TV's Fall Lineup Disappoints Hopes for a Quick Recovery
The first week of the fall TV season brought grim news to network executives hoping for a swift recovery from last year's audience- zapping writers' strike.</br></br>Many viewers haven't rushed back to their television sets to watch this year's highly promoted season premieres, preferring to catch the shows on digital video recording devices and online -- or not catch them at all.</br></br>An average of 9 million people tuned in to prime-time programs on the top five English-language broadcast networks the night they aired last week, a 4.3 percent decline from the first week of the 2007 TV season, according to Nielsen Media Research.</br></br>General Electric's NBC faced the steepest overall declines, with 16.3 percent fewer viewers. Older-skewing CBS, a unit of CBS Corp., was down 9.6 percent among viewers between the ages of 18 and 49. News Corporation's Fox and The CW, a joint venture between CBS Corp. and Time Warner Inc.'s Warner Bros., were both up over last year, but still ranked Nos. 4 and 5 in viewers among the English-language networks, respectively.</br></br>Network executives blame an array of factors for the low ratings, including the increased penetration of DVRs; the availability of broadcast network shows online; the fragmentation of the TV audience; and high interest in the presidential election and the economic crisis, which is drawing viewers away from prime-time programming toward news channels and the Internet.