WCXX

BBC nurse drama, Frankie, which was met with a lukewarm critical reaction on its release and described by The Telegraph as "woefully inadequate", scored an impressive 18.22 per cent. Conversely, the Channel 4 documentaries Skint and Child Genius fell foul of social media users, recording negative scores of -9.01 per cent and -7.05 per cent respectively.

The Wright Way, meanwhile, was subjected to such a scathing onslaught of online abuse that Shane Allen, the BBC's controller of comedy commissioning, admitted it was partly responsible for the cancellation of the show.

^{Dates tops the chart for the highest number of positive social media posts in June}

Unveiled last month, and verified by the London School of Economics, Virgin Media's Hotlist uses an algorithm to analyse data taken from Twitter and Facebook in order to offer an alternative insight into the reaction of TV viewers.

"Sentiment" percentages are reached by collecting all proactive comments posted on social media about a given programme. Using key words to determine whether the sentiment is positive or negative, the number of positive posts is then divided by the total number of posts. Negative posts are then subtracted from this number to arrive at the final percentage.

The percentages for even the most popular shows are relatively low due to the large number of neutral posts, while a negative percentage is arrived at by taking into account the number of negative posts.

Nick Forward, director of TV at Virgin Media said: "The rise of social media and second screens is fuelling a whole new wave of engagement with TV through friends and social circles online.

"The Hotlist looks to capture that buzz and provide insight into what's hot on TV right now."

Starring Will Mellor and Oona Chaplin, Dates concluded a nine-part series on July 3. Its honest portrayal of online dating and its accompanying pitfalls resonated with viewers and it quickly became one of Channel 4's most viewed weekly shows.