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Cape Town – The Sony Channel and Gogglebox SA have remained silent on how they're cheating DStv viewers by showing how families are purportedly watching content on MultiChoice's satellite pay-TV platform – although it was never actually broadcast.
Serious questions are now being raised over Gogglebox SA's production integrity and the show's authenticity.
This comes following the latest episode of the show, broadcast this past Thursday night, that showed how families were watching RuPaul's Drag Race on M-Net's VUZU channel on DStv.
The problem is that the show the families "watched" never aired.
The Sony Channel (DStv 127) showed that the first episode of the 8th season of RuPaul's Drag Race – the show's 100th episode – was watched by the GoggleBox SA families while it was actually never shown on either the VUZU or VUZU AMP channels in the first place.
Not on the channel line-up
On screen, Gogglebox SA credited VUZU AMP channel and World of Wonder Productions, but M-Net's VUZU says RuPaul's Drag Race isn't actually on its schedule and line-up at all as either a first-run new season or as any repeats.
Vuzu told viewers who asked how it's possible that Gogglebox SA is showing families watching RuPaul's Drag Race on the Sony Channel, that the reality competition show "will not be airing on VUZU AMP due to an oversight relating to the content licence deal".
Vuzu told Channel24 in response to a media enquiry that RuPaul's Drag Race "has been pushed back due to an oversight with the content licence deal" and that it will now only start on Sunday, 26 June at 22:00 and on the VUZU (DStv 116) channel, not VUZU AMP.
Authenticity questioned
The apparently staged "viewing" with in-show families watching DStv content that isn't actually on TV, raises questions about how real and authentic Gogglebox SA is.
The show's whole premise is predicated on showing viewers at home how others viewers in South Africa are responding to what everybody can watch on television and the content that was shown on MultiChoice's DStv in the previous week.
Before launch, the Sony Channel touted the show's authenticity, saying the "topical show is filmed 7 days before the episode airs, allowing viewers to observe the households watching the week's TV shows, encouraging up-to-date discussions".
Gogglebox SA and the Sony Channel's territory director, Sonja Underwood, have not responded yet to a Channel24 media enquiry made last week after the airing of the episode.
It is not clear where the shown footage for RuPaul's Drag Race comes from and how it was acquired in the first place.
It wasn't possible for the families in the show to watch it live on DStv sitting on their couches, or as a recording since it wasn't shown in the South African territory, yet the production somehow has the episode and showed families responding to it while watching it.
