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Strictly Come Dancing versus X Factor. Brucie versus Simon. Celebrity versus wannabe. All part of the fight for the largest viewing audience on Saturday night.

This weekend sees the return of what has become the traditional autumn battle for the crown of most watched TV programme of the weekend.

X Factor, currently showing the auditions, is already an established part of Saturday viewing more than a month into its latest series. Last weekend more than 12 million viewers tuned in. It seems not only to be pleasing viewers but must make the ITV bosses happy acting as a spur to advertising revenues in these difficult market times.

The BBC’s announcement last week that it was to pit its Saturday flagship caused a flurry in the media with claims that the BBC was being ‘aggressive’ taking on ITV head-to-head. Over the last couple of seasons, when the shows have been complementary, each has reached around 10 million viewers.

It is unlikely that the viewers will be split down the middle as Britain’s households will probably choose to record one while watching the other. Potentially it could be X Factor relegated to the recorder as it has already been announced that its results will now appear on Sunday rather than on Saturday night, with the BBC dropping its Sunday night results show.

The danger for ITV is that with X Factor recorded, viewers are tempted to skip the ad breaks. This must be a concern for advertisers and for ITV.  

There is only one group that will decide this and it is the British public. Next  week I am sure we will have more debate as this has a lot further to run - well until Christmas.

Let battle commence.

Compared to the real world of magazines, has ITV’s new look This Morning gone from Take a Break to the dizzy heights of Cosmo?

With new co-host Holly Willoughby replacing Fern Britton, the 28-year old ex-model brings a younger element to the show, and dare we say a touch more glamour.

But what will the typical viewer make of such a change in presenter? Both Fern Britton and her predecessor Judy Finnegan were consummate broadcasters. Holly, on the other hand, has already been described as a “talkative airhead.”

But this is daytime TV after all and as a new mum to three-month old Harry, Holly is no stranger to this audience.

What’s more, we’re in a recession with 2.43 million of the population out of work, nearly one million of which are under 25. Not only does this change the viewer profile, it also creates a greater need for escapism and perhaps Holly, who incidentally came out top in a recent poll of who women should most look like in order to land a good job, is just the tonic.

Now in its 21^st series, it’s perhaps time the flagship daytime show had a revamp. With new title sequence and music, the first fundamental change to the opening sequences since it moved to London in 1996, and the likes of Peter Andre signed as the new showbiz reporter, one can’t see why This Morning won’t remain the all time favourite “coffee morning” telly.

The Church of England is taking to the airwaves in the battle for souls or, at the very least, a few more bums on pews come Sunday.

Its first-ever radio ad - created by what the Guardian calls a “Christian media production company”, Whistling Frog Productions - might be the aural equivalent of the trendy vicar wearing Doc Marten boots; but based on a difficult brief (getting people to go to the Church of England at the weekend, instead of the Church of Retail), it does a good job.

And it doesn’t stand alone. As part of its “Back to Church” campaign, The church is clearly getting good advice about integrating its media activity, therefore adding video and audio to the mix.

As a church spokesman says about the radio medium: “It’s a chance to talk to people at the breakfast table and on the drive home. That is the beauty of advertising on the radio.” With a difficult message to convey, nothing beats a captive audience.

The BBC’s move to Salford’s Media City will “reinvent the BBC for the north” and be an opportunity for regional, creative businesses to work hand-in-hand with the organisation.

This was the unequivocal message from two of the most senior members of the corporation’s Marketing, Communications and Audiences Organisation (MC&A) at BBC Manchester last night.

Sharon Baylay, BBC executive board member with responsibility for MC&A  said: “Brands attract brands and we will be building Manchester and Salford as destinations for the creative industries, especially the digital and online sector which are so integrated with what the BBC is doing moving forward.”

The MC&A’s Jacky Brandreth, director of brand and planning, added: “The vision for the BBC is connecting better with audiences across the north and having creative talent living and breathing in the region.”

It was, undoubtedly, a promising sign for the audience of north west agencies and media companies that the BBC is taking its relationship with local business seriously enough to field such senior executives for a face-to-face Q&A session.

And among the 30 staff MC&A North will employ in the region, more than 20 of those will be newly-created positions.

The BBC’s Media City operation will host children’s programming, entertainment, FiveLive, BBC Sport, alongside regional and local programmes, among others. Even the Match of the Day studio will be in spitting distance of Manchester United’s Old Trafford stadium.

Brandreth said: “This is about opening up the conversation and creating an ongoing dialogue with people and organisations here.”

If you’ve found PR Media Blog, then I assume you have an interest in media today and media tomorrow.

That being so, the BBC’s latest World of Business podcast, hosted by Peter Day, gives a fascinating insight into how the media landscape is changing.

Experts he calls upon include the Telegraph’s digital editor, Edward Roussel, media commentator, Mathew Horsman, and TV producer, Peter Bazalgette.

As the The Guardian’s Emily Bell put it in a tweet last night…

With all the uproar about phone blagging and What Andy Coulson Knew, you may have missed the fact that the Public Administration Committee has been holding a public hearing on how the government uses, and misuses, language.

On the Today programme Matthew Parris made the usual cheap shots at “spin”, but what was more interesting was the way they singled out the creep of management speak (top down, bottom up, total envelope) into so called “accessible” language.

This isn’t about civil servant jargon - the deliverables and outputs and visions - it’s about new ways of saying nothing, using what appear to be nifty analogies (anyone remember Who Moved My Cheese?) to give the impression that was you are saying is easily understood, when in fact it’s even more obscure and nonsensical than ever.

As they played a clip of Liam Byrne, my first thought was that they hadn’t used a very good example, that he was actually using quite simple language.  It wasn’t until he reached the end that I got the point - or rather, realised that there was no point at all and he had just wasted several seconds of my life and doubtless several hundred valuable brain cells trying to figure out what on earth he was talking about. 

What we fondly used to call Fleet Street understood perfectly that simple, clear, impactful writing was the most difficult thing in the world - which is why traditionally the Sun’s sub-editors were the best paid and most jealously guarded.

I wouldn’t deny for a second that many people in corporate PR spend a great deal of time trying to say very little at length and with great authority. A vital skill in crisis management is the ability to talk to a journalist for ten minutes helpfully explaining what you can’t tell them anything at all. 

But being clear and making sense generally runs contrary to human nature - apart for the politicians, just listen to Vicky Pollard or the cute little monster in Outnumbered.  So everyone in the public sector should be making superhuman efforts to say what they actually mean. 

Sky Sports have been hyping The Ashes for months in their own inimitable way and who can blame them with the money they have spent to secure sole television rights.

It is one of their older commentators, the former England player and coach David ‘Bumble’ Lloyd, who has taken on their coverage to another level with his tweets from the commentary box.

Reading his tweets reminds me of listening to the grandfather of cricket coverage Test Match Special (TMS).

Over the first two days we have learnt from Lloyd his views on the food being delivered, suggested player look-a-likes and that he even listened to the Inspiral Carpets and Mark E Smith on the way to the ground this morning.

It is not just the occasional tweet either from Lloyd there is regular comment and views through each session. While the BBC’s Jonathan Agnew is sending regular tweets, it seems as if Lloyd has edge. Perhaps Agnew, sitting in the TMS commentary box can add little to what is being said.

Both set up their accounts within days of each other last week and Lloyd has taken a first innings lead with Lloyd having 8885 followers compared with 6820 following Aggers. Interestingly, old stalwart Henry Blofeld has started up his own Twitter account - only yesterday - most of tweets seem to be just retweets.

Sky, along with Bumble, seems to have grasped the extra dimension that Twitter can bring to fans – some of whom are sitting in the office and can’t watch the TV or listen to the radio.

With the furore of press coverage the story achieved, it was hard to miss the fact that some of the BBC’s “top talent” are facing drastic pay cuts. It was reported that a gathering of stars were invited to a less than extravagant affair held at Television Centre to be told that anyone earning over £100,000 a year would face a massive pay cut, with some deals being halved.

Brucie is now contemplating his future as host on Strictly Come Dancing as his considerable £900,000 earnings could be slashed to a mere £500,000.

Terry Wogan, who’s Radio 2 breakfast show Wake up to Wogan averages 7.8 million listeners a week, is facing a similar cut, from £800,000 to £500,000.

Other personalities who may face a drop in salary when their contracts come up for renewal include Chris Moyles, Jeremy Clarkson and Jonathan Ross.

In the current economic climate it comes as no surprise that the BBC is making “efficiency savings” and talent fees are not excluded from the economic pressures.

It’s also no secret that ITV and Channel 4 are struggling in these hard economic times, but throw the licence fee - that’s public money - into the melting pot and it becomes a rather more interesting issue.

As the Telegraph’s Neil Midgley writes; “the PR line from the BBC is clear. Don’t take the licence fee away from us.”

With the amount of press coverage this “top talent” gathering attracted, it soon became clear that the BBC’s PR machine has been working particularly hard since the report by the House of Commons public accounts select committee which criticised the corporation’s reluctance to open its books to public scrutiny, not to mention separate talks of freezing the licence fee.

Clearly the BBC must be seen to be doing all it can to make savings and not waste public money on hugely inflated salaries and what better way to tell the world that’s what it’s doing than at the expense, quite literally, of its biggest, news generating stars.

With this in mind, one can’t help question whether the recent pay cuts were more of a shrewd PR move than a strategic business decision, as it seems the corporation’s freelance production staff (who can command £1,000 a week or more) have, for the moment, been left unscathed.

Last week the Times suggested that BBC insiders hoped that a high-profile name would walk out in a row over pay, to allow the corporation to say that it is refusing to meet overpriced salary demands.  But that doesn’t seem likely. No big stars have publicly complained which is now rather incidental as the headlines have already been grabbed.

Iranians protesting at the outcome of the recent election have been mobilising through social networks like twitter and Facebook. 

In addition to challenging the ’surprising’ results of the presidential election, social networks are being used to organise protests and direct action.   Moreover opponent of the current regime, who claim the election was rigged, have been taking on one of the world’s largest media organisations via twitter.

Whilst organisations like the BBC and New York Times were covering the events as they unfolded, CNN was singled out by twitter users inside Iran and around the world for failing to give sufficient prominence to the outrage at the reported election result emanating from inside the country.  Twitter users in their thousands started to use the hashtag #CNNfail in their messages to point out the limited CNN coverage.   In a direct response to the demands of web users the TV network increased its coverage of events and made the protests their lead story.  

The major news brands around the world remain our most trusted sources of news and comment but the social web is emerging as a critical provider of checks and balance.  

It’s the interview, and interviewee, from hell…

A Fox news presenter tries to get some sense (and a straight answer) out of Mayor Virg Bernaro of Lansing, Michigan, whose constituents are likely to be affected by General Motors’ production cutbacks.

Frankly, neither of them come out of this well. And never has a “thank you very much” for the interview sounded quite so hollow.