Robert correctly tagged the myth of CBS Evening News with Katie Couric’s ratings have greatly improved, but I wanted to follow up with a table and a chart with some seasonal data (Robert provided data from some other periods in his post).
With the Presidential election, all the broadcast evening news showed increases in viewers in the 2008-9 season vs. 2007-8 (cable news networks showed much larger increases, fyi). Looking at the table of season average viewership for the network early evening news, we see that from the 2007-8 season to the partially completed (through 2/8/09) 2008-9 season Katie Couric and the CBS Evening News is up 8.95%. While that is the most of the three broadcast networks, it’s insignificantly ahead of the 8.85% increase for NBC, which also had a larger absolute increase in average viewership. As Robert noted, the CBS PR machine has been out in full force for Katie.
For those looking at the longer term trend, Katie Couric took over the CBS Evening News at the beginning of the 2006-7 season.
Broadcast Network Evening News Season Average Viewership
| ABC | CBS | NBC | |
| Season | Viewers (million) | Viewers (million) | Viewers (million) |
| 1991 – 1992 | 13.63 | 11.92 | 11.15 |
| 1992 – 1993 | 13.84 | 12.68 | 11.65 |
| 1993 – 1994 | 13.03 | 11.66 | 11.62 |
| 1994 – 1995 | 12.68 | 10.32 | 10.31 |
| 1995 – 1996 | 11.62 | 9.38 | 10.60 |
| 1996 – 1997 | 10.77 | 9.20 | 10.91 |
| 1997 – 1998 | 10.13 | 10.12 | 10.68 |
| 1998 – 1999 | 10.23 | 9.13 | 10.23 |
| 1999 – 2000 | 9.82 | 8.40 | 10.25 |
| 2000 – 2001 | 9.23 | 8.52 | 9.90 |
| 2001 – 2002 | 9.85 | 8.62 | 10.26 |
| 2002 – 2003 | 9.58 | 8.01 | 10.25 |
| 2003 – 2004 | 9.24 | 7.55 | 9.98 |
| 2004 – 2005 | 8.96 | 7.06 | 9.58 |
| 2005 – 2006 | 8.12 | 7.41 | 8.99 |
| 2006 – 2007 | 8.36 | 6.74 | 8.40 |
| 2007 – 2008 | 8.18 | 6.16 | 8.52 |
| 2008 – 2009* | 8.60 | 6.71 | 9.28 |
| Y/Y % Change | 5.15% | 8.95% | 8.85% |
| Y/Y # Change | 0.421 | 0.551 | 0.754 |
*2008-9 season data is through 2/8/09, all other seasons are Sept-Sept.
For those a bit more visual, here is a chart of the numbers above, minus the 2008-9 numbers since being just partial season numbers they are not directly comparable.
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Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
At least NBC can take a small victory in the news against CBS and ABC seeing as its the only one to have seen 9mil: plus it has MSNBC (which is a news channel/)
Yikes, CBS primetime is doing well but their news division.. wow.
I totally agree that one would have to be delusional to believe that The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric has seen a spike in ratings. I have seen several articles commenting on Miss Couric’s newly found credibility in light of her pre/post election coverage. Perhaps I’m looking in different places but the notion that there is a myth that CBS’ ratings have climbed of late is itself a myth. Again the recent spotlight seems rather to be on giving her newscast a second look based on her journalistic prowess and contextual changes in the broadcast with an emphasis on whether or not CBS is willing suddenly now to give her time to expand and grow the ratings when her exit had seemed imminent. JMHO.
Doesn’t surprise me.. She needs to stick to the morning shows.. Her guestioning is horrible. I believe a third grader could do a better job. All three of the anchors suck, but she is the worst..
So how long until we see The CBS Evening News with Julie Chen?
Couric stinks. Her interview with the US Air crew was a feel good worship fest. I didn’t hear anything that hadn’t already been said in the paper. She belongs on the View.
I’m surprised she didn’t ask them, “What’s in your iPod?”
Robert says:
February 12th, 2009 at 8:06 pm
I’m surprised she didn’t ask them, “What’s in your iPod?”
But she didn’t. LOL So the query is kinda specious, eh?
I will not watch the CBS evening news for as long as Couric is anchor. I don’t even like the fact that she gets to be on 60 Minutes. It’s bad enough seeing her face on the evening news, I don’t want to see her on another news show.
It was mentioned elsewhere, and I agree with the fact that Moonves won’t fire her until all options are exhausted. Moonves won’t admit to any mistake in hiring her to anchor the CBS news.
I’m fascinated at all the Couric animosity. Might I ask to why anyone has such knee jerk hatred for her? What specifically has she done? Citing interview examples please? As far as the “feel good interview” with the Hudson River Crash survivors? Was that NOT a feel good story? I think with some she can’t win for losing. What questions would YOU ahve asked? Please cite specific journalistic missteps? Some people just rub people the wrong way. Perhpas that is the case?
As an aside are you male? Are you Conservative? Let’s try and keep emotion out of this and have a mature debate. Clearly not all of her interviews are THAT bad. Let’s be fair adn balanced. Please cite one, just one interview that you approve of, and that itself would be a proper template she should use more often in the future. Perhaps the universally lauded interview with Palin? Lauded except with the radical right of course. BTW before I’m accused of being from the radical left, Keith Olberman is IMHO as big a hysterical loon as Bill O’Reilly.
If you can’t find one positive thing perhaps the problem is not with Couric and you dont’ really have anythign to offer? I’m not looking for political debate. I’m looking for journalistic debate as i think we ALL agree CBS Evening News ratings have NOT risen.
GBD: Well put. If all of the media is liberal, then why does it bother them so much that *this* particular liberal has a job?
And I love Keith as a sports guy. But on politics, his anger is over the top and unwatchable – he’s no better than those idiots on Fox News. I’m much happier watching Maddow.
For evening news, I pick Brian Williams, but I respect Couric.
I think Couric’s a great newsperson… an excellent journalist.. people just envied her bcoz she earns 15 million a year…
I remember the same iPod question being asked to Obama when he was running last year and I thought what kind of bs question is this. These are the best interviewers in the fourth estate and this is what we care to know about? Last week during a sitdown with the prez, with the worst economy since the Depression, Anderson Cooper asked how the WH dog search was going. A prime example of superficial feel good journalism. Murrow would be turning in his grave.
I don’t like her because seeing the news as “cutsey” is not my thing.
Robert says:
February 13th, 2009 at 10:32 am
I remember the same iPod question being asked to Obama when he was running last year and I thought what kind of bs question is this
Fair enough. BUT did she not NOT ask the crew the ipod query? Perhpas you could have been pleasantly surprised that she didn’t repeat the same mistake twice? I’m not sure how Anderson Cooper’s question is relevant to Katie.
I do agree with you that today’s news is a joke to the Murrow/Cronkite era. How anyone can take O’Reilly’s “Body Language” segments seriously is pathetic. I’m afraid it is a matter of time before the Big Three will have to resort to this extreme of empty tabloid journalism if ratings is all it is about.
The intellect of the viewers seems to have dropped precariously and been replaced with a desire for emotionally, low attention span, knee jerk histrionics as well. Most notably on Fox and MSNBC. It thankfully hasn’t reared it’s head on CNN to the same degree and so far the Big Three have distanced themselves as well. Thanks for the honest reply.
Robert says:
February 13th, 2009 at 10:32 am
Anderson Cooper asked how the WH dog search was going
We are 100% in agreement here. I really can see historians looking back on this economic collapse and reflecting in horror how blind/stupid we as a people and a media had to be to care about such matters.
I was horrified at the lack of attention/outrage at Pres Bush’s (W’s) video at the Press’ Dinner with a taped joke of him looking/snooping throughout the White house for weapons of mass destruction poking fun at their absence, “Nope not over here,” which of course was his basis for the Iraq war, while 3,000+ of our soldiers gave their LIVES for said quest.
I always thought that sounded like a myth. Good analysis.
Could someone provide links to all these articles that promote this mythological, conspiratorial claim that the public is being fooled into thinking that Ms. Couric’s ratings have recently risen? I’ve googled “Katie Couric’s boost in ratings” and “Katie Couric’s recent ratings” just to name a few and couldn’t find any? If someone has a beef with Katie Couric’s style please don’t distort the truth. All one does is defeat their own credibility. Attacking Ms Couric newscast with unsubstantiated claims about ratings without providing facts is somewhat hypocritical and has more in similar with what finally got Dan Rather fired. Pot meet kettle!
GBD, if you go to the original post about this, which is linked at the beginning of this post, you’ll find this link: http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/cbs/couric_its_not_a_lot_of_fun_being_pummeled_in_the_press_108074.asp?c=rss
Julia, ONE article from a right leaning sponsored site no less HARDLY confirms this mass conspiracy to promote the lie that CBS’ ratings spike? The statement in the article is suspect at best. It isn’t in qoutations but seems to infer that Ms Couric may have stated it. If the author believes that statement then he/she is delusional. One quick glance at THISn site would serve him/her well. I was hoping for multiple legitimate links re: the myth. If one sentence from THAT site is all that exists then I think the myth re: CBS’ ratings is itself a myth. Thanks tho.
Couric is a politically correct hire and that is it. We see how well that is working out. The other thing is CBS must have thought the stupid group of individuals that watched this tramp on the CBS moroning show would still be awake that time of night, lol jokes on them. Keep crying Katie boo hoo hoo you dried out old prune.
The elephant in the room is that men comprise the primary demographic for hard news consumption. Why shouldn’t television cater to that demographic in the same way that it has catered to the female demographic for years?
Women would not be amused if the networks foisted a macho co-host upon Oprah Winfrey or the View. Why then does CBS feel the need to foist Ms Perky on a show that caters mostly to men? Men can always change channels you know. And they are. This silly mistake is costing CBS a lot of money.
GBD, it’s rather difficult, as I breeze through the posts, to believe that you yourself are not the one looking to make this something political. It would be great if we could just once have something blog about something other than their obvious political bias.