Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Tearjerker Olympics - I think Blackjack has it right here: the ratings for the 2008 Beijing Olympics are going to be abysmal. It's not just the time difference that's going to drive off the North American audience. The Olympics used to be about sports; now it's a parade of sticky-sweet human interest stories of struggles overcome and "one world" feel goodery. Is that a word? No, I guess not.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The Nielsens for the NFL, MLB, NBA, NASCAR, NHL, etc. are all down from their previous highs, along with the Olympics In most cases, the leagues have absolutely no chance of ever getting back to those levels again. The same goes for network programming of all sorts, on all nights.

Ratings simply aren't what ratings used to be. I don't know about your cable system, but mine goes up to channel 1,914.

The only thing that remains exactly the same are the articles about falling Nielsens... American Idol is down! The Sopranos are down! The NBC Evening News is down! The World Series is down! Jay Leno is down! The Oscars are down! Heroes is down! Bill O'Reilly is down! The Simpsons are down! (It makes one wonder why the TV stations even bother switching on their transmitters anymore.)

Without factoring in things like broadcasting's logistical changes, narrowcasting, crossmarketing, niche programming, DVD sales, etc., there can be no useful understanding of how profit, deals, and TV decisions are now made in television.

But forget all that complicated stuff, all we really need to know is that Oprah Winfrey's ratings have plunged. Poor Oprah!