Australian Simpsons News
Second Half, 2001

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13th December, 2001 While Sofcom sort out their hosting problems, I'm pleased to welcome you to Tripod. The URL here is http://simpsonsgazette.tripod.com  Please ignore the "directive processing" errors on each page. I don't have an easy way of removing these without making the eventual return to Sofcom more difficult. Sadly, the month.cgi script I use for automatically setting the current month won't work on Tripod (this will only affect links from the main Ten and Foxtel pages, but you can still use the monthly archive page). If anyone knows how to return a URL rather than HTML code via CGI, I could solve the problem once and for all; otherwise, I'll have a work-around in January. I also came up with a better name for the site: "The Australian Simpsons Gazette." Long overdue, I know.    :) Read on for the news everyone missed while the site was down.

10th December, 2001 Hopefully the website problems have been sorted out now. It turns out the data-centre that was hosting this site in the US was shut down (and they didn't try very hard to let Sofcom know it was happening). If you're reading this, we've now relocated to an Australian server, which should make things faster for my Australian audience, and hopefully more reliable. I do apologise for the inconvenience in the meantime, and I hope you haven't missed any of your favourite shows. There's a few changes to The Simpsons in December. On Ten, the Wednesday timeslot has contracted to a single episode to make way for Just Shoot Me! repeats. The Saturday 6:00pm timeslot seemed to have been merged into the 6:00pm weekday strip, starting the 8th December. However, without information for future weeks, I can't confirm that this is a long-term situation. I'll just have to monitor the schedule. On FOX8, there was some weird re-ordering last weekend in the 9:00am timeslots -- nothing major unless you were trying to catch all the episodes in order. The only other change occurs on Christmas Day, when the two evening timeslots are pre-empted by a Simpsons marathon ("A Simpsons Christmas"). The marathon will run for 20 hours, from 9:00am to 5:00am the next day. The five hours after midnight will repeat a selection from the day-time. Most notable is the first appearance of Season Twelve episodes on FOX8 -- five new episodes will feature, from 9:30pm. It is expected the entire season will show up soon. Note that, with New Year's Day dedicated entirely to an X-Files marathon, The Simpsons won't see 2002 until the 2nd January -- not unlike those of us who'll be partying through the change of year!

21st November, 2001 As you may have noticed, the server that hosts this site has been having big problems. Hence, you won't have seen the 15th November update, as I was never able to post it. I apologise for the problems; I'm hoping they'll be resolved soon. In the meantime, if you can't get at one of my pages, try going directly to a different page, as the first has probably been deleted during an attempted update.

5th November, 2001 I'm finally back from India, both mentally and physically. I hope you've missed me just enough to keep visiting the site now that I'm updating again! India was wonderful, and I highly recommend it! It reminded me in many ways of travelling in Europe. And although the culture is somewhat less familiar, it's much cheaper. On the other hand, you wouldn't want to go unprepared. A lot's happened while I've been away. The first season of The Simpsons has been released on DVD, as predicted. I haven't watched the whole thing yet, but the episodes I have watched, the directors' comments have been mesmerising. I thoroughly recommend the set for this reason alone. I haven't decided if I'll keep my tapes yet or not, but even if I can see some minor coding artefacts (mostly background textures), I reckon the DVDs are probably enough. That said, feel free to make me an offer for the tapes... In the US, a new season of The Simpsons (the thirteenth) begins tomorrow. I'm endeavouring to get my episode guide up to date, but the more concise episode list is already current. In the meantime, the show won two Emmy Awards in Creative Arts categories: Outstanding Animated Program, and Outstanding Voice-Over Performance (Hank Azaria). Neither of those awards form part of tonight's telecast. Back in Australia, Ten have been running a fourth Simpsons stream, at 6:00pm Saturdays, mostly with episodes from Season Four (though that's just changed). Don't expect new episodes until February. On Foxtel, there was a late change in September, extending the running of the daily 6:00pm stream, so the only day not featuring a Simpsons episode at 6:00pm was the 1st October, Buffy-related pre-emption. More importantly, Foxtel's rights to the first two seasons of The Simpsons expired in October and have not been renewed (hence the three episodes skipped in the weekend morning stream). If you were waiting for one of the first 35 episodes, it should be some consolation that they'll all be available on DVD shortly (Season Two should lag the first by about six months, hence probably coinciding with Ten's premiere of Season Thirteen in February). Although I would like to be able to tell you this sort of thing in advance, experience has shown that Foxtel never knows it's screening the last run of a season, anyway. To finish, updates to these pages should return to a more or less regular schedule from now on, so please do keep coming back for all your Simpsons scheduling news.

31st August, 2001 Unfortunately, Ten no longer have scheduling information beyond next week, so the site's going to look a bit sparse for FTA info until I get back. Sorry about that. On FOX8, Slayerfest 4 will pre-empt The Simpsons on Monday, 1st October, but all three streams should otherwise continue on from September. Happy viewing to you all while I'm away!

23rd August, 2001 Just a week to go until my holiday, during which time the site will be unattended. I've made Foxtel predictions through to November (but check the Foxtel Guide nearer that time). I'll be back in October, in any case. There'll be one more Channel Ten update next week, but after that, you're on your own. I'll provide as much advance scheduling as I can, but that's unlikely to be more than a couple of weeks. In September on Foxtel, the daily 6:00pm stream loses its weekday timeslots, thereafter confined to Saturdays and Sundays at 6:00pm. The other two streams continue as before. However, in October, the weekday mornings stream reaches the end of Season Eleven and heads back to the very beginning, around 9:50am on Sunday, 14th October.

2nd August, 2001 We're back (for the time being). Ten is finally bringing back new Simpsons episodes on the 8th August (four remain, so we should be done by the end of the month). In other news, Season Thirteen seems likely to start in the U.S. on the 4th November, somewhat later than previous years. You can already pre-order the Season One DVDs at Amazon, though I'll personally be waiting for the Australian release a couple of weeks later (PAL has better picture resolution). On Foxtel in August, there's almost nothing to report about The Simpsons. All three streams will be continuing, though the daily 6:00pm stream jumps back to the start of Season Nine (rather than One) on Saturday, 18th August. Looks like someone may have forgotten to reset the stream properties properly after the last time, when this was done deliberately to keep the streams separated. I'm skeptical about the value of such a tactic.

26th July, 2001 It seems new Simpsons episodes will return on the 8th August! At least this is the latest from Channel Ten. Unfortunately I don't have time for more of an update, and my August Foxtel Guide is running late. Please bear with me, for a full update next week. Administrative Note: For anyone who's been in email contact with me in the past via simpsons@sofcom.com.au, the email address from which I replied will cease functioning tomorrow. That means, if you want to contact me, please use the , and it will be automatically redirected to my new email address. Sorry for the bother.

19th July, 2001 The Simpsons have apparently been nominated for a couple of Emmys: HOMR (BABF22) for Outstanding Animated Program, and Simpson Safari (CABF13) for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series. Go the yellow! Closer to home, despite Ten's insistence on holding off on new Simpsons episodes, "The Green Guide" reports that The Simpsons came in at number 6 in the national ratings! Unfortunately, they couldn't tell me if it was the Wednesday or Friday airing, and whilst I suspect Friday's episodes may have been the bigger draw card, it's likely that Wednesday's more recent episode rated better. Administrative announcement: The way I update this site is about to change. Hopefully, I won't miss any Thursday updates, but you may notice some changes to the timing. If anything more serious does go wrong, I apologise in advance.

12th July, 2001 Not the best of news, but just to keep everyone up to date: Ten has now received the remaining Simpsons Season Twelve episodes, but is continuing to hold them. Short of last-minute changes, the earliest they might start airing is the 8th August, but the actual start date may well be later still. The only thing approaching an explanation is that Big Brother has generally been causing chaos in Programming. Here's hoping we don't have to wait too much longer.

5th July, 2001 It looks like Ten's not bringing back new episodes on the 18th July, after all. I couldn't be bothered chasing this up, on the basis that we'll see them when we see them. But I will let you know when something firms up. Last night's late Simpsons screening was moved forward to 8:30pm as a result of the Big Brother Special wrapping up in just an hour.

Australian Simpsons News Archive: First Half, 2001.