When the clock strikes 5:30 p.m. (in Hawaii) my father dutifully stops what he is doing and sits down to watch the nightly national news. Looking at the time you may have figured out he is old-fashioned in the sense that he still gets his news from one of the three major networks and tends to shy away from the glitzy 24-hour news channels.
Yes, my dad is part of a dying breed of loyal network TV news viewers. These days executives at ABC, CBS and NBC would pay a pretty penny to delve into my father’s mind and learn what makes him choose one over the other.
The race to gain viewers in an overpopulated channel grid has gotten ugly. To call it a dogfight would be an understatement. To call it tough competition would be too humane. Perhaps, it is simply a sign of the times. Ever since the networks started playing musical anchors the people reporting the news have become part of the news.
NBC lost veteran anchor Tom Brokaw to retirement in 2004 and still can’t fully explain why after two years on top Brian Williams and the “Nightly News” broadcast has suddenly been eclipsed by Charlie Gibson at ABC. According to Nielsen Media Research, ABC’s “World News” has been the most popular newscast for eight straight weeks, and 15 out of the last 19. While Katie Couric’s “CBS Evening News” remains a distant third.
Speaking of Couric (who begat Bob Schieffer, who begat Dan Rather), according to the Nielsen folks, in her first 39 weeks at CBS, she lost 287,000 viewers from the average of a year ago when Schieffer was anchoring. Meanwhile, in Williams’ first three months after taking over for Brokaw, “Nightly News” averaged 10.79 million viewers. In the past three months, it’s been 7.66 million. That’s a lot of lost viewers no matter what spin you put on it.
When it comes to examining the numbers, media analysts credit ABC more than they fault NBC. They reason that NBC’s ratings were delayed for two years because of all of the changes at ABC – the death of Peter Jennings, injury to Bob Woodruff and departure of Elizabeth Vargas. So, is that the real reason or do more people just prefer spending 30 minutes with Gibson than Williams or Couric?
What do you think?