Prime-Time Ratings:
Thursday 7/10/08

-Total Viewers:
CBS: 8.22 million, Fox: 7.88, NBC: 4.53, ABC: 3.84, CW: 1.87

-Adults 18-49:
Fox: 2.5 rating/8 share, CBS: 2.0/ 6, NBC: 1.8/ 6, ABC: 1.1/ 4, CW: 0.7 2

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-Yesterday’s Winners:
Greatest American Dog (CBS), CSI R (CBS), So You Think You Can Dance (Fox)

-Yesterday’s Losers (Excluding Repeats):
Swingtown (CBS)

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-Ratings Breakdown:
CBS was the most-watched network on this second Thursday in July, while the home of So You Think You Can Dance, Fox, was first among adults 18-49. Third in both categories was NBC, followed by ABC and the CW.

In series-premiere news, CBS reality/competition Greatest American Dog got off to a positive start, finishing first with 9.46 million viewers and a 2.1 rating/8 share among adults 18-49 from 8-9 p.m. With an increase of 530,000 viewers (9.20 to 9.73 million) and 16 percent among adults 18-49 (1.9/ 7 to 2.2/ 8) in the second half-hour, what viewers saw they apparently liked. For my thoughts on Greatest American Dog, listen to today’s PIPodcast at www.marcberman.tv.
Greatest American Dog led into a repeat of CSI with 9.77 million viewers (#1) and a 2.2/ 7 among adults 18-49 (#2) at 9 p.m., which was the most-watched show overall for the evening, followed by fading Swingtown at a disappointing 5.40 million viewers (#3) and a 1.8/ 5 among adults 18-49 (#2) at 10 p.m. Swingtown might have been more interesting on a cable network like HBO or Showtime where there are fewer restrictions.

Fox’s consistent Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? remained just that, with a second-place finish in both total viewers (7.04 million) and adults 18-49 (2.0/ 8) at 8 p.m. The live Dancing With the Stars Results Show followed with a healthy 8.73 million viewers and a 3.0/ 9 in the demo at 9 p.m., which led the night among adults 18-49 (and built from Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? by 50 percent). Poor Cat Deeley -- she must have been caught in a wind storm! As predicted, Comfort and Thayne bid adieu last night. But as I said on yesterday’s podcast, with a name like Comfort she should be hosting her own syndicated daytime talk show!

ABC opened the evening with a repeat of Ugly Betty (Viewers: #4, 2.98 million; A18-49: #4, 0.9/ 3 at 8 p.m.), followed by a repeat of Grey’s Anatomy (Viewers: #4, 3.07 million; A18-49: #4, 1.0/ 3), and docudrama Hopkins (Viewers: #2, 5.48 million; A18-49: #3, 1.6/ 5), which deserves accolades for building out of the Grey’s Anatomy encore by a hefty 2.39 million viewers and 60 percent among adults 18-49.

A night of Last Comic Standing did very little for NBC, with a repeat at 3.49 million viewers (#3) and a 1.2/ 4 among adults 18-49 (#3) at 8 p.m., followed by a two-hour installment at a5.05 million viewers and a 2.1/ 6 in the demo from 9-11 p.m. Take a look at the half-hour breakdown:

Last Comic Standing (NBC)
9:00 p.m. Viewers: 4.79 million (#3), A18-49: 1.9/ 6 (#3)
9:30 p.m. Viewers: 4.89 million (#3), A18-49: 2.0/ 6 (#3)
10:00 p.m. Viewers: 5.02 million (#3), A18-49: 2.1/ 6 (#1)
10:30 p.m. Viewers: 5.49 million (#2), 18-49: 2.3/ 7 (#1)

Repeats of the CW’s Smallville (Viewers: #5, 1.84 million; A18-49: #5, 0.7/ 3) and Supernatural (Viewers: #5, 1.90 million; A18-49: #5, 0.7/ 2) capped off the evening in the distant No. 5 spot.

Source: Nielsen Media Research data

quote:

Originally posted by Marc Berman:
The live Dancing With the Stars Results Show followed with a healthy 8.73 million viewers and a 3.0/ 9 in the demo at 9 p.m.,

Psst... I think you mean So You Think You Can Dance

FOX Widens Lead in A18-49 After 8 Days of 2008 July Sweep

After 8 days of the July Sweep, FOX now leads with a solid 2.1 A18-49. NBC is second with 1.7, ABC third with 1.6, and CBS fourth with 1.4, The CW is fifth with 0.6, while MyNetworkTV is last with a 0.3 average. Year-over-year, ABC is the only network up in A18-49's, whereas all the other networks are showing A18-49 declines from last July.

After 8 nights, CBS holds on to its customary lead in viewership, with FOX clinbing into second and NBC third. In viewers, only ABC and NBC are showing year-over-year increases compared to last years July Sweep.

I will provide an update later today when households and MyNetworkTV numbers become available.

					nights	nights
demo	web	demo	demo	%	won	won
Rank	web	2008	2007	chg	2008	2007
1	FOX	2.06	2.43	-15%	5	6.5
2	NBC	1.71	1.77	-3%	1.5	0.5
3	ABC	1.63	1.42	15%	1	
4	CBS	1.42	1.87	-24%		
5	CW	0.56	0.73	-23%	0.5	1
6	MNT*	0.32	0.49	-35%		
	total	7.70	8.70	-12%	8	8

					nights	nights
viewers	web	viewers	viewers	viewers	won	won
rank	web	2008	2007	chg	2008	2007
1	CBS	6.488	6.725	-4%	3	4
2	FOX	5.806	6.495	-11%	3	4
3	NBC	5.603	5.296	6%	1	
4	ABC	5.020	4.333	16%	1	
5	CW	1.459	1.910	-24%		
6	MNT*	0.915	1.183	-23%		
	total	25.29	25.942	-3%	8	8
  

* MyNetworkTV first 7 nights only.

Last nights numbers are based on FAST national numbers. Previous nights and last years comparative numbers are based upon final Nielsen numbers.

Nota Bene. This year's Sweep includes the low-HUT Fourth of July whereas last year's Sweep started on July 5th and did not include the Fourth of July.

Is CBS incapable of skewing young? It seems like they need high viewer totals to break a 3.0 in the demo (all the more reason why they should value their comedies and TAR which have a nice distribution of young viewers).

Who would have thought that GAD would do this well. It just goes to show you that Reality TV is so unpredictable. So much for MDP taking over the 8pm slot.

ABC just sucks on Thursday nights, when they do not have original programming.

quote:

In series-premiere news, CBS reality/competition Greatest American Dog got off to a positive start, finishing first with 9.46 million viewers and a 2.1 rating/8 share among adults 18-49 from 8-9 p.m. With an increase of 530,000 viewers (9.20 to 9.73 million) and 16 percent among adults 18-49 (1.9/ 7 to 2.2/ 8) in the second half-hour

So SWINGTOWN did bottom out last week due to the holiday.

Perhaps the 5 Million + viewers is where it will stabilize at as it hopefully finishes out its run in the way that FEAR itself stabilized after falling.

Should Swingtown really be labeled a loser? I mean, this is the first time EVER the show actually built on the week before - it had 1 million more viewers than it did last week, and last week it wasn't labeled a loser.

If Swingtown can continue to grow back up in the ratings, that's a great sign that viewers may be coming back.

And congrats to Greatest American Dog, I thought it would be flop, but it wasn't. This could be very similar to Wipeout in the ratings.

CBS should start its move towards the top of the demo ratings now that BB10 will start on Sunday. It was able to hang around the others despit only 2 hours of original programming during the first week.

Even though NBC is in 2nd place in the 18-49 ratings, That number is really bad considering they had 21 hours of original programming during the first week of sweeps. With such a large investment in new programming you would think they could/should be more than just 0.29 of a ratings point a head of Repeat hound CBS.

quote:

Originally posted by dumont:
FOX Widens Lead in A18-49 After 8 Days of 2008 July Sweep

After 8 days of the July Sweep, FOX now leads with a solid 2.1 A18-49. NBC is second with 1.7, ABC third with 1.6, and CBS fourth with 1.4, The CW is fifth with 0.6, while MyNetworkTV is last with a 0.3 average. Year-over-year, ABC is the only network up in A18-49's, whereas all the other networks are showing A18-49 declines from last July.

After 8 nights, CBS holds on to its customary lead in viewership, with FOX clinbing into second and NBC third. In viewers, only ABC and NBC are showing year-over-year increases compared to last years July Sweep.

I will provide an update later today when households and MyNetworkTV numbers become available.

					nights	nights
demo	web	demo	demo	%	won	won
Rank	web	2008	2007	chg	2008	2007
1	FOX	2.06	2.43	-15%	5	6.5
2	NBC	1.71	1.77	-3%	1.5	0.5
3	ABC	1.63	1.42	15%	1	
4	CBS	1.42	1.87	-24%		
5	CW	0.56	0.73	-23%	0.5	1
6	MNT*	0.32	0.49	-35%		
	total	7.70	8.70	-12%	8	8

					nights	nights
viewers	web	viewers	viewers	viewers	won	won
rank	web	2008	2007	chg	2008	2007
1	CBS	6.488	6.725	-4%	3	4
2	FOX	5.806	6.495	-11%	3	4
3	NBC	5.603	5.296	6%	1	
4	ABC	5.020	4.333	16%	1	
5	CW	1.459	1.910	-24%		
6	MNT*	0.915	1.183	-23%		
	total	25.29	25.942	-3%	8	8
  

* MyNetworkTV first 7 nights only.

Last nights numbers are based on FAST national numbers. Previous nights and last years comparative numbers are based upon final Nielsen numbers.

Nota Bene. This year's Sweep includes the low-HUT Fourth of July whereas last year's Sweep started on July 5th and did not include the Fourth of July.

With the threesome on last night's Swingtown how much else would have been necessary to see? Beside using some cursewords and more expliciit nudity I don't know what being on HBO or Showtime would really add.

quote:

Originally posted by TAYLORJNG:
Is CBS incapable of skewing young? It seems like they need high viewer totals to break a 3.0 in the demo (all the more reason why they should value their comedies and TAR which have a nice distribution of young viewers).

CBS has proven repeatedly that it does not realy value TAR...how many timeslots has it been it since its started? SURIVOR has never moved from Thursdays excepts for during basketball and for the Sunday finale's in all these years.

And then there was ordering only one edition even knowing a strike was in the offing...and of course the internal tinkering that led to the FAMILY edition that nearly derailed the whole program plus adding the lame YIELD and doing away with the FAST FORWARD on every leg.

Swingtown is a loser. It lost over 4 million from its lead in. Growing from what was basically a holiday broadcast last week, It was still down from a more comparable night of two weeks ago.

Swingtown will now, more than ever, that will weigh down the ratings numbers for CBS.

quote:

Originally posted by Julie:
Should Swingtown really be labeled a loser? I mean, this is the first time EVER the show actually built on the week before - it had 1 million more viewers than it did last week, and last week it wasn't labeled a loser.

If Swingtown can continue to grow back up in the ratings, that's a great sign that viewers may be coming back.

And congrats to Greatest American Dog, I thought it would be flop, but it wasn't. This could be very similar to Wipeout in the ratings.

quote:

Originally posted by GMYERS:
With the threesome on last night's Swingtown how much else would have been necessary to see? Beside using some cursewords and more expliciit nudity I don't know what being on HBO or Showtime would really add.

Yeah, that was about as explicit the show has gotten yet, and I don't think we really needed to see anymore than we did without it turning into a porno movie-LOL.

quote:

Originally posted by A.C.:

quote:

Originally posted by TAYLORJNG:
Is CBS incapable of skewing young? It seems like they need high viewer totals to break a 3.0 in the demo (all the more reason why they should value their comedies and TAR which have a nice distribution of young viewers).

CBS has proven repeatedly that it does not realy value TAR...how many timeslots has it been it since its started? SURIVOR has never moved from Thursdays excepts for during basketball and for the Sunday finale's in all these years.

And then there was ordering only one edition even knowing a strike was in the offing...and of course the internal tinkering that led to the FAMILY edition that nearly derailed the whole program plus adding the lame YIELD and doing away with the FAST FORWARD on every leg.

As much as I like TAR (and I enjoy it more than Survivor these days) and I think CBS was clearly wrong to only order one edition last year, I can't blame CBS for treating them differently. The ratings at their peaks were not even close. Survivor was a legit hit in its heyday, while TAR has always just been a decent performing show that skews younger for CBS.

quote:

Originally posted by A.C.:
plus adding the lame YIELD and doing away with the FAST FORWARD on every leg.

The Fast Forward shouldn't be on each leg. Being able to use yours at anytime is practically a free pass. Two isn't enough because people will use it just because it's there, but four or five would allow for strategic use. Besides, that's about how many would be typically used in a season with one on every leg.

As for the Yield, it didn't need to be on every leg, and I'm glad they've replaced it.

I like the yield actually on occasion as it adds to the drama effect and shows the true colors of the team members.

The only lame addition I saw was when the introduced the "intersection" - i think that was it, where they had to work with another team and that was unfair because sometimes you had to wait hours for the next team to arrive.

quote:

Originally posted by RoyBoyCF:

quote:

Originally posted by A.C.:
plus adding the lame YIELD and doing away with the FAST FORWARD on every leg.

The Fast Forward shouldn't be on each leg. Being able to use yours at anytime is practically a free pass. Two isn't enough because people will use it just because it's there, but four or five would allow for strategic use. Besides, that's about how many would be typically used in a season with one on every leg.

As for the Yield, it didn't need to be on every leg, and I'm glad they've replaced it.