Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Cable news ratings

Now that I bit the bullet last month and got cable TV (it's part of a package with my internet and phone), I pay more attention to cable news shows and their ratings.

I'm working hard not to get addicted to MSNBC, the liberal answer to FoxNews, which has dominated cable news for the past 11 years.

January ratings are out, and Fox ratings are the lowest in those 11 years.   Don't get too excited, because they still had 9 out of the 10 top-rated news shows.   But Rachel Maddow climbed into 10th place, up from 14th a year ago.    Her 11 pm replay beat Bill O'Reilly's.

Here's the thing though.   January had a lot of tv time taken up by the Obama inauguration.   Fox couldn't ignore it, but their viewers didn't want to watch.  So they switched channels to something else -- not MSNBC, however, you can be sure.

So this may be an atypical month.  On the other hand, it may be that a lot of people got used to watching Rachel and other MSNBC programs and will keep watching.   New viewers of cable news, like me.

Ralph

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