Posted on 06/16/2013 10:07:44 AM PDT by Kaslin
A key to success in business is knowing your competition.
CBS Evening News host Scott Pelley apparently doesn't subscribe to this doctrine, for in an interview with Deadline Hollywood published Saturday, Pelley claimed that Fox News only has 200,000 to 300,000 viewers:
DEADLINE: So for you, other outlets especially the cable news networks do center on just one segment of the political spectrum in their reporting?
PELLEY: Certainly. It’s no surprise. Fox is associated with the right and MSNBC is associated with the left and they’ve done that because it is a business model. It’s a strategy. They’ve decided to bite off one small part of the viewership and be happy with that 200,000 viewers, 300,000 viewers that they have. But when you are talking to 7 million viewers across the country, man you have got to represent everybody’s views and have got to give them the impression that you are being as honest as you know how to be.DEADLINE: While the news flow on cable may be in the hundreds of thousands, a lot of people are watching Bill O’Reilly, a couple of million a night. Same thing with Hannity.
PELLEY: We measure our audience in millions. They’re not big numbers. People talk about cable a lot and cable has a very high profile. Not a lot of people watch cable news, they just don’t. If you look at the Nielsen numbers, the cable channels have a few hundred thousand viewers at any given moment. The CBS Evening News again has 7 million viewers, ABC has 8 million viewers. Brian [NBC's Williams] has almost 9 million. Altogether we have about 25 million viewers on any given night. That’s a very different order of magnitude.
Pelley's knowledge of his own industry is shockingly low.
According to TV Newser, Fox averaged 1.5 million viewers per hour last Monday, and 2.15 million in primetime.
The O'Reilly Factor had 3 million viewers, The Five had 2.2 million as did Special Report.
As such, speaking of "order of magnitude," Pelley was wrong by a factor of ten.
Pelley was also wrong about his own ratings and those of his broadcast competitors.
As TV Newser reported, the Evening News averaged 5.7 million viewers the week of June 3, ABC World News had 7 million and NBC Nightly News had 7.5 million.
It's been years since any of these programs garnered 9 million viewers and they attracted a combined 25 million.
CBS should be so proud of how well-informed their Evening News host is about his own industry.
Yea!Foxnews has that many viewers at 0300 hours Eastern Time watching Red Eye.Seriously though,How many viewers does CBS have for the entire day.
Facts and numbers do not matter to the MSM.
Gosh they must be really hurting then, and almost out of business!!!
Oh wait... they are the number 1 news station, how can that be?
And MSNBC ... how many viewers does that have? (remember to count them both)
In a story about the significance of low audience number did this guy happen to mention that station?
I wouldn’t count those FORCED to endure CNN at the airports “viewers”.
That kind of started me laughing a little right there.
Idiot talking to bigger idiots, no truth needed.
“As TV Newser reported, the Evening News averaged 5.7 million viewers the week of June 3, ABC World News had 7 million and NBC Nightly News had 7.5 million.”
These are still formidable numbers (unfortunately). CBS, NBC, and ABC are ideological appendages of the Democrat Party. Even if one assumes they operate independently instead of receiving their talking points directly from the Democrats—a BIG assumption—they are ideological bedfellows of the Democrat Party. They couldn’t report the truth even if they wanted to—and they don’t.
Unfortunately, too many Americans still rely on the big three networks for news. That’s a sad fact. Most Americans don’t even realize they’re being propagandized on a nightly basis. Oh, well. It is what it is, and conservatives—who will never get a fair shake in the media—have got to learn to deal with it.
GLBTABDisney has never represented my views.
SeeBS has never represented my views.
N-BS-C has never represented my views.
NPR even on "all things liberal considered" has never represented my views.
I'm not a libtard socialist red diaper doper baby. My views have never been represented by the MSM since at least 1968...
And Fox itself is more moderate right than the article would have you believe. Fox is more closely aligned with the GOPe than conservatives. The far left has MSNBC. The far right is unrepresented, including on Fox.
This "old person" avoids those networks like the plague, but you are probably right about the AARP membership viewers.
He is on drugs. There are no Neilsen boxes in India, Ireland, Germany, South America etc...also viewers in hotels, bars, restaurants, airports are not registered by Neilsen. Pelley is WRONG. CNN and Fox News are global and have ridiculous viewership numbers. Not to mention online streams and mobile streams.
I had no idea CBS news still had 7.5M viewers, five times Fox. I have not watched news from the big three since the 70s and 80s
he lumped FOX and MSNBC in the same sentence thusly:
" Certainly. Its no surprise. Fox is associated with the right and MSNBC is associated with the left and theyve done that because it is a business model. Its a strategy. Theyve decided to bite off one small part of the viewership and be happy with that 200,000 viewers, 300,000 viewers that they have"
And the 200,000 to 300,000 is actually true for MSNBC but the way he says it, it sounds like he is saying it for BOTH stations.
Lets call and complain and MAKE HIM make a retraction on-air and apologize and kiss Roger Ailles' butt on live TV.
Pelly obviously has been guzzeling the cool-aid and/or playing too much with Anthony Weiner.
There are lies, then there are cBS lies.
Mary Mapes could not be reached for comment...
a fool in paradise: “My views have never been represented by the MSM since at least 1968...”
Including Fox. The left owns nearly everything. The right has Fox, but even Fox is more like the Republican Party’s network. In other words, it’s hardly what I’d call conservative.
Fox isn’t even the Republican party’s network. Newscorp execs endorsed John Kerry in 2004. Newscorp is partially arab owned and has squashed stories critical of Islam.
a fool in paradise: “Fox isnt even the Republican partys network.”
The GOPe isn’t critical of Islam either. Remember, it’s a religion of peace. Gah!
[Pelley’s most recent report, like his first, did not pause to acknowledge global warming skeptics, instead treating the existence of global warming as an established fact. I again asked him why. “If I do an interview with Elie Wiesel,” he asks, “am I required as a journalist to find a Holocaust denier?” He says his team tried hard to find a respected scientist who contradicted the prevailing opinion in the scientific community, but there was no one out there who fit that description. “This isn't about politics or pseudo-science or conspiracy theory blogs,” he says. “This is about sound science.”. . .But doesn't the fact that there are a lot of Americans who are skeptical of global warming not well respected scientists, perhaps, but ordinary people watching the segment warrant at least some recognition of the other side? “There becomes a point in journalism where striving for balance becomes irresponsible,” says Pelley.]
Like most at CBS Pelly is not a journalist but an actor reading copy, written by someone else, in front of a camera.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.