Comments on: Nielsen Ratings for Tue, Feb 26: Idol Dominates, Jericho crushes Quarterlife!

By: Duncan Riley’s “Challenge to Network Television” Revisited : The Drama 2.0 Show

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 03:08:54 +0000

[...] put that in perspective, consider that American Idol pulled in more than 28 million viewers for its February 26 episode alone. If American Idol is an unfair [...]

By: Will Your Show Scale? | Bill Cammack

Will Your Show Scale? | Bill Cammack — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 15:46:28 +0000

[...] shows, not network shows, which count their viewers by millions. Recently, this show called “Quarterlife” got booed off the stage for ‘only’ pulling in 3,860,000 viewer… Obviously more than ten times the daily Rocketboom [...]

By: quarterlife Bombs on NBC Debut | Social Media News Desk

quarterlife Bombs on NBC Debut | Social Media News Desk — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 07:36:31 +0000

[...] But in the midst of the writers strike, NBC decided to acquire the rights for quarterlife, but are the execs at NBC kicking themselves now? Airing last night at the 10 PM slot, quarterlife found itself up against “Primetime What Would You Do Now?” In fact, quarterlife got one of the lowest ratings of all the programs on broadcast television last night, according to Neilsen ratings via TV by the Numbers. [...]

By: Markus Green

Markus Green — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 14:31:00 +0000

Jericho For the Win, what a great show!

By: Markus Green

Markus Green — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 13:31:00 +0000

Jericho For the Win, what a great show!

By: Quarterlife Might Not Have A Long Life On NBC | DistrictSource.com

Quarterlife Might Not Have A Long Life On NBC | DistrictSource.com — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 13:21:54 +0000

[...] According to Nielsen Ratings for Tuesday night, Quarterlife managed only 3.86 million viewers for its 10pm debut on NBC, compared to the fan resurrected but short second season of Jericho with 6.9 million viewers and Primetime: What Would You Do Now? with 7.6 million viewers. [...]

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 22:25:49 +0000

Jon, You’re maybe 5 years older than I am

I don’t buy that anyone has ceded anything to Fox, and if they have they’re idiots.

Who “wins” the season matters only for bragging rights.

Relative ratings, including specific age groups, likely correlate pretty well to absolute revenue potential, so doing better is *always* better than doing worse.

Being #1, #2, etc. is for folks like us to chat about, working to get the marginal viewer is what the networks should always be doing.

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 22:06:27 +0000

sorry Jon to me that’s like saying someday all broadcast shows will be under 5 million might as well just accept it now.

Your logic is completely lost on me. Be thinking about the long-term, yes,but maximize the short-term. Fox seems to be the only network doing that. Meanwhile CBS/CW crow about what a hit on the web Gossip Girl is. To that end I applaud the peacocks for axing Quarterlife immediately.

By: Jon V

Jon V — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:55:29 +0000

Bob/Bill -

When you guys get to be my age [sheesh - did I actually type that], you’ll understand the wisdom of long-term thinking. The writer’s strike is the perfect excuse to screw around with some off-the-wall stuff and see if it has a future.

The ‘Alphabets’ have already conceded the season to FOX, so, to use Bill’s bring-up-some-minor-leaguers analogy, let’s throw them some curveballs and see if they can hit.

They’ve got until September before they’re in another pennant race.

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:28:52 +0000

Me too, Bill! My sense is that the entities have largely been run as stand-alone. I believe it will come to that sort of thing, but the network heads aren’t as good as some of the GM’s in baseball (though as a SF Giants fan, I’d take Zucker or Moonves over Sabean any day!)

Let’s face it, the repurposed Law & Order: CI more than doubled Quarterlife’s showing, and in a much more competitive timeslot (though admittedly, a time slot with more viewer) at that. Dexter has done OK on CBS and I imagine Monk will significantly outperform Quarterlife on NBC.

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:25:49 +0000

Jon, You're maybe 5 years older than I am

I don't buy that anyone has ceded anything to Fox, and if they have they're idiots.

Who “wins” the season matters only for bragging rights.

Relative ratings, including specific age groups, likely correlate pretty well to absolute revenue potential, so doing better is *always* better than doing worse.

Being #1, #2, etc. is for folks like us to chat about, working to get the marginal viewer is what the networks should always be doing.

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:23:04 +0000

I'm surprised that with corporate groups of broadcast and cable networks now being the norm that shows & networks are not treated more like the ballplayers and the Major Leagues and the Minors in terms of call ups and send downs. Wayne Friedman at Mediapost had a nice piece on that recently.

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:20:46 +0000

Not me, I’d slap another airing of Deal or No Deal on quicker than you can say 2 bits! OR just keep rerunning the Knight Rider movie until it dips below four million…

By: Jon V

Jon V — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:19:27 +0000

Right you are… I’m not a watcher and I don’t think it will work out (for this show and at this time).

I was thinking more in terms of the ‘experimental’ results and the networks seeing if they can somehow find a crossover method that works. For that reason, I would continue the ‘trial’ and see if there is some information that can be gleaned for future reference.

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:11:45 +0000

Jon, Quarterlife isn’t the new frontier. Quarterlife was MADE FOR TV, and rejected. Then cut up into six minute segments and put online. Then, reassembled back to its original state for TV.

The first instinct to reject it was the correct one. I don’t need more data, but if you need a few more weeks of data first, I won’t fault you for giving it more of a chance than I am giving it.

Either way though, no chance. Right?

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:06:27 +0000

sorry Jon to me that's like saying someday all broadcast shows will be under 5 million might as well just accept it now.

By: Jon V

Jon V — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:01:57 +0000

Since ‘2bits’ is the first real net-to-TV experiment, seems to me that NBC (and all of the other networks) will prob stick with it and tweak until they get the info they want/need.

I would expect that they made a commit to stick with it for X amnt of eps, regardless of numbers (I’m sure they were hoping for better).

Don’t write this off too soon… they really didn’t promote it on the TV side a great deal. I would try different methods before I cancelled – just to get a read.

It’s a new frontier… trial and error.

By: Jon V

Jon V — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:55:29 +0000

Bob/Bill -

When you guys get to be my age [sheesh - did I actually type that], you'll understand the wisdom of long-term thinking. The writer's strike is the perfect excuse to screw around with some off-the-wall stuff and see if it has a future.

The 'Alphabets' have already conceded the season to FOX, so, to use Bill's bring-up-some-minor-leaguers analogy, let's throw them some curveballs and see if they can hit.

They've got until September before they're in another pennant race.

By: NexGen Technology Blog » Quarterlife Might Not Have A Long Life On NBC

NexGen Technology Blog » Quarterlife Might Not Have A Long Life On NBC — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:31:20 +0000

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:28:52 +0000

Me too, Bill! My sense is that the entities have largely been run as stand-alone. I believe it will come to that sort of thing, but the network heads aren't as good as some of the GM's in baseball (though as a SF Giants fan, I'd take Zucker or Moonves over Sabean any day!)

Let's face it, the repurposed Law & Order: CI more than doubled Quarterlife's showing, and in a much more competitive timeslot (though admittedly, a time slot with more viewer) at that. Dexter has done OK on CBS and I imagine Monk will significantly outperform Quarterlife on NBC.

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:23:04 +0000

I'm surprised that with corporate groups of broadcast and cable networks now being the norm that shows & networks are not treated more like the ballplayers and the Major Leagues and the Minors in terms of call ups and send downs.

Wayne Friedman at Mediapost had a nice piece on that recently.

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:20:46 +0000

Not me, I'd slap another airing of Deal or No Deal on quicker than you can say 2 bits! OR just keep rerunning the Knight Rider movie until it dips below four million…

By: Jon V

Jon V — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:19:27 +0000

Right you are… I'm not a watcher and I don't think it will work out (for this show and at this time).

I was thinking more in terms of the 'experimental' results and the networks seeing if they can somehow find a crossover method that works. For that reason, I would continue the 'trial' and see if there is some information that can be gleaned for future reference.

By: quarterlife Remembers to Thank NBC « NewTeeVee

quarterlife Remembers to Thank NBC « NewTeeVee — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:14:12 +0000

[...] All tonal nuances aside, the show had just 3.86 million viewers. [...]

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 20:11:45 +0000

Jon, Quarterlife isn't the new frontier. Quarterlife was MADE FOR TV, and rejected. Then cut up into six minute segments and put online. Then, reassembled back to its original state for TV.

The first instinct to reject it was the correct one. I don't need more data, but if you need a few more weeks of data first, I won't fault you for giving it more of a chance than I am giving it.

Either way though, no chance. Right?