CBS: Cross Eyed

"Someone’s drinking the kool-aid if they think that because the problem is precisely not a problem of fans “coming back.” The fans are already there, roughly 5 million of them. The problem is that CBS has failed to attract new viewers.

So, here’s the idea that brought it in to focus for me. In order for this show to be saved, we know that they need more than the 7 million or so that watched the premiere (because folks told us that 7million was mediocre, remember?). So, let’s arbitrarily set a number, say 9 million viewers, that would get CBS’s attention enough to give the show another chance at a third season.

This means that CBS would expect approximately 3-4 million additional viewers to tune in to Jericho at 10pm EST than tuned in for Big Brother, their primetime lead-in show, in the previous hour. On a Tuesday night.

I’m sorry, that’s just crazy."



"As a part of CBS's belief and commitment to Jericho, its doing a tie in with Big Brother this coming week with the Jericho episode airing on Tuesday (2/26) - BB house guests will have a task to do related to Jericho.

A lot of the points about new media and alternate viewing platforms we have been making are coming to light - Jericho's position on the iTunes chart is great (for both episodes 2.1 and 2.2). The numbers CBS is seeing from views on innerTube are great."


Jericho Blog Carnival by

Amy at RemoteAccess

Nielsen Ratings: Relevance Lost

"The networks may be crying foul over ratings delays, and Nielsen's business is under assault from all sides, but that's not stopping CEO and former GE man David Calhoun from making some money for KKR, Blackstone and Carlyle Group. Nielsen's financials have been a relative secret since it was taken private in an $12 billion deal in 2006, but Fortune squeezes out some data."



"How does the generally competent Sara Erichson, VP of sales and client services, plan to handle the general incompetence of Nielsen, the audience measure company plagued by, among other things, delays in reporting its TV data?
Like any good media conglomerate exec, she’s overseeing the snatching up other companies."



"Nielsen isn’t just playing defense against attacks from, say, benign outlets like ourselves. Rather the clients who fund its operations – and its rumored IPO hopes – are lashing out at the problem-plagued ratings service.

“Nielsen is in a fight for its relevant life,” says Tracy Scheppach, SVP of ad giant Starcom Worldwide."

Jericho Rises At TiVo

Jericho rises again in TiVo ratings.

Up to # 12.



" My husband Dave and I received a thick, official-looking envelope from the Nielsen Ratings Company last weekend. The Nielsen ratings system measures television viewership in the United States. The information they gather establishes commercial advertising prices and determines which shows stay or go in the program lineup."


Condor Recap

Thanks to Amy at RemoteAccess.

Jericho: Condor

Amy at RemoteAccess discusses preparing for tonight's episode: Condor.

More here.



Great article from the New York Times:

"The postapocalyptic fantasy “Jericho” has returned for a second season more pungent and more pointed than its first. (As a matter of procedure we properly ought to start by thanking the fanatics who borrowed from the show’s spirit of communitarianism, sending CBS executives 20 tons of peanuts to rescue the series from cancellation.)"



"New television sets being manufactured this year are being equipped with outlets that will allow users to connect the sets directly to the Internet, the Los Angeles Times reported today (Monday). The connectors will eventually allow them to receive television shows on demand, as well as weather forecasts, stock quotes, and YouTube videos, the newspaper noted. George Kliavkoff, NBC Universal's chief digital officer, told the Times that while most consumers have shied away from additional set-top boxes for such programming, a connection built into the TV set is likely to have a chance. "It brings the ability to have unlimited channel capacity, personalized channels -- a celestial video jukebox in the sky," he said. David Eun, Google's vice president of content partnerships, added, "This is about making content accessible to as many viewers as possible."

CBS: Know Your Audience

"There was even “Saturday Jericho Game Night,” as well as a “Two Old Ladies of Jericho” chat. Back in August, Remote Access asked two Jericho fans to guest-blog on their website; they accepted but approached the task from the fictitious eyes of “Edna and Margie,” portrayed as two of Jericho’s oldest residents. The humorous, gossip-filled blog became both a must-read for Jericho fans and made “Edna and Margie” instant Jericho celebrities."

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

CBS is the real story for many of us. It was shown by Katie Couric's ratings that CBS does have an older audience but they keep trying to grab the 18-49 group.

Once again we see that CBS does not know their audience and they won't until they stop relying on Nielsen. Maybe not even then. Also, I've been told that many CBS affiliates did not air Jericho on Sat. night


"The real story here for me is CBS. And I’m sure I’ll take some hate mail for it, but the problem this network faces is in attracting 18-49 viewers. Indeed, CBS came in last or next to last (beating only the CW) in the 18-49 demo every single half hour of Sunday night. The problem is that on this Sunday, at least two of the four shows it aired, Big Brother and Dexter are aimed at younger people. How bad is the problem? It’s really bad. In the 7:30p half hour, 60 Minutes had 13.12 million people tuned in and American Gladiators had only 6.94 million and still beat CBS handily in the 18-49 demo.

What happened to Big Brother? It finished next to last, in both viewers AND the 18-49 demo, beating only the CW. What happened to Dexter? It finished last (by 10pm, FOX and CW were off the primetime grid or it would have at least thrashed the CW) in viewers and the 18-49 demo.

Dexter did a bit better than Jericho and it also did better than Big Brother, but all three of these shows have the same problem, they seem to be targeted at an audience who don’t actually watch CBS much. "

Jericho: Count All Viewers

If you have TiVo you can record Jericho (on CBS and SciFi) and play it back the next day with commercials.
It's a lot easier to find TiVo owners than it is Nielsen families.

For more info on how TiVo works go here.


Jericho Season One is Currently Airing on the SciFi channels on Mondays at 10/9 Central.



Sign this petition to be counted:


To: Major TV Networks

The Nielsen ratings are flawed and outdated. This is a petition for the major networks to change the way they count viewers.
Please sign this petition and let the networks and their advertisers know we want all viewing methods to count.When enough people have signed an email will be sent to the major networks.

Blackjack Fairgrounds: Blog Carnival

"Despite the fact that Edna & Margie were nowhere to be seen in Tuesday’s season premiere, “Reconstruction,” Remote Access has stumbled upon a transcript of a conversation between the two ladies right about at that time…"



Blackjack Fairgrounds: The first Jericho blog carnival



"Thanks to the Jericho Telegraph:
Posted by Michael Learmonth.

Source: Silicon Alley Insider.

TiVo's attempt to transform itself into a media services company took another small step forward Thursday. CBS signed on as a client of TiVo's Stop Watch service, which provides second-by-second viewing data from a panel of 20,000 TiVo users.

Editor: The TiVo sampling is anonymous, so any TiVo customer might be included in the sampling."



"The last pre-strike episode of Supernatural will be airing next week, and they'll be back with four more season 3 installments beginning on Thursday, April 24. This means that fans will be waiting about two months in between new episodes, and while that is a pretty long time, it could certainly be worse."