The headlines of all the newspapers yesterday were pretty much all on the same topic - ITV suspended all their quiz call-in programmes after premium-rate regulators were prompted to investigate recent scandals with phone-in competitions.A dig through old copies of Media Guardian (yes, I keep cuttings of articles I find interesting lying about my bedroom, I hoard my knowledge in one place) shows this is a long-running problem.
My oldest headline I have is 'Money For Nothing,' investigating the thousands of callers who call the quiz shows every night who stand little chance of winning even though the answer to the questions they ask seem so damn obvious!
The trouble is the answers are so open-ended there are a thousand solutions to the questions! This means thousands of wannabe winners call in (up to 6000 at peak time according to some newspapers) at 75p a minute and most either get put on hold or don't get through. ITV reaps in more from this than its advertising revenue!
Anyway. The investigations mean that no longer does ITV1 (terrestrial) switch to ITV Play (digital) after it has finished broadcasting. Presently, ITV Play is transmitting a splash logo with the message "ITV Play is currently unavailable."
Although we could have easily found out ourselves, The Sun wants to remain a leader in its 'exclusives' and 'lifted the lid' on all the shows that have conned us (EDIT: Link no longer works), even though it only sourced quiz provider Eckoh. Thanks Sun. Like they're the only company who does this. And like you cover media events with the commitment of The Guardian!.
Their whistleblower did reveal that many people who called the premium-rate numbers for some of their shows were being charged even though their calls were not successful due to computer crashes at peak times, and some competition rates were charged way higher than they were advertised.
Michael Grade, executive chairman of ITV has said the quiz call-ins will stay and the news has reached the Prime Minister.
The implications of this mean other TV stations have prompted their own audits into their premium-rate call-in services because now the public wont trust them. And there are a lot of call-in shows out there that want our votes or answers!
What is to be done now? The Network for Online Commerce are backing a 'Fairplay Kitemark' scheme. Maybe this will become a new standard for out late-night gambling addiction?
Possibly related to the story is this. Perhaps her phone was stolen by an angered 'You Say, We Pay' caller?
What the bloggers said:
Posted on the Junkk Male blog, blogger Peter sourced most of the news stories following the phone-in scandal and writes:
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"As a participant in a voter-driven reality TV show, who was the
cause of some to commit funds to these guys pockets in support
of what they thought was fair contest, I am intrigued as to how this
still seems to be more 'slap wrist, don't do it again' as opposed to
what it seems to me to be clearly: fraud. Why?"
PS: Photo taken and copyrighted to me!
2 comments:
At your kind invitation, I reply.
Go, grades, go!
I remain irritated that so many commentators in the major media view this as a silly spat, and those defrauded got what was coming to them.
I await with interest the outcome of my complaints to OFCOM and ICSTIS.
Then we'll see who deigns to answer which reporters' calls!
I remember watching an edition of The Great Big British Quiz a couple of years ago. The puzzle was:
-The number of days in September.
-The number of dots on a double 3, double 4 and double 5 domino.
-The number of dots on 8 dice.
-The number of consonants in the word "attention".
Add up the numbers.
227?
Nope, 10669.
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