DISQUS

dave · 1 year ago

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 :(

angie412 · 1 year ago

I find it disturbing that Farmer Wants a Wife even got a 2.1.

Jack · 1 year ago

LOST! 30 Rock! The Office! Great night for TV.

TV by the Numbers · 1 year ago

I know that Robert's just mocking the typical media take on the sweeps ratings, but in reality, since the mid-80s when broadcast primetime began its long term decline, I'd bet that *every* May sweeps has been the "worst ever" ;)

Robert Seidman · 1 year ago

if it's any consolation at least Univision's "Al Diablo con los Guapos" bested Wife Swap in the 18-34 demographic ! (2.3/8 vs. 2.1/7). And "Fuego en La Sangre" beat everything BUT American Idol at 9pm in the 18-34 demo.

Jon_V · 1 year ago

Univision - Wow...

This is something everyone was talking about when the 'fragmenting thing' was first noticed many years back. With Hispanic and increasing cable programming, this was exactly where we were headed.

For every viewer lost from the 'Big 4 and 1/2' networks, there are 1.05 viewers watching something else somewhere else because they found a show that 'speaks to them'..

We may have to completely change the way we look at the ratings to get the full picture.

Robert Seidman · 1 year ago

Jon, I agree completely. Unfortunately short of us buying the data (not going to happen, and even if we did, they'd not let us publish ALL of it) or someone feeding it all to us including all the cable data, we can't give that full picture. I imagine it would be a heck of a lot more interesting than what we are able to provide.

Last night for the EIGHT "broadcast networks" Nielsen reports at 9pm, the share of televisions that were on and tuned to them, even with American Idol's 21% share, was 53%. So we're almost always missing at least half of the big picture.

Amy, I agree that Idol will pick up towards the finale, but getting back to 30 million is looking "iffy".

amy · 1 year ago

i think idols ratings will increase the next two weeks. i think it just took a temporary dive this week (i mean the performance show). and to be fair. idol Always loses viewers in may because people just arent as interested in the good singers as they are in the bad ones. last year's top 2 performance show got about 25 million but then the viewers always come back for the auditions next year.

kayarn · 1 year ago

maybe if networks actually tried to schedule decent programming, the numbers would pick up. wife swap? supernanny? 'til death? the price is right?

what do you expect out of those shows? they're awful.

John · 1 year ago

Farmer Wants a Wife is another example of American executives destroying a proven foreign concept. The US version looks like a low budget and boring version of The Bachelor, a show I happen to enjoy. In the original, and successful, conception of the show, multiple farmers bring a single partner home and it either works out or doesn't. This show has no credibility and is straight out boring.

Daniel C. · 1 year ago

Your commentary says TPIR and Deal had 7.59 Million. Your chart says TPIR had 370,000 more viewers. Looks more like a TPIR edge to me.

Robert Seidman · 1 year ago

Daniel, in the commentary that info re: Deal or No Deal was based on *just* the 8pm hour. The data table is for the full 8p-10p average, I didn't break the hour by hour detail out. Sorry for the confusion.

Akira · 1 year ago

"Deal just edged TPIR out in 18-49 viewers : 1.9/6 versus 1.8/5" but in the chart it's 1.9/5 versus 1.8/5. Not a big deal though. BTW, do you think there's gonna be a day Fox cancels Idol? I think it's losing its steam.

Robert Seidman · 1 year ago

Akira, the data table was right but the prose was wrong. I've corrected it, thanks. As for Idol losing steam, yes it is. Do I think it will be cancelled someday? Yep, but someday is still a ways off.

whspbe · 1 year ago

Fun trivia: Farmer wants a wife has less viewers than it had in the Netherlands.