DISQUS

DVR is not as important as live viewers. One of these days advertisers will look solely at who's watching commercials, than avg viewers totals. Networks need to start creating incentives to get folks to watch their shows live. American Idol has an advantage because it is live, and so do sports.

My idea for networks is live blogs with the cast immediately after the live viewing. Show with rabid fan bases would eat it up. I think moonlight, gossip girl, lost, office would all see their live ratings improve a little. It may not be a lot but this is how networks need to be thinking.

You look at a day like today and you must wonder what has happened to television. there was nothing on but reality, formula sitcoms, and formula procedurals. the 3 lowest brow, least respected genres in television. It looks like television has devolved until you look at tonight where you have NBC's single camera sitcoms and ABC's lost. shows that push the boundaries of storytelling in television. Thursday night includes some of the best produced well written shows of all time.

Television today, creatively, is simultaneously better and worst than it has ever been.

wife swap won its time slot, this is a sad day for TV :(

For being the Network of the NHL. Versus has pathetic coverage.

How come cartoon network and adult swim are listed separately here?
Same thing with Nick/Nick at Nite

Fox news has smaller coverage than cnn and headline news, but that doesn't seem to matter in ratings.

Its tuesday. time to dl gg. check out that hip slang.
do advertisers care about buzz? It seems to have little effect on ratings. 2.5 men and rules are two of the least buzzed sitcoms ever but check out those ratings. 30 rock and gossip girl have tons of buzz. tiny ratings. house gets both buzz and ratings. bachelor gets neither. I wonder if advertisers will somewhat forgive poor ratings because they are attaching their names to buzz?

I know deal or no deal is comfortable for NBC.(cheap with middle of the road ratings) but they will never compete with the other networks until they develop some real television programs. I often think NBC just isn't trying.

I love BBT. i hope to see it move to 9:30 where even mediocre shows(rules) pull big ratings. I don't see why it wouldn't; it shares a writer with 2.5 men

Robert, I'm sure you're right on the hulu/itunes numbers. If they were big, they'd brag. I read that at the end of the beta that hulu had 5 million unique users. I'm sure that number is bigger now and doesn't include the network sites. Online usage is signficant

How come CNN doesn't have a personality driven show at 8? Its much more competitive w/fox when it does air a personality driven show.

The Office is also number one this week. (and all weeks it airs a new episode) on HULU

Reruns of the office aren't likely to do well against Fox's cartoon block. Oh, NBC how little you try.

wow dateline doesn't even put up a fight against 60 minutes.

Fox's cartoons are popular online too. Family Guy is HULU's 3rd most popular program for the past week. Simpsons 4th; American Dad 7th; and King of the Hill 17th.

I think Dexters rating would be a lot higher if it wasn't the censored version of the show. I know thats why I don't watch.

Monk and Pysch pull in better numbers on cable.

Studio supported shows online do have a future.
First the CPM's for online shows are higher than that of TV shows and will probably get even higher as ads are able to become more targeted. An advertiser will pay more when they are one of 4 ads in a program and an advertiser will pay more when they know their audience is interested in their product.
Second, ads can be attached to clips. 15 seconds of ads for a 30 second clip is a good ratio, especially if the clip was produced as part of a larger program that is also getting ad revenue.
Third, Online video, assuming the rights can be worked out, can reach a global audience much easier. 300 million Americans versus over 6 billion earthlings. You do the math. The only thing content producers would have to take care of is translation; distribution is a non-issue.
Fourth. Old content will continue to produce revenue as long as its online, basically forever. A viewer can blow a day watching an entire season of Arrested Development, content that would just be collecting dust otherwise.

Online video does have a future, if the content producers are smart about it.

I'm with you, I don't usually watch CSI, but I will check it out this week out of morbid curiosity.
I'd like to see a Heros/Office mashup; Gossip Girl/Everybody loves Chris; and the ultimate in cross network mashups: CSI:Miami/L&O:SVU

ABC is the real winner Saturday night. Narnia is a free way to fill 3 hours of programming.(Narnia is a Disney movie, so they wouldn't have to pay anyone to show it) It promotes their new Narnia movie, and it still drew 6+ million eyeballs and a 2.0 in the demo.
The other networks should follow ABC's lead and use Saturdays as movie sequel promotion nights, especially this time of year when movie sequels start to come out. I believe all the networks have an affiliated movie studio, so no why not?

thanks for those numbers.
A quick google search revealed some a handful of different numbers depending on the source, but all seemed consistent with yours.
maybe this tragedy is what it takes to force reform in the sport. From what i've read, a move to synthetic tracks, drug reform, and more responsible breeding/training could do wonders.

To me, there is nothing more pleasant than spending a day at the local thoroughbred track, watching the horses race and placing small bets on long shots. I've always known that the horses were at risk, but I always kind of figured that these things were exceedingly rare. I may have to rethink my love of the sport if this appears not be true. Does somebody have any numbers on how often this type of thing happens?

Big Brown has some decent hype this year so that should help ratings. I love watching the kentucky derby. problem is I only watch the race, not the entire telecast. I wonder how viewership spikes during the actual race time.
Note: neilson doesn't count viewers at bars (or otbs) so sports ratings are always under reported.

I would tend to think that CBS should graduate ML to the 10 o'clock hour for next season and try out numbers at a 10 o'clock time slot elsewhere. (sun-thurs) Procedurals tend to do well at 10 on weekdays(as evidenced by L&O's and CSI's) and numbers is as good as any of them. I think CBS would see numbers for both shows improve and lets them take another shot at 9 o'clock. Maybe something that 's a better thematic fit with ghost whisperer. I'm rootin' for you ML fans.

I'm just jealous you get sci-fi in HD at all. Here in rochester, ny (time warner) we are forced to watch BSG in SD. Ever since getting an HDTV, watching something in SD is almost painful.

Thanks for the shout out in the main post.
I agree with Angie too, people may just not have known supernatural was back; I have a feeling a lot of supernatural viewers only watch the CW when supernatural is on, and missed any promotion of a new episode.

Scrubs moving to ABC will be good for both networks. It opens up a spot for office for NBC. And ABC will be able to use scrubs to launch a new sitcom.

The only reason it looks like NBC wants to keep 30 rock is so its around long enough to make it a good syndication sell. Its number are mediocre. Earl preformed better in the weaker time slot.

The office is a great deal for NBC. It looks relatively cheap to make, it pulls in great demo numbers, it gets great buzz, TBS already runs reruns and its only season 4. A spin off is NBC's best idea in a long while.

NBC Thursday night is the best night on TV.

The demo ratings are seem to actually be very close, but KO's numbers will take a fall when Bush is no longer president.(Unless clinton gets elected, but that will probably be just as good for o'reily as olberman)People watch KO to watch him bash Bush.

Yea, BL has a tough spot, but Thursday a little more competitive day than Monday and Thursday at 9 is the most competitive time slot on TV. Greys, CSI, Office, 5th Grader

ABC needs to kill its "tasteless reality" block. I know the demo numbers are decent, but the overall viewers is pretty low, and it makes ABC feel like something more like the CW. Its not good for their image as a network and their not hits to boot. ABC, you can do better.

Those numbers aren't very good for WMC. Cancel it or move it to Fridays. Could NBC really think of nothing better than a 2 hours of clip shows? Beauty and the Geek is posting bad numbers, even for the CW. No way that should come back. Shark's and NCIS numbers are good considering its comp.

bbt is up cbs.com great episode
house is ussually up on hulu.com (great quality for a streaming site) pretty quickly. house will probably also be on fox.com

Seriously, using anecdotal evidence would you believe raw is more popular than gossip girl?