Thursday, May 23, 2013

The Climate, Weeks 33/34


Week-by-week:

Week Ending TPUT y2y bc y2y LeAv y2y
304/21/201332.3 -0% 6.6 -6% 1.99 -3%
314/28/201331.4 -3% 6.5 -11% 1.88 -7%
325/5/201331.3 -2% 6.8 -11% 1.92 -11%
335/12/201330.6 -3% 7.1 -10% 2.01 -9%
345/19/201330.4 -2% 7.0 -9% 2.02 -14%

Season-to-date:

Week Ending TPUTy2d y2dy2y bcy2d y2dy2y LAy2d y2dy2y
19/30/201232.4 -6% 9.2 -16% 2.50 -15%
510/28/201233.3 -3% 8.8 -10% 2.31 -13%
911/25/201233.5 -3% 8.8 -9% 2.26 -12%
1312/23/201233.4 -2% 8.5 -6% 2.24 -10%
171/20/201333.4 -3% 8.3 -8% 2.20 -10%
212/17/201333.6 -3% 8.3 -9% 2.19 -11%
253/17/201333.4 -3% 8.1 -10% 2.16 -12%
294/14/201333.3 -3% 7.9 -10% 2.13 -11%
325/5/201333.1 -2% 7.8 -10% 2.11 -11%
335/12/201333.0 -2% 7.8 -10% 2.11 -10%
345/19/201333.0 -2% 7.7 -10% 2.10 -11%

Networks season-to-date (A18-49+):
 
Week ABC CBS NBC Fox CW
26 94.02 110 89.61 106 30
30 93.45 110 91.29 106 30
31 93.25 110 91.56 106 30
32 93.09 110 92.07 106 30
33 93.13 109 92.44 106 30
34 92.98 109 92.74 106 30
34+2 93.10! 109 93.10! 106 30

Though Sunday Night Football vaults NBC well ahead of ABC in most of the conventional metrics, the original series-only measurement has them in an absolute dead heat going into the last day of the season! (To take it out to several decimal points, ABC series currently average a 1.9613 while NBC's average a 1.9612.) I had thought a few weeks ago that NBC was favored to pull ahead by the end, but the surprisingly large The Voice downturn over the last few weeks has slowed its furious recovery to the point that, with a day left in the season, ABC is now overwhelmingly favored to keep NBC in the entertainment cellar for an eighth straight season.

Why are they favored? They beat NBC by 0.4 points last Wednesday, and they pulled their weakest half hour for this week (Family Tools), so NBC is going to need practically unthinkable spikes from SVU and Chicago Fire to have any chance.

The late-season Voice deterioration has also taken a toll on the league average, barely able to break a 2.0 in the finale-filled last couple weeks. It's now projected the league average will end up at 2.107, meaning the hit-less year is not coming to pass. The Following will finish with a 125 A18-49+, tying My Name is Earl as the weakest #1 new show of the last decade. But at least it's a hit!

And with no Idol finale on the last two days of the season, there is zero chance the league average decline can get up to -10%. It'll be -11%, the outright worst decline of the A18-49+ era except for the writer's strike season of 2007-08.



Click to expand for more on the "climate" numbers used herein.

TPUT - This is an ESTIMATED average of how many people are watching TV from 8:00 to 11:00.
  • I derive these numbers by adding up all the ratings and dividing by all the shares in each of the 42 half-hours each week. That means there is some error relative to the numbers Nielsen actually releases. Sadly we don't regularly have access to those. I always advise not to rely heavily on these numbers for any one show in any one week, but the hope is that the error is minimized across a 42-timeslot sample every week.
  • I include the Old Methodology adjustment, which makes the number more like a measurement of how many people watch primetime programming Live + SD, rather than a measurement of how many people watch any TV (including old DVR stuff) from 8:00 to 11:00. This makes the number perhaps less intuitive in a vacuum, but it's pretty much a wash when making week-to-week and year-to-year comparisons, which is what we're really interested in.
bc - This is an average of how many people are watching national broadcast TV from 8:00 to 11:00.
  • This does NOT include the 10:00 adjustment used in the True2 calculation which attempts to account for Fox/CW programming and stronger cable. Again, that perhaps hurts the number in a vacuum, because the 10:00 numbers being used only include three networks, so I'm averaging timeslots that are somewhat apples-to-oranges. But again, it's a wash when making comparisons because I treat it that way all the time. It would not really change week-to-week or year-to-year comparisons, and that's what I mostly care about.
  • Another important note here is that these numbers include the preliminary averages for "sustaining" programming like presidential debates and commercial-free benefit concerts whose numbers are typically omitted from traditional Nielsen averages. I might eventually omit these from this particular calculation, but they're needed on my spreadsheets to 1) make PUT calculations in those timeslots and 2) create a competition number for the entertainment shows that air against them.
LeAv - This is a measurement of how many people watch the average moment of original entertainment series programming on the big four networks. Meaning, no sports, no reruns, no specials, no movies, no sustaining programming included.

Note: Beginning with week 9, all numbers compare against the next numbered week in the 2011-12 season. So week 9 compares against week 10 of 2011-12, etc. This was done to make the comparisons more calendar-friendly. See here for more on that.

8 comments:

Spot said...

I expect between +1% and -5% next season. I think we are nearing a point where the ratings will level off.

Spot said...

Do you put out the War of 18-49 updates and new posts soon or do we have to wait until the end of summer :-(

Spot said...

I don't see why. There are a lot of untested, new shows. Cable's not getting weaker, far as I can tell. Sundays will continue to be a problem, save football. 10:00 will continue to be a problem, save maybe Scandal. There is a lot that could go wrong. I know that this was an historically bad season for new shows, but there's nothing to say it can't get worse.

Spot said...

You have to wait about two hours!

Spot said...

I would GUESS it'll do a little better next season if only because 1) Idol and X and DWTS have fallen far enough that even with another big % decline, it won't be such a huge part of the overall average anymore; and 2) statistically it's unlikely the new shows will be this bad again.


But two years ago with the Ashton Kutcher effect, introducing The X Factor and a great scripted newbie class, it could only go -6%. So I would guess the best-case scenario is probably -7% or -8%. I hope I'm wrong though!

Spot said...

This class has a higher ceiling than the Class of 2011-12 did.


Fun Fact:
TV Shows remaining (in season) by Class (incl. shows that originally premiered in Summer, but now air in season)
2012-13: 11
2011-12: 11
2010-11: 7
2009-10: 11 (very strong class, much like I expect 2013-14 to be)
2008-09: 3 (Mentalist, Castle, Parks & Rec)
2007-08: 1 (TBBT)
2006-07: 0 (last show was Rules)
2005-06: 4 (HIMYM, CM, Bones, Supernatural)
2004-05: 4 (Grey's, DWTS, Biggest Loser, Am. Dad)
2003-04: 3 (TAAHM, NCIS, Apprentice)
2002-03: 1 (ANTM)
2001-02: 3 (TAR, Bachelor, Idol)
2000-01: 1 (CSI)
1999-00: 2 (Survivor, SVU)
1998-99: 1 (Family Guy)
------------------------------------------
1989-90: 2 (AFHV, Simpsons)


A couple interesting notes:
- 9 of the 17 oldest shows are unscripted.
- 2006-07 really sucked! There are still 21 shows from before then.
- 2012-13 will wind up very week.
- How about 1989-90. It still has TWO shows, when the next oldest show is nine years younger.
- 2007-08 is very week, despite having the #1 show on TV.

Spot said...

Wow. Really interesting table. Although I guess there's quite a lot of luck required to keep live action scripted shows going. The modern trend of sitcoms and dramas becoming more and more serialised means that shows rarely run in perpetuity anymore. CBS certainly benefit in this regard from having lots of procedurals.

Spot said...

For 06-07, The Game is still on the air, but it moved to BET. Otherwise, it's a lot of stuff that I like but no one else did. Knights of Prosperity, Veronica Mars, Shark.

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