NBC's 'Press' wins
12th straight season
Other shorts: Programming notes: CW bites off more 'Diaries'
By Louisa Ada Seltzer
Sep 25, 2009
NBC's 'Press' wins 12th straight season by smaller margin
Despite the changes at "Meet the Press" since anchor Tim Russert's death last summer, NBC still has a sizeable lead on Sunday mornings, wrapping up its 12th straight yearly victory last week. But that lead is not as large as it once was. ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" is gaining, posting its best year since the 1998-'99 season and closing the gap with "Press." "Week" grew 12 percent year to year, to an average 3.05 million total viewers, while "Press" declined 3 percent, to 3.82 million, according to Nielsen. That's still a 25 percent advantage, but "Week" has narrowed "Press'" lead by 36 percent in the past year. David Gregory took over "Press" from interim host Tom Brokaw in December. CBS's "Face the Nation" finished third for the season in total viewers for the second straight year with 2.88 million, followed by "Fox News Sunday" at 1.33 million. Among adults 25-54, the key news demographic, "Press" averaged a 1.1 rating, with "Week" and "Nation" tied for second at 0.8 and "Fox" fourth at 0.4.
Programming notes: CW bites off more 'Diaries'
The CW's "The Vampire Diaries" is getting more lifeblood. The network has ordered nine more scripts for its first-year drama, which is expected to be given a full-season order as soon as this afternoon, after ratings for the show's third episode are released. "Dairies," which scored the CW's most-watched premiere in its four-year history two weeks ago with 4.9 million viewers, faced its first full slate of competition last night. Also at the CW, the network has ordered a full season of "One Tree Hill," taking its order from 13 to 22 episodes for the seventh-year series, which lost two of its stars during the summer break. Still, numbers held up from last week's premiere to this week's second episode on Monday at 8 p.m. despite facing tougher competition, likely leading the CW's decision. Meanwhile, in other programming, Fox has ordered a script for "Sky Jockeys," a cartoon about airline employees. This is apparently a hot genre; the CW just ordered a midseason show about flight attendants. A&E's "Parking Wars" will return Oct. 6 at 10 p.m. for a third season. E!'s "The Girls Next Door" premieres Oct. 11 at 10 p.m. with all new girls. Fine Living Network's "Bartender Wars" bows Oct. 16 at 10:30 p.m. And Discovery Network's "Storm Chasers" debuts Oct. 18 at 10 p.m.
Ad sales woman: I was axed for blowing the whistle
If you're the head of sales for a magazine, a key argument you make to advertisers is the number of people who see your publication, which is one reason we have auditing outfits like the Audit Bureau of Circulations. And of course if you are caught inflating those numbers, it can mean big trouble. More big trouble may be in the works for a Las Vegas tourist publication called "What's On, The Las Vegas Guide'" after its former head of ad sales charged in a lawsuit that she was fired after raising a stink over inflated circulation numbers for the twice-monthly publication. Earlier this week, Tammy Scarpati alleged in court filings that she had come to learn that the guide was printing and distributing a mere fourth of the 205,000 copies it was reporting to the ABC, some 50,000. She says she was canned Sept. 3, the day after she complained to management. The parent company, Kellogg Media, has not responded, other than to say the guide is audited, according to local press reports. The suit is one of a handful filed in recent months against the publishing house by former employers and vendors.
Magna: DVR subscribers will balloon to 50.7 million
More than 25 million people will discover DVRs in the next five years. That’s the forecast from Magna, according to its Quarterly On-Demand report, released earlier this week. The company predicts that by 2014 there will be 50.7 million DVR subscribers in the U.S., up about 48 percent from 34.2 million this year. That number is expected to grow to 38.0 million next year, followed by 41.2 million in 2011, 44.4 million in 2012, and 47.5 million in 2013. Magna’s study concludes that DVRs don’t necessarily negatively impact the TV industry. It reads, “By 2011 –10 years after widespread availability –DVRs will be in approximately 35 percent of TV homes. With less than 10 percent total-day DVR consumption, less than 4 percent of total universe TV consumption will occur on DVRs. But over the same 10 years, TV consumed per person and the U.S. population will have increased by more than 10 percent each.”
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