IDOL‘S RATINGS: BANGED AGAIN

The first half hour of Fox’s American Idol vied with CBS’s The Big Bang Theory Thursday night, and it appeared that — like last week — ratings results for the two shows among adults 18-49 would come down to a photo finish when final numbers are counted, with actual differences statistically insignificant. According to preliminary [...]

CNN TAKES RATINGS LEADING IN HOUSTON COVERAGE

Affirming CNN’s reputation as the place to go for late-breaking news, especially when that news is non-political in nature, Nielsen said on Monday that the cable news network ‘s wall-to-wall coverage of the death of Whitney Houston attracted an average of 2.17 million viewers from 8:00 p.m. to 1:00 a.m. on Saturday, peaking at 9:00 [...]

IDOL KEEPS FALLING

Fox’s American Idol remained the highest-rated show on television on Wednesday and Thursday, but its numbers were down by nearly 30 percent from a year ago. Thursday’s telecast, which drew 16.99 million total viewers, was actually beaten by CBS’s The Big Bang Theory among viewers 18-49, Idol‘s primary target demo. Among total viewers, the CBS [...]

FOOTBALL TURNS LIGHTS OUT ON GLOBES

Sunday night’s telecast of the Golden Globe awards on NBC had to contend with a massive audience for the NFL playoff game between the New York Giants and the Green Bay Packers on Fox. According to overnight Nielsen ratings, the runover at 7:00 p.m. drew 40.1 million viewers, reducing the audience for the Globes’ red-carpet [...]

CNN LOSES IN IOWA

CNN, which ordinarily draws big ratings for live coverage of special events, saw its audience plunge Tuesday night for its coverage of the Iowa caucuses. According to Nielsen Research, total viewers dropped to 1.3 million — 41 percent below the 2.2 million viewers who tuned in a year ago. As it did last year, Fox [...]

VIEWERS FOR BBC’S ARABIC BROADCASTS INCREASE 80 PERCENT

While state-controlled broadcasters have attempted to buttress the besieged Arab regimes caught up in uprisings across North Africa, the BBC’s Arabic-language broadcasts have increased their audiences 80 percent, according to a study by the International Audience Research Program (IARP) conducted in Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Lebanon and Morocco. The biggest increase was seen in [...]

THANKS TO TALENT, FOOTBALL, NBC’S GOT RATINGS

It was another week for NBC’s peacock to crow. The struggling network saw its America’s Got Talent rank first and second in the Nielsen ratings, with the two-hour Tuesday edition averaging 12 million viewers and the one-hour Wednesday edition 11.1 million. Moreover, its Sunday night preseason NFL telecast between the Saints and Raiders averaged 9.3 [...]

SAWYER CLOSING IN ON WILLIAMS

An excerpt from Diane Sawyer’s interview with Jaycee Dugard that was included in last Thursday night’s World News with Diane Sawyer not only gave the ABC newscast a rare win for the night over NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, but helped narrow the gap between the rival newscasts to a minuscule 4 percent for [...]

MCCREERY WINS BIG; SO DOES AMERICAN IDOL

Fox’s season finale of American Idol Wednesday night averaged 28.16 million viewers. Here’s a run-down by half-hours: 8:00 p.m.: 22.95 million: 8:30 p.m.: 27.78 million; 9:00 p.m.: 30.63 million; 9:30 p.m. (in which the winner, 17-year-old Scotty McCreery, was crowned): 31.27 million. In addition, Fox announced earlier in the day that 122.4 million votes were [...]

NBA GAME SETS RATINGS RECORD

TNT’s telecast of Game 1 of the NBA Eastern Conference Finals between the Miami Heat and the Chicago Bulls drew 11.1 million viewers, making it the most-watched basketball game on cable television in history. It broke a record set in 2003 when 10.8 million viewers watched Michael Jordan playing in his last All-Star Game. The [...]

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