Sunday, June 10, 2007

CBS to Jericho Fans - Watch Jericho Live, Not Time-Shifted


Now that the campaign to save (bring back) Jericho has worked, CBS has an unusual request to the fans. In an NY Times article, Nina Tassler, the CBS Entertainment president tells Jericho fans the following:


"Please watch “Jericho” on broadcast television. Because CBS finances its
shows based on measures of viewership of regularly scheduled broadcasts, “it’s
of primary importance,” “We want them to watch on Wednesday at 8
o’clock,” or whenever CBS schedules the return of the series later this year,
“And we need them to recruit new viewers who are going to watch the broadcast.”

In other words, don't use your PVR to time-shift the show. Watch the commercials or the show will go.... To me that is a strange request coming from the President of a major network. The article had some interesting stats showing that the show has an extremely high percentage of its viewers who were time-shifters or watched the show on the CBS internet site:


CBS received a detailed report on the relatively high rate at which “Jericho” fans
recorded the show for later playback. “That made us take a second look,” Ms. Tassler said. That report, produced by David Poltrack, the network’s head of
research, showed that an estimated 700,000 households — roughly 8 percent of the
audience that watched the show live — recorded “Jericho” for later viewing.

I think the networks have been greatly underestimating the number of PVR users out there that time-shift shows. I know I do it regularly and I can't be alone.


The effort to save Jericho was amazing to say the least. For more info on the resurection of the show, read this article in the NY Times. I guess I'm going to have to catch up and watch this show after all.

Credit to digg for this post
You might also be interested in these related articles: