Editing Network 10 (section)

===1970–1988: Expansion and original run===
For its first five years, the 0-10 Network led a hand-to-mouth existence. By the beginning of the 1970s the network was in a precarious financial position and there were predictions that it would fail.

In 1971, the 0-10 Network first aired ''[[Young Talent Time]]'', which was a huge rating success, and ran for 17 years.

However, the network's true financial reprise came about due to the fact that the controversial adult soap opera serial ''[[Number 96 (TV series)|Number 96]]'' premiered in March 1972 on the night that "Australian TV lost its virginity". The series broke new ground for Australian television and captured the imagination of viewers like few programs before or since. For the next three years it was consistently Australia's top-rating television program and, not surprisingly, its huge popularity attracted advertisers to Ten ''en masse'', with the result that its revenue increased significantly from [[Australian dollar|$]]1 million in 1971 to more than $10 million in 1972.

However, the pattern of rating dominance was already set, and for most of the next five decades from the mid-1960s, there was little deviation from the prevalent rankings, with the Nine Network typically in the first place, the Seven Network second, 0-10 third and [[ABC TV (Australian TV network)|ABC TV]] fourth.

The gradual evolution of Network Ten into its current form has its origins in the ongoing attempts by media mogul [[Rupert Murdoch]] to acquire a prized commercial television licence in Australia's largest capital city market, Sydney. This began when Murdoch's [[News Limited]] purchased the [[Wollongong]] station [[WIN-4]] in the early 1960s, around the same time he bought [[Festival Records]]. In 1977, frustrated by regulatory blocks that prevented him from expanding into the Sydney market, Murdoch sold WIN and purchased a 46% share in Ten Sydney.

In 1979, Murdoch made an unsuccessful takeover bid for the Melbourne-based [[The Herald and Weekly Times]] media group, which originally owned HSV-7. Although the bid failed, he gained a 50% stake in [[Ansett Australia|Ansett]], which thus gave him control of channel 0 in Melbourne.

In 1979, 0-10 first aired the soap opera ''[[Prisoner (TV series)|Prisoner]]'', which was a huge rating success.

On 20 January 1980, the 0-10 Network became known as '''Network Ten''' to reflect ATV moving from channel 0 to channel 10 – although the Brisbane station continued to broadcast as [[TVQ]]-0 until 10 September 1988 when the station changed to TVQ-10. In 1987 Adelaide's Network Ten affiliate (SAS-10) and Seven Network affiliate (ADS-7) successfully negotiated to exchange affiliation rights and channel frequencies due to ownership problems. On 27 December 1987, the exchange came into effect and ADS-7, owned by the same owners as the main Network Ten stations, became ADS-10 with SAS-10 converting to SAS-7, operated by [[TVW]]-7 in Perth.

When Murdoch became an American citizen in 1985 so that he could expand his media empire in the United States with the [[Fox Broadcasting Company|Fox]] network, Australia's media ownership laws obliged him to dispose of the flagship television stations, which were sold to [[The Northern Star]], an offshoot of the [[Westfield Group]] conglomerate controlled by property tycoon [[Frank Lowy]]. However, Westfield was badly hit by the stock market crash of 1987, and in 1989 sold Network Ten to a consortium led by Charles Curran and former television journalist Steve Cosser.

The network became fully national in 1988 with the launch of [[NEW (TV station)|NEW-10]] in Perth after the introduction of satellite facilities made it economical for the network to broadcast to Western Australia. Northern Star officially took hold of TVQ-10 later in the year because of swapping frequencies with neighbouring DDQ-0 in Toowoomba and rebranded [[CTC (TV station)|CTC]] Canberra under the network banner in time for aggregation.