TV Scheduling.

In terms of scheduling, the day is split into three segments. These segements are morning, afternoon and night. 
The morning segment includes breakfast shows and news. This programming is fast paced but the content is relaxed, thus allowing people to wake up easily. This type of programming is aimed towards people who are up early to go to work or school.
Afternoon television is made up of children’s programmes, game shows and antique shows. This segment is aimed at people who do not work or go to school, such as young children and older people. 
Night time television, especially the programmes on after the watershed are for an adult audience as they may contain swearing, sexual scenes, drug use and violence. The watershed is after 9pm and is the time in which programmes that are seen to show adult content, as stated above, are shown.

Moving onto popular channels and the types of programmes found on them. The BBC is a public service broadcaster, therefore BBC One and Two show programmes to cater to every need. For example, in the morning they have Breakfast, in the afternoon they have Antiques road show and CBBC and in the evening they have more adult programmes such as Waking the Dead.
ITV1 is mainly a family channel. This is reflected specifically in their weekend programming as they air variety programmes such as Britains Got Talent and The X Factor. 
Channel 4 has a younger audience, this is reflected in their evening programming through programmes such as Skins and Fresh Meat (focused around groups of young people.)
Channel 5 appears to have a target audience of mainly older men. I believe this is true as many of their programmes are about stereotypically male interest. For example, their evening programming includes Cowboy Builders and their afternoon programming includes The Gadget Show.

Channel 5 shows the most reruns, especially during their day time programming. Although, Channel 4 has recently launched a new channel, Four 7, which is exclusively for showing reruns of the last weeks most popular shows.

Channel 4 and its sister channels show the most import programmes. Channel 4 recently airred popular American shows The Killing and Homeland. E4 shows alot of American sit-coms, such as 2 Broke Girls and New Girl.

In terms of scheduling a new programme, there are two techniques that are used to attract viewers.
Pre-echoing is when a new programme is scheduled before a popular programme, so people tuning in for the popular programme may catch the end of the new programme and want to watch the next episode.
Hammocking is when a new programme is scheduled between two already popular shows. People may catch the begining after watching the programme before hand and be drawn in to watch the rest of the programme. People may also not bother turning a channel over if they are going to watch the next popular programme. 

New technologies have effected the way in which scheduling attracts an audience. Firstly, remotecontrols mean that nobody has to get up to change the channel so they are more likely to watch something they know they like and turn off as soon as it’s over, therefore they will not see any of the new programme. On the other hand, they may catch a new programme whilst channel surfing and continue watching it. Secondly, computers, tablets and smart phones have effected the way in which we watch television as we don’t actually need to sit down and watch the programme whilst it is on as we can use i-players or apps such as Sky Go to watch them on the go or later on.