A rough season for the networks

Viewership is down 6% from last season.

From City News Service

The usual one-two finish for "American Idol" was enough to give Fox Broadcasting its 13th victory in the last 14 weeks in the prime-time ratings race, despite not having another program in the top 15.

Fox averaged 8.75 million viewers for its 15 hours of prime-time programming between April 14 and Sunday, according to figures released Tuesday by Nielsen Media Research. Fox has finished first in all but one week since "American Idol" began its season.

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CBS was second with 8.54 million viewers, thanks to having seven of the week's 10 most-watched scripted programs.

In a season in which three of the four major broadcast networks are drawing fewer viewers than a year ago, CBS is down 17%, NBC 9% and ABC 7%. Fox is up 10%, in part because it showed fewer Major League Baseball playoff games than in 2006. Overall prime-time viewership among the four major networks is down 6% from last season.

In addition to the Writers Guild of America strike, another factor cited by network analysts as a reason for the decline in prime-time network television viewership is the increasing number of households with digital video recorders and Nielsen's inability to accurately measure viewing played back after a program airs.

"NBC Nightly News With Brian Williams" regained the top spot among the network nightly newscasts, averaging 8.17 million viewers for the week, its 16th outright victory in the last 20 weeks. (It also tied "ABC World News With Charles Gibson" for first once during that span.)

"ABC World News With Charles Gibson" was second with 7.51 million viewers, a week after finishing first. "The CBS Evening News With Katie Couric" was third for the 82nd consecutive week, averaging a record low 5.39 million.