Broadcast (TV) viewership hits record low (Dinosaur Media DeathWatch™)

The Washington Times ^ | July 8, 2010 | David Bauder

[abb]

Americans avoided television in historic levels over the past week.

CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox together had the smallest number of prime-time viewers last week in two decades of record-keeping, the Nielsen Co. said. Given the dominance of the big broadcasters before then, you'd probably have to go back to the early days of television to find such a collective shrug.

The first week of July tends to be among the slowest weeks of the year in television, anyway, with families more engaged in barbecues and fireworks. The problem was magnified this year because July Fourth came on Sunday, largely knocking out one of a typical week's biggest viewing nights.

Together, the four networks averaged 18.9 million viewers last week, Nielsen said. During the season, "American Idol" alone usually gets a bigger audience than that.

NBC's "America's Got Talent" is emerging as the summer's most popular show, with its two original episodes last week the only programs to top 10 million in viewership, Nielsen said.

While the biggest broadcast networks are suffering, the Spanish-language Univision is stepping up. Among the closely-watched 18-to-49-year-old demographic, Univision finished second only to Fox in prime-time last week.

It's not World Cup soccer that is behind Univision's success, it's the prime-time telenovelas "Soy tu Duena" and "Hasta Dinero Separe." Those soaps accounted for eight of the 20 most-watched programs among 18- to 49-year-old viewers of all languages last week, Nielsen said.

snip

[dforest]

LOL, I was thinking the same thing the other day. I even thought about visiting Netflix to see if had been moved into the documentary category.

[Major Matt Mason]

Other than Fox News and the occasional sporting event, I haven't watched TV in a lonnnggg time. It is most liberal programming for liberal nitwits.

[norraad]

Yes, indeedy doody, what a load of in your face mind control crap!!

Every now and then if I'm somewhere that mistakenly allows them in, I surf through just to see what their up to.

EeEEEEhhh, click, eeeeeeeh, click, ad ifinitum, that's me going through the channels.

[GeronL]

I had not heard of the Houston-San Antonio thing

[donna]

Just this week I accidentally saw the intro to a Law & Order show. The scene of the dead man and the discussion of his private parts was so graphic and vulgar I thought it was some X-rated movie. In fact, I’ve never seen a movie so bad.

You really can’t have that stuff on in a family home (if you still care about your family).

[OldDeckHand]

"I have a new HDTV, beautiful 1080p picture. Unfortunately, there is no TV I want to watch and no new movies I want to buy."

Movies have also been exceptionally bad this past year as well. I can't think of a single film I saw and said to myself, "man, that was terrific and I'm glad I paid $40 bucks to see it", and my wife and I see a LOT of movies.

As for TV, there's NOTHING on broadcast worth watching, and barely a handful of cable/premium cable shows worth watching. I have nothing against the medium; I would happily watch television if there was something worth watching. There isn't. It's a crapfest.

[freekitty]

LOL

[MarineBrat]

There’s very little broadcast TV I’ll watch. I might watch reruns of Bonanza, Little House On The Prairie, Andy Griffith Show, The Waltons, The Carol Burnett Show, and a few others I could think of if I was in the mood. But you can see by my short list... there’s not much left for me today. Thus, I put the MarineBrat curse upon broadcast TV. Looks like it’s working. :)

[donna]

I actually picked up a copy of the old Ozzie and Harriet show cheap. Holy cow that show was lame. Unbelievably so.

You won't believe this but I remember watching as a very little kid. The very fact that Ozzie had ice cream all the time was a thrill. Only rich people had ice cream that often back then.

[Let's Roll]

I decided to check out Duel a couple years ago and before I turned it on, I thought “It’s probably really aged”.

Not hardly! Still very scary.

[OrangeHoof]

Television viewing traditionally climbs during bad economic times because more people are home, unemployed, with nothing to do than watch tv. What this tells me is that the networks are even worse off than even they realize.

[Zakeet]

CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox together had the smallest number of prime-time viewers last week in two decades of record-keeping, the Nielsen Co. said. Given the dominance of the big broadcasters before then, you'd probably have to go back to the early days of television to find such a collective shrug.

Not mentioned in the article but even more discouraging to the Nitwork Bigwigs, a majority of people immediately hit mute button or flip channels when commercials air. Tee-Vee is, after all, nothing more than an electronic billboard.

You are right. The bastards are finished. They may take some time to finally die given their vast size and enormous financial resources, but they are terminally ill.

[re_nortex]

What is interesting (and getting missed, imho) is how the digital change will eventually bury cable. Broadcast TV (ironicly) is going to end up outlasting cable.

Go to zap2it.com, put in your zip code, click TV, then select broadcast (antenna) as your provider. You’ll be amazed at how many channels you never even heard of are being broadcast in your area. And it is all because of subchanneling.

Digital allows over the air broadcasters to send out multiple channels on a single signal. So instead of channel 2, you have 2-1, 2-2, 2-3, 2-4...2-30. Yea, I have one broadcaster in my area that is sending out 30 seperate channels on a single transmission. Sure, most of it is junk, but so was most of the stuff on cable when it started.

I surmise that we're in the elite minority, Brookhaven. :-(

Aside from FNC and ESPN, all of my viewing is done over-the-air. Although I don't watch much television, the choices one gets with a proper antenna are astounding. Plus, the visual quality via broadcast is better since we don't get the compression and artifacts from pay TV providers.

Most of my enjoyment comes from the subchannels in the Dallas area, such as RTV (``Retro Television'') with some great classic shows not available elsewhere and ``This TV'', with a lineup of movies and shows such as ``The Outer Limits''. All of this is free after a small initial investment in a good antenna.

[Ronbo1948]

“The stated goal of those in charge is to knock the US down a couple pegs. That we consume too much. That our standard of living is too high. That we don’t deserve to be the lone superpower in the world.”

Does anyone in the Obama Regime understand they are turning the American middle class into radicals who will stop at nothing until the Leftards are run out of all major institutions?

They are literally sitting on top of a volcano and when it blows they better be ready to relocate off shore pretty damn quick.

If they stay in country, tar and feathers is the best thing that will happen to them....MARK MY WORDS! This is a country born in revolution and civil war.

[Brookhaven]

I think the people in this thread that say “there is nothing worth watching on broadcast TV” are going off the broadcast channels they are getting on cable—ABC, CBS, NBC, & Fox). Hey, I know because that was me.

I had no idea what was available until earlier this year my mom asked me to find out what would be the best antenna for her with the digital change (she is way out in the country and was having trouble getting channels). I put up the antenna for her ($40); when I had her TV rescan for channels, I thought “where the **** did all these channels come from?” She had like 35 channels in total—including a copule of sports channel, a weather channel, a couple of movie channels, and an oldie TV show channel. All of which I had never heard of.

Those four “national channels” are just the tip of the iceberg of what is being broadcast for free. There is a lot (I mean a lot) of channels being broadcast that never make it onto the local cable listings.

[OldPossum]

The only people still watching the nightly news on the alphabet networks are stuck in a decades old HABIT and don’t care that the anchors are lying to them nightly.

I suspect that a huge percentage of those watching that crap are so politically unaware that they don't KNOW that they're being lied to.

[madison10]

...and here I thought it was because digital TV reception was so crappy.

[Armedanddangerous]

I watch fox, discovery, the history channel, the outdoor channel, NCIS and USA. I watch FX for the best cop show on tv called JUSTIFIED.

[oh8eleven]

Caught “Duel” on a cable channel the other day.
I remember reading the story in Playboy (IIRC), many moons ago.

[PGalt]

GRRRRREAT news! Thanks for the ping/post.