Quiz channel

A quiz channel (also known as a participation television channel) is a television channel that focuses on phone-in quizzes. The quizzes usually focus on puzzles, such as filling in blanks, identifying subjects, or other forms of word puzzles. The channels make money by encouraging viewer to call a toll phone number for the chance to play.

The first dedicated quiz channel is considered to be Germany's 9Live, which launched on September 1, 2001. The best known example in the United Kingdom is Quiz TV (2004–2006), the first to launch in that country. Two major commercial television networks, ITV and Channel Four Television Corporation, through Ostrich Media launched ITV Play and Quiz Call respectively to capitalize on the phenomenon. There are a large amount of quiz channels, particularly on satellite television, with many clones of each other. They are most common at night, where many smaller channels close down and show the quiz channel content in return for a share of the revenue. Portugal also has a substantial amount of quiz programmes, especially on terrestrial channels (including public RTP), however in the daytime they are disguised as pimba-themed talk shows, with blatant phone-in cutaways and quiz participation.

Due to a number of incidents where the fairness of quiz channels and shows came to the attention of the media and regulators in the UK, a number of broadcasters have switched to other types of participation television, focusing primarily on roulette but also bingo[1] and other casino games[2] as well as branching out into other forms of participation television, such as televised sex lines.[3]

Scandals in Britain

Most of the major controversies involving participatory television have occurred in the United Kingdom, where these shows have been late-night staples on some channels.

Quiz channels have received large number of complaints due to use of premium-rate telephone numbers, "impossible" questions and gambling. Often it is far from clear how it is possible to reach the suggested 'right' answer. Some people who are heavily involved in the quiz industry in the UK have complained about the standard and ambiguity of the questions used on the programme. Questions in some games, as an example, Quizmania's tower games are usually very easy and open ended, often with scores of possible answers, but only a handful of which win prizes. This means that the competition becomes less of a quiz and more like a game of chance. A Culture, Media and Sports select committee report suggested that the odds of a viewer getting through to the studio is up to 8,500 to one[4] and for an ITV Play show, 400 to one.[5]

Some estimates suggest that phone-in quizzes generate around £50 million a year for broadcasters, making them a crucial source of income at a time of increasing pressure on advertising revenue.

The Mail on Sunday stated in an article that 15% of complaints made to Ofcom are from participation TV shows.[6] Gordon Brown has criticised the participation TV shows and channels for exploiting the poor.[6]

Ofcom is now considering a proposal to class participation TV channels in the same way as teleshopping channels. This would give consumers more protection against fraudulent channels.[7] According to an article in The Times, Ofcom was expected to receive an estimated 800 complaints about quiz channels in 2007, an increase from 450 in 2005.[8]

Culture, media and sport select committee hearing

On November 28, 2006, an all-party Culture, Media and Sport select committee held a hearing into the concerns regarding the way that quiz channels operate. The broadcasting minister, Shaun Woodward said that no action would be taken on any of the quiz channel operators until the parties had reported their findings. The Gambling commission said they would look into British Sky Broadcasting's concerns over quiz channels that quiz channels are a form of gambling and should be regulated.[9] Nick Rust from BSkyB, said to the committee that quiz channels should be considered gambling.[10] The committee heard evidence from Ofcom, the Citizens Advice Bureau, television executives and individuals.[8]

Points raised included the price of calls, whether the player got through or not. Jeff Henry, a director of ITV consumer said that one in four hundred players have a chance in getting through to The Mint programme. Jeff Henry also stated that by putting up details that there is a one in four hundred chance of winning, then "it would be out of date and we would be accused of misleading you."[10] Points also raised were the answers given for questions set, including an example from ITV Play programme Quizmania, where the obscure answers Rawlplugs and balaclava were given for a question on the contents of a woman's handbag, and examples of where callers were cut off from calling Quiz Call for forty minutes.[8] The commission was also told that viewers are encouraged to call in but are not told that they only have a 0.5% chance of getting through.[10]

Shari Vahl, from BBC Radio 4's You and Yours programme told the committee that one woman had spent £1,500 on calls and suggested that programmes get 200 calls a minute, which makes getting through to the studio a slim chance.[10] However, producers and operators of quiz shows and channels have stated that only a small minority of people have a problem with being addicted to calling shows and channels.[10]

Report findings

On January 25, 2007, the select committee released its report into the participation television channel industry. The committee said that the channels should be classed as gambling and not a game of skill.[11]

The report made a few recommendations as to how the industry should be regulated. These include more transparency to viewers on the odds of getting through to the studio, including a recommendation of the odds of getting through being shown through an on-screen graphic.[5] The report also said that questions should be verified by a third party before they can be broadcast.[11]

BIG Game TV!

BIG Game TV! was the subject of a City of London Police investigation brought by the BBC Radio 4 programme You and Yours in May 2006 over allegations that receptionists were told to ignore all incoming calls for long periods of time while 150-200 calls per minute were clocked up at 75p a time.[12] NTL subsequently removed the channel from their channel line-up on the 7th of June.[13]

The City of London Police said there would be no charges brought against the channel, following its investigation.[14]

British Sky Broadcasting - Quiz channels move on Sky Digital EPG

British Sky Broadcasting made an attempt to counter the problems somewhat by moving the EPG numbers of the channels on its Sky Digital service to the 840's section under the heading of "Gaming and Dating". Many of the quiz channels got around this by broadcasting on other channels, notably the general entertainment channels.

Although British Sky Broadcasting has had quiz programming on its Sky branded channels before (for example, Sky Quiz Live on Sky One Mix), British Sky Broadcasting has avoided placing quiz programming on any of its branded channels, stating that such a move would damage the reputation of the company.[6]

Gambling Commission Participation TV consultation

By law, only charities and Camelot are allowed to run lotteries. Any prize competitions in newspapers, magazines and television shows have to be "games of skill". In an effort to crack down on unofficial lotteries the Government is insisting that television phone-in quizzes become harder since it claims they are otherwise games of chance.

In August 2006, the Gambling Commission in the United Kingdom started a consultation regarding the way that participation television operate. The consultation is designed to clear up the confusion between prize competitions, free draws and lotteries, ahead of the Gambling Act 2005, which came into force in September 2007. If the consultation shows that participation TV shows and channels operate more like lotteries rather than games of skill, they could be required by law to give 20% of their revenue to charity.[15][16][17]

Under the new Gambling Act, the Gambling Commission will have the power to prosecute broadcasters if it believes they are persistently flouting the law by running illegal lotteries. "There are already rules, but what the Gambling Act does is introduce a better definition so that the rules are enforceable", said a spokesman for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport. "At the moment the rules are not clear enough to prevent these kinds of quizzes where the questions are ridiculously easy in order to maximise the number of entrants".

Broadcasters are contesting the proposals, stating that the channels are not a lottery because they have a free web entry system in place on their websites, by law, which allow any individual to enter a competition for free.[6]

ICSTIS

The United Kingdom premium phone regulator, ICSTIS has reported an increase in complaints about quiz shows and channels. A BBC News article stated that "nearly 10% of all enquiries about premium rate services received by ICSTIS between September and November last year were specifically regarding television contests".

On October 10, 2006, ICSTIS announced that it would be investigating participation television channels after complaints it received from the public into concerns that players are paying too much to enter the quizzes by phone. ICSTIS also said that it wanted callers to know how much each call would cost them and the odds of winning any prize. ICSTIS raised concern that players were unaware that they would be charged for each call regardless of whether the player got through to the studio or not.[16]

On March 9, 2007 in the wake of a number of technical problems and controversies over premium rate phone-ins on television shows and quiz channels, ICSTIS warned television companies that any illegal operating would be investigated by the police.[18] ICSTIS also announced measures to bring in licensing to restore public confidence in competitions.

ITV Play

Criticisms about Quizmania, The Mint and other, similar phone-in quiz shows and television channels have been levelled by various groups of people.

An article on the BBC website noted that "ICSTIS - the organisation that regulates premium rate telephone services in the UK - had acknowledged that the growth in the number of puzzle channels has been "matched by an increase in complaints about them".

According to this article, "nearly 10% of all enquiries about premium rate services received by Icstis between September and November last year were specifically regarding television contests".

Despite the criticisms, Quizmania became the first live and interactive quizshow to broadcast on analogue terrestrial television.

Quiz Call

In a Sunday Times article published on September 24, Quiz Call admitted that it had taken calls at 75p a call without any chance of the callers getting through for a chance to win and Quiz Call apologised for using its own staff members to pose as winners. Channel 4 have since sold off Quiz Call due to increasing levels of bad reputation from the channel.[7]

In the Culture, Media and Sport committee held on November 28, 2006 representatives from Quiz Call admitted that one instance of people being put on hold did occur and that the producer responsible no longer works for Ostrich Media.

Call limits

Both ITV and Ostrich Media (who operate Quiz Call) have started limiting the number of phone calls a participant can make to their shows in a day. ITV only allows a participant 100 entries a day whereas when they first started this figure was 150 a day. Ostrich Media has a limit of 140 entries. The measures were put in place to safeguard players from becoming gambling addicts.[6]

Call Care

The Mail on Sunday reported that the major broadcasters in the United Kingdom are planning to set up a telephone service called Call Care which will offer support for players and help them with inquiries regarding participation TV shows and channels.[6]

2007 television phone-in scandals

In 2007, a series of scandals broke out involving allegations of phone-in segments of television programmes and quiz channels conning viewers.[19]

Richard & Judy on Channel 4 were accused of encouraging viewers to enter the 'You Say We Pay' segment after the winner had been picked.[20] The competition was indefinitely suspended soon afterwards[19] and was later cancelled permanently. Channel 4 Racing was also affected after a software glitch allowed callers to enter a competition even though the competition had ended.[21]

ITV suspended all programmes involving premium rate phone-ins on 5 March 2007, including its quiz channel ITV Play.[22] This was to allow independent auditor Deloitte to conduct a review of programmes carried by ITV including Dancing on Ice and The X Factor which use phone-ins to generate revenue to ensure they are run fairly.[23] ITV Play was taken off the air during the review, but for a few days it ran a limited after midnight service for only four hours before on March 13, ITV announced that ITV Play had been permanently closed down.[24]

Five followed suit when they were alleged to have displayed the name of a fictional winner on BrainTeaser after they failed to find a genuine winner.[25] Five was later fined £300,000 by Ofcom - the highest ever amount from the broadcasting watchdog.

The BBC was also affected by these scandals. Saturday Kitchen on BBC One were accused of encouraging viewers to phone in to a pre-recorded programme.[26] On 14 March 2007 the BBC children's programme Blue Peter was revealed to have used a girl who was visiting the studio to pose as a caller live on the show.[27] The BBC stated that a technical error prevented 14,000 callers from getting a chance to win in the competition.[28] Konnie Huq apologised over the phone-in problem on the March 14 airing of the show.[27]

On 20 March 2007 it was revealed that 11,500 votes for the Dancing on Ice final three days earlier on ITV were lost as they were not delivered to Vodafone until the following Monday morning. On 23 April 2007, a BBC Panorama investigation disclosed that callers to GMTV's phone-in competitions may have been defrauded out of millions of pounds, because the telephone system operator, Opera Interactive Technology, had determined the winners before the phone lines had closed. GMTV responded by suspending the phone-in quizzes, but claimed that "it was confident it had not breached regulators' codes". Opera Interactive also denied any wrongdoing.[29]

The BBC suspended all phone-in competitions indefinitely on 18 July 2007, after further revelations about faked competition winners, including incidents during the charity broadcasts Comic Relief and Children in Need.[30]

British tabloid newspapers reported on 26 July 2007 that ITV's broadcast of the 2005 British Comedy Awards had also been conning viewers.[31][32] According to a report in The Sun, viewers telephoned a premium-rate number to vote for the People's Choice Award during what was claimed to be a live broadcast; yet, at 22:30, the show went to a news broadcast, so that when the show returned, viewers thought it was still live, and thus still phoned the number, when the last half-hour was in fact a recording as the vote had already finished, rendering the call-in votes given during the recording pointless and a misuse of the callers' money.[31]

List of quiz channels

This film, television or video-related list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it with reliably sourced additions.

South America

Argentina

Brazil

Chile

Peru

Puerto Rico

Colombia

North America

Although there are no quiz channels in North America, these are interactive programs similar to quiz channels:

Canada

Mexico

United States

Europe

Belgium

The games started airing as from 2004. In Flanders the main TV channels already banned the games between 2008 and 2010, except vtm and 2BE who stopped in 2011. In Wallonia the games are still broadcast.

The Belgian cabaret Neveneffecten had a TV-show Basta in January 2011 on channel Eén. In their second episode, Basta could prove these games were a fraud. Neveneffecten found a job posting as host for such games and they asked Maxime De Winne to apply for the job and to go undercover. De Winne got the job and was a host for about 4 months and used hidden cameras to record conversations with the management. Neveneffecten also hired a math expert: Gaeten de Weert. After some months, De Weert was able to solve every math puzzle, but noticed the answer of the puzzle is incorrect in 16% of the cases due to miscalculation of the producers. De Weert called the studio during a live game and was able to give the correct answer. He also said the show was a fraud and he was going to publish the solution key on the Internet, which he actually did. The episode was aired on 17 January 2011, vtm and 2BE decided to stop the games as from 20 January 2011.[33][34]

The broadcast did not have effect in Wallonia although De Weert was also able to break the solution keys of the call games on these channels in August 2013.[35] The games are no more aired since March 2014.[36]

France

No more call-tv shows are aired since 2007, these games are prohibited by the French law.http://csa.fr/Espace-juridique/Deliberations-et-recommandations-du-CSA/Recommandations-et-deliberations-du-CSA-relatives-a-d-autres-sujets/Deliberation-du-4-decembre-2007-relative-aux-incitations-a-utiliser-des-services-SMS-ou-telephoniques-surtaxes

Germany

Shortly after adoption of the Rundfunkstaatsvertrag (broadcast treaty) in September 2008, which allows the regulators to impose fines to the channels in case of irregularity, several channels announced the end of phone-in quizzes.

Israel

Netherlands

In the Netherlands, call-in quizzes were officially banned by law after losing all network support in November 2007. These programs were cancelled in the Flemish part of Belgium as from January 2011. De Neveneffecten revealed in their television show "Basta" fraud on large scale. The games are still aired in the Wallon part of Belgium.

Switzerland

Czech Republic

Croatia

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Finland

Greece

Serbia

Slovenia

Slovakia

Italy

Poland

Portugal

Russia

Spain

United Kingdom

Former Quiz Programmes & Channels

Africa

Nigeria

Asia

Philippines

See also

References

  1. ↑ West, Dave (2008-02-21). "Bingo lined up to replace ITV1's Play". Digital Spy. Retrieved 2008-05-29.
  2. ↑ "NetPlay TV To Buy Channel 848". iGaming Business. Retrieved 2008-05-29.
  3. ↑ Conlan, Tara (2008-04-09). "TV phone-in shows face crackdown". The Guardian. Retrieved 2010-03-13.
  4. ↑ Bowers, Simon; Gibson, Owen (2007-01-25). "TV quiz shows sidestep gaming laws, MPs warn". Media Guardian. Retrieved 2007-01-25.(free subscription required)
  5. 1 2 Sherwin, Adam (2007-01-25). "Q. Name a form of gambling A. Call-in quizzes, rule MPs". The Times. Retrieved 2007-01-25.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Fluendy, Simon and Rees, Jon TV quizzes under spotlight by The Mail on Sunday, published September 17, 2006, retrieved September 17, 2006.
  7. 1 2 Swinford, Steven. TV quiz sets callers a costly question by The Sunday Times, published September 24, 2006, retrieved September 24, 2006.
  8. 1 2 3 McLaren, Elsa. TV quiz shows accused of misleading viewers. Published by The Times on November 28, 2006. Accessed November 29, 2006.
  9. ↑ Oatts, Joanne. Rival's quiz shows "illegal lotteries". Published by Digital Spy on November 29, 2006. Accessed November 29, 2006.
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 TV phone-in quizzes 'a lottery'. Publishes by BBC News on November 28, 2006. Accessed December 2, 2006
  11. 1 2 BBC News (2007-01-25). "Quiz shows are gambling, say MPs". Retrieved 2007-01-25.
  12. ↑ BIG Game TV - The Fraud Squad Raids by the BBC for the BBC Radio 4 programme You and Yours, broadcast May 19, 2006, retrieved May 27, 2006.
  13. ↑ ntl remove Big Game TV from channel line up by Cable Forum, created June 7, 2006, retrieved June 7, 2006.
  14. ↑ "TV quiz tricks exposed by whistleblower". This is Money. 2007-01-25. Retrieved 2007-01-25.
  15. ↑ Views sought on free draws and prize competitions published by the Gambling Commission, issued on August 3, 2006, retrieved August 13, 2006.
  16. 1 2 Webdale, Jonathan. UK participation TV under review by C21Media, published August 4, 2006, retrieved August 13, 2006.
  17. ↑ Gambling regulator probes quiz TV by BBC News, published August 4, 2006, retrieved August 13, 2006.
  18. ↑ "Phone watchdog warns TV channels". BBC News. 2007-03-09. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  19. 1 2 "The phone-in shows under scrutiny". BBC News. 2007-04-23. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  20. ↑ "Richard and Judy quiz scrutinised". BBC News. 2007-02-18. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  21. ↑ Gibson, Owen (2007-03-14). "TV phone-in shows hit by more woes". Media Guardian. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  22. ↑ "ITV suspends premium phone-ins". BBC News. 2007-03-06. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  23. ↑ "More ITV phone-ins get all-clear". BBC News. 2007-03-12. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  24. ↑ "Phone-in channel ITV Play is axed". BBC News. 2007-03-13. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  25. ↑ Deans, Jason (2007-03-08). "Five dragged into phone-in crisis". Media Guardian. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  26. ↑ "BBC admits TV show phone mistake". BBC News. 2007-02-28. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  27. 1 2 "Blue Peter sorry over fake winner". BBC News. 2007-03-14. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  28. ↑ Plunkett, John (2007-03-14). "Blue Peter phone-in received 14,000 calls". Media Guardian. Retrieved 2007-03-14.
  29. ↑ "Viewers 'lose millions' to GMTV", BBC News, 23 April 2007. Accessed 2007-04-23.
  30. ↑ BBC suspends phone competitions, BBC News, 18 July 2007. Accessed 2008-02-10.
  31. 1 2 Colin Robertson, "ITV Scam Comedy Awards Vote", The Sun, 26 July 2007, accessed 26 July 2007.
  32. ↑ Ben Dowell (2007-10-22). "News: Media: Comedy Awards Firm Angry at ITV". guardian.co.uk. Retrieved 2008-05-12.
  33. ↑ "De mol in het belspel" [The mole in the call game] (in Dutch). 18 January 2011. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  34. ↑ "Hoe los ik een belspel op?" [How to solve a call game?] (PDF) (in Dutch). 18 January 2011. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  35. ↑ "Bastakraker rekent ook of met Waalse belspelletjes" [Basta-squattor now deals with Wallonian call games] (in Dutch). 18 January 2011. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  36. ↑ {http://www.lalibre.be/culture/medias-tele/rtl-met-un-terme-a-la-call-tv-52d7627f3570ba3e183af7ea}
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