Throng

Lets face it - ITV is rubbish isn't it? If it wasn't for Simon Cowell, the occasional Champions League match and Corrie, no-one would watch the channel.

And so, with ITV making a move to pay-TV with three high-definition channels vanishing behind Sky's subscription wall, you have to wonder if anyone will tune in at all.

The agreement with Sky, as reported by MediaGuardian.co.uk, covers HD versions of ITV2, 3 and 4. Yes, really.

Along with an online presence, it seems that ITV are putting £75 million aside for their digital channels.

The company's chief executive, Adam Crozier, said: "For the past decade ITV has not faced up to the challenges presented by the rise of internet-based platforms, the continuing growth of pay TV and subscription services and the globalisation of content.

The licence fee is a prickly topic that sees people vigorously defending the BBC or attacking them for having an unfair advantage over other stations... or in some cases, people don't like the way it is spent.

Well, according to one thinktank called the Adam Smith Institute, the £3.5bn annual licence fee should be scrapped and replaced with a voluntary subscription service.

The report, Global Player or Subsidy Junkie? Decision time for the BBC, reckons that Auntie could be offered a "transitional guarantee" of income from 2012 when viewers would first be told they didn't have to pay the licence fee.

An interim annual fee of £145 (the current cost of the licence fee) would be charged up to 2015, the report proposes, after which BBC services would become subscription-only.

Charley Speed, Elle MacPherson, Julien MacDonald, Grace Woodward
BNTM Cycle 6 Judges

Ruth Rendell has criticised the graphic portrayal of violence on television. She has said, in an interview with The Daily Telegraph that she believes that some scenes are too explicit.

Do you agree?

"The crime on television at the moment is over-violent," she said. "I don't think it's necessary. I don't like it, and many people, not necessarily of my age, don't like it."

She continued: "The more you pander to what is, presumably, the taste of young people, the more you corrupt. I don't think they want it, really - they are told they want it."

There's been a lot of talk around boring media circles about a bloke called John De Mol.

Now, this chap is being linked to a bid for Channel Five after RTL put it up for sale. This is boring right?

Well, De Mol is the creator of Big Brother, which is leading to mutterings that the show might be making a move, one button up on the remote.

If De Mol wins the bid for Five, it is understood that one of the conditions is that he'll provide content for the broadcaster.

Even though Big Brother hasn't been getting the ratings that Channel Four would like, you have to assume that, even in the beleaguered state that Big Brother is in currently, Five would bite their arm off for that audience.

De Mol created Big Brother in the '90s and it was a runaway success which transformed the way people made television.

Paranoia, bitching and Ben's cryptic convo

Housemates Nathan, Shabby and Caoimhe have been moaning that people are talking about them, and they’re right; they are.

Last night, Shabby told Caiomhe, "I really feel like, 'If you want to talk about me, you want to talk about me'. I talk about you.

"I felt like when I came in with Mario talking they were trying to loop round [the conversation]."

Caoimhe replied, "That's how I felt with Mario and Ben."

And Nathan added, "There was far too much whispering, that's why I left [the bedroom]

"There were Govan and John, then there's Ben and Dave. Then Dave got into bed with Sunshine and they’re whispering.

"I'm getting f**king strange vibes mate."

Stop using a strange vibro then dude...

Today, The Guardian has reported on a funding crisis that is battering the production of children's programmes in the UK, threatening one of British television's best traditions.

And now, Ed Vaizey, the new culture minister, has vowed to look investigate the problem.

But is it already doomed?

For some years now, funding in children's television programmes has fallen. In strak figures, in 2004 there was £50m a year more being pumped into the sector.

ITV no longer broadcast children's TV on terrestrial telly.

Colette Bowe, the chair of Ofcom, told MPs last year: "We are sleepwalking into a situation where we do not have enough UK-generated content of high quality for our own kids."

The World Cup is so close that you can almost taste the drinks promotions and the resultant crushing hangover that makes your brain feel three sizes too big for your skull.

And yes indeed, your TV will be riddled with men kicking a football or chasing people kicking a football and men endlessly talking about other men kicking and chasing a football. Are you ready?

The World Cup must be hell of the sport-hating TV fan. Coronation Street gets shunted off to daft times because some inconsequential match went into extra-time and then penalties.

What kind of idiot invites Michael Winner round their house?

Even Michael Winner doesn't invite himself round his house for summat to eat. He's clearly so low on friends that he's needing to participate in Michael Winner's Dining Stars (ITV1, Friday, 9pm)

One thing is guaranteed - he won't keep any of these new prole friends for very long as he's guaranteed to be an obnoxious tit the first chance he gets, willing to pass it all off as high-jinkery with a translucent wink of his ageing eye-lid.

Of course, there's only ITV daft enough to commission this show.

There's only Five or BBC Three I could imagine taking him on... and in the case of the latter, he's not a former member of Atomic Kitten, so he's out of the race.

Paul O'Grady's Channel 4 chatshow was pure trash. However, it was very enjoyable trash. It was perfect just-finished-work viewing. Overly sentimental, camp and self effacing. It's exactly the kind of tonic you need after a crap day of work.

However, O'Grady left the show and subsequently, left a big hole in the listings. This has seen something of a TV scrum to land the job of hosting a chat-show around the same time.

Reports suggest that Davina McCall and Vernon Kay are heading up the battle. According to The Mirror, both presenters have been lined up for 'live auditions' along with Phil Spencer and Kirstie Allsopp.

Apparently, around ten stars have been approached by bosses to host the show one week at a time. Whoever appeals the most will then go on to become a permanent replacement for O'Grady.

Iiiiin the red coooorner, Goooordon'The Cyclops' Broooown! And in the blue coooorneeer, David 'Pillow Face' Cameron! And in the yellow coooorneeer... that bloke... uh... Nick Clogs or something.

Yep. British politics is slowly coming to the realisation that we, the British public, are far more interested in American politics because it's more fun to watch.

The Obama/McCain throwdown was one of the most captivating and brilliantly crass TV series ever. The way Joe The Plumber was dragged into it... then dragged over hot coals... the squaring off, the high production values... it had everything.

Channel 4's Wife Swap is about to throw its last hissy fit ever. The trailer for the last-ever programme plays stirring music and proclaims that this is the end of an era.

Really?

The show has been aired for 6 years and in that time, there's been some staggeringly crass broadcasts.

One of the first stars of the show was the walking urinal-cake that was Lizzy Bardsley. Remember her? She thrilled TV viewers by claiming £37,500 a year in benefits and using language that would make a chair cry.

Thanks to Wife Swap, the nation got to see Lizzie showing her mammaries in The Sunday Sport. So yeah, the beginning of an era of golden television.

The brilliant readers of TV Throng predicted that Joe would win The X Factor. If I remember rightly, over a quarter of you said as much.

Personally, I was convinced that Olly was going to nick it at the death, but mercifully, I was wrong. Alas, last night's finale didn't really mean much away from the televisual spectacular. As is de rigueur, both Olly and Joe will get at least a 12 month career out of this.

So after the immediate Christmas Number One battle (which is being hotly contested by Rage Against The Machine's limp wristed broadside 'Killing In The Name' thanks to a Facebook campaign), what happens next for our final two?

Week 2087 of The X Factor has just rolled by and once again, we're faced with the question: Who will win The X Factor 2009?

Of course, the answer - as ever - is Simon Cowell. He always wins. He's like a casino who reaps up all those failed gambles from bored travelling salesmen looking for a bit of thrill and glamour in between glasses of mid-priced whisky and thoughts on pawning that yellowy-gold bracelet for one more throw of the dice.

We're all that bored business man.