Following up on the NY Times story I posted earlier today about CNN finishing fourth in cable news for the first time, the numbers are reaching us on the magnitude of CNN's ratings decline from October 2008 to October 2009. Big events like last year's election drove big viewership to CNN which has now substantially vanished.
You can see our daily cable news ratings here.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
In some sense, this isn’t a HUGE surprise (considering the elections last year) – and MSNBC is down a similar %age. However, it is quite jarring to see that CNN has SUCH a difficult time holding on to their audience over a longer period of time.
The good news is, ’10 to ’09 comparisons next year will look fantastic!
Meanwhile FOX is near their pre-election numbers!!! GO FOX!!!
http://www.voyagertrans.com/forum1/index.php
Errr…Fox News is down -36% from last year…that’s not anywhere NEAR pre-election numbers.
http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/10/26/steep-losses-at-cnn-as-cable-ratings-tumble-in-october/
anonymous fox has retained 2/3 of their pre election audience in a non election year compare that to 2/3 loss for msnbc down 66% and over 2/3 loss for cnn down 77% with the exception of hln fox is the only 24hr news network who is actually up in 25 to 54 demo 6% compared to cnn and msnbc down 4%
Fox being down way less than CNN is doesn’t prove that Fox has more quality, proves only how many conservative alienated people there are in america, sad america.
I don’t get it how people critize FOX, who cares if it is a conservative news channel! If you don’t like it, don’t watch it! Sad America because we watch FOX? Give me a break! Let’s see, the liberals have CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, pretty much all newspaper sources and you are still complaining about FOX? One network? hmmmmmm, sounds like envy! With everything going on in the world, even the White House has to complain. Every news channel is not perfect and promote their own agenda but I like FOX and looking at the numbers, alot of people like FOX.
The New York Times prints without explanation or verification the opinion that CNN’s ratings are down because they continue to present a news format as opposed to “opinion television.” It would be worthwhile to see some polling to prove or disprove that conclusion. Frankly, I think CNN’s news format is loaded with liberal opinion that is fairly obvious with minimal viewing.
CNN needs to GUT all the lame anchors (Campbell Brown, Rick Sanchez, Wolf Blitzer.. get rid of some of the silly and unoriginal talking heads — Begala, Borger, Roland Martin, Donna Brazile, Jack Cafferty)…Get rid of that whiff of pro-Obama personnel..Get rid of the fluffy commentary sensibility on FNC and MSNBC (which CNN does poorly).
They need to be a no-nonsense, hard news channel. They need to smell of that old-school back-to-basics journalist mentality. They’re not there to support Obama or paint a nice picture of Obama, they’re there to report and ask questions. Get rid of some of the human interest stories (Heroes). Build around new faces and center around the old days when you couldn’t exactly tell if the person was left or right and it didn’t really matter.
Most importantly, CNN needs to be a watchdog. They can’t compete with Fox for right viewers or MSNBC for left viewers, but they CAN compete with FNC for independent viewers looking for a watchdog channel with competent news reporting, analysis, and limited commentary. If CNN rebuilds its brand as a real independent news channel that isn’t pandering for ratings, viewers will come to them. (And they need to get rid of all those dumb mantras ‘best political team on television’, etc.)
wow…the most surprising to me out of all of this is how wonder dude anderson cooper is tanking so bad lately…
he needs to go and find another hurricane to cover with weather dude…
People are looking for honest reporting, not Obama cheerleaders; that is the reason they are tuneing in to FNC
Shannon is right. You will never get high ratings by premoting a president. The only way CNN can get its viewers back is if they become independant (not likely) and watchdogs (not likely). Its sad when only one network covered the ACORN story, NEA propaganda, and Van Jones. The reason why the president went after FOX is because they have a very large independant and democratic viewership (55%). If it was only conservatives watching, the left wouldn’t care. However its not.
But with the kind of reporting on CNN and MSNBC, FOX will continue to get more independants.
Copper’s tea bagging comment put me over the edge … And I used to watch him nightly – F CNN …
Fox is such a bad network.. Really?? But MSNBC and CNN have the most crude and hateful anchors @ night….
Also note that the latest figures on newspaper circulation show a sharp decline – on average ten percent – but the Wall Street Journal is growing its audience.
The implication is clear. Media outlets that try to cover up stories rather than cover them are losing their credibility and their audience. Murdoch dominates cable and print, and no one is in a position to mount a serious challenge to his dominance.
Of course, CNN and the other elite media could fix their problems tomorrow by adding some real diversity to their newsrooms and moving to more balanced coverage, but it will never happen, since they value ideology above their very survival.
Cooper’s tea bagging comment alienated me from watching him too. I knew he had a bias but that was really unprofessional.
Most straight law-abiding American citizens, like me, had never heard the term “tea bagging” and didn’t realize it was a term to describe a lewd homo-sexual act. Cooper Anderson was very familiar with the term though. He is a low life.
CNN used to be called the Clinton News Network. They started losing credibility during the Clinton years when FNC came on the scene. FNC was an alternative to liberal bias in the media. To this day the media is oversaturated with liberal news outlets and CNN is just one of that crowd. FNC is unique and gives the only alternative to the liberal slant in the media. As a result they have amassed a huge audience, and compared to the other networks they are fair and balanced. These two factors contribute to FNC’s assendancy and CNN’s and MSNBC’s decline.
WSJ plays fast and loose with the circulation numbers… the big number they give that makes them the number 1 paper in the country includes paid subs to their website(which the circulation people allow)… I haven’t seen a paper only number, has anyone?
That’s not to say the WSJ is a bad paper, it’s the paper I read everyday on my Kindle2… love it!
veronica i’m with you the little respect i had for cooper was lost when he used the term tea baggers to describe the protesters
OK, With all the talk about AC and Maddow’s comments on tea bagging, I had to go look it up. Sick. Now that I know what it is though, I have to ask; what could Rachel Maddow possibly know about the subject? As Imus once put it, “I thought that dog won’t hunt”? Also, I guess it brings new meaning to Anderson 360 … and a new low to CNN. Literally!
The fact that the term “Tea Bag” has so easily replaced the term “Tea Party”, shows that the problem with CNN is more than just the TV on air personalities.
What is more absurd is that they someone didn’t even consider that it may offend and drive away viewers, or didn’t care.
Its small things like the Tea Bag comments that start from the top and trickle down to the every day personality, i.e “Anderson Cooper” that cause the viewers to change channels.