Nielsen: Broadcast Hits its Stride in October

Broadcast viewership continued its seasonal ascent in October, lifted by gains in both sports and drama viewing, according to Nielsen’s October 2024 report of The Gauge™. The broadcast category exhibited 7% monthly growth and added 1.4 share points in October to finish at 24.0% of total time spent watching television—its largest monthly share of TV since January. October marked the third consecutive month of growth for broadcast, and the category has added 3.7 share points over that time period.

October gains in broadcast viewership were driven by a 29% increase in viewing to drama programs, and a 10% bump in sports viewership. NFL games once again dominated the month’s top broadcast telecasts, notching the top 16 most-watched programs. The Week 7 matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers drew October’s largest audience with 27 million viewers on FOX. Outside of football, Game 1 of the World Series on FOX notched 15.2 million viewers and captured 17th on the list of top telecasts.

Cable viewing accounted for 26.3% of total TV usage in October (+0.2 pt.), and the category notched its first positive share change since April. Cable viewership was lifted by a 5% gain in news viewing, led by the Vice Presidential Debate on October 1 and month-long coverage leading up to Election Day, and a 52% boost in sports viewing driven by NFL Monday Night Football, college football and MLB playoff games. Sports and news programs were also at the top of the most-watched cable telecasts list in October, with the NFL Monday Night Football game between Kansas City and New Orleans taking the top slot with 14 million viewers on ESPN, followed by FOX News Channel’s presentation of the VP Debate which drew 7.9 million viewers on the network. On a yearly basis, cable news was up 17% compared to October 2023, while cable sports was up 14%.

The Gauge™: Broadcast Hits its Stride in October on Strength of Drama and Sports Programming | Nielsen

Streaming viewership in October was fairly flat compared to last month, with eight of the 11 reported streaming services within 0.1 share point or less of their September totals. The category accounted for 40.5% of total time spent watching TV (-0.5 pt.). Among the streamers with larger monthly differentials, The Roku Channel was up 12% and added 0.2 share points to finish the month at 1.8% of television, a high point for the FAST service. Netflix was down 4% with 7.5% of TV (-0.4 pt.), but still managed to own the top five streaming originals this month, led by Love Is Blind, which was also the top streaming title in October, with 4.4 billion viewing minutes.

* Note: A portion of Hulu’s viewing (estimated at approximately 25%) was inadvertently attributed to Disney+ during this interval. The issue was addressed at the end of October and will be correct moving forward. This will not impact the October Media Distributor Gauge.

TV Ratings: Morning Joe Tanks As Viewers Are Pissed

Based on Monday morning’s hour-by-hour ratings, Morning Joe viewers were not happy with Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski’s announcement that they met privately with President-Elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago last Friday.

Trump’s victory is so complete, Morning Joe has fully surrendered. Both hosts went to Mar-a-Lago to kiss the ring. Astonishing.
pic.twitter.com/iDcbuP7Gep

— Buck Sexton (@BuckSexton) November 18, 2024

Mediaite reports that nearly immediately, there has been a bipartisan backlash. The MSNBC morning show hosts’ stated goal of “time for a new approach” was openly derided as evidence that Scarborough and Brzezinski did not believe in the conviction of their previous criticisms. The criticism came from provocateurs and thought leaders from both ends of the political spectrum.

Podcastee Megyn Kelly aaks "How long have MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski been telling us that Donald Trump is an existential threat... Well, they have done a 180 on the matter – and that 180 comes as their ratings circle the bowl."

It turns out that MSNBC viewers were also not impressed, or at least they tuned out over the next four hours Monday. Nielsen ratings obtained by Mediaite show a significant drop in viewers in the 7 AM hour. Roughly 38% of the lucrative 25-54 demo also turned off MSNBC or switched to another network.

Morning Joe airs for four hours each morning, and given different times that people awake and tune in to cable news, the show regularly builds viewers hour over hour. The fact that people tuned out from the MSNBC morning show, and at such a significant clip, does not spell good fortune for the once influential opinion show that seems to have angered the anti-Trump resistance set and has long given up on the pro-Trump viewers going back roughly eight years.

MSNBC isn't the only outlet trying to repair relations with Trump amid broader mainstream media trust issues coming out of the election.

• Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong told Fox News Thursday he's making changes to ensure "the views of all" in his paper.
• The Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos congratulated Trump on his win, shortly after his paper reportedly lost 250,000 subscriptions due to his decision to yank the paper's endorsement of Harris.
• Social media influencers are leaning into the MAGA madness in an effort to curry favor with brands, per The Cut.

Comcast To Spinoff MSNBC, CNBC and Other Networks

Comcast is expected to announce Wednesday that it is moving forward with a plan to spin off its NBCUniversal cable TV networks, according to people familiar with the situation, acknowledging that it will be better off without a business that was once its crown jewel.

The Wall Street Journal reports the company, which last month said it was studying the idea, will separate off entertainment and news channels including MSNBC, CNBC, USA, Oxygen, E!, Syfy and Golf Channel. Those assets generated about $7 billion in revenue in the 12 months ended Sept. 30.

Bravo, known for reality TV programming such as the “Real Housewives,” will stay in the mother ship, along with the Peacock streaming service and the NBC broadcast network, the people said.

Comcast is betting that NBCUniversal’s remaining assets—including in broadcast TV, sports, movies and theme parks—will be better positioned for growth, and that its strong balance sheet can absorb the loss of still-healthy profits from cable networks. 

The new cable venture would likely need greater scale to thrive, media executives say. Comcast’s leadership sees the potential for it to consolidate other networks across the dial over time.

When Comcast gained control of NBCUniversal in 2011, its cable networks were considered among the most attractive assets. Channels such as E!, known for red-carpet coverage, and women-focused Oxygen, seemed to have plenty of potential in the growing U.S. cable market. 

However, years of cord-cutting have taken a heavy toll on subscribers and viewership. Every major media company has slashed costs in these networks, but Comcast is the first to hive off nearly the entire business into a separate firm.

Sunny Hostin Forced To Read Legal Note On 'The View'

The View's Sunny Hostin was not pleased

On Tuesday's "The View," host Sunny Hostin was forced read a legal note from Matt Gaetz's lawyers denying all allegations against him, moments after discussing claims about his involvement with a 17-year-old girl. 

Gaetz's lawyers called the allegations "invented" and pointed to a closed DOJ investigation with no charges. The clip went viral, with viewers noting that "she did not look happy" while reading the statement.

'The View' host Sunny Hostin was asked to read a legal note from Matt Gaetz's lawyers asserting his innocence, just moments after she and her co-hosts discussed allegations about Trump's attorney general pick's involvement with a 17-year-old girl.

NEW: The View host Sunny Hostin fumes as she is forced to read a legal note just minutes after presenting the Matt Gaetz allegations as a “fact.”

Hostin: They discussed the fact that once [Gaetz] finds out that she's 17, he stops having s*x with her.

Hostin 3 min later: Matt… pic.twitter.com/USvYjnWqKZ

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) November 20, 2024

She read: "Matt Gaetz has long denied all allegations, calling the claims 'invented' and saying in a statement to ABC News that 'this false smear following a 3-year criminal investigation should be viewed with great skepticism. That DOJ investigation was closed with no charges being brought.'"

The clip soon went viral, with social media users noting that "she did not look happy" while reading the statement.

FCC's Carr Says Legacy Media Needs Change

President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) chair spoke to "America's Newsroom" on Tuesday and told host Dana Perino that the legacy media's status quo needed to change.

"Jeff Bezos just recently did an op-ed where he said that Americans don't trust the news media. He said now they're the least trusted of all. And I think he's speaking a lot of truth there. So I think the status quo, particularly when it comes to legacy media, needs to change," Carr said.

Trump tapped Carr, who is currently the senior Republican member of the FCC, to lead the FCC on Sunday. Perino asked Carr what the agency can do to help legacy media. 

"There's a lot the FCC can do," he said. "Broadcasters are differently situated than other speakers. They get free access to a valuable public resource, the airwaves. And they're licensed by the FCC. And the exchange for that is they have to serve the public interest. I think it's important that we take another look at that, and we reinvigorate it."

Fox News Digital reports there's also a news distortion complaint at the FCC still, having to do with CBS, and CBS as a transaction before the FCC. And I'm pretty confident that that news distortion complaint over the CBS ‘60 Minutes’ transcript is something that's likely to arise in the context of the FCC's review of that transaction," Carr continued.

Carr said his top issues included looking at tech censorship.

"Free speech is the bedrock of our democracy," Carr said. "And there's been this unprecedented surge in censorship over the last couple of years. And we need to restore Americans' First Amendment rights."

"We have a real opportunity to get the economy going in creating jobs. When President Trump came in 2017, we were behind the 8-ball when it came to communications policy, and he turned things around. And that's exactly what is going to happen again. We need to free up more spectrum. We need to do permitting reform, when you talk about rural broadband. That's the key there. And No. 3 is the space economy," Carr added. 

He said the Trump administration would "unleash America's private sector again."

TV Ratings: Bills-Chiefs Numbers Were Massive

The Buffalo Bills' 30-21 win over the Kansas City Chiefs in Week 11 brought in record-breaking TV viewership during the CBS National window.

According to Sports Business Journal's Austin Karp, an average of 31.2 million viewers tuned in to see Buffalo's home win which snapped Kansas City's unbeaten record and improved the Bills to 9-2 for the first time since 1992.

Not only is Bills-Chiefs the most-watched game of the 2024 NFL season so far, it is also the most-watched regular season NFL game, excluding Thanksgiving & Christmas, since the Patriots-Colts game Week 9 in 2007 (33.8 million).

That matchup featured the 8-0 Patriots, led by Tom Brady, going against Peyton Manning and the 7-0 Colts.

Additionally, Bills-Chiefs is 4th most-watched National window on record (dating back to 1988) and ranks among the 10 most-watched NFL games on record in any window, excluding Thanksgiving.

Atlanta Radio: CMG Snags Michael Saunders To Program WALR

Veteran Programmer Michael Saunders has been appointed as the new Director of Branding & Programming for WALR-FM (Kiss 104.1) in Atlanta by Cox Media Group (CMG).

Saunders will start his new role Monday November 25.

Michael Saunders

His career includes working with brands like KQBT-FM in Houston, WJLB-FM in Detroit, and WCFB-FM in Orlando.

He was also  involved in launching WWPR in New York in 2002 and founded the New York, Detroit, and Florida Music Conferences.

Saunders has been inducted into the National Black Radio Hall of Fame.  In addition, Saunders’s extensive background includes serving as Operations Manager for CBS Radio’s Washington, DC market, Program Director for WJHM-FM in Orlando, Vice President of Client Services for the Left Bank Organization in Los Angeles and Operations Manager and Program Director for WPEG-FM, WBAV-FM and WGIV-AM in Charlotte.

He began his radio career as an on-air personality for WGCD-AM in his hometown of Chester, SC.

CMG Atlanta's Director of Operations, Nate Reed, and CMG SVP Programming, Chris Eagan, expressed their excitement about Saunders joining the team and the positive impact they expect from his leadership.

Sean Hannity to Host FOX Nation’s Patriot Awards

FOX Nation will host its sixth annual Patriot Awards on Thursday, December 5th at the Tilles Center for Performing Arts in Brookville, New York. Emceed by Long Island native and FOX News Channel (FNC) top-rated primetime host Sean Hannity, The Patriot Awards will be streamed live on FOX Nation beginning at 8 PM/ET. An encore presentation will air on FNC on Sunday, December 8th at 10 PM/ET. Please click here for tickets.

In partnership with advertisers Tunnel 2 Towers, Patriot Mobile, Golden Corral and Belfor, the awards show will honor and recognize America’s finest patriots, including military veterans, first responders and other inspirational everyday heroes. FOX News Media personalities, including Will Cain, Rachel Campos-Duffy, Steve Doocy, Ainsley Earhardt, Harris Faulkner, Bill Hemmer, Abby Hornacek, Lydia Hu, Laura Ingraham, Johnny Joey Jones, Lawrence Jones, Brian Kilmeade, Martha MacCallum, Dana Perino, Judge Jeanine Pirro, Jesse Watters and more will make appearances throughout the night and serve as presenters.

Throughout the evening, heroes will be honored in a number of categories, including the T2T Stephen Siller Back the Blue Award, FOX Weather Ultimate Patriot Award, FOX Nation Award for Service to Veterans, FOX Nation Salute to Service Award, FOX Nation Young Patriot Award, FOX Nation Culture Warrior Award, FOX Nation Award for Bravery and FOX Nation Award for Courage.

Leading up to the event FNC’s The Five (5-6 PM/ET) and FOX & Friends (6-9 AM/ET) will present live audience shows from the venue and attendees will have the opportunity to meet and greet the network’s top personalities.

TopicPulse® Redesigns 'What Next' For Content, Audience Engagement

Futuri, the global leader in AI-powered broadcast solutions for media, announces its substantial redesign of TopicPulse, a real-time content intelligence solution used by thousands of broadcast brands. The core purpose of TopicPulse is to inform content creators, broadcasters, and digital publishers about which content their audiences are engaging with right now. It serves as a customized guide to help stations create the most relevant content to engage and grow their audiences across their most critical platforms.

In a media landscape where news is readily accessible, TopicPulse stands apart by providing real-time, actionable insights. Users can identify trending stories in local markets, uncover unique story angles that haven’t been covered, know what viewers will care about next and see what competitors are covering—all with a core focus on informing broadcasters about the content their audiences are engaging with right now.

Key benefits: 

• Decide what content is best to run on-air, on your website, and on social media channels to keep your listeners tuning in and engaging with your station.
• Create custom content categories, called "smart pulses," to track story engagement in categories that are most important to your audience.
• Know the angles of a story that have been covered and, importantly, the angles that have not been covered, to identify and post fresh, uncovered content.
• Track activity in select Facebook groups with our “Community Radar” feature without leaving the TopicPulse ecosystem.
• TopicPulse scans X/Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and 250,000 news sources in real time to select the right stories to cover at the right time, ensuring they resonate with your local audience and target demographic.

“I want to thank our customers for being so instructive on the redesign and vocal about the features that matter most to them,” said Jay O’Connor, President, TopicPulse. “Our team has worked hard to deliver on those customer requests with an emphasis on the main reason customers come to TopicPulse: to find out precisely what stories their audiences are most engaged with right now.

Radio History: Nov 20

➦In 1907...actress Fran Allison was born in Iowa. She played the folksy tale-telling Aunt Fanny for decades on ABC radio’s Don McNeill’s Breakfast Club.  On TV she was a co-star (with Burr Tillstrom & his puppets) on Kukla Fran & Ollie.

She died of bone marrow failure June 13 1989 at age 81.

➦In 1928…WGH-AM in Newport News, Virginia began signed-on.  The WGH call letters were not used from 9/1/83 to 12/10/84.

The earliest ancestor of WGH Radio was WPAB, granted a license by the Radio Division, Bureau of Navigation, United States Department of Commerce on December 4, 1926.  The licensee was the Radio Corporation of Virginia in Norfolk.  On December 6, 1926, WPAB signed on the air at 1040 kilocycles with a power of 100 watts.  WPAB later became WRCV and broadcast programming mostly of a religious nature.

In January 1927, the Radio Corporation of Virginia put another station on the air, WSEA, which transmitted on the frequency of 1370 kilocycles with a power of 500 watts.  In April 1927 WSEA began broadcasting from the brand new Cavalier Hotel in Virginia Beach but was dark by the middle of 1928, the Radio Corporation of Virginia having gone bankrupt.  WSEA, however, had one shining moment on June 10, 1927 when Norfolk Mayor S. Heth Tyler became the first American to extend coast to coast radio congratulations to aviator Charles Lindbergh after his successful solo flight from New York to Paris.  Lindbergh heard the message on WSEA as he was passing over the Cape Henry Lighthouse.

Tom Little moved the WSEA allocation to Newport News and changed the call letters to WNEW (signifying its new city of license, Newport News) on August 8, 1928.  Facilities were in the Tidewater Hotel at 2400 Washington Avenue in Newport News.  The studio was on the ground floor, directly behind the front desk and switchboard for the hotel, and the transmitter and antenna were on the top floor.  Shortly thereafter  a new licensee, Hampton Roads Broadcasting Company, changed the frequency  to 1430, and government authorization came through on October 8, 1928.

The WNEW calls lasted for only a few weeks, when they were changed to WGH ("World's Greatest Harbor").  It was also among the first 100 radio stations on the air in the United States.  By 1928, however, the station was gone and the available WGH call letters were requested by Hampton Roads Broadcasting.  An application to the Federal Radio Commission was approved on November 19 of that year and the station began identifying itself as "WGH" the next day.

In early 1959, a new era was ushered in with a switch to "Top-40" programming under the "Color Radio" banner.  Late 1950's performers included Jim Stanley, Jack Fisher, Lou Nelson, Dick Lamb, Jack Krueger, Frank Drake, Bob Calvert, Dean Collins (who went on to WPGC in Washington as Dean Griffith and later to New York as Dean Anthony, one of the WMCA "Good Guys"), Don Owens, Roger Clark, Bob Calvert's alter ego (and the inspiration for Wolfman Jack) "Baron Bebop", Throckmorton Quiff, and Gene Creasy.  Early newscasters included Ed Meyer, Dick Kidney, Pete Glazer, Bud Buhler and Art Merrill.

By 1960, the station was broadcasting at 5,000 watts from a non-directional daytime tower at the Newport News Small Boat Harbor, switching to the three-tower directional site in Hampton during the evening hours. Today, WGH operates with 20,000 watts by day and 5,000 watts at night.

➦In 1929… The radio program "The Rise of the Goldbergs," first aired with Gertrude Berg as Molly, was heard on the NBC Blue radio network. Later, the title would be shortened to The Goldbergs. Mrs. Berg, incidentally, wrote the first scripts for the 15-minute program and starred in the show — for $75 a week. The program continued until 1945 (it returned for one more radio season in 1949-1950).  The show also aired on TV first on CBS, then NBC, the Dumont Network, and syndication – between 1949 and 1956.

➦In 1940..The iHeartMedia FM station now known as WRVE in Albany NY has a much longer history as one of the nation's pioneering FM radio stations. A by-product of the station being owned by General Electric with similarly pioneering sisters WGY (AM) and WRGB (TV), WRVE traces its history to W2XDA Schenectady and W2XOY New Scotland, New York - two experimental frequency modulation transmitters on 48.5 MHz, which signed on in 1939. The two were merged into one station with the W2XOY call-letters on November 20, 1940 with the station then taking the W57A designation, and finally the long-running WGFM call-letters in the mid-1940s.

Opinion: There's A Problem With iHeartMedia Leadership

By Richard Wagoner | rwagoner@socalradiowaves.com

When two of your brightest stars leave your company, smart managers would reflect on why.

But we’re dealing with iHeart Media; and in my humble opinion, there is a definite lack of caring or programming intelligence at the very top. That is why they are in such dire financial straits and have been for at least 20 years.

Longtime KFI (640 AM) program director Robin Bertolucci resigned her positions — she also oversaw programming on KEIB (1150 AM) — on Friday, November 8th, the same day as her husband Don Martin left his position as general manager of KLAC (570 AM) and executive vice president of sports for iHeartMedia.

Reached for comment, Bertolucci said her resignation was not forced. “It was a breakup,” she called it. “Totally mutual. It was time.”

Asked what her plans were now, she said she’s going to relax. “I am just taking a minute to catch my breath and I’ll go from there.

“I am at peace. It was a good time to go, but leaving hurt. It was very hard to say goodbye,” she concluded. Bertolucci spent over 22 years programming the station, one of the most popular talk stations in the country and the highest-rated AM station in town — by far.

Christmas Cuts

The resignations came as cuts were rumored at iHeart, which owns 860 stations in 160 markets in the United States. Those rumored cuts — hundreds across the country — became a real thing by the following Monday. More than half the KFI news department was let go, including News Director Chris Little who was with the station for 33 years. My hunch — though no one will say it — is that Bertolucci and Martin didn’t want to stay around knowing the cuts were coming.

Some call the layoffs iHeart’s “Merry Christmas cuts.” I call them further proof that the company is unfit to hold a broadcast license. When you tear apart the very thing that made your station successful, you truly have no clue what you are doing.

“Not to be overly dramatic,” one industry observer told me. “But we appear to be witnessing a sad historic moment in the devaluation of local radio.”