kestral wrote:
If there is anyone to blame for this recent run, surely it lays with Endemol and the selection process of deciding the mix of contestants on the wings?
This is of course the most likely scenario! However, it may not even be Endemol's fault at the end of the day. If people say on their application forms that they are gamblers, then maybe they are bluffing? It's become quite clear that Endemol were choosing gamblers to go on the show, so maybe that has backfired on them, and now people are pretending to be gamblers when they apply? I'd imagine you'd get away with it if you lied about the gambling part of the form - you'd only be in trouble if you lied about vital parts, such as whether or not you've had any criminal convictions.
Or it could just be that Endemol have mis-read the way certain people will play the game, and have accidentally chosen a group of cautious people at once. They're hardly going to chuck someone off the show if they hear them say in the bar one night "I need to win money for my wife" or something.
I think it's interesting that Big-Davey mentioned how he overheard a production team member saying that there had been something wrong with the game for a while now (presumably due to all the low wins), which presumably highlights how it is Endemol's fault for choosing the wrong players. As more and more people apply, selecting the lucky few who get to be on the show will be a tough job, especially due to increased applications to become a contestant on the show.
The point Kestral made about Endemol not gaining money any more due to the loss of the LTL is an interesting one. Whilst they generated huge amounts of money from that and surely have a lot left over, they may be feeling more pressure now that they no longer have this substantial (and it was EXTREMELY substantial) income. Interestingly, I would imagine that the people who are on the show now probably applied about this time a year ago, maybe had their auditions last spring, and were possibly chosen to be on the show in the summer. Right at the point where it looked as though the LTL would be dropped and Endemol would lose that source of income. Coincidence that this has now produced a run of possibly obvious dealers and / or targetists? I'm not sure.
Anyway, as for the game today, I didn't watch it live and read about it on here to start with. The blubbing at the start of John's show wasn't too bad simply because we've had a lot less of that lately (in fact I can't remember the last time a contestant got emotional like that before John today).
I was expecting a dreadful show from reading a lot of the comments on here, but it was a good show and the deal he made was obviously very important for him. As Kes said, you can't blame John - blame Endemol if anyone. Some of the comments made on here are aimed too much at the contestant. Although basicasic has actually stated he isn't criticising the player as such, which is good.
I can also see the point of view of the gamblers on here getting irritated by the current run of shows. But I'm not sure that the viewing public will all be getting irritated. I'm sure there will be many people (even gamblers) who enjoyed seeing Laura win £15,000 after saying she had never had as much as £4,000 in her life; and I'm sure a great amount of people liked seeing John today winning £8,000 as it was clearly going to help him so much.
It comes down to a question of what DOND is. Is it a money-making show, an entertainment show, a gambling show or just a simple gameshow? I think it's a mixture of all of those, but one thing is for sure and that's that we do have a lot of targetists at the moment. I'm not so sure this is going to have the negative effect on the viewing figures though, as a lot of these shows have had the feel-good factor about them, such as Lloyd, Pat, Sue, Glenis, John and Laura to name a few this month.
John says his life is totally focused on his wife, Angie, and tells us how she suffers from a disease that has totally affected her life, and he wants to win enough to turn the ground floor of their house into a more usable area for her... He tells us how he met her at a karaoke, and when he saw her he said she was the woman for him... He has a card from his wife and it has a red box with 9 on the front, and Noel talks about John leaving box 9 until the end and swapping for it to win £250,000...
Viv - 2 days in row it goes in the first box!!!
The banker says he pick-pocketed Nic and took her mobile phone and found some very interesting pictures of John on it!! 
