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| -Short Attention Span Theater- |
| Broadcast viewership hits record low |
| 2010-07-10 |
| Americans avoided television in historic levels over the past week. CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox together had the smallest number of prime-time viewers last week in two decades of record-keeping, the Nielsen Co. said. Given the dominance of the big broadcasters before then, you'd probably have to go back to the early days of television to find such a collective shrug. My grandson was born in 2002. As far as I know, he's never watched anything but Disney, Nick, or Cartoon Network. Welcome to the new demographic. There's a reason why the CBS Evening News runs ads for Depends ... The first week of July tends to be among the slowest weeks of the year in television, anyway, with families more engaged in barbecues and fireworks. The problem was magnified this year because July Fourth came on Sunday, largely knocking out one of a typical week's biggest viewing nights. Together, the four networks averaged 18.9 million viewers last week, Nielsen said. During the season, "American Idol" alone usually gets a bigger audience than that. NBC's "America's Got Talent" is emerging as the summer's most popular show, with its two original episodes last week the only programs to top 10 million in viewership, Nielsen said. While the biggest broadcast networks are suffering, the Spanish-language Univision is stepping up. Among the closely-watched 18-to-49-year-old demographic, Univision finished second only to Fox in prime-time last week. It's not World Cup soccer that is behind Univision's success, it's the prime-time telenovelas "Soy tu Duena" and "Hasta Dinero Separe." Those soaps accounted for eight of the 20 most-watched programs among 18- to 49-year-old viewers of all languages last week, Nielsen said. For the week, CBS averaged 5.6 million viewers in prime-time (3.7 rating, 7 share), NBC had 4.7 million (3.0, 6), ABC had 4.5 million (2.9, 6), Fox had 4.1 million (2.5, 5), ION Television had 1.1 million (0.7, 1) and the CW had 950,000 (0.6, 1). Among the Spanish-language networks, Univision led with a 3.5 million prime-time average (1.8 rating, 3 share), Telemundo had 1 million (0.5, 1), TeleFutura had 800,000 (0.4, 1), Estrella had 190,000 and Azteca 150,000 (both 0.1, 0). NBC's "Nightly News" topped the evening newscasts with an average of 7.8 million viewers (5.2, 11). ABC's "World News" was second with 6.7 million (4.6, 10) and the "CBS Evening News" had 5 million viewers (3.4, 8). NBC's victory margin was undoubtedly stretched because Thursday and Friday night results were not included in the network's average because the Wimbledon tennis tournament. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #5 Movies on demand, DVDs that record, mixed martial arts and cable stations for each of the various sports, house and food pron... why would anyone spend the evening in front of the big broadcasters? And the young people either watch the shows that interest them on demand or on-line on their computers. Collective shrug, indeed. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2010-07-10 18:52 |
| #4 There's a reason why the CBS Evening News runs ads for Depends ... The suits will never be able to think out of the box. Among the Spanish-language networks, Univision led with a 3.5 million prime-time average (1.8 rating, 3 share Shut down the 'news' division, outsource it to English speakers at Univision. At least that way, the American public might be introduced to the war just south of our border. You know, things going on in this hemisphere. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2010-07-10 17:10 |
| #3 What's a "television"? (without it since 2002 and going...) |
| Posted by: twobyfour 2010-07-10 16:43 |
| #2 Wife Swap. Super Nanny. Bachelorette. Who watches that? Then Fox replaces Paula Abdul with Ellen Degenerate. Excuse me? How is that supposed to improve your ratings? Morons. |
| Posted by: Abu Uluque 2010-07-10 12:41 |
| #1 Gimme Three Sheets! |
| Posted by: Abu Uluque 2010-07-10 12:37 |