David Kronke was appointed Mayor of Television after a bloodless coup in 2000. Since then, he has improved infrastructure, championed greater educational opportunities and fought for reforms that have utterly erased corruption and incompetence from the television industry. Since Mr. Kronke has ascended to power, Television is a far better place. TV Ratings: The Rise of the Machines
We must now go back in time to revisit the ratings of the fall’s premiere week, thanks to a wonderfully obfuscating new technology that measures how many additional viewers shows received thanks to people watching them on their Digital Video Recorders (that’s DVR to you) within a week of their initial airing.
CBS is using the numbers to claim it has now won Premiere week in total viewers, since it got the biggest boost from DVR usage, slipping it just in front of ABC. (ABC still won in viewers 25-54; NBC somehow edged ABC out in viewers 18-49.)
Thanks to DVRs, “Grey’s Anatomy” added 2m more viewers. “CSI,” “House” and “Heroes” all added 1.9m. “CSI: Miami,” “Criminal Minds,” “Bionic Woman” and “The Office” each added 1.2m. “Numb3rs” notched an additional 1.1m, while “Journeyman,” “NCIS,” “Private Practice,” “CSI: New York,” “Cane” and “Desperate Housewives” lured an extra million viewers apiece.
In the 18-49 demo, “Heroes” added the most viewers, followed by “CSI,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “House,” “The Office,” “Bionic Woman” and the remaining aforementioned shows in what no doubt is a statistically relevant fashion. Two other shows – “Family Guy” and “Ugly Betty” – also got boosts in that demographic thanks to DVR usage.
Here’s guessing very few new shows will get cancelled any time soon as the network executives spend their days scratching their heads wondering What It All Means. (Plus, there’s that looming writers strike, more on which later, so they’re gonna have to put something on the air.)