[Cathryn Crawford]

Do you think it's because of Aaron Brown? ;-)

[ValenB4]

More likely their lack of Lauri Dhue.

[Timesink]

Further Reese:

Wednesday, May 21st, 2003

Wednesday with Cynthia, News Depression

Total news viewing is down for the fifth straight week. Just a small dip this time, 5% total day, 3% prime from last week. On the total day average, 1,794,000 Americans were watching the four television cable news networks each quarter-hour. In prime time the networks averaged 2,801,000 total viewers.

At the height of the Iraqi war, the week of March 17th, there were 13,000,000 people watching news in prime time and 8,420,000 in total day. That?s a 78.7% drop in total viewing and in prime time it was down 78.5%. About five times as many Americans watched cable news two months ago as are watching it now and Fox is doing the best job of retaining its war time audience.

Once again FoxNews dominated, finishing seventh in prime time and total day viewing among the basic cable ad supported networks. Once again CNN is no longer in the top ten and MSNBC and Headline News aren?t even close.

Market share breakdown for the week:

Prime Time:

• FoxNews 53.2%
• CNN 28.9%
• MSNBC 10.3%
• Headline News 7.6%

  Total Day:

• FoxNews 51%
• CNN 27%
• MSNBC 11.7%
• Headline News 10.3%

[Phsstpok]

From Julia Turner's review piece on Slate of Ken Auletta's hit piece on Fox:

And the last word goes to Aaron Brown—the CNN anchor Fox hosts once likened to a dentist at Ailes' request. "There's room for conservative talk radio on television," Brown says. "But I don't think anyone ought to pretend it's the New York Times or CNN."

It seems to me that this is a good thing. Perhaps Fox News should make this their new advertising theme. "Aaron Brown says that Fox 'ought (not) pretend that it's the new York Times or CNN.' Thank you, Mr. Brown. We're not the New York Times or CNN. We report the news. We don't falsify it or plagarize it."