CNN’s Last Place Primetime Demo Finish: Not the First Time…
Time Magazine’s James Poniewozik writes about CNN’s last place finish in October. However Poniewozik notes what Bill Carter wrote in the New York Times. (emphasis ICN’s)
CNN is a sister company to TIME within Time Warner, so let me be unambiguous and without corporate favor when I say that its latest round of primetime ratings are in the dumpster. Bill Carter of the New York Times reports that, for the first time, CNN will finish October in fourth place among cable-news networks in the advertiser-followed demographic. The network even lost to itself, in that sister net HLN beat it out.
I saw that and thought, that’s wrong on two counts: it’s wrong because Carter never said that and it’s wrong because CNN had already finished in 4th place twice earlier this year. So I re-read Carter’s story and, it turns out I should have been paying closer attention to Carter’s article when I referenced it, because whereas I had previously thought Carter didn’t actually spell it out that CNN landed in 4th for the first time, there is this smoking gun of a paragraph right here…
That means CNN’s programs were behind not only Fox News and MSNBC, but even its own sister network HLN (formerly Headline News.) That was the first time CNN had finished that poorly with its prime-time shows.
So I can’t blame Poniewozik for getting it wrong by reading Carter since Carter himself appears to have gotten it wrong (Update: Poniewozik has updated his original post to note that it wasn’t the first time CNN landed in 4th). CNN finished in 4th place twice before, in April and May of this year. In fact, I did a little digging and found that Carter himself wrote about it back in April…
In April, CNN has been fourth. Fox has 668,000 viewers; MSNBC has 300,000; and CNN has 271,000. HLN has 277,000.
Did Carter just forget about April and May or did he just write up today’s story poorly? I don’t know. But as it’s currently written, the story is wrong.
Update: Bill Carter clarifies his original reporting…
It was the first time that the programs had ever performed that poorly against their news network competitors. October was also the third month in the last year that CNN as a network finished fourth behind the three other cable news networks in prime time with the audience that the networks rely on for advertising sales.
October 26, 2009 at 1:23 pm
If the cable news networks are returning to a type of party press a la the 19th century media, we’re going to need another party. Two networks have already taken the leading parties.
Or not another party, just another network. Give us a better product. There’s enough non-ideologues on either side – the vital center if you will – to sustain a network.
But not this one as it’s currently being run.
October 26, 2009 at 1:26 pm
What the heck does that have to do with this thread?
October 26, 2009 at 1:42 pm
What the heck does that have to do with this thread?
My error: Wrong thread. Goes in the post immediately below.
October 26, 2009 at 3:05 pm
I never understood how people could reply in the wrong thread unless they have multiple browser windows open to the same blog and get windows confused.
October 26, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Spud, it happens to me when I read two of your posts in a row, then accidentally reply in the box of the last post I read while still thinking about the previous one. In other words, being an absent-minded bonehead.
October 26, 2009 at 3:20 pm
I never understood how people could reply in the wrong thread unless they have multiple browser windows
I did have multiple windows open, but not to this site.
Anyway, the two stories on CNN’s ratings are right above each other with similar titles, i.e., “Last Place CNN…” and “CNN’s Last Place….”. I simply clicked the wrong post.
Not for the first time (except here).
Anyway, re Carter: Could have been editing error.
Now, we’re really getting off topic.
October 26, 2009 at 3:24 pm
You started it!