Where have all the viewers gone?

[AndyA]

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/TV/05/09/tv.missingviewers.ap/index.html

Networks concerned that they are losing viewers.

I wonder if the thought has occurred to them that people no longer trust them, because they selectively report the news? More and more people are learning that the major networks are largely just corporate media propagandists that support the interests of the right wing.

Maybe they should get a clue and realize that the American people are tired of being lied to and taken advantage of.

[liberal N proud]

1. We are sick of all the reality TV shows and the lying talking heads

Maybe if they were entertaining shows and the news was truthful, people wouldn't tune out. All the shows that I get interested in get canceled after about 12 - 18 weeks.

Life has enough misery with out watching someone go through the bull shit they do on all the reality shows.

I can't stand American Idol, the program that the NBC exec called the most important in TV history.

The TV execs are out of touch!

[YOY]

50. Don't forget the fact that there is more commercial than show these days

Even when there is something entertaining and not exactly mind-numbing there is a f***ing commercial break every 5 minutes for 5 minutes. Yeah you've gotta pay the bills, but come on!

[Horse with no Name]

51. Amen to that.

They put all of this reality crap on the network and cancel the good shows. The good shows get purchased by A&E, TNT, etc and that is where your viewers end up going. I do not presently watch ONE network show. Not one.
But I can recall a few years ago, I had VCR's taping NYPD Blue, Judging Amy and watching another.
It's insane. They are the vehicle of their own undoing.

[SteelPenguin]

2. I doubt that has anything to do with it

They're talking about overall viewership being down, which is probably tied to a few things. Crappier shows, DVR's giving more flex time tv viewing, the internet, etc. More options of things to do hooked in without directly watching their programming. I doubt the editorial position of the nightly news has much if anything to do with whether people watch Studio 54 or not.

[loudsue]

32. Did it ever occur to them there are too fucking many COMMERCIALS?

Between the commercials, and the fact that the people are working 2 and 3 jobs in this economy, there's nobody left to watch the commercials?

Plus, all you hear all day long is JUNK. We've got problems in this country, and there is NOTHING that is addressing those problems! Obviously no honest reporting, only propaganda. Have any of the networks bothered to watch their own crap?

The couch potatoes that are "Survivor", "Lost", or "American Idol" fans are watching because that percentage don't need much mental stimulus. It's like rubber-necking at a car accident. Not everyone in the viewing audience gets their kicks doing that.

There are still people in America whose brains are functioning, but the rightwing media refuses to allow for that. There's nothing that is intellectually stimulating or culturally/artistically advanced. The discovery & Science & History channels are ok, but a lot of what they're showing doesn't tell us that much about how it relates to what is going on TODAY that affects our daily lives.

Everyone I know didn't get enough about the Chinese imports in the dog/cat food from the news on teevee, and there could have been a whole program about that....man, everybody loves their pets!

:kick::kick::kick:

[SteelPenguin]

34. Sometimes I don't watch TV to be stimulated

In fact I generally only plop down on the TV to unwind and be de-stimulated. I don't have enough energy to even read but if I go to bed I'll lay there awake. I need an hour of Lost or Heroes or something where I can just veg. Watching these shows doesn't make someone dumb, in fact I would argue there are some quality programs on tv. Just not enough of them, and what there are too frequently get canceled.

Honestly I never go to TV for mental stimulation, and I think expecting such is a mistake. You'll get better stimulation out of a visit to the library and wander the stacks to find a book on a subject you're not familiar with. Or anything else.

I agree about the commercials though. Which is why more and more people are discovering the DVR/PVR technology and no longer watchign commercials. I never watch live television when I do plonk down and the only commercials I watch are the ones my wife tells me to stop and play back (usually an Apple commerical or Geico Cavemen or something funny).

As far as honest reporting, it's there, it's just lost in the sea of 'balance'. For instance anything on 60 minutes by Lara Logan gets my ear. I trust her reporting, among others. People have always had to pick and choose their news source, whether it was picking which of the 6 daily newspapers they wanted to read 100 years ago, or which websites to visit these days. There's always been tremendous noise from all sides, and people either pick and choose what they want to hear, or more likely turn off.

[Sapere aude]

42. You could spread some sugar or jelly on your bed and watch the ants marching across you.

That sure would beat most things on TV IMHO.

[SteelPenguin]

54. Well

Given 400+ channels broadcasting 24 hours a day I can't help but agree with you.

Still, there are maybe 4-5 hours of broadcast tv a week that I like, and a couple more I can stomach when compressed by DVR skipping over the schlock. Plus it leaves a heck of alot less mess than what you're suggesting. ;)

[Kagemusha]

3. Totally beside that, a lot of previously good shows have plunged.

There was a time when I didn't watch much TV except for CSI and Law & Order (and their variants). Yeah, well... believe me, I don't do that anymore. Whatever energy was behind them collapsed and Fred Thompson did nothing for me. "24" was a nice concept at one time. The CNN article above quotes someone saying he remembers when "24" was on TV. Er, it's still on. It just sucks now. It's not memorable.

The networks have kept big mainstays going to cash in on them and milk the brands. Guess what. The brands are past their expiry date.

I'm only noting this because the issue is not about the nightly news only, but general network viewership, i.e. not just for reality but for fiction as well.

[Carolina]

20. You remind me

of me ... didn't watch much TV except for Law & Order and then they went and made Fred Thompson the DA. Now I don't even watch that, and funny thing: I don't even miss TV.

I get my news from the internet since I not only don't watch M$M but also cancelled the newspaper.

[Kagemusha]

26. I don't miss L&O w/ Fred Thompson either.

I regretted pretty much every episode I did watch with him in it before finally giving up.

I've been getting my news from the 'Net for years - the newspaper web sites I tend to visit are British ones. (Hey, they have their vices, but actual news reporting occurs with them, a lot.) As for entertainment, console gaming is at the point where it's a better personal experience than just about everything on the tube. I completely understand how TV is finding it hard to compete. Especially when producers get fat and lazy and try to coast on past success. That happens a lot now.

[CrispyQ]

47. I only like the original CSI with Grisom (William Peterson)

and if he doesn't have a key role in the episode, it's not very good, although still much better than the other two CSI's. Miami & New York have turned into the Horatio Cane/Mac Taylor shows. Those two do everything. Grisom does his thing but lets his crew do their thing & is happy to give credit where credit is due.

Yes, they are past their date.

[Warpy]

4. That's certainly why I switched them off permanently

in November 2004. The only surprise is how little I've missed them. I don't even watch the local news unless I'm looking for a weather forecast and the net hasn't been forthcoming.

I think the only people they have left are the computer phobic and the people who watch out of sheer habit.

[glitch]

23. I am addicted to weather.com

Plug in your zip and you get hourly, daily and radar. Great for planning trips too.

[Beelzebud]

5. They refer to the drop in viewers as "startling"...

Startling would be the bees disappearing.

Startling would be the government saying your 1st, and 4th amendments are null and void.

Startling would be that we have all of our national guard equipment in Iraq, and have nothing to deal with emergencies on the home front...

[annabanana]

6. heh. . I guess it's "startling"

if your head has been where the sun don't shine for the last few years....

[SteveM]

22. And RKBA is curtailed by Gonzalez's "watch list." No due process.

[patrice]

7. If it weren't for the History Channel and TCM,

and The Weather Channel, there'd be no TV at all in this household.

[EFerrari]

25. I'm getting really close to shutting down directv.

Most of the programs that I like I can stream. If I could stream BookTv, that would be it.

[JitterbugPerfume]

8. some quality programming

would get my attention
I am sick of so called reality TV

I have never wached it , AND I never will

I watch Link , PBS (now that Moyers is back), Olberman on MSNBC , Stewart and Colbert on Comedy central and Sci Fi

and sometimes BBC ( when Dr Who is on)

[Vexatious Ape]

9. Could be.

Limbaugh, Hannity and all the other hectoring fascist nut-jobs have been intimidating the news media for years. I think the networks have gone out of their way to sound conservative, or at least middle of the road, and it's all been a great disservice to the viewers.

[AndyA]

10. I have a difficult time watching the networks because I don't want to support them.

ABC is totally off limits in my house. After Path to 9/11 aired, ABC was removed from the list of channels on my cable box. Same with Disney, Lifetime, ESPN, and all the other channels owned under that corporate umbrella.

And I had a few shows on that network that I loved to watch. But you know what? I don't miss them that much. I find I'm not sitting in front of the TV as much, I'm getting other, more important, things done, and I'm losing weight because I'm more active.

It's a win-win for me. And I have the satisfaction of knowing that I'm not supporting the networks who don't have the best interests of the American people at heart.

Must see TV for me?

Keith Olbermann
The New Adventures of Old Christine
The King of Queens (last episode airs next week)
The Sopranos
Two and A Half Men
30 Rock

But that's about it...most of the new shows introduced last fall are just awful.

[bdamomma]

33. my lineup is:

Keith
C Span
The Sopranos
PBS
ER

that's it.


This is great news for us, we are making an impact, silent protesting, very good DU'ers

[JHB]

11. Let's also factor in the changed nature of the economy...

Working a second job inevitably cuts into one's tube time.

[piedmont]

12. They no longer report just the news, and I no longer trust them.

When I can't even rely on CNN Headline News to give me just the headline stories in 30 minutes, 'round the clock like they used to, I don't even bother watching them. I just go to the internets.

[AndyA]

18. I've heard that Ted Turner regrets selling CNN.

It was a much better network under his ownership. More news, not so much fluff, and they were more accurate in their reporting.

CNN has some of the worst offenders now, and it has lost a lot of viewers as well. Take the hint, CNN...

[piedmont]

19. I know I wish he hadn't sold them or the Atlanta Braves!

They've all gone downhill since he owned them.

[mike_c]

13. LOL-- they lost me 20 years ago....

I'd rather open a vein than watch television.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

14. It couldn't possibly be the quality of the programs...NAAAH

These days, I watch PBS and movies almost exclusively. The reality shows are boring and stupid, I didn't get in on the serial-type shows like "24" or "Lost" to catch the story lines, and I dropped HBO because of cost. Sitcoms no longer appeal, and every cop show seems like every other cop show, with none of the originality seen in the best of the mystery novels.

Hey, TV executives, how 'bout quality and originality in your programming?

If A&E were to revert to its former practice of showing the best British, Canadian, and Australian programs, they'd immediately become my favorite channel.

If Bravo were to revert to its former practice of showing foreign films, they'd immediately become my favorite channel.

As progamming has dumbed down, I've become less interested.

[truebrit71]

15. The networks need to understand that they have to give more than 3 or 4 weeks for a new show..

..to take hold...

Most folks are not interested in investing their personal time on new shows that get cancelled almost as soon as they get out of the gate...

This then creates the knock-on effect of repetative and formulaic programming that bores the viewing public to death...

[firefox_fan]

16. If '24' is a typical example...

That is not a surprise at all! The shows used to be good. But it's become totally repetitive and nonsensical. It's offensive to the viewers's intelligence.

[Gelliebeans]

17. Notice they don't offer a poll

so we can tell them exactly what we think. They prefer to speculate. :eyes:

[hunter]

21. They put a cable into your house and garbage spills out.

It's amazing, but you have to PAY for that!

I figure they ought to pay you to have cable or satellite television installed in your house.

When I flip through the channels of cable television I can feel my brain rotting. The horror of it all, the absolute horror...

Television news??? Is that news? I can't watch it, it makes no sense at all, and never has. Who the hell are those people and why should I care? It's like I've got all sorts of heartbreaking, senselessness, violent, and weirder stories going on in my own community than CNN's never ending tragic-affluent-white-girl-of-the-month showcasing.

Yeah, CNN, I hear Britney Spears cut off her hair, but I saw a woman standing out in the street screaming obscenities and throwing trash at the passing cars. I didn't see any television crews there.

[AndyA]

24. Do they track viewership with cable boxes?

Does anyone know? Can the cable company keep track of which channels a particular box is tuned to?

I remember a time when many of the cable networks were largely free of advertising. Now it seems to be everywhere. I originally paid for cable to get away from advertising, but it seems to follow you wherever you go.

[smoogatz]

27. We get the cheapo cable--local programming only. Costs $12.95/month.

We're regular viewers of Sesame Street and Curious George. Sometimes if we're up past our bedtime, my wife and I watch the first half-hour of Letterman. We almost literally never watch anything else on TV. Mostly we don't have time--but even if we did, we'd probably watch a Netflick instead. On the rare occasions that I flip through our seven-or-so channels of an evening, I'm always amazed at the nothingness of the nothing that's on. "Who watches this shit?" I ask myself. Apparently the answer is "nobody."

[tsuki]

28. That is why I have never gotten rid of my big dish. I have a la carte.

We are so busy, that when we do watch, it's a movie or C-Span. The networks, the cable channels can disappear for all we care.

I like HBO & Showtime, no commercials, and all for about 40 dollars a month.

[warren pease]

29. Most sensible people avoid sewage, and other noxious effluvia...

And since that's pretty much what they're pumping down the cable, it's only fitting that people shut the valve before they turn their living rooms into sewage treatment plants.

We'll reopen the valve when Moyers is a highly paid, universally respected observer of the political scene, spreading the gospel of progressive sanity and intelligence nearly every night in prime time on one or more of the networks, while O'Reilly is begging for food in Battery Park in a howling blizzard wearing nothing but threadbare khakis, a thin shirt and Nikes with holes in the toes.

Ahhhhhh... That was a nice visual.


wp

[paparush]

30. I haven't had a tv subscription since 1989 or so...

No cable. No satellite. No dish.

[MadBadger]

31. The article wasnt talking about news, So I do not understand where you are coming from.

[AndyA]

40. I think it's a general distrust of the network machine.

Not just the news, but the news division is one of the more important aspects of the network. And network news viewership is down as well, so it's across the board, shows, news, documentaries, all of it. Viewership is down for all of them.

The Path to 9/11 that ABC aired just before the elections in November wasn't a news show, it was supposedly a movie drama, although it was misrepresented in ads as being the true story. Yet the fact that ABC aired that movie at the time they did, made me as well as others question the entire network's ethics and values.

I have always questioned their news to some degree, but this was the final straw with me. I haven't watched ABC programming, nor seen any of their advertiser's ads, since that show aired.

But I think people tend to shy away from networks as a whole when they don't trust them. And with more people getting their news on the internet and through blogs these days, they have to question why it seems so many important stories are never aired on the network news. Especially when they consistently prove to be embarrassing or an issue for the party on the right. It's a reflection of the network as a whole, and I think people have just moved on to other things.

So even though the story itself dealt with prime time shows, I still think public distrust plays a role here.

[MadBadger]

43. I dont agree with you still.

I think the article is focusing on prime time television, which isnt the network news.

I dont think the average American is going to turn away from ABC because of path to 9/11. Most Americans didnt watch the movie anyway. Lack of quality television and putting shows on hiatus, as well as lack of originality I think is more the reason why networks are losing viewers.

[AndyA]

45. Then we'll just have to disagree.

The people I've talked to don't trust network news, and I think that carries over to other programming on the network as well.

I've seen other stories that dealt with news specifically, and it's down as well. They said that there was a general trend down in viewership for all the networks.

The news is the face of the network. It is what gives a network whatever credibility it has, and that has now come into question.

I don't believe the news is the ONLY reason viewership is down, programming also has an impact on it, and that too is poor on the networks, but most of my friends and family spend more time watching cable or satellite networks, and I believe they are pretty representative of America.

[AndyA]

41. Ignore - dupe post.

DU had a Republicon moment. (Failed)

[KansDem]

35. Got rid of cable 11 years ago...

Used to get the 3 C-Spans, then our cable provider got rid of C-Span 3 and replaced it with "local programming." :eyes: Big mistake. Anyway, my wife and I assessed our viewing habits and realized we were paying over $30 a month but only watching 3 or 4 channels or so. So we dumped cable and I haven't missed TeeVee since.

Frankly, I was growing weary of the constant drivel. CONSTANT!!! Local news was a joke; TeeVee sitcom writing wasn't funny; too many commercials on every network (I thought "pay TV" was supposed to eliminate this? Why "pay" for a station only to be subjected to the kinds of commercials one watched with "free TV?"); and the "interview shows" usually consisted of a few soft-ball questions to someone who was plugging a movie, CD, or book. Overall, TeeVee programming insulted my intelligence and I often went away from a session of viewing feeling like I had eaten a tub of cotton candy.

We do have a TeeVee but we use it for DVDs.

edited for spelling...

[MadBadger]

36. I will say, Cable TV is the best part of TV

That is where the best some of the best shows are. My life would change greatly without cable TV

[hvn_nbr_2]

37. Same thing happened in the old USSR

People quit listening/watching the news because they knew it was bullshit. That's why I refer to the MSM as "GOP Pravda."

[YOY]

52. and we all know what happened to Pravda:

http://english.pravda.ru/

Batboy level quality stuff...

In Soviet Union TV watches YOU!

[GeorgeGist]

38. May Sweeps?

[truedelphi]

39. There are some good shows - Have you found "Still Standing" or

Caught Law and Order when it looks into RELEVANT issues like the secret prisons across the world where the enemy combatants are S&^$ canned for eternity? (Law and Order has also kicked butt on the chemical/pesticide issue)

But even FrontLine has been watered down - I found their episodes on examining the media to be so insipid that a commercial or two would have been refreshing.

[loudsue]

44. "...They collected $8.8 BILLION on advertising" ???? Duh!

They don't give a SHIT about their customers, ONLY their advertisers. THAT is what is wrong.

ALL we're paying for is COMMERCIALS, so that the network owners can get high-paying CEO salaries and the money machine can swirl its way back into republican coffers, so that republicans can make the corporations even more powerful.

ALL of our money is going back to the republicans. Whether it is through no-bid contracts (that our TAX dollars pay for) that go to republican-friendly corporations, that turn around and plow a big part of that money back into republican coffers, or whether it is right-wing friendly programming that is 30% commercials, which puts money back into the hands of republican-friendly stations, it's all part of the churning of our dollars to keep afloat a regime that is destroying our country. $8.8 BILLION IN ADVERTISING DOLLARS, and we're already paying anywhere from $20 to $90 per month for cable or satellite.

That's quite a revenue stream for the republican party.

:kick::kick::kick:

[FloridaJudy]

46. They haven't had me for 10 years

The cable company tried to charge me $250 for pay-for-view boxing I never ordered. I told them to take their box and never darken my doorstep again.

Don't miss it at all. The few times I've been forced to watch TV (for some reason nail salons, laundromats and my credit union run overhead TVs constantly) I've been appalled. The old expressions "The Vast Wasteland" and "The Boob Tube" occur to me. Particularly the latter since MSM seems fixated on dim-witted celebrities who never miss an opportunity to expose their implants (I've got nothing against breasts, but surely something else is newsworthy).

Yes, there are interesting TV shows, but guess what? You can rent them on DVD - sans commercials. I can watch Olbermann, TDS and PBS specials on the web. Why should I pay to have the rest of that junk piped into my home?

Maybe if the networks still broadcast usable signals to people who don't want or can't afford cable, they'd pick up a few more viewers. Unless they improve the quality though, I probably won't be one, except for the rare occasions when a hurricane is headed my way.

[pacalo]

48. Networks, get a clue: We're smarter than you think, we don't like being lied to.

[MadBadger]

49. How have the networks lied to you?

[pacalo]

55. Honestly, if you don't know, you haven't been paying attention.

Here's a good primer to start off with: http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=7&issue_area_id=6

[LSK]

53. CSPAN, KO, DailyShow,Colbert

The only shows I watch on network tv is 24 and occassionally CSI.