I am so tired of watching Aussie TV channels. No quality material and full of shitty content. For even news- 9news, 7news, ABC all kept going on about Taylor swift all day. No quality news reporting at all. Thanks to YouTube , my go to channel for news now is DW and France 24. European channels are the best in my opinion.
I gave up watching Australian FTA in the late 90’s or early 2000’s. Their treatment of the end-user and the abuser abusee relationship there just wasn’t worth it. So many good shows I just stopped watching because I was sick of their crap and streaming / torrents weren’t a thing yet.
And before anyone goes “you’re not the customer you’re the product” yada yada, I very specifically said “end-user” earlier, not customer. I know. You’re not telling me anything I haven’t already acknowledged.
The only thing I’ve watched on FTA since is live sport when there’s no other options, or things via the catch-up apps (mostly ABC & SBS’s).
@bastardsheep @yoz The whole saga around Fran Kelly’s chat show in 2022 kinda sums up the issue: https://www.smh.com.au/culture/tv-and-radio/fran-kelly-is-fine-and-familiar-but-she-s-not-the-future-of-the-abc-20220812-p5b9c9.html
Since the early 2000s, the Australian free-to-air networks have churned out an endless stream of low-budget reality shows.
There’s been nothing really worth watching for the past 20 years on FTA, and better shows online. So everyone under around 40 tuned out long ago.
So the FTA networks have responded by pandering to the tastes and views of older viewers.
That’s not just on social or political issues. That’s in terms of the shows themselves, and the talent who host and appear on them.
And so any younger viewers that tune in end up tuning out. That leads to lower ratings, and fewer and dollars, which leads to more shows pandering to older viewers.
And so what you end up with is this self-perpetuating death spiral.