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The Forum > Article Comments > Oprah will do it for Australia > Comments

Oprah will do it for Australia : Comments

By Will Turner, published 10/12/2010

Hey girlfriend, Oprah's worth every dollar, and we all might win something at her Oprah House shows.

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Teensy little reality check, Mr Turner.

In your position as "Media Officer at the United States Studies Centre at The University of Sydney, NSW", I suspect that self-serving propaganda comes naturally. But this is a little rich, don't you think?

"Even if the overwhelming majority of Winfrey’s 40-million-strong American audience are choosing to holiday at home because of the recession..."

Errr, how many was that again?

According to news just in from the USA...

"The audience for Oprah was just over 4 million viewers -- the lowest it has ever been since the show first went on the air in 1986."

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2010/06/30/oprah-lowest-ratings-history/

A little fuzziness on numbers here or there is no big thing. But a full order of magnitude?

Just a bit much, eh?.

Making this amount of fuss over a US TV personality simply guarantees that no other country will take us seriously.

We are just a bunch of hicks from hicksville, it would appear.

Only we're just a bit further away than Butte, Montana, is all.
Posted by Pericles, Sunday, 12 December 2010 3:08:56 PM
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Australia just needs Ellen for a visit now Pericles, accompanied by the beautiful Ms Portia De Generes/Rossi!
Posted by we are unique, Sunday, 12 December 2010 10:49:13 PM
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Oprah has brought her circus here to promote her new TV network due to launch on 1 January 2011. It is called OWN, Oprah Winfrey Network.

We generous taxpayers are giving her much free advertising.

Oprah's show, like Oprah herself, is waning in the USA and, as is common, performers past their prime visit Oz where we fall at their feet as this country is behind the times in many respects.

I doubt if many Americans will visit Australia with the exchange rate the way it is right now. They won't pay $3 for a bottle of Coke! And their economy, except for the mega-rich, is stuffed!

Opera, one of those mega-rich, has benefited greatly from the Bush tax cuts enhanced by the Obama tax cuts for the very very rich.

With Opera, its all profit - straight to her.
Posted by brennie, Monday, 13 December 2010 7:17:28 AM
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Point taken about the numbers. For facts and figures I was using ABC online as a source. See http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/12/08/3088309.htm for an example of the 40-million figure used for her American audience, but I could have been delved into that further to find counter examples such as the Fox news story Pericles linked to.

I stand by my point about the publicity being a good thing in any measure that involves dollars. Like it or not, it is difficult to see how $3 million spent on promoting tourism in any other manner could bring greater returns.

As for the world not taking us seriously, even if Oprah's visit makes us less respected by the super high-brow from outside of Australia, do the rest of us really care that much about said group's opinion?
Posted by Will T, Monday, 13 December 2010 8:20:23 AM
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*We are just a bunch of hicks from hicksville, it would appear*

Well Pericles, it all blends in with uggs boots, an Aussie
invention. Then of course Kath and Kim! It appears so.
Posted by Yabby, Monday, 13 December 2010 8:36:47 AM
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Good defence, Will T.

>>For facts and figures I was using ABC online as a source<<

And the ABC in turn used Tourism & Transport Forum director Christopher Brown as a source. No need to check anything that he says, of course.

But I liked this even better.

>>...even if Oprah's visit makes us less respected by the super high-brow from outside of Australia, do the rest of us really care that much about said group's opinion?<<

"Super high-brow". Nobody wants to be labelled with that neat little put-down, do they?

Better just settle back and accept that we can't be bothered with the opinions of that snooty lot, whoever they are. After all, we don't want to appear in any way intellectual.

Terribly un-Australian, that.

Enjoy our hicks-from-hicksville image. Because anything else is pretentious and up-itself, according to those in charge of our image overseas.

Incidentally, just picking up on the tourist angle for a moment.

Has anyone bothered to examine the demographics of Oprah's (rapidly dwindling) audience?

Can they actually afford to come here, without having to sell their double-wide?
Posted by Pericles, Monday, 13 December 2010 8:48:30 AM
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