the early 1960s, I often heard older passengers on buses muttering "Speak Australian, why doncha?" to couples conversing in unfamiliar languages. Terms such as wog, dago, balt, chink, spick, pom, nip and the all-encompassing "reffo" were in everyday usage.

But by the 1990s, spag bol was our national dish, cappuccino was our national drink and a survey found that soy sauce and curry paste were in the cupboards of 70 per cent of Australian households. A poll of 4270 adults conducted in 2005 by the Australian National University's Centre for Social Research found that 74 per cent agreed with the statement "Immigrants make Australia open to new ideas and cultures", and 69 per cent agreed that "Immigrants are generally good for Australia's economy".

Last week one of our most entertaining politicians, the Immigration and Citizenship Minister Kevin Andrews, declared he would not "be scared off by people who don't stand up for Australians ... We've got to balance up bringing people from overseas but with an ability to actually be able to properly settle and integrate into the Australian society."

There's more of Deakin's "unity of race" than McKell's "more varied community" in that comment -- which is understandable. On the strength of the Immigration Restriction Act, Alfred Deakin went on to become prime minister.

Is variety or uniformity the spice of immigration? Are pleasant surprises better than comforting predictability?

To register your prediction for the federal election and beyond, click here.

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. For further observations of Australian attitudes and behaviour, go to www.smh.com.au/tribalmind.

• by David Dale in Who We Are at 10:45 AM
• Comments (90)

Culture: Daniel reviews Harry

[To discuss if Australians need deodorant, shampoo, toothpaste or toilet paper, go to Who We Are.]

Warning: this item contains major spoilers, and we do mean major, if you have not yet read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Of course, if you don't intend to read HPDH but want to know what millions of people under the age of 30 are currently discussing, you may wish to stick with this item.

Daniel Radcliffe, who plays Harry in the movies, celebrated his 18th birthday last week not by cracking a nice bottle of red but by finishing the latest (and last) novel in the series. He told Entertainment Weekly (here come the spoilers) that what "surprised or shocked" him the most was the death of Dobby.

"He's always been a comic character, in some ways. And that's what makes it so powerful, I suppose. I'm sure Jo's had that planned for a very long time. One of my other theories had been that Snape would end up being a sort of tragic hero, and so I was pleased to see that one in fact come through."

Asked if Snape had been "used pretty ruthlessly" by Dumbledore, Radcliffe said: "I have to say it matched some of my predictions ... I'd imagined we would see a darker side to Dumbledore. But I didn't know in what way. I was incredibly moved by it, the whole thing."

Radcliffe thought "the bravest thing'' done by J. K. Rowling was to keep Harry, Ron and Hermione alive. "I was convinced for about two years that Harry would die ... I just thought that was the only way she could end it. But then, within the last six months, it suddenly occurred to me that that was far too obvious. In a way, Harry actually does die, because he believes he's going to die. I just can't wait to be able to film it. I think Jo has given me, once again, an amazing opportunity to step up ...

"I'm still struggling to really take it in. It doesn't leave you in a hurry.''

Do you agree? Below you'll find our readers' first reviews. And to read the full transcript of Daniel Radcliffe's comments, go here

The first reviews
Many Tribal Mind readers bought their copies of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows last weekend and stayed up all night to read it. Some of them were kind enough to break away from their reading to give the rest of us a running comentary. You may care to join this literary conversation, below.

Trying carefully to avoid spoilers, tell us how it compares with the earlier books, if it kept you in the required degree of suspense, if it answered all remaining questions, if it gave closure to the characters and and if it's as "monumental" and "spellbinding" as The New York Times makes out, or if you were annnoyed by the "lumpy passages of exposition" and the "clunky detours" (also The New York Times).

Yes, for one time only, this is the TM book club. Dog-ear the page and share your thoughts ...

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. For further observations of Australian attitudes and behaviour, go to www.smh.com.au/tribalmind.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 12:03 AM
• Comments (122)

The ratings race: Week 31

This blog is now a heritage item -- worth studying but not the latest word on the subject. For this week's discussion, go to www.smh.com.au/tribalmind.

To enter our emoticon short story contest, click on <*)))-{ and to discuss which shows and people have unjumped the shark this year, go to The Tribal Mind .

The daily media briefing from David Dale, updated 10 am Saturday
Channel Ten won Monday and Wednesday, Seven won Sunday, Tuesday and Friday and Nine won Thursday and Saturday. At the end of the week, the average prime time audience shares stood at: Seven 27.9 per cent, Nine 25.9, Ten 24.3, ABC 16.3 and SBS 5.6.

What Australia watched, Saturday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEVEN NEWS - SAT Seven 1,318,000 374,000 311,000 284,000 142,000 208,000
2 AUSTRALIA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEO SHOW Nine 1,184,000 334,000 318,000 236,000 123,000 173,000
3 NINE NEWS SATURDAY Nine 1,155,000 317,000 342,000 232,000 153,000 112,000
4 THE GREAT OUTDOORS Seven 1,045,000 334,000 243,000 233,000 84,000 150,000
5 TEN NEWS AT FIVE SAT Ten 1,011,000 223,000 341,000 163,000 128,000 157,000
6 GREAT COMEDY CLASSICS Seven 987,000 321,000 246,000 235,000 85,000 99,000
7 THE DAME EDNA TREATMENT Nine 971,000 298,000 317,000 158,000 73,000 125,000
8 DOCTOR WHO ABC 895,000 284,000 231,000 186,000 85,000 109,000
11 SATURDAY AFTERNOON AFL Ten 723,000 81,000 319,000 79,000 122,000 122,000
12 SATURDAY NIGHT AFL Ten 720,000 Not even shown in Sydney M 238,000 139,000 223,000 120,000
13 THE BILL ABC 651,000 203,000 219,000 89,000 52,000 88,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Updated Friday
Do we think Ten was engaging in a bit of mischief by replaying Mick Molloy's classic movie Crackerjack, and getting 300,000 more viewers than The Nation, Molloy's weekly variety show on Nine?

What Australia watched, Friday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,362,000 351,000 355,000 225,000 192,000 238,000
2 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,361,000 424,000 396,000 232,000 141,000 169,000
3 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,322,000 370,000 334,000 211,000 182,000 225,000
4 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,211,000 423,000 276,000 199,000 132,000 180,000
5 NINE NEWS Nine 1,156,000 332,000 348,000 246,000 123,000 106,000
6 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,113,000 304,000 339,000 256,000 113,000 101,000
7 SILENT WITNESS ABC 1,061,000 330,000 314,000 183,000 113,000 122,000
12 NEIGHBOURS Ten 819,000 219,000 230,000 154,000 105,000 110,000
15 RUSSELL COIGHT'S CELEBRITY CHALLENGE RPT Ten 790,000 154,000 238,000 161,000 113,000 125,000
18 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 18: WESTERN BULLDOGS V ST KILDA Seven 712,000 24,000 405,000 9,000 149,000 126,000
20 NINE'S LIVE FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 609,000 399,000 210,000
21 CRACKERJACK RPT Ten 605,000 130,000 195,000 115,000 84,000 80,000
30 NINE'S FRIDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL Nine 402,000 254,000 148,000

What Australia watched, Thursday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEA PATROL Nine 1,603,000 483,000 512,000 260,000 176,000 172,000
2 GETAWAY Nine 1,455,000 441,000 416,000 289,000 141,000 168,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,444,000 409,000 364,000 266,000 163,000 241,000
4 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,384,000 415,000 359,000 259,000 143,000 209,000
5 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,362,000 400,000 361,000 239,000 152,000 210,000
6 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,212,000 357,000 364,000 257,000 133,000 101,000
7 NINE NEWS Nine 1,199,000 329,000 354,000 256,000 153,000 107,000
8 TEMPTATION Nine 1,170,000 308,000 393,000 232,000 119,000 118,000
9 ABC NEWS ABC 1,162,000 337,000 372,000 190,000 126,000 137,000
10 THAT '70S SHOW Seven 1,086,000 283,000 319,000 211,000 125,000 149,000
11 THE FOOTY SHOW Nine 1,056,000 235,000 448,000 102,000 131,000 140,000
12 LAW & ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT Ten 1,052,000 271,000 303,000 230,000 111,000 136,000
13 LAW & ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT RPT Ten 1,008,000 295,000 264,000 184,000 125,000 139,000
18 LAS VEGAS Seven 844,000 228,000 251,000 160,000 114,000 91,000
22 NEIGHBOURS Ten 791,000 195,000 224,000 143,000 114,000 115,000
28 INSPECTOR REX RPT SBS 472,000 138,000 156,000 72,000 63,000 42,000
29 MARK PHILIPPOUSSIS' AGE OF LOVE Seven 466,000 170,000 135,000 54,000 61,000 47,000
34 DIFFERENCE OF OPINION ABC 410,000 139,000 113,000 63,000 38,000 57,000
38 RALPH TV Nine 353,000 103,000 136,000 37,000 53,000 25,000

Updated 10am Thursday
If ever there was one week in the year that should be won by Channel Ten, this is it, with the finals of Big Brother on Sunday and Monday and TGYH and House riding high on Wednesday. Ten did, indeed, manage to win last night, but not by enough, and with four sevenths of the week now gone, the average prime time audience shares stand thus: Seven 27.9 per cent, Ten 26.1, Nine 23.6, ABC 16.4, and SBS 6.0.

Here's a sampling of yesterday's results, covering all the shows readers of this blog have asked about in recent weeks. Note, for example, that Neighbours is back to its audience of early 2007, that Bindi is doing well but does not have the most watched afternoon kids' show, and that Kerri-Anne does not have the most watched morning shopping show.

Feel free to ask about any we've inadvertently omitted.

What Australia watched, Wednesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 1,829,000 507,000 589,000 303,000 178,000 252,000
2 HOUSE Ten 1,571,000 420,000 469,000 248,000 186,000 249,000
3 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,437,000 384,000 373,000 248,000 153,000 280,000
8 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,205,000 310,000 354,000 234,000 167,000 141,000
9 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,190,000 358,000 360,000 208,000 136,000 128,000
11 COLD CASE Nine 1,175,000 375,000 342,000 238,000 110,000 109,000
15 NEIGHBOURS Ten 887,000 222,000 258,000 163,000 111,000 133,000
17 THE CHASER'S WAR ON REPEATS ABC 876,000 254,000 252,000 159,000 110,000 101,000
18 M-THE TERMINAL Seven 861,000 268,000 264,000 125,000 100,000 104,000
19 MEDIUM Ten 859,000 211,000 259,000 142,000 114,000 133,000
30 TEN LATE NEWS WITH SPORTS TONIGHT Ten 419,000 105,000 116,000 77,000 59,000 62,000
31 AT THE MOVIES ABC 417,000 105,000 182,000 43,000 36,000 51,000
33 SUNRISE Seven 403,000 136,000 90,000 90,000 42,000 46,000
34 THE NATION Nine 387,000 97,000 150,000 52,000 45,000 43,000
40 FAIRLY ODD PARENTS-PM ABC 334,000 103,000 129,000 59,000 18,000 26,000
45 BINDI: THE JUNGLE GIRL-PM ABC 307,000 95,000 84,000 75,000 15,000 38,000
51 DATELINE SBS 253,000 77,000 86,000 56,000 19,000 15,000
52 TODAY Nine 249,000 76,000 69,000 49,000 18,000 38,000
59 DR PHIL Ten 235,000 46,000 82,000 40,000 29,000 37,000
70 LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN Ten 193,000 70,000 39,000 36,000 22,000 25,000
74 THE MORNING SHOW Seven 184,000 55,000 52,000 36,000 18,000 23,000
80 PLAY SCHOOL-PM ABC 170,000 58,000 34,000 44,000 10,000 24,000
96 MONSIEUR IBRAHIM AND THE FLOWERS OF THE KORAN SBS 129,000 34,000 49,000 13,000 14,000 20,000
104 9AM WITH DAVID & KIM Ten 99,000 27,000 32,000 16,000 11,000 13,000
106 MORNINGS WITH KERRI-ANNE Nine 95,000 30,000 25,000 16,000 7,000 16,000
What Australia watched, Tuesday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,689,000 436,000 518,000 332,000 159,000 244,000
2 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,685,000 464,000 500,000 312,000 142,000 267,000
3 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,453,000 442,000 447,000 216,000 163,000 186,000
4 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,412,000 403,000 366,000 236,000 174,000 234,000
5 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,379,000 375,000 403,000 221,000 154,000 226,000
6 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,349,000 404,000 361,000 242,000 120,000 222,000
7 NCIS Ten 1,302,000 333,000 428,000 202,000 173,000 166,000
8 THE SIMPSONS TUES Ten 1,282,000 308,000 470,000 182,000 173,000 148,000
9 THE ALL NEW SIMPSONS Ten 1,234,000 325,000 436,000 163,000 163,000 147,000
10 NINE NEWS Nine 1,226,000 316,000 395,000 237,000 178,000 101,000
14 CROSSING JORDAN Seven 1,081,000 335,000 342,000 147,000 125,000 133,000
15 THINGS TO TRY BEFORE YOU DIE Nine 1,081,000 288,000 325,000 176,000 161,000 130,000
26 THE BILL ABC 664,000 174,000 234,000 114,000 60,000 82,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Updated 10am Tuesday
Torchwood fans should not get excited by the chart below. It seems to suggest a sudden surge of 800,000 viewers in the mainland capitals. In fact, the audience listed for Captain Jack is actually the audience for the last hour of Big Brother, which ran so far overtime it bamboozled OzTAM's computer. Channel Ten says the average between 8.30 and finishing time of 10.09 was 1.9 million, with a peak of 2.3m.

Ten won the night, with 28.8 per cent of the prime time audience, and at this point in the week, the averages are Seven 26.9 per cent, Ten 26.5, Nine 22.3, ABC 17.4, SBS 6.7.

And judging by the numbers for Nine's nostalgiafest What A Year, we fear we may soon be saying that the most interesting woman on television, Julia Zemiro, jumped the shark when she made the mistake of teaming up with Bert Newton. Premature, but we'll keep an eye on it next week.

What Australia watched, Monday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 BIG BROTHER - THE WINNER ANNOUNCED Ten 1,791,000 500,000 552,000 308,000 214,000 216,000
2 "TORCHWOOD" ?? Ten 1,695,000 476,000 537,000 276,000 208,000 198,000
3 BORDER SECURITY Seven 1,693,000 514,000 435,000 291,000 182,000 271,000
4 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,658,000 445,000 411,000 296,000 225,000 281,000
5 BIG BROTHER - FINALE NIGHT Ten 1,580,000 385,000 499,000 312,000 183,000 201,000
6 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,578,000 412,000 448,000 279,000 198,000 241,000
7 NINE NEWS Nine 1,437,000 412,000 448,000 260,000 174,000 143,000
8 SURF PATROL Seven 1,379,000 401,000 404,000 201,000 149,000 223,000
12 CRIMINAL MINDS Seven 1,190,000 337,000 380,000 183,000 132,000 157,000
15 NEIGHBOURS Ten 1,070,000 276,000 325,000 221,000 106,000 141,000
16 AUSTRALIAN STORY ABC 1,039,000 359,000 303,000 164,000 94,000 120,000
18 ENOUGH ROPE WITH ANDREW DENTON ABC 941,000 313,000 272,000 121,000 109,000 126,000
22 WHAT A YEAR Nine 803,000 173,000 275,000 164,000 91,000 99,000
25 TOP GEAR SBS 753,000 194,000 252,000 140,000 97,000 70,000
28 BOSTON LEGAL Seven 629,000 220,000 204,000 67,000 83,000 55,000

Updated 10 am Monday
So apparently Australians would rather see the nation's best backyards than backyards being blitzed, but more than 2.5 million of us in the mainland capitals love Jamie Durie. On the same principle, will Nine put repeat episodes of Today with Jessica Rowe up against Dancing With The Stars later this year?

Helped by one of Jamie's incarnations, Seven won last night -- unusual for a Sunday -- and released this claim this morning:
"Seven delivers strongest performance since introduction of Oztam ratings in 2001 ...
Seven wins 20 of the 22 weeks in total viewers in the current television season.
Seven wins 22 of the 22 weeks in 25-54s and 19 of the 22 weeks in 18-49s. Seven now cannot be led in weekly wins in total viewers and wins 2007 in weekly wins in 25-54s - with only 18 weeks remaining in the current television year.
Weekly Wins Seven Nine Ten
Total viewers 20 ... 2 ... 0
Aged 16-39 7 ... 0 ... 15
Aged 18-49 19 ... 0 ... 3
Aged 25-54 22 ... 0 ... 0"

What Australia watched, Sunday
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 SEVEN NEWS - SUN Seven 1,648,000 347,000 554,000 291,000 184,000 272,000
2 60 MINUTES Nine 1,539,000 465,000 461,000 292,000 152,000 169,000
3 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,537,000 501,000 396,000 314,000 195,000 131,000
4 BIG BROTHER DOUBLE LIVE EVICTION Ten 1,427,000 303,000 456,000 276,000 205,000 188,000
5 AUSTRALIA'S BEST BACKYARDS Seven 1,416,000 325,000 474,000 231,000 148,000 238,000
6 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 1,359,000 389,000 429,000 203,000 163,000 175,000
7 HOT PROPERTY Seven 1,297,000 312,000 429,000 213,000 142,000 202,000
8 GREY'S ANATOMY Seven 1,289,000 395,000 407,000 192,000 133,000 162,000
9 UGLY BETTY Seven 1,181,000 339,000 351,000 165,000 149,000 178,000
10 THE WORST JOBS IN HISTORY-EV ABC 1,152,000 308,000 387,000 179,000 125,000 153,000
12 BACKYARD BLITZ Nine 1,102,000 343,000 299,000 201,000 169,000 90,000
13 BIG BROTHER SUN Ten 1,077,000 226,000 357,000 200,000 137,000 157,000
14 ROVE IN LA Ten 1,012,000 200,000 369,000 158,000 142,000 144,000
19 SEVEN'S AFL: RND 17: ESSENDON V ADELAIDE Seven 809,000 65,000 355,000 64,000 216,000 109,000
24 NINE'S SUNDAY FOOTBALL Nine 570,000 345,000 185,000 39,000
25 SURVIVOR: FIJI Nine 455,000 144,000 161,000 48,000 46,000 56,000
29 GILMORE GIRLS Nine 409,000 114,000 151,000 44,000 48,000 52,000
33 2007 TOUR DE FRANCE STAGE 20 SBS 340,000 99,000 112,000 45,000 28,000 57,000
34 ALIAS Seven 335,000 161,000 66,000 40,000 68,000
(OzTAM preliminary estimates, mainland capitals)

Channel Ten had some consolation last week for the disaster that is Big Brother. Its revamped version of Neighbours averaged 959,000 viewers in the mainland capitals, which means the faster pace, new actors and brighter credits brought back 100,000 viewers who had drifted away over the past ten years. Neighbours helped Ten to a 23 per cent share of the prime time audience.

Channel Seven had some consolation for the disaster that was the court finding against it on Friday. It managed the biggest audience share: 27.2 per cent to Nine's 25.9. Nine's only consolation for the dawning realisation that it will come a distant second this year was the continuing success of Sea Patrol.

The ABC didn't need consolation -- it's holding 17 per cent of the prime time audience, with Midsomer Murders drawing 1.4 million on Sunday and the Australian Story about Belinda Emmett drawing 1.4 million on Monday.

What Australia watched, week ending July 28
Description Total Sydney Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide Perth
1 BORDER SECURITY Seven 1,898,000 548,000 534,000 299,000 202,000 315,000
2 THANK GOD YOU'RE HERE Ten 1,888,000 538,000 618,000 305,000 191,000 237,000
3 HOUSE Ten 1,749,000 494,000 547,000 256,000 223,000 228,000
4 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,664,000 536,000 452,000 262,000 238,000 177,000
5 RSPCA ANIMAL RESCUE Seven 1,653,000 458,000 473,000 273,000 170,000 279,000
6 60 MINUTES Nine 1,651,000 451,000 485,000 305,000 204,000 206,0007 SEA PATROL Nine 1,617,000 438,000 503,000 290,000 197,000 188,000
8 MEDICAL EMERGENCY Seven 1,583,000 419,000 451,000 290,000 176,000 246,000
9 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,539,000 398,000 416,000 263,000 192,000 270,000
10 GETAWAY Nine 1,516,000 414,000 407,000 320,000 169,000 205,000
11 SEVEN NEWS - SUN Seven 1,509,000 389,000 408,000 338,000 162,000 212,000
12 SURF PATROL Seven 1,476,000 417,000 431,000 229,000 148,000 251,000
13 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 1,448,000 368,000 396,000 258,000 192,000 233,000
14 GREY'S ANATOMY Seven 1,419,000 456,000 401,000 246,000 149,000 168,000
15 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 1,405,000 381,000 462,000 202,000 172,000 187,000
16 AUSTRALIAN STORY ABC 1,397,000 394,000 445,000 224,000 148,000 186,000
17 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,362,000 403,000 459,000 197,000 144,000 159,000
18 BACKYARD BLITZ Nine 1,326,000 399,000 392,000 212,000 197,000 126,000
19 WHERE ARE THEY NOW Seven 1,319,000 377,000 348,000 261,000 148,000 185,000
20 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,311,000 386,000 410,000 204,000 156,000 155,000
21 1 VS 100 Nine 1,301,000 384,000 411,000 210,000 154,000 143,000
22 NINE NEWS Nine 1,290,000 356,000 377,000 266,000 166,000 126,000
23 CSI Nine 1,276,000 406,000 327,000 249,000 165,000 129,000
24 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,275,000 370,000 384,000 228,000 142,000 151,000
25 BIG BROTHER - FRIDAY NIGHT LIVE Ten 1,273,000 279,000 424,000 259,000 160,000 151,000
26 WITHOUT A TRACE Nine 1,259,000 395,000 385,000 186,000 142,000 152,000
27 HOME AND AWAY Seven 1,247,000 371,000 309,000 218,000 146,000 202,000
28 SEVEN NEWS - SAT Seven 1,229,000 334,000 325,000 235,000 138,000 196,000
29 THE WORST JOBS IN HISTORY ABC 1,225,000 326,000 420,000 180,000 128,000 171,000
30 COLD CASE Nine 1,215,000 375,000 340,000 245,000 103,000 152,000
31 UGLY BETTY Seven 1,214,000 393,000 312,000 201,000 166,000 142,000
32 NINE NEWS SATURDAY Nine 1,194,000 339,000 334,000 255,000 148,000 118,000
33 AUSTRALIA'S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEO SHOW Nine 1,191,000 322,000 349,000 225,000 145,000 150,000
34 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,188,000 319,000 364,000 247,000 130,000 129,000
35 CRIMINAL MINDS Seven 1,179,000 317,000 351,000 184,000 170,000 158,000
36 THE ALL NEW SIMPSONS Ten 1,172,000 281,000 394,000 185,000 173,000 138,000
37 LOST Seven 1,171,000 321,000 386,000 216,000 129,000 119,000
38 CSI: MIAMI Nine 1,160,000 361,000 300,000 230,000 151,000 119,000
39 MCLEOD'S DAUGHTERS Nine 1,155,000 319,000 320,000 207,000 170,000 139,000
40 BIG BROTHER DOUBLE LIVE EVICTION Ten 1,154,000 325,000 343,000 197,000 156,000 133,000
(OzTAM mainland capitals)

David Dale is the author of Who We Are -- A snapshot of Australia today (Allen and Unwin). His latest book is Soffritto -- A delicious Ligurian memoir. For further observations of Australian attitudes and behaviour, go to www.smh.com.au/tribalmind.

• by David Dale in The Tribal Mind at 10:42 AM
• Comments (105)

The Tribal Mind: Just one look, that's all it took

[To discuss if Australians really need deodorant, shampoo, toothpaste or toilet paper, go to Who We Are.]

By David Dale.
IF YOU went to Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix at the advertised starting time, you'd have seen the shorts of a Christmas flick called The Golden Compass. It's a masterpiece of trailer-making, convincing you