Channel Seven''s Tim Worner says the station isn't scared of internet pirates. Picture: Sam Mooy Source: The Australian
SEVEN Network boss Tim Worner says the station will not be spooked into fast-tracking imported television series and dramas because of internet pirates.
Seven has just announced a range of new shows and the return of several big hits from overseas for 2013.
Several have screened or will be shown in the US before they appear in Australia.
Among the shows Seven is screening in 2013 are the second season's of Revenge and Once Upon A Time, which have already started in the US, and the third season of the period drama Downton Abbey which is screening in the UK.
Of the new series coming out, Last Resort, about a US nuclear submarine crew which turns rogue after being attacked by its own navy, and Mrs Biggs, a co-production with UK's ITV and based on the life of great train robber
Ronnie Biggs, are on air elsewhere.
Worner said there was no denying illegal downloading does have some effect on television ratings but not to the point where he believes Seven needs to start fast-tracking its shows.
"I'm confident that those shows won't be greatly affected by the fact they have been on somewhere else first,'' Worner told AAP.
"I know there are other people in the industry who feel differently (about the ratings effects of illegal downloading) and they are making their programming decisions based on that feeling, but I think it's jumping at shadows.''
He said the first season of Revenge, one of Seven's big success stories of 2012, ran some six months behind the US and yet was still the number one drama in Australia.
"I don't think it's a concern with us and Revenge is a great example,'' he said.
"We ran that sometime after it had been on in the US and the show was huge.
"Downton Abbey, we screened some time after it had been in the UK, and the show is big.''
Worner said he was not dismissing the impact of internet piracy but he did not believe it was the problem other networks were making it out to be.
Network Ten has heavily promoted that several of its US series, such as Homeland and Hawaii Five-0, are now being fast-tracked and Foxtel has done likewise with a number of its popular programs, including Sons Of Anarchy and Boardwalk Empire.
But Worner said viewers are accustomed to watching shows when they are aired in Australia and in suitable timeslots and he was confident piracy would not spell the end of imported television shows.
"A lot of these sorts of things, cannibalisation, pirating is a story that gets over written,'' Worner said.
"Look at the ratings of the shows that have been fast-tracked, how have they gone?
"By saying that I am not saying we have our head in the sand and we don't think that there are challenges we are facing, but I don't think it's going to kill television.''
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